There wasn’t so much gold for what he needed, but then people could live off gilded air just as easily, Rob had taught him. When your promises were so big you couldn’t hold them in your hands, they became just as solid.
In a way, the marriage had been a diversion, but it had also been his declaration of independence. For all practical purposes, he was a foreigner leeching off Caytor, threatening their prosperity and maybe even their sovereignty. No longer. He was now one of them, committed. If Eybalen prospered, so would he and vice versa. Marrying Rheanna had also meant a death to many a dream of ambition that fathers may have fostered for their daughters, potential friends and rivals alike. But it had to be done. He had to cleave through doubt and make certain who would march with him and who would fight against him.
So, he had sparked his own Night of Red Lilies.
When he went back to the mansion a little later, all smiles and winks, he would be surrounded by people who truly believed in his cause. He would be surrounded by young men in love with his charisma and commanding style, paid soldiers who cared only for strength and power, and affluent councillors, bankers, and lawmakers who genuinely believed that Emperor James of Athesia would help Caytor. The rest of them would be dead in a day or two.
He had nothing else to say to his patrons. They had served him well. But like hundreds of their colleagues, they had planned on getting rid of him one day, the same day they led their bloody revolutions across Caytor, finishing off guilds, taking over industries, and exiling families. Only they had dallied too long, and now the cuddly puppy had turned into a ferocious beast.
“Take care of this,” James told Xavier and went back to the civilized part of Pain Daye.
He found Rob smoking under one of the outer wing archways, snapping finger-long icicles from the curved stonework above. “You really ought to tell your servants to cut these down. They could fall and hurt someone,” he muttered, lips tightly pressed round a long swab of weed.
James snorted. “Not these. Perhaps the big ones under the balconies and rooftops. These might inconvenience a young lady if they slipped down the back of her skirt.” They both sniggered.
The world was white, impossibly white. Everything seemed painted in one color. James was rolling the next sentence in his head. He had rolled it around ever since that day with his witch.
“Tell me about Nigella.”
Rob did not seem surprised one bit. “Oh, so you’ve met her.”
James pulled the collar of his leather jacket tighter. It was rather cold. “Yes.”
Rob tossed the cigarette away. “Nine years ago, I was visiting one of my family estates in Goden. Our horse master had a stroke, and there was no one capable enough to replace him, so I spent the entire summer breeding and selling horses. Not much different from investing in guild businesses in the city, just a bit more fresh air and a whole lot more sun. Same amount of dung, though. Nigella was working with the horse cook, making special food for them. She had a gift with herbs or something like that. Just a rather ugly common girl, nothing more she was. But she would always be there when I was training horses, watching me.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I had tons of women in my life, each prettier than the other. I’d never have given someone like her a second glance in Eybalen. But out here, I don’t know, I felt some kind of a raunchy need to bed an ugly commoner. So, I got her in my bed. I warned her that she couldn’t have any children on me. And she promised me she would drink some tea that kills babies.”
Rob stepped onto the snow. It crunched under his feet. “Guess what, nine months later she showed up in Eybalen and told me she had a son. So, I had her expelled from my estate.” He shrugged. “It wasn’t even good sex. She was a virgin. She was ugly. She barely moved. But I liked it in a strange kind of way. I can’t explain it.”
Magic, James thought. She had made him feel the same.
“I wasn’t going to put up with some common bastard. She took it hard. She cried and told me she was in love with me, and all the usual things women say when they need money. But I had her sent away from my estate and threatened that if she ever tried to contact me again, I’d have her punished.”
“Well, she’s alive and well, just a few hours’ ride from here,” James said.
“Really? That’s interesting.”
“She doesn’t like you very much, Rob. She wants you dead.”
The investor chuckled. “I’m not surprised there. A woman’s scorn is sharper than a razor.”
James couldn’t share the same joke. “She’s a witch. She can foretell the future. I hired her services. And I promised, in return, to kill the man who had dishonored her. I’m also supposed to provide for her son. Your son, it turns out. He’s an apprentice in a monastery near Jorat.”
Rob stopped crunching the snow. He was silent for a while. “Will you keep that promise?”
James took a deep breath. “No, I will not.”
Ordinary people would have gladly accepted it at that and never broached the subject again. But Rob was not an ordinary guy. “Why not?”
“You are my friend.” And in so many words, Rob was bound to him for life.
“I am grateful, thank you,” the investor said.
“You will provide money for your son, though,” James added.
Rob sighed. “I guess that can be arranged.”
James relaxed. “Do you have any other bastards?”
Rob raised his arms and gestured dramatically. “Who knows? You only have as many children as you pay for. But I did have another woman in Eybalen almost sire another unwanted whelp on me not that long ago. This girl, Constance, was from a respectable family. But she was a little slut, nonetheless. Half my friends bedded her before me. I guess she was just looking for an excuse to latch her fangs onto some rich boy and milk off his wealth. Her dad was in debt and couldn’t provide her jewelry and minks and all that crap women love. So, she came to me one day and told me she was pregnant.”
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t believe her it was mine. It could have been mine, but it could have belonged to any rich fop in Eybalen. But, she reminded me of that affair with Nigella. Only this one I couldn’t send away. And I sure didn’t need a scandal. So, I took care of it.”
James nodded in understanding. Recently, he had been taking care of things, too.
CHAPTER 50
“We will lodge here for the night,” Calemore decided.
Elia stared at the inn. It was better than spending the night in the snow.
Calemore dismounted and led his horse toward the stable in the back. It was a small, low building, with a roof sagging under the weight of snow. But it was warm inside, and the lonely groom was dozing off, half buried in a pile of old straw.
“Boy,” he snapped, startling the sleeping figure. “Take care of my horses.”
Leaving the animals behind, he led Elia around. The village must have had some name, but he didn’t know it and didn’t care. For him, it was another nameless, puny human place, overlooking the eastern shore of Lia Lake. Above it, like warts on an old crone’s face, rose the western hills of the former Safe Territories. Not too far, hidden by those slopes of windblasted pines and crags and thorny bushes, was the ruined City of Gods, and more importantly, the Womb.
They had taken a boat across the lake, but the captain had docked four riding days to the south in one of the fishing towns. Battered by icy lake gusts and spray, Calemore had led his divine prisoner up seldom-used gravel paths, wishing he had mules or donkeys for the journey. They would better stand the weather and make better progress on the twisting little roads. Round the lake’s shores, you could find villages almost every two or three leagues; you could see farms and people traveling in carts and on foot. But just a little deeper inland, civilization ceased. This stretch of hills was wild and rough and didn’t like humans.
The village had been a surprise as much as its two-story inn.
He had not expected to find any hum
an places once they had left the shore and started climbing. And yet, something had changed the land—either war or the death of the magical spells protecting the area or some other perverted turn of luck. Humans were like insects; they could smell when it was safe to crawl out of their holes and take over the territory left by the bigger predators.
Calemore looked down the slope. The road snaked for a few turns and then became a goat trail. The rippling lead surface of the lake was maybe a good arrow shot away, but it had taken them almost a day to climb this far. He hated delays. But Elia was trying her miserable, weak best, giving him no reason to beat her or murder children to goad her.
She stood behind him, resolved, sad, almost like a puppet, waiting for her master’s orders. She was shivering, too. Goddess or no, pain of the sharp and icy winds howling from the lake made her weep sometimes.
“Let’s get inside,” he told her.
He pushed the heavy door that refused to revolve easily on its hinges and stepped into the dark place. Half the inn was buried underground, another quarter was snowed in, and it had tiny windows that were smeared in grease and soot. Light was in short supply. Instead, you got smells, deep, animallike, nourished by those inside.
Calemore truly marveled why insects needed social interaction so much, and yet there they were, a whole bunch of them, small, hairy, filthy, with mistrusting eyes, wasting their time drinking sour ale and waiting for the winter to pass. They all looked the same, small, stunted, probably a family, except one man, who seemed to be another unfortunate traveler. The White Witch found his presence disturbing, but then again, this whole place was wrong.
The innkeeper had his pit dug into the far end of the common room. Behind him was a cellar of sorts, crammed with vegetables that could survive the winter, and casks of drinks. He served from behind a table made of badly hewn logs.
“Lucky me, two more guests,” the man said morosely.
Calemore scratched his chin. “Why is this place here?”
The man squinted his stupid, close-set eyes. “What? I’m Body. What can I get you?”
The White Witch insisted. “Why is this village not down there, near the shore?”
“Leave him be,” Elia whispered.
Body was still stupid. He pointed behind him. “Food? Hot ale?”
Calemore smiled. “How come this village’s up here on these thorny slopes and not near the lake? You haven’t got any fish or good grazing land or anything. Why did you come here?”
The innkeeper rubbed his palms on his belly. “What? Oh, old Ratty had a fight with the village head down in Konath, so they forced our kin out. We came here, made this place. We call it Upper Konath. There’s good fishing in the stream nearby and we got good potatoes here. And as come by the occasional travelers going to monasteries, they pass by here and stay with us.”
Calemore lost interest. “Do you have beds for us?”
Body nodded. “Got two. One is for the man over there.” He pointed a fat finger with a black nail at the other would-be guest. “You can have the other one. Thirteen coppers. Fifteen, and you get a hot meal now and goat’s milk for the road in the morning.”
Without arguing, Calemore paid. “We will sit with that gentleman,” he said.
Without invitation, he sat near the other guest. Elia took a place opposite the stranger. She looked frightened, wondering what Damian’s son might do.
“What’s your business here?” the witch pressed, no introductions or niceties.
The traveler looked at the rude, richly dressed man and decided to cooperate. “I sell traps, my lord. Good for hunting beasts, even bears. Useful for this kind of season. Got good steel traps that don’t rust, from Terrogam.”
That was the boat port they had left four days back, Calemore recalled. Perhaps this man was not a threat, but he still wasn’t completely sure. Body, taking the role of a serving wench, laid down a wooden tray before them, with two wooden mugs of hot ale.
Calemore sipped the piss, ignoring the taste altogether. “So, where are you going?”
The trap man pointed, his sense of direction quite keen inside this dirty, sooty hole. “The Parusites pay well for my traps, my lord. They like the manufacture, and they’re not used to hunting bears back in their country. Always some new face comes and they need traps. Old settlers got their game all sorted, but there’s always new migrants.”
The White Witch emptied his mug. Even his entire net of informants could not feed him all the news he wanted or needed. The problem with people was that they reported things they deemed useful or significant. Most of his spies would never bother telling him about the Parusites going back to ruined temples and rebuilding them, bringing their faith back to the Territories. Well, he could not really explain to them the importance of such news, either.
Most of the gods were dead now, but the people who believed in them did not know that. And there was always a risk that the magic of belief and religion would mix too much, and then he would have new or resurrected gods to deal with again. He looked at Elia. She was a terrible puzzle, and he could not put his doubts to rest.
She should have been dead forever. But she was not. Worse yet, she claimed she was not a goddess anymore. That made no sense. It could not make sense.
“Are you a man of faith?” Calemore asked the trap man, who still had not introduced himself.
“Oh yes, I am,” he said, not seeing the dangerous glint in the witch’s pale eyes.
“Who would be your favorite god?”
“I pray to Tanid to give me good weather and clear skies when I travel.”
Calemore nodded. The fool was praying to a dead god. One of the many who had perished in the Feoran uprising. Well, some had survived, but he had rectified that. Almost. He looked at Elia again. Her soft, forgiving expression angered him. For a moment, he wanted to draw his knife and bury it in the trap man’s liver, to have him gurgle to death as his blood seeped into the filthy clay floor. But killing the insect would accomplish nothing. He did not want to waste his magic on tricks covering up the murder. He was so close. He must remain calm and focused.
So, when the man was not paying attention, Calemore slipped something into his drink. And when the peddler drank next, he was soon asleep in his own spit, one cheek resting hard against the table’s pocked surface.
“You have no respect for humans,” Elia said quietly, accusingly.
The White Witch snorted. “Should I? Why? Respect for bugs?”
Elia smiled sadly. “You forget, Damian made you first and didn’t like you. So he made these inferior humans as your replacement. That must hurt.”
Calemore realized what she was doing. “My fool of a father was afraid of the greatness and perfection that I stood for. He could not bear the idea of being bested by his own creation.”
Elia did not blink. “Your arrogance is only matched by your stubbornness.”
The witch sighed appreciatively when Body came and laid down platters, blood sausages full of gristle and fat and a side dish of the famous potatoes, but Calemore didn’t care. He watched as Elia carefully nibbled on the food.
“I am not a goddess,” she repeated for the hundredth time.
“We will see,” he said simply. “We will see.” That seemed to shut her up, but he was in a talkative mood. “What do you expect Damian will do when he meets you?”
Elia shrugged. He was disappointed by her reaction. “Whatever he does, he will never be happy. He will never have what he needs or wants. And neither will you.”
Calemore picked up a whole potato and started chewing on it, like an apple. It was still rather raw. “How does it feel to know you’re the source of all evil and suffering? After all, Damian almost destroyed the world trying to forget the pain of your betrayal. And now, once again, you’re the core of all his troubles. He’s weak because of you. He could have completed this sorry mission eighteen years ago.”
“You will not get what you want. You just would not listen. I am not a goddess an
ymore.” Elia pushed the plate away.
“Then what are you doing in the world of the living?” he taunted.
Silence. She had no answer to that.
“You know, Mother,” he said, teasing, “if your death was not necessary, I would make you my queen after this is done. In time, you could grow to appreciate my style and humor. You could counterbalance my wrath, my sense of dramatics. I could be the whip, and you could be the salve they rub in the lash wounds afterward.”
“You are a lunatic,” Elia accused.
“Of course I am,” he said, frowning, looking almost melancholic, but it was all a farce. “The truth is, both you and Damian are relics of the past. As a matter of fact, all of you are. You do not belong in this world. Without me, Damian would still be weeping his sorrowful tears in the Abyss. I do not know how you got away from death, and it doesn’t matter now. You, Damian, Simon, Lar, Selena, Lilith, all of you are just ghosts. This world belongs to me now.”
Elia looked at him carefully. “So, what do you plan to do with Damian?”
Calemore made an innocent face. “I will have to convince him that he doesn’t want to spend another century or two in the Abyss or walk the realms pretending to be an old man with a fatherly, trusting face.”
“And then what?”
Calemore shrugged. “First, there’s the matter of my heritage to settle.” He grinned. “After that, Damian and I will have to discuss how we can rule this world, father and son, if possible. Or just son.”
Suddenly, Elia laughed. The somewhat inbred patrons of the inn raised their ugly, low-browed foreheads and stared stupidly. Calemore squeezed her wrist until she whimpered with pain.
“Don’t draw unnecessary attention, or I will butcher this village. By hand.”
She wiped away her tears. “I told you, Calemore, your arrogance will be the end of you. You would give up your immortality for a worthless dream of…what? I can just imagine how the two of you will get along. He will kill me,” she said, almost reciting. “He will then make your wish come true. You will then free him from the Abyss, is that it? And then, I wonder who will try to kill the other first?”
The Broken (The Lost Words: Volume 2) Page 57
