Sorrowing Vengeance

by David C. Smith

  “And do you know what struck me as I talked to Sianus and listened to a thousand years of history? We have become what we have become because of those men and women who have believed in the best. It is true. Be there wars, be there disasters, Abgarthis, be there generations of darkness and pain and misery—still, we aspire. Humanity aspires. Sometimes we grasp too much, but we aspire. And our nation today is an empire, not because of small men or frightened men or men who try to foist their own fears and delusions upon us, but because of the best that is in us. Look at my father. Examine our past. It comes about so slowly that it seems not to be happening at all. One lifetime is too short to comprehend it; it requires trust. But when we look at the length of our history and see doors opening, ideas changing, arms reaching, voices raising themselves with cries of fairness and openness— I actually believe in prog­ress, Abgarthis.”

  “Do you?”

  “Yes. You don’t, do you? You believe that time is a wheel. Well, you are being short-sighted. There is progress, we can improve things, and we do that by understanding ourselves and working for the best that is in us. But it takes great courage, great strength. Think of it! A few hundred years ago…five hundred years ago—look at how primitive we were! Look at the laws we had not so long ago. But now? Perhaps our laws are not well enforced, but we have them, we believe in them, they are our foundation, aren’t they? A hundred years is a long time, but such a short time! How many wars since we became a nation? How much blood? An oceanful? Ten oceans full? And yet—we have progressed. When we compare our sophistication, our laws, our attitudes, to what we’ve had in the past—we’ve pro­gressed.”

  “Perhaps we have,” Abgarthis admitted.

  Elad finished his second goblet of wine and set it aside. “I am going to try to…create progress, Abgarthis.”

  The old man, already anticipating what Elad would say and astounded by it, stared at him. “Your crown!”

  “These…sirots…that the rebels want? We will try them. We will—”

  “Elad!” Abgarthis cried. He rose to his feet and clapped his hands together, trembling with the enthusiasm of his long-lost youth. “You are sincere?”

  “I am. I have given it much thought.”

  “Then you do a mighty thing.”

  “Abgarthis.… Please—sit. Yes. We will try it. Treat it as we would a discovery, a new path, and follow it. With courage, and with strength. These riots and demonstrations…they cannot continue. I could blame the revolutionaries—I could blame myself, or Council, or the businesses—but blame is easy to place. The empire has been through such things before. Like a cork in a bottle. The pressure gets to be too much inside the bottle, and the cork is released. This way, we remove the cork before any damage is done.”

  Abgarthis was immensely gratified by Elad’s words. “I am well pleased.”

  “These sirots will have very limited authority, of course. They will be overseen by our people in the cities. But I will put Count Adred’s ideas to the test. His and Orain’s and Galvus’s.” Elad smiled. “As king, I can certainly be as courageous as any law-breaking nobleman! It simply seems to me that if things were as strong today as our Councilors insist and our businessmen claim, then we would not have unemployed people in the streets. But we do; so there is some weakness; our system is not as strong as we claim it to be. Recall those discussions you and I had, Abgarthis, about power and kingship. You asked me, ‘What is a king without his country? What is a king without his people?’ Well, he is no king, is he? And I am as much the king of that man who tried to kill me as I am of these privileged bankers on our Council.

  “Many of them are worthy men, Abgarthis, but they make errors, and so can I. I claim to believe in the best. So does Council. Yet so do these rebels. Well, we debate issues in the council chamber; the king decides on an issue, but voices are heard. And that is justice. So we shall let the people of this empire, these workers, have their voice in the sirots. I am trying to decide whether or not to go so far as to have them actually represented in the palace. We must be cautious; we cannot give them too much too quickly. But they shall have their sirots.”

  Abgarthis stood and bowed slightly; his good humor seemed to have relaxed. “I’ll remind you of only one thing,” he told Elad. “There is great good in diversity. It’s always easier to deal with matters when everything seems uniform; I know that businessmen and commanders of war tend to think that life would be much more convenient for them if they didn’t have to deal with actual human beings. But you must remain above that sort of close-mindedness. The finest thing you can do, King Elad, is to be what you are, and to be that honestly. You must not be contemptuous of anyone or anything; and the joys you feel at being a man must not be denied anyone else, regardless of who is making a profit or who has however much power. You say you should not move too quickly in recognizing the voice of your people; I would say to that, ‘Do not move too slowly.’ The best thing you could have now, in your council chamber, would be the clash of ideas and opinions. When these collisions occur, new things are created. Do not move too slowly, my king.”

  Elad nodded thoughtfully to this. “You have great in­sight,” he allowed. He gave a wide-mouthed yawn. “Forgive me. It’s getting late.”

  “Yes. I’ll take my leave now.” Abgarthis took one of Elad’s hands in his and grasped it firmly. “I always knew that you must be your father’s son. Sooner or later, the child betrays the parent in him—the weaknesses, but also the strengths.”

  “Thank you, Abgarthis.”

  “Go to the people, my king. Have you considered that? You have been in the capital for too long. When you are fit again, travel. Visit the cities.”

  “You’re right; I should make plans to do it.”

  “I believe you should.”

  Elad yawned again. “Tell Ogodis…I will see him tomor­row.”

  A small smile. “Of course. Rest well, Elad.”

  “And you the same, good Abgarthis.”

  * * * *

  When the queen came in, much later, Elad had turned down the wick in his lamp. He was sleeping, propped on his cushions, the blankets disheveled and half thrown off.

  He awakened groggily at the sound of her breathing, the presence of her shadow. He opened his eyes and reached out with one hand. “Salia?”

  “Yes.” This was a whisper, and she took his warm hand.

  He saw her smiling at him.

  “I wanted look at you.”

  “I was dreaming.”

  “Not more bad dreams?”

  “No. These were good dreams.” He grinned, still almost asleep, and tugged on her arm.

  She hesitated, as she might have with a stranger. “Elad.…”

  “Lie beside me.”

  She followed the pull of his hand, climbed onto the bed, rearranged the covers, and stretched out alongside him. She was naked, and her slender warmth instantly invited him to embrace her. He moved carefully, positioning himself, while Salia, allowing Elad to rest his head on her shoulder, made herself as comfortable as she could. She stroked his hair with gentle fingers.

  “Go to sleep,” Salia whispered. “Go back to sleep.”

  “The pain isn’t there so much now.”

  “Shhh. Have more good dreams.”

  He kept his eyes closed, yawned, held himself against her, and began to breathe steadily.

  Salia, for the first time since she had come to Athad, did not feel threatened—not by her father, not by this king, not by anyone is this palace. She felt—alone, but safe. Was it because her husband was so severely injured and in need of her solace? She had come here to be a wife; instead, she was a nurse. He didn’t seem to be a king, now, but only a warm, naked man sleeping beside her. Perhaps it was simply that he was asleep, this naked, wounded man, and she was still awake, and holding him.

  She felt less a stranger to herself than she had before, and she realized that tonight, for the first time in many long weeks, she would at last sleep soundly and undisturbed th
e night long.

  “All of this is here for your enjoyment, if you but smile at it. This is a secret I have learned. The gods offer no greater wisdom than to allow us to laugh at the world they have given us. If you laugh at a thing, you control it, Salia!”

  She bent her head to kiss Elad’s forehead, she gently rubbed her fingers in his hair, and—she smiled.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  When the first of Lord Thomo’s scarlet-and-gold-sailed round ships made dock at Port Erusabad on the eighteenth day of the month of Grem, the Wolf, General Thytagoras, in charge of the Athadian troops garrisoned in the Holy City, and Lord Sirom, Acting Athadian Consul to the Salukadian govern­ment, met Thomo on the dock. Thomo led his contingent of imperial advisers, lawyers, and businessmen onto firm ground and handed his sealed order to Lord Sirom.

  “We are happy that you’ve reached us safely,” Sirom smiled to Thomo. “Your voyage was a pleasant one?”

  “It was unspectacular,” Thomo assured him. “Have you made preparations for the king’s people?”

  Sirom ducked his head. “We have several old government buildings on this side of the city where our officials might stay indefinitely. And we’ve made apartments out of the top two stories of the Central Authority.” To Thomo’s look of inquiry: “Governor Dusar and his officers spent most of their time in villas outside the city; we thought it better to make accommodations inside the walls.”

  “Judicious. King Huagrim and his people are here, then?”

  “They arrived less than two weeks ago, your honor.”

  Thomo pursed his lips.

  “They’ve moved right in,” General Thytagoras commented darkly, eyeing Thomo in hopes of identifying a kindred spirit. “They’ve taken over. The city is theirs. Really rubbing our faces in it.”

  Thomo fixed him with a steady gaze. “Any deaths of Athadian citizens?”

  Thytagoras colored, taking that insinuation as an insult, and Sirom, seeing the general flinch, hastily answered: “None since the afternoon their troops first took control, your honor. There were a few incidents—but you know about those.”

  “Yes.” Still Thomo kept his eyes on Thytagoras. “Yes. We’ve reviewed everything that happened.”

  His reference was to Thytagoras’s murdering Governor Dusar. The official report identified General Thytagoras simply as the individual who had found the governor’s demolished corpse and determined that the death certainly was the result of mob activity, not of an angry imperial officer venting his rage with a sword.

  “Well, then,” Sirom said, his tone one of placation, “you can understand—”

  “I am not here with an armed force,” Thomo reminded both Sirom and Thytagoras. “And I will not order any military action against the Salukadians unless it is by direct order of King Elad or provoked by the direst of emergencies. The verbal orders given me are to take only retaliatory action, and even then, to do so with extreme prudence. You men, I’m sure, can appreciate the consequences of a declaration of war in this city.”

  Thytagoras said nothing; he was clearly suppressing his infamous temper.

  But Sirom affirmed, “We serve our king, Lord Thomo. You know that.”

  “This is a legal argument, not a military maneuver.” To Thytagoras, in a more affable tone: “No matter what you and I may think of this situation, General, we are not the government. You and I might perhaps take a different stand on the matter—but we are not the throne. Agreed?”

  Thytagoras accepted the proffered hand. “Agreed, your lordship. But still—they’re rubbing our faces in it.”

  “And that is precisely why I have brought with me three shiploads of lawyers, diplomats, and businessmen.” He gestured behind him to where the last of fifty ambassadors were gathering on the wharf. And behind them, men from the Cloud, the Ordavian, and the Evarris were carrying luggage and boxes filled with personal items down ramps and onto wagons dockside.

  “General Thytagoras,” Lord Sirom told Thomo, “has gra­ciously accorded us a unit of his men to help the members of your retinue to their quarters and lend them any assistance needed.”

  “Thank you.” Thomo nodded to the general and glanced beyond him to the Athadian infantry standing stoic and proud in the wide sunlight.

  “If you’ll come with me, then, I’ll show you to your apartment.”

  “Yes.…” Thomo nodded to his two court retainers, young lieutenants both, and followed Lord Sirom up the dock to where two horse-drawn landaus awaited them. Sirom and Thomo rode together, in the company of Thomo’s retainers.

  Thomo watched the avenue as they moved along. Expres­sionless faces stared at him. The crowds were swirls of color and noise, dark faces and white faces, men and women, animals, vendors.…

  “So they have destroyed the Temple,” he said.

  Sirom looked at him. “Yes. Not destroyed it, actually. They are…renovating it. Making it into a temple of their own.”

  “We heard that. No violent demonstrations over this? I find it hard to believe that our citizens would stand by and let such a thing occur.” He eyed Sirom critically.

  “Some…very violent demonstrations took place, in fact. The Church leaders suicided—you heard that. I suppose religious people do that sort of thing. And for the first few days of the occupation, when the Salukadians took charge of the Temple, there was quite a bit of trouble, yes. I sent a report to King Elad. Didn’t he say anything to you about it?”

  “No. He has been—”

  “Yes, I know. The, uh, ‘incident.’ But since then, very little. From what I can gather, the religious in this city have accepted it as a sign of the end of the world.” Sirom said it straightforwardly, although his tone betrayed his dismay with the concept. “Their apocalyptic ideas, you understand. Prophecies.”

  Thomo sniffed and rubbed his beard. “So that’s why they’ve been so pacific?”

  “I believe so. It’s a pervasive attitude. Most of our citizens here have tried to adjust, but the religiously inclined.… Well, they have a stronger sense of fatalism, if I can call it that, than there is within the empire proper.”

  “Doom-Soulers?” Thomo smiled.

  “Why, yes. You’re familiar with that sect?”

  “Only what I’ve heard. I am not a particularly religious man,” Thomo admitted.

  The secretive Doom-Soulers had come to prominence since the takeover of the Holy City by the Salukadians, an event these mystics regarded as one signaling the end of human life.

  As the landau came into Himu Square and approached the Central Authority, Thomo asked, “Where are the ghen and his court staying?”

  “In Lord Semul’s old villa, by the Vilusian Gardens. We will have an audience there as soon as you wish.”

  The carriage rolled to a stop, and Thomo’s door was opened by a young soldier. His lordship stepped out.

  Sirom followed. As he led Thomo up the stairs and into the Authority: “I have been granted only one audience with this king since his arrival here. He does not seem to be in the best of health, your honor.”

  “Is he dying?”

  “I suspect so.”

  Thomo paused at the top of the stairs, looked back down into the square, and glanced toward the east, where the golden dome of the Temple of Bithitu had once glowed so magnificently that its brightness rivaled the sun’s. Now, where that dome once had been, Thomo saw tall wooden parapets and scaffolds and hundreds of men working like insects, erecting statues and hammering gold sheets onto animal-shaped sculptures.

  Sirom waited a moment, then lifted an arm toward the colonnaded portico that shaded the entranceway. “If you please, your lordship.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  It seemed to him that the faithful of Athadia, the faithful in Erusabad, should have been more vociferous in their protests than Sirom had indicated.

  He thought again of the Doom-Soulers.…

  * * * *

  Early in the afternoon, bin-Sutus, the oldest and most respected of the aihman-sas s
erving in Huagrim’s court, entered the Vilusian Gardens to find Nihim, the ghen’s younger son, sitting on a bench by himself studying one of the decorative, fountain-fed pools. Nihim did not look up immediately when bin-Sutus intruded; the courtier coughed slightly to gain the ghen-mu’s attention.

  “Yes?”

  “I have been asked to tell you that the Athadian entourage comes soon to meet with your father. Your presence is required.”

  “Yes, yes. I am coming.”

  “Agors, as well. Do you know where he is? Has he gone riding?”

  Nihim nodded to his right, where the brick pathway lost itself in the tangled colors of the deeper gardens. “I believe he and some companions have taken a stroll. They came by here a short while ago.”

  “Shall I fetch him?”

  “No.” Nihim rose to his feet and casually straightened his robe. “No. I know where he is. I’ll get him.”

  “They come soon, Ghen-mu.”

  “Yes. We’ll be there, bin-Sutus.”

  bin-Sutus made a short bow; his bald head shone in the dappled sunlight, his white beard fluttered. He turned and strode down the path heading back to the villa. Even in the gardens, the noises of working men could be heard as they transformed Lord Semul’s old villa into something akin to a palace. bin-Sutus followed the sounds, and as he came out of the gardens, he waited a moment to watch the progress.

  Nihim watched bin-Sutus go through the broad leaves and bright flowers, then threw his hands behind his back and started in the opposite direction, following the walkway where it curved around the pool and led over a small bridge into a domestic forest.

  It amazed him that these gardens could so reflect an eastern appreciation of beauty and order and simplicity, tucked away as they were in a pocket of western barbarism. Astonishing. But it pleased Nihim. Thoughtful, studious, and observant as he was, devout subscriber to Toshin’s Wo Ayhat—the Way—Nihim had prepared himself for this journey to the West by deciding to search out beauty and insight wherever he might find it. It would be an intellectual challenge: that had been his intention. But he had been surprised to discover, so far, very little in Erusabad that was appreciably foreign from what he knew of life in Ilbukar. The same streets, much the same sort of architecture, dialects he could understand because of his study of the Athadian tongue.