Now they were her constant companions, moving on a spectrum somewhere between friend and pet. Sometimes she thought they were smarter than her and other times they acted as if they were even younger than her sibs. She looked over to see one of the Nif taunting the empty cart that still followed her. Finally the cart lost its patience and shot toward the Nif. Lil watched them take off around a corner and shook her head. The two other uninvolved Nif exploded into their whistling laughter.
She wasn’t worried. Nif couldn’t really be hurt and they wouldn’t harm Athenaeum property. She came to the main foyer and hurried down the stone steps. Bookshelves extended like wings from the bottom of the stairs and circled most of the room. The center space was filled with glass cases holding the fragile books that had not yet been recopied, or that they were forbidden to recopy at all.
Giant doors loomed at the other side of the room. Twelve feet high, made of steel and glass, layered and twisted around each other. She could feel the Babel carved into the steel bones of them as she got closer, a shiver along her spine, an electric spark over her skin. The doors were not flat but twisted into peaks and valleys; ridges and divots caught the light of Yanwan, the setting sun, held it, shattered it, and made the door look alive.
They weren’t formed to look like anything specific that she could discover, because every angle showed something different. Sometimes it was an Ante, or the skyline of Zebub, sometimes a mating run of crike or a map of all Corpiliu, sometimes a wing of dragons coming to carry her away.
And rarely, very rarely, she would catch glimpse of an odd shape, one that twisted in on itself, trying to break free. She took it to be the written form of Babel, the living language. She could almost recognize them from the way the shapes had burned her throat and she studied these the hardest, trying to keep perfectly still so the vision would linger. The written form of the language had been lost since before the Athenaeum Wars, and examples were few and far between.
Tonight as she came closer the door looked to her like Zebub, the streets laid out before her in metal and glass, except that something was different. As the buildings began to fade with her movement she finally figured it out: everything looked ready to buckle and crumble. As if the whole city was in the process of breaking down.
Then it was gone, the angle of the light changing in her headlong rush to the door.
Even as she struggled to shake the image from her mind another feeling filled her, shivered across her raw and sensitive tongue. Anxiety. The closer she got to the door, the more sure she was that someone was waiting on the other side. There were only two reasons someone would be waiting outside the door instead of announcing themselves.
A ’dant who was being pursued might not want the bells that rang through the city to announce his request for sanctuary. Lil finally reached the doors and pulled them open. That was probably all it was, someone looking for protection. It was always bad when the Athenaeum was under siege but simple enough for Holder Mayer to smuggle them out to another city where he had contacts.
As she placed her hands on the door, heat flared in her body; her mouth began to salivate heavily, and she swallowed. The door slid open smoothly even as she heard the footsteps behind her and realized that Holder Mayer was on his way.
Still, she hoped her prediction was accurate.
Only as she opened the door to reveal the three Antes did she face the truth of it.
The one in the center was tall, even taller than it appeared, since it was crouched down on a dozen stick-thin legs that ended in sharp points, moving and clacking on the stone. Its torso flared up and out from the point all the legs met, like a flat triangle, into two pointed shoulders. From each of the pointed shoulders, mouths opened and closed as if they longed to speak, and just below each shoulder three upper limbs sprouted, all of them ending differently—hands, pincers, and something like proto-wings. Its head sprouted from between the shoulders from a single point to a triangle, a miniature version of its torso from which two golden eyes looked out, its mouth an almost unidentifiable vertical slash. Small but sharp spines covered the top of its head and the back, almost like hair.
Its skin was a deep, dark red that pulsed and shifted in her sight.
She turned her attention to its two companions, standing on either side. They looked more like ’dants—like her—but so pale she could see the tracery of purple and black veins below their skin.
Belatedly she realized she was standing in the door staring at them, Holder Mayer coming up behind her.
“Fair Night!” she blurted as she backed into Mayer and dipped into a bow.
Holder Mayer did the same, except without the edge of panic to his voice or movements.
“Fair night to you all.”
A chorus of voices answered. “Foul may it fall on your enemies.”
She rose from her bow and moved to the side with Mayer to allow them entrance. She averted her eyes from the Ante in the lead, turning to the ’dant-looking retainers, who were easier to handle. Still, Lil had not missed the sash of office it wore.
The two could have been twins, their features even and the same. Too smooth though, as if their faces were not done, a carving only half-complete. They had the same twisted braids of blue and purple sprouting from their heads. They wore only pants, their torsos and feet bare. Aside from the skin color, the odd wrinkle that adorned their foreheads, and the circular markings that ran down their torsos, they could be any of those who lived in the same building as her parents.
They entered and arrayed themselves behind the other Ante.
Bodyguards?
Mayer’s voice was smooth and his hand on her back calmed her even further.
“How may we be of service to a Queen of the Ruling Courts?”
Lil nodded, again looking at the sash wound around its torso that proclaimed Chayyliel not only the newest Queen of the Ruling Courts but also Head of the House of the Long Arm. The symbol for a Queen, the circle pierced by the eleven spikes, each representing a Court, done in bright silver rather than the usual rainbow, was in ascendance over the symbol of its House—an impossibly long arm knotted around itself in stylized black. Chayyliel spoke for its Court right now.
“We would speak with you, Holder.” The mouths on Chayyliel’s shoulders whispered echoes along with its voice. Lil looked at the other Antes and saw their pants carried the Ruling Courts circle design in its normal rainbow, the circle itself black and the silver spike pointed upward, twice as large as the rest to show their allegiance. Members of Chayyliel’s Court.
They both watched her back, eyes like nothing she had ever seen, a continuous spiral of color, slowly darkening from yellow to gold to black and back again. She slid closer to Holder Mayer. This was what she had been trained for, for twelve long cycles she had studied.
Why did she feel so ill-prepared?
“Very well. Come into my office. My Apprentice will bring tea.”
None of them looked at her as they turned away, and she took a calming breath. She hurried back upstairs to the office to prepare the tray. The Nif who had disappeared as the doors opened reappeared at her feet, following, leaping about, piping in their soft unintelligible voices.
“Yeah, you all were very helpful.”
The pitch of the piping changed to one she decided was apology.
“I know. I know. You guys don’t like Antes but I have to deal with them. It’s my job and I have to do better.”
The piping became comforting as they entered the office.
“Thanks, but that doesn’t change how I froze.”
They whistled and clustered around her feet as she set up the tray. Speaking to the Nif had become habit at this point. She was always careful to let no one catch her. Like speaking to the mizzene at her parent’s apartment, it tended to make people uncomfortable. They were a comfort—Holder Mayer did not speak much except during lessons so Lil often conversed with the Nif, learning her own mind by what came out.
“Do you guys
remember the first time I did this?” She had no idea if these were the same Nif as twelve cycles ago, knew nothing about their life span. No one did, and all attempts to research it had led nowhere at all. Still she treated them as if they remembered and took their long high-pitched group whistle as agreement. The small teapot they used already sat in the heat bowl.
She opened the lid, adding the water and leaves. The bowl immediately reacted and began to heat and steep the beverage.
The set was yellowed with age. Mayer said it had been pure white in his great-great-grandfather’s time, when aspaks roamed the outskirts of cities freely. Before they were pushed farther into the wastes. Small bumps that had once been vestigial teeth now lined the cups and were purported to purify any poison they came into contact with. Using it would show good faith, that they had no intention of violence.
She turned to the back of the office. The serving table she wanted was in the corner, growling to itself. She whistled to it, a tune of coaxing, no Babel this time but one of the lesser magics, just a hint of calm. The table was the fancier sort and not often used, so it had gone a bit feral in the meantime.
It came forward cautiously but relaxed once it saw the tray in her hands. The faded yellow of the tray looked lovely and stark against the warm gold and crystal of the serving table. The table growled a little as she placed her hand on the front handle, but it let her lead it from the room. They hurried to the meeting room, the Nif around her melting away the closer she got.
The Queen, the two companions, and Holder Mayer were all staring at her as she entered. Her nerves returned but she sucked in a deep breath.
“Tea.” She guided the table forward to the center and took the empty seat next to Holder Mayer as her own. She met his expressionless face with a placid mask and accepted the small nod of approval.
Chayyliel broke the silence in that same odd echoing voice. “So it has been decided.”
Holder Mayer’s head snapped around. “Nothing has been decided as of yet.”
The Holder sounded firm and strong in a way Lil had never heard before, even at his most angry. Even that time she’d knocked over that shelf of older texts and one had broken into tiny fragments and dust.
Chayyliel and Holder Mayer locked their gazes. Lil faintly felt the very building still and pay closer attention as the Holder called on it. Lil only had a small echo of the Holder’s connection with Kandake, so she could not communicate with the Athenaeum yet. It felt warm like honey, but fleeting, not yet hers, she was only vaguely aware of when Mayer called on it.
Chayyliel’s two drones watched her and she met their gaze with blankness, no longer shocked or off-center. Looking closer, she saw the blue and purple that exploded from their heads was not hair but something artificial screwed into their skulls. Chayyliel’s blended voice broke the staring contest.
“The invitation has already been sent. The terms agreed to.”
“Without my consent.” The building pulsed around them and the two drones looked nervous. As well they should be. To challenge a Holder in their Athenaeum was close to suicide even for an Ante. Being Head and Queen meant almost nothing in these walls.
“I have acknowledged the debt.” Chayyliel’s echoing voice came together on that, firm and unyielding.
Holder Mayer nodded but Lil could see the reluctance in it.
“And if you choose to have her stay you will lose face with your compatriots.”
The nod this time was quick and angry. “Yes, how neatly you’ve manipulated this.”
Chayyliel said nothing, simply waiting.
“Lil, you will be going home for the night.”
She blinked but otherwise did not allow the surprise to show. “It is my duty to be beside you. To learn.”
“All true. However, this evening is not one you will witness. I shall tell you everything when you return in the morning.”
Lil was the one to nod reluctantly now. She rarely returned to her parents’ apartment to sleep, instead staying in one of the sleeping rooms in the lower levels of the Athenaeum. She went once a six-day to spend some—supervised—time with her sibs and have an awkward and boring dinner with her family. Watching her parents’ gratefulness war with the fear and hate was not her idea of a fun evening at home.
“There are many things afoot. Thiot shall carry you home and bring you back in the morning.”
She stood and bowed to the Queen. Holder Mayer stood as well and for the first time she noticed she was now taller than him; it was only by a hair but it made something in her stomach churn. She had no idea why, though, the Holder placed his hand on her upper arm. The silent reminder was unnecessary; she would not question him further in front of company. To question was part of being a Holder, but not at the cost of showing weakness.
One of her first lessons—never show weakness to others whether they be allies, enemies, or something in between, because those categories shift on whims and winds.
“Go to the side entrance, Thiot shall be waiting for you—”
“No.” The multitoned voice of Chayyliel spoke from behind Holder Mayer. “Arel and Jagi will accompany her home. They will make sure she gets there safely on my personal crike.”
Holder Mayer turned back to the Queen. “I would not like them to miss any of the discussion.”
“They will not miss a thing.”
There was no elaboration on this and Holder Mayer drew in a breath.
“Swear on your House or Court that they will safely conduct her home and leave her there.”
“I swear on the House of the Long Arm.”
Some of the tension left the Holder but not all of it. He held Chayyliel’s gaze, searching, before turning back to her.
“Go with them. I will tell you all in the morning.”
The two pale ones rose and moved to either side of her. She nodded at the Holder and walked with them back to the large front doors, now open to the night breeze. Small packs of Nif scattered at their approach. They emerged onto one of the larger ’dant market-circles, bursting with last frantic activity before everyone went home for the night.
At no signal that Lil could hear or see from her companions, one of the sleekest crikes she’d ever seen scuttled up to them. Its carapace was a slick red that reflected the dying sun’s light beautifully; its six legs were a matte black other than the thick bristly white hairs which spiraled up and down them.
Its eyeless face twisted their way and it extended its front leg into a slope for them to climb. Lil paused but the Antes—she had to remember they were Antes, despite their ’dant-like appearance—were clearly waiting for her. She stepped into the bend of its claw and grabbed the first hair. She was used to such travel aboard Thiot, though he was much smaller and not as geneered, so she climbed upward and swung through the neck opening into the first section of the crike’s thorax. She settled on one of the bones shaped like reclining seats, the Antes settling across from her.
“Where do you live?”
Lil did not catch which of them had spoken.
“At the Athenaeum.” She considered simply stopping there, but she wanted to continue this conversation. A Holder learned whenever they could from whoever they could. “My family lives in the Court of Sorrow and Riches district.”
They nodded, not quite in unison, and the crike began to move.
“What are your names?”
The one on her right smiled. “You may call us Arel and Jagi.”
“And your bloodline?” She treaded on rudeness to ask so bluntly, but there was no time for subtlety; the crike was moving through the city at too fast a clip.
“Many names.” The one on the right again, his smile growing broader, revealing even, stone gray teeth.
Lil refrained from rolling her eyes. Of course, the first Ante she had the chance to question would be a radical. She cared not for controversial theories of divergent bloodlines; she wanted to know what she was dealing with.
“Bloodline Tlazolteotl was the name we we
re born to,” the one on the left answered.
Lil nodded in thanks.
Tlazolteotl, the eater of filth, corrupter and purifier both. She wondered how their blood expressed but it would be beyond rude into dangerous territory to ask. So she changed the subject and tried to question why they’d come to the Athenaeum, but they talked in circles.
Whenever one spoke of Chayyliel or their Court, revealing nothing she did not already know, she would look to the other for any nonverbal clues, but their opposite was always staring off into space. She wondered if they might share one mind? Some other bloodlines had group minds but it would seem to make them inconvenient bodyguards if only one could function at a time.
Were they listening to something else?
Were they reading her mind?
Telepathic abilities were rare in Tlazolteotl but not unheard of.
Or were they listening to their Queen?
She glanced out of the hole in the crike’s carapace, down, down, down at its long spindly legs deftly moving without spearing any of the ’dants or small personal crikes scurrying about. It minced delicately between buildings and through alleys. They were discussing the welcoming parade in a couple months for the delegation from Ghinai when they passed Hypatia Athenaeum, the burns on the walls evidence of a war that they refused to erase.
“They have been most resistant.” Lil’s head turned when she realized it had been two voices for the first time since the ride began. She met their gazes and saw that not only were both her companions present, but they had moved from their seats while she was distracted. They now bracketed her, all of them looking out at Hypatia as they passed.
What did it mean? Both watched her, waiting for a response of some sort. She settled on, “To what?” wondering if the conversation at the Athenaeum was over, if they were finally going to tell her something worthwhile.
The Root Page 4
