by DAVID B. COE
“Is there anything else you can tell me?”
The man shook his head. “No, Chanc’lor. I think ’e wen’ right t’ ’is chamber. None o’ us saw ’im th’ res’ o’ th’ night.”
Stavel fumbled in the pocket of his robe, pulling free a five-qinde piece and offering it to the man.
“No, Chanc’lor,” he said, shaking his head a second time. “I’s jes’ doin’ my job.”
“Well, thank you,” Stavel said. “I’m grateful.”
The man nodded and left him, the click of his boots echoing loudly off the vaulted ceiling of the corridor. The chancellor stood there for several moments considering why Dusaan might need a sword. Could it be that he’d never had one? He came to the court of the emperor as a young man, and he’d never actually needed one during his tenure as high chancellor. It was possible, no matter how unlikely. At last, Stavel shook his head, as if rousing himself from a dream, and hurried on to Dusaan’s chamber.
He was the last to arrive, which was unusual, and his tardiness did not go unnoticed. Dusaan arched an eyebrow at him, and several of the older chancellors regarded him with open curiosity as he took a seat near the window.
The discussion began unremarkably and soon the older chancellors were immersed in yet another argument over how best to keep the pestilence from spreading beyond Pinthrel. Stavel, who usually would have been debating the matter with the rest of them, found it difficult to keep his mind fixed on what they were saying. Instead, his gaze wandered the chamber, and within moments he had spotted a sword-the sword? — sheathed on a belt that hung over a chair in the far corner. The hilt was gold, but rather plain, as was the leather scabbard. Still, once Stavel saw the weapon, his eyes kept returning to it, as if of their own volition. It might very well have been a new blade, though the sheath seemed worn and scuffed along its edges. But if it wasn’t a new sword, why would the high chancellor have gone to the city to get it?
“Chancellor?”
Dusaan’s voice cut through his thoughts, forcing him to look away from the weapon. The high chancellor was staring at him, frowning slightly, though there was amusement in his golden eyes, and something else as well, though Stavel couldn’t say for certain what it was. He seemed in a lighter mood this day, but that only served to give Stavel a somewhat queasy feeling.
“Yes, High Chancellor?”
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine.”
“It seems your mind is elsewhere.” Dusaan turned, glancing in the direction of the sword before looking Stavel in the eye once more. “Is something troubling you?”
“No, High Chancellor. Forgive me. I was … merely thinking of something else. I’ll do my best to keep my mind on the matters at hand.”
“Of course, Chancellor. We were just saying that with Braedon at war, and so many of the emperor’s men committed elsewhere, we would be better off leaving it to the army of Pinthrel to cope with the situation there. Wouldn’t you agree?”
“Indeed, I would.”
“Good.” Dusaan turned his attention back to the others, a brittle smile on his lips. “The emperor has also asked me to discuss with the rest of you his plans for the Emperor’s Day celebration, which, as you all know, comes at the beginning of the next turn.” Stavel and the others knew that Dusaan was putting a good face on bad circumstance. He hadn’t spoken with the emperor since their last confrontation. Harel sent messages to the high chancellor instructing him to raise certain matters with the other Qirsi, and Dusaan sent back reports of their discussions in written form. No one dared correct Dusaan on this point.
The Emperor’s Day festivities tended to be much the same from year to year. Planning for the affair usually fell to Harel’s wives and their courtiers, but the emperor always made a show of involving his Qirsi and Eandi advisors in the preparations. Clearly Dusaan had little patience for the task this year, but he dutifully led the discussion. For his part, Stavel forced himself to attend to the conversation, though he continually fought an urge to gaze once more at the sword.
When at last Dusaan ended their discussion, the midday bells were tolling in the city. The ministers and chancellors began to leave, Stavel with them.
“Wait a moment, won’t you, Chancellor?” Dusaan called.
Stavel turned, hoping that he would find the high chancellor looking at one of the others. Would that it had been so.
“Of course, High Chancellor,” he said, his hands starting to shake.
When the other Qirsi had all gone, Dusaan gestured at the chair next to his. “Please sit.”
Stavel lowered himself into the chair, feeling as though the tip of that damned sword were pressed against his back.
“I wanted to make certain that you were all right, Stavel. I’ve never seen you so distracted.”
“I assure you, High Chancellor, I’m fine.”
“So you said before. Yet I find myself wondering what it is about my sword that would interest you so.”
Stavel felt as though there were a hand at his throat. The high chancellor hadn’t moved.
“Your sword, High Chancellor?” he asked, trying with little success to sound puzzled, or unconcerned, or anything else other than panicked.
“You’ve spent the better part of the morning staring at it.”
“Have I?”
Dusaan eyed him briefly, then rose, crossed the chamber, and retrieved the weapon from the chair on which it sat. Walking back toward Stavel, he pulled it from its sheath, appearing to examine the blade. The chancellor half expected Dusaan to run him through right there, but the man merely held out the sword to him, hilt first.
“There’s really nothing extraordinary about it,” the high chancellor said, as Stavel took it from him. “It’s a simple weapon. I’ve had it for years.”
Stavel looked up. “For years, you say?”
A strange smile alighted on the high chancellor’s lips and was gone. “Does that surprise you?”
“No, of course not. Why should it?”
“A good question, Stavel. Why?”
“As I said, it didn’t surprise me at all.”
“I’m not certain that I believe you. This is hardly the time for a Qirsi to tell lies, Stavel, particularly to another Qirsi.” Dusaan’s tone was light, but there could be no mistaking the warning in his words.
Stavel gave a small shrug, sensing that he was far out of his depth. “I heard that you had a new sword, that’s all.”
The smile returned. “Really? Where did you hear that?”
Too late, the chancellor realized that Dusaan had taken him just where he didn’t wish to go. His mouth had gone dry and that hand at his throat seemed to be tightening slowly. “I … I don’t recall. I must have heard the guards speaking of it.”
“How strange. The weapon’s been with a swordmaker in Curtell City for nearly four turns now. I only just retrieved it last night.”
“But how could-?” Stavel stopped himself, the blood draining from his cheeks. “How could the guards have known then?”
This time Dusaan grinned broadly. It almost seemed that he knew what Stavel had intended to say. But how could you have taken it to the city when no one saw you leave the palace? “I don’t know. I suppose the emperor’s men have ways of learning such things.”
“Yes,” Stavel said, the word coming out as barely more than a whisper. “That must be it.”
They sat in silence for a moment, their eyes locked. Dusaan appeared amused again, though there was a predatory look in those bright yellow eyes.
“Well, Chancellor,” he said, “I’m glad to know that you’re well. You can go.”
Stavel nearly jumped out of his chair, so eager was he to be away from the man. “Yes, High Chancellor. Thank you.” He hurried to the door, then forced himself to stop and bow to Dusaan. “Until tomorrow, then.”
Dusaan gave a small nod. “Until tomorrow.”
A moment later he was in the corridor. The air felt cooler, tasted sweeter. He felt as
though he had escaped a dungeon. Except that he knew better. Through circumstance, or ill fortune, or just plain carelessness, he now found himself caught between the emperor and Dusaan. If he didn’t extricate himself quickly, he would be crushed, like an innocent trapped between advancing armies.
* * *
It had been the last remaining obstacle. After his humiliating encounter with the emperor-he could still smell the muslin hood, dampened by his breath and his sweat-he had determined that there was nothing more to be gained by waiting. Tihod jal Brossa, the Qirsi merchant who had arranged payments of gold to the Weaver’s servants, was dead. Even if Tihod still lived and his network of couriers remained at the movement’s disposal, Harel had taken the fee accountings from Dusaan, placing them under the authority of his master of arms. The high chancellor no longer had access to the emperor’s gold, which meant that he no longer had any reason to debase himself before the fat fool.
All that kept Dusaan from beginning immediately to set in motion the next part of his plan was his suspicion that Harel had one or more of his Qirsi working as spies within the palace. Until Dusaan had identified the emperor’s agent, or agents, he couldn’t risk revealing himself.
He had suspected Stavel jal Miraad from the start. From what Nitara told him just after Kayiv’s death, he knew that Stavel had worked with the young minister in his efforts to turn the other Qirsi against Dusaan. At first the high chancellor had been skeptical of this, not because he thought Stavel was loyal to him, but because he didn’t think the old man courageous enough to involve himself in matters of this sort. But when Gorlan jal Aviarre, who had wisely chosen to ally himself with Dusaan’s movement, confirmed all that Nitara had told him, the Weaver had no choice but to believe it.
Still, the emperor could not have known any of this, and while Dusaan saw the old chancellor as the natural choice to act as Harel’s spy, the emperor might have had someone else in mind. Though certain that he was being watched, that one of his fellow Qirsi had been asking questions about him, he couldn’t be sure which of them had betrayed him. Hence the sword.
It hadn’t really been with the cutler for four turns. Dusaan had taken his blade to the city only a few days before, departing the palace and returning through a sally port on the western side, taking great care not to be seen by any of the guards. It was a simple ruse, one that might not have ensnared someone more adept at court intrigue. That Dusaan’s trap worked so well was less a reflection of his own cunning than a testament to Stavel’s shortcomings as a spy.
What mattered was that Stavel was the emperor’s man. Dusaan was certain of that now. Which meant that the time to reveal himself was finally at hand. Through years of careful planning, of meticulously laying the foundation for his coming war, he had remained patient, knowing that eventually he would be rewarded. He would wait no longer. A new day was dawning, and with it a new age for the Forelands. The anticipation of his victory, after so very long, nearly overwhelmed him. He would have liked to go to Harel that very moment and show the fat fool just how powerful he was. But though everything was in place, he still needed to proceed with some caution. Harel might be a fool, easily turned to Dusaan’s purposes and far weaker than he thought himself, but he was not without his resources.
Only a few moments after Stavel left him, looking like a frightened rabbit, there came a knock at his door. Gorlan and Nitara.
“Enter,” he called.
They came in together, but quickly separated, Gorlan taking a seat near the window, Nitara sitting beside the high chancellor. It seemed that his hope of fostering a love affair between them, one that would make her forget her desire for him, had been in vain. A pity: her expressions of affection were becoming more and more distracting.
“What have you learned?” he asked, looking from one of them to the other.
“I believe all of the ministers will join with you,” Nitara answered, eyeing Gorlan as she spoke. “And perhaps one or two of the chancellors.”
“And the rest?”
“I’m not certain what they’ll do. They’ve served the emperor for so long they’ve forgotten what it is to be Qirsi.”
She said it to please him, he knew, because she thought it sounded like something he might say.
“What do you think?” Dusaan asked, looking past Nitara to Gorlan.
He had chosen to join the movement, just as the Weaver had known he would. The alternative had been death, or a desperate attempt to flee Curtell. Gorlan wasn’t the type to choose martyrdom, and he was too wise to think that he might actually escape. What impressed Dusaan, however, was the fervor with which he had embraced the Qirsi cause as his own. It was hard to tell if the minister had considered the possibility of joining the movement prior to that day when Dusaan offered him the opportunity to do so. But once presented with the choice, he committed himself fully to its success. Dusaan would have known if the man was feigning his enthusiasm-such was the power of a Weaver. It almost seemed that having opened his eyes at last to the suffering his people endured under Eandi rule of the Forelands, Gorlan could hardly stand to look upon what he saw. He was everything Dusaan had once hoped Kayiv would be, and more. Intelligent, passionate, but controlled, and above all, honest with his opinions and insights, even when he knew that they were at odds with what Dusaan wanted to hear.
“I’m a bit less certain about the ministers than is Nitara. B’Serre and Rov will probably pledge themselves to the movement. I don’t know about the others. And I have little sense of what the chancellors will do.”
“What do you think it would take to convince those who are less willing to join us?”
Gorlan shook his head. “I really don’t know.”
“Do you think telling them of the Weaver would help?”
“It might.”
“What if they were to learn that I was that Weaver?”
Dusaan heard Nitara give a small gasp, but he kept his eyes fixed on the other minister. Gorlan was staring at him, looking awed and just a bit frightened.
“You’re the Weaver?”
“I am.”
“I’m not certain that I believe you.” There was no disrespect in his tone. Just disbelief.
Dusaan smiled. He had concealed his powers for so long. He would enjoy proving to this man what he was. “Raise a wind,” he said.
“What?”
“I want you to summon a wind, right here in this chamber.”
Gorlan regarded him briefly, then gave a small shrug and closed his eyes. A moment later the air in the chamber began to stir. In a few seconds a gale was howling, blowing scrolls onto the floor and making Dusaan’s hair dance.
“Good,” the Weaver said. “Don’t stop.”
He reached for his own power, and joining it to Gorlan’s strengthened the wind as only a Weaver could. Two of the empty chairs toppled. His sword, still sheathed, fell to the floor. The shutters on his window clattered loudly, until it seemed that they would splinter.
Gorlan’s eyes flew open. “Demons and fire!”
“You believe me now?”
The wind died down, and a broad smile broke over the man’s face. “Forgive me for doubting you, Weaver.”
“You needn’t apologize.”
“The others will join you,” he said, still grinning. “I’m certain of it. How could they not?”
“I hope you’re right. If I reveal to them the true extent of my powers, and they still refuse to pledge themselves to our movement, I’ll have no choice but to kill them.”
“If you tell them that you’re a Weaver,” Nitara said, “and they still refuse you, they deserve to die.”
Gorlan nodded. “I have to agree.”
“You both have served me well, and I know that you’ll continue to do so. For now, though, speak to no one of this. I’ve one more thing to do before I can tell the others who and what I am. Do you understand?”
They both stood and bowed to him.
“Yes, Weaver,” Nitara said.
O
nce they had left his chamber, Dusaan stood and began to pace. Now that his time had come, he was eager to act, to put an end to the Eandi courts and begin his reign as ruler of the Forelands. But once more, he had to wait until nightfall so that he might speak with those throughout the land who served him. One last time, the sun would set over the Western Sea with the Curtell Dynasty ruling Braedon. When morning came Dusaan would begin to reap the rewards for which he had waited so long. There was no one in all the Forelands who could stop him.
Chapter Four
How could a single night take so long to pass? Even with all Dusaan had to do before dawn, it seemed to him that the moons took days to turn their broad arcs across the darkened sky. He had waited years to begin his war in earnest, he had dreamed of doing so since before his Fating. Patience had long been his greatest weapon. But on this final night, his anticipation got the better of him.
He barely touched his evening meal, which a servant brought to his chamber at twilight and removed several hours later. He paced, he sat by his window staring up at the stars, and he waited for the tolling of the midnight bells, his mind churning, his heart pounding so loudly that he thought everyone in the palace must hear it.
When at last he heard the bells, he wasted no time. Closing his eyes, he began to reach across the Scabbard and the Strait of Wantrae for his chancellors, his most trusted and most powerful servants. He found Jastanne ja Triln aboard her ship, the White Erne, just off the Galdasten shore, within sight of the warships of Braedon, Eibithar, and Wethyrn. As always, she was naked, her body offered to him as a gift. And, again as always, he sensed her ambition, her daring, and her keen intelligence.
Abeni ja Krenta, archminister in the court of Sanbira’s queen, proved more difficult to locate. He had expected to find her in Yserne, but she was riding with the queen and a force of nearly eight hundred men. They were two days out from Brugaosa, just across the border into Caerisse, and pushing hard toward northern Eibithar. Dusaan was pleased; he had feared that she might not reach the northern kingdom in time. Of all his servants, she might have been the most valuable. As brilliant as Jastanne and as passionate in her commitment to the movement, Abeni was somewhat older, and with that age came a wisdom and calm that the young merchant lacked.
