The Tyrant

by Seth Dickinson

  “I’m not your husband!” Abdumasi shouted, in Aphalone. “I don’t know what you want me to say! I don’t even know his name, they gave me the damn thing and I—”

  Silently, frowning, Kimbune offered her arms.

  Something happened between them, a savagely quick exchange of emotion, like two crippled ships locked in broadside by their toppled masts: then Abdumasi was sobbing against her neck, clinging to the first person he had seen in months whose comfort might (might) not be a trick.

  Kimbune pushed Abdumasi upright, inspected him succinctly, brushed at his shoulders and looked critically over his naked chest. “Food,” she said. “Then I’ll tell you about the proof.”

  “The proof?”

  “My husband never believed I’d finish it. But I did. I’ll tell you everything, and he’ll argue, I’m sure.” Kimbune’s eyelashes fairly dripped raw determination. “But first, you talk to Baru.”

  “What?” Abdumasi barked. “This is Baru Cormorant?”

  What do you say to a man who you have deceived and destroyed? What had she imagined she would say to Xate Olake if she saw him again? Nothing: she had avoided the thought.

  “Yes,” she said. “This is me.”

  Abdumasi Abd measured her. A lot of merchants must have seen those eyes across their cups, their contracts, their papers of concession. The eyes of a man who had bargained his way into the company of immortals just for a chance to strike his foe.

  “Talk,” he said. “So I don’t go looking for something sharp.”

  She told him how the Cancrioth had come searching for him, and how Barhu had led them to Isla Cauteria. She told them that the Cancrioth had Tau, and that Tau already knew Abdu was carrying an implant. He covered his fungus-scarred face and hid in Kimbune’s arms.

  “Do you want to go back to the Cancrioth in exchange for Tau?” Barhu asked him.

  “No,” Abd choked. “I don’t want to go back to them. I just . . .”

  Kimbune closed her eyes.

  “I want to go home with Tau. I want to see my wife, and tell her how sorry I am, and then maybe get mad at her again. I want . . . but it doesn’t matter. I bear a sacred line. The Cancrioth can’t let me go. Can’t let this thing,” he groped for his back, “go. . . .”

  “The thing in you, yes, Abd, that’s what they want. The Line and all the souls within it. Not you, Abdu. The tumor.”

  “What’s the difference? It’s growing in me.”

  She waited for him to look at her. She showed him the tip of the little knife.

  “Oh,” he groaned. “Not again.”

  “I could free you from your burden,” Barhu told him. “I could bring you to see your wife again. But I need to ask you questions first, Abdumasi. Questions about a man you once knew, and the reason you hated him.”

  Barhu found Yawa in the fortress stables, dressed in simple peasant’s clothes and the sort of dull wooden mask a Selions farmer might wear when the livestock warden came round. The old woman sat on a stone wall with her bare hands clasped in her lap.

  “Napping?” Barhu teased. “Manure smells like your childhood?”

  “No,” Yawa said, miserably. “I’m watching them kill a foundered horse.”

  He was a roan carriage horse, long-legged with small hooves. A ring of bumps around one of those hooves betrayed his fatal wound: the bone of his leg driven down through the hoof below. Every few steps the horse flared his nostrils and tried to lie down. The groom whispered in his ear.

  “Farrier,” Yawa said. “That’s what they call a man who tends to horses’ hooves.”

  “Did they overwork the poor thing? I remember there was a rash of foundering in Treatymont. The carriage services bought good field horses and walked them to death on hard roads.”

  “No. He was a prize horse. They let him stay in their best pasture this spring, and he had too much fresh grass and sugar. It made his hooves soft, somehow.”

  The horse lay down on a pile of hay in a gutter. The grooms tossed up cut grass to hide the smell of blood. The veterinarian wrapped a blindfold over the horse’s eyes.

  “Ah, Devena,” Yawa croaked, and spat into the stone of the wall. “What do you want?”

  “I came to ask you about a surgery. Iscend’s going to demonstrate the technique down in the morgue, when she finds a corpse with an appropriate spine. We need your expertise. I need to know if it can possibly work.”

  Yawa shuddered. “A spinal? Good luck.”

  “It can’t be impossible, can it? You certainly brought me through meningitis. . . .”

  She shuddered again where Barhu expected a chuckle, and said nothing.

  “Yawa, what is it?”

  “Cryptarch business,” Yawa said, roughly. “Svir was right. We had it easy on Helbride. We were under our own power. I forgot how it is. . . .”

  “Your brother.”

  “Yes.”

  “Was Hesychast here?”

  Yawa shrugged. “Why would it matter?”

  “He might have betrayed something, when you told him what you’d learned. You’re a judge, Yawa, you know how to read the witness.”

  “Not this witness,” Yawa grumbled. “I suppose he was . . . sentimental about Abdumasi Abd and Tau-indi Bosoka. I saw him react when I mentioned trading Abdu to the Cancrioth.”

  “Good. That’s what I thought. I just spoke with Abdumasi Abd, and he—”

  She cut herself off.

  “What?” Yawa demanded.

  “I . . . I’m not sure it’s safe to tell you. If Hesychast’s putting pressure on you, maybe it’s best if I keep what I learned to myself. So he can’t force it out of you.”

  “I need something. Anything. A crumb.”

  The horse’s veterinarian prepared a glass syringe: kratom opiate, to ease the pain of the paralyzing aconite that would follow. Barhu reached for Yawa’s gloved hand.

  She drew it away. “Baru. We are out of time. One of us has to be destroyed. One or the other. It’s been made absolutely clear to me.”

  Barhu shifted closer to whisper. “We could use the secrets.”

  “What secrets?”

  “Renascent must have some way to blackmail or control Farrier and Hesychast, right? If we could learn their secrets, then we’d be too dangerous for them to destroy. We could set up vendettas for automatic release. Then we’d—well, you’d—be on an even keel with Hesychast.”

  Yawa hemmed in thought. “You thought Farrier might be a pedophile. It would explain his belief in discipline. He would have to believe that the mind could master the flesh.”

  “No. That’s not it, thank Wydd.”

  “You’re certain?”

  Her brief conversation with Abdumasi had narrowed her suspicions. Tau-indi had started her down the path, with their outburst on Eternal, on Baru’s last night aboard. Abdumasi wouldn’t have joined the Cancrioth or fought the Masquerade if he didn’t hate Farrier so much. And why does he hate Farrier? Kindalana most of all.

  There was an obvious reason for one man to hate another over a woman. Kindalana lived in Falcrest now, as the Amity Prince, so there was clear opportunity. But say Farrier and Kindalana had been entangled: would that be blackmail useful to the Throne? Charges of unlicensed miscenegation and consorting with aristocracy were dangerous, but Farrier was a popular man, and an affair with an Oriati Prince might only add to his cachet. It did not seem enough to control him. Could Kindalana be his hostage? Could he care about her that much? Possibly: but Barhu didn’t believe it. Farrier would rationalize his way out of any compromising attachment. And an Oriati Prince would be dangerous to assassinate or execute, so the threat might not be credible. . . .

  Or perhaps Abdumasi’s grudge against Farrier had nothing to do with the blackmail that bound Farrier to the Throne. Abd had not been forthcoming with further details.

  “I’m sorry,” she told Yawa. “I really can’t tell you more.”

  “You’re impossible.”

  The veterinarian slid the syringe i
nto the horse’s neck. It switched its tail and whickered. It seemed glad to be off its hooves.

  “How do you butcher an empire?” she asked Yawa, thinking, unfortunately, of the knackers.

  “What?”

  “How do you kill it, and render it down to its useful parts, and feed your hungry mouths with the meat off its carcass? That’s what we have to do.”

  “Historically speaking,” Yawa said, “I think you arrange a succession crisis, and split the realm. But the nature of Falcrest’s Emperor and Parliament makes that difficult.”

  The people believed the Emperor was selected by exams and lottery, an anonymous will with its own autonomous finances and property, chemically forbidden to know Its own identity so that It could use Its power to ensure fair, clear-sighted rule for all. But they were misled. The edicts the Emperor announced were fed to It by the Throne. The body in the People’s Palace was just a lobotomized proxy, and the chorus read the scripts the Throne prepared.

  “How do you suppose it’s decided what the Emperor will say in public?” she wondered.

  “The same way the Throne decides anything else. You exert your influence on the scriptwriters and handlers in the People’s Palace. You tell them what should be said, and when. And if no one else stops you, then it’s done.”

  “But there must be a process of review. You can’t just decide to have the Emperor blurt out whatever you please. What if someone decided to reveal all the Throne’s legends? Or declare war on a lark?”

  “It takes time to schedule an appearance by Its Majesty. I imagine the others will keep an eye on the preparations, make necessary inquiries. Including . . .” Yawa trailed off significantly. Including, she meant, any notional second cell of the Throne. “If there’s disagreement on the wisdom of a proclamation, I’m sure the Emperor’s appearance would be scuttled.”

  “And you couldn’t possibly buy off the Emperor Itself.”

  “Not when It’s a lobotomite who never speaks aloud.” Yawa sighed and rubbed her wrists together. “The trouble with Falcrest, I find, is that they’re very good at aligning the self-interest of their subjects with the preferences of the empire. Even we members of the Throne face personal destruction if we step out of line. Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “Like what?” Barhu asked, innocently.

  “Like you’re pleased about how clever you are.”

  “It’s what you said. About self-interest. It’s possible to turn self-interest to our own purposes. Do you know how a joint-stock concern works?”

  “No. I mean, yes, I’ve read the related laws, I have a basic understanding. But none were ever registered in Aurdwynn, and so I never practiced any law regarding them.”

  “It’s a way to turn your concern into a single-purpose bank.”

  “A bank? I thought joint-stock concerns were business ventures.”

  “They are! They’re a bank that accepts deposits for the purpose of doing some kind of business, and then pays those deposits back out of its profits.”

  “Barhu,” Yawa said, “I am exhausted and empty. Please tell this as simply as you can.”

  But it was so magnificent, so very close to magical! Didn’t she want all the gory detail, the minute glands and fine bones of the beast Barhu would invent?

  “Look.” She stabbed her fingers into her palm. “A bank is powerful because it can spend people’s money when they’re not using it. A bank’s like—like if you gave your silver coins to a fisherman, and the fisherman melted the silver into hooks to fish. After a while you ask for your money back, and the fisherman returns your silver. But he keeps the fish he caught. Banks are the same: people give the bank their money. The bank spends the money on investments. When people ask for their money back, the bank returns it, but keeps any profit it’s made off the investments.”

  Yawa tapped her fingers impatiently. “Fine. I know this much.”

  Barhu banged her fists together in excitement. “A joint-stock concern is the exact same principle, but with more risk. It asks for silver coins, turns all the coins permanently into hooks, goes fishing, sells the fish it catches, and pays you back out of its profit from fish sales. It has no obligation to give you your money back. But you can buy stock in it—an obligation to give you a share of its earnings. Does that make sense?”

  The horse stopped breathing. Yawa made a vicious strangling gesture with one hand. “Enough.”

  “But I haven’t told you about the middle class, how they’re drooling to give someone their money, so they can be really truly rich—”

  “Stop. You’re right. I’m not a financier, and I shouldn’t know the details of your schemes. But I am a judge. And I know when a witness is evading.”

  Barhu flinched from her bright blue eyes. “Evading?”

  “Can you genuinely find enough leverage over Farrier to control him? If Farrier’s protégé turned on him, then Hesychast would win the Reckoning. I’d be safe. If you can do that . . .”

  “I think I can.”

  “You think? You don’t know?”

  “I’m trusting in trim, Yawa.” In the clues she’d detected from Farrier, the moments of weakness . . . and in the possibility Tau might yet confirm.

  The Throne was the arena where two powers overlapped. The place where the influence of Barhu’s fascinations—great edifices of trade and violence—crossed over into Tau’s world, the small, secret bonds between people.

  Yawa stared at Barhu in alarm. “What do you mean, trusting in trim?”

  “I need some information from Tau. Or from Abdumasi. But neither of them will talk unless they trust me.”

  “You said that Tau hated you.”

  “They do. But if I can do what they wanted of me—if I can reunite them with Abdu—maybe they’ll help me in turn.”

  Yawa snorted. “Wydd help us.”

  Barhu nudged her with a hip. “Did I tell you I’m going to see my parents again?”

  “Baru,” Yawa said. “Are you going to kill me?”

  “What?”

  “You’re talking about your parents. You talk about all these plans for commerce and investment. You seem confident. All I can think about is how they’ll put spikes through my brother’s eyes if I fail. Am I going to fail? Am I going to die? Do you already know?”

  “No, Yawa. I promise”

  “Then how—”

  “Yawa,” Barhu said, taking her hand, “please come down to observe the surgery. It might be important. It might be more important than anything.”

  Iscend drew the scalpel down the dead man’s spine. Barhu shuddered at the thickness of the parting skin: like a mat of rubber.

  “Light, please,” Iscend prompted.

  Yawa steered the mirror’s magnesium beam onto the incision. In the harsh shadows of the morgue’s darkness she looked archonic, a being of angles and geometric primitives.

  Iscend cut down to the cadaver’s vertebrae. The bones of the spine were clearly separated, shockingly so. The corpse stank of bleach and cloying perfume.

  “Here.” Iscend counted vertebrae down from the top. “Inside these bones is a canal which holds the spinal nerves. Tributary nerves and blood vessels enter the canal through these openings, called the foramen.”

  Her hips and waist moved subtly, steadying her as she cut. “This membrane, here, is the meninges. A tissue that protects the spinal nerves. Abd’s cancer will grow inside or outside of the meninges. If it is inside, we must cut through the meninges, and then we risk infection. The instruments and sutures must be as sterile as desert.”

  “The nerves give me the most concern,” Yawa said. She’d been very quiet.

  “Justifiably so.” Iscend marked a certain vertebrae with a long needle, flagged with red cloth. “Any injury to the spine above this point will kill him. A lower injury might only cause paralysis.”

  “In Aurdwynn, before Falcrest,” Yawa murmured, “the paralyzed would die of infected bedsores.”

  Barhu stared into the cleaned body
, counting the tiny vessels, the processes of the spinal bones. So much required to keep one’s heart beating! Maybe Hesychast was right. Maybe there was more to learn inside one body than in an entire empire. “Do you think you can keep him alive?”

  “At spinal operations my success rate is better than the average. Hesychast trained me himself.”

  “Tell us the exact rate.” Yawa’s grip on the magnesium mirror began to shudder. She transferred it to her other hand.

  “Seventy percent. If you discard those who came into the theater already dying.”

  Barhu groaned in worry. “Abd is weak. He hasn’t been eating well. He has a fungal infection. I can’t let him die.”

  “There are no certainties once the skin is open, Your Excellence.”

  I cannot make this choice for him, Barhu thought. I cannot force him into a decision between life with the Cancrioth and death on the surgical table. I have to let him talk to Tau. Then they can decide together. And if I ask them whether they will help me against Farrier, maybe, out of gratitude . . .

  But it was not very good trim, she reminded herself, to do good things out of hope of reward.

  “Wait a moment,” Yawa snapped. “Wait. Baru, what exactly are you planning to do here? Give the tumor to the Cancrioth but keep the man?”

  “Yes. The cutting goes home, to continue the Line of Undionash. Abdumasi will be free to choose his own fate.”

  “They’ll never allow it! They came all this way to save him, didn’t they?”

  “They trade bodies like campsites, Yawa. They don’t need the man Abdumasi Abd. They need his souls.”

  “And I need the immortata. I need it for Hesychast. You know this. I’ve explained it again and again. Why don’t you listen?”

  Iscend cringed and tried to cover her ears. It was a childlike gesture, hiding from parents’ squabble. Barhu pitied her. The corpse stain on her gloves kept her from touching her face: she cringed again, in deeper horror, and ran to the sink.

  “We can’t get the Cancrioth to give up the immortata, Yawa. It’s too important to them. We’d have to take it by force, and even if we did, could we keep it alive?”