Beneath the Twisted Trees

by Bradley P. Beaulieu

  Ramahd is weary beyond words, which perhaps explains why he doesn’t remember his purpose until he and Meryam are fully joined in battle. He wanted Meryam to find him—it’s necessary if his plan is to succeed—but she hasn’t come for him in some time. And she’s distant. Very distant. Are the two related in some way?

  He isn’t sure, but he’s glad she’s being forced to spend more of her power to try to find him. It will help to weaken her, a woman who always pushes herself to the edge. Indeed, he already feels it. She’s ready to give up. It’s in that moment that he presses her. He steps toward her, cutting the whip with greater ease. Soon the weapon no longer divides and regenerates.

  He sees it then, a grand web fanning out around her, thin tendrils connecting Meryam to many others. Hamzakiir is there, as are Mateo, various servants in Eventide, and more servants in the Qaimiri embassy house. She maintains dominion over dozens. Some of the links are bright. Others are weak and fading, perhaps those she used days or even weeks ago.

  He’s captivated by it, so much so that his attack pauses and Meryam, angry that he’d got the better of her even momentarily, is back on the offensive. His sense of the web vanishes as she lashes out with the whip again and again, each strike bringing her a little closer.

  “Wake up!” Cicio was shaking him so hard his pallet shifted against the attic floor. “Alu damn you, Ramahd, she’s coming!”

  Ramahd was still in the throes of lethargy, but when Cicio’s words registered, he levered himself up and began the process of locating Meryam’s grasping tendrils and cutting them off before they came near.

  “Well?” Cicio said when he began to breathe easier.

  Ramahd nodded. “We’re safe. She hasn’t found us.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  Cicio considered this while his eyes glanced nervously toward the door. “And the web?”

  He nodded. “I found it.”

  “Do you know how to use it?”

  “No,” Ramahd admitted, “but I’ll find a way.” He’d known the web would be there, but he’d had too little time with it to find a way to free Mateo without Meryam learning of it.

  Cicio’s expression made it clear he wasn’t nearly as confident as Ramahd, but in the end he nodded. In silent concert, the two of them traded places, Cicio lying in the bed, leaving the blankets crumpled to one side in the heat of the night, Ramahd taking the stool near the bedside. Davud and Esmeray lay on their own pallet nearby. Davud was still in the throes of his fever, and Esmeray was cradling him against her chest. As angry as that woman always was, she’d certainly warmed to Davud. It did Ramahd’s heart good to see them so, legs tangled, their worries briefly forgotten after falling asleep in one another’s arms.

  Cicio was looking at them too, but didn’t seem consoled in the least. “We lost Vrago,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “We lost Tiron.”

  “I know.”

  “It’s time we get Mateo or go after Meryam herself.”

  “Mateo hasn’t been seen outside the House of Kings since he arrived in the city.” Cicio started to argue, but fell silent when Ramahd held up a hand. “It may not matter much anyway. Mateo can do nothing until Hektor arrives. It’s better if we wait for the fleet.”

  “That may be too late. And they are near. They must be by now.”

  Ramahd couldn’t argue. Mateo had told him the fleet would be no more than two weeks out when they’d spoken in Alu’s temple. That time was fast approaching, and Cicio was right—Mateo might not leave the House of Kings before then. And when the fleet did arrive, there was no telling what the Malasani fleet would do. The war would consume Mateo’s days, possibly even take him away from the city. The time was now. Free Mateo from Meryam’s spell of domination and they would have him. And if they got him on their side, Duke Hektor was sure to follow, and the tide would truly turn against Meryam.

  “We’ll find a way,” he told Cicio.

  “I’m sick of this fucking city, Ramahd. I’m sick of the heat. I’m sick of the dust. I’m sick of the incessant press of people. It makes me feel like a fish in a net that keeps tightening. I want to go home to my wife. I want to see my son. Mighty Alu, I want to feel rain on my face again. Instead we sit here like does in a glade, waiting for the huntsman’s arrow.”

  “I want to go home too.” The first thing he would do is visit the graves of his wife and child, then swim in the Austral Sea, immerse himself in the cold swells to his heart’s content. He squeezed Cicio’s shoulder. “Sleep.”

  Cicio closed his eyes and eventually slept. Meryam’s presence, meanwhile, faded until it was lost entirely. She knew Ramahd had awoken and that she’d have no chance to catch him now. Needing some fresh air after his close call, Ramahd went outside to the small yard behind the locksmith’s home. Fezek was there, staring up at the stars, as he often did at night. “Beautiful, is it not?”

  There was no denying it, but the scene was strange. As in his dream, the moons were full. Beht Zha’ir, the night of the asirim, had returned to Sharakhai.

  “I never thought I’d see the day,” Fezek said in that wistful, wheezy voice of his. Ramahd knew precisely what he meant. The city was silent. No howls of the asirim. No cries of fright or pain. “Too bad it never happened while I was alive. It mightn’t have felt so eerie.”

  “No,” Ramahd said, “it’s eerie when you’re alive too.”

  The city still observed the dictates of the holy night: perfect silence, no lights lit. Ramahd wasn’t certain what had happened to the asirim, but surely it had something to do with the looming war, the Kings summoning them for some other purpose.

  Fezek pulled his clouded gaze away from the night sky to look at Ramahd. His eyes had unsettled Ramahd in their early days, but now he merely found them sad.

  “Have you saved us once again from the attentions of the terrible queen?” Fezek asked.

  “A bit dramatic, don’t you think?”

  Fezek shrugged. “It’s what the people want.” When Ramahd paused, confused, he went on. “I’ve started composing an epic.”

  Despite his lethargy, Ramahd laughed. “Planning your visits to the tea houses already?”

  Fezek stared down at himself. “I rather think the shisha dens would be more appropriate, don’t you?”

  “Perhaps. Do you know how it ends?”

  “No,” Fezek admitted, “but I’ll be able tell you soon enough.” He returned his gaze to the sky. “Was it the field of glass again?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hard times.” Fezek liked to think he could interpret Ramahd’s dreams to find some hidden truth about Meryam they could exploit.

  “I finally found what I was looking for.” Ramahd knew it would lead to wild speculation on Fezek’s part, but he didn’t care. He needed to get it out.

  “Oh?” Fezek said.

  “Meryam was weak, and a grand web appeared around her.”

  “A web. Conspiracies.”

  “In a way. The threads in the web are the bonds she’s created to others through use of their blood.”

  “Mmmm . . .”

  “Hamzakiir’s was the strongest among them.”

  “Yes, I see. She’s taken quite a shining to him, which he hasn’t returned. It’s difficult to love a queen.”

  “It doesn’t mean that at all, Fezek. She’s dominating his mind.”

  “Yes, but you said yourself one still has will.”

  “And you think underneath it all, Hamzakiir actually loves Meryam?”

  “Love is a complicated thing,” Fezek replied easily. “Take you, for example.”

  “What about me?”

  “You say you hate Meryam, but you love her as well.”

  The silence of the city pressed in on Ramahd. He supposed he might have admitted it to himself but he ha
d no idea anyone else had picked up on it, much less Fezek.

  “Well,” Ramahd finally managed, “Hamzakiir has no love for Meryam, I can tell you that.”

  “You said you’re looking for a way to free this Madano.”

  “Mateo.”

  “Yes, well.” Fezek took a rasping breath, as if he were building up to something grand. “My mother used to weave baskets.”

  Ramahd lowered his head into one hand and began rubbing his temples. “Fezek . . .”

  “She was good, but she was creative as well. Sometimes too creative. She’d weave patterns of ribbon into the reeds in the shape of animals, fish, birds, flowers. One time she made one of Tauriyat, complete with the palaces.”

  “Fezek, I’m tired.”

  “But she would often change her mind. She’d spend all that time creating a beautiful image, but then she’d become dissatisfied, and she’d undo it and start all over again.”

  Fezek paused, waiting for Ramahd to see his meaning, but for the life of him Ramahd couldn’t understand it. “So?”

  Fezek sighed, the same one he used when no one appreciated his latest bits of verse. “She’d use the same ribbon, the same reeds. The old image was lost, replaced by the new, and no one, including my mother, would know by looking at it that the old one had ever existed.”

  Ramahd stared at Fezek, who finally looked satisfied.

  “Fezek, I could kiss you.”

  Fezek’s head jerked. His cloudy eyes widened. “Oh, very well.”

  Ramahd left him there, ran up to the room, and woke Cicio. “I’ve got it,” he said.

  Cicio rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “Got what?”

  “A way to bring Mateo to us.”

  Chapter 39

  IT WAS NIGHT WHEN ANILA WAS GAGGED, taken in chains to a prisoner’s wagon, and driven down King’s Road. Through a small window, Anila could see that the driver had no light to speak of—no moons in the sky, nor lighted lanterns hung from hooks at the front of the carriage. It was so bloody dark she feared they would tip off the edge of the road and fall to their deaths. But they didn’t, and soon they reached the Sun Palace, where she was led inside by a pair of Silver Spears and taken deep below the palace.

  She’d walked this path before, but as a free woman with Davud. Four of the Kings had accompanied them as King Sukru led them all to the large cavern where the roots of the adichara met, where the strange crystal stood glowing, where Yerinde herself had demanded the Kings lay Nalamae’s head at her feet. So it came as no surprise when the Silver Spears brought her to that very same cavern, nor was she shocked to find King Sukru already standing near the crystal.

  Still, her breath quickened at the sight of him. She immediately worried that he had her father or sister, Banu, waiting nearby to convince her to do what he wanted, but thankfully she saw no sign of them.

  Three days had passed since her meeting with Sukru in the crypt. She’d been fed her daily meals. Her chamber pot had been emptied. Beyond that, not one of the guards had spoken a word to her, and she’d had no indication of whether her father and sister were well, or for that matter still alive. That first night she had resolved, over and over, never to do Sukru’s bidding, but by morning those feelings had been eclipsed by fear for her family. And she worried that Sukru might still betray her and kill her father and Banu even after she’d done as he asked.

  The day after her mother’s death had passed in a haze. She’d hoped it was a dream. She’d told herself it was a trick, that her mother was still alive, somewhere. By the following morning, however, she’d accepted the truth, and the lethargy brought on by news of Hamzakiir’s death all but vanished. Her ability to call on magic returned, along with her sense of death in others, no matter how faint. Her endless thoughts of revenge against Hamzakiir, nearly extinguished, had been rekindled and replaced with a desire to see Sukru dead.

  As the Spears led her across the cavern, it burned her that Sukru had been right about all of it, a feeling that only intensified the closer she came to him. How she longed to drain the life from him. Even from this distance she could sense it: the decay that was peculiar to the Kings of Sharakhai. They’d staved off death for so long that their bodies seemed eager to embrace it. Like a boulder on the edge of a precipice, she need but tip the balance; the rock’s weight alone would do the rest.

  Or it would if it weren’t for the other notes she smelled, the more delicate scents of jasmine and sandalwood and rose. These were the work of the healing elixirs they drank, one of the many gifts the desert gods had granted them. It was some distillation of the adichara that had kept them alive for so long and, despite her desires, might keep her from unleashing the pent-up decay that had been building for centuries within him.

  “Unchain her,” Sukru said.

  The Spears did, then retreated to the cavern’s entrance. Beside Sukru was a massive bird cage hanging from an ornamental stand. It might have been one of those from the Sparrow’s tower. She couldn’t be sure. When she came closer, she noted a variety of species within. A handful of firefinches shared space with a tailrunner, two thornbills, and a small host of saddlebacks. They chirped and chirruped, the sounds fairly swallowed by the immensity of the cavern and its soft, spongy floor and walls.

  The birds were bathed in violet light, thrown off by the nearby crystal, which was twice as tall as Anila and shaped like a wedge. The lowest reaches of it were lost to layer upon layer of thin, tendril-like vines, while the top of the crystal was situated just below a thin root that hung down from center of the cavern’s roof. For a moment, Anila’s hatred of Sukru was forgotten. This was a wonder of the desert. If only its secrets could be unlocked.

  “Where is the Sparrow?” Anila asked.

  “You will begin with the birds.” Sukru opened the cage and crooked a finger near an ivory-breasted thornbill. He nudged it until it hopped on, at which point he pulled the bird out and closed the cage door. “When you have mastered them, you will move on to animals of increasingly large mass. And only when you have mastered those will you be allowed to begin the ritual on my brother.”

  “I’ve told you,” Anila said, staring at the bird as Sukru stroked its back, “I haven’t the ability to grant it real life.”

  “We shall see.” With the sort of assured movements that made it clear he’d done this before, Sukru wrapped his hand around the bird’s head and began to suffocate it. “Before today, necromancers have only managed to summon ghuls. The result has always been men, women, even children, who have at best been poor reflections of their former selves. You are one of the few people who know why. Their souls are but tattered remnants. They’re torn, part of them in the farther fields, another here in our world. I have no doubt, were we able to walk with their other halves in the world beyond, we’d find them every bit as incomplete as the one that resides here. This, however . . .” He regarded the monolith with naked reverence, all but ignoring the dying bird in his hands. “This gift from the gods will change that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I suspect,” he went on, “you will find it not only easier to summon the dead when near the crystal, but that the soul will be delivered whole, or near enough that it makes no difference.”

  Anila had felt many souls since learning about her power. She’d witnessed deaths, and had watched in wonder as their souls had left for the world beyond. She’d seen others who were already dead, and felt the threads that ran from their bodies to the farther fields. She’d tugged on some of those souls, forcing them to inhabit their bodies once more, but it was as Sukru had said: the results had been incomplete at best.

  As the thornbill in Sukru’s hand went still, his purpose and the way the crystal figured into it came clear, and yet it was still strange to feel the bird’s soul move so sweetly through the crystal.

  When Anila had first begun testing the limits of her burgeoning power, she’d d
one so on a firefinch, the very one Sukru’s brother, the Sparrow, had been using to communicate with Davud in secret. Davud had walked in on her during one of those first experiments and found the finch lying at the bottom of the cage, apparently lifeless. He had assumed that she’d killed it and brought it back to life. She hadn’t, though. The finch’s soul had merely been suspended over the threshold to the farther fields.

  That was how this bird, the thornbill, felt. It was child’s play, laughably simple, to draw its soul back. The bird fluttered. It stood on quivering limbs and shook its head as it might under a fresh downpour of rain. In a burst of movement, it fluttered up, wings thrumming, and was lost to the deeper darkness of the cavern.

  “But,” Anila said, already seeing several problems, “it won’t be so easy with one who’s been dead as long as your brother has.”

  Sukru’s stare was merciless. “Then you’ll simply have to work that much harder, won’t you?”

  The scent of his decay was so strong she wondered how long it would take her to send him to the farther fields. She quickly buried the thought. Her father’s and sister’s lives depended on her compliance. As did her mother’s, if her plan was to work.

  “There are also his wounds to contend with,” Anila said, “and the state of his decay.”

  “Let me worry about that,” Sukru said sharply.

  Anila’s fingers were shaking so badly she gripped them tight and straightened her back. What she was about to say was dangerous, but there was no other way. “You don’t have to hide it from me,” she said. “I know what you plan to do.”

  Sukru often looked angry when he was surprised, as if he couldn’t stomach even the smallest amount of embarrassment. Now he seemed calm, which felt infinitely more dangerous. “Pray tell.”

  “You plan to use the elixirs that keep you alive to heal his wounds and restore his body once his soul has been returned.”

  He looked her up and down, reassessing.

  She pressed on. “But you won’t want to make him the first subject.”