Winter King
Page 3
Soon Dana, too, would be eighteen. Soon she and Andrion would celebrate with more than stolen kisses. A Sabazian favoring a man, indeed, she thought with acerbic humor. Women counted the quiet cadence of daily life, and were therefore more important in the scheme of existence; men were sudden lightning bolts illuminating the far horizon of another world. But if her mother and her grandmother knew certain men as both friends and lovers, why not she? A slow smile shaped the fullness of her lips.
And then died. It was midsummer, the moon was full, Andrion did not come. She would not sleep alone, not yet; she guarded the city while the others slept satiated in the arms of men.
Not Danica her grandmother, though; not Ilanit her mother. They kept vigil in the temple, as restive as she. Rumors came from beyond the borders of Sabazel; the goddess Ashtar spoke grim words from her shield, from her pool, from her cavern in the mountain. But she spoke only to the queen.
Dana slipped the bow from her shoulder, braced its end against a rock, and leaned her cheek against cool willow and sinew. The city dozed, glinting black and bronze like fine armor below her. The moon hung ripe and round high above her. The wind? The wind was still.
Her spine crawled. A faint odor of smoke tickled her nostrils. Cooking fires in the city of Sabazel, of course.
Dana looked down the valley, beyond the high plains sacred to Ashtar, to the horizon. It seemed as if tiny flames flickered there, pyres consuming the flower of the Empire. It seemed as if a distant wailing of grief and pain and grotesque victory hung heavy on the heavy air.
She frowned again. Her Sight seldom failed her but the images could not be called; and when they seized her, they would not be denied, even though their meaning often remained elusive. Was this what her mortal mother felt when the Goddess spoke to her, what mortal Danica had felt when she bore the star-shield of Sabazel?
“Let the others celebrate this night,” Dana said to the moon, quietly but firmly. “My grandmother rode pregnant into battle, carrying Andrion himself within her womb; by all the gods, he was conceived with a fate upon him. But I shall ride to battle empty, waiting to be filled with destiny.”
Would that destiny be Andrion’s, or her own? Or were their fates inextricably intertwined?
Her extra sense faded, leaving her without an answer. But then, some answers were to be dreaded. Dana straightened, tested the bow, reached into the quiver on her back and nocked an arrow to the string. She raised it up, up, until her bow repeated the gleaming arc of the moon. Her fingers snapped and the string sang with one high sustained note of music. The arrow hissed upward, bisected the face of the moon, disappeared against the muted sky.
A cold breath of wind sighed down the flank of Cylandra, stained with the scent of blood, and Dana shivered.
* * * * *
The Khazyari raged through the city, raping, burning, killing, until at last their blood lust was sated. Then, and only then, did the warrior prince Tembujin set small squads to putting out the remaining fires, to sorting looted silk and gold and fine porcelain, to mending the wounds of Khazyari and imperial citizens alike.
“This city will be another jewel in your cap,” he said soothingly into his father’s ear. “The people will work, and their work will fill our hands with riches. Go, savor the pleasures of this night, and let me oversee the dawn.”
Baakhun, the great khan, nodded agreement. His burly form straddled the temple steps; his powerful arms glistened with sweat, and his thick felt boots were soaked crimson. A haggard crowd of survivors crouched at his feet. “See your gods!” he declaimed in a fractured common tongue. “They run! Khalingu strong, stronger than all!”
None of the survivors disputed his words. They lay prostrate as he and his officers, his nuryans, swept by them, and they crawled away, weeping, after he passed. The ancient temples slumped into blackened rubble; the fruit trees in the hanging gardens stretched bare and blackened limbs toward a gray sky.
In that chill hour before dawn, when the world lies stripped of illusion, each object hard-etched in silver, each sound uncannily clear, Tembujin, the khan’s eldest son, rode out of the city toward the vast encampment of the conquerors. He sipped from the jeweled drinking cup in his hand, letting the strong Sardian wine, blood red, blood warm, linger on his tongue. The high planes of his face, eyes and cheekbones sculpted by the winds of faraway steppes, curved into a smile that was echoed by the curve of the bow on his shoulder.
The smile tightened as he passed the pyramid of severed heads heaped outside the gateway, defenders of the city resting uneasily. Beside the grisly tower were several poles set into the ground, each impaling the naked, twitching form of a Khazyari warrior. Tembujin’s smile faded into a slight frown.
He came to the tall yurt of his father Baakhun, walls appliquéd with scenes of battle and the hunt. A lion skin waved in a slow breeze, and pipes wailed a hymn of victory. Attendants, seeing the white pony of the first odlok, flocked forward; Tembujin dismounted and flicked a drop of wine at the cart holding the wooden idol of the god Khalingu. “Such work you have done this night,” he said quietly. “Are you pleased, O greatest of Gods?”
“Our own kviss is good enough for Khalingu,” said a voice at his side. “Why not for you?”
He turned to see his twelve-year-old half-brother. Vlad’s swart features were not flattered by the uncompromising light; his cheeks were stained and his nose ran. Tembujin raised an eyebrow and sipped again from the cup. “My mother was a Mohendra princess, given to Baakhun in alliance a decade before yours, who is only the daughter of an insignificant chieftain. My sensibilities are much the finer.”
Vlad flushed. His lower lip pouted around a muttered epithet.
Tembujin snorted, “Wipe your face, piglet.” He ducked into the great yurt; Vlad followed.
Butter lamps burned inside, casting a thick yellow light over the felt rugs and hangings, over the multitude of faces turned to the khan. Imperial officials begging for mercy, Khazyari nuryans and their retainers waiting for rewards. Baakhun himself sat cross-legged on a raised wooden bed, a skin of kviss—fermented mare’s milk—in his hand. His high shaved forehead was flushed, his braid of black hair askew, his wet lips open in a vulpine grin. The carved ivory plaque of the khan, a rampant lion, stuck against his perspiring chest.
The hacked and mutilated body of General Aveyron lay amid the riches heaped before him, stripped of helmet and armor, but not, somehow, of dignity. Beside it a cadaverous man in torn imperial robes lay prostrate, his face fastidiously averted from the corpse. Tembujin’s other brow rose, and he slipped noiselessly into his place at his father’s right hand.
On his father’s left hand was Raksula, his favorite wife, Vlad’s mother. She reached out and tucked the boy under her arm, wiping his nose on her skirts; he clung to her, whining about his half-brother’s insult. Her sharp black gaze darted behind Baakhun’s back to Tembujin, and she hissed like a cobra who sees a mongoose.
Tembujin’s teeth flashed in his bronzed face; he shook back the fringe of black hair on his forehead and temples and saluted Raksula with his cup. Insolent bravado, perhaps, but his eyes went suddenly wary, and his hand closed protectively around his own plaque, a carving of a lion’s cub.
“My lord,” said the prostrate man in the common tongue. “My lord—khan, my lord prince, I beg my reward; I served you well this night.” His features were loose, pliable, ready to be molded into whatever expression was most expedient.
Baakhun drank deeply from his skin. “Who is this worm?” he demanded in Khazyari.
“The chamberlain, Hilkar,” replied Tembujin. “The traitor.” He threw down his cup and his bow and drew the long knife from his belt. He grasped Hilkar’s sparse hair, jerked his head upward, and set the blade against the loose skin of his throat, drawing from it a thin trickle of blood.
Hilkar gabbled, “My young lord, please, it is I who aided you!”
“You sent a messenger to our camp this last month,” said Tembujin in the common speech,
“saying that you wished vengeance on the Sardian conqueror. You came yourself, on your belly like a snake. Now you have your vengeance. Is that not enough?”
“But I can further serve the great khan!”
“What does the creature want?” asked Baakhun impatiently.
Tembujin never took his eyes from Hilkar’s scrawny neck. “Wealth,” he replied in Khazyari. “Rank. Payment for his treachery. He says he will serve you.”
“Perhaps he can.”
“But if he betrayed the emperor, might he not betray us?” Tembujin’s fingers tightened and Hilkar gasped. His eyes darted from side to side, as if he could see through the language his ears did not understand.
Raksula yawned. “Kill him. He has served his purpose.”
“No,” said Baakhun. “One thing remains.”
Tembujin shrugged. He released Hilkar, who crumpled back onto the rug with a gasp and quickly rearranged his face into an empty, fawning grin.
Baakhun leaned down, his lips working to shape the common tongue. “Where the khan, the . . . king? Where the odlok his son?”
Hilkar raised his hands placatingly. They were stained rust-brown from Aveyron’s pooled blood. “They must be hiding like rats in the city. I gave you Bellasteros’s cloak, to enspell him . . .”
“Where?” bellowed Baakhun. Hilkar winced and fell prostrate again, contracting his length to an inoffensive huddle.
Baakhun straightened and spoke to Tembujin in Khazyari. “A patrol saw a party of imperial horsemen at the middle of the night, far beyond the walls. One of them bore a shining sword and carried terror with him.”
“Our patrol ran from them?” demanded Tembujin incredulously. “By Khalingu’s tail . . .” He stopped. “The warriors by the gate. I see.”
The khan nodded. He spat, narrowly missing Hilkar’s head. The throng eddied and emitted the squat form of Odo, the chief shaman. He bowed extravagantly before the khan, the battery of amulets on his chest clanking, and pulled a length of scarlet fabric from his tunic. “I cast strong spells,” he purred. “Confusion, despair. But the king is strong; why else would Khazyari run from him? And the boy—I had nothing of his.”
“Why did you not bring us a possession of the boy’s?” Tembujin asked Hilkar.
The huddle shifted. Hilkar’s face surfaced, still grinning. “He is young, unimportant.”
“Evidently not,” Tembujin returned. And in Khazyari, “The prince helped his father to escape. Some, then, are loyal.” He stirred Hilkar’s ribs with the toe of his boot.
“So,” Baakhun scowled. “They are gone. Even his women are dead. A stain on my victory.”
“But the city is ours,” continued Odo, smiling so broadly his eyes almost disappeared in folds of flesh. “What matters a dispossessed king, a prince without an inheritance?”
“Mm,” Baakhun said petulantly. His tongue was growing thick, even with his own language. “I meant to sacrifice Bellasteros and his family to Khalingu. I wanted his god-sword, that they sing of even in the Mohan.”
Raksula leaned toward her husband, murmuring, “We will find him, and that power will be yours. As for today, Odo has served you well and deserves reward.”
Baakhun gestured; Tembujin took a jeweled bracelet from the sleeve of his tunic and flicked it onto the rug. Odo fell upon it, tested it in his teeth, and slipped it onto his arm with a chuckle.
Guards hoisted the body of Aveyron. “A brave man,” said Tembujin. “Sacrifice a horse to him.” Baakhun lifted the skin and gulped.
Other guards seized Hilkar and pulled him to his feet. “My lords,” he protested.” I have served you, and I shall serve you again; I shall find the Sardian and his heir. They have fled to the hole of Sabazel, I daresay.”
Baakhun shook his head at the flood of common speech. “Spare him.” he ordered. “His life shall be his reward.”
“Your life is your payment,” Tembujin translated. “Get out.”
Hilkar opened his mouth, thought better of speaking, gathered his composure about him. He smiled blandly and made a deep obeisance. He strutted across the yurt, but some of the captive imperial officials spat at him, and his last steps to the doorway were a rapid scurry.
Raksula took the scarlet cloak from Odo. “I shall guard this,” she said. “We shall need it.” Odo smiled again. His slits of eyes glinted with a feral cunning, and Raksula’s eyes glinted in return. Vlad, from the shelter of his mother’s skirts, sneered openly at Tembujin.
Tembujin’s mouth tightened, but he said nothing.
Raksula touched Baakhun’s mighty arm in a familiar proprietary gesture. “I shall go to my own yurt now, my lord, and leave you to your celebration.” Her hand pushed Vlad in the back, and he fell forward in a respectful bow.
Baakhun waved expansively; Odo led them out. He and Raksula began speaking together in low tones almost before they were outside. “Sabazel,” hissed the woman; Tembujin glanced quickly at Baakhun, but the khan, grinning again, did not hear.
Baakhun conferred with his nuryans and sent the imperial officials back to the city. “And for you, my son,” he mumbled at last; he drained the last drop of kviss and looked mournfully at the deflated skin. Tembujin turned an attentive expression on his father. Baakhun cleared his throat. “You are my right hand, you are my finest weapon. How may I reward you?”
“It is reward enough serving you,” said Tembujin, bowing. From the corner of his eye he saw several guards escort in a brown-robed palace servant and a group of women, fair imperial women. “However,” he went on smoothly, “if you insist . . .”
Baakhun saw the direction of his son’s gaze and laughed. His huge hand slapped Tembujin’s back, and the young man staggered. “You are indeed my son!” the khan bellowed. “Take whichever one tempts you!”
Some of the women struggled against the ropes that bound them; others stood slumped, weeping. But one stared boldly around the yurt. Her brittle lapis lazuli eyes inspected the nuryans and Baakhun’s stocky form and then dismissed them. Her stare fell on Tembujin and paused. She essayed a smile, rather weak at the corners, but a smile nonetheless.
Tembujin strolled with lazy feline steps to her side. Her dress was torn and her hair, bright with the sheen of copper, was tangled, but she seemed unspoiled. He took the delicate curve of her chin between thumb and forefinger. “From the imperial harem?” he asked.
Pleased that he could speak the common tongue, her smile steadied. “This emperor has no concubines. I am a courtesan from the Street of Silk.”
“Ah,” sighed Tembujin. His finger traced the line of her throat, the fine bones of her shoulder, the curve of her breast. She did not flinch. “And your name?”
“Sita.”
“Sita,” he repeated. “Come then, Sita.” Obediently she followed him. The servant, a plump, beardless old man, bobbed a perfunctory bow as they passed. For just a moment Tembujin was caught by a spark in the man’s expression, by his oddly translucent eyes. But no, he was smiling vaguely, face blank. He knew his place, to serve whatever master fate gave him.
The dawn light was thin and pale compared to the luminescence of the butter lamps. Smoke tinted the still air; a bloated crimson moon rested on the western horizon. Tembujin paused, regarding it with narrow eyes as it sank slowly, inexorably, and disappeared. A warmth touched his back, a greedy sun for the new day.
Sita watched him watch the moonset. When he turned back to her she smiled and held out her hands. He unbound them. “Stop smiling,” he said. “I grow weary of hypocritical smiles.”
Quickly she straightened her lips, cast her eyes down, and allowed her mouth to crumple in faint, unassuming hurt.
“You learn quickly.” Tembujin laughed. “Come.” He guided her to his own yurt, marked by the feathered standard of the odlok. “Tell me,” he said as he ushered her inside, “what is this place called Sabazel?”
Sita’s eyes widened in what might have been bewilderment. The fabric door fell behind them.
Chapter Three
Andrion stood at the mouth of the ravine, looking down a rough scree to the rolling grassland across which they had struggled in those dark hours between midnight and dawn. Now, at noon, sunshine glanced off the stones to assault him with waves of heat. The air moved in slow eddies, scented with the sweat of horses and men, with the dry odors of dirt and crushed thyme. The empty lands before him, abandoned long ago by the dregs of the hero-king Daimion’s dynasty, shimmered and danced with mirages.
He closed his eyes. Perhaps the memories of the night were also mirages, nightmares induced by some fevered dream, terror and grief and pain circling in red-tinted darkness. If he could see beyond the heat-distorted horizon, he would see Iksandarun shining like a great peacock, unsullied, unbloodied . . . No, he was an exile in his own land, dirty and unshaven. Following the custom of Sardis, as became the son of a conqueror who had adopted the fashion of his new Empire, he had never gone unshaven.
Sardis. It was still there, governed by his father’s oldest friend, Patros; forty days’ journey along the Royal Road in peacetime, more, much more, along the wilderness tracks of a conquered Empire.
Abruptly Andrion turned back into the shade. A small trickle of water pattered down the gully; three of the guards tended the horses, rubbing them with tufts of grass, offering tender shoots of the tamarisk trees that clung precariously to the rock.
Bellasteros was propped against a boulder, holding a cup of water untouched in his hand, his head resting on his rolled cloak. The bronze figure of Harus sat on a small altar of pebbles. The emperors eyes, washed pale with pain and sorcery, waited for a sign. The imperial diadem rested dust-stained on his brow; the sword Solifrax lay sheathed and quiet, forgotten at his side.