The Living Throne (The War of Memory Cycle Book 3)

by H. Anthe Davis

  A movement behind her: a white-armored guard turning the far corner.

  Enkhaelen's hand rose, limned in blue-black energy, and Geraad knew he was going to kill her. Instinctively he grabbed for the necromancer's shoulder. His fingers passed through an envelope of frigid air to one of heat before striking and activating a ward. As his grip slid off, he braced himself for death—his own or the girl's.

  But Enkhaelen stopped, and cut a sharp look at Geraad. The girl had turned around and was backing toward them, the guard approaching methodically, almost mechanically. They were nearly out of room.

  “She's a proto-mentalist,” Geraad blurted. “Claim her for the Inquisition.”

  Enkhaelen's scarred right brow arched, and Geraad felt his resignation mutate into gleeful spite. Looking forward, he snapped, “Halt in the name of me.”

  The girl made a quizzical sound but the guard stopped in his tracks, featureless helm turning to regard the necromancer. Striding forward, Enkhaelen gestured to the girl and said, “As per the agreement between the Silent Circle and the Risen Phoenix Emperor, I claim this one for training. Surrender her to me and get back to your post.”

  For a moment, the guard stood rigid, and Geraad had the dim sense that he was listening to something. Then he gave a nod and turned around, utterly indifferent to his defeat.

  “Now, girl,” Enkhaelen started, but the girl brushed past him and started running again.

  Geraad gawped after her, too startled to grab, but before she was a yard past him he felt a cold thread whip by. Her surprise and fear slapped him as she collapsed, legs locked.

  “Iskaen. You advocated for her. Get her under control,” said Enkhaelen.

  Geraad looked from the necromancer to the girl, now wiggling on the floor and cursing as her legs refused to work. “I'm not— I don't know how to handle children!”

  The necromancer stared at him.

  Hurriedly, Geraad moved to the girl's side. “Calm, calm,” he said, projecting peace toward the furnace of her mind.

  “Let me go!” she shrieked.

  “You asked for help. We're trying to give it.” He was loath to touch her, loath to push the empathy further. The first rule of mentalism was the avoidance of direct emotional alteration; subtle influence was acceptable, but the use of force could injure both subject and mage.

  And she was dangerous. Close now, he saw her mind coiled like a spring: not a strong talent, but compressed so tight with hate and terror that it was just a matter of time before she broke her shell in a wave of psychic shrapnel.

  This was why the Inquisition had been formed. Not to police minds, but to find the proto-mentalists hidden in the general population—those rare, spontaneous talents that could wipe out entire communities if left unidentified. Geraad had been detected young, sent to Valent young, long before the psychic pressure could get to him. This girl was not the oldest proto-mentalist he had seen, but certainly the most pent-up.

  “It will be all right. We'll get you out of here,” he tried.

  “No you won't, you liar! Pervert! Creep! Stay away from me!”

  “Calm, girl,” he said, then realized he was projecting his nerves onto her. The last thing he needed was to get into a feedback loop with an explosive type. Sitting back, he took a deep breath and tried again. “We're here for a...a meeting and if you want to leave with us, you need to settle down and follow along like an attendant. Would that work, er...Archmagus?”

  Enkhaelen had his back turned, watching the way the guard had gone. “Call me 'master'. But yes. Mouth shut, eyes down, hands to yourselves. Both of you.”

  The honorific tasted sour on his tongue, but he mumbled it nevertheless. To the girl, he said, “You belong to the Inquisition now. You'll be fed, housed, educated like all mentalists, but in return you must obey the rules of the—“

  She spat in his face. Behind him, he heard a snort, and felt a curl of amusement from the pillar of impatience that was his 'master'.

  Wiping his cheek, he considered a response—then reluctantly acknowledged the fear under the veneer of fury. He had been in those black depths before, choked by their sickening helplessness. “Master, please release whatever you've done,” he said, and rose.

  Enkhaelen scoffed, but the fine chilly thread dissipated and the girl twitched, then rolled over and pushed up on her elbows. Her dark eyes still seethed, but when he offered his hands, she let him pull her up and did not fight when he took her by the arm.

  “Are we done, children?” said Enkhaelen.

  “Yes.” I hope so.

  “Then onward.”

  And so they walked, with Geraad keeping his grip on the girl lest she try to flee and the girl striding along with chin high as if he attended her. The festering anger ebbed as they retraced her steps, and as fear swelled in its place, he tried projecting calm again. It was easier now, but she soaked it up without impact, and her own emotions curdled his stomach.

  On impulse, he tried thinking at her. Proto-mentalists were often unreceptive, having instinctively built walls to block out others, but she seemed raw. 'Head bowed, eyes down like the master said,' he tried. 'I'm not sure who we're meeting, but they surely outrank us.'

  She shot him a startled look, and he felt her try to think back at him: a murky, muddled attempt at a question. Guessing it, he thought, 'My name is Geraad Iskaen, and the man leading us is Inquisitor Archmagus Enkhaelen. He'll honor this deal, but for now we both need to blend in with the background.'

  Truthfully he was all but sure. Enkhaelen might sling them both onto the mortuary slabs once they returned to his lair, or else hand them over to the authorities here. But there was no way to escape; he couldn't even call Sanctuary, not with the teleport-blocks that cloaked this place. He had to follow.

  Another muffled attempt at a response. Geraad smiled reassuringly. It had been a long time since he'd communicated with a fresh mind, but he knew it was a skill honed by use. She would get there eventually.

  He just hoped she wouldn't try anything stupid first.

  How long they walked, Geraad could not tell. At last, the corridor widened into an entry hall, huge double doors standing open to a radiant chamber beyond. He focused past the girl's anxiety and sensed other minds within, and felt the sudden touch of other mentalists' probes.

  All he could see was a shifting sea of white-on-white until Enkhaelen strode into it, breaching the throng like a black ship. In the ripples of his passage, Geraad glimpsed faces as disembodied as the girl's had been in the hallway: white-hooded and white-robed people turning to look at the interlopers, their skin the only color in this bleached room, their movement creating a sense of motion without form.

  Swallowing hard, Geraad crossed the threshold—and nearly crumpled as a wave of awe and fervor crashed over him. His shields wavered beneath the force of what felt like thousands of people in the throes of religious rapture. Then the pinprick probes of those unseen mentalists drilled at him, and he forced himself to raise stronger shields, to get his senses under control. It took all that he had, but finally the crowd's joy receded to a background murmur.

  Only then did he notice the girl hanging from his arm, eyes glazed, face slack and overwhelmed. He forced his shields out to embrace her, thickening them until she blinked and struggled upright. Revulsion etched her features as she stared around at the pilgrims.

  Geraad looked ahead to find Enkhaelen yards away, the path he had broken still clear. Dragging the girl in pursuit, he quick-stepped until the necromancer was close enough to touch, and only then spared a glance for the chamber. Hard to see, it gave the impression of breadth and high ceilings, flanks covered in great doors, a far end small in the distance and a near end rising like a terrace to—

  The Imperial Throne. The Emperor.

  Eyes that glowed like searchlights swung toward Geraad and he immediately dropped his gaze, giving the girl a psychic yank to do the same. That kind of force was barely legal for a civilian mentalist, yet he knew by instinct that meeting
the Emperor's gaze would be foolhardy—if not fatal—and she was his responsibility now. He felt her dizziness and confusion like an echo in his skull, and firmed his grip on her arm to steer her after Enkhaelen's black robe.

  His mind ticked over the details he had glimpsed. The Emperor: genially handsome, perhaps late-middle aged but showing little wear, in a plain robe and golden circlet, his fine pale hair and short beard kept neat. His eyes, those lambent circles...

  But there was something else, something beyond his appearance. Not the psychic absence or attenuation of Enkhaelen, nor the inscrutability of a well-shielded mentalist, but a strange sense of presence without thought, without emotion. Despite the smile-lines around his mouth and the corners of his eyelids, the Emperor did not project anything.

  Beside him, on a lesser throne, was a woman. Geraad could barely sense her—a shadow of a person. The Empress?

  And then he could not sense her at all, for as they neared the foot of the dais, Enkhaelen's hatred swelled around them like a smoky fire. Though still detached from the position of his body, it was not nearly as distant as before, and it held back the intense ambient worship of the crowd like a lantern against darkness.

  Listen, he had said, but it was impossible to perceive past his hate.

  Then suddenly it was gone—squelched to a background glow of contempt as a figure stepped between Enkhaelen and the dais. The worship surged into its place, and Geraad blocked it out firmly.

  “Enkhaelen, what is this?” said the interloper, voice strained.

  “An escapee. And good morning to you too, Kelturin. How are the legs?”

  “Working. Thank you.” The words came tightly clipped, and Geraad peeked up past Enkhaelen's shoulder to the speaker. He was a tawny man in the armor of the Palace guard but it looked different on him, less form-fitting, and the helm in his hand had a proper visor. His strong jaw was tensed, his eyes dark-ringed despite the illusion pendant that gleamed at his throat. The huge leather-wrapped hilt of a greatsword protruded over his shoulder, its strap dividing the matte whiteness of his armor like a wound.

  “And everything else?” Enkhaelen said lightly.

  “I haven't tried. What in pikes are you playing at, bringing these—“

  “New assistants. Surely I'm allowed.”

  Subtle emotions crossed the tawny man's face, and Geraad cursed his shields for making them inscrutable. At any other time, he would have listened in, but doing so now would be like trying to catch a melody in an avalanche. He had no desire to go empathically deaf.

  Instead, he lowered his thought-specific shields just enough to check the people around him. With empathy locked down, the throne room was much calmer, the mob of robed petitioners just a faint hum of adoration and Light-beautiful-Light. Only a few minds stood out in contrast.

  The tawny man—Crown Prince Kelturin, apparently.

  The Empress on the dais, distinctly fractured.

  Five agitated petitioners thinking variations on fight, flight, and oh no Izelina.

  Three mentalists under heavy shields.

  The strangeness of the Emperor.

  And Enkhaelen. Without the miasma of his mood as concealment, his thoughts skipped around erratically, fast and technical—diagrams, equations, phrases and shorthand reeling by like someone flipping through a torn-up textbook. Listening in were all three Palace mentalists.

  Surprised, Geraad stared at the back of Enkhaelen's head as he and the Crown Prince continued their curt, oblique discussion. He sensed a shallow eavesdropping on the unshielded prince but nothing on the other minds. That the Emperor would have his mentalists so closely monitor his third-in-command showed a remarkable lack of trust.

  What that meant for him and the girl, as Enkhaelen's hangers-on, was unclear. He felt the other mentalists prodding at his shields but only lightly; he could resist just fine while sending out probes of his own. The bulk of their attention was fixed on Enkhaelen, though what they were gleaning from his random flashes of numbers and anatomical sketches, Geraad could not guess.

  “Enough.”

  The calm, clear voice cut through the bickering, and Geraad barely stopped himself and the girl from looking toward it. Peripherally he saw the Crown Prince turn to face his father with plated arms crossed.

  “Shaidaxi, I did not call you here,” the Emperor continued, sounding not angry but curious, speculative. “You know that you are no longer required to oversee conversion.”

  “Apparently I should be,” said Enkhaelen, “since you seem intent on ruining everything.”

  “Is that so?”

  “I told you the parameters for the procedure. No god-touched, no pregnant women, no sub-adults. They disrupt the entire process. And here I see two of the three.”

  “I am unconvinced of the need for your 'parameters'.”

  “Uncon—“ Enkhaelen exhaled harshly and dragged a gloved hand across his face. “Emperor, I shaped this. I know how it works. You remember the rejection issues we had with the first batch of lagalaina? Pregnancy. The malformed ahergriin? Children in the mix. The complete failure of the attempt on the Trifolders?”

  “As I recall, the issue with the lagalaina led you to create your first bodythief.”

  “That was a fortunate accident and immaterial to this discussion. These converts you've selected will ruin the templates if you put them through. You know this; we've been over it a thousand times. Why would you not consult me first?”

  Amusedly—almost warmly—the Emperor said, “Rackmar wanted it to be a surprise. Alas, it seems someone has spoiled it.”

  There was a moment of silence in which Crown Prince Kelturin's thoughts declared: And I'd do it again. Then the prince said out loud, “I remember Enkhaelen's instructions even if no one else does.”

  “What is he trying to achieve here?” said Enkhaelen.

  The Emperor sighed. “As he expressed to me, he wants certain of these petitioners—including that girl—to be converted in secret so that he can use them against your little pawn. It is within the rules to act behind each other's backs.”

  Rules? Geraad thought.

  Enkhaelen made a sound of exasperation. “You can't be serious. You know there's only a ten-percent success rate without preparation. If he wants to have specific people converted, I need to do it by hand.”

  “I did mention that. He said he preferred secrecy to success.”

  “Piking wasteful.” Enkhaelen looked over the crowd. “Which ones are they?”

  “Just a moment. I shall put the rest out of the way.”

  Geraad dared a glance at the Emperor, puzzled, and saw him settle back in the throne as if making himself comfortable. His eyelids sank to half-mast as his attention turned inward.

  The mob of voices Geraad had been hearing since his arrival swelled into an eager chorus, and he realized suddenly that they were not around but under him. He looked down in confusion just as the floor began to flux with light, its substance roiling in nacreous waves beneath the solid film on which he stood. The handful of independent minds raised their own chorus—What is this, what's happening, oh no, oh Goddess—and a single bitter thought came from Enkhaelen: Showing off again.

  Then the floor unraveled into thick tendrils, and the petitioners cried out en masse—some in worship, some in surprise and fear—as they were ensnared and drawn down into the viscous glowing substance below. Geraad felt the girl's mind strain with horror and automatically pulled her close, clasping her head against his chest to hide the view. She clung to him as every white-robed man and woman he could see was pulled beneath the surface.

  If not for her, he might have run for a door. As it was, he could barely keep himself together. He saw now how the corridors could shift as they did, and why he kept sensing thoughts and feelings when no one was in sight. The Palace was alive, and caged its worshipers in its heaving, smothering depths.

  As the floor smoothed back to perfection, he looked around shakily. A few souls remained standing: two women clutchi
ng each other in terror with a little boy clinging to their robes; a burly, hirsute man in a crouch, every hair on him standing up; a pale-faced yet calm woman with her hand on his shoulder, speaking soothingly; Enkhaelen; the Crown Prince; and several observers on the outskirts in embroidered robes or white guard armor.

  “There. Now you have space to work,” said the Emperor.

  “My deepest thanks,” Enkhaelen replied caustically, then started toward the others. Geraad clamped down on his desire to grab the necromancer's arm and cling; as much as he feared the floor opening up again, he knew Enkhaelen would not react well.

  Instead he forced himself to separate from the girl and drag her along after Enkhaelen. Stepping out of their undisturbed circle was the most terrifying thing he had ever done; he could swear that the tiles beyond it felt softer, more malleable. Ready to sink.

  Closest was the pair of women, but as Enkhaelen approached them, the burly man slipped his keeper's calming hand and surged upright. Within two lunging steps he had gone into a full charge, his face bristling with fur, maw splitting wide to release a deafening roar, shoulders broadening with a crackle of joint and sinew.

  Enkhaelen halted. As the great bear reared over him, massive claws gleaming like sickles, he raised his left hand and clutched thin air, then wrenched it to the side. The bear froze in mid-swipe, an indescribable expression on his furry face, then keeled over in the direction of Enkhaelen's gesture and began spasming wildly.

  “Sogan!” said the pale-faced woman. She did not rush to his side but strode for Enkhaelen instead, and Geraad saw fire in her eyes. Literally. A reflection of a phantasmal hearth-flame floated in them, and as she drew closer Geraad felt the heat rolling off of her.

  Enkhaelen did not move, hand still curled into a claw aimed at the bear. “Priestess,” he said. “Or...ah, Mother Matriarch.”

  “Yes. Mother Matriarch Vriene Damiel of Turo,” she said, lips curled with revulsion. Even with the flames in her eyes, she was a lovely woman, her hair long and black and smooth with only a few threads of white, her face aristocratic, figure shapely beneath the indifferent drape of the robe. But her stare could have burned holes in steel, and Geraad knew that if it was turned on him he would be on his knees begging forgiveness.