The Flight from Kar (The Emperor's Library

by Frederick Kirchhoff

  “I do,” Karl replied.

  “And do your brothers think the same?” Peter looked at John when he asked this question.

  “Yes,” John replied. “Wouldn’t you say so, David?”

  “I don’t always agree with Karl’s worst-case scenarios,” David said, “but this time I fear he’s right, so I’d say yes, too.”

  “Then let’s hear what happened.”

  “Karl, tell us about your journey to Bridgetown,” Ethel concurred. “Helen and I want to hear everything.”

  Karl leaned forward in his chair and looked up and down the table into each face. Jon saw he was relishing this moment.

  “As you feared, Grandfather, the Prefect did not appear. We waited four weeks for him—that’s why we’ve been away so long—but he never came. Yet while we waited, we heard rumors explaining his absence. Some say the Emperor has lost interest in the outlying provinces and spends his revenues to strengthen the fortifications of Kar. Others maintain he squanders his wealth in self-indulgence, idling in the company of poets and dancers.

  “But I believe neither story. The Emperor’s palace is already strong, and the walls of Kar are legendary. As for the rumors of pleasure—isn’t that what people always say about their rulers?”

  “They believe such rumors,” John noted, “because that’s what they’d do themselves. It takes imagination to put power to good use, and most have no imagination. For them, the only value of wealth is pleasure.”

  “Possibly,” Karl replied dryly. “I haven’t read all the books you’ve read, John, so I can’t pretend to be an authority on human nature. But I know that the Emperor isn’t a young man. He’s ruled for thirty years at least.”

  “More than thirty,” Peter interjected. “Thirty-four years ago the Prefect announced that a new Emperor had been crowned. I remember the day—a rainy morning in Bridgetown followed by a clear afternoon. People took it as a good omen, but of course it meant nothing of the kind. Weather is weather—that’s all.”

  “So if he’d been a man who cares for pleasure more than duty,” Karl continued, “we’d have seen his character long ago. Men don’t change once they’ve passed the midpoint of life.”

  “Old men can surprise the young,” Peter commented quietly. “And it’s possible to tire of what you’ve done year after year. Remember the adage about the barleycorn that broke the donkey’s back. Still, you’re probably right about the Emperor. If he’s changed, it’s because something has forced him to change.”

  “Karl, if you don’t believe either of the two explanations you just offered, what do you believe?” Helen asked.

  “Yes, what’s the real reason?” Ethel added.

  “The real reason is that a new enemy has risen and his resources are being directed against it.”

  “What enemy could that be?” Peter asked. “No force is strong enough to raise a sword against the Emperor. Centuries ago, there was constant war, but once the Empire was established, it outweighed any possible adversary, so we’ve had peace ever since.”

  “What you say is true, Grandfather,” Karl replied. “However this isn’t an ordinary army, but the followers of a new religion, spurred by a fanatic from the eastern marches who claims that his god has promised him a kingdom on earth.”

  Peter sat back in his chair.

  “His god?”

  “Yes, he claims to be the agent of a supernatural power, Grandfather, and, what’s more disturbing, thousands have taken him at his word.”

  “There’s no underestimating the nonsense people will believe,” Ethel observed.

  “Especially when it gives them an excuse to kill each other,” Helen added.

  “And this madman you describe has frightened the Emperor? I can’t believe it,” Peter said, looking at his two daughters for confirmation.

  “Karl didn’t say he knew this for sure,” David interrupted. “He’s just putting two and two together—rumors of a new religion and the failure of the Prefect to appear.”

  “Yes, that’s exactly it,” Karl said. “From what we heard, the religion is spreading like a disease. A moment ago I said thousands, but I may underestimate the actual numbers. Hundreds of thousands might be more accurate. Or even millions.”

  “But what do these hundreds of thousands have to do with the Bearded Men?” Jon asked.

  “He means the Brotherhood,” John reminded them.

  “I know what he means,” Zoë said. “Remember what I told you, Jon. If they attacked someone on the River Road they must no longer fear the Emperor.”

  “That’s not the only sign something’s wrong,” Karl added. “We bypassed Pex on the way to Bridgetown, but coming home, we stopped there. The new wall now encircles the village, and they plan to build it higher and stronger. They told us that strange people were coming from the North and East, and we saw a few of them on the road.”

  “Is that necessarily bad?” Peter asked. “There’s vacant land here with plenty of water. I’ve never understood why this part of the Empire remains empty. Clear the trees, and you have some of the best farmland on the planet—not that I’d want all the trees cut down.”

  “The wanderers the villagers fear aren’t searching for farmland,” Karl said. “They are men fleeing trouble, and they bring nothing beyond the clothes on their backs. When they’ve appeared, travelers have been importuned for money and there’ve been thefts of livestock. It makes sense for the Pex men to build a wall, if scum like that are abroad.”

  “If they’re hungry, even good men may steal,” Helen said.

  “Perhaps some are what you’d call good men, Mother, but I’d rather starve than steal a crust of bread.”

  “Karl says that because he’s never gone without dinner,” John observed.

  There was a glint of anger in Helen’s reply.

  “No, John. Your brother speaks the words of a man of honor.”

  “Did the villagers say anything about the Brotherhood, Karl?” Ethel asked.

  “No—nothing that we heard?”

  John drummed his fingers quietly on the table. Without realizing it, he’d become the center of attention. Even Karl expected him to speak.

  “It was odd for Jon and Zoë to have seen them where they did. I’ve never heard of the Brotherhood on that part of the River Road,” he said. “That’s what’s hard for me to understand.”

  “Why?” Jon asked.

  “I’m sorry. I should have remembered that you’d have no way to follow what I was saying,” John explained. “Their land lies across the river, on the border of the highlands. Traveling to Bent Lake, they take the road from the East that joins the River Road south of where you and Zoë saw them yesterday.”

  “The road to Gort?” Jon asked.

  “Yes. But to go north, they’d follow a route that joins the River Road at a different place, where there’s a small town and a wooden bridge across the river.”

  “Is that Bridgetown?”

  “No, it’s called Krapàn and, on foot, it’s five days north of Bridgetown. The Brotherhood go there or to one of the towns beyond Krapàn to trade their silver for goods. I’ve never heard of them visiting Bridgetown. As the crow flies, it’s not far from their territory, but mountains block the route. Besides, the Bridgetowners are our kin and that makes them enemies of the Brotherhood.”

  “I know that they wear silver. I’ve seen it.”

  “There are veins of silver east of their main settlement,” Peter explained. “The men scorn work in the fields—women’s work, they call it—but they’re not ashamed to put their hands to metalsmithing, and they make good swords—even Karl would admit that.”

  Peter looked at Karl as if expecting him to confirm this assertion, but Karl remained silent. John meanwhile leaned toward Jon once more to deliver a whispered message.

  “That must be where some of your friends find themselves working—deep in the silver mines. I can’t bear the thought of that happening to you.”

  The Foresters knew a surpr
ising amount about the world, but of course their duty was to find out what was happening around them. Yet how did they live? This small farm wasn’t enough to sustain them—Jon was sure of that. Where did they get the green cloth, for example? Ethel had used it to make his new clothes, but he’d seen no one spinning or weaving here—and what would they have spun or woven it from? The Emperor’s annual payment of twenty-one gold ducats seemed an enormous sum. To his mind, even a single gold ducat was a fortune. So perhaps the Foresters bought most of what they used. But where did they buy it? Certainly not in the forest.

  “But this new religion, Karl. How did you find out about that?” Peter asked.

  “From the merchants. They also confirmed what the villagers had told us about the increase of vagabonds, but they’re not frightened of them—they say there’ve always been odd sorts on the highways. Of course the merchants travel in groups, and most have men-at-arms in their company, so they wouldn’t be worried about a few drifters. An isolated farm family, however, would see things in a different light. They’d look to their chickens—and their daughters.

  “The merchants volunteered little about the new religion, but once we got them started they identified towns that had succumbed to the faith. Trading there required permission from the local teacher. That’s what they call their leaders, and each town has at least one. And there’s also a Great Teacher somewhere, but we could never pin them down about his whereabouts. From what they said, getting a local teacher’s permission to sell in the market entailed paying a bribe, although they never called it that.”

  “A tithe—one of the merchants used that term,” David added. “They’re expected to contribute a percentage of their anticipated profits to the teacher.”

  “In advance?” Helen asked.

  “In advance. And the teacher’s men watch to see what goods they buy and sell. They have spies everywhere.”

  “What happens if they don’t make the expected profit?” Ethel asked.

  “No one told us,” John said. “But I got the impression that once a teacher gets his hands on a thing it’s futile to try getting it back. They claim the money is for the poor, but there’s no evidence it goes anywhere beyond the teacher’s pocket.”

  “What do the merchants think of all this?” Peter asked.

  “They find it more a minor annoyance than anything else. One man called it a cost of doing business and said he added it to his prices, so the customers end up paying. But we couldn’t get any of them to describe the religion itself.”

  “They probably didn’t pay much attention to it,” Ethel said. “Merchants have too much sense to waste their time with foolishness.”

  “Maybe,” John said. “But I sensed they didn’t want to risk any negative comments.”

  “Why would that bother them?” Peter asked. “Everyone knows that religion belongs to a primitive age when we were all like children. You’ve read about that time, haven’t you, John?”

  “Yes. All the histories make a point about how the Emperors replaced superstition with the rule of law. But the authors were writing in support of the Empire. There may have been other opinions that never made it into the books.”

  “Of course, of course,” Peter acknowledged. “There have always been cults. But most people treat them as a harmless eccentricity—the kind of muddle the old fall into when their minds get fuzzy.”

  “Not you, Father,” Ethel interjected. “Not any of the Foresters. We keep our minds sharp to the end.”

  Peter smiled.

  “Let’s hope you’re right, Darling.”

  “But these aren’t old men and old women,” John said. “Remember what Karl said about whole cities converting? I think the merchants are afraid to speak because they aren’t certain whom they can trust. After all, how could they be sure that the three of us weren’t spies ourselves? Green cloth shouldn’t be that hard to come by. And, to be honest, it doesn’t count the way it did in the past.”

  “Do you agree, Karl?” Peter asked.

  “Yes, I agree. The Foresters are no longer respected as we used to be, and followers of this new cult are popping up all over the Empire—sometimes in powerful positions. It’s easy to understand why a merchant would avoid risking their ill will.”

  “Still, I don’t see how what you’ve told us fits together,” Ethel said. “What does religion have to do with the men who’re fleeing south? And how does it explain the absence of the Prefect? Moreover you said that what Zoë and Jon learned about the Brotherhood is another piece in the same puzzle. What’s the connection?”

  “There’s one more thing,” Karl explained. “We spoke to one of the fugitives.”

  He paused, looking around to make sure he held his audience.

  “Tired of waiting, we decided to go for a few days’ journey—as far as Krapàn. We wouldn’t miss the Prefect, since we’d pass him if he were on the road, and we hoped Krapàn would be a good place to gather news, since there’s regular traffic between it and the towns further north, although, as it turned out, we learned little beyond what we’d already heard at Bridgetown. However, one story caught our attention. Weeks earlier, two strangers had appeared begging for food—a woman and her daughter. The woman had once been beautiful—they said you could see that; and the daughter would someday be beautiful—if she could be saved from beggary. Nevertheless, the villagers had ordered them on their way. But an old woman at the edge of town had taken them in. Hearing this story, John wanted to talk to these women, and I agreed to it.”

  “Were they as beautiful as you’d been told?” Zoë asked.

  “I’ll leave the question of their beauty to John. He’s a better judge of such matters. But I can tell you that the mother was very reluctant to answer our questions. She said she wanted to forget the past. Still, John got her to talk—you know the way he has of ingratiating himself with strangers.”

  Karl glanced at Jon as he said that.

  “Tell them what the woman told you, John.”

  “To answer Zoë’s question, both women were indeed beautiful, but the suffering in their eyes made you forget their physical appearance. I interpreted the mother’s reluctance to speak as fear of three strange men, so I asked her to walk outside with me. The old woman had a vegetable patch behind her house; there, the mother and I strolled among the squash and cabbages, talking about weeding and slugs until she opened up and told her story.

  “They came from Varana—a town southeast of Kar. It was one of the first places where the new religion was preached, and many converts were made. Its followers call themselves the Chosen, and one immediate benefit of their faith is that its adherents are no longer obligated to pay tax to the Emperor. That in itself may account for its success among the wealthy. What the others saw in it, she couldn’t explain. But the number of believers increased until they managed to replace the town laws with laws that gave the teacher absolute authority. Restoring the Kingdom of God they called it.

  “What does that mean?” Ethel asked. “How can you restore what never existed in the first place?”

  John smiled.

  “You’d have trouble convincing them of that, I fear,” he told her. “Their account of history is very different from what you can read in the Foresters’ library. They claim that men and women once possessed great powers that were lost with the coming of the Emperors. Just what those powers consisted in neither the woman nor any of the merchants could explain, but the Chosen insist our ancestors lived in an age of wonders that they promise to restore. This is what they mean by the Kingdom of God. It’s all nonsense, of course, but they take it seriously. Perhaps all the more seriously because somewhere in their benighted brains they may fear it’s a lie.”

  “How did you find out so much, John?” David asked.

  Karl looked oddly at John. Jon sensed that this was the first time he had heard some of these things and was annoyed with his brother for holding back information.

  Ethel answered for her nephew.

  �
��You know John’s way of getting people to open up. He’s a marvel at it.”

  “The woman I spoke to had studied the Chosen carefully. And so had her husband. He was an alderman and a respected member of the community, but when his opposition to the new religion became known, rumors circulated that his wealth had its origin in magic and the family found themselves ostracized, even by old friends. One night a crowd gathered before their house, demanding that the husband surrender himself. His wife begged him to refuse, but he feared for the safety of his wife and children. So he gave himself up to the mob, and they dragged him to the town square. There, a tribunal declared him guilty of consorting with demons and condemned him to death by stoning. Furthermore it was also decreed that his son, too, should die, since his father’s blood ran in his veins. He was a boy of twelve.

  “The woman expected that she and her daughter would be the next victims, but they were spared on condition they accept the religion. To save her daughter she did as they asked. Still, she knew they couldn’t remain in Varana. All eyes were on them; one false step, and they were doomed. And so they fled, and eventually, their resources exhausted, they’d reached Krapàn.”

  “And that, Grandfather, is the reason we connect the new religion with the presence of fugitives,” Karl explained. “Events like those the woman described must be taking place in other towns and villages as well.”

  “But that leaves the role of the Brotherhood to explain,” Ethel observed. “What can they have to do with this new religion?”

  “While we were in Krapàn, five members of the Brotherhood arrived and took lodging in the inn where we were staying. They were annoyed to see us, but we kept to ourselves and avoided a quarrel. However, our last morning there, their leader came over to where we were eating breakfast.

  “‘Enjoy your food while you can,’ he said. ‘You Foresters won’t be able to run to the Emperor for protection much longer. Once the army of the Chosen has taken care of him, they’ll put you in your place.’ Then he and the four others left on horseback.

  “The full significance of his words is unclear. None of the merchants had spoken of an army threatening the Emperor, and the Brotherhood enjoy spreading lies. Still, we can’t ignore the possibility that he was telling the truth—and the behavior of the men whom Jon and Zoë saw on the River Road confirms what Karl said a few moments ago: they no longer fear the laws of the Emperor.”