by Brent Weeks
One thousand three. One thousand—
Kip hugged Teia to himself, and hopped off the edge of the tower.
Teia hugged him hard with her arms and legs as they fell, eyes squeezed tight shut. They fell and fell—and then swooshed out over the Chromeria’s wall, and out over the sea, together.
She looked up, stunned. Kip had drafted a simple loop of solid yellow luxin over the cable, and doubled the bar they were sitting on. He swapped spectacles and drafted a steady stream of orange for lubrication where yellow luxin scraped over steel cable. They were emitting a constant stream of yellow sparks, but it would hold. It would hold long enough.
Teia looked at Kip, wide-eyed. Then she squeezed him hard again, but this time with glee. In the perfect light of early morning, they flew over the sea and shoreline. They flew over Sapphire Bay. They flew over the morning parades and luxin fireworks. Teia waved to the bewildered crowds, and many waved back, laughing.
Whites fly, too, indeed.
The cable passed over the east side of Big Jasper, high over houses and warehouses and ships and the wall.
Teia looked at Kip, and he looked at her. She was glowing with joy and morning light, her skin radiant, her eyes holding a million colors Kip had never seen. And they were flying, and they were holding each other, and they were safe, and they were alive, and they were breathing pure glory, and Orholam’s Eye gazed on them with the approval that only young lovers know, and in that moment Kip knew the difference between love and infatuation, and love and hunger, and love and the longing not to go unloved. And he wanted to know nothing more than this, and he wanted this moment to freeze forever and thought to cease.
He kissed her. And she kissed him. And it was infatuation, and it was hunger, and it was longing to be loved, and it was an all-consuming fire so hot it devoured worry and loneliness and fear and time and being and thought itself. They kissed, embracing, flying, and for a hundred heartbeats, there was no war, no death, no pain, nothing hard, nothing terrible, nothing but warmth and acceptance.
And as they slowed, nearing the end of their flight, when Kip pulled away from her at last, and gazed again into her eyes, he knew he was lost in her. And he knew at last the difference between love and necessity.
Chapter 95
“This convocation is now in session,” High Luxiat Amazzal said. “None may enter. None may leave.” Karris wondered if, out of all the High Luxiats, they’d chosen Amazzal solely for his voice. He had a great booming, deep, powerful voice. Maybe the voice and the beard. He had a braided beard in the Atashian style. It was enormous and perfectly white, woven with white silk thread and pearl beads.
With a gravitas that imbued even simple actions with meaning, he held up the end of a thick iron chain. Half a dozen young luxiats were holding coils and coils of the stuff. It was a single, long chain. Unhurriedly, he walked to the main doors and wrapped the chain around the handles, rattling and clanking. There was some sound there that set off Karris’s Blackguard senses. But maybe it was just thinking of Gavin being in such chains. Gavin, here. Home again. Gavin, her love, perhaps broken.
A young assistant brought High Luxiat Amazzal an enormous lock, and he snapped it on. He repeated this at each of the doors, unwinding the chain from each relieved young luxiat’s arms, walking to each, taking his time, and winding the chain securely. By the time he reached the last door, the last assistant was trembling with fatigue. He was sweating, clearly terrified he would shame himself by dropping the chain.
Finally, they came back up the side aisle, fully encircling the nobles and drafters seated in the audience hall.
Karris realized she was supposed to be praying. She was off kilter still. Seeing her son—her son?—had been more of a shock than she’d thought it would be. He was staring at her, too.
But he wasn’t only staring. He was wearing a crown. Her son had been made Prism-elect. Karris hadn’t imagined that Andross Guile would demand that a new Prism-elect be named, not while his own son was Prism. That would have meant a loss of power for his family. Unthinkable. Or at least it should have meant a loss of power for the Guiles. Karris knew Andross wouldn’t have given such power to Kip. Andross didn’t hold Kip, didn’t control him. Not yet, though no doubt he was working on that.
But this was altogether unforeseen. A failure of intelligence, in both senses of the term.
Andross had another Guile in play: Zymun. And he’d kept him out of sight until the moment came to play him. Karris hadn’t even known that Andross knew she had a son. He hadn’t only known it; he’d insinuated himself into Zymun’s life somehow. The only thing worse than having to face her abandoned son was to face him after Andross had picked him up like an abandoned toy and taken ownership of him.
She couldn’t think about this now. She didn’t even recognize this ceremony, and somehow she was sitting in the front row.
Damn, her whole side hurt from that idiotic dive into the water. Tomorrow she wasn’t going to be able to get out of bed, she was sure of it.
But sitting here in front, she couldn’t even try to massage her shoulder. If only Lord Bran Spreading Oak didn’t like her so much. He was old now, but still perfectly genteel. She’d known the Spreading Oaks since she was a girl. Back then they’d had six sons. One had become a Prism, briefly. All were dead now: raiders, fever, the wars. When she was twelve and thirteen years old, Lord Bran had hoped she’d marry his youngest, Gracchos. He’d been a kind boy, more poet than warrior.
He’d died a hero’s death that had accomplished nothing in a battle that hadn’t settled anything.
Karris looked back to Zymun. She couldn’t help it. Was there something about him that drew the eye like iron to lodestone or was it only her? No, no. He was very handsome. He was Prism-elect. Everyone was at least glancing at him frequently. But only Karris stared with her gut churning.
She looked away, to the other Colors sitting on the platform with him. Delara Orange looked sober for the first time in months that Karris could remember. Karris’s eye was drawn to the two she didn’t know: Caelia Green and Cathán Sub-red. The dwarf Caelia Green of new Tyrea seemed like she could be a natural ally. Gavin would need those in the days to come. Karris should have already made her acquaintance. Cathán Golden Briar was the newest Color, stepping into Arys Sub-red’s place after she had died in childbirth. Cathán was a cousin of both Arys Greenveil and Ela Jorvis, and therefore to Ana Jorvis, whom Gavin had thrown off his balcony, albeit accidentally.
If Karris had been looking for someone to look at who would set her mind at ease, she was looking in the wrong place. She looked back at Zymun, and away again. Dear Orholam.
One time when she and Gavin had been hunting a sub-red wight, they’d come upon a family that had fought the wight briefly and chased it away. Through dinner, the father had acted strangely, but denied he was hurt. The next morning, he stood up and screamed. He’d taken a flame crystal in the groin. It had unmanned him, and ashamed, he’d hidden the injury. The flame crystal had cauterized the wound closed—until infection made the skin burst apart when he stood, spurting blood and pus everywhere. He’d died, of course. They wouldn’t have been able to save him even if they’d known.
Looking at Zymun, she felt like that. Stomach diseased, like a grotesque pregnancy. Sixteen years of shame and failure had distended her belly, filled her with poison.
Is not the one test of a mother how well she cares for her child? Karris had abandoned this boy. She’d not taken him once to her breast. Hadn’t even looked at him, as if he were a monster, or worse, as if in looking at him, she would love him.
And now, she was looking at him, and it was too late. Her heart was dead.
Success, Karris. Your fears were unfounded. You are colder and harder than you knew.
But the ache in her stomach only got worse. She couldn’t look at Zymun. She needed her head in this, and it wasn’t.
She knew it was kind for Lord Spreading Oak to give her his seat, but she wished he hadn’t. She
felt exposed up here. People were looking at her as if they expected her to do something. They didn’t know about Zymun, did they?
“Child,” High Luxiat Amazzal repeated. He was looking at Karris.
Now everyone was looking at Karris.
“Yes?” she asked.
“Please come forward.”
She blinked, trying to remember what he’d been preaching about. She had no idea. Surely he didn’t know, did he? Was he going to shame her publicly? For simply not paying attention? Surely not.
She stood and moved forward with all the grace she could muster.
The High Luxiat gestured her to stand in a place off to his left, but as Karris was walking, she saw a muscle twitch in Andross Guile’s jaw. A wave of relief swept over her. She didn’t know what was happening, but if Andross was angry about it, she wasn’t about to be shamed. She took her spot, and finally, finally started thinking.
“Ismene Crassos,” the High Luxiat said. A middle-aged noblewoman stood from one of the other front seats and walked up to a place beside Karris. From the row behind her, her horse-faced cousin Aglaia beamed with pride.
One by one, the High Luxiat said the names of those seated in the front row, and each came to stand in line. “Eva Golden Briar. Naftalie Delara.”
Next would be Jason Jorvis, then Akensis Azmith, and Croesos Ptolos last.
Karris knew them all. Some from her time as a discipula, others only by reputation. All were drafters. Each was from either a prominent family or a formerly prominent one. Even she counted as the latter, she supposed. But she shouldn’t be here with these people.
And before the last name was even announced, Karris knew why they were here. She almost gasped aloud, though if she’d been paying attention to the ceremony, it would have been obvious. But what was she doing here?
If she had been putting together the lists, every seat was acceptable but hers. Drafters from the most important families among the satrapies that were still standing, with a special concentration on Ruthgar and Paria. Karris’s seat should have been held by a Malargos, but with Tisis gone, it had reverted to Lord Spreading Oak, who was as weak a blue drafter as one could be and still pass the test. It was why he’d survived into old age—he never drafted. Didn’t see the need.
They weren’t here for a sermon.
“Lords and ladies,” High Luxiat Amazzal said, “I present you with the cream of the Seven Satrapies. I present you with your finest, the seven candidates from whom Orholam will choose a new White.”
The room broke out into applause, but it was a fierce, competitive applause. There were factions here.
They were here to select a new White. The pool was selected by the High Luxiats, but the White was selected by Orholam himself, in a casting of lots.
But Karris? What—
‘There isn’t always a grand design,’ the White had said. It was exactly the kind of wordplay she loved. It seemed a denial, but it wasn’t one, was it? That there isn’t always a grand design doesn’t mean that there isn’t a grand design this time.
The White had been a discipula with Bran Spreading Oak, ages and ages ago. They were good friends. Bran deserved a seat at the front but could be overlooked because he was so old. If he were made the White, he would only last a year or two, surely. Thus he became a nullity in Andross Guile’s plan, whatever that plan was. But by Bran’s waiting until the ceremony was under way to vacate his seat and give it to Karris, there was nothing Andross Guile could do about it.
Then, moments later, they’d been locked in here. Not even slaves were allowed to come or go.
The White had arranged for Karris to be here.
All her tutelage was for this. The dozens of minor missions in years past. The possible suicide mission in Tyrea. The slow takeover of the White’s spy network. Those tests that Karris had seen as so harsh, so unnecessary, were harsh and unnecessary—for any position less than the White. Which meant that the White had wanted Karris to be her successor—no, that thought was too grandiose, too arrogant, too presumptuous.
And yet here she stood.
The White had wanted Karris to be the next White.
Perhaps Karris wasn’t the White’s only choice, though. Five of the seven standing here might be the White.
But as Karris looked around, she was pretty sure that wasn’t the case. That was Andross Guile’s kind of strategy: buy everyone, so whoever wins, you win. The White gambled differently; she put all her money on the long odds. Orea Pullawr had wanted Karris to be the next White.
Karris’s eyes started leaking. She couldn’t stop it. That irascible old woman had even apologized for it beforehand.
The White had been teaching Karris to take over, all this time. And Karris had never seen it? That didn’t bode well for how good of a White she would be, did it?
We all have our blind spots, but pity her whose blind spot is a person. Karris had had two—the White, whom she’d underestimated but loved, and Gavin, whom she’d underestimated and come to love when she stopped underestimating him. It was by Orholam’s grace alone that both of her blind spots had been good to her.
Karris had only one chance in seven to fulfill the White’s wishes. And suddenly, she wanted it with half her heart.
No one sane could want to be the White. But Karris could want Andross Guile’s puppet not to be the White. If she was the only stumbling block in his way, so be it.
If it be your will, Orholam, use me.
But how could she do it? Had the White been trusting Orholam to take Karris the rest of the way?
And there it was again. A distant sound that made Karris’s ears perk up. The first had been louder, but it had been buried under the rattling of the chains. A musket shot. There were multiple shots, muffled by the thick doors and thick stone, coming from another floor, perhaps? Or was she hearing the shots through the window? Was someone out on a balcony several floors down celebrating Sun Day?
It was, of course, forbidden to celebrate in such a way, but that didn’t stop many people on Big Jasper. It did, however, usually stop people within the Chromeria itself. Karris looked over at the Black, who was seated in the second row, but Carver Black didn’t appear to have heard the shots, or he was a better pretender than she’d ever guessed.
Andross on the other hand … Andross was the ultimate in pretense, in misdirection. Karris stared at him, though he shared the dais with her, and staring was obvious. What did she care? It wasn’t like they could take away her candidacy because she was socially awkward.
And then she saw it. She didn’t know why this should be the first time. She’d seen Gavin operate a thousand times a thousand—but Gavin had always been a special case. Now she saw power for what it meant to her. To her, it meant not just operating outside the social norms—she always had—it meant flouting them. It meant staring at a man past the time it was acceptable to stare, and instead of feeling awkward, making everyone else feel it. That mastery, that freedom at the expense of others, was intoxicating.
For one who had always had an affinity for the blue virtues of order and harmony and setting a plate exactly according to some point-book written by some long-dead prince of the punctilious pompacio, power was a revelation. Power, not for others, but for her.
And the heart of intoxication is toxic.
Andross Guile looked back at her calmly. He didn’t seem angry. It was a feeling, an intuition, rather than any hint of expression. He had an air of expectation. And an expectation, for Andross Guile, was an expectation of victory. He was patient because he was going to win.
Karris smiled at him, smiled like she knew the game, like she loved that he thought he was going to win, smiled like she was better than he was. He blinked, then, the barest flicker of doubt. She ducked her head demurely and smiled on sweet secrets.
He had a plan. Damn. Andross Guile wasn’t a man to leave anything to chance. He wasn’t going to take a chance, not even a six-to-one chance. Even if he owned all of the other six, he would have
a favorite.
But how would he cheat? The ceremony must surely be designed to making cheating impossible.
But Andross Guile knew exactly what those safeguards were. Or who.
Karris looked at the High Luxiat Amazzal. Was he part of it?
“Orholam, all-mighty Lord of Lords,” he said. “Look upon us. Highest Lord and Highest God, thee we beseech. Look upon our efforts and bless them with thy light, thy life, thy favor. This day, Orholam, Lord and High King, Emperor of Emperors, Balancer of Scales, Mighty and Just, Honorable and Pure, Awesome in Power, Wholesome in Mercy, we seek your will and not our own. We seek this day your White, your light, your antidote to night. We, your satrapies, ask your hand to rest lightly on us, lightly on obedient hearts that need only prompting, not compulsion, only guidance, for it is thy purpose which we seek to serve, and not our own. We praise thee, Lord of Luxlords, Light of Nations, Voice in the Stillness, Guide to the Blind, and Path of Mercy to the Benighted. See and move, O God.” Each time he said ‘God’ he gave it the traditional moment of hesitation, of respect. It was a measure of his piety or simply his experience that he made the traditional seem vibrant, like he himself thought even this measure of respect was perhaps too little.
“Candidates,” he said, “come forward. From this time forward, drafting is forbidden. Drafting is an imposition of our will upon the world. Any who draft or who accept another’s drafting on their behalf will be disqualified and executed as a heretic. Understood? If so, repeat, ‘Under the Un-deceivable Eye of Orholam, I understand and I agree.’”
They did so, in unison. Then they followed him to a circle on the floor. Young luxiats carried folding screens out for each of them and set them up quickly. Karris’s luxiat was a pimply, blushing young man of no more than eighteen.
The High Luxiat spoke now only for their ears. “The ceremony must be unimpeachable. Thus, because in years long past others have attempted to destroy the sanctity of it, we have put safeguards in place. No lenses. No mirrors. No jewelry. No strips of cloth in your color. Nothing. Even your hair will be covered. In order to assure all that you are obeying these injunctions, you will strip, be searched, and be given identical garments, randomly assigned, all under the eyes of the Blackguards, luxiats, and each other. No exceptions. Even a White submits. If you object to these rules, you may remove yourself from consideration now. If you don’t object now, and are found violating the rules, you’ll be executed by Orholam’s Glare. You understand?”
