Sword of the Deceiver

by Sarah Zettel

  “Very well, come, get me washed and dressed so I may go to her.”

  The daughters of the noble houses swarmed around her, removing her soiled clothing, washing, powdering, painting, scenting, taking and receiving jewelry until Bandhura was freshly clad in topaz and sapphire silk. Her hair was looped into neat braids and her throat, ears, arms, and ankles were all decked with pearls. Now she might go soothe whatever her mother-in-law’s pet might be.

  When Bandhura entered the old queen’s room, Damman, as usual, did not fully hide her anger. The woman had better hope her family would take her back, or that the old queen had left her well provided for, because her time in the small domain was limited to the span of Prishi’s fading life.

  Prishi herself had been moved to a low couch on the terrace, where the cool air generated by the pouring rains might ease some of the fever her long illness brought. Indeed, she looked almost lively today.

  “Ah! Daughter of my heart!” she called in her rasping whisper as Bandhura approached, bowing her head humbly. “There you are. I was so worried.”

  “What could worry you, mother of my heart?” Bandhura plumped Prishi’s pillows and held a cup to her perpetually dry mouth, that she might sip the tangerine juice.

  “I saw an omen, daughter, an omen!” She clutched Bandhura’s hand in her scabbed claw. “I saw a great fish swimming through the rain. It swallowed up two dragonflies. They were my sons. I am sure of it!” The force of her words half-lifted Prishi off her cushions.

  “There, Mother, calm yourself.” Bandhura pushed her back down, gently but firmly, and gestured to Damman to come running with rosewater to cool her brow. “It was a dream, not an omen. A nightmare of your illness, that it all.”

  “No, no.” The old queen shook her head back and forth. “It was an omen, an omen.”

  Movement caught Bandhura’s eye and she saw the eunuch hesitating in the doorway with Lord Divakesh, massive and proud behind him. Priests of the Mothers were one of the few classes of men who were allowed access to the small domain. Many lewd jokes passed among the ladies and boys about how the priests used and abused this privilege, but no one told those jokes about Divakesh.

  Bandhura smiled. The high priest had excellent timing. “Here is Lord Divakesh, Mother. He will tell you the meaning of what you saw.”

  The high priest came in and made his respectful, abbreviated obeisance. He listened seriously while Prishi repeated her babble to him. He closed his eyes for a moment, as if seeing what she saw. When he opened them, he said, “It is as the first of all queens told you, Majesty. It was a dream. But it was a dream of good omen. It means that the power of Hastinapura will soon put an end to two of the bright enemies that threaten her.”

  Prishi’s cloudy eyes searched the high priest’s face for a frantic moment, as if looking for a reason for disbelief, but even Bandhura could see nothing but utter seriousness in him. Slowly, the old queen began to breathe more easily. “Yes, yes, that must be it. Thank you, Lord Divakesh.” Prishi closed her eyes and coughed a little.

  “You should sleep now, Mother,” said Bandhura.

  At this, Prishi’s eyes flew open and again she grasped Bandhura’s hand, her sharp fingers digging into Bandhura’s flesh. “You will not leave me, Daughter? I am afraid. I … you will not leave me.”

  “No, no, if you do not wish it.” Bandhura extricated herself delicately. She had had a great deal of practice at the maneuver. “I will just sit over here with Lord Divakesh so our talk will not disturb you.”

  “Yes, yes.” Prishi nodded, her eyes already closing. “Thank you, Daughter. You care so well for me. So well …” and her words trailed away as the fever sleep took her yet again.

  Bandhura leaned over and kissed her mother-in-law’s forehead, ignoring as usual the glare of her servant woman. Her own servants clustered to follow her, but she waved them all back to the doorway. She did not wish an audience for the conversation she was about to have. She walked over to the bench at the edge of the latticed terrace and beckoned Lord Divakesh to follow. The rains beyond the ivory lattice made a solid silver curtain. Bandhura could understand how old Prishi believed a fish might swim past the balcony.

  But this was no time for whimsy.

  “How may I be of service to the first of all queens?” Divakesh stood before her, and she did not bother to ask him to sit. Divakesh resented efforts to make him comfortable, regarding them all as temptations.

  “Lord Divakesh, I wish to speak to you about Princess Natharie of Sindhu.”

  Divakesh nodded. “She is watched, my queen. It will not be long before I have proof that she still practices her blasphemies and she will fall under the Mothers’ judgment.” There was no bloodlust in his voice, as there might be in a man of lesser devotion, and certainly there was no anticipation of triumph. There was only the cold certainty of the killing sword he wielded so efficiently in service of the divine.

  And what will he do to me when I speak? Bandhura marshaled her courage. Chandra would not permit this one to harm her, however much he feared the high priest’s words. She was safe. “I ask you spare her.”

  “Why should I do that?” It was as if she had asked him to stop his own heart from beating. “She corrupts the heart of the dance.”

  Yes, yes, but there are other considerations here, my lord. “We spoke before about Prince Samudra. I see now that Natharie is the key to reaching him. It is through her I will be able to bring his dealings into the open.”

  These words drew only cold anger from Lord Divakesh. “You would conspire against the one the Mothers chose to protect the Throne?”

  Bandhura felt a moment’s chilling doubt. Had she misjudged her moment? “Never,” she said firmly. “Unless I knew he had already broken the dance.”

  That took Divakesh aback. He folded his great arms and for a moment he watched the rains, as if he might read the Mothers’ purposes there. “You have proof of this?”

  “None I can take to the emperor.” She clasped her hands together, assuming an admiring look. Divakesh acted as if he were immune to human flattery, but she did not believe any man was that strong. “You have taught him that the devotion and duty to the Mothers is the most important of all things, but when he looks at Samudra, he still sees only his brother.” She leaned forward, head a little turned. See how I am ashamed, Lord Divakesh. See how I am afraid. “While this remains true, your lessons about the dangers of the Awakened lands will not truly reach him. But I too have my eyes and my ears, Lord Divakesh.” She twisted her hands, pleading now. “Give me time, let me take this pollution onto myself before it reaches the emperor. I promise, Natharie will be laid low, and she will take Samudra with her. When that happens, Chandra will be free to be the true servant of the Mothers you and I both know that he is.” She looked up, her eyes wide and blinking fast. See me, my lord. See the devoted daughter before you. Think about the advantage of having me do your work for you.

  Lord Divakesh considered these things for a moment, his expression rock-hard and inscrutable. “It may be you are the instrument of the Mothers. It may be she was brought here for you to show your faith, and that was why I could not reach her.” He said this more to himself than to her, as if trying the idea on for size. Then, he nodded. “I will wait then, First of All Queens.” She opened her mouth and he held up one finger to interrupt her. “But not long. Each day the threat to the Throne and the dance grows darker and will be more difficult to remove.”

  In that we are in perfect agreement, my lord. Bandhura stood and took his hand, pressing her forehead to the tough, scarred back of it. “I thank you, Lord Divakesh. I will not fail you, nor the Queen of Heaven.”

  The high priest touched her head in blessing and Bandhura let herself smile toward the rain-silvered evening outside. Night would come soon, and the night showed so many new things.

  What Bandhura did not see was that on her couch, Queen Prishi, who had overheard each and every word spoken between queen and priest, also smiled. At
last, she fully closed her eyes and slid into sleep.

  Ekkadi hated going down to the temple ring. The great temple of the Mothers was the first ring of the Palace of the Pearl Throne so that the Mothers might be the foundation of all that was done there. If the small domain was a maze, the temple was a massive labyrinth. Within its winding corridors, each of the Seven Mothers had her own great shrine, and here too waited the great central temple to all of the Seven and the dance that was theirs. Besides this, scores of priests and acolytes were housed in the first ring. The library there was the greatest in all Hastinapura, holding texts that were over three thousand years old. Always there were scribes and scholars at the copying tables, transcribing, translating, repairing, or memorizing. The ring had its own kitchens, its own laundries, and its own storehouses, for the wealth of the Mothers could not be allowed to mingle with baser golds and jewels.

  The journey here was bad enough on the holy days, when she was marched down with all the other women of the small domain to watch the sacrifices and hear the hymns. Mother’s breath, she had thought Princess Sacrifice was going to faint at the sight of the blood, and she’d had to hover behind her the whole time.

  That was bad, but it was worse coming down on her own when Natharie had finally gone to bed. Her lamp was low and guttery, and the servants’ stairs and passages were steep, dark, and cramped. Where the stairs were not stone, they creaked, and no matter what the hour, there was always someone rushing in the other direction to bump into her and curse her for being slow and stupid. For your business is so much more important than mine. Ekkadi was, however, careful to keep her curses to herself. She did not want one of these others to have any cause to remember her. She certainly did not want them to wonder why she took these stairs every night after most of their masters and mistresses had sought their beds. The lowest servants could talk. That was something her sisters had drilled relentlessly into her before she had been brought here. Mother might think sacrifice was the way to advance her children, but Ekkadi’s two older sisters had much more practical ideas about how one’s position could best be secured.

  Next to all this, lying to the guards was nothing. She was a maid and might come and go from the protected confines to fetch her mistress any little thing, though she might not have managed quite so easily if she was not also carrying love letters from one of the boy clerks to his darling. What he used to bribe the eunuch who let her move about so freely, Ekkadi did not know and did not want to know.

  After the narrow stairs and the winking guards came the vast, empty corridors between the temple spaces, and these were the worst of all. Her way was dogged by the never-ending thump and brush of feet she could not see. The priests’ dances never completely stopped. There were dances for each hour, for each sort of weather, for peace, for war. Dances to keep all in their proper place, dances to keep emperor and empire strong. There were holy sorcerers in those dances, weaving their spells with their steps. The enormity of it made Ekkadi feel even smaller as she stole along the polished corridors. She kept her lamp close and shaded with her hand, showing no more light than she needed to. It was good to hide her face, but in truth, she did not like seeing the white eyes of the Mothers whose likenesses decorated the walls. What she did could not be wrong, not all of it, for it was at the command of the high priest, but she still did not like to look at them.

  When Ekkadi reached the northernmost corridors, she came to the place she liked least of all. The priests did not have rooms in the palace; their rooms were cut from the mountain itself. A plain archway took her from the edifice raised by man and magic into one raised by the Mothers. The squared-off corridor was as elaborately carved and painted as the others, but here the very air was different. It was always cold, damp, and hushed. She could not hear the dancers anymore. She could not hear anything but her heart and the slap of her sandals on smooth black stone. Here, the carvings of the Mothers were very old, and very confusing. Other figures stood level with them, a thing that she had never seen anywhere else. Ekkadi counted curtained doorways until she came to the fifth on the right, and rapped her knuckles against the stone. “Lord Divakesh?”

  “Enter.”

  Ekkadi pushed aside the plain saffron cloth. Divakesh’s private rooms consisted of three cells — one for sleeping, one for washing, and the one she stood in now, for sitting or studying. The furnishings here were more spare than those in even the lowest servant’s room. The only extravagance was in the niches. Dozens, maybe even hundreds of small, regular alcoves had been carved from the mountain’s stone, and in each one stood a statue of some aspect of the Queen of Heaven. Some were plain red stone. Some were solid gold, flickering in the light of Divakesh’s single oil lamp. Some were crystal, others obsidian or alabaster. There was even one small blue image that Ekkadi was sure had been carved from a single sapphire.

  Surrounded by the greatest of all the Mothers, the high priest knelt before a block of stone carved to serve as a table. On it was spread some scroll. Though he was dressed in a simple burgundy robe, his presence lost none of its power. He certainly lost none of his understanding of who he was compared with his visitor. He did not even turn his head to look at her.

  Despite this, Ekkadi set down her lamp and made obeisance. It would not do to disregard propriety before or, indeed, behind this man.

  “It is very late, Ekkadi.”

  “Forgive me, Lord Divakesh.” Ekkadi remained crouched on the floor. “But the princess sometimes does not sleep well and she sits in the gardens for a while.”

  Carefully, patiently, Divakesh lifted up one leaf of the scroll before him and laid it aside. “The Mothers make her days longer so she might see them more clearly.”

  “It must be as you say, Holy One,” murmured Ekkadi humbly. The stone was cold and bit at her knees. She shivered.

  “What of her and the prince? What did they speak of today?”

  “Not much, Holy One.” She wished he would turn around and give her permission to stand, but he didn’t, so she remained where she was, and recited as much as she could remember of Natharie and Prince Samudra’s latest meeting.

  When she finished, Lord Divakesh finally lifted his head. “You heard, but you did not understand.” He turned, but not to face her, to face the niches in the eastern wall. He watched the likenesses of Mother Jalaja with an expression that made Ekkadi think of nothing so much as a despairing lover. “It begins. She tells him of her polluted life, making him see it as pure and good. He falters, Ekkadi.” The high priest shook his head slowly in resignation. “I knew this would come when I first saw how he looked at her. She seems so fair, young and brave. She is enough to make mortal man forget the greater sight of the Queen of Heaven. For that, though, the prince will fall.” A shudder took Ekkadi, although she tried to repress it. The priest’s sharp eye caught it. “You tremble at this. You should.”

  “Yes, Holy One.” I tremble because this place is cold, Holy One, and my feet hurt and I’ve been running about all day after the one you’re so afraid of

  The high priest rubbed his thick, blunt fingers together, like a merchant rubbing a coin. “She did no more than what you’ve told me? She spoke not a word of the corrupt teachings? Think hard.”

  Ekkadi furrowed her brow for what felt like a reasonable length of time, and then shook her head. “No, Lord. Nothing. I’m sorry. I am trying.”

  “You are. You are a good daughter.” He touched her head in blessing, and Ekkadi could not suppress another shudder. “Make your obeisance, and take your reward. Remember, as soon as she speaks of the teachings of vanity to the prince, you will come to me at once.”

  “Yes, Holy One.” She could recite Anidita’s words from beginning to end for all of me, Holy One. But you or she will win this game, and I will be standing beside the victor, whoever it is. She turned to the wall of deities and kissed the cold, smooth stone of the floor before it. Then she backed away still on her knees. Divakesh remained where he was, contemplating the hundred images of
Mother Jalaja in front of him. The look on his face was that of a starving man. It was raw, and terrible in the strength of its need. Ekkadi shuddered again, and shuffled back as quickly as she could.

  Beside the doorway waited two small gold rings, and Ekkadi slipped them onto her smallest finger. Coins would raise suspicions if she were found with them, but new jewelry had many plausible explanations.

  Lord Divakesh was already back to his studies and Ekkadi took her leave in silence. Hurrying, she left the mountain cells for the temple. Again, the distant rhythm of the holy dancers whispered in the air around her. She was already perspiring from the heat, and her weariness made her think with longing of her narrow pallet beside Natharie.

  But caution ran strong in her and it turned her weary feet down one of the side corridors.

  The temple doors were of course shut tight, but there were smaller shrines beside the great teak doors. Ekkadi stopped before the one that showed the woman with the sword raised high in her hand. Skulls and pearls girded her waist, and she had one eye shut and one eye open. A snake twined her shoulders and whispered in her ear, and another wound around her ankle.

  It was the Mother of Destruction, but with one eye open. Those who thought she slept would be deceived.

  Ekkadi put her lamp down. She made the salute of trust to Mother A-Kuha, holding the posture for ten slow breaths. Then, she slipped one of the little rings off her hand and laid it beside the goddess.

  Mother, I am following your narrow path. I beg you, walk before me and clear the way, for without you I will surely fall.

  She kissed Mother A-Kuha’s foot and stroked the snake that twined around her ankle, and then retrieved her lamp. As quickly as she could without blowing out the flame, she trotted toward the servants’ stairs. It would not do for Natharie to wake up and miss her maid. She might say something important.