Crown Thief ttoted-2

by David Tallerman

  With the show apparently over, at least for the moment, I turned my attention back to the marvels of Pasaeda.

  At the point we'd reached, a barricade of temples cut off the residential districts from the palace, just as in Altapasaeda. Though these were infinitely grander, their decoration was fundamentally the same. Festooned with flowers, perfumed with incense, hung with birdcages and strung together by arches, they formed an immense hive of worship that must have traversed an entire quarter of the city. Statues representing the gods loomed in every recess and burst forth from every prominence. Weird minglings of men and women with animals, birds and fish, which held the most unlikely things: a child's rattle here, a bucket or a three-pronged sword there. Some I recognised from Altapasaeda, many more were new to me; all were bizarre and terrifying.

  It was a relief when we eventually broke through to the district of the palace — at least until I got my first proper look at it. Nestled deep in the crook of the mountains, its monolithic grandeur was the final move in Pasaeda's game of architectural one-upmanship.

  The palace struck an unlikely compromise between splendour and defence. Somehow, it managed to be half plaster and glass confectionary, half unassailable fortress. In contrast to the rest of the city, it was also a riot of garish colour. Every window was stained glass, every roof a mosaic, every wall illuminated with bright curlicues or murals or clutters of interlocking geometry.

  It should have been chaotic — and it was. Yet it didn't seem to matter that nothing matched when every column and balustrade was a masterpiece in its own right. The palace crept — in layers of roof and archway and balcony, through endless juts of tower and spire and cupola — up the sheer face of the cliffs, like an ornate beetle clambering to safety.

  All told, it made the palace in Altapasaeda look like a dung-collector's cottage. I'd never wanted to steal anything so badly in my life.

  As we drew close, however, the fortress aspect of its character grew more apparent, and by the time we entered the palace grounds I felt more intimidated than impressed. We were ushered through a gatehouse in the outermost layer of defences, across a courtyard as big as many a Castovalian village, through another gatehouse, down a wide street bordered by tiers of exquisite garden, into yet another gatehouse in yet another set of walls into yet another courtyard — where Gailus left us, drifting off towards the stables with a jovial "Goodbye!" — and up a flight of marble stairs, through enormous double doors… until I found myself, at last, within the palace itself.

  By then, I'd had my fill of marvels. My head ached to match my feet, and I barely glanced at the colossal hall we'd ended up in. I chose to stare at the floor instead, which was mercifully plain, at least in comparison with everything else.

  It seemed too much to ask that someone would offer us lunch, or at least a cup of wine. Minutes passed, punctuated with low-whispered conversations between Ludovoco and the palace staff. Just as I was sure I'd topple over, he ushered us on towards a small, draped archway.

  Before we could pass through, however, a voice called, "There you are!"

  It was Gailus — and I couldn't escape the feeling that he'd been waiting for this moment, though I hadn't seen him. He trotted over at a leisurely pace, to Ludovoco's obvious frustration.

  "Off to the reception hall?" Gailus asked. "Why don't I take over from here?"

  Ludovoco tensed. "Take over?"

  "I'm a friend of young Alvantes's father, as you're no doubt aware. Since I agreed to hold my tongue on affairs of state, mightn't it be reasonable to ask for a minute to discuss affairs of family?"

  "Alvantes is in my custody," said Ludovoco.

  "He must pose quite a threat if you daren't leave him alone for even a minute."

  "Not so far as I know."

  "Or else be determined to escape?"

  "There are… protocols."

  "One minute, Commander, is all I ask. Your men can stay close to ensure our friend the guard-captain does nothing uncharacteristically treasonous."

  Ludovoco froze. It was clear he wasn't used to being talked to this way. I suspected a part of his brain was already busy plotting harsh reprisals.

  The rest of him, however, seemed paralysed by the unfamiliar prospect of conceding defeat. Eventually, he tipped his head. Without a word, he led us through the curtain, down one long corridor and another, and off into a much smaller room, which I took from its sparse furnishings to be some sort of antechamber.

  "Wait here," he told Alvantes. Gailus he carefully ignored. He motioned his men to one side of the room and disappeared through the drape that hung across the room's only other exit.

  Scowling at Ludovoco's men, Gailus beckoned Alvantes and me towards the farther corner. "With all due respect to the Crown Guard," he intoned loudly, "I'm sure your father would prefer his private affairs to stay that way." When we were as far away from our black-clad escorts as the space allowed, he dropped his voice and added, "We don't have long."

  In that moment, his manner was unrecognisable. Gone was the cheerful, buffoonish figure who'd ridden beside us through Pasaeda.

  "How is my father?" asked Alvantes. He seemed just as thrown by Gailus's changed tone as I was.

  "Anxious for news. He thought you might try to come here. One of our men on the walls was ordered to send signal if there was any sign of you."

  "Our men?"

  "The faction of which your father is a part — as I am also. He thought it would be more discreet if I met you in his place."

  "I don't know anything about factions," Alvantes said, sounding unexpectedly defensive. "I've come here in service to the King."

  "We're all in service to the King. But lately, it grows harder to know how best to serve. His Highness feels himself assailed by enemies… and not without reason. The reports of Moaradrid's death have done nothing but fan the flames in the far north."

  "I heard such talk in Aspira Nero."

  "No doubt. The Bastard Prince. A joke that has long since ceased to be funny."

  There was that name again. What was going on in the far north that had everyone so nervous? As far as I knew, Moaradrid's rebellion had begun with him. I'd assumed until now that it had ended in much the same way.

  Any last hint of levity left Gailus's voice as he asked, "Are the rumours true? About Prince Panchetto?"

  Alvantes looked uncomfortable. "The news I have should reach the King's ear before any other."

  Gailus nodded. "Then they are. Your commitment to duty does you credit, Lunto — but be careful. Enduring so much has made His Highness… unpredictable."

  It was obvious he had more to say, but Ludovoco chose that moment to reappear from behind the door hanging. He looked at Gailus and Alvantes with unconcealed suspicion, and to Alvantes said, "Go through. His Highness will arrive shortly."

  "Well… your father will be glad to hear you're well," said Gailus. He'd unblinkingly resumed his previous character, with the ease of someone pulling on a favourite overgarment. "Pass on my regards to the King, won't you?"

  Alvantes replied to Gailus with a short bow, which he noticeably failed to extend to Ludovoco. Then Alvantes led the way through the narrow doorway Ludovoco had left and returned by, and I followed close on his heels.

  The room beyond was large and hexagonal, built around a raised stage at its centre that echoed its shape. Opposite where we'd entered, a throne of elaborately engraved, gold-inlaid wood perched on a stepped dais twice the height of the platform. Along the other five walls, high-backed benches were arrayed. There was ample space for a hundred people, so seating a mere dozen men and a couple of elderly women left them conspicuously empty. All of those present were finely dressed, at least, more than enough so to show up our own travel-stained garb.

  Alvantes took a seat on the bench to our left, and I sat beside him. As though our arrival were a signal, discordant pipe music blared immediately from behind another drape in the wall to the left of the throne. I couldn't help noticing how the three men waiting nea
rby jerked to their feet and edged away.

  The music died abruptly. The curtain swept back. In the space beyond was nothing but darkness.

  Then two figures danced out with rapid steps and leaped onto the stage. They wore long, open robes over loose shirts and trousers. Alarmingly, their faces were covered with cloth masks, blank apart from narrow slits for eyes and mouth. Masks and clothing both were patterned with interlocking diamonds, black and white endlessly alternating. Any two diamonds appeared identical, yet together the effect was chaotic, seeming to shift whether the pair moved or not. Worse, their costumes were contrastingly chequered, as though each was a distorted reflection of the other. Between their disguises and the bagginess of their clothing, it was impossible even to guess at their sex.

  I knew I'd never seen them before, or anyone remotely like them. Yet I couldn't escape a sense of familiarity. The sight as they took up opposite places on the stage, the rippling, ever-shifting black and white, the inhumanly blank masks and a certain too-quick, almost insect quality in their movements all made my skin want to crawl off my bones.

  I didn't feel any better when they each pulled fanned handfuls of knives from the recesses of their cloaks.

  What followed was indescribable, even as I watched it. It possessed qualities of a juggling act, an acrobatic display and a sadistic fight to the death, all in apparently random combination. Knives flashed through the air, were caught — with hands, feet, occasionally teeth — and ricocheted back, in a blur of blades and limbs that was impossible to follow, let alone make sense of.

  I had no idea how long it went on for. It felt like hours. When they stopped — when they finally stopped — I let out a long-held, shuddering breath, and realised my forehead was slick with cold sweat. I'd sat paralysed through the performance. Now, every muscle ached with the exertion of stillness.

  I didn't think I'd ever been as relieved as I was when they closed with a jagged bow and scuttled off the stage, back into the waiting darkness behind their curtain.

  I tried to speak, managed a muffled squeak. With a struggle, I calmed myself enough to form actual words. "What — who — what was that?"

  "They call themselves Stick and Stone," murmured Alvantes. "Rumour has it, they're brothers. They're the King's favourite entertainers."

  "That's funny. I feel the exact opposite of entertained."

  If it was possible, Alvantes's voice sank even lower. "Rumour also has it they've been known to operate in other capacities."

  Then I understood why they'd seemed familiar. The way they'd moved — it had reminded me of Synza. It was the absolute, incontestable confidence of men who could kill without qualm or effort. I said, "Someone has a funny idea of keeping us amused."

  "Perhaps."

  "You think it was some sort of warning?"

  "I think someone doesn't want me here. Or else wants me here for reasons I wouldn't like."

  "Alvantes, why do I get the feeling none of this is going how you intended?"

  His mouth turned up slightly, in a smile that went nowhere near his eyes. "You know what they say, Damasco. If you want to make the gods laugh…"

  "What? Tickle their feet? Let them win at cards? Given the state of their creation, I'd think the difficulty was getting them to take something seriously once in a while."

  "You tell them your plans," he replied.

  A fanfare of trumpets sounded from somewhere invisible — and Alvantes's faint smile vanished. Everyone, Alvantes included, slid from his or her seat and onto the floor, where they kneeled with heads hung low. I followed their example — just too late for the King's entrance, so that his first impression of me was my falling face first into the clumsiest grovel imaginable.

  For the instant it took my head to smack the tiled floor, I got a clear view of him. He arrived from the right of the throne, flanked by four black-robed guards. I wasn't the least surprised to see Ludovoco amongst their number.

  King Panchessa was recognisable as Panchetto's father — but barely. The same features were there, the bulbous nose and broad lips, the piggy, jewel-like eyes. However, the softness that had defined his son was entirely absent; what had been fat in the son was bulk in the father. Panchessa was imposing, despite his age. It was as if those indulgences that had kept Panchetto a plump, extravagant child had turned inward, been focused into something altogether less pleasant. I couldn't guess what was going on behind those gimlet eyes, but it was hard to imagine I'd like it.

  In fact, it was someone altogether other than Panchetto he put me in mind of. Someone who shared that impression of violent intensity, of darkness shifting beneath a still facade — someone who'd set my nerves on edge in exactly the same way.

  Strange as it was, Panchessa reminded me not of his son but of the man who'd murdered him.

  One of the guards stepped forward — though not so far as to place him in front of the King. With a look and a wave, he dismissed everyone else in the room, one by one. They appeared more resigned than annoyed, and I guessed this wasn't the first time they'd waited, only to be unceremoniously banished.

  When the chamber had emptied, the guard called to Alvantes, "Step forward."

  Alvantes raised his eyes, not enough to meet Panchessa's gaze. "Yes. Altapasaeda is in the hands of enemies. Northern soldiers, many of the families — perhaps under duress — and an alliance of criminals led by a man named Castilio Mounteban."

  Panchessa nodded, slowly and deliberately. "Then my son…" he asked, letting the question hang like a sword blade.

  "With the greatest sorrow and shame, I must tell Your Highness that Prince Panchetto is dead. He was killed by Moaradrid, in a cowardly and unprovoked attack."

  Panchessa's voice remained cold and level as black ice. "And Moaradrid?"

  "Dead as well. It was… an accident, of sorts."

  Panchessa reached out one hand to the throne, steadied himself just slightly. The four guards edged closer. He warned them away with his free hand.

  "My sons…"

  Or so I thought I'd heard, and the sentence hung tantalisingly unfinished. Surely he must have meant to say "son's". But his son's what? His son's body? Could he be asking about the crown?

  Then he drew himself erect, not looking at Alvantes. Abruptly, he turned to leave, and his entourage fell in around him. At the last moment, Ludovoco — who until then had played no part in proceedings — leaned to whisper something in his ear.

  The King stopped. With a gesture, he picked out two of his personal guard. Without turning, he motioned to where Alvantes still stood on the stage.

  "Take him to the dungeons," he said, "and cut his damned traitorous head from his body."

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  "Easie Damasco. I fear you fail to appreciate the severity of your situation. You are guilty of treason, despised in the eyes of men and gods alike. And tomorrow, your head shall be struck from your shoulders."

  "It isn't that I don't appreciate the severity," I said. "It's more that I don't see it as being significantly worse than any other day I've had lately."

  The Royal Inquisitor looked at me with struggling annoyance and disdain, as though I were an insect and he was trying to decide whether swatting me would justify the effort involved. "I'll ask one more time. Will you answer my questions sensibly? I can't promise clemency, but perhaps your honesty will be rewarded in another life."

  All I could manage was a weary sigh.

  If I'd learned one thing that afternoon, it was how underrated boredom was as a tool of interrogation. It was a constant struggle not to confess to something, anything, just to enliven the conversation. My questioning was well into its third hour, and it was fair to say that progress had not been quick.

  I looked to Alvantes for the hundredth time, desperate for some hint of affirmation. He was sat just as he'd been since our incarceration had begun, knees tucked to his chest, eyes focused on some distant point beyond the barred window. The fingers of his right hand played idly around the grubbily bandaged s
tump of his left arm. All told, he seemed to be taking imprisonment for treason even worse than I might have hoped.

  The Inquisitor tutted to draw back my attention and said, "Let's start from the beginning."

  I managed one word, which sounded to my own ears like, "Gfargh." Summoning what mental energy I had left, I tried to rephrase my complaint into something more like language. "We've started again five times now. Why won't you believe I'm telling the truth?"

  He rolled his eyes. "Because I strain to find one aspect of your story that's less than preposterous."

  "It is preposterous. That doesn't mean it didn't happen."

  "You really expect me to believe that you kidnapped a giant?"

  "Not kidnapped," I said. "Borrowed. Or, at any rate, liberated."

  "You kidnapped a giant from the insurgent Moaradrid. You stole the stone he was using to control this giant and others of his kind. Then you escaped…" The Inquisitor paused to make a great show of consulting his own notes. "By riding upon said giant."

  "Until he got tired. Then I liberated a horse instead."

  "And it was your theft of this so-called giant-stone that set about the chain of events which ended in Prince Panchetto's murder."

  "No! I mean, how am I supposed to know? Maybe if I hadn't taken the stone… if Moaradrid hadn't been a murderous lunatic…"

  Had my brain not caught up with my mouth just in time, I'd have added, if Panchetto hadn't had all the sense of a wet sponge. The truth was, every time we went over the events preceding Panchetto's death I found myself feeling a little more guilty; every time I narrated my role in the last hours of his life, I sounded more culpable. I was slowly being condemned by the power of suggestion.

  The Inquisitor frowned down his nose, apparently now trying to impress my guilt on me through sheer intensity of expression. "Maybe? Why can't you admit your iniquity?"