by Col Buchanan
Near the edge of the Shoals, close to the waves, he spotted Meer the monk sitting beneath a raised lean-to close to the sea, with a group of children gathered around him. Ash stopped, and lowered his bottle of Cheem Fire to watch.
The monk was holding up a slate and a stick of chalk. He was teaching the children how to read, and they were laughing, making a game of it.
Ash felt a semblance of peace as he gazed at the scene. He walked a few steps further onto the rocks and hunkered down with his bottle, still within earshot of the group, just out of reach of the hissing spray of the waves.
A fishing boat was out there in the heavy swell, struggling towards the harbour, its sails flapping in tatters and its crew straining with oars against the current. A hard business, thought Ash.
He settled into himself. Thoughts fluttered like falling leaves, glimpsed then gone.
A flake of snow ensnared itself in his eyelashes. He blinked it away and looked up at the clouds. More snow began to tumble down.
‘Look, children, snow!’ he heard the monk exclaim from behind.
The children instantly forgot their lessons and chased him over the rocks, overjoyed at the flakes of ice floating from the sky.
The wind felt cold on Ash’s teeth as he smiled.
The monk approached him as dusk was falling, a long fishing pole in his hand.
‘You look hungry, my sad friend.’
Ash’s stomach made an audible noise in reply.
‘Follow me. We’ll catch some fish and enjoy a supper together.’
He agreed, and together they found a flat spot next to the lapping water as the stars emerged, slowly populating the night sky with their shingle of light. Meer cast his line as far out as he could, then hummed a tune as they waited.
‘I thought the monks of Khos did not eat the flesh of fish,’ Ash said after a while, drawing his gaze from the eastern sky, where constellations were rising.
Meer drew in the line slowly, then tossed the hook, weight and float back out into the water. He sat down again.
A minute passed before he spoke. ‘I have a confession to make. I’m not really a monk.’
Ash saw that he was serious.
‘You’ve heard of fake monks before?’
‘Of course. Since the war only monks may beg for coin.’
The monk who was not a monk exhaled loudly. ‘I find it a useful way to live, whenever I’m here. It suits me best.’
‘So why tell me this?’
‘Because it’s no secret. If anyone asks me directly I tell them. And most people here don’t care what you are. I’ve helped them when I could, unlike a great many of the monks you’ll find on this island, locked away in their high sanctuaries. I must tell you. Even in my few months at the monastery, I thought most of them were more concerned with dogma and politics than in the Way.’
Meer glanced at Ash then, sideways, as though trying to read his reaction. ‘Besides, as soon as spring arrives, I’ll be leaving again to travel abroad.’
‘But I have heard them talk in the Perch of how you keep a vigil in the shrine every day, meditating deeply.’
‘Pah. They call it what they wish to call it. In the shrine I merely sit and watch the world turning.’
Ash saw the irony in that. In the native tongue of Honshu, the meditative act of chachen meant simply to sit in stillness.
He watched the man and pondered.
‘I was coming to see you later,’ Meer admitted. ‘I’ve been talking with some friends in the city. Concerning your situation.’
‘You have been doing what?’
‘I can get you to Cheem, if you want it.’
‘Oh? And I suppose we are flying, like a leaf on the wind?’
Meer showed him one of his quick, boyish smiles. ‘I have a friend who owns a boat.’
Ash’s expression clearly said it all.
‘It’s true,’ Meer chirped.
‘And tell me. Why would you go to all that trouble, simply for an old farlander like me?’
‘Because we’d want to come along with you. To Sato.’
Ash’s hand reached for his sword, though it grasped at nothing. He had left his weapon back in his room.
‘Who are you?’ he asked coolly. ‘How do you know of Sato?’
The man shrugged and held out his hands in a gesture of openness. ‘I am who I say I am. And a little more. All you need to know, in this moment here and now, is that I’m a friend to you, Ash. And that I have certain other friends. People who would dearly wish to have words with the Rōshun order.’
‘There is no more Rōshun order.’
‘Why not? Because the Imperials attacked it? Yes, we have already spoken to several of your agents in the Free Ports. They all said the same as you. Still, there might be survivors left in Cheem. If there are, we would like to make them an offer.’
Ash was on his feet now, though he could not recall standing.
‘You are with the Few?’
A modest twitch of the head.
‘Trust me – we only wish to talk with your people. And in return, I may just be willing to help you.’
‘Help me? With what?’
Meer stepped forward to set a hand on his shoulder. He looked Ash straight in the eye.
‘With your loss, my friend.’
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
The Bunker
Deep beneath the Temple of Whispers, old Kira, mother of Sasheen, stepped from an elevator into an underground tunnel lit by gaslights, and saw that all but one of the carriages had already departed.
She boarded the remaining one, the carriage sitting there with its wheels on the rails and the driver diligently avoiding her eye, the team of zels sniffing and snorting in impatience. With a hard tug on the cord she rang the bell, and the driver, a slave with a complexion made pasty white from lack of sunlight, lashed his whip across the backs of the zels, and they were away.
Deep within her own her own heart, a fierce fire was burning. With the bland concrete walls flowing past her, and the harshness of the lights interspersed with identical lengths of gloom, she stoked it with memories of her daughter, and her grandson too, young Kirkus, both of them gone now.
It had been Kira, in her capacity as a handler within the Section, who had given the order to the Diplomat Ché concerning what was to be done in the event that Sasheen was captured, or ran from battle. An order that had needed to be given, as it always had been when a Matriarch or Patriarch had taken to the field; an order she had been commanded to pass on herself.
And now it had come to pass. Her daughter lay dead, poisoned by a Diplomat’s bullet.
Oh, Sasheen, she thought, and couldn’t help the grip of loss that seized her thin frame.
Her direct bloodline would end with her own passing. Others within the family of Dubois, her half-sister Velma and her get, would take the helm of the family’s falling fortunes.
Her thoughts turned to the Diplomat still at large in Khos, the one who had clearly shot her daughter through the neck. Ché, the young man with his Rōshun ways. A deserter, if the vague report from the twins was in any way accurate.
Kira wondered how utterly she could destroy him.
It felt like hours, rocking from side to side as the carriage rolled along the endless track of rails, always downwards towards a never-changing vanishing point. Time to linger on things, to allow her emotions to slowly ebb into numbness and her mind into random thoughts.
She was jolted as the carriage came to a halt, and saw that they had arrived at their destination. The air was stale here, so deep beneath the catacombs of the Hypermorum.
Kira stepped out and walked to the heavy iron door in the wall. Even as she approached, a priest stepped out from a cubicle to open it. He bowed low as she stepped through the raised threshold into the small chamber within, which was cylindrical, its sides glassy smooth, so that she felt as if she was standing in a bottle. Another round iron door plugged the end of it.
Darkness, as the lig
ht slowly faded to nothing. A hiss as a fine spray covered her, smelling of pine trees and the sea.
‘Your pass, please,’ came a voice from all around her.
‘Eight-six-oh-four-nine-nine-one.’
The inner door cracked opened. Kira stepped through into the light beyond.
The bunker was a tomb for all those who had been buried there alive; the iron doors were there to keep them in as much as others out.
The priests and slaves who lived down here would never see the sky again. Some had volunteered for this half existence, but for most there had been little choice in it. The dry, filtered air that fluttered through its rooms held an atmosphere of hopes abandoned and desires forever repressed. Quiet chatter came from the pools and salons and cages of the harem. Silence from the libraries and map rooms. Singing, even, from a boy standing naked on a pedestal in a marbled hallway, his words a celebration of the jealousy of lovers.
Kira stood beneath the strips of gaslights that made it as bright as day in there, surrounded by friezes on the leather-faced walls of forest hunting scenes. It smelled of dampness in the waiting chamber, and of decay, even with the fresh scents on her clothing and skin.
Four others stood in various postures around the room. Octas Lefall was there, famous uncle of Romano, leaning on the mantelpiece of a decorative hearth while he stared down his long nose at her, looking as though he was pleased with the news of the Matriarch’s death. The rest were over by the bar, conversing quietly in whispers.
Kira returned the stare of Octas with one just as icy. She would afford him no small victories today by an outward betrayal of her emotions.
They all fell quiet as a set of double doors clattered opened. Quickly, they gathered in a line and fell to their knees, their heads bowed low.
The high-backed chair creaked as it was wheeled through by a burly male priest. The man sitting in it had his eyes closed behind a pair of gilded spectacles. He was naked beneath his half-open silk robe, and his ancient withered skin was covered with the blotches of liver spots and the odd wiry white hair. His bald head rocked slightly as the chair stopped before them. His bearer retreated from the room and closed the door.
Nihilis snapped open his eyes.
Through the thick spectacles, the watery orbs were oversized and spiteful.
‘Kira,’ he snapped, and his voice sounded as worn and scratchy as his one-hundred-and-thirty-one years warranted. ‘Your daughter lies dead in Khos. My condolences for your misfortune. May she be remembered for her strengths and not her many weaknesses.’
Kira bowed her head even lower, if only to hide her sudden flush of rage.
He rang a tiny bell that sat in his lap. The tips of his fingers were coal black.
Another priest entered, and strode silently across the plush carpet to hand him a crystal tumbler filled with Royal Milk. Nihilis smacked his lips as he took a sip from it. Colour washed into his face, and he straightened. The robe parted further to reveal the silver spikes in his nipples, the mass of piercings in his genitals.
She watched him from beneath her eyelids, loathing himas much as she feared him.
‘So. What is to be done now? It seems we have an empty throne requiring an occupant.’
Octas Lefall cleared his throat first. Lefall was as old as Kira, had been there too during the Longest Night and the subsequent rise of Mann. ‘My nephew intends to lay his claim once he has wrested control of the Expeditionary Force in Khos. He is a stronger candidate than any other, and all here know it. We should notify the Arch-general to accede to his command. Let the transition be a smooth one. Let them get on with the business of taking Bar-Khos.’
‘A predictable sentiment, Octas. As always. And what do the rest of you think of this?’
‘I would support such a motion,’ commented Chishara of the Bonnes. ‘The longer this war continues, the longer it costs us all dearly.’
Hart, of the coal-rich Chirt clan, looked to Chishara in surprise.
‘That may be,’ Hart responded loudly. ‘But there are others who intend to make a rightful claim to the throne. My sonis one of them. He should be given his chance.’
A snort of derision came from Lefall, who snuffled it with a swipe of a finger down his long nose.
‘You wish me to give the nod to spirited Romano,’ Nihilis said to him. ‘Yet that is hardly our way, is it? No. We must see if he is fit enough to rule first. If he wins through in Khos, then he may have my consent. If not, we shall see who rises from the infighting here in Q’os, and I shall decide then if they are right for it.’
‘But, lord,’ said Chishara. ‘If we allow them to dither, we may lose our chance at Bar-Khos.’
‘Oh, the Free Ports will fall all right, have no doubts on that, Chishara.’
Kira found that her attention was drifting. Her fists were clenching tight by her sides. She could feel her fingernails biting into her palms. A fierce bitterness had possessed her, a sense of shame, even, at this lessening of her daughter before them all; at the lessening of her own position.
Look at the harm you have caused our family, she spoke to her daughter. We are losers now. Our star falls and our force diminishes. You were meant to win, my child! You were meant to conquer!
Beyond her, in the greater world, Chishara was glancing at Lefall as she made to reply. ‘It is not only that, my lord. There is the expense of it. Last week, my annaliticos informed me that if the war continues for another year, it will have cost us more than we can hope to recoup from the islands over twenty years of occupation.’
Nihilis waggled a finger at her, as though at an impudent child. Indeed she was the youngest of the gathering, barely beyond fifty years old. ‘The defeat of the Free Ports means much more to us than merely what we can profit from their wheat and ores.’ He paused to drink again from the tumbler of Milk. Savoured the taste of it for a lingering moment. ‘Yes, I see that you are interested now, all of you. Kira, tell them of this clever plan of ours.’
Hostile faces turned to observe her. Stares that accused her of their lord’s favouritism, because she had once been this his casual lover.
‘Of course,’ Kira croaked, gazing straight at Nihilis now. Her knees were starting to hurt, kneeling like this. ‘A plan, I should add, first endorsed by myself and my daughter.’
A tight-lipped smile stretched his wrinkled features, and his head nodded in subtle acknowledgement.
To the others, she said, ‘We project that the Free Ports will have fallen within the year, once we have dealt with Bar-Khos. When they do fall, we will be free to turn our attentions to the problem of Zanzahar and the Caliphate.’
A rolling of the eyes from Lefall. Kira chose to ignore it.
The words tumbled from her lips of their own practised accord. ‘At that point, we become their sole customer for blackpowder. With the war over, we will cut our demand for blackpowder to almost nothing. We will do so under the guise of a temporary consolidationofour accounts. At the same time, we will manufacture a famine in Pathia, or another of the southern lands, so that the price of our wheat will soar. We will be forced then, or so it will seem, to raise our tariffs in the wheat that we sell to Zanzahar, and which they are reliant upon.
‘Within a year of these double blows to their economy, Zanzahar will be experiencing a period of deepening crisis. Conditions will be ripe for a coup against the House of Sharat. We will make certain of that. We will manufacture the coup ourselves, with players of our own choosing, using our Diplomats to back them. Zanzahar and the Caliphate shall fall without a single battle. More importantly, their monopoly on trade with the Isles of Sky shall be ours. And with it, the only known source of blackpowder.’
They were all blinking at her as though she was speaking in tongues.
‘Are you quite serious?’ exclaimed Chishara, forgetting herself in the heat of her temper. ‘We stand on the verge of finishing the Free Ports here, and already you wish to gamble with all that we will have gained? What if the Caliphate realizes our tr
ue intentions? They could call an embargo on our heads, choke us of powder whilst feeding it to whatever insurgencies they can foment within the Empire.’
‘You fear for what we might lose,’ interjected Nihilis, lifting a finger again. ‘That is always your weakness, Chisara. Better if instead you embraced all that we could gain from this.’
‘So it’s settled, then,’ asked Lefall. ‘We’re going ahead with this?’
Nihilis craned his head back so as to scrutinize the man better. Kira gazed at the startling redness of her master’s lips, the tip of his tongue, the fleshy rims of his eyelids.
‘Do you have enough chattel, Lefall? Enough to satisfy you, I mean.’
Lefall chanced a subtle smile. ‘One can never have too much, my lord.’
The vivid tongue of Nihilis probed the air for an instant.
‘Then there is your answer, is it not?’
EPILOGUE
Friends with Boats
It was a sound like no other, the roar of a skyship’s burning tubes. It filled the air while blanketing all other noises, so that after a while, when the ears had grown used it, it became a kind of silence.
Ash pressed forwards against the rail as the skyship began a slow circle above the monastery grounds. His grip tightened as he looked down on the small woodland of mali trees with their copper leaves covered in snow, and the stark black rectangle of ruins that lay at the heart of them like the stamp of some wrathful deity.
Amongst the thinning outskirts of the woodland, canvas tents stood in a sprawling camp with smoke smearing from their metal chimney pipes.
‘All gone, you said,’ remarked Meer the monk. ‘You recall?’
Ash could only stare in astonishment.
He heard a cane rapping against the decking as Coya came to join them both.
‘My spirits lift to see that there are survivors,’ he remarked, cheerfully, and then turned towards the captain of the ship, standing on the quarterdeck with his pilot. Both of them were discussing where they should land.
