Just his appearance alone would scare off anyone with ill intent, Isao thought.
Isao wanted nothing to do with him.
"Isao," Kamon said with a smile, his voice trailing off in a light trill, like a hiss. "What a surprise to see you!"
Isao rushed forward and embraced his friend, relieved to see a kind face. "Kamon, my friend! It's good to see you."
Kamon returned the embrace with a slight laugh.
Isao stepped back, his cheeks flaring with heat and embarrassment over his display of enthusiasm. "I'm sorry. But it's been a very long couple of days, and it's so good to finally see a friendly face."
"I understand."
"Please," Juben said with a wave of his hand. "Have a seat. Let us begin our feast to celebrate Maru and Saya and our unexpected guests. I am concerned over what evil has happened in the Sunsan nation, for nothing good could have brought you here in such a distressed state, but that information will come in time. Please have a seat, relax, and enjoy dinner first. Then we'll get into more details on what has come to pass."
"Thank you, my friends. Your generosity is truly inspiring," Isao said formally and with sincerity.
Servants whisked dinner in set on golden plates with designs of coiled snakes. Isao and Khalem ate heartily, accepting everything on their plates. Isao, despite his fatigue, forced himself to join the jovial small talk. He took care to admire Maru's brand-new tattoo: It was a brown viper, the symbol of adulthood in Ular fighters.
Saya then pulled back the neck of her shirt to reveal a horned red snake running across her shoulders.
"Very nice," Isao said. "The detail is exquisite."
"Do you remember," Kamon asked, "when we found that cat in the dungeons of the imperial palace?"
Isao hooted with laughter. "You ran to try and kill it right away!"
"Yes, but that wasn't as bad as when we ran into that coffin, remember? The lid was partially open, and neither of us wanted to look inside!"
As laughter rippled around the table, Isao relaxed back into his chair. Khalem, too, seemed to unwind, although his hands twitched occasionally and his eyes intermittently darted around the room to take stock of the surroundings. Like Ishii and Juben’s daughters, he said little, almost nothing at all, leaving the conversation to Kamon, Isao, Ransaki, and Juben.
Dinner passed almost too quickly. Soon the servants were collecting up empty plates and clearing the table of a dessert hash made of marsh berries and a sweet wine.
"Please, Isao," Juben said loudly from the top of the table. He motioned for the servants to refill all their wine glasses. "Tell us the of the goings-on in the imperial palace."
Isao recounted all the events he could, recalling what he could from his disjointed experience and unclear information. He still didn't really know what happened, who did it, or why. But he pieced together what he could for the group, laying the information before them all at once.
The telling took several minutes. By the end, he was exhausted.
"Now we're here," he said. "Among friends, and safe at last."
"A toast," Damla suggested with a hand on her husband's arm. "Let's toast to Hiwan and Ular. May we form a strong alliance against these traitors and restore the Empire to its former glory."
"Yes," Juben agreed, grabbing his goblet. "To Hiwan and Ular!"
Isao and Khalem reached for the goblets of fresh wine the servants set in front of them. Then Isao noticed Kamon had dropped his gaze and was fingering the stem of his goblet. Even Juben’s daughters seemed preoccupied suddenly. Why were they being so quiet?
"May we defeat our enemies and be stronger for it," Juben said, holding his glass aloft. "To us."
"To us," Isao and Khalem murmured. They touched glasses, and drank. The wine trickled down the back of Isao's throat, warming him. It tasted sweet, almost saccharine.
Maru began to explain her new duties as an official warrior, and Isao listened to the conversation with interest.
After a few minutes, a prickling sensation crawled up the back of his head, over his scalp, and into his face. It tingled. Isao pressed his lips together as they turned slightly numb.
He blinked. Why was the table blurring? Why were his thoughts moving so slowly?
Khalem seemed to be starting at the same spot on the table, as if attempting to memorize it. Were they so tired from their journey that it now caught up to them? Isao wondered. Perhaps the wine had relaxed them too much.
"Isao, are you all right?" Juben asked.
"Fine," he said.
"Your head isn't spinning, is it?"
With a bit of horror, Isao realized that was the best way to categorize the next sensation that overcame him. He gripped the edge of the table in a poor attempt to right his spinning world.
"What . . . what is . . ." he gasped out.
"There is a very powerful poison known throughout the Ular Clan. Anyone that's ever visited will have heard of it. The rest of us know how to obtain it and purify it from the time we're five. And now, my friend, you know it yourself," Juben said.
Isao struggled to under Juben’s words. Poison? Ular Clan?
His chest tightened. The air seemed to thicken, and time passed more slowly.
Something in his gut twitched. This wasn't right. He shouldn't feel this way.
His body slumped down farther in his chair. He tried to push his body back up, but his legs wouldn't respond. His arm fell off the table, plopping onto his lap.
"It's a progressive paralysis. Renders our enemies almost totally unable to move. A real delight when you have betrayers in your midst and want to get rid of them. Such as is the case tonight."
"Betrayers?"
The word came off Isao's tongue thick and garbled. His gaze darted around the table; all except Khalem were staring at him now.
As the strange feeling moved through every inch of his body, a figured moved into the room from the doorway. The dark masked figure from outside. The bulbous nose and fine cloak seemed more pronounced at the moment.
"The poison will not kill, just paralyze. We have taken it too, but we are masters of our own poisons and it has no effect on us." Juben gestured to Maru and Saya. "Tonight, they have finalized their warrior training by proving their deep tolerance to the serum."
Both Maru and Saya held their glasses high with accompanying smiles.
Juben's voice sounded far away. Isao attempted to speak, but the words wouldn't come. His lips wouldn't move. He closed his eyes, his neck pitching his head forward.
Juben continued to speak.
"The Hiwan clan will never understand the real meaning of religion, Isao, not with a man like Saemon at the head. He was too traditionalist. The Empire needed . . . more than he could provide. So I took action into my own hands. Thanks to that cunning Nari woman, we have planned every last detail of this takeover. For the good of the Empire, of course."
Isao's sluggish thoughts took in every word one by one. Although the words moved slowly through his brain, the truth wasn't lost upon Isao.
The Ular clan had done something horrible to the Empire because they had felt Saemon wasn't a good enough ruler.
If Isao’s mind hadn't been overtaken by a pervasive numbing sensation, he would have screamed aloud in rage.
"Do you remember, Isao, the ancient underground passage in the old armory where the two of us played?" Kamon asked. "We told the Nari woman about it. The Ameyas also were ecstatic to know about a hidden passage into the Jade Cradle. Beautifully simple, isn't it?"
Isao lost consciousness and plunged into the darkness awaiting him. The bitter taste of betrayal filled his mouth.
Isao ached all over. Every movement sent a shiver of pain through his body. His head pounded. His mouth was as dry as a bag of sand. His shoulders and muscles protested as he slowly swam up through layers of unconsciousness.
He had nightmares in this drugged, hazy state. Of mountains. Masked people. Tribal chanting.
Isao tried to reach out, but his arm felt so
heavy. Then he realized that his hands were bound together at the wrists in front of him.
The realization of the betrayal of the Ular clan came racing back through his mind, and he felt torrents of rage anew. "Khalem?" he whispered, hearing the fear in his own voice. "Are you there?"
"Here, my Sheng," croaked a voice.
"How are you feeling?"
"Pain."
"Your arm?"
Khalem hesitated. "I think the fever is coming on. No doubt it will be fully infected soon, even with the healers’ work of yesterday."
"If they didn't start an infection purposefully," Isao spat, livid. His body began to tremble from the rage.
"You must calm yourself, Sheng, if we are to escape this."
Isao's nostrils flared. "They have deceived us, Khalem. I should have listened to you."
"Neither of us knew. We are not at fault. We did the best that we could."
"I'm so angry."
"Me too, Sheng. But let us believe in your father, eh? Perhaps he won. Perhaps things are not as bleak as we believe them to be. We left without all the information. I believe your father and the Karus are strong enough to overcome on their own. If they did, the Ular would not know this yet."
"Yes," Isao murmured, enjoying the brief spark of hope Khalem had given him. "Yes, Father is strong."
The sound of clanking came from down the hall. Heavy footsteps followed. Moments later, a door near Isao's head rattled open. Two men stepped in, grabbing them by the arms and yanking them to their feet.
The strange feeling of not being able to control his body rippled back through Isao. No matter how hard he tried to lift a hand or a toe, nothing would move. Isao pressed his lips together to keep from yelling in fury and pain.
The guards dragged them down a series of wet corridors, up staircases, and finally down staircases, taking them down into the deepest, darkest corridors of the Sarpa Palace. As was the case everywhere before, images of snakes lined the halls.
The guards spoke to each other in low tones, hissing as they did so.
"Where . . . where are you taking us?" Isao finally wrenched out in between grimaces of pain.
The guards said nothing in response.
Eventually the dank halls opened up into an expansive underground room illuminated by torchlights. Murals of snakes destroying cats dotted the walls here as well.
A gigantic head of a snake with a golden snout protruded from the far wall. Juben and Kamon flanked this massive head on opposite sides.
Isao bit back an insult and settled for glaring at them instead. The guards stopped, holding him and Khalem upright and in one place.
"So, Prince Isao, you have come here for help, and found none," Juben sang. "Did you sleep well last night?"
Isao's voice shook. "You are vile, Juben Ular. The worst kind of betrayer."
Juben giggled in a snide way that sent a chill down Isao's back. "Oh, Isao. You naive fool. You are just like your father. He and I used to be close once, you know. We would have all kinds of discussions. But he was a stubborn man, and no matter how much I planned and strategized, he would never accept my ideas for reforming the religious system in the Empire."
Juben stepped forward holding a scepter with a serpent’s head. He stroked it affectionately with his other hand, like it was his pet. "It was time to change, Isao. Simple as that. Too many edicts from your father. Too much of a limit on the system."
"A messenger just arrived this morning, Isao," Kamon said in a crisp tone. "I have been informed that Sheng Saemon was slaughtered during the attack."
Isao's heart was crushed. His body seemed to lose the will to live.
"Yes, a devastating blow, I'm sure," Juben hissed, his bright yellow eyes alight with fervor. "But Saemon had to die for a new Empire to come in, you know. For the betterment of everyone."
Isao struggled to slow his racing mind. His father couldn't be dead. Men like Saemon were indomitable. The Sheng was healthy. Strong. Virile. People in the Empire adored him, and he would lead forever. There was no chance that they had endured all this hellish misery just to lose now.
A litany of curses rose from Khalem's mouth. Tears gathered in Isao's eyes, dribbling down his cheeks and dripping to the ground below. A bitter, metallic taste rose in his mouth. He realized he'd been biting his cheek and hadn't known it.
"Why?" he wrenched out. "WHY?"
Kamon rolled his eyes. "Your father was weak, that's all. We are strong. You are not."
Juben strode forward a few steps, motioning to the giant snake head behind him. "Do you see this, Isao? When you climb through this, you gain access to a very special place." His voice lowered. "A very special place. We call it the Sarpa Karul, or you may know it as the ‘Snake's Gut.’ Some call it the ‘Haunting Prison.’ We don't care what you call it, really, as long as you enjoy your time there."
With a gleeful, hissing giggle, Juben reached over and pulled a golden lever. A grating sound followed.
Isao blinked in terror as the mouth of the snake dropped open. The golden snout gave way to expose a completely dark space behind the mouth.
Isao sucked in a sharp breath. Sorcery. It had to be.
"Have fun!" Juben sang.
He and Kamon strolled past them, hissing in their strange way, their eyes alight with an amber glow.
Terror gripped Isao as the guards each grabbed a torch, then used their remaining hand to drag Isao and Khalem into the snake’s great, black maw.
Inside, they followed an unknown path that wound through the dark in what felt like every direction. Right. Left. Down. Over. The path twisted and turning so much that Isao felt like a small mouse moving through the belly of a snake.
The screams of other people across the landscape filled his ears, turning his entire body cold.
My father is dead.
The Ular are traitors.
Isao’s guard stopped, and the sound of wood grating on the floor followed.
The guard shoved Isao into a small cell. The other guard pushed and kicked Khalem inside the same cell before he slammed the door shut.
"You’ll find out soon enough why this is the ‘haunting prison.’"
With a cackle, the guards moved away, bearing their torches with them.
Once the sound of their footsteps faded, giving way to the distant shrieks of the other prisoners in the great belly with them, Isao pressed his head to the floor. Tears trickled out of his eyes, leaking onto the dirt floor, which felt gritty against his cheek.
It was over. Everything was over. There was no escaping the main prison of the Sarpa Palace, and certainly not this one. Besides, why should he continue? His father was dead. The Empire had been betrayed by several clans: Nari. Ameya. Ular. There was no redeeming such a lost world.
"Khalem," he cried, his throat thick with sobs.
"I'm here, Sheng."
"There is no hope."
A struggling, hesitant reply came. "We are in a bad place, Sheng."
"We are too far from the sun or moon for there to be any light shed on our path. Nothing can brighten the dark hole we are in. Nothing can save us. The Empire has fallen, my father is dead, and soon, so are we."
There was nothing for Khalem to say.
Epilogue
Ranbelt entered the great temple with a weight on his heart.
The shining silver shrine of the Triad awaited him, as always. The right hand was outstretched and clasping a sphere in the colors of burnished orange and white. The sun and moon. The five elements lay on top of the hand’s five fingers: Water. Earth. Air. Fire. Wood.
Ranbelt bowed to his knees before the symbol of the Sacred Order of the Triad, reverence in his heart.
The prayer seemed to reach up from his chest, seize his throat, and begin of its own accord.
Ranbelt chanted and intoned for several minutes, allowing the prayer to flow freely from him, ridding him of his heaviest fears and thoughts.
Once he finished and was set free of his pain, he stood, backed a
way from the shrine, and sat on a marble bench along the side of the narrow room.
For a long time, he didn't move. He simply studied the shrine, drawing in peace from the stillness all around him.
As expected, a robed figure eventually approached him. A pendant swayed from this person’s neck – a pendant in the shape of a right hand.
"You are here," the priest said in a his deep, rich voice.
"Yes. I sought peace, as usual."
"Peace is sought by many right now."
A long silence stretched between the two. Ranbelt's thoughts lay heavy on his mind, but he knew the priest would already know what he had come for, and what he wanted.
"We must save him before it's too late," Ranbelt began.
The priest nodded. "Yes. I think you already know that this is your burden to bear, don't you? That you alone will be able to save him. We have given you a new life, free from your marauding sins of the past, as a way to rid yourself of your pirate filth. This is your chance to do so. Do you accept?"
"Yes," Ranbelt murmured. "Gladly. I am prepared to remit the stains of my former life, as agreed. Through Isao, I will do this, and I will be happier and better for it."
"May the Triad be with you…Beltran."
The priest faded away, leaving Beltran – now called Ranbelt – alone in the shrine room with only his thoughts to guide him.
The residents of An Wan were asleep, with only a handful of guards awake.
Quietly Yuna moved through her room with an owl with yellow eyes perched on her arm.
Hanging from the owl’s leg was a small scroll with the coiled snake seal of the Ular clan.
Yuna accepted the delivery of this scroll. She pulled it open, and quickly read. A grin crossed her face.
She released the owl out her window, then slipped into the dark hall and wound through the palace in the utter quiet. Not a soul detected her movements.
Soon, she pushed through the doors to the throne room, leaving them open to the moonlight spilling in from the high windows and corridors.
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