The Immortal Throne

by Stella Gemmell

  Now the gold lay in the depths of the fishing boat, under a shining blanket of silvery sea bream which would argue their innocence if they were stopped by the enemy. It would be enough to pay her brother’s mercenaries for a year longer. Enough, perhaps, to end the City’s siege.

  If they could run the blockade.

  The Blues’ blockade tactics varied, according to who was in charge of the fleet, and who captain of each ship. Sometimes they would let a single fishing boat sail by, unbothered by a few fishermen catching food for their table. Sometimes they would stop and board, and search the boat for reasons of received intelligence, or boredom, or whim. And occasionally they would stop and board, and kill everyone and throw them to the sea gods. The ten men on the Linnet were aged from sixteen to sixty and could pass for an extended fishing family, with Giulia as their matriarch. But in fact they were all soldiers faithful to Marcus Rae Khan, tough as boots, and they would all die hard before losing the gold or before any harm came to their lady.

  A low whistle came from the bow. One of the men, with the eagle eyes of youth, had spotted the fleet. Giulia peered again. She could see nothing. But if she could not see the enemy ships, they certainly could not see her boat, dark on a dark sea. For a while Giulia forgot about the arthritis in her hands and hips as she felt the cool breeze comb through her hair. She sniffed the dark night. She thought she could smell the City, the City of blood she loved and hated, where her brother would be waiting impatiently for her, wondering what treasures, what words, she had brought him. She would be with him soon, with luck.

  Lorens said quietly, ‘Tessera.’

  She knew what he meant. The isle of Tessera was in sight. They had discussed this morning’s tactics during the night. They had the choice of going round the island on the far side from the fleet, which would be a longer voyage but safer. Or squeezing between it and the blockade ships, hidden from the enemy by its dark bulk. Giulia nodded to her captain, confirming her decision to take the shorter route. It was the more dangerous course, but if they were spotted, Tessera would possibly offer sanctuary.

  The little boat was flying like its namesake and Giulia could dimly see the white wash of the wake on the starboard side where she stood. She wondered if there were dolphins, cutting through the water, leaping and diving, keeping up with the boat. But if there were it was still too dark to see their grey shapes. She would miss them, the dolphins, for she had become used to this travelling life, away from the blood and death of the war, and the petty politicking and power struggles of the generals.

  The light grew around them and the shapes of the great ships became clear even to her eyes. Then a sailor called out, ‘They’re launching boats!’

  ‘Have they seen us?’ she asked the captain.

  ‘Impossible.’

  Then we have been betrayed, Giulia thought, watching the little isle of Tessera growing, too slowly, on their starboard side. But perhaps the launch of the boats is just a coincidence; they have been waiting for dawn too, but for some undertaking we know nothing of.

  That hope was dashed as the fast galleys arrowed directly to intercept their path.

  Giulia leaned over the side. ‘Is the water shallow here?’ she asked Lorens.

  ‘Yes, lady, we are above a rock shelf.’

  She looked to the advancing galleys, the rowers leaning into their oars.

  ‘Will they ram us?’

  ‘I would.’

  ‘Then prepare to scuttle.’

  ‘Lady?’ He frowned.

  ‘Our most important mission is to keep the gold safe. If we are rammed we can open the planks and sink the Linnet. They will think the vessel is foundering because of their actions. We can come back at a later time and retrieve the gold, with luck.’

  ‘And if they kill us all? Who will retrieve it then?’

  ‘If our coming has been betrayed, they know I’m aboard. They will take me for ransom, as sister of the City’s greatest general. I will get word of the gold to my brother somehow.’

  ‘Lady Giulia, we will give our lives to stop you being captured,’ the captain argued.

  ‘I know, my friend. But that is foolishness. If I am taken you must survive and swim to the island. They will leave you alone then, a few stray sailors, not worth the trouble of hunting down.’

  ‘General Marcus will have my balls for breakfast.’

  She smiled. ‘One problem at a time, Lorens.’

  The advancing vessels were closing in on them at speed. It seemed one would ram the Linnet amidships, the other cut across her path. Lorens ordered his men to retrim the sails and he turned the tiller towards Tessera and shallower water. But the two chasing vessels merely adjusted their course and continued towards them. Giulia could see the ram on the prow of the closest boat, painted red and carved like a fist. Then suddenly, thirty paces or more from the Linnet, they slowed.

  ‘What are they doing?’ Giulia asked.

  Lorens shook his head. ‘Perhaps the fleet’s surrendering to us,’ he said with dry humour.

  A man stepped up to the prow of the closest boat, which was coasting slowly towards them, the oars held high. He shouted across the water, ‘Lady Giulia, I have a message from your brother!’

  Giulia thought for a moment. They were standing off to show good faith. And she could see no advantage to be gained by pretending to have a message from Marcus. Yet they were Blueskins. They were the enemy.

  ‘They did come from the enemy fleet?’ she asked Lorens, uncertain now in her failing memory, still wondering if this was a ploy and what it could achieve.

  He nodded. ‘Undoubtedly, lady.’

  A message from her brother via enemy hands? Her immediate thought was What trouble has Marcus got himself into now? But she stood straight and called out, ‘Very well.’

  The oarsmen eased the enemy boat forward until the man on the prow could pass a package to a sailor on the Linnet. It was handed on to Giulia and she awkwardly unrolled the waterproof covering to see Marcus’ familiar slovenly penmanship, drips of black ink crawling down the paper. Her heart caught in her throat. How she missed him.

  The message said: Sister mine. The war is over. Trust this man Tyler. He will see you safely home.

  The man on the prow, dark-skinned and smartly clad in a Petrassi uniform, bowed his head courteously. ‘I am Tyler, lady,’ he told her. ‘Will you be our honoured guest?’

  The Seagate was in the far south of the City where the high cliffs which formed the Salient descended sharply to the sea. The huge, unnatural harbour had been dug out in the reign of the emperor Sarkoy II using the sweat and blood of tens of thousands of labourers in times when lives were easy to come by and inexpensive. It was a magnificent structure, its high walls faced with pink marble carved with sea creatures both real and imagined, and topped with statues of the seven lordly beasts. But only a few years after it was completed an earthquake off the coast caused a tidal wave which swept away part of the walls and left the harbour filled with debris. It was rebuilt, but on a less grand scale, and in the following centuries engineers fought a constant battle against the sand and shingle which tides and currents brought into the harbour. In a bid to propitiate the gods, twin temples to the deities of winds and waves were built on the harbour arms, and sacrifices made to them. But the harbour continued to fill, and the deprivations of the endless war, sucking labourers to the battlefields to shed their blood there, meant it was largely abandoned, limited as it was to a single channel through the sandbanks.

  When Giulia stepped out of the Blues’ galley on to her homeland she was tempted to get down on her knees and kiss the stones beneath her feet. Rather she lifted her skirts like a girl and hastened up the steps to the top of the harbour wall from where she could see the City. It lay luminous and misty in the morning light. A pain seized her heart and tears filled her eyes. She squinted but the mist hid the distant Shield from her sight. At first she thought the City unchanged, though the Wester quarter below her looked strangely quiet. Then
she looked to her left, to the familiar outline of the Red Palace, and was shocked to see it much reduced, its myriad towers, cupolas and domes blunted and broken or gone altogether.

  ‘What has happened here?’ she asked Tyler. ‘What has done this?’

  ‘We destroyed the dams, unleashing your two southern reservoirs,’ he told her, stone-faced. ‘The flood destroyed the eastern end of the Adamantine Wall. Much of the south-east of the City was badly damaged. When the last of the flood reached the Red Palace the water poured into the lowest levels, crumbling the already weak foundations. It is largely uninhabitable now. Only rats live there.’

  She looked at Tyler’s calm face, trying to absorb the enormity of what he was telling her. ‘What of the emperor?’

  Tyler looked around them, then walked a few steps away from the gathered warriors. ‘He is dead, lady.’

  ‘You murdered Araeon?’ she cried. The thought was incomprehensible and her mind stumbled around it, trying to find a way to approach it.

  ‘Your emperor was killed by a City warrior,’ Tyler told her.

  ‘Unspeakable! By one of the Thousand?’

  ‘No. A common soldier, I’m told.’

  Araeon murdered by a soldier of the City. She shook her head. ‘I don’t believe you,’ she snapped.

  ‘Nevertheless, it is true.’

  Giulia’s legs felt unsteady. If she had been alone she would have sat down gratefully, but she could not show weakness in front of this enemy.

  ‘Araeon was a great man,’ she declared.

  Tyler sniffed. ‘Getting killed was the greatest thing he ever did, lady.’

  Anger sparked in her and she said, ‘You seem like a civilized enough man for a soldier of Petrus – do not ever speak to me like that again.’ He bowed his head a fraction.

  She made a deliberate decision to think about Araeon later, when she had spoken to Marcus. ‘My brother lives?’ she asked, still needing the reassurance.

  ‘Yes, lady. He is waiting for you.’

  ‘Have the Blues captured the entire City?’ she asked. She was having trouble getting her thoughts in order.

  ‘No. Only the southern part. There is a peace treaty in place and we have agreed to restrict our troops to the south. There is much for you to learn, lady. A great deal has happened in recent days. I have been asked to take you to the Khan Palace where you will have answers to all your questions. I have ordered a carriage.’

  She followed his gaze, down the outer steps of the harbour wall to where a coach and four waited. She snorted derisively. ‘It will take days to get to the Shield in that thing, considering the ruin you have made of the City. I will ride. Bring me a mount.’

  Tyler raised an eyebrow, but he called out orders in his own tongue and a horse was brought to meet them at the bottom of the harbour steps. Giulia frowned when she saw it was a gentle mare with quiet eyes, but she said nothing and accepted a soldier’s help to mount. She kicked the beast into a fast trot. It was a long time since she had been in the saddle, but she knew she was a far more experienced rider than most of the young Petrassi troopers flanking her.

  The ride was a torment. Giulia had known the City for longer than most, and she had walked its streets and alleys and squares for all that time, over generations of ordinary mortals. But she found it hard to recognize parts of it as they rode past. Everything was covered in a veil of dried dust – the buildings, the trees bordering the wide avenues of Amphitheatre, the debris in the streets. The few living people they saw peered from the shelter of ruined homes, fearing no doubt that death still awaited them at the hands of the invaders.

  She broke her resolve on silence to ask Tyler, ‘How many died?’

  He shook his head. ‘I’ve no idea.’

  She felt her blood pressure soar but forced herself to be calm. This man was just a soldier, following orders. She would ask him no more questions. It would achieve nothing and only infuriate her.

  It took them all day to reach the Shield but eventually the old Khan Palace came in sight on the western side of the mountain, surrounded by venerable pines and flanked by the White Palace of the Vincerii above and the black Iron Palace of the Gaetas beneath.

  To her surprise she saw a troop of City cavalry awaiting her at the bronze-gated entrance to the mountain. The Third Imperial, still at liberty? What sort of invasion is this? she wondered.

  ‘I will leave you here,’ Tyler said and, before she could open her mouth, he wheeled his mount and the Petrassi party took off.

  Giulia called briskly to the waiting escort, ‘I do not need you! You are dismissed!’ She walked her mount through the gates and on to the white Shell Path which meandered lazily up the Shield, linking the Family palaces. She held her head high as she rode, enjoying the pungent smell of the pines shading the path. The air smelled fresh, like rain.

  She passed the Iron Palace and wondered if Sciorra Gaeta still lived. The last she had heard, the old woman was mired in madness, her brain ageing long before her body. At least, Giulia thought gratefully, I have my wits.

  Riding higher she came to the first sharp curve of the path, where the Shrine of the First stood on a small outcrop looking west, the direction of last things. It was a plain titanium plaque embedded in a material which had once been transparent but which had weathered over the centuries so its words could no longer be discerned. Not that the language could ever be read by any but a handful of people. Giulia reined in the mare and paused, remembering those who had died. She could not recall their faces, or indeed most of their names, but it had been a long time and she knew they would forgive her. For the ones who had died had been the best of them.

  But she could remember the words. She knew that when she lay on her deathbed, when she had forgotten everything, perhaps even her own name, she would remember them: We came to bring knowledge and peace. May your gods look kindly on us for our transgressions.

  At last the horse clopped noisily across the golden stones of the Khan Palace courtyard, the sound echoing off the walls. Giulia looked around. She was greeted only by stillness, by silence. Then suddenly there was an explosion of servants from doorways on every side. One ran over and held the mare’s reins while another carried the wooden block for Giulia to dismount. More servants – familiar faces – brought cool water in a pitcher filled with sliced limes, while another proffered a crystal goblet on a silver tray. Maids brought soft slippers for her feet and moist cloths to cool her brow and clean her hands. This welter of obsequiousness both amused and comforted her, for in the past year she had become used to self-denial and the grudging welcome of strangers.

  Then, a sight for her old eyes, across the courtyard shambled her brother, his arms open, his face wreathed in smiles. He looked, as he always did, as though he had dressed in the dark, and tears sprang to her eyes.

  He flung his arms around her and wrapped her in a bear-hug which threatened to break her spine.

  ‘Get off me, you old fool,’ she said, laughing.

  Then, remembering the day’s grave news, she asked him quietly, ‘Araeon is truly dead?’

  Marcus frowned and shook his head. Not in front of the servants. They walked hand in hand, as they had done since they were children, into the palace and along familiar corridors. Without speaking they found their way to their favourite parlour. Giulia felt her heart ease to see it again, with its trophies of war and peace and lives lived to the fullest, her old rugs on the floor, worn and wearied by time.

  ‘He is dead?’ she asked again once they were alone.

  ‘He is.’

  She narrowed her eyes. ‘Are you sure?’

  Marcus snorted. ‘Araeon abandoned subtlety many generations ago. No, he has not gone to ground, is not lying in wait to see what the rest of us will do. He is dead. There is no doubt.’

  ‘When did this happen?’

  ‘On the Day of Summoning.’

  ‘Then who is emperor?’ she asked, the question which had been on her mind since she received his message. H
er brother, she feared, would never put himself forward. I’m just an old soldier, he’d say. ‘Marcellus, I suppose?’

  ‘Marcellus also died,’ a voice said, and Giulia turned to see a woman framed in the light from the doorway. For a heartbeat she was angered. Fiorentina? What was she doing here? It was the strongest indication of how her world had changed, for she would never have allowed the sister of the whore Petalina to set foot in their home. Then the words entered her consciousness and her breath stopped. Giulia clutched her chest, pierced through the heart. Marcellus dead? She sank to the floor. No, it was not possible. Memories fluttered through her mind, too many, too rich for an old woman.

  Fiorentina came forward, knelt and took her hand. ‘I’m sorry, lady,’ she said. ‘That was cruel of me. I know you were once wed to him.’

  ‘It’s all right, my dear,’ Giulia lied. She tried to breathe deeply but her chest was too tight. She was surprised that word of his death had hit her so hard. There had been, after all, many times when she’d wanted to kill him herself. ‘That was all long ago,’ she told the girl.

  Then she realized that if Marcellus was dead then Rafe, his reflection, must also be. She added politely, ‘You have lost your husband too. How sad.’

  ‘You heard, lady? Both brothers killed on the same day. What a terrible day for the City.’

  Giulia’s head cleared a little. What a curious thing to say, she thought. She looked up at Marcus’ anxious face, a question in her eyes. Does she not know? Her brother shook his head slightly. It seemed incredible to Giulia that Fiorentina, ten years married, now widowed, should not know she had been wed to a reflection, a creature that was no more than a walking corpse.

  She tried to marshal her thoughts. Araeon and Marcellus both dead.

  ‘Then who is emperor?’ she asked again. She looked at Marcus, who avoided her eyes, then at Fiorentina.

  With a spasm of fury, she realized what they were going to say.