by David Hair
Mekmud, the Emir of Lybis, had retreated here after a maniple of Endus Rykjard’s mercenaries had seized Lybis. The Kiskale – the White Keep – had been built high up in the mountains, above the winter snowline, and even the well-equipped and experienced Rondians were leery of attacking the fort. The approaches were commanded by bastions from which flaming oil and boulders could be dropped, and heavy ballistae guarded the approach. So for now an impasse reigned: Mekmud couldn’t get out, and Rykjard’s men, encamped below on the plains, couldn’t get in.
She laid a hand on Timori’s shoulder. Only nine years old, and he’s been through so much . . . He was eagerly watching the plaza fill with a great crowd of the emir’s people: Mekmud had promised a great revelation and the air buzzed with speculation.
If this goes badly, there will be a riot.
A trumpet blared and the emir’s herald stepped forward. ‘The Emir of Lybis, Mekmud bin al’Azhir, wishes to announce the presence of great allies, who have joined him here to take the fight to the enemies of Ja’afar!’
This caused a stir among the crowd. As one everyone pressed forward: the wealthy men at the front, the poorer men in the middle and even some women at the back, all tried to get a better view.
The herald’s voice boomed as he announced, ‘Emir Mekmud welcomes to his realm a new ally and friend of Lybis . . . Lady Elena Anborn!’
The name sent a shiver of interest through the gathered Jhafi, nobles, soldiers and commoners alike, and drew muted cheers from the latter. The noblewomen peered intently through their veils while the men stared more openly, respectful, but wary. They all knew who Elena was: Alhana, the White Shadow, once bodyguard to the Queen-Regent Cera Nesti, more recently a ghost stalking the northern roads killing Rondians. Cera saw approval, but there was fear too, and more than a few evil-eye gestures.
She is magi. No matter how much she gives this kingdom, some will always suspect her.
‘The emir also welcomes Lord Kazim Makani of Baranasi,’ the herald shouted.
Cera studied the Keshi as he lowered his hood. He was a young man, but tall and well-muscled, and he looked every inch the warrior-lord, despite his rough clothing. In fact, he was no aristocrat at all, but a title was needed if the Jhafi nobles were to give him any credence. Elena went to Kazim’s right side, prompting a murmur of interest, as that was where a wife would stand.
And now, at last, came the moment she’d prayed and ached and suffered and almost died for. How will they react? she wondered.
‘And Emir Mekmud is most honoured to welcome Timori Nesti, Crown Prince of Javon,’ the herald shouted. His eyes bulging with pride, he cried, ‘LYBIS WELCOMES OUR FUTURE KING!’
Cries of shock went through the plaza and people spilled forward, all crying out the boy-king’s name. The crows in the towers rose, their beaks clacking at the sudden clamour below, as if they too honoured their sovereign. Cera thought she would burst with emotion as the slender boy walked to the top of steps as he’d been coached, dropped his hood and waved his hand. The soldiers began to hammer their spear-butts against the stonework, a rhythmic thumping that echoed off the peaks.
Welcome to public life, little brother. May it be merciful.
Of course, Timori had been presented to crowds before, but not in these circumstances. He had been a prisoner of the Rondians for more than a year, but he was free now. The Nesti needed all Javonesi, Rimoni and Jhafi both, to rise to his command if they were to be restored and the Rondians driven out.
The emir, his iron face grave, raised a hand for silence and signalled for the herald to go on.
‘And finally, Emir Mekmud welcomes Princessa Cera Nesti, Queen-Regent of Ja’afar.’
A hush fell as Cera lowered her veil. For a moment she was almost overwhelmed, feeling all those eyes piercing her like spear-points. But she too had been bred for public life: she belonged to these people. Though most had never seen her in person, they knew her: they had sung hymns to her and gossiped about her, judged every known deed, from defying the Rondians to capitulating and marrying one – and speculated on others that were only rumour. When they heard she’d been stoned as a safian, some would have believed, others not.
What would they do if they knew the truth? she wondered for a moment, then drove that thought away; right now the heart of the matter was this: she, Cera Nesti, was supposed to be dead.
They mourned me for days on end. They thought me condemned and shamed, stoned and cremated.
There was a long moment of utter silence, the fullest silence Cera had ever felt. She held her breath and clutched Timori’s hand for courage.
It’s much easier to love a martyr than a living person.
Perhaps, left to human nature alone, it might have gone badly: the crowd might have believed her to be an imposter, put forward by the emir to rally the people for war. The serious-faced girl in the plain shift was surely too imperfect to be their princessa, because everyone knew princessas were special, creatures of beauty, not bookish and plain. But leaving things to chance had never been Elena’s style. Cera had spent the morning being made up, her hair washed and combed, and she was dressed as a supplicant, come to appeal for forgiveness. The dark circles beneath her eyes, like her other imperfections, had been concealed. Elena wanted her to look like she’d stepped down from on high.
Cera recognised the faint look of concentration on Elena’s face even as her white dress began to glow, the effect so subtle it looked entirely natural, just as if the light shone slightly brighter on her than on mere mortals. On a roof above, a single white songbird fluttered its wings and broke into song.
Then a woman in the front of the crowd burst into a loud, joyous wail of thanks to Ahm and sank to her knees, and slowly, the rest did the same, a wave of homage that swept backwards through the plaza.
Cera almost fell to her knees herself, bowled over by relief, but she kept her legs straight, locked in place, her eyes gazing into space, as Elena had instructed: this was only the first step, and there were so many more to take.
*
Kazim Makani sipped a peach sharbat and wished the evening would end as yet another kohl-eyed Jhafi lady glided up and enquired, ever so subtly, if it was indeed the case that he, a Keshi lord, was wed to a Rondian mage. He wasn’t married, but that was not because of any lack of commitment, which went deeper than anyone here could imagine. He was a Souldrinker, but he no longer had to kill to maintain his power, for their bond of love had become a gnostic bond, replenishing him as if they were one being. It was far easier to gravely assure the noblewoman that he was indeed married to Lady Alhana, and that Ahm had been generous to give him such a wife, blessed as they both were with the gnosis. He had to restrain himself from laughing as the woman scrabbled to get away, all but poking his eye out with a gesture against the evil eye.
It’s either laugh or go mad.
The hardest part of the evening was still to come: dinner. Elena had been drilling him on table etiquette among the nobility, and though it sounded simple enough there was much to remember. Eat with the right hand – slowly! – and don’t finish everything on your plate. Sip your drink; don’t eat when someone talks to you; take your time and lots more besides.
‘You can always eat in your room afterwards,’ she’d said. ‘It’s not really a meal; think of it as more like a conversation with nibbles.’
But it was the nuances that were confusing him; like what to do with his left hand, and how to remember all these accursed titles. He was deeply regretting leaving Elena’s side, but right now she was in earnest conversation with a Jhafi lord on the other side of the room. Her shining blonde hair marked her out in this sea of glossy black hair and dark skin. Her face was tanned but recognisably Yurosian, with crow’s feet around her eyes that gave away that she was much older than him. He didn’t care: she was a mage, and would enjoy a long and vigorous life. With him.
‘Lord Makani?’
He turned, and found the one person in the room he’d been avoiding:
Cera Nesti, a young woman with thick black hair plaited around her head, deep-set eyes and a grave manner. Elena had exchanged Cera and Timori for the life of the Rondian spymaster Gurvon Gyle, and he still doubted they’d got the best of that deal. Timori might make a good king one day, but this Cera Nesti seemed untrustworthy – she’d already betrayed Elena once. Was she truly worth losing the ferret-faced Rondian? He was someone who could turn the tides of war with a single knife-thrust – and he was Elena’s former lover. Not that he was jealous of the man; far from it; he just knew he’d sleep easier if Gyle was dead.
He turned his attention to Cera, who’d been waiting patiently for him to acknowledge her. He sketched a bow. ‘My Queen,’ he said politely, though she wasn’t his queen at all.
‘I’ve been wanting to meet you,’ Cera said, ‘ever since the news came to Brochena that Elena and an unknown Keshi had been attacking Dorobon soldiers. I’ve been wondering who you were.’
Kazim had never been a shy youth, or modest – but that was before he’d become a Hadishah assassin, killed Antonin Meiros, the most famous mage in the world, and discovered he was a Souldrinker. Now he’d rather talk about almost anyone other than himself. ‘My parent was Ordo Costruo,’ he lied, giving the agreed story. ‘There’s not much more to tell.’
Cera looked sceptical. ‘Were you raised in Dhassa? Your accent is unusual.’
‘Er, no . . . in Lakh.’
‘Really? Teshwallabad?’
‘No, Baranasi.’
‘Ah – but your parents were Keshi, yes?’
‘Yes.’ This much is true. ‘My father was severely wounded in the First Crusade and taken in by a Lakh trader. He took my parents south to Lakh so he could care for him.’
‘That was a great kindness.’ Cera studied him frankly, but not in the way that women usually did. He was used to women looking at him speculatively, but her eyes were cool and distant. She’d been condemned as a safian, and though it was clear most Jhafi thought it a lie concocted by the Rondians to justify ridding themselves of a troublesome young woman, Elena believed it to be true. It felt odd to be in the company of such a one. There had sometimes been gossip in his youth about this or that girl liking her female friends far too much, but he’d never met someone he actually knew was . . . that. It left him unsure how to react.
‘How did you come to return to the north?’ Cera asked.
‘I heard the call for shihad,’ he said after a moment. That too was at least part of the whole story. ‘I should join Elena—’
‘Wait! Would you please tell Elena that . . . that I won’t let her down again. I swear it.’ Cera looked up at him, her dark eyes full of pain.
‘Can’t you tell her yourself?’
‘I don’t think I can,’ she admitted. ‘Not in a way she’ll believe. I was so stupid to listen to Gyle – but I was scared, and . . . I thought I was protecting Timori.’
Elena hadn’t told him the details of what had happened – she had to come to that in her own time. But he thought his lover did want to find a way to forgive. ‘I’ll tell Alhana what you said,’ he promised. And it is time for her to tell me what happened, so I will know the signs if it happens again.
She turned away, then stopped. ‘Does Elena have a plan to get us out of here?’
He grinned, despite his wariness. ‘Most certainly, yes.’
*
Elena Anborn tied down her pack and buckled on her sword belt, then looked around the room where she and Kazim had spent the past week. She was thankful to be able to cast aside the bekira-shroud and courtly manners and get back to being who she really was: a mage and a warrior.
Beside her, Kazim flexed and stretched, as impatient as she to be moving. For a week they’d been laying plans with Mekmud, Cera and those of Mekmud’s advisors he really trusted. Lybis was no place to try and start a war from, not when the Nesti’s main strength was in Forensa, on the far side of the kingdom, and Mekmud accepted this, though he clearly wanted Elena and Kazim to stay. The best he’d been able to wrangle from Cera, who’d grown into a shrewd negotiator despite her youth, were unspecified promises of aid. Once they’d gone, Mekmud would fight on regardless, and hope the Rondians withdrew once open war broke out.
‘Where is Gyle now?’ Kazim asked.
Elena sighed. ‘I don’t know. He might be in Lybis town, just a few miles away, or he might be back to Brochena by now. But if I were him, I’d be trying to pen us in here, and that’s why we need to get out.’
‘I can’t wait,’ he said fervently.
In her gnostic sight, Kazim’s nature was clear: she could clearly see the tainted aura of the Souldrinker, the tendrils embedded in her own aura, but they were so entwined now that the further she and Kazim were apart, the more it hurt; even a few hundred yards was hard. They were Mage and Dokken in love, bound together in unprecedented ways, with nothing in history or legend to guide them – they were making it up as they went.
‘Then let’s go,’ she said firmly.
As they left the room together, her eyes lingered over the stone latticed windows where they’d sipped coffee and watched the sunset from a tangle of pillows and blankets. It had been a beautiful interlude.
They descended a spiral stair, emerging on battlements overlooking the valley. The dawn air was cool, for all that it was summer. Elena’s eyes were drawn upwards to two small Rondian windskiffs circling high above. Was Gurvon Gyle up there, or Rutt Sordell? Neither, she hoped.
A mental touch nudged her consciousness and she responded, then signalled to the waiting group below to join her. Cera and Timori were among them, dressed in travelling clothes and rubbing bleary eyes.
A sentry shouted as a large windship swam into view from around a bluff. Its sails bore the emblem of the Holy Inquisition of Kore: a scarlet Sacred Heart impaled on the Dagger that slew Corineus. Alarm bells clanged wildly in the gate-tower and men began to pour from the barracks.
Elena pursed her lips as the two windskiffs darted toward the ship, no doubt sending greetings back and forth. The next few moments would tell her whether this was going to go smoothly or not. She gripped the stone wall, watching as the skiffs ran up alongside the Inquisition vessel. Beside her, the emir’s men peered anxiously upwards.
There were only half a dozen sailors visible on the warbird, which was some fifty yards long, with swivel-mounted ballistae fore and aft. The rough-clad captain was exchanging words with the nearest skiff-pilot, though they were too far off for Elena to make out what they were saying.
Suddenly shapes rose from concealment on the Inquisition ship and the ballistae, giant crossbows on swivel-mounts, swung round. She saw fire ignite as the crew set alight the bundles of rags that had been tied behind the spearheads – then the bolts went searing across the sky like comets.
The nearest skiff was swatted sideways as the bolt slammed into the mast and sent the little ship spinning over and over. Arms and legs flailed in vain as the pilot fell towards the ground just as his craft burst into flames. But he was the fortunate one. The other mage-pilot was convulsing wildly as he was pinned to the mast by the bolt, engulfed by the flames that roared up his sails. Without his gnosis to move it, his craft lost impetus and just hung, burning, in the air.
On the walls, the soldiers were bewildered: enemies fighting enemies in the skies above was quite beyond their experience. Elena frowned as the falling pilot engaged Air-gnosis and soared away down the valley, arms spread and robes flapping madly. He wasn’t as fast as a skiff, and he’d not be able to get far, but she’d hoped to kill both men.
She looked to the warbird, calling mentally,
The emir’s officers had succeeded in reassuring the soldiers that the incoming windship was friend, not foe, and when the trumpeter blared a few notes, the call to attention, and the noise in the courtyard barely lessened, Emir Mekmud shouted, ‘Be still!’ When his men were once again silent and giving him their full attention, he called, ‘No matter what you now see,
keep your hands from your weapons!’
‘What’s happening?’ Timori asked loudly.
‘The windship does indeed belong to the Rondian Inquisition – but it has been stolen by friends!’ Mekmud shouted. He was greeted by cheers which died away as he added, ‘Those onboard are allies of Lady Alhana – and they are not human.’
The onlookers gasped, and as one the eyes of the soldiers flashed as they stared at Elena. This would be as near to a demon as any of these men would ever see, and she hoped they would be able to keep calm. ‘The ship is piloted by men,’ she called in Jhafi. ‘But the fighters aboard are Naga!’
A palpable sense of superstitious awe was generated by her words: though the emir’s people were Amteh, most would know something of Omali mythology and the tales of the snakemen who helped the gods to create the world – though she doubted any here would ever have believed in them.
And quite rightly, she added wryly to herself. Well, they’re in for a surprise now!
The windship sailed right to the walls and came about, silhouetted by the rising sun against the glorious pink and gold dawn sky. She heard cries of wonder as a shape swarmed up the masts and furled the sails, moving with incredible agility – thanks to the massive snake-tail he had instead of legs. As the creature came into sight the watching Jhafi could see that his skin was scaly and green, and a crest like a rooster’s adorned his skull. Others appeared on deck, equally inhuman – and heavily armed.
Though Elena had called them ‘Naga’ so the Jhafi would know what to expect, these creatures named themselves ‘lamia’, from Lantric legend – although that was no more accurate, for they hadn’t been created by gods, but constructed by magi, illegally using Animagery to blend men and reptiles in a bid to make better soldiers.
l still can’t believe my wayward nephew is responsible for me having an Inquisition windship full of escaped constructs at my beck and call, she thought, and offered up a heartfelt, Thank you, Alaron!
