Reign of Stars

by Tim Pratt

  The murderball closest to him lifted one of its legs, and drew a line of fire down the middle of Elias's face, cutting through his metal eyepatch, and his nose, and his cheek. He fell out of his chair, dead. The dwarf beside him leapt to his feet, but Char was there, reaching into his chest and pulling out his heart, dropping it on the table with disgust.

  The murderballs spread out on the table, lifting their limbs and pointing them at the remaining captains. "My little darlings," Zernebeth said fondly. "They were sick, and I nursed them back to health, and they're so grateful." She reached up and stroked the one on her shoulder. "Now, Elias and Xanos there were obviously not my allies, and they've been dealt with accordingly." She glanced around the room. "Now, I wonder—where do the rest of you stand?"

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  After the terror came a party, welcoming Zernebeth back to the fold. Their feast didn't have as many courses as the Sovereign's had, or any bits of bloody theater, but it was still absurdly decadent. Alaeron danced with his friend Malica a bit, but mostly he watched Zernebeth, who moved among the captains, the lieutenants, and favored underlings, cementing her power and rebuilding her reputation, a murderball familiar perched on her shoulder the entire time. She'd retrieved her prosthetic arm from whichever captain had claimed it, and she looked gleaming, deadly, and majestic.

  After a while Zernebeth slipped away from the other captains and took Alaeron's hand. She led him to a corner and pressed him back against the wall, then kissed him, deeply. "This party lacks a certain something," she said.

  "What's that?"

  "You, naked, in my bed."

  "We should definitely remedy that," he said.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  Zernebeth's old rooms had been looted, and she hadn't recovered everything yet, but there was a bed, and they didn't need much else. Come to think of it, they didn't even strictly need the bed, though it made things more pleasant.

  They made love, slept through the last hours of the night, then spent a long and languid morning together, discussing their plans for the League. Alaeron told her his ideas about encouraging the captains to share secrets with one another, to allow all of them to progress more rapidly in their researches. Hoarding secrets was fine if all you cared about was power, but if you cared about truth and knowledge—

  Zernebeth kissed his face. "You're a visionary. Once you're a captain, you can make your proposals, and I'll lend you my full support. We will do great things, don't worry." She reached over and removed the earring from Alaeron's ear, placing it gently on the table beside the bed.

  "You don't want to talk to me anymore?" he said.

  "I no longer need to keep track of you. You've proven yourself." She put her face close to his neck. "And when I want to talk to you in the future, I'll whisper in your ear this way instead."

  They lingered for a while, but eventually the sun rose higher, and at a moment that seemed no different from any other, Zernebeth leapt from the bed. "I have to go see the council of captains, Alaeron. A few details to work out concerning my triumphant return. Make yourself at home here, in the meantime." She dressed in her finest League attire, all black leather and gleaming silver and deadly weapons.

  "We're embarking on a new age, aren't we?" he said. "We can achieve so much."

  "How could we not?" She blew him a kiss as she departed.

  The past days had been exhausting, so Alaeron rolled over and sank into a deep and dreamless sleep, possibly the first truly untroubled rest he'd had since returning to Numeria. He finally dared to believe things might actually work out.

  So it was quite alarming when he was flung out of the bed onto the floor. When he opened his eyes, naked and afraid, he saw one of the Kellid Technic League captains standing over him, flanked by two Gearsmen. "Take the traitor," the Leaguer said. "Throw him into a cell. And when I say throw, I mean throw."

  The hands of the horrible metal men were cold, even colder than Zernebeth's, and Alaeron's struggles mattered to them as little as the desperate writhings of a worm did to a cruel boy.

  They took him to the basement of the compound—though not the subbasement, a small mercy—and hurled him into a dim cell. Skiver was already there, not naked but with his clothes torn and a split lip, sitting on a dirty mat of straw. Alaeron rose and rushed to the bars as they clanged shut, shouting after the departing League captain and the Gearsmen. "Wait! What's the meaning of this! Zernebeth will be furious!" A horrible thought occurred to him. What if the other captains had turned on her at the meeting? Caught her unawares, found a way to deal with her familiars, killed her? She—

  "Zernebeth is the one who betrayed us, Alaeron," Skiver said, voice low. "You really do have the worst luck in love. Not that it's entirely luck, of course. I'm being generous."

  "I...what? What do you mean?"

  "About luck, or about Zernebeth? Ha. The fella who dragged me out of my bed was chattier than yours, I guess. He told me why I was being tossed in prison. It turns out, you and me were the ones who arranged all those thefts. Did you know we were secretly working with Bothvald all along? He gave us secret information, and we sold it to our villainous friends in the criminal fraternity, et cetera. Zernebeth had her suspicions about us all along, thought we were playing her false when we claimed loyalty to her, but she wasn't in a position to do anything about it until she was welcomed back into the League, don't you know."

  "That's madness," Alaeron said.

  "Nah, totally plausible. After all, didn't you once kill a captain of the Technic League, and steal all those relics from Silver Mount? I'm not saying there aren't any holes in her story, but who's going to argue with a woman who has a clutch of pet murderballs?" He shrugged. "Anyway, here we are. In the second most horrifying basement I've been locked up in this year."

  "I can't believe it." Alaeron paced in the cell, thinking frantically, trying to find an angle, an alternative explanation, a reason that Skiver's captor would have lied. "Zernebeth would never do that—"

  Skiver snorted. "Of course she would! Alaeron, you're like a brother to me, but you do persist in thinking the best of people who don't deserve it. She's a captain in the Technic League."

  "She's not like the other captains, Skiver, she's good—"

  The thief shook his head. "No, she's not. I'll grant you this much—she's better. She's not a sadist, like so many others in the League. Her cruelties are incidental, not the whole point of the exercise. But the point of the exercise is the exercise of power, however she might have prettied it up with poetry about discovery and knowledge and truth when she was pillow-talking with you. I think she believes in that stuff, too, or thinks she does. Why not? She can be more than one thing. But one of the things she is is treacherous. All she cared about was taking power back from Bothvald. I didn't like the man, for obvious reasons, but I think you were wrong, when you said he was a grasping little shallow man of no ambition. That stuff he said in the wreck, about mathematics—I don't know what he meant, because when it gets more complicated than creating plausible accounts for a cover business, I'm lost—but it sounded a lot more high-minded in its way than anything I've heard out of your Zernebeth."

  Alaeron stopped pacing, and slid down the stone wall at the rear of the cell, sitting beside Skiver. "But why? She got what she wanted. Why betray us, when we helped her?"

  "Maybe you can ask her, if she attends your torture personally."

  Alaeron moaned. "Skiver. I'm so sorry I got you into this."

  He shrugged. "Coming to Numeria was a risky venture. I knew that when we got started. Besides, we're not entirely doomed yet. We've been in stickier situations."

  "Differently sticky, anyway," Alaeron said.

  "True enough." Skiver closed his eyes. "Just let me think for a bit."

  His silence gave Alaeron ample time to brood over the choices he'd made. Deep down, surely he'd known what kind of person Zernebeth was. He'd let himself be distracted, confused, misled, turned around. "Women," he said bitterly. "The problem wi
th women is, they're all liars—"

  "Shut up with that noise," Skiver said sharply, without opening his eyes. "Women? You blame women? Blame a woman, named Zernebeth—one person who made her own choices for her own reasons. My friend Genthia's a woman, too, and she risked her life for us, just because I asked her nicely." He paused. "And gave her a great big sack of gold, admittedly."

  "Jaya, too, though, she led me on," Alaeron began, and Skiver made a dismissive sputtering sound.

  "Jaya didn't lead you on, Alaeron, she let you lead yourself on. She had an affair with a wizard while she was traveling with us—she never pretended she was carrying a torch for you. And anyway, the first day you met her you found out she was a notorious confidence trickster, a professional liar. So, yes, she lied to you, and she exploited your obvious affection for her—but she was doing her best to survive in a difficult situation. If you recall, she was facing almost certain death even if everything went perfectly on our little venture. I don't blame her for letting you wrap yourself around her little finger."

  He opened one eye, but just to glare, then continued. "You might remember, quite a few Kellid assassins tried to murder you not so long ago, but I don't hear you saying, ‘The problem with Kellids is they're all obsessed with murdering me,' and if you did, I'd smack you upside the head for that, too. If there's one thing I've learned from years in the criminal enterprises, it's that anyone can do almost anything to anybody else for any reason, and villainy and treachery doesn't have a thing to do with race, sex, species, or creed." He paused. "All right, maybe creed, if you're a demon-worshiper, or something. But those other things, they're irrelevant. The problem with women is only the problem you have with women, which is, if someone lifts her skirt to show you a bit of ankle, you suddenly stop being a brilliant man with amazing insights into the nature of the universe, and become like a teenager again, thinking only with the contents of your breeches."

  Alaeron thought of half a dozen retorts, each more biting than the last, but finally said, "You know, I never had many girlfriends. When I was younger. Or any, really. Or even that many since I've been older."

  "You don't say," Skiver said. "Maybe next time try chatting up a woman who isn't a professional confidence trickster or the leader of an organization of evil arcanists. You might be surprised at how well it goes. Here's another wild suggestion for you: consider thinking of women like people instead of some entirely different order of being. Because that's what women are—they're people, just like you. They're not...sex elementals, or something."

  "This is useful information."

  "I'm a font of the stuff." Skiver lapsed into silence again. Alaeron went to the bars and looked out, and saw a guard walk past the end of the corridor. At least it wasn't a Gearsman. He tried to figure out how they might escape, to remember the way out of this particular basement, wishing he'd paid more attention when he'd been dragged naked and screaming down the steps, but it was all too disheartening to contemplate. He sat back down, shivering a little, wishing for a blanket, or even for a stitch of clothing.

  Eventually a guard came and threw a few rotten vegetables and pieces of fruit through the bars, doing his best to strike Alaeron, snorting laughter when the black potato struck him in the chest and a disintegrating onion bounced off his shoulder. "Enjoy," he said. "Every meal could be your last." The guard sauntered away.

  "Good thing you have friends in high places, or they might not have fed us at all," Skiver said.

  "I thought you were asleep."

  Skiver opened his eyes. "Trying to conserve my strength. Still have a brutal hangover from the party last night. Could you believe they ate a unicorn? Who does that?"

  "I think it was a horse with a horn and a false beard."

  "Never saw a unicorn up close. Seemed convincing to me."

  "One of the captains took a bite out of the horn, though. I think it was made of marzipan or something."

  "And those tiny live songbirds they were biting the heads off of. What's the point? They can't possibly taste good."

  "They're very rare, though. Used to flourish in Numeria, when it was just a bunch of plains filled with a hundred different unaffiliated warring tribes. The birds were famed for their sweet songs, good music for slaughtering your enemies with huge swords. But they aren't doing so well anymore, only a few flocks left. The very definition of a delicacy."

  "Numeria," Skiver said, "is a bloody madhouse, and if my choices were dying or living here, I might have to flip a coin and leave the decision up to fate."

  Char rose up out of the floor, smiling horribly. "Living or dying?" he said. "Perhaps I can help make that decision for you."

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Bound South

  Char. He'd been jealous of Alaeron, or offended by Alaeron, or both, and he'd wanted him dead. Now that Zernebeth had turned on them, had she sent Char to kill them, reach into their chests and stop their hearts? If they were tortured, after all, they might reveal some truths Zernebeth didn't want anyone to know.

  I never did get that adamantine mail shirt, Alaeron thought. Not that I would have been wearing it when I was dragged from Zernebeth's bed anyway.

  Alaeron stood with his back straight, trying not to show fear. If Char had come to kill him at last, he would at least go with dignity. Before he inevitably pissed and shat himself, of course. He'd seen enough death to know that, in extremis, dignity was a nicety the body didn't bother with.

  Char floated out into the corridor, drifted down a ways, and then drifted back. "All clear," he called down the hallway.

  Zernebeth sauntered to the door of the cell and looked inside, giving them a half-smile. "Hello, darling. And Skiver."

  Alaeron stared at her for a moment. "Zernebeth," he said, annoyed at the way his voice cracked. "Why?"

  She held up a hand. "Please. Just let me speak. First, I should say I'm sorry about all this. Best to get that out of the way up front. I don't usually bother with apologies, since I don't do things lightly and I don't often second-guess myself...but I am treating you rather roughly here. I know that."

  Skiver snorted. She ignored him. "What you—really the two of you—did, it's remarkable. The pair of you engineered the downfall of a leading Technic League captain with a few days of planning. Which led me, inevitably, to wonder—what could you do to me, if you ever decided I needed to be disposed of?"

  "Zernebeth, I'd never—"

  The murderball on her shoulder lifted one of its limbs, and Alaeron fell silent.

  She reached through the bars and touched his cheek with her cold fingers. "Oh, I know you're fond of me—I did certain things to ensure that fondness—but some of the things you say disturb me. Sharing information among the captains? If we lose our secrets, we have nothing. I certainly don't intend to share anything. All that talk about instituting reforms, to run the League more efficiently? How can I retain control if the captains stop fighting among themselves?" She clucked her tongue. "Besides, you're Andoren, both of you, and Andorens are notorious for their outrageous ideas about so-called human rights—as if anyone has rights they can't defend by strength of arms! Skiver, at least, has made no secret that he finds slavery distasteful, but where would we be without our slaves? No, no, it just won't do."

  Alaeron blinked. "But—but I thought you cared about...about truth, knowledge..."

  She nodded. "I am interested in unraveling mysteries, Alaeron, yes—but because that is the most interesting route to knowledge, power, and mastery. The way you choose to live, working always at the edge of your competence, forever pushing past the point of your own understanding, constantly taking on new tasks just when you've mastered the old ones—it baffles me. You chase failure, you seem to relish it, whereas I love success, Alaeron, and grinding that success in the faces of those who doubted me. Take this imprisonment as a compliment, really. I think you're too dangerous to keep around. Why, what if you outsmarted me, and rose above me in terms of influence among the other captains, and tried to inst
itute your so-called ‘reforms'? You'd be skinned alive and hung in the sun for vultures to peck. Honestly, Alaeron—I'm saving you from yourself."

  "Apart from the bit where we're imprisoned and awaiting torture and execution," Skiver said.

  She sniffed. "Well. As to that." She tossed something into the cell, at Skiver's feet. He picked it up and grunted. "You did perform a great service for me. If Skiver is as adept as he claims, that lockpick will get you out of here. You'll have to make your own way out, but I've made sure the guard presence is unusually lax—most of the underlings are being given their own opportunity to celebrate my reinstatement in the League. You'll have to get past a couple of guards, but surely you can manage that? Your things are in the chest by the guard station. Not the black box, of course—I can't very well let you keep a captive myrmidon—but the rest. I stashed the crawler by the rocks, where you waited when you came to rescue me. It's old and broken anyway—you're welcome to it. I sent word to Iadenveigh, and your friends should be able to spirit you across the border to freedom, if you make it out of here alive."

  "So the League assassins will keep coming after us, just like before," Skiver said. "Isn't that grand."

  She shook her head. "Tomorrow I'll tell everyone the fugitives were hunted down and killed. I'm sure we can find a couple of bodies about your size to devastate with fire—there are always people who need killing. Or at least who won't be missed."

  "How...kind of you," Alaeron said.

  She smiled. "I will miss you, Alaeron. In my way. Think less of me, if you must...but I do hope you'll think of me." She turned on her heel and strolled away, leaving Char to hover, chuckling, in the hallway.

  The incorporeal apprentice showed his teeth, though it wasn't right to call it a smile. "Apostate. It pleases me to see you cast down. You deserve no—"

  Alaeron took a deep breath. "Not to interrupt your gloating, but tell me, Char: why did you want to join the Technic League?"

  He frowned. "It's not about the League, particularly. The League is a means to an end. I used to be a killer, just another sword in a tribe full of them, and I spilled blood by whim or by the design of others. One night I looked up at the stars, and I began to wonder—what are they? Just pretty lights hung by the gods, or something else? And I looked around me, and there was so much I didn't understand, so much I'd never before realized I didn't understand. I wanted to know. Zernebeth promised to teach me. To open all the doors, and show me what lies behind them."