Beneath the Twisted Trees

by Bradley P. Beaulieu

  He drew the sign for misfortune.

  She laughed again, and this time it was a genuine, soul-pleasing sound. “Misfortune indeed.”

  He pointed to how? for the third time. He hadn’t retained his throne for more than four hundred years without persistence.

  “In truth,” she said, “I was trying to protect Sharakhai. Or one small part of it in any case.” She seemed to want to tell the tale, which Ihsan found was often the case. Get someone talking about themselves, even for a little while, and a hundred doors to their heart were revealed. Then it was simply a matter of choosing the next one to open.

  She spun a tale of her mission to the east, how she’d come to spy on the desert tribes as the owner of a small trading company. After a bit of prodding, she told him how she’d met King Emir. How the two had fallen in love. “Or so I’d thought,” she said, suddenly much more conscious of her cuts and bruises than she had been a moment ago.

  Shortly before the assault on the city had begun, she’d brought the pleas of the thirteenth tribe, as spoken by their emissary, Emre, to her king. She asked him to stop the attack on the blooming fields, saying out loud what everyone already knew: that the attack on the blooming fields was a fruitless endeavor. King Emir let her speak her piece then asked her about her time with the Sharakhani emissary, whether she enjoyed his company, how necessary it had been to sleep with him.

  “He was the one who told me it might come to that. He encouraged it so long as it would help secure Malasan’s future and ensure peace with the tribes for long enough to take Sharakhai.”

  Ihsan wiped the dust and wrote in it anew. And when he learned the truth?

  “He flew into a jealous rage, claiming I’d put the safety of Sharakhai above that of Malasan.” She turned her head and spat on the deck boards. “Empty words. He knew as well as I did that his attack on the blooming fields was useless. He admitted as much. And then, two days after I was thrown in here, I learned that he’d ordered the attack to cease!”

  The news of Emre was interesting. He was a childhood friend of Çedamihn’s who’d joined the Moonless Host. Ihsan had thought him little more than a foot soldier, a lesser player in the game at best. But Haddad’s story was forcing him to reconsider. Why would a man, once a scarab of the Moonless Host, try to protect the asirim? It struck him how quickly the thirteenth tribe were embracing the history that Ihsan and the other Kings had spent centuries trying to erase. Most of the Kings had believed a war of disinformation would be enough to discredit the thirteenth tribe’s story and suppress the truth. But now Ihsan knew he’d been right all along. As much as he’d tried to convince himself otherwise in the years after Beht Ihman, stories like those of the lost tribe were undying flames. One might bury them for a time, but eventually they would work their way back to the surface and light the world aflame.

  Now he saw why Haddad had opened up to him so quickly. She had an unspoken desire to hurt King Emir. She might not even know it herself, but it was there, and it was a thing he might trade on for something infinitely more important to him.

  King Surrahdi, he wrote on the floor. Did you know he was alive?

  To say Haddad’s expression was guarded would be an understatement. He thought asking had been a mistake, but then she offered, “It wasn’t common knowledge.”

  She’d avoided the question, which hinted at how loyal she was to the throne. Was it merely out of habit? She was speaking to a Sharakhani King, after all. There was only one way to find out: keep her talking.

  Surely Emir wouldn’t have hidden it from you.

  She was silent for a time. “No.”

  Ihsan smoothed the dust and wrote, Did you know he was creating his army?

  She shrugged. “Yes.”

  And no one spoke against it? He put on a look of confusion, the sort parents gave to their children when they’d done something shameful.

  “No. Why would they?”

  She’d spoken too quickly. She knew the shame Ihsan was hinting at—any Malasani would—but had chosen not to take the bait. In reply, he drew the ancient symbol for one of their holy trinity, Tamtamiin, god of a thousand hearts.

  She stared at the symbol in the dust for a long while before answering. “What Surrahdi did was for the good of our people. That honors Shonokh and Ranrika as well as Tamtamiin.”

  Ihsan wrote the ancient symbols for love, compassion, and empathy, Tamtamiin’s primary attributes, those to which one was to adhere when working in her name. Golems were always created from a place of love. They were used to remember and honor family. They had no place in war save to defend the life of those from whom they’d been made and their loved ones. To use them for acts of aggression was forbidden. In fact, before now, Ihsan would have thought it impossible. Were they not given life from the spring Tamtamiin herself had summoned from the earth? Were they not bound through that connection to adhere to her teachings?

  So the lore of the golems went. Ihsan had read many such texts in his travels to Malasan. And yet Surrahdi had made hundreds of them and was using them for war. It was easy to point to greed as the justification behind it. Surrahdi had always coveted Sharakhai. But to do so was to underestimate the importance of the triumvirate in the lives of the Malasani, particularly those who sat the throne, who were raised to worship all three in equal measure.

  The Mad King, Ihsan thought, was named the Mad King for a reason.

  Surrahdi had inherited the throne just short of his twentieth summer. He’d seemed normal in those days, if a bit aggressive toward the desert and Sharakhai. But he’d changed over the years, becoming not only more truculent, but more unstable as well—one point short of a crown, went the joke in the halls of Tauriyat. Knowing what he knew now, he had to wonder: Had creating the golems driven him mad? Had he been creating them for decades? Creating even one was a trial on the soul that left one weakened and feeling broken—I feel unmade, one woman had written centuries earlier.

  Decades spent at this one task, Ihsan mused. The man might be mad but I’ll give him this much: he’s tenacious.

  Knowing Surrahdi’s penchant for symbolism, Ihsan guessed he’d made a thousand of them. A thousand hearts missing, Zeheb had said, which was another moniker for Tamtamiin. It was sacrilege, to do such a thing. He would have tried to justify it in many ways; creating enough to pay homage to the goddess was surely one of them.

  Still, it was a high crime. He found himself wondering why the ruling families of Malasan and the priests in their temple halls would have allowed it, but he laughed at himself a moment later. Surrahdi’s boldness had brought decades of prosperity to Malasan. As so often proved true, the comforts of this world trumped those of the next.

  Do you feel no shame? Ihsan wrote.

  “What does my shame matter? It isn’t my place to say.”

  Ihsan swallowed involuntarily and immediately gasped. For long moments the pain was overwhelming. When he was able to look at Haddad again, he tapped the space above his dusty words.

  “It isn’t my place.” Haddad turned and stared intently at the occupant of the far cell. “I’d mind my business if I were you.”

  The woman in the far cell, who wore a host of tatty rags, gave no reply except to turn and face the hull. It was in that moment that Ihsan thought he recognized her, but the remembrance was lost as a sudden coughing fit overtook him.

  Haddad’s words filtered through his pain as she snapped at the tatty woman, “Now keep those goggly eyes fixed anywhere but here.”

  Heavy footsteps approached the door at the end of the large room. Ignoring his pain as best he could, Ihsan stretched an arm between the bars and wiped the words from the decking. The door swung open a moment later and in stepped the turnkey with a tray. They were each given flatbread and water but, lo and behold, Ihsan was given something extra. A glass of araq. The turnkey stared down at Ihsan, then glared at the araq and emitted the sor
t of displeased grunt an ox might make when whipped by its master. Then he lumbered away.

  As the turnkey left and closed the door, a conversation that had clearly begun earlier resumed. “I’m telling you, we’re not going anywhere,” a voice said, “not until the golems have recovered.”

  “They know—” the turnkey began, but the rest was lost as the door slammed shut.

  Do they indeed? Ihsan mused.

  He picked up the araq and sniffed it, immediately recognizing its scent. It was an extremely good glass of araq from Bhylek House, one of Sharakhai’s finest makers. He wondered if it was poisoned, but what would be the point? They could poison him any time they wished. He took a sip and it burned the severed end of his tongue badly. He didn’t care, though; his mouth hurt anyway. He might not be able to taste much, but he could smell plenty. When the pain passed, he took a deep, long whiff, and found it to be aged perfectly, with just enough water lily to counterbalance the sharper notes of lime peel and orange. The faint notes of pepper and oak completed one of the most satisfying scents Ihsan had ever had the pleasure of inhaling.

  He held it up to the light from the portholes, admiring the shallow, sunflower depths, then reached out through the bars, offering the glass to Haddad. She stared at it, then shook her head. Ihsan shrugged and took another sip as memories of the many late nights sipping the same liquor on his palace veranda returned to him.

  It was a message from King Emir. An insult. They’d taken the city, the glass of araq said, or enough of it to begin stripping Sharakhai of her riches. But it only served to reinforce Ihsan’s way of thinking. The very fact that King Emir would try to rub Ihsan’s nose in their conquest only proved how eager they were to overlook Surrahdi’s shame. They know, the turnkey had said before the door closed. The golems understood Surrahdi’s shame, because each retained some small piece of his humanity.

  You cannot believe creating so many golems honors Tamtamiin, Ihsan wrote to Haddad when they were alone again, nor Shonokh, nor Ranrika.

  She remained silent, perhaps hoping he’d give up, but if so, she’d severely underestimated his resolve. He wiped it away and tried again.

  You’re willing to jeopardize your place in the farther fields, the future of your entire nation, to protect a king who would treat you so?

  He didn’t have to gesture to her bruises or her cut lip for her to understand what he meant. She seemed to notice his gaze, and averted her eyes, perhaps embarrassed over them. She didn’t have to say a word for him to understand the shame and worry she must feel at the way King Emir and his father had chosen to conquer the desert.

  Is Sharakhai worth the burning of your faith?

  “You seem to think I have some control over my king. I have none.”

  You need no control of your own. Emir is devout. Control will be found through faith.

  “Yes Emir is devout, but so is Surrahdi.”

  Then use their devotion against them. Remind them of the teachings of their faith.

  She pointed to her face. “I did! Why do you think he did this? I tried using his faith to get him to stop the attack on the asirim.”

  Then appeal to others. There must be a dozen who could convince him.

  “They’ve tried! Why do you think he parades around in the high priest’s robes? He took them for his own after murdering the woman who last held that title, because she dared speak sense to him. Why do you think the golems keep dying? Deep down he knows what he’s doing is wrong. But does he recognize his crimes when it happens? No, he only makes more of them. Like plastering mud over cracks, he hopes to repair his fractured mind or at the least cover his shame. But it only drives him deeper into madness.”

  Ihsan’s hand froze above the deck boards as the implications of her words sunk in.

  The golems are dying? he wrote.

  Haddad stared at the writing in the dust. She swallowed hard, then looked into Ihsan’s eyes, the embarrassment clear on her face. She’d divulged one secret too many.

  Just beside dying he wrote, Why? Then tapped both of them hard.

  Haddad leaned back against the hull. “You’re a clever man. Figure it out.”

  He tried to learn more, but she refused to so much as look at him. Even when he tried to speak with his ruined tongue, a sound like lowing cattle, she kept her gaze averted.

  Ihsan fell into silence. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected out of this conversation. He’d wanted information, perhaps the beginnings of a plan to get himself out of this camp. But somehow he’d ended up with a thread that, when pulled just so, might unravel the entire Malasani army. It was too early to start tugging on it, but the time would come.

  His gaze drifted to the woman in the far cell near the door. She was curled up on the floor and staring at him, her arms wrapped around her head. He was just about to rattle his door and point at her to look away when he realized how intimate the position was. And how very familiar.

  He nearly laughed. How rich, he thought idly. Two days ago he’d contemplated killing himself. Now he could think of nothing but the satisfaction of seeing Surrahdi’s grand vision come crashing down around his ears. And yet, even with the help of the woman disguised as a shabby prisoner, it wouldn’t be easy.

  He’d been feeling sorry for himself these past few days and in his grief had abandoned one of his primary tenets: that one controls one’s own fate, always, even when it seemed it wasn’t so. But how to make it happen? He had few enough strings to pull.

  He stared at Haddad. At how forlorn she looked. She might be manipulated, but not by him. Her defenses were too high. Who, then, might he use? He thought back on everything she’d told him, and landed on the one who had accompanied her here, the one she’d slept with to gain his trust, the one who’d urged her to speak to King Emir.

  The young scarab, Emre.

  He wouldn’t take direction from a Sharakhani King easily, but he’d cared enough about the asirim to try to save them; he might care enough about Sharakhai to do as Ihsan wanted.

  The woman in rags opened her mouth and mimed sounds coming out, a request to speak aloud. Ihsan shook his head no. If Haddad were to learn he had an accomplice, it could all fall apart. He made his fist fall slowly behind his arm, mimicking the sun setting behind the horizon.

  The woman nodded and lay her head back down. Ihsan, meanwhile, listened to the sounds of the Malasani war camp.

  Chapter 50

  “THE KING WILL SEE YOU NOW,” said the Malasani guard to Emre.

  He wore the red armor of King Emir’s personal guard. He was, however, newly appointed to the role, the others having killed themselves four days ago when King Ihsan ordered them to slit their own throats. Emre thought the city would have been taken by now, but the Kings’ forces had put up a stiff defense at the inner walls. And, perhaps more telling, something strange had happened with the golems. Many of them, if the rumors were true, had suddenly, all in concert, turned and walked away from the conflict. They’d returned to the southern harbor and huddled in one large mass as if waiting for something. What they might have been waiting for, Emre wasn’t sure. To recover, he supposed, but from what? The golems might have a sliver of a soul within them, but that didn’t mean they had feelings, did it?

  Emre followed the guard into the pavilion. Hamid, by Emre’s side, ducked under the flap, took one look at the king sitting on the far side, and said under his breath, “Fuck me. I’m surprised he doesn’t walk on stilts.”

  The pavilion’s floor was not carpets over sand, but a series of interlocked wooden platforms. And King Emir himself was sitting on a throne, which in turn was on a dais. Along with the movable platform the king used to watch the war, it gave the impression of a man who found the sand of the Great Mother so offensive that he refused set foot upon it.

  The first thing Emre noticed when they came closer were the bloody cuts and bruises on King Emir’s knuck
les. The king noticed and, rather than hide them, sat straighter in his throne and gripped the carved lion’s heads at the ends of the armrests, as if daring Emre to make mention of them. Emre didn’t. He bowed instead, only deep enough that it wouldn’t be considered an outright insult. Hamid, standing on Emre’s right, did as well, though clearly it was a reluctant gesture. For once, Emre didn’t care.

  Near the King’s side, sitting on a padded chair, was Surrahdi. He was once again wearing the mask of Tamtamiin and a robe of golden flax. The way he sat, legs crossed on the seat, exposed his ankles and sandals. His hands were in his lap, ever moving, a ceaseless flow of unconfined energy. It was a strange parody of innocence, the pose of an unruly child, not that of a man who’d helmed one of the most powerful nations in the known world.

  “We meet under an auspicious star,” King Emir said when they’d risen. “Isn’t that what you say in the desert?”

  Surrahdi giggled and spoke behind his mask. “An auspicious star indeed.”

  “It is,” Emre replied, doing his best to ignore Surrahdi, “though the expression is used for ill portents, not fair.”

  “For that you use favorable winds, yes? May we meet as the sands blow calmly along the dunes?”

  “Among others, yes.” Emre was already annoyed with the king’s smug attitude. “Does this mean you’ve considered our offer?”

  King Emir gave a conciliatory smile and waved to the low stools below the dais. The stools were so low that Emre and Hamid would have to sit cross-legged, forcing them to look up to Emir like children being scolded. Emre made no move to comply with the request. Neither did Hamid, who stared at the king with a calm expression, eyes half-lidded. It was as emotionless an expression as Emre had ever seen on him, which showed just how angry he was.

  “We would not take more of the king’s time than is necessary,” Emre said to him.

  Surrahdi had practically been vibrating in his chair, his hands clasped beneath his chin, but at Emre’s words he stilled, as if terribly disappointed.