by Jay Lake
He sat amid a bed of ferns and looked toward the Rugmaker's Cupola. It rose atop Nannyback Hill, sheltering the Root Market and all the northern districts from the endless machinations of Limerock Palace syndics in their silk-walled offices.
"I cannot quit you," Imago said to his city. He patted the ferns and by extension the bones which slept beneath them.
Though he waited awhile, no answer came.
Eventually he tired of watching flowers grow. The Lord Mayor stood, waved to his guards. It was time to resume his duties.
Imago and his escorts arrived at the Costard Gate along Maldoror Street, at the south wall of the Limerock Palace. Enero had mustered an entire squad of Winter Boys for the Lord Mayor's escort. Marelle was present, with two clerks carrying armloads of cloth.
Formal robes, Imago realized, and a fresh cloak for him. His chamberlain was not going to allow him to enter the house of his enemies in ordinary street wear. He mouthed his thanks.
A crowd had gathered. Two-Thumbs, from Jason's warehouse. Men and women and dwarfs he recognized from the neighborhood around the Rugmaker's Cupola. Ducôte even, the old dwarf dressed in formal muslin wrappings and leaning on a cane as he whispered to a young dwarfess close by his side.
Imago slid off the pony to find that Marelle had pushed close.
"You won't have time to change," she said. "Put your arms up."
A robe was tugged over him and pulled down as if he were a child. Imago was about to object when he realized they'd done the deed surrounded by freeriders. No one could see much of him.
Marelle set his chain of office into place, and slipped the flat fur cap of the Lord Mayor's ancient regalia onto his head.
"Go, now, and force them to hear you." She pushed him gently away. The Winter Boys opened up, and Imago stepped before the Riverward Gate.
The way was blocked by six bailiffs with staffs and pistols. Imre stood at their head. A decent man, the Lord Mayor recalled, if a bit of a fool. He had been close to Serjeant Robichande.
"Well met," Imago said. "I offer my sorrow at the death of your serjeant."
Imre seemed surprised. "Hello, your right honor."
"I am here to speak before the Assemblage of Burgesses."
"Are you on the docket, sir?"
"No."
"Do you have a writ of summons?"
"Imre," Imago began, his voice lowering with frustration. He caught himself, tried to recapture the sense of peace he'd found at the Potter's Field. "You know who I am, what office I hold. The welfare of this city is my business, much as the Burgesses think otherwise. Do not conspire with them at pretending me away. I am here, with my people behind me." The live and the dead, he thought.
"I have been ordered not to admit private citizens."
"I am no private citizen. I am Lord Mayor Imago of Lockwood. You yourself called me right honorable just now."
Imre looked nervous. "In accordance with the Electoral Reformation and Civic Governance Act of seven Mars, anno 618 Imperator Terminus, your claim on that office has been voided. You are enjoined to hand over your keys and regalia."
"Let me in," Imago said, feeling less reasonable by the moment. "I will speak to the Assemblage. If they do not express a revision to their will afterward, I will surrender my keys and regalia to you." To his surprise, he realized that he meant that. "If they do heed me, all will be well." He jerked his head slightly, indicating the freeriders and the gathering crowd behind him. "These are not angry people, they are curious people. Perhaps you recall what happens when people grow angry in my name."
"Do you threaten riot?" Imre asked.
"I threaten nothing. I merely point out recent history." Imago stepped close, until his face nearly bumped Imre's chest. "Let me pass, or haul me away in chains. I shan't be going anywhere else this afternoon."
Imre retreated into his own line of men. Enero and the Winter Boys surged forward, followed by the chattering crowd. In a moment they were all inside the cobbled expanse of the South Garden.
This face of the Limerock Palace still showed scars from the fires of last winter. Even the stones remembered.
"Onward to the Assemblage!" he shouted.
A ragged cheer arose.
Attended by several hundred of his citizens, the Lord Mayor of the City Imperishable entered the South Doors of the Limerock Palace, intent on taking a stand before the rulers of his city's vanished empire.
Imago followed a mass of retreating retainers down a wide hall floored in black marble. Electrick chandeliers hung from the high ceiling—the rooms in this portion of the palace were two and three stories tall. Large, irregular sheets of leather stretched on frames were hung on the walls every few feet. Glancing at them as he walked, he realized they were from the hides of executed criminals. Each was inked with a recounting of the decedent's crimes.
He came to a wide gallery where the functionaries had made a stand before a high pair of wooden doors which were scarred with axes and fire from some battle of old. The gallery spread out to his left and right, stairs leading to upper doors. Weapons and flags were racked upon the walls.
"I seek admission to the Assemblage of Burgesses," Imago announced.
"You-you are denied," squeaked one of the pages.
He wasn't going to have the same argument twice. Imago beckoned the freeriders to spread out. At a sharp word from Enero, they drew their pistols.
The defenders scampered away. Imago tugged the ancient doors open.
The Great Hall had been the seat of the Imperators. The Bladed Throne was poised high on a dais a hundred paces before him. It had rusted in its centuries of vacancy, now far more relict than instrument of state.
The Assemblage of Burgesses was in session. Each sat behind his desk with a high-backed chair surrounded by little stools for his clerks. The desks were arranged according to the political parties of the Assemblage.
Imago smiled as broadly as he could, and walked down the center aisle. First Counselor Fallen Arch stood at the base of the throne, with Provost Selsmark and another man—small and bald, though certainly no dwarf.
Wedgeburr, Imago thought with a hard and sinking heart. The judge-financial had not been ruined. Rather, he stood here at the front of the chamber in robes of silk and velvet.
The Lord Mayor's only comfort was the shuffle and clatter of feet behind him.
The upper balconies were screened with wicker. Their balustrades were carved with scenes of forests—marble trees greened with emeralds and jade, gem-bright birds in their leaves. The ceiling above vaulted to meet pillars, then vaulted again. The highest reaches were a deep purpling blue, stars inset as discs of crystal. Constellations had been picked out among them with silver lines, though not the traditional images of the night sky. Instead of the Archer, the Horsetail, and the Crown, he saw a rose, a wasp, a bat.
Someone else's view of the world.
Imago stopped three paces before Wedgeburr, Fallen Arch, and that fool Selsmark. He felt like a man arriving for his own hanging.
"My good Imago of Lockwood," exclaimed Wedgeburr with delight. He actually pressed his hands together. "It is always a pleasure when the citizens of the City Imperishable come to view their government at its work. I believe, however, that you have been misdirected. The galleries above are reserved for persons in their private capacity."
"First Counselor," said Imago gravely, with a slight bow to Fallen Arch. That man he could work with—they had conspired at the overthrow of the previous regime.
Zaharias returned the bow. "No longer, I am afraid. Burgess Wedgeburr has just been elevated to my former dignity by virtue of his Imperatorial party colleagues."
A gleam of desperation shone in Fallen Arch's eye. Imago was suddenly struck by the fact that he had no idea what game was afoot. Two dozen armed men at his back seemed remarkably insufficient.
"I see," he said, racing to find a line of argument which would run in his favor. "So the rivers of change have flowed within these halls."
"Certainly they have." Wedgeburr rubbed his hands, knuckles whitening. "I see a man in borrowed robes with a misplaced jewel of state around his neck, who has brought armed rowdies into the presence of the Bladed Throne. That is an offense punishable by quartering and being cast into the River Saltus."
The buzz of angry voices behind him was both encouraging and worrisome. Imago set his own loud and hard. "Which offense would that be?"
If the game were to be played rough, rough he would play. He could always have a man killed. Marelle had said so herself.
"Which offense?" shouted Wedgeburr. "You are a fool as well as a madman, Lord Mayor, to bear arms in the Great Hall."
Imago raised his arms and turned away from Wedgeburr. "See, even the First Counselor acknowledges my office," he called loudly. "Burgesses and citizens alike take note!"
There was snickering from the Boyarist side of the aisle. Enero grinned but kept a grip on his pistol. Clerks, mostly from the Imperatorial party, pressed in against the citizens who'd followed Imago. They avoided the armed freeriders.
He turned back to Wedgeburr. "Note, sir, that I bear no arms. And you yourself have just given voice to my claim of office. I see no trouble here. Only the two legs of government met in solemn council."
The First Counselor looked triumphant. "I will not brook your sophistry." Wedgeburr tilted his head back. "Now!"
A tearing noise echoed from above. Imago turned to see the wicker screens tumble away from the witness galleries. Several dozen bailiffs stood on each side, rifled muskets raised to train on Imago and his followers.
"I—" Imago said as the first volley echoed.
Enero fell without ever firing his pistol. His Winter Boys tried to return the attack, but they were cut down. Something stung Imago's arm with a hot, hard slap.
Another volley. Clerks died, as did Imago's people. The survivors stampeded toward the doors, only to be met by another line of bailiffs with pistols in hand.
He could not allow this to go on. Imago turned and dropped on one knee to Wedgeburr. He dipped his head and drew off the chain of office, knocking loose his broad-brimmed fur hat.
"The day is yours, First Counselor." He tried to humble his voice through his tears for Enero, and the senseless waste.
Selsmark kicked Imago hard in the ribs, knocking him to the ground. He landed on the aching arm, which blossomed into great pain. He was shot.
Fallen Arch was aghast.
As Imago was dragged away by bailiffs, he glimpsed Enero face down in a pool of blood. He searched for Marelle, but she was not to be seen.
He wished that Wedgeburr had been willing to settle for the assassin's bullet after all. Enero dead and Marelle lost once more was too high a price to pay for anything.
Bijaz
He found himself alone in a stone room without knowing quite why he'd been asleep. No memory of dreaming told him what his soul had recently been about.
He was lying in a nest of blankets.
"Bijaz." One of the Northmen squatted over him, pronouncing his name with flattened vowels and a stretch of the final sibilant.
Bijaz? "That's me." The dwarf looked curiously at his right hand, which was wrapped in a great length of silk. "Isn't it?"
A long, sliding string of sentences this time. They meant nothing. The Northman stood, clasped his free hand a moment, and matched gazes.
Memory came to Bijaz then in a burning flash of terror. "We lived!" he shrieked.
The Northman nodded, giving Bijaz the first smile he'd seen from any of them. The man then turned to call for Ashkoliiz.
She swept in moments later with an expression he didn't recognize. Moments later it dawned on Bijaz: respect.
"You are present in your own head once more, little god." She sat on the floor next to him.
"I was absent?" It was a foolish question, he realized. He already knew the answer.
"You spent time crying about the wheat. Whatever that meant." She looked him over. "I'd also guess you've lost twenty pounds. Your skin will hang slack when you decide to stand." Her hand reached out tentatively. Those ice-blue eyes caught him once more. "You saved many lives. Offerings have been left at your door."
"We are all at the top of the shaft?"
"Wee Pollister rode the platform back down to us once he'd signaled for the descent. I do believe it was the bravest thing he'd ever done in his life. But you opened the way, and the fliers were gone."
"Did you mean to send us into them?"
Her eyes slipped away. "No. I had not taken this way before, but had been reliably informed it was open."
Another mistake, with all their lives in the balance. "Not so reliably as all that." He tried to hold in the laughter bubbling inside, a gibbering primal terror seeking escape. It came out a snort.
"No. But here we are, holding fast in the upper galleries in hopes that you would wake. Can you travel?"
He tried to sit up, but a spinning sickness took him. After heaving his empty guts a few minutes, Bijaz lay back down. "Not now, I think."
"I will have Ulliaa bring you something for that." She rose, dusting her hands. "We must go soon. You will be better on your feet than on a litter, but either way we must go."
"Ulliaa?" he asked.
"One of my Northmen. You have earned sufficient respect to merit knowledge of their names."
"He said my name. The one who was in here."
Her smile seemed real. "You have also earned sufficient respect to merit the remembering of your name. It means they believe you will survive long enough to matter to them."
"I am overjoyed." Bijaz immediately regretted his tone as her smile closed.
"Rest a bit longer, and eat whatever he brings you."
Ulliaa came back with a dark wad the size of a stuffed grape leaf, tightly rolled and very sticky.
Bijaz took it and sniffed. Honey, though not so sweet as he was used to. He had a sickening feeling he knew where this had come from. The wrapping was not a leaf, but rough, charred paper.
The Northman remained impassive. He merely watched Bijaz.
The dwarf wondered if this was medicine or a test. Probably both at once. Bijaz could not imagine Ulliaa and his fellows being any less clever than the woman they served. Her actions always fulfilled multiple purposes.
He ate the wad in three bites. The charred paper was filled with something that stuck hard at his teeth the way bones in a baked fish might.
I will not look, I will not think, I will not ask, he told himself, chewing and swallowing. It tasted of ash and that unsweet honey, having a mealy texture punctuated by the sharp crunch of chitin.
Bones, he told himself. Think of them as fish bones.
The bolus hit his stomach like last week's pork, but he clenched his jaw. This was no different than swallowing his hysteria, really.
The Northman nodded.
"Thank you, Ulliaa," Bijaz said.
Another nod, then he was gone.
Twenty minutes later, deep-stabbing abdominal cramps drove the ailing dwarf in search of a latrine.
"I see you are on your feet now," was all Ashkoliiz had to say as he staggered past her.
She had been right. Still with an itching in his guts, Bijaz inspected the little shrine outside his chamber. Insect parts and nest paper shards were scattered around. Some had been folded or twisted into little homunculoid shapes that were probably meant to be him. Two silver obols and a scattering of copper lay shining among the tiny figures. There was also food and drink: a leather-bound flask of something doubtless too strong for him right now, along with bread, dried meat, and a twist of honey candy someone must have carried in their pack ever since leaving the City Imperishable.
"How is it, being a god?"
Bijaz straightened as he met Pierce's gaze. The light troop leader squatted to meet the dwarf face to face.
"I would say that I tire of it, but I truly don't know. Within, I am still a dwarf of the City Imperishable."
Pierce looked thought
ful. "Maybe all gods say this. 'Once I was a shepherd.' 'I am a carpenter who set down his plane too long.' 'Give me back my ship and I will quit this temple.'"
Let me tend my wheat field, Bijaz thought. That would make no sense to anyone but him. "We have a dwarf god," he said quietly. "Sleeping these long centuries. I don't think my purpose will extend thusly through the deeps of time."
"Maybe." Pierce nodded slowly. "I could not say. But the men who were on the platform with you?"
