“Oh yes, Prophet. Many floors indeed, for I agree with you; to be clean is to be holy. A floor is just a floor, but what man is a man who doesn't keep it pure?”
“Well stated, my moonlight friend. I am pleased to see the office you held previously has not warped your mind, and that there is benevolence within.” Juppa had knelt beside him now, gaze fixed on the scrubbing and resulting bubbles. He even moved his head in circular motions. “Tell me, friend, what do you know of the faith?”
“I strive to know all.” More lies.
“Hah, a reasoned response. There is more to you than tokens, that much is clear. But I ask in earnest and want your thoughts.”
Takha sat back on his heels and placed his scrubbing brush in the bucket next to him, then braced himself with his hands on his knees. “In truth, I know little. I saw you in the crowd on that day, weeks ago, pleading with those lost in darkness to come back to the starlight. But the faith did not bring me; it was the prospect of hope. Hope for my brother and sister, wherever they may be, hope for my fellow starless, and hope for Celaena, and all that the city might be. Your words gave me hope, and I understand your words derive from the faith. These apostles-” he lifted his hands from his knees and splayed his arms out around the great hall of the shrine, “-they meant something, once. The faith understands it, I know that much, and if the hope I felt is entwined with Gethael and the apostles, then I want to be with them.”
Juppa peered at Takha for a long time, quiet and expressionless, and Takha panicked for a moment, thinking he’d said the wrong thing. His entire plan revolved around infiltrating the faith and destroying it from within; it would be devastating if he were cast out of the shrine so soon, and he feared for his life if he was forced to report as much to the shadow man.
“Passionate, my friend, that is how I will describe your words when I relay them to the Starmother. She will be pleased to know there is one so articulate within her grasp and among the first of the disciples. Perhaps as a result she will be less angry with me as I search for more pebbles to toss.” The man grinned, an annoyingly boyish gesture complemented by the tuft of black hair swept across his brow and visible despite his hood. “Now, finish this floor and then make your way to the skyview chamber for evening prayer. A cloudless night approaches and we must express our thanks.”
“Of course, Prophet. There is much for which to be thankful, and the light provides.”
Juppa smiled again, then stood and strode from the hall, humming to himself. Takha didn't recognize the tune, but he hated it all the same. Anything that came from that young fool, prophet or not, was to be derided. Takha looked around before spitting on the floor, then hastily scrubbed the marble until it dissipated. His plan needed to bear fruit sooner rather than later, lest he sin and tear the prophet down with his bare hands.
Ezai dragged his feet, cobblestone grabbing at the toes of his boots. He instinctively caught his balance several times, persevered, and carried forward, but not because he wanted to keep on ahead. He’d prefer to have let himself fall, to curl up on the ground and forget the world.
Rain fell throughout the night, heavy and dense, no simple summer shower, until his tunic was soaked and his armor hung cold against his skin, permeating thin undergarments.
His heart told him to seek shelter and find a fire to warm his flesh, but his mind didn’t listen, instead intent on shuffling one foot in front of the other, over and over, with nowhere to go, lost in the city and in himself. The sky was filled with heavy clouds, the usual twilight was dampened, and his path dark. Since his banishment, the Lion's words had tormented him, seared into his mind: “But that is your father's legacy. Not yours.”
No firstborn adhered to the foundation of the Order more than he, no firstborn had closed more bonds with so few deaths, no firstborn had brought honor and integrity to their sacred duty like him. Every breath he took, every tenet espoused, all had been done to fulfill his father's legacy, to further his solemn undertaking. Everything, from his first swing of his father's sword to his first arbitration to accepting the Rayn’s call for justice, had been in the name of the Orange Dawn. The people must be protected, those without power shielded from the tyranny of starlight. Those had been his father's words, and now they were his words. Did they mean anything, in the end? What was the purpose of such devotion if it could be discarded so easily at a few words from a silver tongue?
Disbelief shook him. He had been cast out from the Order at the decree of the forebearers, their vision obscured by the manipulation of a ginger-haired devil in a Brother's body. How could he have been so dull to drop his guard and let Veydun slip in the knife? Dishonor. A pure, righteous disciple would not have bent to such illusions. He was weak and had done his family a disservice. Were he not the only born of Nesher, had his mother not passed early, perhaps seconds and thirds could have taken up the mantle. But the only remnants of his family were now dust and ash.
Forgive me, Father.
After docking with the city-island, he walked the majority of the distance back to Celaena, refusing the luxury of coasting the rivers in a watercraft. Did he punish himself out of shame?
Starless villagers joined him on his journey, lugging their wares to the city to be bartered or sold, always with heads bowed low and eyes fixed on the ground before them. Despair hung heavy, prickled at his skin, and soured his mood.
Did he deserve to walk with these men and women, who labored and toiled for a meager existence? Was his revel in self-pity and sorrow worthy? The starless were not people of plenty; they had been born into struggle, their every act aimed at survival. No reason or purpose drove them, only the need to see tomorrow.
What kind of life is that?
The question nagged at him the entire walk back to the city with the forlorn commoners whose march seemed a rolling tide of gloom sweeping over the plains, passing the outer gates, breaching the walls. Inside, he parted from the throng of roving merchants, pointed nowhere in particular, so long as his walk continued. His legs burned, but did not falter, and despaired at the thought of his family's name tarnished, worsened only by the reality of the coming storm. Why wouldn't they listen? Why couldn't they see? Veydun represented the corruption seeping within the Order. He was a parasite, seeking to replace the good with his own filth, and Ezai had failed to excise the pestilence.
My father's legacy, not mine.
A drunk commoner in tattered clothing clawed at his tunic as he lumbered past, but he paid no mind. Wails of the downtrodden cut through the thick mist draping the city, an odd extension of the clouds. Hundreds of men and women lined the streets, nestled in crooks of buildings or lying under tattered blankets, crumbs at their feet and sorrow in their eyes. They called to him, begging for absolution.
Not days before, he would have cared and sought to provide the comfort of justice where bonded. Sometimes justice meant sparing a morsel of bread or tokens to draw water from the pipes. The Order's tenets encouraged righteousness, a call for equality, and a belief that no man or woman was better than another. All deserved aid by those strong enough to give it. His father had spoken to him at length about these ideals many times, and it had made their family who it was, revered by their brothers for generations.
But that was all gone now, and he kept walking along a row of shambled housing, oblivious to the cries. He could not save them. Not from the Astral and their ruthless lust for power, and not from the city and its savage reality of lawlessness and strata.
Where am I?
The surroundings looked bleaker than usual. The wood in many of the buildings was rotted, a sickly pallor present in the few starless who milled about at this early hour. Was that salt he tasted? Had he wandered all the way to the city's northern tip, to where it met the gulf of the Unpassable Sea? If so, he’d led himself into the Rayn quint. Fitting, since his only distraction from the shame of his excommunication was his bond with Sotma, confirmed by the Lion to be his to see through.
They called him a mad
man, since he drew upon history and legend rather than facts, plain as they were. Perhaps they were right, all of them correct to raise their eyebrows at his ravings about Saryx.
In Ezai's many years, he’d found the simplest solution often correct. Marks of defiance in the charred remnants of the death scene told an invited story, and it would be no great mischief to pin the murders of the Rayn children on an Arbiter. Laying the blame at the feet of an Arbiter was cause enough to rekindle the thirst for war.
Still, Sotma's aspirations alone did not explain the conclave or the Lion's command. It was collusion, and it would explain much—like Veydun's curious behavior in the weeks prior and the shunning of Ezai, another step in the slow extrication of the good and the pure from the Order. It felt as if a blade cut across his throat too slow to feel the slice. Removing the defiant obstacle was beneficial for any Astral seeking power.
Could Veydun have done this as a tool wielded by Sotma? The puncture wounds in the warden Levant’s neck had been small enough, perhaps caused by a rapier?
No. He shook his head to banish the inquisition playing out inside him, whispers of conspiracy from only himself. Veydun may have received good pay from the Astral, and have connived and devised to taint the Order, for the lost Brother yearned for power. But he was still a Brother of the Dawn, and to kill in cold blood to fulfill another's agenda would be too much, even for Veydun.
Which left only one possibility, only one truth. The black arrow left at the scene of an assassination, the defiance visible in the marks intersecting the starlight scorches, and the resurgence of the faith all pointed to Saryx’s return. Saryx, the forgotten apostle, back from the ashes of the great war and the purge, had somehow survived these past thousand years. But no one listened to Ezai. And why would they? To them, Saryx was a children's story. To them, Saryx was a myth and a fable, confirmed by nothing other than haunting words from old starless with vivid imaginations. The people of the Dominion believed nothing had survived the purge, all records and scriptures burned and removed from history. For the most part it was true, though some things remained. Few possessed the secret, forbidden knowledge. The Order itself only retained bits and pieces within the Arcanum, but enough for Ezai to be convinced. If nothing else, his father had shown him a truth.
None of it mattered if the rest went unconvinced, and they had revealed their unwillingness. And while the shadow assassin did his work, seeking an unknown endgame, the Astral sought a move against the Order and another attempt at their war to usurp the city and implant themselves as lords. This time, there would be no union of Lion and Eagle to kindle the flames of virtue within the mighty Arbiters. Ezai did not see a way out other than to reveal Saryx and draw out the assassin.
Ezai broke from his downward spiral and escaped the trap of his own anguish. His vision focused, and he saw the muddy roads of the fisherman's wharf and smelled the scent of fresh catch hauled by rickety wagons. Early morning chill saturated his bones, and a relentless ache shot through every muscle. Weariness caught him, and he was drained from his labors over the past day. He needed food, water, and warmth. Only then would he be ready to seek answers and clear a path toward salvation. Not just for him, but for all of the starless.
He pulled his cloak tight, bracing against the frigid dawn as breath furled from his lips and lost itself in the thick fog in front of him. The fog was like none he'd seen before. A bad omen in troubled times.
Chapter Nine
“The enemies of the righteous are neither steel nor star. They are anger, lust, and vindication. Stay objective, stay neutral, and you will face no foe.”
- Interpretations by Nesher
“There has been a complication,” Sotma Rayn spoke slowly while sitting back in his high chair, squeezing his hands open and closed, over and over. It drove Veydun mad. The Raynlord's moonroom was stark, vacant of the finery that ran rampant through the Rayn's manor. Sotma, so different than his brothers, was unconcerned with pomp and circumstance. In the politics of the Houses and the Dominion, he remained no more than a solider in a suit.
“What complication?” Veydun looked at the Raynlord, a smirk on his face and a glass of wine dangling in his fingers.
“Nothing in our scheming called for assassinating the Patron Ferai and his wife and gentle son, Brother Veydun.” The white-haired old man looked too comfortable and confident, basking in a cloudless night under an open skylight—his only condition for meeting with an Arbiter.
Did he think a clearer channel with the star would matter even a little bit if things got out of hand? Defiance was defiance, no matter how strong the light. Even so, Veydun kept an eye on this one; it was easy to take advantage of the man, politically, but one did not lightly meddle with the Elegance. Many of his Brothers and Sisters had made that mistake in the war a decade ago.
Still, Veydun only tolerated so much stupidity in his life. “Wait, what exactly are you implying, Sotma?” he said, looking around the room as he scanned the faces of the others present.
Ah, Marcinian Lokka, now there's a powerful foe. Efforts should be focused there, not on Sotma, a minor player from a minor House.
“I’m implying that you took it upon yourself to strike down the Ferai. Perhaps you thought it’d advance our goals and earn you favor in our eyes.”
“Careful,” said Veydun. “I did no such thing. But, even if I did, so what?” He set down his goblet, kicked his feet up on the table, and clasped the back of his head. “House Ferai is all but destroyed—so what? I don't know why you think it's a complication.”
“The faith now has a martyr,” said Bril Vo, completely monotone.
Veydun shifted his eyes, but remained calm. “That fool, a martyr? Doveh Ferai inspired little while he lived—why would that change in death? Why would the starless faithful care about a murdered Astral?” Ridiculous, he thought.
Bril Vo continued, still expressionless. “The starless woman he plucked from the city and placed at the head of the faith—the woman he calls Starmother—no doubt owes him greatly. Though I hear her debt is being labelled as respect for resurrecting belief, contrary to our wishes. Deeper still given his rejection of the holy seat on which they sought to place him.” Veydun flinched. “Oh, you didn't know? The Ferai have been recently elevated in the eyes of the believers, heralding a divinity not known in Celaena for many years. Whatever assumptions we had made about the Patron's understanding of the faith were clearly wrong. The rebirth is not a fake, it is not an echo of beliefs long forgotten. Instead, it seems to be resonating in a way we did not expect.”
Kriv Tsac huffed. “Come now, has the faith really gone that far? What gives the starless the right to ascribe divinity to anything?” Veydun watched the interaction, amused by the Vo's utter lack of emotion and the Tsac's inherent boiling rage.
“It has gone that far, Kriv, and they believe their right is divine in itself—a circular logic, depending on who you ask. Even now the faith spreads further, deeper. You should take a walk in Gambler’s Row sometime, Kriv. You'll be surprised to see what's grown right under your nose.” The black-clad Tsac said nothing, glowering. “In any event, the complication is clear. We are no doubt suspects in Doveh's murder. Such a belief will only cement the hatred burning in the starless.”
“So?” Veydun asked. “Why should we care?” These singers were insufferable in their glacial thoughts and tiny moves, and he thought them incapable of more devious scheming. They were always two steps behind, at least, but he liked them there; it was easier to stay ahead.
“Because, you fool!” Marcinian slammed the table in a flurry of white robes. “Can't you see the faith is spreading like a plague, or are you blind?”
“Again, so what?” He raised his glass and drank.
“So, now we face an entire world of starless—millions of starless—focused and furious, rallied behind a martyr and led by a starless woman heralded to be as honorable as she is cunning. And where does that fury point? To us, to the Astral—their gods.”
The Lokka snarled. “We are their betters, our powers godlike. They are merely bags of water and bone, fit for nothing but labor and furthering commerce. Even they know the truth! None of us make them live the lives they do, make them chase tokens just to spend on gambling and ale to help them forget another day. Pathetic.”
“Oh, please.” It was really too much for Veydun. “Spare me your malcontent. You live a comfortable life; you all live comfortable lives, luxurious lives. It's enough that your comforts derive from the toils of the starless. There is no need to humiliate them. Though, if they're going to get caught up in a delusion of faith, it’s somewhat fitting you are as well. Gods—hah!—indeed.”
“You are forgetting your place, Arbiter.”
“And you have not answered the question, Astral.” Veydun grew slightly annoyed. “You are Starsingers, you have godlike powers—you just said it. Who cares how many starless rise and rally against you? Slaughter them all and start over. I don't see the issue.”
“You wouldn't. You think resisting a million starless is the same as simply relying on your defiance against a few Starsingers? You are stupid if you won't respect the numbers.”
“Can we return to more pressing matters?” Sotma interjected before Veydun could respond. “I'll be direct and ask you one last time, Brother Veydun, for we're all seeking an answer to the same question. Did you kill the Ferai?”
Veydun barked a laugh. “Me, a brother of the Dawn, assassinate an Astral? I think not, and I told you as much already. I'll do your dirty work through subterfuge and manipulation, Sotma, because—believe it or not—our ultimate interests are aligned. But I would absolute not go so far as murdering a singer and completely destroying the balance.”
Remember the Dawn Page 14