“Dasa, I’ll rest now. Keep watch.”
“Yes, Brother.”
Gyalo sat down where he was, between two of the Pavilion’s pillars, and began the breathing exercises that would aid his descent into contemplation. He intended simply to meditate for a little while, to clear his thoughts and calm his spirit. Afterward, he would sleep. But as he fell into the familiar state of mindfulness, attuning his awareness to the rhythms of his breath, he felt a deeper pull. Down he sank and down, parting the waters of self as cleanly as a diver, driving toward a different place within him, a place beyond or outside of physical sensation and the surge of time—as if, spinning in the swift currents of a river, he had kicked just a fraction to the right or left and so escaped the flow. In other meditations, he had sometimes touched this place; but he had never been able to hold himself there. This time he stepped easily onto the riverbank and effortlessly remained.
Beyond him, the world rushed on. The rain clouds drew off, and the sky blazed with stars. Dawn came up, eclipsing them. The sun appeared, devouring the long shadows of its rising, stretching them out again as it declined. The air began to dim, the western sky to burn. Each instant was a window on eternity. All of them together passed as swiftly as a breath.
Sunset.
Gyalo reached out, or up, or past: it was not possible to know. He felt the shift as he returned to the flow, the rushing exchange of birth and dissolution, of being and becoming, of essence and existence: all the principles it was a Shaper’s gift to know. He let himself rest a moment, adjusting to the change, then got to his feet, feeling the protest of flesh forgotten, of muscles locked for hours.
“Dasa.” It was strange to speak, after so profound a silence.
“Here, Brother.”
Diasarta emerged from the shadows of the Pavilion, carrying a cup. Water. Gyalo realized how thirsty he was. He drained the water in a series of long swallows, then stooped and set the cup down.
“It’s time.”
“Brother.” Diasarta’s face was fearful. “What must I do?”
“Stay by me.”
Gyalo led the way down the stairs, to the brass-seamed flagstones of the Court. In all that great deserted space, his footsteps and Diasarta’s were the only sound. The Blood pulled at his neck. He closed his hand around the lattice, as the Bearer had, to ease some of its weight. Beneath the flux of his senses, he was aware that he had not entirely left the riverbank: a little of its stillness was still there inside him, a little of that inhuman disconnection, a hard pebble of quiet that seemed to reside just below the base of his throat.
Halfway to the gates, at a midpoint between the walkway and the western wall, he stopped and turned. The Court swam with twilight, but above the walls the sky was still bright. The last light of the sun burnished the Pavilion’s gilded pillars and kindled the red tiles of its roof, embracing the towering rata-images to the waist: the World Creator, smiling in ecstasy, the sun cupped between his hands; the Primal Warrior, his face fierce with battle lust, his sword of flame uplifted; the Eon Sleeper, mouth drawn with pain, his body scored with wounds; the Risen Judge, stern of eye and brow, fire rising from his outstretched palms. Patterns of stone, of gold, of brass—and binding them all, blurring them all, the pattern of the Courtyard’s immense antiquity.
Gyalo closed his eyes. He had thought to pray. But to speak the god’s name seemed enough.
“rata.”
He opened his eyes. In that brief instant of darkness, something in himself—or outside him—had shifted. He looked upon a world defined by the possibility of destruction. Everywhere was flaw. Everywhere was defect. Just there, for instance, where the structure of the walkway had settled, and a sharp unmaking would cause a whole section to buckle. And there, where the great blocks from which the rata-images were carved had separated, and a finger of transformation would send them toppling. And at the walls, where a hundred imperfections spoke of the potential for collapse; and in the Court, where the shifting of the earth had unseated the flagstones and twisted their brass seaming; and at the Pavilion’s foundations, where a complex interplay of stress and force revealed exactly how the entire structure could be brought crashing down.
Gyalo had never before seen, or thought to see, in such a way. He knew it for a final sign, a final gift: a gift of vision. He breathed deep, drawing on the stillness, the certainty he had brought back from another place. He pulled all his muscles into alignment. He opened himself to will: not to make, not to change, but to dissolve. To uncreate.
He set it free.
He had planned to strike at the Pavilion’s foundations, bringing it down first. But in the moment of release, he changed his mind and directed the whole force of his will upon the flagstones at the foot of the long stairway. Blue-white light-shot upward. The Courtyard shuddered like a table hammered by a colossal fist. He struck again, his will arcing from him hot and clean and true. Lightning sizzled across the flagstones; they heaved, grinding together, cracking apart. Again he flung his power forth—more power than he had thought he was capable of releasing, more power than he had ever imagined he possessed. The Pavilion sagged, its pillars splitting, red tiles crashing from its roof. The rata-images swayed. The golden sun flew from the hands of the World Creator like a stone from a catapult. The gilded sword of the Primal Warrior broke off at the hilt, smashing down onto the walkway.
Gyalo felt the pulse of ecstasy.
He knew now why he had struck at the stairs: There was a dissonance beneath them, far below the level of the soil—an instability, a flaw deep in the bedrock. Deliriously, drunk on destruction, he reached for that weakness, delving toward it, tearing downward with the greedy fingers of his gift. He was close, very close—it was much bigger than he had realized, much more unstable—
Comprehending all at once what would happen if he touched it, he tried to catch back his will. It was too late. He had released too much, relinquished too much control. He felt his power twisting from his grip—or perhaps he had never gripped it—perhaps he had not seized, but had been seized—
Not me—it isn’t me—
A great voice shouted in him, a single cataclysmic word that was not any word he knew or was capable of knowing. He felt his soul tear open. He screamed; fire seemed to leap from his throat.
He touched the flaw.
The earth groaned. His will snapped back into him with a force that stunned him to the bone, toppling him like the rata-images. The ground leaped and bucked like an animal under the lash. He felt Diasarta’s arms go round him, the other man shielding him with his body as the world came crashing down around them both.
28
Sundit
IN THE MIDDLE of the morning, when we were by my reckoning no more than two days from Baushpar, Reanu, in the lead of our little group, drew his horse abruptly to a halt, holding up a hand to indicate that we should also stop. In the quiet I could hear what had alerted him: the sound of hooves and harness from ahead, where the road curved out of sight.
“Off the road,” he ordered. “Now.”
We urged our mounts into the trees, and waited as the party came in view. I saw the tattooed faces of the riders in the lead, the trundling black coach that followed—so precisely what I had hoped to see, all through this backward journey, that for a moment I hardly believed it.
“Thank the god!” I said. “They’ve decided to flee after all.”
We rode down. There was shouting as they saw us. The long snake of the procession lurched to a stop: a phalanx of mounted Tapati, four coaches, more Tapati, a mass of vowed ratists on foot, and a train of ox-drawn carts, all of it winding out of sight around the bend in the road.
The canvas covering of the first coach’s window twitched aside. My Brother Taxmârata stared at me as if I were an apparition.
“Sunni,” he said blankly, as I reined in alongside. Reanu and the other three fell back to giv
e us privacy. “What are you doing here? Where are the others?”
“On their way to Faal.” In the release of the urgency I had carried for so long, the terrible dread that I would be too late, I felt an urge to weep and laugh at once. “I turned back. I couldn’t continue, knowing you and others had remained. I thought to try again to persuade you to flee. Ah, Mâra, Mâra, I am so glad.”
He shook his head. In the slanting morning sunlight, he looked aged, his face drawn in lines of weariness and sorrow, but beneath the strain there was something else, something I could not immediately identify. Little Athiya sat on the cushioned bench beside him, watching with large eyes. “We are not all here, Sunni. I did what I could, but not all of them would heed me.”
The dread clutched at me again. “Who?”
“Baushtas. Artavâdhi. And Yarios—I begged, but Baushtas would not give him up. I did what I could,” he repeated. “They are in rata’s care.”
“I’ll go on, then. I’ll persuade them—”
“No, Sunni. There’s nothing you can do. They believe in him, the false Messenger. Even word of his death was not enough to shake them.”
“He is dead?”
“Yes. Burned in a fire. rata’s hand, perhaps, reaching down in punishment. For the true Messenger has come.”
I stared at him. The corners of his wide mouth curved up, and suddenly I understood what lay under his exhaustion: joy.
“I know now, Sunni. He has been among us all along, but in our fear we could not see him.”
“Gyalo Amdo Samchen,” I whispered.
“Of all of us, I thought perhaps only you would not be surprised.”
“How did you—what did he—Brother, tell me what has happened.”
“The false Messenger arrived in Baushpar a little over a week ago, with his pilgrim army. Most of the city had already fled. There were terrible reports from Ninyâser after you and the others left. He made—the false Messenger made—some sort of cataclysm that swallowed up the army sent to stop him there, and he and his people swept down upon the city. Even those of us who had determined to receive him were frightened, and Kudrâcari and Okhsa and Ariamnes and Sonrida changed their minds about remaining and fled for Rimpang. So there were only ten of us to greet him in the Pavilion of the Sun. It was exactly as you said, Sunni—he wanted us to bow down to him in blasphemy, in ignorance of his real nature. When he realized we knew the truth, he flew into a rage and left us. The others prayed for his return, but I did not—I knew that you were right, and we had been wrong to wait. And yet we were not wrong. Three nights ago the true Messenger arrived in the Evening City. He came to me in the Pavilion of the Sun, as the false Messenger had. I knew him even before he named himself—I looked at him and saw the truth, all of it in an instant. Ah, Sunni, how blind we have been! He told me what I must do. What we must do.” He reached through the window of the coach, caught my hand. “Our rule is over. We must leave Baushpar forever. The Brethren must disperse, and the church must pass away.”
“What?” I snatched my hand from his. “The church cannot pass away! The church is rata’s!”
“It is a fearful thing, I know. Even as I gave the orders, I questioned. But with each passing hour, my certainty has grown.” He smiled again, that smile of bliss, like the expression artists give to images of rata Creator. “The soul knows the soul’s truth, the Darxasa says, and it is so. This is what it means to open the way.”
“It cannot be.” I shook my head. “You did not hear aright. You misunderstood.”
“No, Sister. It’s as I have said.”
“Is he down there, Gyalo Amdo Samchen? Is he still in Baushpar?”
“I left him in the Evening City. Sunni, tell your men to join the rest. Ride with me and Athiya.”
“No.” There was no question; the intent was absolute, immediate. “No, I will go on.”
“Always you must see for yourself, yes, Sunni?” The joy seemed to cloud a little. “I don’t know what you will find.”
“What do you mean?”
“I spoke with him at night. We left before sunset the next day. I heard nothing, saw nothing in this coach, but those on foot say that as dark fell the earth trembled, and a plume of dust rose above Baushpar.”
“Dust? Brother! What has happened?”
“We did not turn back to see. The Messenger ordered me to go, and I obeyed.”
I pushed aside my anger and my fear; there would be time for such things later. “Will you follow the others to Faal now, Brother? Whatever it is that we must do, we must first gather to decide.”
“Yes.” Slowly he nodded. “Faal. rata guide you, Sister. Be safe.”
“And you.” Now at last I noticed something, which perhaps I should have noticed first. “Mâra, where is the Blood?”
“With him. Our father was the first. He is the last. You’ll see, Sunni. You’ll see.”
He leaned from the window and called his driver to move on, then withdrew inside the coach. The driver shouted an order. The procession lurched into motion. I sat my horse as my spirit-siblings passed, leaning out to greet me: Idrakara and blind Haminâser in the third coach, Gaumârata and Karuva in the fourth. In the second coach was Vivaniya, alone; I had seen him when I first came alongside, peering from his window, but he had drawn the cover down again, and it did not even twitch as his coach went by.
My men and I turned and rode on. It took some time to reach the procession’s end: The foot train comprised several hundred people, and there must have been fifty carts bringing up the rear, piled high with furniture and other goods. We rode continuously after that, stopping only to rest and water the horses and once, for a few hours, to sleep. The urgency was sharp in me—the same urgency as before, dread for Baushpar and for my spirit-siblings. I concentrated on it so I would not have to think about what else I might need to dread. Gyalo Amdo Samchen, my mind sang, Gyalo Amdo Samchen.
Late in the afternoon of the following day, we came over a rise and saw Baushpar below us, laid out in its valley like a child’s toy. For an instant my eyes showed me what I wished to see: the long light of the sun burnishing the red and yellow roofs, striking fire from the Temple’s lotus domes, kindling the walls of the old city to the color of half-dried blood. But that longed-for image was not the truth. The city I looked down on had been ravaged. Parts of it still seemed intact: the walls, the interior sections immediately adjacent to them, the crowded suburbs. But there were no lotus domes. There was no Temple, no Evening City. The center of Baushpar was gone.
We were transfixed, my men and I. Over the centuries, the region has been shaken by earthquake—seriously enough, on two occasions, to force us to rebuild large portions of Baushpar. But this did not look like any earthquake. It did not look natural at all. It was as if an enormous fist had struck the city, printing a ragged flower of destruction at its heart. In that territory of ruin, I could see nothing standing. I thought of Dracâriya, of Santaxma and his entourage. Somewhere underneath the rubble, my spirit-siblings’ flesh-shells lay. And how many others? How many hundreds, how many thousands, of others?
I don’t know how long we sat, staring down. Reanu, at last, broke our silence.
“Old One, perhaps we should make camp here for the night.”
“My Brother was wrong,” I said. My throat was so tight I could hardly speak. “Râvar isn’t dead. He did this.”
Reanu’s grim face told me he agreed.
“I want to see.” Blindly I fumbled for the reins, which had slipped from my hands. “I want to go on.”
Reanu reached out and gently took my wrist. “Old One, it will be dark soon. You won’t be able to see anything in the dark.”
Of course he was right. He and the others set up our camp, pitching my little tent, hobbling the horses, making a fire and boiling tea. Commonplace actions, performed without speaking. I could see and feel their shock. They
were born in Kanu-Tapa and ordained in Rimpang; the holy city has never truly been their home. Yet I know they grieved, for the sake of the church, for the sake of history. For my sake. I felt very close to them that night—Reanu and Apui and Lopalo and Omarau, the four who had been with me since the beginning, who had seen all I had seen and would see all that was yet to be witnessed. Below, on the black lake of the valley, a little light trembled up from poor ruined Baushpar—signs of life, or maybe only fires kindled by the disaster. Occasionally something flashed blue-white, like lightning.
I slept little. I wondered if Râvar remained in the city, if Gyalo did. I cursed Baushtas for refusing to send little Yarios with Taxmârata, for condemning to body-death a child incapable of choosing for himself. I cursed Artavâdhi for supporting him. I wept, silently, for the three of them, their souls adrift upon the world.
At first light we rose and packed the camp and rode down to Baushpar. We reached the northern perimeter of the suburbs perhaps an hour after sunrise. We were no longer elevated above the level of the walls, and thus not able to see the destruction; as we approached, it was almost possible to believe that nothing was amiss, for the walls were whole and the ground undisturbed, and from a distance the houses seemed undamaged. In the streets, though, signs of vandalism were everywhere—the work, I assumed, of Râvar’s pilgrim army. Doors hung open, window screens had been smashed out. Pilgrim sigils defaced nearly every surface. Reanu and the others, tense as drums, closed around me in a diamond formation; I drew down the hood of my coat so my tattoo would not show. The suburbs were deserted. We met cats and dogs and pigs, starlings and sparrows and pigeons, but not a single human being. I began to hope that in the old city it might be the same, that not so many lives had been lost after all.
We passed beneath the heavy lintel of the Winter Gate, and rode down the Avenue of Winter. For half its length, Winter ran intact; beyond that it was choked by rubble, entirely impassable. We retreated, turning east into the maze of side streets, heading for the Avenue of Dawn. The streets and houses were whole, though marked like the suburbs with signs of human violence. Once again we encountered no one. As we drew near Dawn, however, we began to hear the sound of shouting, and now and then a thump or crash, as of falling stone or timber.
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