The Seer - eARC

by Sonia Lyris

  “Are any of them in-city?” he asked.

  “My sources say one, perhaps two.”

  “Are they . . .” He thought of how to put it. “Already on the gameboard?” Under contract to the king, he meant.

  It was a dangerous conversation.

  “One is, perhaps. But . . .” She considered her answer. “This is another level of expense entirely, Captain. Your credit will not stretch so far.”

  “I have funds.”

  Not long ago, his Cohort brother Tok had run with him during his morning’s exercise and whispered to him that his mother, Etallan’s eparch, wanted to be sure that the king was not the only one who had someone with good vision close at hand.

  Some thought House Etallan, with its fingers on mines across the empire, had too much influence. Etallan had done well at the last Charter Court. But Innel knew Tok, and trusted him as much as anyone. If House Etallan was backing him, that was good for him and it was good for Cern.

  As for the actual mage, Innel had mixed feelings. He’d met a few, quietly, and found them not much different than some of the touchy Anandynar royals, expecting to be treated with great deference. With mages, respect first. It paid to handle them like blown glass.

  But if Etallan was paying, then—

  “Tell me when you find one.”

  In spite of vivid tales intended to terrify Arunkel children, negotiating with mages was mostly a matter of tactful diplomacy. Offering them what they wanted, whatever it was. Even mages must eat.

  “My honor to serve,” Bolah said, spreading her hands.

  “Your sister,” Nalas said with a brief smile.

  Innel made a face. “Yes, yes.”

  Srel slowed his work at Innel’s elbow a moment, shot him a warning look.

  “I know. It should only take a moment.”

  Innel was almost late to attend the king in his bath. Srel had been intently sewing an elbow rip in Innel’s amardide and leather jacket, and while the jacket would come off immediately in the damp royal bath, Srel insisted it was essential that he look correct as he walked in.

  “Brother.”

  Cahlen’s clothes, by contrast, were as far from acceptable as was possible to be without her being tossed out of the palace as a beggar. He sniffed a little. How often did she change them?

  “Sister.”

  “The east tower dovecote,” she said.

  “It’s been addressed. The Minister of Palace says—”

  “He says many words. I’ve heard them all. Nothing changes. Nothing is fixed.”

  She reached under her loose jacket and brought out a bundle.

  “I will look into it when I can, Cahlen. But right now I’m a bit busy—”

  She put the item on his side table and unwrapped it. One of her messenger birds, gray and white, blood across its feathers and head, beak splayed, long neck limp. Dead.

  “The males fight when they’re too crowded,” she said. “This was the best of my stud-cocks. Yesterday.”

  “I am late to attend the king,” Innel said. “Do you know about my betrothal to the princess, Cahlen? Do you know what has been happening?”

  “You killed my brother. Now you kill my birds.”

  He exhaled frustration. “Cahlen, you don’t understand—”

  But she had said what she came to say and turned away, walking to the door, brushing close by Nalas as she went. He quickly stepped back. She left.

  Srel focused on the needle he held, tying off a knot, then motioning Nalas close to provide him a knife to cut the thread.

  “We will need to do something about her, ser,” Srel said, stepping back.

  “Start by making sure she looks like she belongs in the palace. If you can figure out the dovecote problem, do that, too.”

  Innel pulled on his boots—again, despite the fact that they would come off as quickly as the jacket once he was in the royal bath.

  Appearances.

  And an honor, he reminded himself. A point of status, anyway; not everyone had even seen the king’s bath, let alone the king inside it.

  Srel was kneeling at his feet, tying the straps of his boot around horn-cut buttons. He stood, reaching up to adjust Innel’s collar and cuffs and run a comb through his hair and beard.

  “Something in magenta?” Innel asked, thinking of Cern.

  As well as Innel knew the palace language of clothes and color, Srel knew it even better. “Not yet, ser.”

  Innel nodded and left.

  The royal bath was a large room, walls tiled in white stone, ceiling and sunken tub inlaid with black and red quartz. From the wide window, cut glass caught the light, casting shaped reflections on the walls that changed with the time of day. In the mornings, one could see birds and butterflies on the far wall and floor. Now, sunset, it was ships, moving slightly, as if on a sea.

  Innel bowed as he entered, waiting for permission. Best to be careful; he’d found that when soaking in hot water, the Anandynar royals could be especially touchy.

  “Yes, yes,” Restarn said impatiently from the huge rectangular tub, waving him in. Steam rose to partially obscure the overhead mosaic, a circle of the sigils of the Eight Houses. Innel made sure that his glance up did not stop at any one sigil; it was the sort of thing he would have looked for, had he been the king.

  A few servants were scattered about the room, bringing scented herbs and soaps, or sponging the king’s royal back.

  Innel’s gaze stopped on the large male slave who suddenly stood before him, blue eyes downcast, blond hair falling in locks down his muscled shoulders. He felt his heart start to race. Only years of careful practice allowed him to keep his gaze moving past the man as if he barely saw him.

  What was it about this particular slave that caught his eye?

  The way he held himself, was what. So much like memory.

  As the slave helped Innel off with his jacket, tension made Innel want to swallow, but the king’s line of sight was direct. Instead he walked to the bench, forcing his movements to be calm and unhurried. Sitting slowly, he reached for the ties of his boot.

  Another royal gesture, and a female slave knelt at Innel’s feet, her golden hair cascading over her face as she bent over his boot. The man joined her. One on each foot, each unwrapping leather straps, removing boots and socks.

  “She’s new,” Restarn said. “What do you think of her?”

  Innel forced his gaze to the woman. She turned her face upward for inspection, looking beyond him.

  Sky-colored eyes below long, golden lashes. A slender chin. Full lips. Beyond beautiful.

  “Breathtaking, Sire,” he said, hoping the king would mistake the oddness in his tone for awe.

  The king chuckled.

  Look at something else. Think of something else.

  Through the far window the sun was setting in vibrant shades of orange and vermilion. From the Great Houses to the bay’s shimmering sea, the city seemed gilded in gold. A marvel of glass-craft, this window, well beyond the present-day ability of House Glass. Mage-made, most likely.

  Though again, not something to say aloud. Only the king could break both custom and laws with impunity.

  Innel tried to remember which of the Anandynar royals had built this bath. The Grandmother Queen, he was pretty sure. A pragmatic ruler, Nials esse Arunkel, quietly rumored to have kept mages more openly than her descendants. Why Restarn, who revered her enough to have coins minted in her likeness, did not do likewise, he did not know.

  When Cern came to power, well. Perhaps then.

  “I’m thinking of breeding her, Innel. Her hair is soft as silk. Go on, feel it.”

  Willing his breath to slow, Innel put a hand on the woman’s head.

  Just like one of the king’s puppies, he told himself.

  “And the other. Go on, see how soft his hair is, too.”

  Gold inside as well.

  Innel’s stomach lurched.

  It occurred to him that the king might be doing all this to unsettle him,
but surely the incident had happened too long ago for him to think Innel would still be affected. He wanted to look at the king, judge his expression, but he didn’t dare. Not until he had made a good show of doing as he was told.

  He drew the woman’s tresses through his hand. Then, affecting as much ease as he could, put a hand on the man’s head as well.

  How old had he been? No more than seven, surely.

  Innel remembered standing in the hallway that day, head bowed as the king and his entourage strode past. Then he had made the mistake of looking up. At a gesture from the king, one of his guards grabbed him by the arm and pulled him along.

  Later, Innel would come to recognize the expression on the king’s face at that moment, an assessing scrutiny edged with amusement, and know that it presaged something unpleasant. Then, though, all he felt was pride that he had been selected while his Cohort siblings were left behind.

  As he walked behind the king with guards and retainers, a man strode at his side, naked to the waist, blond hair falling to his mid-back. One of the king’s fabled slaves, Innel knew, though he had only seen one at a distance before, at a musical performance in the Great Hall. A lithe woman, kneeling at the king’s side, his hand on her shimmering head as the music began. Innel had stared wide-eyed at the exotic creature until Pohut, standing next to him, hit him sharply in the ribs to make him stop.

  Walking alongside, the young Innel stole another glance at the blond man, trying to understand what about him was impressive. Clad only in simple black trousers, hands shackled in iron bands, he somehow looked anything but a slave. What was it?

  The way he moved, Innel realized. How he held his head and shoulders. As if he were in command not only of this group of guards and retainers, but the king himself, even the entire palace. The king’s royal guard did not move as well as this man. Not even the king, he thought. The slave put him in mind of the king’s best stallions, who strutted and galloped as if the world existed to serve them.

  Innel found himself standing up straighter, changing the roll of his shoulders, the tilt of his chin, even his stride, as he tried to emulate the compelling blond man who walked beside him.

  The group descended one flight of stairs and then another, then through a corridor Innel had never seen before, to a room deep underground. They streamed in, door thudding shut behind. At a heavy wooden table, the slave was roughly shoved prone, held fast by a handful of guards.

  At a nod from the king, one of the servants drew a knife. In a single, fast motion he sliced the man’s throat open. Gasping, thrashing, blood pulsed from the blond man’s neck, splattered across his pale chest.

  The young Innel clenched his fists, mouth dropped open, eyes wide. With a horrified shock, he realized the king was watching him. He looked disappointed.

  “You may go if you wish,” the king had then said.

  Only two years in the Cohort then, but the young Innel knew perfectly well that these words were far from true. He tightened his stomach, clenched his jaw, and forced his gaze back to the man on the table, who was twitching and taking a very long time to die.

  “You think we’ll find gold inside, Innel?” the king had asked.

  What was the right answer? He desperately wished Pohut were here to give even so much as a glance for guidance.

  He knew the story, of course: how the pale-headed northerners had gold inside them, like pearls in oysters, which accounted for their pale hair. But was it true?

  “I don’t know, Sire.”

  Steady, he told himself. This would be over soon.

  But it was not. The servants first cut the man’s golden hair at the scalp. The long locks were closely inspected, offered to the king, then laid aside. Next they cut into the dead man’s face and scalp, pulling skin away, digging out the eyeballs, handing each part to others who stood by to take it, making careful examination, often cutting it apart further on another table, before dropping the bits into buckets.

  The slave’s fingers were cut off, skin stripped away in small segments, ligaments pulled off bone, bones crushed with mallets against the stone floor. Each piece again meticulously reviewed, given to the king at a word to inspect. Blood dripped off the table, sluiced with water onto the sloped stone floor, oozing redly into a central drain beneath. They cut into the stomach and pulled out organs trailing intestines, dicing them into small bits on another side table. As one might prepare sausage for a stew. All the bits were then strained through a weave in a careful search, liquid dripping through.

  Innel felt sick.

  There was very little talk. The sounds of bones being ground. Bits of wet meat dropping into buckets. The room stank of blood, offal, and emptied bowels.

  It took hours. Innel held himself as still as a statue, not daring to even look away from the table, terrified he might find the king watching him.

  When at last the body had been completely taken apart, the table empty but for the tiniest bits, and soaked in blood, buckets of meat and pulverized bone lined the wall.

  Nothing that remained was recognizable as the man who had walked beside him in the corridor.

  Servants then hefted the buckets and left to take the remains to feed the royal pigs.

  The young Innel found himself wondering if the blond man had known this was coming as he walked here so proudly. If he had, surely he would have fought it, even knowing that it would do no good.

  Or perhaps he had indeed known, and knowing was what had given him the bearing that had so impressed Innel.

  “Now,” the king said. “we are finally and completely certain.” And then he had laughed, a sound that haunted Innel for many nights after.

  There was no gold inside. Not a single flake.

  With a bow to the king, a servant offered him the long strands of gold-colored hair. Long, long locks of shimmering hair.

  Much like the long, long locks that Innel now held in his hand as he sat in the royal bath room, under the king’s close scrutiny from the tub.

  Restarn snapped a finger, motioned, and both slaves stood quickly, the woman’s long tresses flowing through Innel’s hands as she pulled away. The two of them left through a side door.

  Innel exhaled softly, finally daring a look at Restarn, finding his expression unfathomable.

  “You seem distracted, Innel. Not getting enough sleep?” The king grinned widely. Of course he knew that Innel was sleeping with Cern.

  “No, Sire, I am not.” Innel gave a small smile in return to show he shared the king’s amusement and met his gaze, but broke away first.

  Just like with the dogs: show strength, but not dominance, not until you’re absolutely sure you can win.

  That would come.

  “Innel, we must talk about the wedding.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” Innel responded, relieved to be discussing the future rather than remembering the past.

  “I need someone to go to Arteni.”

  “Arteni, Sire?” Innel frowned. A town along the Great Road, a central collection point for grain in the surrounding fertile lands. Contracted directly to the crown in the last Charter Court, as he recalled.

  “They’ve made the poor decision to sell some of their harvest to traders at the Munasee Cut. Maybe they thought they could get a better price there. Maybe they thought we wouldn’t notice.” He gave Innel an unpleasant smile. “An insult to me, personally, and an affront to our hungry citizens. I need someone to go and sort it out. Someone I can trust not to be soft about it.”

  Innel could see where this was going. “It would be a great honor, Your Majesty. But with the wedding—”

  “Exactly. I can’t marry my daughter to a captain. It would be embarrassing.” At this Innel felt a chill down his spine. “I could promote you, of course, but not without”—Restarn waved his hands as if searching for words, splashing a little water—“some demonstration of your capability to the generals. They think you’re unproven.”

  “Unproven? They’ve been testing me for years. The Lord C
ommander in particular.” He still had the scars.

  “Yes, yes, I know. But they’ll say pretend battles make for pretend soldiers.”

  It was one of the king’s favorite maxims. Of course they would say it.

  “I’ve been out on campaign repeatedly, Sire, and—”

  “Not in command,” said sharply. “I have to give them something if I’m going to give you a higher rank.”

  There—he’d said it twice. The prize of advancement now dangled irresistibly in Innel’s mind. Were it bestowed on him by the king, it would say a great deal about the monarch’s faith in him. Given his lack of bloodline and House, that could matter, once he was wed to Cern. Could matter a great deal.

  But Arteni was many days south. It would take him time to mobilize an armed force, even a small one. And how long would this sorting out take?

  Innel could easily be gone months. That would delay the wedding. Take him from the palace. Away from all his plans, which might unravel quickly if he were not here to oversee them.

  Away from Cern, whose interest might cool if he could not regularly remind her why she liked him.

  No; there must be another way.

  “You’ll need to install a new town council,” the king said. “Make sure they observe what you do to the old one—you understand. And the mayor, I don’t have to tell you how to handle him, do I?”

  “Sire, the wedding—”

  “We’ll put it off. Short delay, but for good cause. Midwinter, most likely.”

  Midwinter?

  Innel thought furiously, quickly turning over what he might prudently say next. Not a time for missteps.

  “Or,” said the king, drawing the word out, “I could send Sutarnan. He’s eager for the chance to prove himself. At times I think Cern might still hold some fondness for that boy, cheeky as he is. And Mulack—I still wonder if he might be a bit of a late-blooming rose.”

  Mulack was nothing like a late-blooming rose. He was eparch-heir to House Murice, and had no interest in getting his hands dirty.