“Who knows where to find the house of Prisca Dezisimu?”
The boys exchanged glances. The outsider didn’t seem dangerous, but they expected nothing good to come of this. He might be a rich man, and in a carriage no less, but he was still an outsider.
“I am a doctor,” the emperor explained. “She is sick. I can heal her.”
He didn’t wait for an answer, but Koerlig saw that the boys were surrounding them. Locals began to emerge from their huts and hovels to see what the commotion was about. They were sickly, dirty and deformed one and all. Koerlig didn’t doubt that they also stank. What happened was amazing. Usually, such impudence toward his gelatinous majesty would cause far more important heads to roll, but right then, the emperor was serenity itself.
“I was sent from the palace,” he said patiently. “The woman is sick with swamp fever. I can help her.”
“Who’re you then?” a filthy and ragged peasant said as he approached and jabbed a finger at the emperor’s chest (Koerlig nearly fell off the carriage in shock). “What d’ya want?”
“I am a doctor,” Ma Ju Ro answered. “I’m searching for a sick woman called Prisca Dezisimu.”
“What d’ya want?” It was as if the peasant hadn’t heard what the emperor had just said! “Who’re you?”
Koerlig couldn’t take it anymore, and climbed off to bring some order. His fist was clenched around a surgical scalpel in his pocket, and he was ready to use it. Nobody could talk to the emperor like that, even if he was in disguise!
“Show some respect, you there!” he shouted threateningly.
“Wha’?” the peasant said in amazement. “And who’re you then?”
The emperor shot a glance at the secretary, annoyance flashing in his eyes for an instant. But why?
“Get back in the carriage, Koerlig!”
The young man frozen in confusion. It was odd enough that the emperor had decided to remain alone with this aggressive rabble... He’d also called him by name! Koerlig returned to the carriage in a stupor.
Unfortunately, the ruler continued his conversation quietly. He shook (so disgusting!) the peasant by his dirty hand, and the latter checked himself, cringed and looked at the ‘doctor’ with respect. The coin resurfaced in the peasant’s hand, then he shouted something and the crowd dispersed. All the boys ran off, apart from the eldest. He nodded to the peasant and clambered up to the reins with Koerlig. Lentz’s secretary smelled an acidic stench of sweat. His uninvited new neighbor fidgeted a little and started touching everything with the same hands that had just been digging through the mud. Koerlig decided to be strong and patient. The important thing would be to properly disinfect everything later.
“The boy will show you the way,” the emperor said, climbing into the carriage. “Onwards!”
The route the boy sent them on was extremely complex. It occurred to Koerlig that he would never have found the right turns on his own, hidden as they were in this warren of miserable hovels. Once again, he felt admiration for Lentz, who went out that morning alone, quickly found the right place and returned whole.
Finally, the grubby boy told them to stop.
“Can’t drive further,” he said with a sinister smile. “You’ll get stuck. Go on foot.”
The guide jumped down and was off like a shot. While Koerlig thought of whether to escort the emperor himself or stay and guard the carriage, it was all decided for him.
“Keep an eye on the carriage,” the emperor ordered.
He started tramping along the muddy street without a shadow of hesitation. Up to his shins in sticky slurry, Ma Ju Ro confidently walked down the road and then disappeared into a house. A couple of minutes later, an unfamiliar man walked out and froze at the entrance like a statue.
The emperor stayed inside for a long time. Koerlig, at first attentively keeping lookout so that none of the local vagrants could come on him unawares, finally calmed down and started daydreaming. Some flies snapped him out of it when they decided to brazenly crawl on his face. He slapped one of them and accidentally poked himself in the eye. His lord still hadn’t returned.
The sun had moved noticeably across the western horizon when three men approached the carriage: the emperor, the unfamiliar man and a tall woman. They held her up, one at each side.
The ruler helped her into the carriage, then climbed into the carriage on the other side. The stranger sat next to Koerlig at the reins.
“I’ll drive,” he said. “Keep an eye out, it isn’t safe here... for people like you.”
Koerlig nodded. Lentz had told him that the woman was in the final stages of swamp fever. In that condition, she should be barely breathing! But although she looked exhausted, this woman showed no symptoms of swamp fever. She was absolutely healthy, and the top student of the university medical faculty was one to know.
The carriage quickly made its way out of the slums under the control of the stranger, who explained to Koerlig that he was also Lentz’s man. On the edge of hearing the secretary heard the emperor lying to the woman, telling her that her son was alive and well. She began to ask him about her daughter, Luca’s sister, in a hurried stream of words. The emperor disingenuously calmed her, promising her that the girl would be found and brought to the palace.
“Everything is going to be fine from now on, Prisca,” Ma Ju Ro assured her. “You have nothing to worry about. And you’ll never need to do anyone else’s laundry again, you will be served like an empress!”
None of my business, Koerlig thought. Apparently everyone in this Dezisimu family is a suitable donor. True, he didn’t understand the purpose of all this mystery and the emperor’s personal involvement, but he’d had plenty of time to get used to his eccentricities. However, when they again passed by the spot where they’d had stones thrown at them, Koerlig realized what it was all about. Did the emperor want to get closer to the people, gain popularity among the poor? Considering Rezsinius’s growing power, the move was understandable.
“All hail the emperor!” that filthy peasant shouted as they drove by. He held a pitcher of ale, apparently bought with the emperor’s kind donation. “Sacred Mother protect Emperor Ma Ju Ro the Fourth, kind and benevolent!”
To the secretary’s surprise, the other street thugs supported the filthy peasant fervently, shouting the emperor’s praises. Koerlig turned back in his seat and spoke before thinking.
“What did you say to them, my ruler?”
Ma Ju Ro stroke the woman’s shoulder and raised his head. Koerlig sighed with relief when he saw that his eyes held no anger, only... joy? The ruler smiled.
“Nothing that you need to worry about, Koerlig.”
“All the same, what..?”
“I declared that by imperial decree, from today onwards, all healing for all subjects of the empire is free. After all, what is more important than our people’s health?”
The secretary opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again. Nothing he could think to say seemed at all appropriate.
“That’s right, Koerlig,” the ruler nodded. “Nothing to worry about.”
Chapter 27. Constant Value
ALL THE WAY to the palace, Luca tried to touch his mother and even took her by the hand, but she flinched and pulled away. He could understand that. She didn’t know where her son was, what had happened to Kora. She was sick with worry, and she found the fat doctor’s awkward attentions inappropriate. And it was obvious that she didn’t quite believe his assurances that Luca was fine. The emperor could tell. He saw it in her eyes. His mother emanated mistrust, and even the fact that he’d healed her changed nothing.
When Luca had first walked into the hut, she didn’t even know what was going on, what day it was. She had no memory at all of the last few days. Events flowed together in her fever-struck mind, layering on top of each other; Kora in prison for stealing an apple, a few days on her feet scrubbing sheets, Luca’s incredible recovery, the accusation that he attacked Karim, the court, Kora’s disappearance and...
&
nbsp; Tortured with fever, unable even to stand, she quenched her thirst with the water that accumulated in the corners of the shack as it leaked in from the street. In her delirium, the woman was always speaking with someone: with him, or rather, with Luca, or with her daughter, or customers, or the judge. The name of the innkeeper Nemania came up a few times too. Luca’s mother was trying to convince him to have mercy on her son.
The emperor, ravaged with sympathy and pain, had intuitively embraced the burning woman and desperately wished for her to be healed. In that very moment, tendrils finer than thread grew out of him and joined the two bodies together, giving his metamorphosis power all the relevant information on the subject ‘Prisca Dezisimu.’ The infection had already made its way into her brain tissue and devastated all her organs. She couldn’t be healed. The only option was to clear out her body, absorb all the old organs and recreate them anew. It was imperative that the subject’s memory be preserved and that she be fed and provided with oxygen during the operation. Not a complex task, but one that required time and Wheel energy reserves.
The son had lain pressed to his mother for several hours, patiently waiting for her to recover. When she woke up, she found herself in the embrace of some disgusting fat man and screamed loudly. Lentz’s man ran in when he heard the cry, and together they somehow managed to convince Prisca that they weren’t robbers or rapists. It had been even harder to convince the woman to go with them to the palace.
“An audience with the emperor?” Prisca frowned suspiciously. “Why on earth..?”
Luca himself found the right words, saying that Kora was in trouble and only the emperor’s direct involvement could save her.
He felt his mother’s mistrust as they went, and Luca accepted it and locked his emotions inside. His mother was alive, well and safe. All he had to do now was save his sister, and as soon as possible. If Lentz couldn’t handle it, he’d go to that bloodsucking healer’s home himself and grind the man into a fine powder, along with anyone else who tried to get in his way.
The palace medical wing had its own entrance. Lentz’s man dropped off the emperor and Luca’s mother there. There was nobody in the reception room, and Ma Ju Ro calmly walked inside unnoticed, not counting the dozing guard. There he cleaned off the day’s dirt, got changed and then set off for his quarters with his mother in tow.
“Let me introduce myself again, Prisca,” he said, once they were alone. “I’m not really a doctor. My name is Ma Ju Ro the Fourth. I’m the emperor.”
Luca’s mother had always had a sharp tongue, and it was obvious she wanted to say something like “well then I’m the Sacred Mother,” but something stopped her. The woman was undoubtedly in the palace, and the courtiers they ran into in the corridors all bowed low. And it seemed unlikely that they would address her companion as ‘your majesty’ if he were a simple doctor. Spellbound by her understanding of what was happening, Prisca had no words.
“Make yourself at home,” the emperor said simply. “You’ll be fed. Later, if you want to rest, the far bedroom is at your complete disposal. In the meantime, I have matters of state to attend to.”
Koerlig rushed in, breathing heavily and barely getting out his words, to report Lentz’s return. Ma Ju Ro left his mother and went to meet the healers.
The palace courtiers, newly emerged from their holes, stared with surprise as their ruler rushed so purposefully and quickly through the halls. Rumors began to float through the palace halls, each more outlandish than the last, and from there they flew out through the entire capital. Something was happening, but nobody knew exactly what yet. The emperor had time to think about this on his way to the medical wing, and made a mental note; he needed to learn about his government’s communication policies, and find out who handled them. It also wouldn’t hurt to find out who all these people were and what they were good for.
Once he reached Lentz’s domain, the emperor burst into the chief imperial medic’s office.
“Where is she?”
Lentz nodded to the emperor in a businesslike fashion and began to report immediately.
“My ruler! We managed to take the girl right from Yadugara’s operating table, fortunately before he had time to begin the transfusion procedure. She was drugged. She is currently recovering in a private chamber.”
“I want to see her.”
Lentz led him to Kora’s chamber. Luca touched his sister and requested her status.
Subject: Kora Dezisimu. Vital signs: 38%.
Detected toxins harmful to the nervous system!
Subject is extremely malnourished!
Luca gave the mental command to heal the body. His metamorphosis reacted instantly.
Analyzing reaction options...
Releasing neutralizing agents.
Energy reserve saturation... Successful.
It suddenly occurred to him that when his sister awoke, it would be best if she saw her mother first, and not him. All it took was a thought to send Kora into a deep and restorative sleep. His power affected the brain directly, imitating the effect of the hormones responsible for sleep.
“Allow her mother to remain here, Lentz,” Ma Ju Ro said. “The girl will sleep until tomorrow morning, she needs to recover her strength.”
“It will be done, my ruler! I intended to suggest that myself.”
The rest of their conversation was not for listening ears. Ma Ju Ro and Lentz set off for the imperial chambers. Koerlig tagged along, but walked at a distance behind them.
It was a long way from the medical wing to the part of the palace with the emperor’s chambers. They had to walk across almost the entire palace, and then go up to the third floor.
And people scurried all over the entire way there. Another public appearance by the emperor, efficiently moving about on his own two legs, sparked a furore. A man dressed like a peacock separated from one of these groups of loiterers. As he walked past, the emperor noticed that the courtier had unusually rosy cheeks.
“Remind me who that is,” Ma Ju Ro asked Lentz.
“Reyk Lee Vensiro, your majesty,” he whispered. “He is from a noble house, an unlanded aristocrat.”
“Reyk?”
“Reyk is the title of the ancestors of the comrades of your magnificent ancestor Ma Ju Ro the first...” Lentz explained.
“Your imperial majesty!” the approaching Reyk bowed deeply. “Good day to you!”
“Reyk Vensiro,” the emperor nodded somberly without slowing his pace.
Lee Vensiro ran past Ma Ju Ro’s large figure and placed a pleading hand on him.
“But, my ruler! Spare me a minute of your precious attention! I have wonderful news for you! Each piece better than the last!”
Ma Ju Ro stopped. Lentz crossed his arms, snorted sceptically and choked back laughter.
“Tell me, then,” the emperor ordered.
“My ruler! Three beautiful flowers of the South were delivered to the capital this morning! Fresh, unspoiled and burning with desire! And each of them thirsts this very minute to...”
“Next.”
“Um...” Vensiro lost his train of thought, but quickly corrected himself. “The purest Tassurian... spices, my lord! Distilled ten times, the strongest ever concentration!”
“Any other news?”
“A circus of monsters, my lord! The ringmaster has collected the most monstrous monsters from all corners of the Empire! He even has mutants! A bearded lady! A pig man! It’s enchanting!” It’s...”
“Is that all?” Luca interrupted him. He was impatient to share his ideas with Lentz before tackling the issue of his mother and Kora and meeting with them. There was so much to do. On top of that, Keirinia was still waiting for him, and this peacock was standing here flooding him with his foolish offers.
“Yes, but...” The Reyk cast an unfriendly glance at Lentz, nervously licked his lips and finished his thought. “My ruler will be very pleased!”
“Are you sure? Then I’ll see you in my office in an hour with all your
‘news.’ But no talk of enchanting monsters. Bring the ringmaster with you.”
Leaving Lee Vensiro to his thoughts, the emperor and the healer continued on their way. Nobody else made any attempt to approach them.
“Tell me,” Ma Ju Ro said, glancing at Lentz. “Why did he do that?”
“Your interests were extremely clear before, sire. On the one hand, long life and good health; our service provides that for you. The other hand is entirely occupied with that for which I was responsible. Entertainment. You always thirsted for one thing — dispelling your boredom. Mature women and young girls, opiates and alcohol, tasty food and exotic dishes, shows, bards, songbirds and singers, magicians and other such charlatans, gladiator combat and orgies...” Lentz took a breath. “Every courtier competed for your attention and favor. And it could only be won by satisfying your primary pleasure. Some find beautiful women, organizing a whole observation network across the entire Empire, others deal with the delivery of...”
Blood of Fate Page 17