by Tanith Lee
“Yes,” said Raldanash. “I know the justice given a straying royal wife. Spikes and flames.”
“Leniency would be a mistake,” said Vencrek. “If she were of the race of the goddess—from the countries of your birth, or the Lowlands, maybe then. But she’s Vis.”
The Vis counselors shifted uneasily.
Raldanash said, “You haven’t taken her yet.” The beautiful kingly head was turned. He looked across the chamber at his half-brother. “What do you say, Rarmon?”
“Do you want my agreement or my opinion, my lord?”
“Whichever you think most useful.”
“Storm Lord,” Vencrek broke in, “the Lord Rarmon himself has some questions to answer to the council.”
Rarmon regarded him. “Upon what?”
“Your dialogues with Free Zakorians.”
“Which dialogues are these?”
“Storm Lord,” said Vencrek, “this isn’t the moment—”
“If you’re accusing me of something, Lord Vencrek,” said Rarmon, “any moment will do to make it plain.”
Raldanash came to his feet. They all looked at him.
“Lord Warden, you may convene full council for two hours after noon. Until then, I thank you for your energies on my behalf. Good day, gentlemen.” Then, almost idly from the doorway, “Rarmon. Attend me.”
Presently, in one of the glorious rooms of the palace, the Storm Lord sat down again and pointed Rarmon to another chair.
“And now,” said Raldanash.
“Your lordship has, I believe, taken delivery of the statement I sent him.”
“The Zakorian informer who waylaid you in the Fountain Walk? Yes, I do know him; he purports to be ours. But apparently other things have been going on. Free Zakorian letters brought to you. Signals exchanged in passages. Some spy’s dispatch intercepted, which mentioned, albeit obliquely, yourself.”
“And you think I’d be such a dolt as to do such things here, at your elbow?”
“Perhaps,” said Raldanash. “But I doubt it. Another man, maybe.”
“You continue to trust me,” said Rarmon.
“I sense powerful forces at work against you, in this.”
“Do I have your permission to disorganize them?”
“If you can. But these may not be the powers of men alone.”
Rarmon seemed to hesitate.
He would not let himself reach to the amber ring, to contact the fierce yet painless burning.
Raldanash said softly, “and Ulis Anet?”
Rarmon recollected himself. He said, “The flight of the Xarabian Queen is a little too pat.”
“Yes. It parallels, also, the saga of Raldnor and Astaris.”
“Such an ideal, of course, might have appealed to Iros. But she didn’t want him.”
“She was informed,” said Raldanash, “that she might welcome any man, providing it was done discreetly.”
Raldanash, even in this admission, showed nothing at all. Rarmon gave in, and closed his right hand convulsively around the ring. And wrenched his hand away. Though it did not sear the finger that wore it, the other intruding hand seemed scorched. Raldanash had not missed any of this, but made no comment.
“It’s a fact,” said Rarmon, “everyone knew of Iros’ obsession with your wife. And anyone could have learned of it. Someone has therefore abducted her, probably against her will. While the coincidental disappearance of her commander has been arranged to suggest that he and she have fled together. I imagine his body is feasting carrion birds up in the hills. Or fish in the river.”
“Who would want her so much?”
“There is one man. To my knowledge, he never saw her. But it may have happened. Kesarh Am Karmiss.”
Raldanash made no protest, did not even ask for reasons.
“Then he no longer cares to pretend friendship with Dorthar.”
“Enough to give you another story to believe, should you wish to. Iros took her.”
“I see.”
“I can arrange a private search for Iros’ body, and any evidence left lying about up there. And you could send fast chariots to cut them off. They’ll have used the Okris, I think, to go east. Kesarh must have a ship still standing off from Dorthar, ready to take them aboard. Of course, if you do apprehend his men, you’ll have no choice but to break all ties with Karmiss. He could have foreseen that, too.”
• • •
In the hour before sunset, the Anackire Temple swam in a dark golden gloom. The Prince Rarmon had previously come here on two occasions of formal religion, included in the Storm Lord’s party. The ceremonies were Vis, noisy and exotic; even the mystic flamboyance of Ashara had not gone to such lengths. But now the place was hugely stilled, smelling of incense and cibba wood, only the cup of flame burning under the great statue.
Climbing the paved avenues up the forested hill, he had been half reminded of Ankabek. But there was nothing of Ankabek here. Though the more extreme rituals were not’ practiced so close to the palace and sacred prostitution was left to the other fanes of the city, this place was simply impressive in the way of mortal things. The marvelous statue, marble, gold, and precious gems, was taller than the Anackire of Ankabek. It touched the intellect and appetite, not the heart.
A yellow-robed priest appeared around a screen, and bowed low, as Ashara’s priest would not have done.
“I regret, the young woman’s dead, Lord Rarmon. It was a subtle venom. We were able to alleviate her pain and lend her courage, but we couldn’t save her life.”
Poor Yeiza. She had been caught in the plot, ventured too far from shore, drowned there. Seeking sanctuary in the temple when she saw how things were going was her only act of wisdom. He could assemble the rest of it: Some token stolen from Ulis Anet to persuade Iros to the meeting. No doubt they had paid Yeiza. An Alisaarian trick maybe, a coin with one razor edge, and poison on it. She had not investigated the little wound until too late.
“I’m sorry,” Rarmon said. But her death was a proof, too, as much as anything she could have told him. “You did right to send for me anyway. I’ll see Anackire’s well-gifted.”
“Thank you, Prince Rarmon.”
Abruptly Rarmon recognized the swarthy little man. He was the Thaddrian who had been among the Amanackire that night of the testing, the Thaddrian who, in his childhood, had supposedly witnessed Raldnor and Astaris riding into the jungle forests.
“I’ve already a gift with me for the goddess,” Rarmon said. “Or for you.”
He drew off the amber ring, cool now, and held it out.
“No, my lord,” said the Thaddrian. “I can’t take that.”
“Why not? Lowland amber is valuable and considered holy.”
“Nor can you give it, my lord.” Despite the squat body, the priest was dignified, almost gentle. “It’s geas, Prince Rarmon. You can’t lay it down. It can be removed by the one who set it on you, no other.”
“It’s only a ring.”
“That isn’t so. It has Power. A gift for you, not to be given elsewhere.”
“I thought you believed in the pragmatics of worship.”
“Yes, my lord. Magic itself can be very pragmatic.”
“I’ll merely leave it lying on Her altar, then.”
“No,” said the Thaddrian. “It isn’t the ring you’re trying to be rid of. It’s your destiny. Which is unavoidable.”
Rarmon found he had replaced the ring. He said, halting, gaps between the words, “Is that what I feel, hanging in the air about me like a storm? I don’t believe in Anackire. I don’t believe in gods.”
“My lord,” said the Thaddrian, “Anackire is the symbol. The externalization of the Power inside us all. The face we put on beauty and strength and love and harmony. As writing is the cipher for a sound we only hear.”
“You stan
d under the effigy and say that?”
“And see,” said the Thaddrian with a monkey’s grin, “She doesn’t strike me down. Truth is never blasphemy when the god is Truth Incarnate.”
Rarmon turned and walked between the pillars, and out into the pillars of the forest. The storm-warning of destiny pursued him.
• • •
It had rained, and the marks the carriage had made going in and out of rough ground were washed away. Rarmon sent his five men along the darkening south bank of the river. They found things, evidence of bandit lairs, a lover’s tryst—but not the one they searched for—and disturbed a nest of wildcats. Torches were lit and bobbed about amid the ruins.
The council had detained him through the afternoon. It had been necessary to parry Vencrek’s added allusions to Free Zakorian friends, in person. But to leave this trail till morning would have left it colder even than it was now. Finally, by an old standing house, one of Rarmon’s men came on a chariot with a team of fretting animals. The chariot-prow bore the sigil of Xarabiss.
In the house they discovered a lamp, upstairs; dregs of recent oil. There was a black stain on the floor, equally recent blood. They went out on to the terrace.
“He’s in the river, my lord.”
“Yes. I think so.”
“Luckless bastard.”
Rarmon sent the chariot cityward with two of them. One of the other three went down by the tree in the yard to urinate. He did not come back.
Rarmon checked the last two men, who were for rushing to see. From the side of the terrace they discerned, around the tree bole, a booted leg sprawled in the relaxation of death.
“Bloody robbers—”
“Robbers wouldn’t dare kill palace guard so close to the city.”
There was a gasp above, a man spontaneously taking air to jump, and Rarmon flung himself aside.
A figure crashed down, crying out as it hit the edge of the stone terrace, but taking one of the Dortharians with it.
The second Dortharian sprang round, thrusting his torch at another running figure while he jerked out his sword. His hair alight, the attacker plunged aside screaming, but two more had the Dortharian between them, blade immobilized.
Someone must have struck the screamer quiet. His noises ended in time for Rarmon to hear the snapping of the second guard’s neck.
Behind him, the first Dortharian had also stopped fighting.
“Throw down your sword, Prince,” someone said. “You can see it can’t help.”
The spilled torch had been rescued. It gave enough light to display the dozen or so men clustered about. They wore the black-washed mail of Karmiss, but unblazoned.
“We knew you’d come here,” said the voice. It was familiar. “Your erstwhile lord, Kesarh, can read your mind like a Lowlander.” A man sidled forward. He was not wearing mail but black owar-hide. It was the accosting Zakorian. “Yes,” he said, “I’ve decided after all to renege, to give my loyalty to my own old master, King Yl Am Zakoris. Your Kesarh helped me to decide. Not shocked are you, Lord Rarmon?” He gestured at the Karmians. “Take his sword, knife, any other weapons. Give any jewels he has to me. I’ll have that ring, to start.”
Aid would not come. Even the other two guard would have been caught and killed by now. Rarmon offered no battle. It would have meant death and he was not ready for death as yet. Even so, they pushed him to his knees before ripping the weaponbelt from him. Someone kicked him in the back, a blow like thunder. He fell into a pit of blackest nausea, and lying on the paving, was aware of the sword removed from one hand, the ring of the geas torn from the other. Then a yell. Of course, the ring had been burning. He heard it hit the stone somewhere and shatter like glass.
The Free Zakorian swore.
• • •
Vencrek was not, this time, the first with an accusation. Instead, a parchment had been fastened to the gate of the council halls. It read:
Nobles of Dorthar, you should never harry a wolf. He has run to his brothers in Free Zakoris with news of all your strategies of war. And he laughs at you as he runs.
• • •
After the river, there was a traveling-chariot. After the chariot, another oared boat out to a dark galley standing like night on morning sea. They had continued to drug her, she saw these things in snatches. On the ship they drugged her also and now she was glad, for the brief voyage was storm-flung.
When she woke from that she was on land again. She conjectured which land it must be.
But this last awakening was dreamlike. She was in a house, ornately built, overlooking savage gardens of wild and disconcerting loveliness. Beyond, a cultivated valley undulated to the horizon.
As the physical weakness of the drugs left her, she took note of her surroundings. Every appurtenance, everything her rank had made her used to, was supplied, even to the nourishing and decorative food, the costly unguents, and trays of jewelry.
Two women attended her. They behaved as gracefully as any of her attendants had ever done, and answered freely, except when she put questions regarding where she was, and who had placed her here in this attractive cage.
“But I’m in Karmiss,” she said.
“Look at this velvet, madam. How well it suits these pearls.”
The pearls were black, Karmian riches. Yet they would never reply exactly.
But then, she did not need to be told, that was only some vestige of pride—to pretend herself ignorant and afraid.
His men guarded the house, which she came to see was a mansion-villa. Though she might go anywhere in the tower which she had woken to, the rest of the mansion proved inaccessible. The garden, too, was only to be enjoyed from a balcony. She saw distant figures in the fields, but no other servants. It was a relief. If any might have heard, she would have felt obliged to cry out.
Four days went by. Each seemed twice its length. At night her sleep was feverish. Her body ached, but not with any sickness. Sometimes, attempting to read one of the books, or wandering the tower, or seated on the balcony, she seemed to sense some stir in the house—a scarcely audible conversation, a footstep sharp on a walk below—and her heart would spasm with a kind of agony, thinking he had arrived. But her response was never justified.
On the fifth day toward sunset, however, every symptom was shown her that he was indeed imminent. The women brought fresh and surpassing clothing, complex jewels. They were agitated as they contrived to dress her hair. In the chamber where she ate, the braziers now necessary had been lit and perfumes added. Extra candles appeared and were set on fire.
“We must hope,” she said tartly to the women, “the Lord Kesarh won’t be late.”
When they were gone, she paced about in the violent and disquieting afterglow.
She had, captive that she was, no choice but to receive him. But no, the ease of that was false. It had all been made easy for her, but she found at last she could not lie to herself. Since infancy, she had been molded to her existence. Given to the Storm Lord six years before, she had looked for nothing save those things her molding assured her were hers by right. But Raldanash did not want her. She had had some warnings. She tried to be stoical. To remain so, faced with a life of such stoicism. Then, in the darkness of that dawn near Kuma, Kesarh had crossed the black river like the river of arcane myth which separated the living from the shades, and bound her to him by his shadow across her face, the grasp of his hands, the will behind his eyes. Kesarh, unlike Raldanash, had wanted her. And she. Yes, she had wanted to be wanted by Kesarh.
And her integrity was revolted.
Very well, she must receive him. But like this? Garbed and gilded for him like one more dish upon his table—
She ran to the mirror and wiped her face clean of cosmetics. She took down her sculptured hair and shook it loose. Shedding the gems and the velvet, she took up the dress she had traveled in, which they h
ad cleansed and returned to her when she asked for it—she had not then known why—but which was dulled by the journey, no longer gracious, in places even torn.
She was only just in time.
As she stared at her transformation in the mirror, the outer door was opened and then firmly shut.
She learned then that she could not move.
So it was in the mirror’s surface that she saw him come through that chamber with the candles and braziers and table, and stand framed in the doorway of this.
You have seen him, she thought, turn and confront him. He’s no more than you behold in the glass. But in the glass he was enough to take her breath from her. Somehow she made herself turn. She avoided his eyes, looking directly through him.
He said, “I thought the women were to dress you.” She could not stop her ears. His voice came into them.
“They did everything you wanted,” she said. “Now I’ve done as I thought fit.”
“Yes,” he said. There was no irritation, no mirth. No expression at all:
He went back into the outer room, and she was impelled to follow him and to say: “Am I at last to have an explanation for your atrocious act against me?”
He wore black. They had said in Dorthar that was usual. He seemed all blackness against the flaming wax. He was pouring wine, which he now offered her.
“No.”
He drank the wine himself, straight down, all of it.
“You are,” he said, “on the estate of my counselor, Raldnor. At Ioli. Soon it will be expedient to move you elsewhere. I apologize that, as yet, I can’t receive you in my capital of Istris.”
“I’m your hostage against Dorthar,” she said.
“No,” he said. “Just mine.”
“This insult to the Storm Lord could mean war.”
“There will be war anyway. Nothing like this ever caused a fight that wasn’t already spoiling.”