Dust and Light

by Carol Berg

  Since leaving boyhood, I had passed off such old-woman pronouncements as artifice and clever guesses, contrived to frighten those of lesser mind. My spine had no longer prickled at my grandmother’s tales, nor had my stomach hollowed at talk of omens. But all that had changed since my magic had taken me into visions . . . since Oldmeg and her portrait . . . since Necropolis Caton.

  “Tell me more.” The old woman’s broken teeth tore off another bite of the leathery apple and chewed slowly.

  “I cannot,” I said. “My question is bound in . . . divine mystery . . . and vows of silence. I will go to the high priestess. I prefer to go with your blessing.”

  “The dark is fraught with pain. You bring it . . . and bear no small portion of it.” She shrugged. “Yet the Sinduria is of your kind. That in itself gives you no privilege, but I ween she would wish to understand a wild-hearted, blood-marked sorcerer who brings her mortal urgencies on a dangerous midnight.”

  The high priestess was pureblood? It certainly made more sense that Pons would have hidden Juli with one of us—a woman powerful in her own right, as well as protected by her office—than with some ordinary. Purebloods who took on the mantle of clergy did not serve contracts, only their gods.

  The old woman ate the last bit of her apple, seeds and all. She grinned and patted her scrawny middle. “Planting time is coming! Not long now. Enter as you dare.”

  Trying not to imagine an apple tree growing from her decaying belly, I bowed and walked round her to the door in the column.

  The tight spiral of the downward stair was well lit, and the scenes of bountiful fields, lush forests, and healthy sheepfolds painted on the close walls were beautifully wrought, their brilliant colors only slightly dimmed by smoke stains. But I detested every step of that descent. The stair plunged deeper than Arrosa’s baths. Deeper than the Tower cellars.

  The lower temple that opened out from the bottom of the stair was almost the twin of that above, like a reflection in a calm lake, save that columns and altars and smoke-stained murals were right side up. The vastness smelled of earth and smoke and musty herbs, with a pungent trace of lavender that seemed somehow out of place.

  No priestess or initiate, but a man in the Mother’s green livery awaited me. Large ears protruded from his dark straight hair and green half mask. A pureblood, too.

  He touched fingertips to forehead. “Greetings of the Mother, eqastré. I am Silos, attendant to Sinduria de Cartamandua-Celestine. What business brings you to the goddess and her priestess so late of an evening?”

  He seemed a soft man, his voice pleasant and polite. But I felt as tight wound as a clockwork. I needed us to be out of this pit . . . out of the city.

  “My name is for the Sinduria’s ears alone, Eqastré Silos. Please inform her that I’ve come to retrieve a valuable that was left in trust with her a month ago. The circumstances of its leaving have changed.”

  Perfect composure graced the man’s features. “I shall inform her.”

  “And time is of the essence.”

  “We live by the goddess’s time here,” he said.

  The quiet reprimand did naught but grate. But indeed he returned in moments. “This way.”

  He led me between the columns—squat and thick. The farther we went, the more oppressive the place felt. Older. Heavier. Who could say what really went on down here? In ancient times, the goddess required a healthy young male die every spring to ensure an abundant harvest. Tales said the priestesses drove the unwary sacrifice to mating frenzy and then stabbed him, leaving him to bleed slowly into the earth. Deep in a cave. Naked, in the dark.

  I pinned my gaze to the wide back in front of me. Silos must be a brave man to serve in the Mother’s fortress. Or perhaps his Head of Family had simply committed him to a terrible contract.

  “The Sinduria will join you as soon as she is able.”

  Silos motioned me through a doorway into a candlelit chamber. Water trickled into a laver set into one wall. A stone altar stood before a crumbling fresco on the end wall. Even half-peeled away, the images were recognizable—the story of Kemen and Samele, the twin brother and sister born of Light and Darkness.

  “Sit, if you like. I’ll bring wine.”

  “No wine, eqastré,” I said, wanting only to be gone with Juli at my side. “But I would clean my hands before greeting the priestess.” Pureblood healers forever warned of sepsis from dirty wounds. Without hands to release it, my magic was dead.

  “Certainly. Be free of it.” He gestured at the laver and took his leave.

  Both palms were scraped and raw and threaded with cuts. The cold water stung as it washed away filth, grit, and blood—only the visible blood, of course. A deep and dirty laceration on my left palm continued to seep. I rinsed it until my skull threatened to crack and blotted it with my cloak. Then I sat beside a small stone writing table and waited. Pacing would have worked better to prevent me grinding my teeth to pulp, but I knew I was more tired than my anxieties would admit. The night was like to get no easier.

  A person’s worktable can reveal many things. The Sinduria’s held pens, an ink cup, a box of sand, a stack of blank parchment, and implements to impose a temple seal, laid out in precise order. An iron clip and a box of cheap rushlights bespoke a mind for thrift unusual in a pureblood. And a cedarwood box held a stack of beautifully painted, well-used cards.

  Sinduria de Cartamandua-Celestine, Silos had named the priestess. Cartamanduas were the family of cartographers, the mapmakers cursed with a drunkard son who had become a recondeur while still a boy. But the Celestines were diviners. The painted cards could be those of a pureblood soothsayer.

  I wasn’t sure I wanted to know more of the future. My own pen and ink had shown me sorrow enough.

  As the hour crept onward, my thoughts raced in ever more chaotic circles. My fingers took up one of the pens and a little knife. I soon found myself sketching on a scrap of parchment from the stack, summoning memory and what magic remained in me. . . .

  “Who are you who dares make free of my implements?”

  The accusation, cold and low, lifted my head from the drawing. A youngish woman of robust figure stood not ten steps from me.

  I leapt to my feet, my cheeks heating. What had possessed me?

  Heavy black hair had been twisted and piled atop her head with jeweled combs. Even so she would scarce reach my chin. But the interlocking beads of lapis, malachite, and gold spread like a shield across her ample breast proclaimed her a Sinduria.

  “I don’t recall your leaving any valuables here in trust,” she said before I could answer. “Indeed I wonder what you must value, coming to the goddess with such unseemly dress and deportment.”

  Eyes were the mark of a pureblood diviner. The priestess’s wide silver bracelets were graven with eyes, and instead of a mask, her own eyes were enlarged with thick outlines of kohl and swaths of blue paint. Once my gaze met hers, it was difficult to look away.

  No reason to play games with a woman granted such a rare, difficult gift, and a character so formidable as to be named the Mother’s high priestess while near my own age. She would never house a fugitive pureblood without knowing exactly what she was doing and for whom.

  I inclined my back and touched my forehead. “Grace of the Mother, Sinduria. And I beg your pardon for the late hour and my unseemly dress. My name is Lucian de Remeni-Masson. I’ve come to fetch my sister, Juliana, given shelter here by your divine mistress’s grace.”

  “The Goddess Mother frequently shelters supplicants. Some have names. Some give up their names in humility before her. If you are the person you say, you are condemned as a deviant and a murderer by our superiors. Why would I do aught but send for the Registry? And do not tell me because I am your supplicant’s family, as family can be the most treacherous of all enemies.”

  Silos had materialized in the doorway behind her. I doubted insisting on privacy would alter that. Indeed, I seemed entirely bereft of argument, save perhaps . . .

  I p
assed her the page in my hand. “I am the person I claim. If you would look at this, lady, you might recognize the one I seek. And by the gift the gods have granted me—and the one they’ve given you—perhaps you can see that I mean only her good.”

  The drawing depicted Juli on the night she’d told me about her friend Egan the linkboy and how she’d found us a place to live. I knew I had captured the truth of her—earnest, intelligent, flushed with righteous indignation, and afire with youthful passion and laughter as she had called me the most priggish, solemn, dearest ancieno in this miserable world.

  The Sinduria examined the page, then tossed it onto the table.

  “The Mother’s grace must be profound in your family,” she said coldly. “Your sister is quite safe. I understood you would leave her until those responsible for your family’s murder and the slander on your person are rooted out. Although . . . I’ve no illusions that purebloods are free of sin, Remeni, but for someone highly placed in the Registry Tower to be involved in such savagery is exceedingly difficult to accept.”

  Determined not to anger the woman, I worked to shape the right words. “The motives for our family’s murder are not entirely clear. That my sister survived two deliberate fires was a matter of sheerest chance on one occasion and a timely warning on the other. But the gods themselves have revealed through pureblood magic that someone in the Tower was responsible. And due to certain events of the past few hours—which I’m sure you’ll hear of on the morrow—our danger has become even more critical. In short, the secret of my sister’s refuge is no longer secure, which means neither of you is safe if Juli remains here.”

  The priestess clasped her hands at her breast and, in thoughtful silence, strolled toward the frescoed wall. I hoped she didn’t plan to pray. We needed to be gone.

  She pivoted sharply. “The Mother’s fortress has withstood blasphemers since the days of barbarian raiders. Where could you take the girl that would be safer than this?”

  “That must remain my secret, lady. You understand the difficulty of Registry interrogations.”

  Her eyes grew even larger with dawning understanding. “Only a curator would dare interrogate a member of the Sinduri Council. You deem a curator involved in murder!”

  Pons must have told the Sinduria next to nothing. The priestess was neither warm nor ingratiating, but she deserved to know her danger.

  “The Registry will execute Guilian de Albin this night for consorting with Harrowers. Justly so, his guilt revealed by the gods’ magic. At least two other curators are entangled in a web of lies, corruption, and murder that extends not only throughout the Registry, but taints the court of Ardra, the Karish hierarchy, and Arrosa’s Temple. I’ve no freedom to judge individual guilt or innocence and no impartial wisdom to outweigh the horrors done to my family. I simply must get my sister away from Palinur until the problems at the Tower are resolved. You yourself, doma, must be wary.”

  And here I had to lie. The priestess could not be allowed to think of us as recondeurs before I had Juli. I didn’t trust her that far.

  “Curator Pons has made provision to shield the Remeni name from dishonor. Fortunately, my contract master has business interests in a western city where my family has powerful allies. There my sister and I shall persevere in our duty until we can return safely.”

  “Silos!” The Sinduria’s sharp command displayed neither shock nor disbelief, only urgency. “You and I go to the Registry within the hour. Prepare. Our guest will leave by the Ox Gate. I’ll have a message for my father and a letter for the abbot before we go.”

  The soft man bowed and vanished.

  “Now you, Remeni, must explain your inference about Arrosa’s Temple as I write. Yes, the whole thing.”

  I felt a bit silly recounting the story of Ysabel, Tremayne, and Perryn to the Sinduria’s back as she wrote and sealed a number of letters. But she listened, peppering me with questions about Gab the sweeping girl, Motre Varouna’s bath girls, and High Priestess Irinyi’s exact words. By the time I spoke of the inquest, her writing was finished, and she listened with her entire attention. And when the tale was done, she laid down her pen with an excess of deliberation.

  “The matter of divine Arrosa’s Temple shall be dealt with,” she said, cold fury locked in every syllable. “The Sinduri Council has heard this accusation before and failed to act; thus, these sins rest on our shoulders as well as Irinyi’s.”

  She rose. “We’re finished here. Silos”—I’d not seen her aide return to the doorway—“I’ll be ready to depart for the Registry as soon as you’ve taken care of these.”

  She passed him the letters, gestured his attention to me, and swept from the room.

  “But what of my sister?” I called after her.

  “Luka!” A blur of green silk from the direction of the doorway resulted in an impact sounder than any magical thunderbolt, and I was lost in the joy and confusion of blessed reunion.

  * * *

  “. . . Never thought to see you . . . that last time when you were so cruel . . . terrified . . . came to understand . . . so much time to think . . . drove me mad. Old Pew-Pons locked me in a tiny closet . . . sure I would die . . . but never harmed . . . Well, all right it was just a vile, bare, cramped room . . . Then brought me here . . . No one told me anything ever . . . only ‘behave yourself’ . . . or ‘his life depends on you’ . . . But I knew you’d come. Years . . . oh, Luka, I thought it would be years!”

  Juli’s flood of words had not ceased since she plowed into me like an attacking legion. It was just as well, for weariness and relief had robbed me of words. As we hurried after Silos through the underground, I whispered “Decorum, Juli” and “Later, serena” though the phrases were but placeholders for all the things I wanted to tell her.

  She looked well, her dark braid glossy, her flushed cheeks smooth, her eyes sparking with excitement and pleasure that buoyed my spirit beyond measure.

  We came to a . . . barn was the only thing to call it, though it was merely another vast extension of the underground temple. Mosaics depicting fire and bloody sacrifice adorned the squat columns; straw covered the stone floor. Wood slats divided pens holding a few goats, a dozen sheep, and a pair of rare white oxen. There was naught divine about the beasts; their stink overwhelmed the more ordinary perfumes of a temple. A wide ramp led upward to a great bronze door hammered with the image of the Mother’s favored beast. The Ox Gate.

  “You look so thin, ancieno! Are you hungry? These beasts are offerings to the goddess. Most of the meat goes to the poor, but we residents get to share a bit of it. We could ask the lady if we could take some. Silos would see to it. He’s most helpful.”

  “We must go, serena. Silos, has she cloak and mask?”

  “I have them here, domé. Her other things—”

  “We’ll send for them when we’re settled.” But I doubted that was to happen anytime soon.

  Men in temple livery hoisted two great beams of oak. Magic snapped and hinges ground as the bronze door swung inward. Beyond the door the city bells pealed and clanged in relentless cacophony. Perhaps Perryn wanted everyone awake to celebrate his anointing.

  Silos hurried Juli into a claret-hued pelisse, its fur lining thick and clean, and passed her a finely embroidered mask.

  Against all protocol, Juli clasped Silos’s big hands. “You’ve been so kind, Silos. I’ve been a terrible nuisance, forever pestering and pouting, but you’ve taught me much of patience and duty.”

  Though his half-naked face remained impassive, Silos smiled beneath his mask. He bowed to each of us. “It has been an honor, Domé Remeni, and very little trouble, doma. May the goddess protect you both through these perilous hours.”

  “What hour is it?” The clamor of the bells continued as if it were the first day of the new year. The world pressed on my spirit, a swelling clamor to match the bells, as if I had touched the earth and invoked my bent.

  “We’re at fourth hour of the morning watch, domé. For the last hour t
he bells have not struck the hour or the quarters.” He dropped his voice, eyeing Juli, who had gone to pet a bleating lamb. “You must be on your way quickly. ’Tis the alarm they peal. The Sinduria has Seen Prince Bayard closing on the city.”

  The Sinduria—a pureblood diviner—and Seen, pronounced in that way that raised the hair on my neck.

  Silos exhaled a long breath, clearly wrestling with himself about saying more. “The siege will be long and difficult. Months. Perhaps years. This war and this winter threaten to lead us into an age of darkness such as Navronne has never seen.”

  So it was a tightening noose I felt. Was this Oldmeg’s seeing, too? “Come, serena, we must go. Express our deepest gratitude to the Sinduria, Silos.”

  Juli nattered on about putting fat on my bones as we hurried up the ramp and into a yard that smelled of beasts and ash. The bronze gate crashed shut behind us. Two ponderous thumps told me the defensive beams had been lowered.

  Juli quieted and grasped my hand. The pale, unmasked half of her face was all I could see of her in the sudden dark. I longed to enfold her in my arms and promise that I could keep her safe. But I would not lie to her. The bleak truth had settled in my gut like lead.

  More than anything I wished to return to the necropolis. I’d given Bastien my word, and I desperately needed his aid. He knew so much more of the ordinary world where we would need to live. And surely his incisive wit could help me discover the Path of the White Hand. But he would never abandon his dead-city, and I dared not enter Caton. The Registry would be waiting. One glimpse of me inside, and my people would kill them all. Juli and I were on our own.

  “Stay close,” I yelled in her ear. Now we were outside the thick walls of the temple, the jangling timbre of the bells made it near impossible to hear. “This way.”

  Before choosing our escape route, I needed to see if the attack had begun, if there were riots or fires.