Cold Iron

by Miles Cameron

  ‘The Master of Arts will return in the autumn,’ Dahlia said. ‘I’m to see her after the funeral, with Sasan.’

  Aranthur nodded. ‘Sasan can work the grimoire,’ he said, with what he hoped was a selfless attitude.

  He didn’t mention that he had seen the Master of Arts, however fleetingly. She hadn’t said anything to him.

  ‘No, I can’t,’ Sasan said. ‘Nor do I particularly like being spoken of in the third person. No, one talent I lack completely is power. But I’m pretty sure I can help you learn Safiri faster.’

  Ansu glanced at Dahlia. ‘Found us a place to live?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘And why is it my job, anyway?’

  Ansu shrugged. ‘You’re nobly born and local.’ He shrugged again. ‘All the rest of us are one type of foreigner or another, yes?’ Then he relented. ‘Aranthur will be sailing with the military expedition. I expect I’ll go as well. The last supply ships won’t leave for three days, and then you two can have our room. No need to search.’

  Dahlia paused. ‘You are going with the army? To Atti?’

  Aranthur shrugged. ‘I’ll hear today.’

  She sighed, and they started down the long steps to the Embankment, the long park on the south side of the Long Canal. During the First Empire it had been a palace with hanging gardens, but Tirase had given it to the city. Almost three hundred marble steps led from the student houses below the Sunne in Splendour all the way down to the Embankment, and the bronze handrails were polished by the passage of thousands of Students. A magnificent bronze of the sea god, Posedaos, had been touched for luck so many times that his face had developed a noseless smile. The Weaver, sometimes called Tyche by the Byzas, stood opposite. Her robe’s folds were almost rubbed smooth.

  ‘You really think that we can just … go back to the Academy?’ Aranthur asked.

  Dahlia shrugged. ‘Yes?’ There was a question to it, but also an answer. ‘Things change. Doesn’t one of the pre-First Empire philosophers say something …?’

  ‘One of ours says that there is no constant but change,’ Ansu said.

  Aranthur thought of his parents; of Alfia; of the Inn of Fosse and the world in which he’d grown to near-adulthood, where everything at least appeared to be the same every day. Cattle and sheep; wheat and millet and barley and oats; stock and grapes and olives.

  He thought of Alfia with guilt and worry, and wondered what had driven him to make love to her, and what the result might be. And about the foolish letter to Nenia.

  He thought a great many uncomfortable thoughts, descending the long stairs, until Ansu punched him lightly in the shoulder.

  ‘You’re not that ill,’ he said. ‘I count on you to be entertaining.’

  ‘Me?’ Aranthur asked.

  Dahlia covered a chuckle. ‘You do most of the talking.’

  Sasan kept going down the steps.

  ‘Don’t listen to them.’ He laughed. ‘Last one to the bottom buys the wine after the funeral.’

  ‘Don’t you take anything seriously?’ Ansu asked.

  ‘I used to. Look where it got me,’ Sasan said.

  Aranthur stepped between them and began to bounce down the steps two at a time.

  ‘Bastard!’ Sasan shouted, in Safiri.

  If the city was like a ready laid fire, the funeral was a tinderbox. The ceremony was long, and very pious: a Sophian funeral in an austere temple of white marble, with no decoration beyond the aesthetic purity of the columns. But the congregation was clearly divided into three sections, and the nobles wore their House colours, and a bewildering variety of alliance tokens. Almost no one from any of the three groups spoke to the other groups. All of them, men and women, were armed.

  When the ceremony was over, Kallinikos’ father and his younger brother and sister and his mother all stood in a line, receiving the guests, who were ushered into a garden for a meal. Aranthur was behind Dahlia, and Kallinikos’ mother embraced her.

  ‘And you were on each other’s marriage lists,’ she said, with a sob.

  Dahlia nodded.

  ‘I am Hangela, of the Coutri. He was such a lovely boy. If hare-brained,’ she said, and Dahlia smiled. Hangela kissed her on both cheeks. ‘You are probably too well-bred to mention that he was involved in theatre.’

  Aranthur bowed, and Hangela was just turning to him.

  ‘We were there the night that Mikal and the Emperor provided all the effects for Niobe.’

  Kallinikos’ mother looked at him intently. ‘What is this, now? Were you his room-mate?’

  ‘No, my lady. I was a friend. I lived across the street and your son very kindly fed me on many occasions.’ Aranthur bowed.

  Hangela put a familiar hand on his arm. ‘What House are you from, young man?’

  Kallinikos’ father turned. ‘You are Timos? The sword chap?’

  Dahlia smiled. ‘He is.’

  ‘Oh, Mikal thought the world of you,’ Kallinikos Primo said. ‘And it is so good that he had Arnaut friends. Isn’t it? Damme, that we are only meeting you now.’

  His tone was false, and his eyes seemed to stare through Aranthur.

  ‘I want to hear this story of Niobe,’ Hangela said. ‘When we eat.’

  At the word ‘Arnaut’ her look of friendly familiarity vanished.

  The line moved on, and Aranthur went in, trying not to feel … the vague anger that every Arnaut comment sparked in him.

  ‘That’s their palazzo just across the canal,’ Dahlia said.

  She pointed at an edifice of pink-grey marble with elaborate painted columns between a myriad of arched windows.

  Aranthur shrugged. ‘I knew he was rich.’

  Dahlia laughed bitterly. ‘Do you think our precious Lightbringer has even told them how their son died, or why?’ She looked around, watched a young man in a red, black, and yellow armband push a tall woman in striped hose – an ungentle shove. She reached for her dagger, and another woman grabbed her arm.

  ‘If someone doesn’t stop this, we’re going to have blood everywhere,’ Dahlia snapped.

  She left Aranthur without waiting for an answer, pushing through the crowd of aristocrats towards a woman who could only be her mother – the same hair, the same look of calm intelligence.

  There was one man standing to the side: tall, with long, dark hair and a neat beard and moustache, straight as an arrow. He wore red and black House colours with a yellow velvet patch sewn to the breast of his coat. Other men and women who wore twists of yellow and red came and went, paying court to him. Aranthur noted that Kallinikos Primo brought him a cup of wine.

  Aranthur turned and took a cup of red wine from a tray and noted that the hired servant was an Arnaut. Their eyes met for a moment and Aranthur allowed himself a small smile, which the other man echoed.

  ‘Ditë e mirë për ju,’ he said quietly in the language of home, and the man’s smile intensified.

  ‘May the Eagle stand with you, brother,’ he said. ‘They are all crazy, yes?’

  Aranthur nodded to the man in the red and black. ‘Do you know who that is?’

  ‘Brother, he is the famous Verit Roaris,’ the Arnaut waiter said. ‘He doesn’t like us, give him a wide berth.’

  ‘Many thanks,’ Aranthur said. ‘May the Eagle bless your works,’ he added.

  The waiter bowed and moved on.

  ‘Was that Arnaut?’ Sasan asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Aranthur said. ‘At least, my valley’s dialect. That gentleman is from over the mountain somewhere.’

  Sasan nodded, sipping white wine. He was neatly dressed, and he looked very different – more muscular, less hollow-cheeked. But he appeared as Arnaut as Aranthur, or more so, in tight hose under a fustanella of linen with a magnificent red velvet sleeveless doublet and a turban of silk that changed colour as it caught the light, blue green to gold.

  ‘That’s my best turban!’ Aranthur laughed, but he was not entirely amused.

  ‘It is very nice, yes.’

  Sasan smiled and patted it
, adjusting the fringe. He also wore the shamshir he’d taken in the fighting, thrust rakishly through his sash, which was, somewhat daringly, in Dahlia’s green and gold House colours.

  Sasan was exotic and Aranthur could see how handsome people found him.

  As if reading his mind, Sasan put his wine cup down on a table and turned.

  ‘She doesn’t love me any more than she did you,’ he said.

  Aranthur wanted to look anywhere but into those black eyes.

  ‘I really …’

  He didn’t even know what he intended to say. Really wanted another chance? Really cocked up? Really happy for you? Really never knew who she was?

  He shook his head. ‘You saved my life.’

  Sasan smiled thinly. ‘I did, too. And that gives me hope, because I’ve had a lot of reasons to die and too few to live.’ He put a hand on Aranthur’s shoulder. ‘I—’

  ‘Never mind,’ Aranthur said. ‘Really. I screwed it up and you … she …’

  He flailed about a little, and then he and Sasan were locked in an embrace.

  ‘I could go back to thuryx tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Please help me … so that I do not.’

  Aranthur smiled. ‘Fair enough.’ He shrugged. ‘Anyway, it’s her choice …’

  Sasan grinned. ‘Perhaps also my choice, eh?’ he asked sharply.

  ‘Fair enough,’ Aranthur said.

  ‘Good. Because I want to work with you. Teach my language. Maybe write again. I know … I know she is not for me, but she makes me feel alive, instead of dead. And the other person who makes me feel alive is you. Eh?’

  Aranthur snatched a second cup of wine. ‘To Dahlia,’ he said.

  Sasan nodded. ‘I can drink to that.’

  Then suddenly everyone was kneeling.

  The Emperor had come. He was not incognito this time; he was dressed in black and cloth of gold, and wore a sword with a diamond the size of an egg at the pommel. At his side, Iralia shone as brightly as the jewel in the sword hilt. Behind them were twenty Axes of the Imperial Guard. The Axes were supposedly incorruptible and were reputed the best blades in the world.

  The Emperor greeted the parents and embraced them, and then spoke briefly to the older son.

  ‘He’ll be making his oath of fealty,’ Dahlia said. ‘All of the heirs must. It’s the law.’

  ‘The king is dead, long live the king?’ Ansu asked.

  Behind him, a noble-born woman in a kirtle of scarlet silk stood close, as if trying to possess the foreign prince.

  ‘That sort of thing,’ Dahlia said.

  They all sat to eat. Kallinikos Primo gave a short speech, thanking everyone for attending and asking them to sit as they wished, without ceremony, as his son would have wanted. The Imperial Axes circulated, and suddenly the temperature cooled; there were no hands on sword hilts, and very little posturing between the factions.

  About the time that Aranthur was finishing his second helping of polpo, an octopus dish, the chair behind him moved. He found that Hangela was sitting with him, with his sister, whom he’d met once and seemed familiar.

  ‘Aranthur Timos,’ she said. ‘This is my daughter Elena.’

  The young woman, perhaps three years older than Aranthur, smiled. She had red-brown hair and freckles, and was dressed foppishly in a laced shirt and a long velvet coat.

  ‘We’ve met,’ she said. ‘You made my brother a better blade, that’s for sure!’ She shrugged.

  ‘So tell me this story of Niobe,’ Hangela demanded of Aranthur.

  Dahlia leant forward. ‘We were there as paying guests,’ she began. ‘We didn’t even know that Mikal was participating.’

  Aranthur nodded. ‘The effects were dazzling. Superb. When Aploun shot his poisoned arrows, they burned with green venom …’

  Dahlia laughed. ‘Anyway, afterwards I wanted Aranthur to meet some of my friends, and my cousin, and my sister Rose.’

  ‘Ah,’ Hangela said.

  The small exhalation conveyed a great deal of information about her views on women who became actresses, especially women of noble families.

  Elena Kallinikas shot her mother a look of irritation. ‘Mater. Women have careers now. I will be an engineer.’

  Hangela sniffed.

  Aranthur went on. ‘We bumped into Mikal backstage. We discovered that the magiker was sick, and he had volunteered to do the effects. The Emperor helped him.’

  ‘It’s not true,’ the Emperor said.

  Aranthur shot to his feet.

  ‘Informal!’ the Emperor said quietly. ‘We are not at court. If we were, I would not be wandering about.’

  Aranthur turned to find one of the Axes standing behind him, a hand on Aranthur’s dagger.

  ‘Nothing to worry about, laddie,’ the man said. ‘Just chat. And don’t do anything really sudden, like.’

  Hangela shook her head. ‘What’s not true?’

  ‘It wasn’t me,’ the Emperor said.

  ‘It was me,’ Iralia said.

  Her smile dazzled, and her web of power put her in a haze of compulsions and enhancements. Hangela reached out, as if against her will, and took Iralia’s hand.

  ‘Mikal was a splendid caster and had a fine talent. He just didn’t have the store of power needed for the whole performance.’ Iralia looked at the Emperor. ‘I did so enjoy working with him.’

  ‘It’s true?’ Hangela asked. ‘Mikal was good at this “effect” magik?’

  The Emperor bowed. ‘I won’t set up as a theatre critic. But he had talent. He was also amusing and loyal, a combination one rarely finds these days.’

  Aranthur found the emphasis on the word loyal to be out of character. Disturbing. As if the Emperor was probing for a reaction.

  Hangela excused herself with a deep curtsey. ‘The gods bless you, Majesty.’

  But her eyes thanked Iralia. She was flushed, and she might even have been angry.

  Elena Kallinikas bowed. ‘Majesty,’ she said. ‘I’m due aboard.’

  He smiled. ‘Myr Kallinikas, I know my city is well defended by the likes of you.’

  The Kallinikas woman rolled her eyes.

  The Emperor turned, and smiled at Iralia. ‘Really, I should reward you for your contributions to the arts.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Iralia said.

  ‘I could give you the rubies that Volta just gave me to buy off my wrath,’ he said lightly.

  ‘He would hate that,’ Iralia said with satisfaction.

  Aranthur saw Lady Hangela start.

  ‘You could wear them in your hair,’ the Emperor said.

  He touched her hair, a very intimate gesture that was, at the same time, romantic, and natural.

  Then his focus, which was almost as intense as Iralia’s, fell on Aranthur like a lens powered by the sun.

  He smiled at Aranthur. ‘Ah, Syr Timos. How is my reader?’

  ‘Safe and sound in the inner Temple,’ Aranthur said. ‘Syr.’

  The Emperor nodded. ‘And this is the Safian?’

  ‘Is there only one of us left?’ Sasan asked.

  The Emperor winced. ‘My apologies, syr. I know Dahlia, and I know Aranthur Timos, and I know Prince Ansu – that leaves you.’ He gave an empty smile that in a less practised politician might have been bitter. ‘I know what you four did, alongside some other brave souls. I wish to thank you.’

  ‘Don’t throw flowers, just send money,’ Sasan said.

  The Emperor laughed. So did Dahlia.

  ‘It’s something my sister says,’ Dahlia added.

  The Emperor bowed. ‘Perhaps an appointment might be made for these four to visit me, with Kurvenos and Drako?’

  ‘I have it,’ Iralia answered. She had a rectangle of light between her hands and she wrote with a stylus of ruby light on the shining page of power. ‘I can bring them in for a private audience after your formal reconciliation … tomorrow.’

  The Emperor made a face. ‘Aphres, is that tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  T
he Emperor sighed.

  Aranthur watched, fascinated. ‘Would you teach me to do that?’

  Iralia furrowed her brow in mock consternation. ‘Don’t I ask and ask you to visit me? I sit alone in my tower, waiting, hoping …’

  The Emperor smiled. ‘Now you’re in for it.’

  He smiled and swept off, and Aranthur felt the slight pressure on his back vanish; when he looked, the Axe was gone.

  Dahlia rose and Sasan with her. ‘I’m off; meeting the Master of Arts.’ She smiled. ‘I still can’t like your Iralia. She’s like a cheap trollop overdone and writ large.’

  Sasan shook his head. ‘I can’t agree. She’s … remarkable.’

  Dahlia rolled her eyes. ‘Make-up and enhancement and a really fine cleavage, and that’s all a girl needs,’ she said bitterly. She put a hand on her sword hilt. ‘I liked Elena though. Why haven’t I run across her before?’

  Aranthur felt himself willing Sasan to make some comment – something that would make Dahlia relax.

  ‘I found Iralia extremely attractive,’ Sasan said. ‘Aranthur, that goddess asks you to visit and you haven’t been?’

  Aranthur didn’t look at Dahlia. ‘We’ve been busy.’

  Dahlia’s eyes were narrowed, but not for long.

  ‘What you need is work,’ she said.

  She pecked Aranthur on the cheek, which seemed an improvement, and then Aranthur was sitting with Ansu.

  Ansu raised an eyebrow. ‘He’s a fool,’ the prince said. ‘Actually, almost everyone is a fool.’

  Aranthur was just shaking his head when everyone stood to wish the Emperor farewell. There was some jostling; a tide of people who had been waiting to leave went out, and chairs cleared.

  A man came and bowed: a man of middling height, in very expensive clothes, a fine dark wool doublet cut to look like an Arnaut fustanella.

  ‘You don’t know me,’ he said, after a bow to Prince Ansu.

  ‘No, sir,’ Aranthur said, rising. And then he did.

  ‘I suppose that technically I could arrest you,’ the man said with an easy smile.