by S L Farrell
“Is that what Axat shows you?” Zolin pointed at the bowl Niente was holding, scribed with the moon symbols of the god. “Do you see-undeniably-my defeat in the water?”
Niente shook his head.
“Good,” Zolin said. The muscles in his jaws worked, flexing the wings of the eagle. “I know you would rather we return home, Nahual. I understand that, and you’re not alone in that feeling. I hear you, all of you. We all miss home and families, myself no less than anyone. But my duty is to protect us as best I can, and this… this seems to me to best do that. I appreciate that you would not lie and tell me that the gods insist that retreat is the wise course.”
“I tell you what I see, Tecuhtli. Always. Nothing more. Nothing less. I vowed to Axat that I would follow and serve the Tecuhtli, no matter who he is or what he orders us to do.”
Zolin gave a laugh that was more a sniff. He rubbed at his scalp, as if stroking the eagle inked into his flesh. “You made that vow to Necalli, not me. Niente, if you wish to be released from it now…” A shrug. “One of the other nahualli could serve.”
The threat hung there in the humid air. Niente knew what Zolin offered: no Nahual gave up his title and lived; Niente wondered which one of the nahualli was whispering in Zolin’s ear-certainly there were a few who felt they could be Nahual. “If the Tecuhtli feels that another nahualli is better suited to serve him, then he should have him bring his spell-staff here, and we shall see which one of us Axat favors.”
Zolin chuckled, but there was an uneasiness to it that told Niente that the man was tempted. “For now, I will let you serve me, Nahual Niente. And you will see that I am right. I will come to this great city of the Easterners, and I will smash it and leave it burning, as I did Munereo and Karnor. I am a great slow spear, and I will pierce their armor, their flesh, their organs, and burrow through to stab their very heart. The people of the Holdings will understand that their god is weak and wrong. They will leave our cousins’ land and ours forever. They will pay tribute to us, for fear that a Tecuhtli will bring another army here again. That is what I will do, and that is what you will see in your scrying bowl, Nahual. You will see it.”
Niente lowered his head. “As I said, Tecuhtli, I will look and I will tell you all that Axat grants me to see, so that you may know the possible futures for the choices you make. That is all any nahualli can do.”
Zolin sniffed. He gazed confidently at Niente from eyes surrounded by the feathered wings of the eagle. “You will see it,” he said again. “That is what I tell you.”
Kenne ca’Fionta
Guilt gnawed at his stomach and made him push his plate away.
“Kenne, you need to eat.” His longtime companion and lover, Petros cu’Magnaoi, u’teni in the Faith, reached out across the white linen of the table for Kenne’s hand, cupping it in his own. “You were only a pawn in Cenzi’s plan. You couldn’t have known.”
Kenne shook his head. It’s not your fault… You couldn’t have known… That was what everyone had said to him over the last few days. Sometimes the words were spoken with a heartfelt sincerity; at other times-as when he’d gone to visit Sigourney ca’Ludovici in her bed as she recovered from her wounds-he’d thought he’d heard only a veneer of politeness draped over deep resentment.
“I sent that man to the Kraljiki, Petros. I did. No one else, and-”
“Kenne,” Petros interrupted. He was shaking his hawk-thin head, the jaw-long hair that Kenne loved so much, long ago gone white but as thick on the man’s head as his own hair was scarce, swaying with the motion. Pale blue eyes, still sharp and wise, held Kenne’s gaze and refused to let him look away. “Stop this. You can keep repeating the same words over and over again, but none of them will change what’s happened. You did what any of us might have done. This Eneas cu’Kinnear’s reputation was solid, and he said he had news from the Hellins, which the Kraljiki desperately needed. If I’d been in your place, I’d have done the same.”
“But you didn’t. He came to me.”
“He did, and you had no way to know what he was or what he would do, just as his superior offiziers didn’t know. What we must do now is make certain that the populace’s anger doesn’t spill over into a bloodbath. There are already voices at the Old Temple calling for a renewed purge of the Numetodo, and the same is coming from the Council of Ca’, too. Your voice is needed as the head of the Faith, Kenne. The voice of sanity.”
Kenne felt Petros’ fingers tighten around his own when he didn’t answer. “Kenne, my love, Cenzi gives you a test now. You know that Archigos Ana wasn’t killed by Numetodo, not the way Karl felt about her. This Eneas, and what he did to the Kraljiki… It sounds like the same thing that was done to Ana. The black dust that we found in the temple afterward; I hear that it was found all over the pieces of the Sun Throne as well…”
“I killed Audric,” Kenne muttered. “I killed his chamber servants, the supplicants who were closest. And as for poor Sigourney…” Sigourney’s face swam before him, torn and flayed by shards of the Sun Throne, her right eye bandaged (and gone, according to the healer who whispered to Kenne afterward), her right hand wrapped with the missing fingers far too visible, the covers falling ominously flat to the bed at her right knee.
This was his fault, no matter what Sigourney might have whispered to him with that ruined voice. This was more terrible than Ana’s assassination, though that had been horrible enough.
His fault.
He started to speak to Petros and could not, his voice choking. Petros’ hands tightened on his hand, lifting it and pressing it to his lips.
Someone knocked on the door. “Archigos?” The call was faint through the carved, varnished planks. Petros let his hand fall quickly and sat back in his chair.
“Enter,” Kenne said.
It was one of his o’teni staff who peered in: Sala ce’Fallin, his aide. She glanced at Petros, nodding to him and giving Kenne the sign of Cenzi. “I’m sorry to disturb your dinner, Archigos, U’Teni, but.. .”
She bit her lower lip, shaking her head. “What?” Kenne asked her gently.
“There is news,” she said. “A messenger has come from the Council of Ca’; you are to go to the palais immediately.”
“What is it?” he asked. “Firenzcia?”
She shook her head. “No,” she told him. “The messenger said nothing other than it was about Karnmor…”
He expected to be told that the long-slumbering volcano that overshadowed Karnor City had awakened again. But the news was far worse.
Kenne could barely believe the words of the rider who stood before the Council in their palais chambers, but the exhaustion, the dirt and soot on his face, the horror in his eyes and in his voice… Those he could not deny.
The city of Karnor was a smoking ruin, according to this man, with thousands dead, especially from the assault of the Westlander war-teni. Worse, the Westlander army was now on the mainland and advancing slowly up the A’Sele. The city of Villembouchure was next in their path.
“Many of the ships they came on,” the rider said, “were our own. I recognized the lines of the Marguerite from when she left Karnor Harbor to go to the Hellins a year ago, but now she flies the eagle banner of the Westlanders and they’ve painted her in garish colors. That’s why there have been no fast-ships from the Hellins; the Westlanders must have destroyed our forces there.”
“There’s no evidence of that,” Aleron ca’Gerodi snapped, glaring at the man as if daring him to contradict the statement. “None at all.”
The rider shrugged. “I saw what I saw, Councillor,” he said. “I was one of those who fled Karnor, as the city was taken and burning. I found a boat on the eastern shore of the island; I saw the sails of the Westlander fleet driving up the mouth of the A’Sele, and I saw fires on the northern shore.”
“He doesn’t lie,” a voice said as the doors to the chambers were thrown open. Kenne turned to see Sigourney being carried into the chamber on a litter. She sat propped up with pillows,
her face a red-lined horror, the black dye washed from her hair so that the thick strands were now silver-gray. Her single eye glared at them; her right eye was covered with a quilted patch. “There are other riders coming into the city even as we speak here,” she said. “I have spoken to one: a man from the headlands of the coast. He says the same: the Westlander army is here in the Holdings, and they are marching up the northern shore of the A’Sele.”
“Councillor ca’Ludovici,” Kenne said, concerned. “You shouldn’t be here. Your injuries-”
“My injuries are not important,” she answered, waving a bandaged, few-fingered hand. “The herbalist has given me extract of cuore della volpe; that has taken away the worst of the pain. We have lost our Kraljiki, the traitor Regent is conspiring with Firenzcia, and the Westlanders have dared to come here. My injuries?” She spat. Kenne and the others watched the arc of the expectoration to where it landed on the stone flags. “They are nothing, ” she barked in her ragged, hoarse voice. “We can’t wait and dither here. We must act.” She paused for breath. “And the first thing we must do is name a Kralji, since Audric had not named his successor.”
Kenne knew then what had managed to cause Sigourney to ignore her injuries and leave her sickbed.
It was obvious, looking around the chamber at the other members of the Council, that the same thought had occurred to them. It was also obvious to Kenne who they would choose. Aleron was nodding, as was Odil ca’Mazzak; others were looking intently at the table, as if something had been scribbled there. It was Odil who finally spoke.
“You are Tete of the Council of Ca’, Councillor ca’Ludovici, and it was you who was closest in Kraljiki Audric’s confidence. I agree-a new Kralji must be named immediately… and I believe it should be a Kraljica.” He looked around the room. “I propose that Vajica Sigourney ca’Ludovici be named Kraljica Sigourney. She has the name, she is the closest relative here, and she has amply demonstrated that she possesses the qualities of leadership we need.”
“I agree,” Aleron said immediately, rising to his feet, and then they were all rising, and Sigourney was smiling through her pain and healing wounds and raising her hands to them in mock humility, and it was done-before Kenne could say anything. Not that they would have listened to him, he thought ruefully.
His voice was not one to which they paid attention.
Sigourney’s single-eyed gaze traveled the room and when it found Kenne, she frowned momentarily. He could see the accusation and the blame in her face, and he knew one thing more.
He would not be Archigos for long. The new Kraljica would find a way to bring him down.
Karl Vliomani
Serafina smiled at them as they came into the kitchen of their small apartment, though Karl could see a sadness, almost an envy, melded with the lifting of lips. She brushed her hair back from her head with the back of her hand, still holding the knife with which she’d been chopping vegetables. Karl could smell the stew, bubbling in the black pot over the hearth fire. “Good morning,” she told them. “It’s good to see the two of you together.”
Varina laced her arm with Karl’s and pressed against him. “It is,” she told Serafina. “Even more than I’d hoped.”
Karl smiled also, and he wondered if either of the two women could see the emotions that mixed in with his own happiness: the tiny nagging sense that he was somehow betraying Ana, even though he and Ana had never shared physical intimacy. She would have smiled at you also. She would have told you to go ahead. She would have been happy for you. That’s what he told himself, but it didn’t ease the kernel of guilt.
“I’ve been betrayed too many times and hurt too many times,” Ana had told him once, not long after he’d returned from the Isle of Paeti, after he’d found that Kaitlin no longer loved him, no longer wanted him to be part of her and his sons’ lives. “I can’t give you that part of me, Karl. It’s just not there anymore: there are too many scars and too much pain. I can be your friend, if that’s enough for you. But not more. Not more.”
“You don’t love me…” he began to reply, and she shook her head.
“I do love you,” she said, “but not in that way. If you need that, then find someone else. I would understand, Karl. I truly would. I’m sorry…” And he had found release elsewhere, in the grande horizontales that Varina had seen. But he’d somehow missed the person in front of him who was interested in him as more than friend, and who he’d also liked…
Now, Varina hugged Karl again. He leaned down, her face turned toward him. The kiss was soft and sweet, and the guilt receded again, slightly. “If you need that, then find someone else…” Perhaps one day, soon, even that whisper would be gone.
He hadn’t known he’d needed this so much, and he wished he’d realized it much sooner.
“Let me help you, Sera,” Varina said to Serafina, and her warmth left his side. “Karl, why don’t you put a pot on for tea?” He watched the two women for a moment, then took the teakettle, poured water from the pitcher into it, and hung it on the crane over the fire next to the stew. He found the mint and herbs, placed it into a linen bag and tied it off.
“I’ll go to the market and get some honey, and perhaps croissants,” Karl told them. “With Audric’s funeral procession today, I’ll bet the markets-”
He stopped.
A shadow passed the shutters of the window. He heard footsteps outside the door. Someone knocked. “Serafina? Serafina, are you there?”
He knew the voice. He remembered it.
Serafina dropped the knife she was holding. It clattered from table to floor, but she didn’t notice. She was running to the door. “Talis!”
She flung the door open; Karl saw the man standing there over Serafina’s shoulder, but then she dropped to her knees with a cry-“Nico! Oh, Nico!”-and Nico was there also, his arms hugging his matarh fiercely. They were both crying.
“Matarh! I knew you’d come here looking for me. I knew…” Nico saw the two of them at the same time. “Varina,” he said. “Oh.” He suddenly let go of his matarh. “Talis…”
“I see them,” Talis said. He was staring at Karl. “Serafina, take Nico and leave. Now.”
Serafina was looking from Talis to Karl. Talis had lifted his walking stick-and Karl realized what that meant, realized it better than he ever had. His hand came up, readying to cast his own attack. “What-” Serafina was saying.
“Just go!” Talis said. “Now!”
“No,” Serafina said. She was holding onto Nico fiercely and though she looked as if she wanted to do nothing more than follow Talis’ advice, she remained between them. “I’m not leaving until I understand what’s going on.”
Talis gestured at Karl with his free hand. “That bastard’s the Numetodo Ambassador, Serafina,” he said. “That’s the man who tried to kill me and the reason you had to leave the city. He kidnapped Nico when he came back here, and used him for bait to catch me.”
Serafina was staring at Karl, her gaze stricken and betrayed.
“Is this true?” she asked. “Tell me.”
Karl glanced at Varina. She nodded. “It’s mostly true,” Karl told Serafina. “I’m Ambassador ca’Vliomani. I’m a Numetodo, as is Varina. We found Nico here when we were looking for Talis, and yes, we kept him-though I’d point out that he was alone in the streets when Varina found him and we kept him fed and warm and safe. We told people in the neighborhood that we’d found him… and yes, that was with the hope that Talis would come for him, but he never did. As for Talis-I believe he’s the man who killed Archigos Ana.” Serafina cradled Nico to herself. Confusion struggled with fear on her face as she listened to him, her gaze moving from one to the other of them. “Now ask him something for me,” Karl told her. “The truth. Ask him who killed the Archigos.”
Serafina looked at Talis, who was shaking his head. “No,” he said. “It wasn’t me,” but Serafina’s face had gone red.
“You knew where Nico was, and you didn’t go to him?” she half-shouted to Tal
is. “You didn’t try to help him? You didn’t send word back to me when I was worried sick about him?”
“They would have killed me if I had gone for him, Serafina. And maybe Nico too.”
“No.” Varina stepped closer to Karl. “You’re wrong, Talis. We only wanted to know the truth. The Numetodo were being blamed for Archigos Ana’s death; we were in danger ourselves. I-we-would never have done anything to harm Nico. Never. You know that, don’t you, Nico?”
Nico nodded earnestly on his matarh’s shoulder. “I know that,” he said. “Varina was good to me, Matarh. She said she would try to find you… and look, she did.”
“Talis is a Westlander spellcaster, Serafina,” Karl said. “The last Westlander I knew like him was Mad Mahri, and he tried to kill Ana, too.”
At the mention of Mahri’s name, the walking stick trembled in Talis’ hands and the muscles of his jaw tightened. “You knew Mahri?”
“I did,” Karl told him. “I knew him very well. And I know he wasn’t here for the good of Nessantico. And you’re not either. Sera, I’m sorry. I know you love this man. But you need to understand what he is. He’s an enemy of the Holdings, far more so than any Numetodo.”
“She knows what I am,” Talis grunted. “Sera, I haven’t changed. I do love you; I love Nico, too. I found him and I was bringing him back to you. If you hadn’t been here, I would have gone next to Ville Paisli to find you. I’m not the monster they’re painting me to be.” He scowled at Karl and Varina. “If I were, I wouldn’t have waited; I’d have attacked the Ambassador without worrying about whether you and Nico were in the way. Sera, please. Move aside.”
Instead, still holding Nico, she turned back to Karl and Varina, stepping between them and Talis. “I know Talis,” she said. “I believe him when he says he didn’t kill the Archigos. If you want to talk to him, well, he’s here.” She paused, stroking Nico’s head. “I trusted the two of you. Now I’m asking you to trust me.”