The Carnelian Throne

by Janet Morris

  But Kirelli did not, and he was conscious of raising his arm slowly through the viscous stuff around him to steady the whelt on his shoulder. He wanted to stop, to cease the senseless pushing, but the whelt urged him on. He plodded sightless through the blood-warm sea for eternity. Eternity consisted of Kirelli’s wehr-voice cooing his name and the whelt’s claws in his shoulder and at its end lay the dreaming mind of Imca-Sorr-Aat.

  “Deilcrit.”

  “—Kire ... I cannot think .... What is it l must not forget?”

  “Imca-Sorr-Aat lives in dreams. He kills for dreams. We must not let him .... Deilcrit, do not sleep .... If you cannot hold, open your mind to Wehrdom ...”

  And then he heard the whelt no more, but only faced that which rose out of the mist at him: a muscular ossasim thrice the size of any he had seen, talons extended. He tensed to throw himself aside, upon the boulder-strewn ground, then recalled there were no boulders in the corridor of red mist. There was red mist: it seemed that the whole ossasim was comprised of red mist, and when he grappled with it his arms would not obey him and his hands closed upon empty air. Yet he felt its teeth in his neck and then its great weight pinning him down as it poured into his defenseless mind all of the burden of knowledge that had been Imca-Sorr-Aat’s for twenty-five thousand years. And he screamed, and gurgled, and drowned in what no man should hear. Insanity beckoned, mindlessness a cool dark refuge with a lovely woman at its gate, yet he could not even surrender, for he lay helpless in the clutches of Imca-Sorr-Aat. The mad red eyes burned into him every knowledge forgotten and damned, and the lives of the billions it held chronicled within were his lives, and he lived them each and all. And at the end of them trailed his own, and he recognized all that he had been, and recollected his purpose, and tasted of his own strength. Then did he open his mind to Wehrdom and let the crushing weight of the years flood through him and out into the mind of every wehr who lived. And there came a great sighing, and a wailing shook the ground under him, and it cracked asunder, and the red mist that was Imca-Sorr-Aat began to discorporate before his eyes.

  A terrible urgency filled him, that Imca-Sorr-Aat might escape and leave him trapped in the shuddering dreamscape. With all his determination he called on those wails as his own, willing the most palpable. Slowly, the thing that was Imca-Sorr-Aat took shape once more, and as it did, he grabbed its neck in both his hands and dug in his thumbs. For a score of heartbeats there existed only his straining fingers and the jaws seeking his throat.

  Then he was coughing paroxysmatically, on his hands and knees, before an open doorway. Kirelli the whelt lay motionless by his right hand. By his left glittered oasasim feet through which the floor could be seen. Still choking, his eyes streaming tears, he gathered up the whelt and held it to his ear. A heart beat, weak but clear, within the feathered breast. He pressed the whelt against him and rocked slowly back and forth on his knees, not knowing what else to do for it, though within him rustled something which knew more than he ever dreamed possible. He did not prod that nightmare, quiescent. What lapped around the edges of his conscious mind told him more than enough. He knew for what the whelt-headed attendant waited, knew what yet lay between him and the carnelian throne.

  But he sang wordlessly to the whelt, limp in his arms, content to wait.

  This was their journey, together. He thought, inundated by grief, that though it was but a few steps more, he could not make it alone.

  “You promised me, whelt, that you would follow me one day. That day has not come. Live!” And he pressed his head to the whelt’s, and sent himself within its mind.

  A soft, frightened thing curled there, whimpering. He reached with comfort, with success, with love, into the whelt mind. But the crying thing would not come forth.

  Wordlessly he entered his despair, his own fear, his need, into that empty space, and Kirelli came to fill it.

  The limp whelt body stirred, fluttered, grew animated in his arms. He sat back on his haunches and laid Kirelli on his thighs and stroked the cobalt crest. There was an explosion of wings, and an irritable “Breet,” and the whelt stood uncertainly on the floor by his knee, shifting from foot to foot.

  Deilcrit rubbed his eyes and snorted and growled menacingly to the whelt that their host awaited them. Then, trying hard not to grin, he extended his arm.

  As the age-old guardian of light preceded them down innumerable corridors that lit when they entered and darkened when they left, he allowed himself the first small thrill of triumph. He had not been consumed by the trial of Imca-Sorr-Aat.

  The corridor had not judged him fit only to end as fodder for Othdaliee’s fire. And his mind had not turned to curd ....

  But then the light figure winked out abruptly, and all about him the illumination dimmed, and the walls drew back to admit him into the presence of Imca-Sorr-Aat.

  Here were corporeal attendants, ossasim in resplendent cinnabar robes who stood rigid about the octagonal chamber’s walls, staring straight ahead of them. These were the servants of Imca-Sorr-Aat’s flesh, deployed around their master, who slumped as if sleeping in his carnelian throne.

  With a whisper to Kirelli to take wing, Deilcrit approached the throne alone.

  None among the ossasim lining the walls moved. Their eyes did not follow him. It was possible those eyes did not see, that they saw only Imca-Sorr-Aat, that they had seen nothing else for a thousand years. He did not fear them. They would not move to stop him. They were disfrancished with their sleeping regent.

  He climbed the three steps slowly, heavily. He had won this right, and none would stop him, but as he faced his last grisly task, he faltered.

  He looked down into the peaceful, sleeping face of the snow-white ossasim whose dreams had ruled Wehrdom for the last millenium. His hands clenched convulsively on the sword he bore at his hip. For a thousand years the interface that coordinated Wehrdom had been this ossasim, kept alive by Othdaliee’s elder knowledge. Yet and still did the burden of that correlative function lay upon the brain whose projection had battled him in a dreamland of its construction. What would be left of Deilcrit as he knew himself when he alone bore Wehrdom’s weight? Not for ten thousand years had he who bore the title Imca-Sorr-Aat been more than an idiot-savant. This the thing which lay in the back of his mind told him smugly.

  Upon an instant, before the thing that dwelt in him could weaken him further, he drew the sword and mounted the final step and lopped off the head of the ossasim who had been Imca-Sorr-Aat.

  Then did he feel the full weight of what resided in Othdaliee.

  IX. Gardens of Othdaliee

  Twice since entering the gardens of Othdaliee had we been beset by creatures intent on turning Mahrlys’ prophecy of our deaths into truth. First, the guerm attacked upon putting us ashore at a flight of hand-hewn steps leading toward a crevice from which spilled amber light. And we had killed the guerm, and Mahrlys had wept, and Chayin had growled, and Sereth warned them both that he was near the end of his patience.

  The second time had been at the stairs’ head as we peered about us into a silent, petrified forest under an arching dome. From their perches in those leafless giants whose wood had ages ago been replaced with scintillant silicates they attacked: strange creatures, angular and gnarled as the limbs from which they descended, on us. The sandy ground was littered with them, as if with dead branches after an electrical storm.

  Sereth leaned against one of the great tree bolls. His chest was heaving and sweat gleamed on him. Through the trees at his back I could see the curve of the amber dome riverward, toward the place where the narrow island met the water.

  “Chayin, I would speak with you alone,” he said, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. I, too, was perspiring freely. The air within the dome was close and moist and stale.

  Chayin left Mahrlys’ side and approached him.

  For prudence’s sake, I sidled close to her. She was staring, back turned to the men, through the trees of stone toward the little isle’s center, where
something gleamed as warmly as the dome above, as if a second hemisphere of amber rested there.

  I said, “What is that?”

  And she answered: “The heart of this garden’s rarest flower: the recollections of Othdaliee.”

  And then she shuddered as if struck from behind, raked her fingers through her black hair, uttered a little scream, and fainted dead away.

  I heard: “How dare you vent your wrath on her?” And whirled in time to see Sereth push Chayin from him with the flat of his hand. The cahndor staggered back a pace, then another, then slipped in some white slime puddled near a tree-thing’s corpse.

  Sereth, a smile on him, waited patiently while the cahndor recovered.

  The two circled each, other.

  Numbly I sank down beside Mahrlys, and closed my eyes: owkahen sprang clear and bright into my sensing, all wraiths of the wehr-mist ripped away.

  And I screamed: “Chayin, Sereth did not do this. Look. Look at owkahen,” and by then I found myself between them, my fists pounding the cahndor’s chest.

  Chayin imprisoned my wrists in one hand, snarled, and by that grip pulled me from between them. Then he hesitated, asking Sereth: “Is this true?” And his membranes snapped as he sought conformation from the time.

  “It is. You did not ask me. I think you and I need wait upon excuses no longer. One reason is as good as another.”

  “No, Sereth, no,” I blurted. “Please, seek owkahen. Something has happened. Wehrdom stands clear and revealed.” And then Chayin shoved me toward Mahrlys and I crouched there, shaking, staring sightlessly at her chest rising and falling under the thin white robe.

  I did not watch: I read death in that silence broken only by a foot sliding in the sand and a rustle as they circled each other. No, I did not look, only shuffled through the enlightenment the time held out. And then moaned, struck my forehead with the flat of my hand, and shouldered my way into Mahrlys’ unconscious mind.

  Ah, I could not have done it sooner, no more than I could refrain from it then. Therein I found the nature of her designs, the awful fate she had orchestrated for Chayin. I saw what reality was called Imca-Sorr-Aat. And I saw what had dropped her senseless and chased her mind into the corner where it cowered: linca-Sorr-Aat no longer dreamed. Thereupon I did not need her further, for owkahen showed me why. It showed me what responsibility was Chayin’s, in what way he had betrayed us. But I cared not, for all else was shown me, and in that larger context all things are fit.

  So I turned from her, opening my eyes, and watched carefully as they closed, grappled, fell together in a heap. For a moment I thought I could do no good, that they would never break apart, but Chayin’s grip on Sereth’s neck slipped. They separated. I found an opening, in that tangle of limbs and I flesh-locked them both so neatly that my father, were he watching, would have been proud of me.

  I knew what I did, how great the risk of applying physical force to Sereth, but I did not really consider it.

  Unsteadily, my steps slow and careful, I went and knelt down between them, my eyes on my own knees that I not see Sereth’s face and lose hold on them. Then I said: “Give me long enough to explain, and do what you will,” and dropped the hold, far becoming untenable as Sereth’s fury sought to breach my defenses.

  I had a few moments, while the tremors attendant on flesh-lock rolled over them, and I used them well:

  I told Chayin what life Mahrlys had planned for him, that of a semisentient vegetable who would dream Wehrdom’s dreams a thousand years and never wake; and I remanded him to owkahen for instructions as to what punishment might fit such crimes as hers.

  And I told Sereth to look there also for Chayin’s crimes, if crimes Sereth judged them after seeking counsel in the time, were no more than hesting Se’keroth’s legend into fact without heed to consequence. And then I brought both their attention to the designs of Wehrdom newly etched on owkahen’s face, and said:

  “It is not any of us whose minds will be turned to jelly by Wehrdom. Though it seems to me late, it might be fit of us to attend him who took Chayin’s place on Wehrdom’s altar. Perhaps we can offer him an easy death.”

  I broke it off, eyes still lowered, waiting for Sereth’s revenge. I had raised Shaper skills against him. But it did not come. When I looked up I saw that they sat regarding each other, as if they had not heard.

  “Chayin, you promised Deilcrit your aid. Mahrlys lies unconscious in but the reflection of his need. Can you sit and pick an old bone with Sereth, knowing that Deilcrit suffers the very agonies she meant for you?”

  “If Sereth agrees,” said Chayin stiffly, “we will continue this at a later date.”

  “Gladly. But on one condition: I will do what I please to that saiisa of yours, and we will worry about reparations later.”

  Chayin’s mouth tightened. He looked at me pleadingly. I only shook my head. Even if I wanted to use it, I had not enough influence on Sereth to lift the murder from his demeanor. And I did not want to. I almost asked Chayin whether he would have slain Deilcrit for Mahrlys, but bit my tongue, and rose stiffly and brushed the sand from my knees instead.

  Chayin gathered up the unconscious Mahrlys in his arms and brought her to where Sereth quietly explained to me how we were going to obviate four people into a place we had never been, on the strength of the image of that room owkahen held out to us. I did not disbelieve him, only followed his terse instructions and added my strength to his own, while a part of me ruffled all the pages of owkahen seeking some probability in which Deilcrit was not a mindless hulk, sacrificed to the time. And I thought I might have found one, in the very presence of Wehrdom’s web about owkahen, when Sereth said, “Ready?” and I nodded and took his hand and Chayin’s and the three of us put our combined strengths into the obviation of space for the first time.

  There was the golden glow of nonspace, and the cold that nibbled at my substance; but there was no pain, only a gathering as if to spring, and a sucking in of the flow we rode. And when I let go Sereth’s hand and blinked away the vertigo as my substance repaired to its accustomed form, I saw the carnelian throne I had viewed in the Eye of Mnemaat, and upon owkahen’s face.

  It centered a featureless octagonal chamber of black glass, bathed in a pool of amber light of the same sort as poured in through the wide-open door at our backs.

  In it slumped a battered figure, one rag wrapped about its loins and another about its left arm. His belly and shoulders were scored with clawmarks, his chin rested on his chest. And above, perched on the throne’s unornamented back, poised a huge whelt. Across the throne’s arms rested a gray-bladed sword with a jeweled hilt.

  The battered chest rose and fell very slowly. He did not stir. The whelt humped its wings and gave a forlorn cry.

  I looked at the figure, and tears blurred my vision. I whispered Deilcrit’s name, and Sereth gave me shelter under his arm. Without a look at Chayin or Mahrlys, we approached the throne and what rested therein.

  “There—must be something we can do,” I quavered to Sereth as the whelt took screeching flight and from behind us came a bellow:

  “Stop right there.”

  As one we turned, looking past Chayin, who crouched over Mahrlys’ just-stirring form, and saw a huge, blackhaired, ragged man striding toward us brandishing a steel sword. As he came upon us I recognized it as the sword I had lost in the forest, and whispered that to Sereth.

  “Who are you?” demanded the man. Giving us a wide berth, he circled until he stood between us and the motionless figure on the carnelian throne.

  The whelt, squawling loudly, dived toward us, veered at the last instant, to take perch again on the throne’s back.

  The man waggled my sword, repeating his query. His eyes were red and his cheeks bore clean white tracks among the dirt and stubble.

  “Perhaps we should ask the questions,” Sereth said, letting go his grip on me and stepping a, pace closer to the man. “That weapon you hold—”

  “Quendros, stand aside,” came a vo
ice, deep and distant, from behind the hulking giant. That one, with a grunt of surprise, stumbled backward down the steps.

  “Deilcrit!” I cried, and ran toward him. Sereth caught my arm roughly and pulled me up short.

  The face looking down on me was sheened with strain. Under sheltering brows, long brown eyes flickered back and forth across us; touched Chayin, and Mahrlys, and Quendros, and then returned to me. The chiseled, ascetic features remained unmarred by emotion. The luminous eyes held no hint of recognition.

  “Imca-Sorr-Aat,” he corrected, and then leaned back and seemed to fall asleep. The whelt bent its head to his, and cooed softly.

  X. Imca-Sorr-Aat

  He dreamed a dream of life behind locked lids whose key he had misplaced. In the dream the presence called Imca-Sorr-Aat spoke through his mouth, and the growling sound echoed back in his emptiness and disturbed him. So he went to the pool of recollection and stared long therein, listening to the lullaby Imca-Sorr-Aat sang in his inner ear, that he might dream of man-wehrs undisturbed while that which dwelt within him held audience with what dwelt without.

  But they were his eyes which Imca-Sorr-Aat opened, and what they saw belonged to him also. Three creatures like shadows before flame, the eyes had seen, and the vision triggered another vision that had been Deilcrit’s when he alone commanded the flesh in which he rode. In the vision there had been himself, and the three combusting silhouettes, and a black-haired woman and a man. Such was the ladder of recollection Deilcrit climbed while Imca-Sorr-Aat hung to his legs and whispered sweet songs. And when he had pulled himself up that great distance he had no strength left to say whatever it was he had wanted to say.