The West Is Dying

by David C. Smith

  “And if there were any greater penalty I could place upon you or exact from you,” Muthulis proclaimed, “I would not hesitate to do it. You have soiled your faith.”

  Thameron sneered at him. “This isn’t about faith. This isn’t about helping people. This is about helping yourselves!”

  “Thameron, that is sufficient!”

  “You’re all in it for yourselves! This isn’t a temple! This isn’t a church of faith! This is a business! You’re all in business to keep people ignorant and, and help yourselves and take their money—!”

  “Enough, Thameron!”

  “You take their money, you treat people like slaves, because you lie to them! You have no faith! You’re greedy liars, that’s all! You’re in business like greedy—!”

  “And if we were not in business, you young fool, where would you be today? You were left on the steps of this temple! You would have died of neglect!”

  “At least I would have died before you’d poisoned me with your lies!” Thameron answered angrily. “You didn’t care about me! You just wanted another slave!”

  “Enough!” Muthulis slapped his hand heavily on the table before him and coughed from the exertion of this confrontation with someone so insolent. With both hands, he pushed himself to his full height and gave Thameron the blackest of stares. “You are to go now,” Muthulis told him. “If you wish to wait for us to draw up the final Orders of Expulsion, you may appear in Holy Council tomorrow morning and have your reply to this sentence read into the Codex. I would prefer that you go now, as quickly as possible, so that you will no longer defame this temple with your presence.”

  Thameron answered him, “You’re a fool, and I have only one answer to give you, and Andoparas, and your whole hypocritical temple, your whole hypocritical religion. You will be destroyed!”

  You will be destroyed, [Bithitu had said to his judges] by a love greater than the hatred that compels you.

  “Begone!” Muthulis yelled at him, waving a trembling arm at him. “Begone! You have defiled us—defiled us!”

  * * * *

  How should we deal with the guilty? Let us treat them as though they were innocent. Let the criminal be taken in by the family he has harmed; let the thief work for the merchant from whom he has stolen; let the murderer repay his wickedness by selling his life to the family of the murdered. I say to you, let those who have strayed learn that they have strayed in ignorance, and that wisdom, through love, joins them to their brothers, where ignorance, through hatred, casts them from their own brothers.

  * * * *

  “I am sorry!” Hapad exclaimed mournfully. “I am sorry, so sorry, my friend!”

  “You have no reason to feel guilty for telling them any­thing, Hapad. You did what you believed to be the right thing. But, my friend, I’m more sorry for you than you are for me. You still believe their lies. You’re good, Hapad. I’m good. But it’s not good to be in the service of liars.”

  Hapad fell upon his cot, weeping.

  Thameron removed his priest’s robes and pulled on what street clothes he had been able to find—a pair of trousers, a shirt and vest, and a long leather coat. Into an old purse he deposited the remainder of the money given him by the aristocrat the day before.

  “I go now,” he told Hapad. “But I’ll see you again, my friend. Trust to that.”

  “Oh, Thameron.…” Hapad sat up, stared worriedly at his friend, and then, impulsively, plucked from his finger the golden ring that he wore. Thameron had removed his own, but Hapad offered him his as a reminder of their friendship. “Know that there was good here,” he told Thameron. “Please. The world is wide. I am afraid for you. Wherever you travel, my friend, please keep this with you, to remind you—”

  “I will, my brother. And I thank you for it.” Thameron took him in his arms, hugged him, and looked him in the eyes. “The prophet be with you, my brother. Whatever my path, Hapad—I’m not evil, and I don’t wish to hate. The prophet be with you!”

  “And with you, Thameron. And with you. I am very afraid for you.…”

  * * * *

  The afternoon was cool and cloudy, and a strong wind, harbinger of storm, scatted litter down the streets as Thameron made his way to Ibro’s tavern.

  Assia was astonished to see him dressed in old clothes; she had never seen him without his priest’s robes.

  “They’ve expelled me,” he admitted to her. “And excommunicated me. I am no more a priest.”

  “Oh, gods! Thameron!”

  He told her that it was far better this way. New things had blossomed in his spirit. He declared to Assia that he felt he had to go away—make a voyage. It would clear his mind, prepare him for a new life. And he wanted her to go with him.

  “Take what money you have,” Thameron urged Assia. “We’ll go together. Board a ship, sail to—”

  “I can’t!” she cried, amazed and puzzled by his sudden change. “I can’t, Thameron! My father needs me.”

  “He brutalizes you!”

  “But he needs me, Thameron! And I need to—”

  “I need you, Assia!”

  “I—I cannot.” She began to cry. She coughed.

  The realization of her illness struck him freshly. He calmed himself and told Assia to see a physician. He would help pay.

  “You go away, Thameron,” she urged him. “You sail away. Come back to me whenever you can. I’ll save some money.… I’ll run away from Ibro when you get back; then we can go. Find us a city, Thameron—find us somewhere to live, and I’ll go with you. I will!”

  “Do you mean that?”

  “I do, Thameron! I do!”

  He threw his arms about her; she lavished kisses upon him. He wanted to stay; he wanted to go. “I love you, Assia.”

  “Then come back for me, Thameron.”

  “Do you, Assia? Truly love me?”

  “So much.… It frightens me.…”

  He touched her hair, looked into her eyes, embraced her and held her.

  Outside her window, the day was gray and cloudy. Raindrops began to fall. Holding onto each other, in a room above a tavern, they were alone, and young, and frightened.

  PART THREE

  END WITHOUT MERCY

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The season of grief, speechless, the hour of mourning, forever.

  On the seventeenth day of the month of Elru the Lion, in the Year of the Lion—five days after the death of King Evarris of the empire—Dursoris dos Evarro edos Yta was placed in a cedar wood box on the wide, white plain of warm ashes and, beneath a summer sun, immolated and returned to the memories of the gods. Wine was poured. Gongs were struck. Prayers were lifted; breasts were beaten. Against the curved azure sky flecked with white clouds, Sim the Moon yet glowed and birds wheeled and floated—perpetrators.

  O fears profound, cauterizing memories! O pain boundless, shrinking full life to a whisper of shadows! O death of king, death of prince, death of empire! O torments waiting, tears unflowing, flames unlit, passions unspent! O clay, O clay, O journey of sins! O Children of Empire, misbegotten of the gods, gratuitous—you have sown vengeance’s crimes, you shall reap long trails of ashes watered with tears, nurtured with agonies! O uncounted years, travails are upon you! The serpent has suckled at the lamb, the sword has cleaved the dove, the wine is bitter with blood! O gods, die with us, do not survive us!

  Yta—alone on the plain, long after dusk. Alone with the torches on poles—alone with the long parade of sorrows, the tired procession of crimes. No debasement, no humiliation, no confusion enough to purge the endless, unending end.

  * * * *

  O gods, die with us, do not survive us!

  O crimes, where are your promises?

  O mother’s sins, find a door in the ruins!

  * * * *

  Deep, where unending pain causes an end to pain—low, where the ceaseless cries reduce themselves to whispers—soft, where torment finds knowledge.…

  In the Hall of Darkness, where there is no lig
ht, no light, no light…

  …a light will grow…

  …to make the darkness darker still.…

  * * * *

  Uncoil, serpent!

  Rise, furrowed seeds!

  Carry back in echoes, all sounds raised!

  Return, Life, to the womb your grave, cradle of fears!

  Come, Death, with laughter, no shouts.

  Come, Death, with the friendly sorrow.

  Come, Death, with no blood, no ache of years.

  Come, Death, laughing, to wrap up my soul, cleanse

  my eyes, caress me with the lover’s touch, last

  Friend.…

  * * * *

  Yta, alone on the plain of warm ashes, visited by Death, as the cold closes in, as the night revolves down in promise:

  “You have known me all your life, and though my guises are many, my masks myriad, my purposes are uniform. Touch my fingers of bone—yes—breathe the ashes of my mouth, come into my closet and reproach no one, gaze upon the stars—you are immortal. Time waits here, with me—and no crimes exist.…”

  * * * *

  Yta, escorted by slow, silent guards, sentinels as grim as heartbreaks, led the somber procession back into the city, to the palace. Yta, the uncomforted. Yta, prepared at last, resolved at last, to return herself to Mother Hea’s mercy.

  And may the gods reduce the golden crown to golden ashes.…

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Late in the evening, with the smoke of the funeral still in the air, untouched cups of wine before them, and with the silence as heavy as clouds, Adred and Galvus sat in Adred’s chambers.

  “Why?” Galvus wanted to know. “Why?”

  Adred shook his head.

  “I feel as though I’ve turned into someone else, like I’m rock or steel. It’s not real. My body doesn’t feel like I’m real.”

  Adred understood. “Cry, if you want to. Let go, Galvus.”

  “Do you think I’m still a boy?”

  “Men cry.”

  “I don’t feel like crying. There are knives and poisons in me. Everything’s a lie. Everything is a lie.”

  “Galvus, you have to face up to something. Look at me. If anything happens to Elad now, you inherit the throne.”

  “I don’t want the throne.”

  “Listen, now. We’re in a dangerous situation. This isn’t over yet. Elad could be assassinated—anything. Everyone’s afraid. You’re next in line for the throne unless he hurries up and has a son. And soon.”

  Galvus wanted no part of it. “Let the throne fall, then. He dies, and we let the throne die. Let jackals fight over it; let the people rule themselves. Listen to me: I want no court life! I don’t want men like my father around me, or men like Elad! Is that why we’re here?”

  Adred admired this young man: everything a good king should be, he was. “The throne’s as good as whoever’s sitting on it. It’s a horse you control; you don’t let it get away from you. I don’t have to tell you that.”

  “All right. But suppose all of this is planned by the gods. Suppose grandfather wasn’t the great king we think he was—I mean, from the perspective of the gods, how they see us. Suppose he was actually a poor king. Suppose all of this is necessary for Elad to become a great king.”

  Adred smiled strangely. “I appreciate a hypothetical argument as well as anyone, Galvus, but be careful. You’ve been reading Radulis, but you’ve been misreading parts of him, too.”

  “But suppose—”

  “Let’s not suppose.”

  “Then I don’t want it,” Galvus said firmly.

  “Suppose you have no choice,” Adred told him. “You’re the blood.”

  “Then we find another way to argue about it. I’ll abdicate, and you can have the throne.”

  “I don’t want to be a king!”

  Galvus shook his head. “There’s a limit to what humanity can endure. There’s a limit to things like this.”

  “You’d think there must be,” Adred agreed.

  “I was raised by a good mother in a great land. Can that end overnight? Can the world end overnight? Are the gods dying, and they’re taking everything with them, and now we’re all dead, too? That’s what it is. It’s the fable.”

  Adred looked away; this came too close to feelings of his own. Hollow, he watched the dance of a candle flame and thought of religious parables.

  Small comfort, now.

  “I don’t think the world will die, Galvus.”

  “Then it should!” the young man said.

  Soon, in the dimness beside him, Adred heard Galvus—a man—beginning to cry.…

  * * * *

  “Is it my fault?” Orain murmured, wondering aloud.

  Quiet, in white robes, Yta, haggard and undone, sat with her.

  “I caused this when I left Cyrodian, when I turned to Dursoris.”

  “Hush,” Yta solaced her. “Shhh.… It’s not your fault. Yours is not the blame.”

  Orain began to weep. “Oh, Mother.…”

  “Orain, I leave tomorrow to do my penance, but you must keep your heart in trust to strong things. Orain, believe me.…”

  Orain with a child’s face, child’s eyes, child’s heart in a woman’s body, woman of guilt and wants, lady of long, sad shadows, stared at her in surprise.

  “Remember this always, though it may be small comfort. If the pain continues, if the tempest increases, if our world should end— Daughter, this is all the truth that remains: the gods are not in the temples, and they are not with the priests. I have worshiped Hea all my years, although I have not been to her temple. But Hea is not in her temple only, Orain; she is everywhere. Hea, the gods—the one god—they are within us. Remember this: the gods are within us. We are the gods; we are our crimes, we are our sins, we are our destiny, and the cause and end of all our dreams and ambitions.”

  Orain sobbed, strengthless, not wanting to listen. Too tired.…

  “I love you, daughter not born of my flesh. You have done no crimes; the crimes have been done to you. Orain, how can I face the Goddess when to face her is to look into my mirror? These pains have come, so awesome, because we have refused our deep secret, and we cannot share or under­stand what we refuse.

  “Orain, live with this—I go with this—the gods are within us. We are the gods. We are their masters, and we are very poor masters, indeed, of our gods and ourselves.…”

  Orain sobbed. Yta watched the candle flame and saw a funeral pyre, saw the fire grow, grow—grow to devour the world.…

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  On the quay, Abgarthis, white-haired, stood with Galvus to bid farewell to Yta. Along with them had come Adred. Elad had confined himself to a chamber of his palace—as had Princess Orain, for quite different reasons.

  Yta was dressed in a pale scarlet robe and was devoid of jewelry other than the wedding band she wore upon her right hand. She was silent as she watched the last of her belongings taken aboard the merchant bireme, which rested far out on pale waves. There were no tears in her eyes, no expression on her lips.

  O torments waiting, tears unflowing, flames unlit.…

  One son dead, another a murderer in chains, the third upon the throne of empire. And a week ago—a mere few days ago—she and her husband had sat on their patio and shared remembrances and had made plans for their future.

  “My queen.” Abgarthis addressed her solemnly, refusing to acknowledge her at this moment as other than she had always been. “Do not return to the Goddess with old griefs in your heart. Whatever becomes of us, be glad of your king’s reign. Be glad for yourself.”

  “Do not flatter the past, wise adviser,” she answered him. She studied him deeply—the lines of his face, the sorrow in his eyes, the trembling of his lips—and Yta told him then, quietly peering into Abgarthis’s spirit, “Guard, as well as you can, the best of the empire.” She glanced at Galvus, and the old courtier understood.

  “By all that I am able, Queen Yta.”

  She turned to her g
randson. “You are a man now, Galvus.”

  “Yes, grandmother.”

  “Keep your heart clean. Strive, please, to believe in great things—things greater, even, than the throne.”

  “With all my heart, grandmother, I do.”

  “Then act on them, Galvus. And, for me—for yourself—protect your mother. She is my daughter, and I have always loved her. Guard her with all your love.”

  “I—I’ll try.” His eyes became wet.

  Yta turned and looked out to where her ship was. The skiff was waiting at the quay, ready to row her out. She looked back at her city and then noticed Count Adred standing a short distance away.

  “You will be staying in the capital, Count Adred?”

  “For a time, yes, your crown.”

  She smiled at his error; she was no longer the crown of the land. She said to Adred, “I am sorry we did not have time to talk. I remember you well, Adred. I remember your father. Even your mother. Did she not die giving birth to you?”

  “She did. Thank you, my lady, for recalling her.”

  “You and Dursoris—you were good friends when you were boys.”

  “I hold those days dear to me, Queen Yta. I’m only sorry that I had to return—now.”

  “Surely it is for a purpose.”

  “I would trust so.”

  “Adred, I see your heart. Do not mourn. Do not look behind. May I entrust you with a philosophy?” she asked him.

  He was touched. “I would be honored, Queen Yta.”

  “Strive. Aspire. Never look behind, save for lessons. We enter—” She paused reflectively, then spoke the words in her mind. “We enter a dark age, friend of Dursoris. I have seen the future, and it is dark, but there is a light. Will you aspire toward it?”

  “I—I will try, Queen Yta.”

  Yta wanted to trust him—but there was a gulf between them, a gulf of time and opportunity, and she had now to leave her life behind. Sighing, she faced Abgarthis once more and lent him her hand. “Guard the empire with your love, all your strength,” she commended him.

  Abgarthis bowed, understanding his trust: the empire, not specifically the throne. “To the end of my strength,” he vowed.