There was a moment of suspended motion, hung by a brittle thread. Csorwe had not been afraid for a long time, but she tasted a drop of the real dark crawling vintage just then. I could be the gate through which she returns …
The other revenants fell, as though their legs had been kicked out from under them, and shuddered. They shouldn’t have been able to feel pain. The dead were beyond suffering. And yet the veiled princess thrashed like a beetle caught in a web, and Shuthmili watched.
“They’re dead, Shuthmili. Let them go.” Malkhaya’s free hand fell on Shuthmili’s shoulder, although Csorwe had the irrational conviction that she would burn to touch, and he shook her gently. At last, like the turning of the seasons, she looked up at him, and her hands fell loose at her sides.
There was a sound like an exhaled breath, a smell of bone dust, and the revenants on the ground disintegrated. The four of them were alone on the hillside.
Tal straightened up, and Shuthmili started like a hound sighting a hare.
“What was that?” said Tal. He turned on them, keeping the higher ground. Malkhaya had his arms round Shuthmili, and his hands were shaking slightly. Shuthmili’s eyes were open and staring, and her lips were parted, baring small pearly teeth. There was no expression on her face but blind, vacant hunger, as though the illumination had burnt her away and left a void.
“Think it through,” said Malkhaya, through clenched teeth. He wasn’t angry, Csorwe judged, but frightened.
Malkhaya held Shuthmili’s bare hands in his own. Either a brave or a reckless man, and as far as Csorwe was concerned they were more or less the same thing. “Go up to the lodge,” he said, shaking slightly. “Get Aritsa. He has a sedative—”
At the lodge, Aritsa was already shoving bottles into a bag. He followed them back to the field of bones, to find Malkhaya cradling Shuthmili in his lap. She was shuddering, as though trying to shed her skin.
“What does she need?” said Aritsa, opening up his bag. His white vestments fluttered around him, making him look like a ghost.
“Give her a full dose,” said Malkhaya. “She’s overstrained herself.” He waved at the layer of corpse debris dusted across the hillside, and laughed weakly.
Aritsa knelt over them, dripping the contents of a vial into Shuthmili’s mouth. At last she stopped twitching and lay still. Malkhaya rose to his feet, lifting her easily, and without a word began trudging uphill toward the lodge.
Csorwe and Tal followed him. All around them, the barrens of the dead world echoed.
Back at the lodge, Aritsa and Malkhaya lit the lanterns and banked up the fire, laying Shuthmili out on a pallet in the central room. Aritsa prayed out loud. Malkhaya prayed silently and paced.
Eventually Malkhaya broke away and came to speak to Tal and Csorwe, as though shielding the priest. “You’re not the only one with questions,” he said. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
9
The Hollow Monument
ARITSA AND MALKHAYA WERE sitting at the table when Csorwe and Tal emerged the next morning. The Qarsazhi looked very solemn, as if they had prepared notes for this encounter.
“Shuthmili is resting,” said Aritsa, almost before they could take their seats, and Malkhaya poured them coffee.
“What the hell is she?” said Tal. “And why don’t you keep her on a leash?”
Tal was used to Tlaanthothei magic. Sethennai’s magic. Clean, economical, controlled. Whatever they had seen last night, it had been none of those things.
Lagri Aritsa frowned, and Malkhaya winced.
“Shuthmili is a valued Church Adept,” said Aritsa eventually. “Our Adepts are not beasts of battle. They are treasured national assets.”
“I saw your treasured national asset melt nine skeletons to death,” said Tal. “How do we know you’ve got her under control?”
“Shuthmili was raised and trained at the School of Aptitude in Qaradoun. She was an exemplary student for more than ten years,” said Aritsa. “She is shortly to be considered for tether to the Imperial Quincuriate—”
Tal’s expression betrayed how much he knew about whatever this was.
“Has she hurt you?” said Malkhaya. He didn’t seem at all friendly this morning. Clearly Tal had fluttered his eyelashes in vain.
“No,” said Tal, reluctantly.
Csorwe finished her coffee and set down the cup. “Look,” she said. “We have a bigger problem, don’t we?” Aritsa and Malkhaya watched her, impassive. “There’s someone else here. The dead don’t rise of their own accord, not like that. Not with that kind of purpose.”
“This is a dying world,” said Aritsa. “The phenomenon of revenance is well documented, and—”
“No, Csorwe’s right,” said Tal, for the first time in history. “Last night, one of the revenants spoke. You know how unlikely that is? They have a whole proverb about how many tales dead men tell. If you need reminding, it’s no tales. Someone was pulling on its strings, or I’m a fucking turnip.”
Malkhaya rested his big square chin on his big square hand. “It’s true,” he said. “It spoke to Shuthmili. It provoked her deliberately.”
“So,” said Csorwe. “If I’ve got this right, we’re dealing with a necromancer who can afford to raise nine revenants from the dead and control them remotely.”
Even back at the House of Silence, nobody would have raised a revenant just for the sake of it. They rose naturally in the crypts if you left them long enough. It would be like planting in midwinter—a pointless waste of energy to interfere with a natural process.
“Yeah, and I’m pretty sure you two knew about this, didn’t you?” said Tal. She almost snapped back at him, before she realised he was backing her up. “If you didn’t know it was a bloody necromancer, you knew there was something out there. Any reason you decided not to tell us?”
“Well, you haven’t been one hundred percent straight with us, either, have you?” said Malkhaya.
“Haven’t we?” said Csorwe, sitting back in her chair.
“Sethennai said he was sending two scholars. If you two are scholars, I’m the Emperor’s beard-trimmer. Scholars—sorry, Aritsa—don’t run towards the fight, and if they get in one, they don’t fight like that.”
“We’re his agents,” said Csorwe. “We can defend ourselves.”
“And you’re lucky we can,” said Tal, “or you’d be smeared halfway across the landscape.”
Malkhaya dropped his hands on the tabletop with a thud, exhaling sharply. Tal often had this effect on people.
“Malkhaya, calm down,” said Aritsa, after a long, unpleasant pause. He looked very weary. “We have had our suspicions, yes. We did not choose to share them. Perhaps that was an error. It is done, now. However … prudence suggests we should pool information. There are few capable of dealing with the dead. And of those capable, fewer still are willing.”
Aritsa explained about the unfamiliar ship the Qarsazhi had seen, first a week ago and then on the night Tal and Csorwe had arrived. Csorwe listened with mounting apprehension.
There was a nursery rhyme they sang in the House of Silence: This is the road the dead walk. This is the road of bones. Despite herself, Csorwe remembered all the old songs. A sickly suspicion sprouted within her, uncurling pallid roots. If she was honest with herself, it had been growing since last night, since their encounter with the revenants.
Sethennai couldn’t have been the only person who read Lagri Aritsa’s paper. There were others out there who wanted the Reliquary.
“The question is what we do now,” said Malkhaya. “We’re clearly no longer safe here. If you ask me all five of us ought to take Prosperity and head to the Gate. But, uh, Aritsa—what do you think?”
The priest rubbed his eyes and blinked at them. “I am loath to abandon this world,” he said, with unexpected resolve. “There is still so much work to do. The Survey is not the most lively office of the Church, but we have a long history of perseverance.”
“Right,” said Malkhaya, clear
ly torn between affection and exasperation.
“We’re not leaving either,” said Tal, in his worst and loudest drawl. “We have a date with the Hollow Monument. We’ve dealt with worse than revenants—”
Csorwe kicked him under the table, although maybe it was too late to bother keeping up the pretence that they were real scholars.
“Perhaps one of us could go and call for help?” said Aritsa.
“I could,” said Malkhaya. “But it would be several days’ journey to the Atalqaya nexus. I’d be happy to go, but I don’t like the idea of leaving you and Shuthmili unprotected.”
Or in company with these hooligans, I bet, thought Csorwe.
“It’s never a good idea to split up,” she said. She rose from the table and went to peer out of the window. Outside, the morning sun turned the dying world a washed-out grey.
“Agreed,” said Malkhaya.
“But there’s no immediate sign of danger,” said Aritsa.
“You’re lucky if you get a warning,” said Malkhaya. “We’ve had ours.”
“Sounds like you’ve had several,” said Tal, who never knew when to leave well enough alone. Before Malkhaya could jab back at him, there was a sound from the staircase. They all startled. Shuthmili was leaning on the banisters. Csorwe wondered how long she had been listening.
“Ah,” said Shuthmili. “Good morning.”
There was a flurry of activity as Aritsa and Malkhaya rose to offer their assistance. One of them actually helped her down the stairs.
Shuthmili looked soft and newly washed in fresh white robes, and she had the same look of pristine detachment Csorwe had noticed last night, like a veil separating her from the world. Now Csorwe looked more carefully, it was much closer to weariness than haughtiness. There were deep, purplish shadows under her eyes, and she rubbed her hands together as if they were cold.
“Warden, your reverence, I couldn’t help overhearing—” she started.
“Shuthmili,” said Aritsa, looking pained. “Please don’t concern yourself. All will be well.”
“I ought to repair the outer perimeter,” she said. “It was breached last night.”
“Not immediately,” said Aritsa. “We have discussed this. It is not safe for you to make use of your powers so soon after your exertions last night.”
“I am much recovered,” she said.
“You may feel that,” said Aritsa, “but we now know what we are dealing with, and—”
“Exactly,” said Shuthmili. For a moment her eyes brightened, as if she’d only woken up in that moment. The effect was startling, like coming up into the sun from out of a cold cellar. “I heard. There’s a dangerous necromancer somewhere out there and we need to defend ourselves. Without the perimeter we’d have no warning of—”
“Our first responsibility is to keep you safe, Shuthmili,” said Malkhaya.
Shuthmili lowered her eyes, and went on, without raising her voice or looking up at the two men. “No. Your first responsibility is to keep other people safe from me. I am a calculated risk, and there is no point in keeping me here if I can’t be of use. If I can’t do anything, I am nothing but a risk.” Her hands were twisted tightly together, the tension visible even from here.
“We shouldn’t just wait here,” she went on. “We waited before, and it didn’t prevent them from attacking us. We need to find out what they’re doing and stop them.”
“Whoever it is, they’re here for you,” said Malkhaya. Aritsa twitched. “I know. But we have to be straight with her. Shuthmili—there are people out there who, uh, who might—”
“Yes, I know,” she said. “There are people out there who would like to kidnap and enslave me. I know I’m valuable. But the Church believes I’m also useful in the field, or I would still be cloistered in the School of Aptitude, in perfect safety. I am an asset. So use me.”
Discontent and uncertainty moved like shadows across Malkhaya’s face. Lagri Aritsa looked unmoved.
“Nobody knows better than I do how much you have trained or how hard you have worked,” said Aritsa.
Shuthmili sagged back into her chair, her lashes falling again. Csorwe felt a moment of terrible pity for her. She remembered how it had felt to be attended to at every moment. Even as a child Csorwe had found it smothering. Shuthmili was a grown woman, and didn’t have a crypt to escape into.
“The Traitor will lie to you,” Aritsa went on. “She will try to assure you at every turn that you are doing the right thing, that your superiors are blind and misguided, that the stable order of your life is a cage rather than a sanctuary. You cannot let yourself be won over.”
Tal rolled his eyes. Csorwe knew what he would suggest: let the Qarsazhi deal with their own problems and go hunting for the Hollow Monument by themselves. The trouble with that, as far as she could tell, was that all their problems were the same problem.
“Look,” she said. “You were right. We haven’t been straight with you.”
“Csorwe, what the fuck are you doing,” said Tal under his breath.
“Sethennai sent us to this world to look for an artefact in the Hollow Monument,” she said, ignoring him. “Maybe the necromancer wants Shuthmili, but it’s just as likely they want our thing, too.”
Lagri Aritsa blinked disbelievingly. “This is a Qarsazhi Precursor world,” he said. “Any artefact here would belong to—”
“Put it aside a minute, Aritsa,” said Malkhaya. “Go on.”
“Shuthmili’s right,” said Csorwe. “We have to go on the attack before this person can find what they’re looking for. If we leave it too late, we won’t stand a chance.” This was just a guess. She didn’t know what kind of time or effort it would take to get the Reliquary open, but she needed to get them moving. The Qarsazhi knew the Hollow Monument’s layout and location. Without them, Tal and Csorwe would be searching at random. If the Reliquary was here in this world then they couldn’t let someone else get to it first.
Tal finally seemed to get it. “Yeah,” he said. “They’ll be able to saunter up here and pull your perimeter apart whenever they feel like it. If you want to stay in this world, you’ve got to do something about them now. And we can help.”
Shuthmili looked up at Malkhaya, not quite daring to hope.
Malkhaya squared his shoulders. “It isn’t safe. I still think we should leave.”
“That might indeed be wise,” said Aritsa. “Still—”
“Your reverence,” said Shuthmili, perhaps sensing that the priest was an easier mark. Csorwe was cautiously impressed. “This world is a part of our history. Isn’t it worth risking something of ourselves to protect it?”
This struck home. Aritsa nodded, slowly, looking something like a snail peering out of its shell.
“Perhaps I could go,” he said. “You could stay here with Malkhaya.”
Shuthmili let out a single sigh, then seemed to collect herself, betraying no further sign of disappointment. It was almost painful to watch. Csorwe wondered how dull her life had been that she was so desperate to run into danger.
“Aritsa, you know I can’t possibly let you go alone,” said Malkhaya.
Csorwe let them talk it out and went to get her things ready. Eventually, Malkhaya would realise that his choice was between leaving Shuthmili alone at the lodge and letting Aritsa travel into the Monument with only Tal and Csorwe’s doubtful protection. They were all going to have to go together.
Manipulating the Qarsazhi left a sour taste in her mouth, but she was sick of this cold world and sick of spending time with Tal—and worse, she had her own suspicions about whom they might find in the Monument.
In the years since Echentyr, they hadn’t seen or heard from Oranna, but Csorwe hadn’t forgotten. Bats, and books, and parcels tied with string, all sometimes gave her pause. Every recollection came with a little twist of fear, an accompanying ache of curiosity. Remembering that life went on at the House of Silence, that people came and went, was like looking at a fallen log and imagining all the wood
lice wriggling underneath. It was better to put it out of your head, but part of you wanted to know, even when you’d hate the knowing.
She felt much the same about trying to work out how things now stood between Oranna and Sethennai. Sethennai rarely spoke of her, and never with fondness. Csorwe had to assume that things between them had ended in Echentyr, if not long before.
She swept these thoughts aside. It wasn’t complicated. If Oranna was here, and meant to steal the Reliquary, then she was Csorwe’s enemy, and by now Csorwe was well used to dealing with those.
* * *
Prosperity was no bigger than a fishing boat, with two red canopies and a quiet alchemical engine. The lodge and the watchtower sank away beneath the ship as it unhitched from its moorings and floated into the sky. The grey land receded. The lake, the hills, the ridges were like a drawing in charcoal, loosely sketched. The only flashes of colour were the flags of the security perimeter, and soon even they were invisible.
Aritsa and Malkhaya were occupied handling the ship. Tal, at the end of his tolerance for company, had gone to lean over the side. Csorwe and Shuthmili were the only ones left in the cabin.
Shuthmili was curled up on a cushioned bench, withdrawn into herself. Csorwe wondered if she was travel-sick. Under ordinary circumstances Csorwe would have appreciated the silence, but she still didn’t know what to make of Shuthmili. She had been surprised at the way the Adept had held her ground in front of the two men. She was certain there was more to learn.
“You’ve been to the Monument before,” Csorwe said after a long pause. She knew lots of people who were experts at winkling out secrets, but she wasn’t one of them. All she knew was that you had to start small and work from there.
“Yes,” said Shuthmili. “The three of us went a few months ago. But I’m afraid we didn’t get very far. Just a survey of the grounds and the top level of the structure. Dr. Lagri wanted to write up the findings before we returned. I’ve been working on translation for him. I did some of the work for his paper, actually—I heard you might have read it…?”
The Unspoken Name Page 17