by Dave Duncan
The old mating magic was working again. Dantio would never experience it, but he had seen it happen many times. Two people could not shed their clothing and normal dignity, embrace each other in the most intimate ways possible, rollick like small children while performing the most adult of actions and exulting in the most potent of pleasures—not without being changed and bonded by common memories. Two personal walls had been breached and joined, so that now a single wall enclosed them both, shutting out the world.
The others instinctively spread around the table, choosing a side apiece. It was a very large table, able to seat the whole council, and with a mere six people they were spread far apart.
Cavotti looked very tired. He smiled his ogreish smile. (contentment)
“I apologize for taking so long to find time for you. This get-together should have happened much sooner, but you know what has delayed me, or some of it. I have promises to make to all of you. You, Oliva, will have equal precedence with my mother, and your children will outrank my brothers. That includes you, Chies. Second, a new doge must confirm his predecessors’ land grants, meaning your appanages, although I expect most of you don’t even know about those. Wife?”
Smiling happily, Fabia took over. “Mama, on your marriage you were granted an estate at Lacema, a short distance down river from Celebre, so we understand. Is it sufficient for you? Have its revenues suffered from the war?”
“I honestly do not know, dear,” Oliva said. “In the last year I have had no time to visit it or talk with the tallymen.”
“Please do both and let us know your wishes. Marno will grant whatever support you need to maintain yourself in proper state. Celebre owes you that and much more. Also, choose suitable quarters in the palace to be your city home.”
Oliva expressed gratitude, while emitting waves of alternating happiness and loss.
Marno was enjoying himself, sharing out the spoils of war. “Also, my lady, I am appointing you to the council, as deputy-president. We need your wisdom and experience. Is there anything we have overlooked?”
“No, no! You are most generous.”
“Dantio, your appanage at …” Fabia saw him shake his head.
“No?” “No. My lady, my lord, I cannot own land. The use of a room in the palace when I am in the city—that I would appreciate. Possibly a small pension if the Eldest does not accept me into the Florengian cult, but no more than that. I am very grateful for your offer and for your generosity to my mother.”
Cavotti frowned. “You could be invaluable to me and my government.”
“I betrayed my oaths once, but I am still bound by them, my lord. I must witness and not meddle.”
(annoyance, disappointment) “Very well. Carry on, Dogaressa.” Fabia turned to Orlad (caution) and spoke in Vigaelian. “Packleader Orlad … You wish to remain Orlad or revert to Orlando? Orlad, then. You were granted an apanage called Guiniama. Go and visit it, then come and report to me or Marno. If it is insufficient, or has been wasted by the Vigaelians, we shall find you another.”
Orlad said, “Thank you.” (envy—that should be me wearing purple)
“Marno very much wants to have you as leader of the city host, a job he feels should be held by a member of the family. He promises to promote you as soon you have proved yourself, and to appoint you to the council at that time.”
“My lord is very kind,” Orlad growled in Florengian. (distrust, pleasure) “You amply earned it all.”
Marno turned to look at Chies. (abhorrence!) Dantio was startled by the intensity of the doge’s hatred. And Fabia, too? Her smile at their half-brother concealed intense distrust and suspicion. Judging the situation only as a Witness and not as a family member, Dantio would conclude that Chies Celebre was in grave danger of his life.
What had changed? At Veritano Cavotti had been openly contemptuous of the boy, while in secret regretting the need to bully him. Indeed, his hidden sympathy for Chies had been the most startling of many startling things Dantio had noted about him, qualities unexpected in a Werist. At Veritano Fabia had not faked her support for her half-brother. Why had he suddenly fallen so drastically in their estimation? How had he alienated them both so quickly?
He obviously knew whatever was going through the ducal minds, for his polished, boyish smile hid screaming terror and murderous hatred. Mother of Lies! How was a boy like him managing to dissimulate so skillfully?
“Lord Chies,” Fabia said with careful formality, “you should have been sworn in as an adult citizen last New Year. The person responsible for your absence—” She shot a smile at her husband. “—regrets the inconvenience. He has ordered the chief priest to arrange a private ceremony, for you alone. Congratulations on reaching your majority, brother.”
Chies thanked doge and dogaressa profusely. (contempt, distrust)
“Congratulations,” Orlad said.
Chies turned the same false smile on him. “Thank you, too, packleader.” In perfect Vigaelian, he added, “Does this mean that you don’t want to tear my head off any more, brother?” (detestation)
“Not as much, anyway.” (scorn)
“Stop that, both of you!” Oliva shouted, but she was registering (fear) in addition to (anger), so even an extrinsic could sense the festering distrust.
Her outburst stopped the sniping. Everyone smiled as if they had been joking, and yet the emotional firestorm raged unabated. Orlad disliked the youth, both personally and as evidence of his mother’s abuse by Stralg. His feelings were nothing compared to the hatred of Fabia and Cavotti. Chies, however, seemed to hate Orlad most, the man who had slain his real father.
So?
So there was no proof and never could be proof as the Maynists knew it, but adding up what Dantio had seen that morning, plus whatever had aroused such emotion in Fabia and that peculiar story of the escape from Veritano, there was good reason to suspect Chies Celebre of being a Chosen. Less evidence than that had sent many to living graves.
“Doge Piero,” Marno told the boy, “deeded you an appanage at Fauniani. You know it?”
“No, my lord. Papa never thought it safe for me to visit it.”
“It isn’t safe now, but I am sure that won’t stop you, so ask one of the huntleaders for an escort. And you may keep your present quarters, here in the palace.”
Chies was being treated with astonishing generosity—most people in Celebre would agree with Orlad’s first thought on meeting the Stralg bastard, that his head should be removed right away. Chies was thanking the ducal pair, and so was Oliva, and all was sweetness and light on the surface. Underwater the sharks still circled.
Dantio shivered. It was past time that he left. He had broken his oaths once and could not expect a second forgiveness. Never meddle, never warn. He must leave Fabia and Orlad to fight their own battles, or rather he must leave Fabia to fight them. Orlad was a spectacular killing machine, but he wouldn’t have a hope against a Chosen, no matter how weedy and harmless the brat looked.
THE STRANGER
disembarked late in the day, when the shadows were long and the summer heat lay heavy on the city. Young and powerfully built, he leaped ashore even before the riverboat tied up. His bundle of possessions was notably slim, his loincloth frayed, and the rag around his neck was grubby and sweat-stained. Even his golden hair and beard could have benefited from some attention.
No one questioned him or contested his arrival, although most cities had rules for dealing with young men who wore scarves like his. Usually the authorities would send them packing right away. He might be given the option of removing the scarf, but only on condition that he immediately swear allegiance to the city and its horde.
The stranger barely glanced at the busy frontage, with its hawkers and stalls, its traders and porters, and all the cargoes being moved between boats and carts. He headed straight to the nearest alley and vanished into its shadows. Thereafter he kept to the right-hand wall and carried his bundle on his left shoulder, shielding his face. Although the st
reets were merely gaps between a jumbled maze of mud brick buildings, he strode along without hesitation.
Other pedestrians mostly moved out of his way. The few men who did not, and came face-to-face with him in contested passage, took sudden note of the scarf and his scars and the look in his eyes; then they, too, stepped aside, muttering apologies. It was the eyes, mostly.
At last he came to a turning he did not remember, a wall so obviously fresh that it must have been built within the last year or two. He had anticipated an open space there, but no space stayed open long in a heavily populated city. He tried bearing right, then left, and eventually found himself below a flight of marble steps and the facade of a large stone building. He had forgotten how big it was. He remembered other things, though. With a snort of annoyance, or possibly disgust, he strode up the steps and entered.
He stood, then, within a single large, circular chamber that resembled a giant birdcage. The entrance he had used was one of twelve, all very high, separated by twelve walls like elongated, curved pillars that supported a domed roof. On this sweltering day in late summer the interior was shadowed and cool, but it would be wildly uncomfortable in winter. The floor was notably devoid of furniture, a total waste of space, but there was a shrine at the base of each wall. Above each shrine stood a god or goddess, shaped from honey-colored marble. This was the Pantheon, home of the Bright Ones. Their images were so lifelike that the stranger could almost imagine Them stepping down at the end of the day and strolling off in laughing groups to Their carefree homes in Paradise.
One quick walk around and he could leave. If he could return to the riverbank before sunset he might find passage on a boat out; otherwise he would spend the night at the temple of Eriander and go as soon after dawn as possible. A dozen or so other people were at worship, mostly elderly women and attendant priests. Since they all happened to be to his right, the stranger turned to his left, feeling the marble cool and smooth underfoot.
The first idol was neither male nor female, just an ambiguous youth clutching a cloth in front of Himself or Herself. His or Her arm obscured His or Her breasts and the cloth covered His or Her groin. Yet why so sad? If the deity in charge of lust could not look happy, who ever could?
The stranger bowed his head and muttered the briefest possible prayer: “I honor You, holy Eriander; give me Your blessing.”
A fat, shaven-headed priest came shuffling over, rubbing his hands. Then he noticed the stranger’s neckcloth and cringed away from his glare. “If I can be of help, my—”
“No! You cannot.”
The priest offered a meaningless smile and limped away on very flat feet.
The stranger strode on to the next shrine. He had seen this statue before. Hiddi! He knew the model intimately and had many happy memories of tumbling her in Eriander’s temple. Even for a Nymph, she had been an incredible rollick. Here she depicted holy Anziel, holding a hawk on Her arm—goddess smiling down, bird turned to peer up at Her. Every feather on the bird was as perfect as every curl on Hiddi’s head. Just looking at her image was enough to arouse him. He felt certain that the statue’s leg would feel warm and supple to the touch.
Resisting that sacrilegious temptation, the stranger mumbled the same curt prayer and went on to the next god, a naked young man with a dove on his shoulder, smiling down at a fawn held in the crook of his elbow. Oh gods! That face! That smile! Was it Finar? Or Fitel? His brothers had looked exactly like that early in their Werist training, before their teeth and noses got smashed in the roughhousing. Finar, probably, but even their mother had been mistaken sometimes. The sculptor must have known which twin he was depicting, but how could he possibly have remembered them so well? “I honor You, holy Nastrar, give me Your blessing.”
Seething with fury now, the stranger strode on. Beyond the next entrance was the idol he especially wanted to see. Or not to see. But there He was, holy Weru Himself, holding a sword, His emblem. He differed from all the others in that He was shown seated. Seated, and yet the same height as all the others! The implication took a moment to register—that Weru was twice the size of all the other gods.
That was what Satrap Horold had ordered. But Horold had died long before that statue was made. Why had the artist obeyed a dead man’s instructions at the cost of spoiling the symmetry of the Pantheon? Why should a Hand so honor the war god?
The Terrible One deserved a longer prayer. “I honor You, most holy Weru, my lord and protector, mightiest of gods. I will live in Your service and die to Your honor.”
“I promised I would be generous,” said a quiet voice behind him.
The stranger’s fists clenched into mallets of bone. He knew that voice. It was the last voice he wanted to hear. The face he would see if he turned around was the very face he had been trying so hard not to meet.
“Go away!”
There was no reply. He continued to study holy Weru. Weru studied him. The god’s nose had never been flattened, his ears had not been bloated out like tubers. Otherwise their faces were the same face. The god was perhaps a few years older. Wide shoulders, thick calves … everything as it should be. More or less. More, probably.
“You were not stingy,” the stranger admitted, just to discover if his unwelcome companion was still there.
“I was sent to fetch you.”
The stranger turned around.
The Florengian was still big and hairy and dark of hide. He wore a leather smock smeared with clay and paint. If anything, he had grown even broader in the last three years or so. Life had left marks on his face, and robbed his smile of some teeth, but it had also given him more confidence—possibly even arrogance. Werists did not take kindly to extrinsics putting on airs.
Not even homeless hungry Werists didn’t.
“It’s wonderful to see you, Cutrath! We thought you were dead. Where have you been?” Benard whipped his great stonemason’s arms around the stranger and crushed all the breath out of him. “Thank the gods!”
Cutrath tried to break free and was dismayed to find that he couldn’t—not without using a wrestling trick or two, and that was not proper behavior in a temple. Masterless Heroes who disturbed the peace by brawling soon found themselves in serious trouble.
“Let me go,” he whispered in the sculptor’s ear, “or I will tear out your guts and strangle you with them.”
Benard released him with a puzzled look. “Only trying to be friendly! I really am overjoyed to see you. Ingeld has been going out of her mind for days, staring in the fire day and night. Half a pot-boiling ago she started screaming, ‘He’s here! He’s here! He’s going to the Pantheon!’ So we came to get you.”
Dismayed, Cutrath said, “We?” Not his mother here too? Then he saw that the third person present was very small.
The Hand bent and raised her. She was another Florengian, with dark curls and very large, dark eyes. Thumb in mouth, she stared at the stranger from the safety of her father’s arms.
“Your sister Oliva. This is your brother Cutrath who Mommy’s been telling you about. What do you say to him?”
Oliva thought for a moment, then took her thumb out of her mouth. “Twelve blessings!”
“That’s very good. Cutrath?”
“Twelve blessings on you too, Oliva. Now, why don’t you run outside and catch pigeons while I break your daddy’s neck?”
Benard set the girl down. “Pardon me,” he said, and brazenly reached out to untie the rag hiding Cutrath’s collar. “You don’t need to wear this in Kosord—not you. You are not a masterless out-of-work unwanted Werist here, you are the dynast’s son. You are also—if you will pardon my mentioning it—her consort’s stepson. Old Guthlag is too old and I need to find a new hordeleader. Cutrath Horoldson is the logical man.”
If Cutrath did not hit this mucker soon he would explode. He must smash him into rubble or die of frustration. Unfortunately the priests were nosily watching this encounter between the vagrant Werist and the consort, not to mention the dynast’s heir apparent.<
br />
“You need a hordeleader? Oh, isn’t that kind of you! You killed my father. You raped my mother. And now you have the gall to offer me a job? To work for you?”
The Florengian raised heavy black eyebrows. “Work for her, actually. Kosord belongs to your mother. I was not the one who raped her, Horold was. Repeatedly. I rescued her and took her away where he could not abuse her. And yes, I led him into the ambush that killed him. He came two eyelashes short of beating me to death while I was at it.”
“My ambition is to finish the work my father started.”
Benard sighed. “I should warn you that Ingeld forbids me to travel anywhere outside the palace without a bodyguard, a full flank of Werists. They are an accursed nuisance. Or have been up until now. Suddenly they feel sort of useful to have around. Why didn’t you come straight home to the palace? Did you find religion? Develop a sudden interest in art?”
“I’m not staying. I won’t go to the palace. I’m leaving as soon as I have walked around this craft shop of yours.”
Infuriatingly, the Florengian laughed. Laughed at a Werist!
“That won’t make my life any easier. Ingeld will order me to order the hordeleader to run you down and bring you back. What’s the matter, really, my lord? Whatever it is, you’re safe here in Kosord. How can we help you?”
Cutrath swallowed a mouthful of bile. A Hand offering to help a Hero? The world had gone mad. “You can’t. I’ve been having bad dreams is all, terrible dreams. I keep dreaming I’ve become your Weru idol. I dream that instead of carving my likeness, you somehow turned me into stone, and there I am, sitting here in the Pantheon in Kosord, and people are going in and out and worshiping me—worshiping Weru I mean, but offering me the sacrifices. And nobody can see that it is really me! I can’t cry out or move or anything. I finally went to an oneiromancer. He said the dreams were a sending from holy Cienu. Don’t ask me how he knew that. His job to know. He said they meant I should come to Kosord and pray in the Pantheon. And when I had done that, the nightmares would stop.”
