by Mike Shel
“The Djao’s bloodthirsty gods,” said her father, nostrils flaring as though assaulted by a rank odor.
“Yes,” said Helmacht.
“But what are these tears of regret?” Agnes inquired, pointing to the raindrops. “The victim’s regret that they’re being killed? That seems…um, rather an obvious thing to take up space.”
“No!” said Helmacht, eyes lighting up. “That’s what’s so fascinating about this particular glyph—the tears are those of the one wielding the knife. The action of sacrificing the victim is done not out of adoration or devotion, but necessity.”
Agnes’s father said something in a whisper. She turned to him and met his eyes, which were fixed on the glyph but seemed elsewhere. “Father?” Her call summoned him back.
“Paying ransom,” he repeated more loudly. “A comment made by a Royal Navy captain of my acquaintance regarding the sacrifices sailors make to the gods of the sea. Babaloc and the others. No sailor makes his obeisance to them out of devotion. It’s out of fear. To stave off the gods’ malice.”
“Exactly,” interjected Helmacht, his head bobbing in vigorous affirmation. “This was the first pebble that began the avalanche. We do not believe the Djao worshiped their foul gods out of any sort of religious love. They were paying ransom to forestall apocalypse. Human sacrifice as the price for survival of the race.”
The significance of this started to dawn on Agnes, and there was a sick stirring in her heart.
“It’s not just this particular glyph, nor the rest of what we have managed to decipher,” continued Helmacht. “The prophecies we’ve received—the one that predicted your fire and the lad Ruben’s death, but others as well…well, they call many of our assumptions about the Djao into question. We have always thought them a wicked, bloody-minded people—”
“As the scriptures confirm,” interrupted Kennah.
“Exactly,” Rae said, picking up the thread. “What we are discovering is theologically dangerous. If what we have learned so far can be trusted, the Djao did not adore their demonic gods. Those gods held them hostage: the blood of some sacrificed to spare the rest. They had no choice: worship their deities or be destroyed.”
“In at least two dozen passages, the Divine Codex clearly states that our blessed pantheon wiped out the Djao because of their utter depravity, because they worshiped demon-gods,” interjected Kennah, pulling at his beard in agitation as he spoke. “What you say upends a central pillar of our faith!”
“Yes,” Rae answered, almost mournful. “So we have kept the knowledge confined to our scholars and diviners and others involved in linguistic work. All have sworn binding oaths, as all of you must now. We have not shared this with any of the cults, including the resident priests of Vanic and Mictilin within the Citadel walls, or our allies in the Church of Belu. All of you must swear absolute secrecy. Under no circumstances can this knowledge go beyond those explicitly initiated into these confidences. At least not yet. Do all of you swear it?”
Each, one by one, affirmed the oath, Agnes’s father last. There was a brief, solemn silence, broken at last by Kennah.
“How by Chaeres’ green grotto did you figure all this out?” he asked, eyebrows meeting as he squinted at the glyph on the paper. “Just with the tumultu Sir Auric brought back from Serekirk?”
“In part,” Olbach responded. His self-satisfied smile held more secrets, Agnes was sure.
“Again, you are being coy, sir,” she said. She heard the irritation in her voice, wished she had done a better job reining in the emotion. Helmacht held up a hand.
“It is…complicated. There are factors and subtleties at play which—”
“The girl is right, Helmacht, Lictor Rae,” interrupted Olbach. “Let’s stop teasing and let them in on the nature of the assistance we’ve received. Lictor Rae, why not enlighten them?”
“No!” shouted Helmacht. All turned to the sorcerer, whose face was crimson with anger. He closed his eyes and held a hand over the emerald set in his forehead, as though shutting a third eye. He took a deep breath and continued with a false serenity that fooled no one. “No. We needn’t trouble them with that…information, Lictor. Olbach is cruel and careless. He treats this as though it were a theater farce. Sir Auric cannot be burdened with this.”
Agnes turned from Helmacht to Auric and could sense her father’s anger ready to burst as he faced the aged lictor. “Pallas, you summoned me out of Daurhim, you said you wanted me to know what’s been uncovered. Well, let’s have it all out. I don’t know what secret it is you think should be hidden from me, but I grow impatient.”
Rae slowly closed her good eye and rubbed the back of a hand on her forehead, letting out a long raspy breath. “Sir Auric, no. I forbid it. I need you to trust my judgment in this matter. It is for your own sake.”
Agnes took hold of her father’s hand before he could reply. There was something about Pallas Rae’s weariness that told her they mustn’t press further. It frightened her. After a moment, Auric squeezed her hand and spoke, his voice better controlled.
“Lictor, you have always been direct and honest with me. I want to respect your judgment, as I have in the past. But you are asking a Syraeic brother to set his curiosity aside. That’s as unnatural as expecting an eagle to walk from one tree to the next.”
Rae’s wet cough was followed by a humorless smile. “Unnatural, you say. How appropriate, that word.” She looked at Auric for a long moment, then at Agnes, her old eye seeming to bore into her soul, intense, examining. Agnes tilted her head back, a childish defiance filling her heart for which she was immediately embarrassed. With effort and a wince of pain, the lictor propped herself up with her elbows on the table, looking again at Auric and then back to Agnes, whose heart fluttered. She would never have predicted what the lictor then said.
“Agnes,” said Rae, after a few more coughs racked her chest. “Olbach, Helmacht, you will introduce Agnes. Let her determine if we should reveal what we’ve hidden from her father.”
Agnes turned to Auric and back to Rae, astonished. Helmacht started to speak, but Olbach stepped forward and held a hand up to silence him. “Very well, Lictor,” said Olbach, coming around the table and patting Agnes on the back. “Let’s go lass.” She stood, and his hand was at the small of her back, urging her forward. Helmacht muttered a curse and exited the room. Agnes let Olbach guide her from the library, but she spared a look back at her father, whose face was a mixture of anger and confusion.
They headed through the corridors of the Syraeic complex, at last taking a stairway down several flights into the bowels of the Citadel where Agnes had never ventured. The deeper levels were reserved for the alchemists and sorcerers, about their abstruse and sometimes dangerous pursuits. The sorcerer led the way, his light brown robes fluttering with distress that mirrored the man’s, but Olbach stayed beside her, his hand still at the small of her back, guiding her onward. Agnes resented that hand, feeling its condescension, as though she was a reluctant child needing prompting.
At the same time, her mind raced, wondering to what secret they escorted her, one that she could see, but her father couldn’t. What was it about the lictor’s face that frightened her? Shouldn’t she be flattered by the trust it indicated?
“What is it you’re taking me to?” she asked, working hard to keep the anxiety out of her voice.
“Be ready for a shock,” said Olbach. She could hear the grin on his face, though her eyes were focused on the dancing robes of the sorcerer.
“What is it?” she said, a bit too sharply. Helmacht was right about this Olbach: he was a cruel man.
“It’s better if we just show you, Miss Manteo,” answered Helmacht without turning around. “I’ll do my best to address your questions once you’ve had time to take it in. But my unkind colleague is right: brace yourself for something unsettling.”
Agnes’s heart raced. She took long,
slow breaths to calm it, tried to quiet the alarm as they approached a series of heavy oak doors bound with black iron. Helmacht at last stopped at one upon which words of Middle Djao were written in shimmering alchemist’s chalk. The sorcerer drew a ring of keys from a pocket, selected one and inserted it in the lock, whispering the words written upon the door as he did so. She started at the loud, metallic click as he turned the key and pushed his weight against the door.
Within was a cramped and dusty library, its walls lined with shelves of books of every size and description, naked scrolls and scroll cases stacked precariously as well. A single oil lamp lit the chamber, its flame doing a flickering dance that created strange shadows. There was a large table at the center, covered with scrolls, a few open tomes and writing supplies, two chairs at opposite ends.
But it was the object at the center of the table that claimed her attention, propped upright in a ceramic bowl. At first, she didn’t recognize it, its eyes milky white, hair matted, dried blood and mud painting the face. It looked to be no more than three or four days separated from its body, but she knew that this could not be the case. Agnes instinctively reached for the hilt of her sword and slapped the other hand over her mouth to stifle a scream.
“Hello, goddaughter,” said the severed head of Lenda Hathspry. “It’s been an age since last we spoke.”
9
A True and Faithful Recording
The echo of the door closing behind Agnes and her escorts as they left the Too-Tall Library was the only sound for several minutes. Auric fumed, wondering what Pallas Rae was about with this stunt. Agnes, only four years a field agent, would decide whether he should be fully informed as to where this unexpected bounty of knowledge sprang from? The old woman sat with a frown, staring at the scrolls with their hieroglyphs, one hand on the knob of her cane, the other flat on the table’s surface. There was a brittleness about her that held back Auric’s anger, and a weariness that went beyond her age and infirmity. Kennah still sat on the bench against the bookless wall, looking down at the polished marble slabs of the floor, hands clasped together. In the instant before Auric was ready to break the awkward silence, the lictor spoke.
“Kennah, would you please give Sir Auric and me some privacy?” The bearded man gave Rae an almost grateful nod and exited the room, shutting the door behind him. She looked at Auric with her one watery eye.
“You know why I would expect to be fully informed, Lictor,” said Auric in a calm voice that belied the turmoil within. He looked down at his folded hands.
“Aye,” she answered. “I intend to have Olbach flayed, metaphorically speaking. He’s been increasingly cavalier about these matters of late. I wonder if his immersion in these hieroglyphs and prophecies haven’t somehow unbalanced his mind. He was always a sardonic fellow. Now he grows reckless. I’d sideline him, but I can’t. He’s too crucial to our progress now. Regardless, his chatter complicates this matter. And I must tell you other news, and of another prophecy.”
Auric’s eyes leapt to Rae’s face. “What?”
“It was received after Agnes and the boys left, so you know I didn’t keep it from you intentionally. You’ll be called to the queen again soon.”
It was as though a great icy hand clasped his heart. “For what reason?”
“A ‘forbidding task,’ are the words. I know nothing more of that, but you will soon. Agnes and Kennah will be summoned with you.”
“Do we have an oracle hidden in the basements?”
A humorless smile broke across Rae’s face. “Of sorts.”
“By the six floating virgins, what the hell is going on in this place?”
“Something wonderful, in the literal sense of the word. Something terrible. The news that goes along with this latest prophecy concerns the nature of Crown Prince Kedrech’s death. Normally the death of such an old and infirm fellow wouldn’t provoke much curiosity.”
Auric grimaced. Rae was at least as old as Kedrech had been.
“What we’ve been able to gather from our informants in the palace is horrifying. An old Aerican man presented himself to the queen, the same day Agnes set out for Daurhim. We have few details. It was a relatively small audience that morning—meeting with Her Royal Highness has become increasingly hazardous over the last several months. She’s grown more capricious and cruel, so wiser petitioners have found other ways to seek redress of grievances and other matters typically brought before the queen. Whatever occurred at that peculiar audience, Her Majesty’s, uh…reaction…none could have predicted it, except perhaps some bloody-minded fantasist. After the Aerican had spoken his piece, she pounced on the crown prince like a wild beast and with her own teeth tore out his throat.”
“Belu have mercy! This isn’t some lurid gossip?”
“If only that were so. We trust our source: it was the Grand Chamberlain himself who informed us, Ulwen Bath.”
“What happened then?”
“She ate him, or at least parts of him. The petitioners and royal family members present fled, along with officers of the court. The Grand Chamberlain at last worked up the nerve to return to the throne room, enveloped in a necromantic shield of some sort for his protection. He found Her Majesty serene and smiling on her throne, the crown prince’s blood staining her face, hands, and clothing. The palace guard had the Aerican man in shackles before her. She sent him to the dungeons, along with the petitioners who could be located. The story circulates in varying forms in the taverns and bawdy houses of the city, but it’s given no more credence than the other crazy tales about our monarch.”
Auric sat back in his seat, the still-healing burns radiating needles of pain. “What do the nobility know?”
“I’m not sure. Some of the families and their agents have been flocking to the city. Some have fled. Everyone has spies at court. The wiser noble houses cultivate sources of information to seek advantage and warning of the next mad pronouncement. Something has leaked out. Gods know what they’ll do about it.”
Auric’s mind reeled.
“Our world becomes more disordered,” continued Rae after a moment, “and we don’t know what lunacy will happen next.” She rubbed her good eye with a bony, balled-up fist. “The miraculous matters here at the Citadel happen as the empire’s fate grows more uncertain. Word is the Korsa tribes have united under a single chieftain, someone named Magda. Harkeny is on a full war footing, contending with raid after raid on our northern frontier. The navy reports the Azkayans are making sea raids along the coast of Warwede—”
“And Queen Geneviva Reges is a bloody cannibal.”
“Our queen is no longer human. That much has been plain for some time.”
“The priesthood of Timilis must be reveling in the chaos.”
“One would assume so.” Pallas Rae’s chest was racked by a coughing fit, but she waved Auric away when he stood to intervene. She wiped spittle from her chin and shook her head. “We are a society of seekers, Auric,” said the lictor, her hoarse voice an intimate whisper now. “Since our founding, over seven centuries ago, the material treasure we have accumulated has always been secondary to the knowledge we’ve gained, despite the slander spoken by others. We’ve shared the wisdom we’ve found when we could, with our rulers, the nobility, the clergy, whoever might benefit from it, whoever could be trusted with it. But we’re also a society of secrets. We’ve hidden some of what we’ve discovered over the years when that knowledge was judged harmful if disseminated. And many of those secrets are hidden from all but a small circle within the League. Do you think this was the right course for us, Sir Auric Manteo, lately of Daurhim?”
Auric smirked at another dose of pain from his shoulder and the plain meaning of the lictor’s words. “Yes, Pallas Rae, it was and is the right course.”
“You, sir, did not climb the ladder of the League’s hierarchy. You remained in the field, and then left our company altogether. I have done th
e bitter, thankless work of an administrator, fiddling with balance sheets, arguing with bureaucrats, smoothing the ruffled feathers of self-important Syraeic showboats. I have earned my place in the inner councils, earned a seat privy to our darkest secrets. For all your scars, you have not.”
Auric looked down at the table, chastised.
“I will keep my word,” the lictor continued. “If Agnes thinks you should know more of this matter, you will be informed. But as galling as that is, Auric, you must understand this isn’t about respect, nor should it be read as a disregard for your experience and the great service you have done for the League.”
“Agnes won’t vote to keep me in the dark, Lictor. This is a pointless exercise. She wouldn’t do that to me.”
“I pray you are wrong.”
“I’m not.”
“I like your daughter, Sir Auric. Agnes embodies everything we hope for in a young Syraeic. Smart, courageous, inquisitive. I’d like to share something with you.” She pointed across the table to the stack of books Olbach had brought with him. “Third from the top, if you would.”
Auric stood and walked over to the stack, retrieving a red leather volume with gold lettering embossed on the spine: INQUIRY RECORDS – 776YOE, VOLUME 6. That would be about a year into his retirement, Agnes’s first as a field agent. He returned to his seat with the book in his hand.
“Turn to the twelfth record, fourth interview. Do you know Arla of Ulstermythe? Sir Arla of Ulstermythe, I should say.”
“I do. She was knighted?” Auric remembered the woman well: sturdy, steady, cantankerous, and with a tremendous appetite. Her consumption of the repast at League celebrations of Revival and Candlerook was legendary.
“She was, by the queen herself, a few months after you left our company for your retirement.”
