The Tears of Sisme

by Peter Hutchinson

  “I still don’t think we’re being fair about this,” Idressin began.

  “Fair?” The Tinker’s bushy grey eyebrows rose in mock astonishment.

  “If I was invited into some venture where I had as much chance of surviving as a snowball in a furnace, I’d want to know all about it before I started. Not when it was too late.”

  “Too late for what? What could they possibly do about it if they were told beforehand? If they refuse to participate, we’re all lost, them included. If they at least make the attempt…..”

  “….then we’re probably lost anyway, from what you told me about the Bridge.”

  “Piro will hold it together.”

  “Is that hope or prophecy?” The woman’s voice was quiet, but incisive.

  “Hope,” came the soft reply. “He needs me, but he knows I can’t abandon this group while there’s the faintest chance that the snowball might roll out of the fire before it’s all melted. The last Talisman group failed a thousand years ago and every year since then it’s been getting harder to maintain the Bridge. This group must win through.” Unexpectedly he smiled. “The snowball’s new, I like it, but it’s the same argument we’ve had twenty times already, and it comes down to the same thing each time. What’s to be gained by frightening them?”

  “On the face of it, nothing.” The tutor sighed. “And I admit it will be a very long time before they’ll be able to understand about Nemeso and the Bridge. But there are enemies they might meet face to face any time from now on. It doesn’t feel right to lead them blindfold into the bearpit.”

  “That’s your emotions talking. After the Norleng you’re letting your affection for the lads….”

  “……and my respect. They’re no longer children, Tinker, and they’re not fools.”

  “Alright, your respect too. They’re clouding your judgement. There’s not one of our enemies they could deal with, forewarned or not. We are their only protection.”

  There was silence, until at last the Tinker looked across at his companion. “Still not convinced?”

  “Oh, I’m with you as always. But I fear for them. Can we possibly keep them safe, now we’re coming out into the open?”

  “We didn’t do such a good job when we had them hidden away, did we?”

  “True. There’s one enemy who’s already found them and will stay on their tracks if he can. But in the Empire we’re going to be walking right into the arms of another.” He glanced up at the older man. “Pepper’s trying to get closer in to the Terrechar. I know,” he went on overriding the other’s protest, “it’s dangerous.”

  “Dangerous doesn’t begin to describe it.”

  “But real Terrechar or not, we have to know who these people are and why they’re beginning to target ‘Guardians’. Alright at the moment they’re just knocking off one or two crazies, but why? What does the First Talisman mean to them and why would they care about it? Or are they being paid to do it?”

  “Idressin, if Pepper goes in there and doesn’t come out - that’s a definite possibility if these people are the Terrechar - then your group is incomplete and the succession is broken. Even if everything else went right, that in itself might break the Bridge. You can’t take the gamble.”

  “’We are their only protection’. You just said it yourself. If we truly are facing the Terrechar of old and they’ve set out to kill all possible ‘Guardians’…….” He didn’t finish, leaving the unspoken threat to dominate the silence.

  “I still don’t like it,” the Tinker finally grumbled. “Pepper’s too fond of taking risks.”

  “Not this time,” Idressin replied. “And look on the bright side: in the Empire we won’t have the Spinners to deal with.”

  “That may no longer be true.” Meruvai looked up to find both men staring at her. She shook her head. “I have nothing definite. If I did, I’d have told you. But I think it would be unwise to go west assuming you’ll be clear of them.”

  “You mean they’re following us? It’s not…”

  “No, I mean one of them probably left the Republic some years ago. I told you at the time it felt different in Rittabye, not the same absolute control they usually exert. Well, wherever the wanderer went, he hasn’t come back and the change in Rittabye’s even more noticeable now. The Watchmen are still there, but it’s possible that another of the younger ones has come this way.”

  There was a very long silence, as they digested the news.

  Empire: Karkor

  Chachi walked silently along the endless corridors of the Palace, eyes downcast as befitted a grey-robed superior of one of Ajeddak’s most contemplative orders. The robe and rank were honorary, for use when he was not fulfilling his ceremonial functions. His real position was unique. Chachi was unique. The Prentex of his time. And now on his way to his fifth meeting with the Princess Shkosta.

  An interesting human being, the princess. Deceptive and full of secrets, but then Chachi was a Spinner and knew something about deception himself. Yes, she was a very dangerous person, a mixture of self-effacing modesty in public and assertive force in private: she had evidently had the power to break the compulsion he himself had placed on Theyn not to speak of their secret use of the Stone. But now the Watchmen had told him to put aside his reservations and cooperate, so it was time to stop fencing and to find a way of working with her while revealing as little as possible.

  How much to tell? Fiction? The stories about the god Ajeddak that he had invented for Theyn’s benefit would be unlikely to impress her. The truth? That Shellimill, another ‘Translator’, as these barbarians called Chachi himself, was operating near their borders? No, that would raise far too many unnecessary questions. For the present he would have to offer her just the right level of knowledge to feed her ambitions. As the Watchmen had pointed out, the Network was giving them access to Shkosta’s secrets as well as Theyn’s and the potential gains from the arrangement far outweighed the risks.

  Her arrival in the capital little more than a year ago had been a complete surprise to most of the court, Chachi included. Following the traditional pattern of Habbakal alliances, she had been despatched at the age of seven as a hostage to the Barons of the Cold Coast and forgotten. At that time her feckless father and her elder brother had both been healthy and relatively sane, so the Habbakal line looked secure and no one gave a thought to the little girl until her brother died of the plague.

  Shkosta had been secretly summoned back to Karkor, only to arrive two days after the death of her father the Crown Prince in a hunting accident. At the funeral the court had suddenly woken up to the fact that this unknown girl was now the Emperor’s only direct living descendant.

  Even then they had held back, waiting to see what advantage could be gained from this new player who had unexpectedly intruded into their courtly games, and more importantly to observe the Emperor's attitude towards her. They must still be wondering, Chachi thought with amusement. Shkosta had been universally friendly without intimacy, while for his part her grandfather had so far declined to accord her his formal acknowledgment as his heir. It seemed the old man's instincts were still in working order.

  Knowing he was expected, the Prentex inclined his head gently to the guard at Shkosta’s door and let himself into the anteroom. The low murmur of voices sounded from the next room, inaudible to ordinary ears through the closed door. Chachi simply stopped and listened, the words coming to him faint but clear.

  “. . .only half-using him, Melim. You still don’t see it, do you? Spreading information is just as valuable as gathering it. Forget for a minute that you’re a policeman. We can have people believing whatever we want. Not believing us, the official line, because they won’t. But believing rumours, supposed facts, however we want to feed it to them. It may not be what we need right now, but it will be. We can even have tame prophets: give them a few juicy items to foretell, things which have already happened on the other side of the Empire, and people will soon hail them as infallible.”


  “I still don’t like it, Shiko.” A degree of intimacy already, the listener noted. This woman would use any means without hesitation to bind Theyn’s allegiance and render him vulnerable at the same time. Chachi appreciated the technique even as he reassessed the danger. Quite apart from her effortless control of the colonel, what he had just heard showed that she had already seen for herself one of the deeper values of transpeech, a remarkable feat for a barbarian. The Watchmen had always rated spreading information as more important than gathering it. Well, there was little risk in allowing her to follow it up and it might occupy her for years, long enough for his purposes: he could slow it all down if necessary by inventing ‘technical’ difficulties.

  Chachi’s interest suddenly sharpened. Theyn had been expressing his unease at putting too much trust in ‘religious sorcery’, over which they had little control.

  “I think someone even has his own agenda,” he finished.

  “You’ve never mentioned this to me, Melim.” The steel showed clear in the silky voice.

  “It’s only a hint here and there. You know I get the conduits to send me pigeons as well, just for appearances? Well, I’ve had several bits of information come in that way recently, answering questions I never asked. So who’s asking them? Who’s got access to the Network except us?”

  In the silence which followed, Chachi cursed his own rashness. Semikarek had never noticed and he had been so cautious at first with Theyn. But his own separate network of conduits was incomplete and in the end the pressure for results had pushed him to take the occasional risk of using Theyn’s. Of course the colonel would have a backup: he was a very careful and suspicious man. An explanation to satisfy the princess was simple enough, but it would probably demolish his role as a humble priest, passively serving the Stone. Well, it would have come out sooner or later. Why not now?

  “You said no one else knew.” Shkosta’s voice was glacial.

  “I don’t see how I could have anticipated. . .”

  “How can you be such a fool, to keep this from me? What were the questions, Melim? Quick, I need to know.”

  “Look, Shiko, you’re heir to the throne,” Theyn was still on the defensive, “and I freely admit that you’re my equal at handling intelligence material. . .”

  “Your equal!” Shkosta laughed. “Oh Melim, you’re priceless. Now, what questions were being asked?” That voice allowed no hesitation.

  “A strange collection to judge by the answers. Reports on the movements of foreigners, and quite a lot of religious stuff, you know, reports on sects all round the Empire. Someone seems to be trawling for anything new, new cults, new holy objects, any new claims or prophecies or prophets, that sort of thing.”

  “Then the questioner may be close to hand.”

  Time to move. Chachi knocked softly on the door. Bidden to enter, he came and stood silently before the table where the others were seated. The rules of the grey robe forbade him to sit anywhere outside the Temple, to touch the princess, or even to look any woman in the face. For the present it was a useful device and helped him to keep his distance in his visits to her apartments. Often she had left it to the colonel to do the talking, only putting in the occasional sharp query of her own. On this occasion the princess herself began to quiz him immediately on new details about each conduit. Was there any limit to how much traffic each could carry? Were they all equal? Were the best of them in the key cities? How quickly could the network be expanded?

  Chachi was impressed. She was making a swift study of the feasibility of her new idea, to feed information out to the people of the whole Empire. She was precise, quick, and appeared to remember what she heard.

  Then without warning she switched. “Can anyone use the Stone for communication besides you?”

  “No, your Highness.”

  “Then tell us, Prentex, who else is using this secret service of yours?”

  “No one, your Highness.”

  The princess got up and prowled towards him. For all the superiority he felt, Chachi quailed at the physical threat: she was keyed to attack like a hunting leopard. He broke one of his own rules and spoke first.

  “No one except me, that is.”

  Shkosta stopped, close to him. Head down, he could see her rich blue skirt, gathered up to a slim waist. Rich, but plain; this girl had little time for playing games.

  “And why do you ask your own questions of Colonel Theyn’s agents, Prentex?”

  The tone was soft, but the question was sharp as a blade.

  “Because there are things afoot in the world, your Highness, things which could be of great danger to the Empire, but which lie outside the range of the colonel’s enquiries.”

  “Religious squabbles, Prentex?” The princess sounded almost disappointed. “It’s a long time since they’ve had any serious bearing on state affairs.”

  “Allow me to explain, your Highness.” The priest’s voice was soft. “We are approaching what is called a cross-roads year. The signposts of prophecy all indicate it most clearly.”

  “There are always prophecies, priest. The old Rybus one about ‘kingdoms falling’ is being trotted out again to whip up enthusiasm for the war. Last week some madman in the city was claiming a revelation from the gods: the whole world is going to be drowned under the sea except the Sarai plateau, so we need to scrabble our way up there to be saved. There’s probably a dozen more rife in the Empire just as fanciful. What’s remarkable about that?”

  “What’s remarkable, your Highness, is the concurrence. For separate prophecies to predict the same timing for a particular event is highly unusual. For them all to do so, recent and ancient alike, is unprecedented in our time. We of the Church know that such a phenomenon cannot be mere coincidence.”

  “Well, we of the laity have a different view of coincidence. You know the story of the man who stepped in a cowpat, then worked out the odds against that particular cow choosing that particular spot to lay a booby trap for him when he’d never been in that part of the country before. At countless millions to one against it couldn’t have been coincidence, could it?”

  Chachi didn’t need to look at her face to know that she was smiling. She was teasing him. Well and good, he was quite content to play the earnest fool. But against his own better judgement he had been told to engage this woman’s energies in his own search, so he persisted in patient persuasion.

  “I will let you be the judge, your Highness. Perhaps I may take the prophecy you mentioned from the Rybus manuscript as an example. The part the Generals are quoting about kingdoms being conquered is a comparatively small section. There is a much larger one devoted to the person due to make all this happen, ‘The Renewer who shall astonish the world’, as he is often referred to. The Rybus is a very old and famous prophecy; the full text is available in many places throughout the Kingdom. What a powerful weapon it would be in the hands of any claimant to the throne!”

  “Now you interest me, Prentex,” Shkosta said softly. “And you think it possible this Renewer may be appearing soon to fulfil the prophecy and seize the throne?”

  “Anything is possible, your Highness. But I think it far more likely that some more ordinary pretender with high ambitions will see the opportunity to use the Rybus prophecy, and other prophecies like it too. They all signpost conflict and change at this time. It’s the perfect platform for a usurper.”

  The princess moved away and resumed her seat at the table.

  “I didn’t know the Church was so politically perceptive,” she said reflectively, a half-question hanging in the air. Then she switched her attention. “And how is it, colonel, that | have heard nothing of this from you? You would concede the danger?”

  “Yes, my lady.” Warned by the edge in her voice Theyn was cautious now. “If you remember, I have often said that the succession was the most immediate threat facing the Empire. But at Special Forces I deal with the here and now, with the rebels who are already plotting. My job has never extended to anticipating futu
re religious events which may never happen. I. . .”

  At the edge of his vision Chachi saw the tiny gesture of Shkosta’s finger, which halted the colonel instantly. Theyn was no one’s lap dog, but she had him well trained.

  “You know by now, Melim, I’ve no time for justifications. I'm not the least interested in religious events. I am interested in people smart enough to make use of them. From today consider your role, your unofficial role of course, extended to cover . . .what shall we call it? ….possible politico-religious disturbances. I’m sure the Prentex can find the time to give you a complete report on the most dangerous of those possibilities. For the moment, in fact right now, Chachi, I would like an outline for myself of the chief prophecies you’re following up.”

  The use of his name pierced the priest's calm. Confound the woman, she was always throwing him off balance. A Prentex lost his name when he was inaugurated: that was the first time he had heard it spoken aloud in fifteen years. Chachi was tempted to test her confidence by telling her that she was too late; that there were already groups in Razimir, Karkor, and other cities, just waiting for the opportunity to put forward candidates to be the new ‘saviour’ of the Empire: that there were even those outside the Empire already taking an interest in the coming of the First Talisman. But he had the distinct feeling that she would absorb it all, controlled as ever in pursuit of her own aims, and besides he had no intention of revealing so much all at once.

  Outwardly he answered with his normal studied assurance. “The Rybus prophecy I have already mentioned, your Highness. It is believed to be several thousand years old and has been invoked at intervals when people believed cataclysmic events were at hand – please excuse me if I am covering ground already familiar to you.”

  Shkosta did not interrupt.

  “By any accurate interpretation of the manuscript those earlier attempts to use the prophecy were false, though they may have proved fruitful for their proclaimers. This time it is different. Scholars agree that we are on the threshold of the period truly predicted for these events, in fact, if the prophecy is to be fulfilled, the Renewer has already been born.”