“Forgive me. I never meant to imply you had a choice. You’re under arrest.” The minister gave her a predatory grin. “You’ve been consorting with the enemy, Duchess. You’ll be tried for treason and hanged by the neck until dead.”
Chapter Nine
23rd day, Month of the Hawk, Year of the Rat
Last Year of Imperial Prince Cyron’s Court
163rd Year of the Komyr Dynasty
737th Year since the Cataclysm
Wentokikun, Moriande
Nalenyr
Save for decades of practice, the Naleni Grand Minister could not have kept surprise and outrage from his face. He had served the Komyr court perhaps not always enthusiastically, but diligently and certainly above the level the Princes deserved. The Komyr Princes had never fully appreciated the role the bureaucracy played in stabilizing the world.
But this—this outrage—showed how far Prince Cyron’s mind was gone. And Prince Pyrust has joined him.
Pelut Vniel stood in the doorway to the Naleni throne room, with a phalanx of lesser ministers behind him. Wooden columns split the room in three. A red carpet edged with purple occupied the center and ran right to the door. Had Vniel stepped through incautiously, he would have trod where only nobility walks, and his life could have been forfeit.
To the left of the throne stood Prince Cyron. He wore a purple robe emblazoned with a golden dragon. Pelut had never seen the robe before, and the way the dragon coiled around a golden crown certainly had not been seen since before the Empire had been sundered. The crown’s nine points each bore a sign of the Zodiac, the foremost pair being those of the Naleni dragon and the Desei hawk.
Pyrust aided and abetted Cyron in this lunacy. He wore a deep blue robe with a flying hawk emblazoned on it. The left wing had two feathers clipped, marking the Prince’s half hand. The hawk was poised to land on an Imperial crown, within which nested two fledglings. The image again had not been seen since before the Cataclysm.
But it was the third person, the woman seated on the Dragon Throne, he focused upon. She was Prince Cyron’s whore—uncommonly beautiful and rumored to have been a bed companion to previous Komyr princes. Her imposture was an absurd satire, worthy of Jaor Dirxi or other artists of his ilk.
The ministers behind him gasped.
The woman on the throne snapped open a fan as if to shield herself from the sound. The fan was emblazoned with a purple crown, as was her antique golden robe. The woman sat the throne as if it truly belonged to her, and her calm shocked Pelut so much that he finally began to assess what he was seeing.
The way she deployed the fan and used it to shield her face meant the ministers were to take no notice of her. She clearly understood the games played at court, but she was not alone in being able to invoke symbols.
Pelut bowed deeply to her and held the bow for only as long as appropriate to honor the throne had it been empty. He then straightened and bowed first to Prince Cyron, holding it for as long as was appropriate for the ruling Prince. He waited for Cyron to acknowledge his gesture, but the half-armed Prince graced him with nothing more than a nod. When he bowed to Prince Pyrust, Pelut only got a grunt, but he covered his reaction to this affront passively.
Entering the room, Pelut had a choice. As Grand Minister, he could take a place at the throne’s right hand, but doing so would place him before Prince Cyron. Alternately, he could position himself on the left. Since both men’s left arms were crippled, through this choice he could signal his willingness to serve the throne more ably than they could.
He chose this latter course, skirting the edge of the carpet and making certain the hem of his robe did not touch it. He moved forward with tiny steps. The gait was appropriate to the occasion, and it allowed Pyrust’s impatience to simmer nicely. Pelut reached his appointed place and bowed low to the throne again as his ministers filed into the room behind him.
Once their shuffling had ceased, he came upright again. “It is my pleasure to see both of you well, my Princes.”
Cyron nodded dismissively. “I am feeling more hearty, thank you.”
Too hearty. The last time Vniel had seen him, Cyron had been three-quarters dead and appeared to be losing ground. Pyrust’s invasion of Nalenyr had brought a foreign army to the edge of the city. Traitorous westron nobles had thrown open the city’s gates, confident Pyrust would murder Cyron. While Cyron did not look fully recovered, Pelut inwardly despaired at the rosy hue of his cheeks.
Cyron stepped down from the dais and dropped to his knees opposite the Grand Minister. He bowed to the throne but was summoned back upright by a flick of the fan. He sat back on his heels, then waved the stump of his arm in the throne’s direction. “It is my distinct honor to present to you Empress Cyrsa. She has come to reclaim her empire.”
“What manner of game is this, Prince Cyron? A joke, now, in these dire times?” Pelut looked up at Prince Pyrust. “Have you not seen his army swelling on the plains around Moriande? Have you not heard their measured steps as they cross the bridges and form up to the south? Your nation is no more.”
Pyrust laughed. “There are no nations anymore, Minister, only Imperial provinces. Can you not read the crests we wear? Have not your spies told you of the flags our troops gather beneath?”
“Yes, but…” Pelut had seen the banners and had reports of their commissioning. He had assumed they signaled the Desei Empire rising.
Cyron looked at him inquiringly. “Had you not wondered at all the reports I demanded in the past weeks?”
Pelut’s head came up. “If I may be frank, Highness, I had assumed you traded cooperation with the enemy for your life. All those reports told Prince Pyrust about our supplies and capabilities. They would facilitate his conquest of Erumvirine.”
“You mean to say Erumvirine’s liberation.” Cyron’s blue eyes slitted. “It may seem a semantic difference, but I have learned—from you—that the precise use of words is valuable.”
“You should have learned as well, Highness, that my ministers and I live to serve the state. We would serve Prince Pyrust as well as we have served you.”
Pyrust growled. “I hope better than you served him.”
Pelut looked down, furious at the hint of a blush coming to his cheeks. Cyron had lost half his arm in a bungled assassination attempt Pelut had sanctioned. The man who had acted as Pelut’s agent had gone missing. Had either Prince found him and extracted evidence of the minister’s complicity, the red carpet would be drinking Pelut’s blood.
“You will forgive me, my Princes, if I point out that the charade of making the Lady of Jet and Jade into the Empress is unnecessary. If you rule as a coalition, we shall serve you faithfully. You need not create a figurehead, unless you believe the people need such a symbol to hearten them in such dire times.”
Neither Prince replied. Silence fell for a handful of heartbeats, then measured clicking broke it. Panel by panel the fan closed, delicate fingers slowly and precisely making the crown disappear.
The Lady of Jet and Jade looked down from the throne. Pelut felt panic rise. Behind him ministers instinctively bowed, hiding their faces. Pelut started to bow, too, but caught himself as his hands pressed flat against the cool wooden floor.
“You have no reason to believe I am the Empress Cyrsa, returned from the Wastes. You know me as the Lady of Jet and Jade. You know I have trained countless women in the pleasures of the flesh. Your wife is not among them, but your mistress is.”
“All true, but none of it makes you the Empress Cyrsa.” A bit more confident, Pelut sat back on his heels. “There is nothing you could do or say that would convince me you were anything but an impostor.”
“Which is exactly why you lack the imagination to be the Grand Minister of my Empire.” She pointed the closed fan at Prince Cyron. “Prince Cyron is your master now, and you shall obey him in all things, lest I choose to become angry with you.”
“What?”
Cyron smiled. “It matters not if you believe that she is the
Empress. Prince Pyrust and I do and we’re acting in accord with her commands. Through you and your ministers, I shall coordinate the resources of Nalenyr, Helosunde, and Deseirion so we may crush the invaders.”
Pelut looked up at the half-handed Desei Prince. “You would give him command of your nation’s resources?”
“He has given me command of his nation’s armies. Is this not a fair bargain?”
The woman on the throne flipped the fan around to point to Prince Pyrust. “Behold my warlord. He shall lead the defense of my Empire.”
This is not happening. Pelut opened his arms. “My Princes, if there is a point to this game, please, reveal it now. If you have reached an accommodation, share it with us. If you require us to join with our counterparts in Helosunde and Deseirion, we shall be pleased to do so. We will help you draft laws of succession. We can help you apportion the nations. But do not dishonor yourselves by elevating this woman.”
Cyron’s face hardened into a mask. “The point is that this is not a game—it never has been. Yet, for too long, you’ve treated it as such. You believe you know more and better than the rulers of a nation. Often you do because you choose the information we are given. You create an impression, then tailor our responses to fit the reality you shield us from.
“That approach no longer works, Minister Vniel. There is no more tailoring the dire news from the south. You hid things until well past the time I realistically could have done anything about it. This alliance you believe exists between Prince Pyrust and myself might, at one time, have been possible. But because of your scheming, I could not meet him on equal footing, so I was forced to deceive him; and here we are at this state of affairs.”
“You make it sound, Highness, as if I give your words and wishes no regard.”
Cyron laughed. “I point out a single instance and you turn it into an indictment of your performance since you entered the bureaucracy. Your rhetorical trick may have other princes retreating and praising your efforts. They miss the truth your trickery confirms: there are instances where you utterly disregard my orders. It is those instances in which you presume to place your judgment above mine. In doing so, you fail to serve the nation and, instead, serve only the bureaucracy.”
Pelut let shock rise on his face.
Pyrust dropped a hand to his sword. “Empress, allow me to take his head now. I will take all their heads, and we will replace them.”
The Lady of Jet and Jade waved that suggestion away. “Their heads are not gourds to be harvested. Each of these men is a spider who has spun a web. Their webs run together, and that network has value.”
She looked straight at Pelut. “Unlike the Princes, Minister, I have ample evidence of how you work. I have my own network of agents, and what you deny, here, to Prince Cyron, you gloat about in the safety of a trysting bed. So let it be understood that if you deal with this as a game, it is a game you will lose.”
Pelut pressed his hands together. “I am judged harshly. I fear those who serve me are judged harshly as well. It has been our duty, since the Empire was first established, to preserve order and maintain stability. If this is a vice, then I shall gladly be a criminal. Perhaps it should be best, in that regard, if Prince Pyrust were to harvest my head.”
“No, that shall not be necessary.” She snapped the fan open again.
“What is necessary, then, is the following.” Prince Cyron began reciting his wants and needs in an even voice. Various junior ministers scribbled notes. The rustle of rice-paper sheets reminded Pelut of autumn leaves scuttling over cobblestoned streets.
He did not listen. He could not. The words were blasphemy. Everything Cyron wanted would have to be gathered in haste, and haste bred incomplete and unreliable information. Acting on bad information bred disaster.
Only a fool would deny that the situation in Erumvirine required urgent action; but so much remained unknown about the invaders that it would be impossible to field a force to oppose them. Some tales suggested they were inhuman monsters. Others suggested they were superior beings who would drive Men from their Empire as Men had driven the Viruk from theirs. No one knew if they could be negotiated with, or even if they intended to head north. And what good would racing troops to the south do when so much coastline remained vulnerable to attack?
Too little was known. Cyron and Pyrust could play their game, but it would destroy them and their nations. It would leave the people without leaders or a means to survive. It would be worse than the Time of Black Ice.
And I cannot permit that. Pelut kept his face frozen. He would comply with Cyron’s wishes and give him what he wanted. All of it. He would overwhelm the Prince with details too vast and trivial to be of use. Once Cyron had been overwhelmed, he would leave the working of the world to those trained for it.
Then the game would end and the losers would be very sorry indeed.
Chapter Ten
23rd day, Month of the Hawk, Year of the Rat
Last Year of Imperial Prince Cyron’s Court
163rd Year of the Komyr Dynasty
737th Year since the Cataclysm
Jaidanxan (The Ninth Heaven)
“You are perplexed, my brother.”
Jorim had sensed Tsiwen’s presence, but had chosen not to acknowledge it until she spoke. He turned from the edge of his palace’s courtyard and leaned back. A balustrade materialized, preventing him from tumbling to the earth. He was not sure which of them had manifested it, but he let it accept his weight.
“I am, sister.” He folded his arms over his chest. “I have stood here and watched since my brothers left. It seems as if no time at all has passed, but nights and days have blinked over the face of the world. It hardly seems enough time to consider all I have been told—and certainly not to reach a decision about Nirati and her death.”
The goddess laughed lightly, the sound coming as gently to his ears as a warm spring breeze. “Our brother believes death is the solution to everything because he is the Master of it. Because of the magic you gave Men, he cannot touch your mortal sister.
“I do not believe I can, either.”
Tsiwen raised an eyebrow. “Dire news if true.”
Jorim waved her to the courtyard’s edge and the balustrade obligingly evaporated. “See, down there: Anturasixan. My grandfather used magic to create it.”
“Yes, I can feel the power in it and him.”
“My brother and I used to debate about whether or not a cartographer could become a Mystic. What would magic enable us to do? Draw maps without brush and ink? Would we be able to make one master map, and all maps drawn from it would change as the master changed? These were the lines along which we were thinking, but Qiro seems to be able to create lands by whim. He used to say that no place existed until he put it on a map, and now places seem to exist because he places them on a map.”
“So it would appear.”
Jorim scratched his throat with a gold talon. “But now he has created his own world. And wittingly or not, he has defied the gods and denied them access to his creation.”
Tsiwen hugged her arms tightly around her middle. “So even if Grija’s solution were the key, you could not simply appear there and destroy Nirati.”
“No. Nothing lacking a blood tie with my grandfather can set foot there. Nirati is allowed. The things he makes—some of them creatures plucked from nightmares I confided to him—are free to leave. I think he had created those things before he even made his continent, and they had ventured out to attack the Amentzutl. The Mozoyan became more complex over time as he unconsciously redesigned them, making them better.”
“If what you say is true, then nothing can reach your sister.”
“No. She is there because she is his flesh through my father. Likewise my brother. He could get there.”
A cloud passed beneath the palace, momentarily eclipsing the world. Tsiwen turned and looked up into his golden eyes. “How does he prevent someone from going there?”
“He’s crafty. He al
ways has been.” Jorim waved a hand toward the continent. “You are Wisdom incarnate, sister. Perhaps you can find a way to outwit my grandfather.”
Tsiwen smiled impishly, then stepped off the courtyard’s edge and streaked earthward. Her silken gown snapped as the wind plucked at it, then the flailing sleeves grew into bat’s wings as she dove, flittering out of his sight. She looked to be having so much fun that Jorim almost sprouted wings of his own to join her.
But he had already failed in the mission she was attempting. He had no desire to be frustrated again. It was less anger at being thwarted by a mortal than being unable to best his grandfather. He’d never been able to outfox Qiro when he was human, and divinity hadn’t made much of a difference.
But isn’t Qiro a god of sorts himself? Because Qiro had become a Mystic, he had access to the fabric of reality. He might not have as much power as a god, but he had enough. Unlike other Mystics, Qiro did not seem to release a lot of chaotic magic as a by-product of his talent—he appeared to use all of it.
I wonder if that is because he is creating something, not just performing a task. Could it be that Mystics tapped into far more magical energy than their task could accommodate, hence the release of the excess? The release of excess magic should have warned people against profligate use.
The flapping of Tsiwen’s wings revealed her irritation as she returned. She landed, then blossomed upward with a venomous expression on her face. “You could have warned me, brother.”
“I did. I told you he was being clever.”
“And you knew I would take that as a challenge. You are correct, however. I can see the continent, but I cannot find a path to it.”
“Exactly. Unless he grants us a map or wills us to approach, we cannot reach Anturasixan.”
Tsiwen looked at him closely, then her eyes widened. “Your grandfather is not the only clever one. You could get there, if you reanimated your body.”
“I’m certain of it.” Jorim pointed and the world spun. Beneath them now lay a continent far to the east of where Jorim had been born. With another gesture the world drew closer, providing a clear view of the Amentzutl capital, Nemehyan. Almost a dozen ships bobbed in the bay—the largest being the Stormwolf. People moved along a floating quay, bringing supplies to the ship.
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