by Sam Bowring
‘Would you defy me?’ he asked. ‘Would you defy the will of Arkus? Do I even need to explain myself to you?’
It was clearly a rehearsal for the case Bel would make before the Sun Court, but it was effective nonetheless.
‘It is no small thing to include the Sun God in a lie,’ said Fahren hesitantly.
Bel drew his sword, and it blazed in the light that streamed through the window.
‘Does it look as if he has a problem with it?’ he said.
In With the Old
In With the Old
In With the Old
The Sun Court atop the Open Castle was the fullest Fahren had ever seen it. Word had spread that two things of great import would occur here this day: the formal introduction of the blue-haired man and the appointment of the new Throne. The Open Castle was always full of representatives from the various states of Kainordas – Borgordus, Centrus, Dennali, Cindeka and Tria – but it was rare that all of them would be in attendance at the same time. Bodies crowded almost to the very edge, the lack of any wall or rail making some of the jostlers nervous, despite the magic that stopped anyone falling. Even the carpet from the stairwell to the dais, where the golden throne Borgordusmae stood shining, was packed.
Fahren began by introducing Bel to the court, which went smoothly enough. He spoke of how Bel had been kept in hiding until the time had come to show him to the world. There was some dissent over whether hiding Bel for so long had been wise, but Fahren pointed out there was little point in objecting to things that had already come to pass, and that the people should now rejoice upon hearing the good news. He moved on quickly to speak of how Arkus had appeared to Bel and himself, to give them directives, although he was deliberately unclear about when this had happened, whether it had occurred before or after Naphur’s death. He also did not go into specifics about Bel’s mission – the less public knowledge there was of that, the better.
‘And now,’ Fahren said, ‘to the matter of the Throneship.’
Thedd Naphur emerged from the crowd, smiling expectantly. He moved towards High Overseer Varta, who waited by the throne with the Auriel in her hands. It was cruel, in a way, that they had not warned Thedd of their intentions – but better to catch him by surprise lest he organise some defence.
Bel strode between Varta and Thedd, halting the man’s progress. Gerent Brahl also appeared, though next to the blue-haired man little attention was paid to him. There were murmurs of confusion, and people craned their necks to see.
‘My apologies, lord,’ said Bel, not sounding sorry at all. ‘Our orders from Arkus extend also to the Throneship.’
Thedd faltered, then drew himself up haughtily. ‘Whatever do you mean?’
‘He spoke, in his wisdom, of where certain pieces need to be in place to ensure the maximum chance of defeating the shadow. You have a part to play too, oh Trusted Naphur – to rally the troops of your home state of Tria.’
‘That should be easy enough,’ said Thedd. ‘Our soldiers are loyal and strong, and who are they to refuse the man who was once their Trusted, now their Throne?’
‘You misunderstand me,’ said Bel. ‘Arkus charges that the Throneship go to another.’
‘What?’ spat Thedd, for a moment all decorum gone. He struggled to suppress his temper. ‘With all due respect, Blade Bel, the Throneship is my birthright.’
‘These are trying times,’ put in Gerent Brahl stoically. ‘Sacrifices must be made. The world is changing, and we must change with it, lest we be defeated. It is sad indeed that the traditions of so many centuries must be abandoned.’
He sounded as if he really meant it, but Thedd was not finished. Some of his friends moved behind him, shooting dark glances around as if they thought themselves more formidable than they actually were.
‘In such trying times,’ said Thedd, appealing to the court in general, ‘we need unity. This is not the time to muddy the waters with desperate plays for power, whether or not they come from the blue-haired man. I mean no offence,’ he turned to Bel, ‘but you are young, and perhaps not well versed in the ways of politics.’
Bel’s amber–gold eyes flashed brilliantly in the blazing sun. ‘Do you dare defy Arkus?’ he asked menacingly. ‘Do you doubt his wisdom? If so then it is you, Thedd Naphur, who works against unity, by condoning the betrayal of our god!’
The court fell silent. Thedd opened his mouth but couldn’t seem to summon any words. He looked to his supporters, who glanced amongst themselves uncertainly. It was a perfect plan, really, thought Fahren. Thedd wasn’t left with a leg to stand on – he could hardly rebuff the blue-haired man, the High Mage, the Gerent of Borgordus and the Sun God they claimed to represent.
‘Well then,’ snarled Thedd, ‘who does Arkus say should be the Throne, if not the rightful heir? You, I suppose?’
‘No,’ said Bel, and Fahren stiffened. He did not look forward to what was coming. It was for the greater good, he told himself, and Arkus had seemed to give his blessing – or had that merely been light shining through a window?
‘The High Mage Fahren,’ said Bel, ‘is powerful and wise. We face terrible magic from my counterpart, and it makes sense that we have one who can match him. That is what Arkus has willed.’
‘But . . . but . . .’ Thedd rallied. ‘Fahren already has responsibility, as the Grand High Mage. He can still fight this counterpart of yours.’
Bel did not budge, but folded his muscular arms across his broad chest, emanating resolve. Looking at him now, Fahren reflected, it was easy to be awed. It was easy to believe.
‘It is,’ said Bel, sounding out each word clearly, ‘what Arkus has willed. And there is a simple enough way to prove so to the disbelieving, which you know well enough, Thedd Naphur – by placing the crown upon Fahren’s head.’
Fahren saw signs of relief in the court, for which he was thankful. No doubt many of the nobles thought that Bel would attempt to seize power and, despite the colour of his hair, he was still a young man they knew little about. Fahren, on the other hand, was a familiar authority, and they had taken plenty of orders from him over the years. There was an acceptance from them that Fahren could feel with his well-tuned empathic senses.
Thedd was forced to retreat with a glower that Fahren suspected would live on in his heart for a long time to come. Bel and Brahl stepped aside, gesturing at Fahren to approach Varta. Trying not to seem hesitant, he forced his feet to take him to her, and knelt. She nodded at him, then raised her voice to speak a prayer to Arkus, which he only heard with half an ear. Above him she held the Auriel, glinting, and he watched it descend with a sense of dread. Then she set it upon his head.
For the slightest moment it hung loosely – if it did not accept him, their lies would be exposed. Despite this, he would have been relieved had it fallen loose and static upon his brow – but instead, with faint nausea, he felt it tighten. The gold ‘rays’ of sun that protruded from it burrowed into his hair, adhering to the contours of his scalp, proving that Arkus accepted him as leader of the light and making it impossible for any to deny. Even him.
Cheers broke out as Fahren approached Borgordusmae, climbing the steps to the seat of power from which his old friend had presided for so long. Naphur would not object, surely – he’d had no love for his cousin and always kept him at arm’s length. Still, as Fahren eased himself onto the throne amidst the crescendo of cheers, his doubts did not abate. Nothing would ever change the fact that he had risen to power through a falsehood.
Small sacrifices, he told himself. For the greater good.
•
Fahren stalked up the stairwell of the Open Tower, two blades closely dogging his heels. Already he found it irksome being shadowed everywhere he went, and realised now why Naphur had always resented it. The gerent had even spoken of adding mages to his guards, citing the ease with which ‘the previous Throne’ had been assassinated by Losara. Ridiculous! Had Brahl forgotten what a powerful mage Fahren was in his own right?
He reached hi
s quarters and shut the door on the guards behind him. A petty gesture, he supposed, but he had never asked for them and was more capable than they would be at fending off an attack. As he glanced around his quarters, Fahren wondered when he would move to the Throne’s rooms in the Open Castle. He could stay here, maybe – as the Throne, he could pretty much do anything he liked. But since he was no longer High Mage, another would shortly be appointed to the role, and it was only fair that they reside in these traditional quarters. Varta was his first choice, although if he promoted her then High Overseer would simply become another role that needed filling. Already he felt resentful of the mantle of rule, felt his freedom disappearing and his responsibilities building.
No wonder Bel had avoided it.
For the moment he simply wanted to rest and collect his thoughts in familiar surrounds, before the feast that evening in celebration of his ascension. He entered his study on the way to the bedroom, and paused as an unexpected sight met his eyes.
A golden bird chirped softly and scratched at the tabletop, a tiny message tied to its leg.
‘Hello, my dear,’ said Fahren. ‘How long have you been waiting?’
The sundart chirped again and hopped towards him. Not one of his, he realised – probably it carried a message of congratulations from someone or other who had not been able to attend the ceremony. He reached out and the sundart allowed itself to be stroked as he unclasped the message from its leg. Uncurling the small roll of parchment, he discovered it was no mere obsequious nicety, nor did the sender even know that he was now Throne. Of course not, he chastised himself. No one had known what Bel, he and Brahl had planned, and there had been little time for news to spread. Woolly thinking in his old age. This was a message to the High Mage from one of his subordinates, and it made for interesting reading indeed.
Fahren went back to the door and opened it. ‘Fetch Bel Corinas,’ he ordered. One of his guards nodded and quickly departed.
Maybe they had their uses after all.
•
From the other side of the court, Jaya watched Bel. He had not extricated himself from the proceedings as swiftly as Fahren had, nor did he seem inclined to. Nobles were lining up to speak with him, keen to curry favour with the man of power – some more zealously than others. Meanwhile she was left alone, apparently forgotten, though she didn’t really mind. She had other things to occupy her – such as nimbly relieving a noble or two of their valuables. It was the perfect hunting ground, actually, for none of these colourful courtiers expected a common thief to be moving amongst them. She supposed she should try to restrain herself, but the risk, she estimated, was minuscule. Everyone was jostling to get closer to Bel so they didn’t notice her brushing by, agile fingers darting in and out of pockets, or quickly untying purse strings from belts. These idiots had so much money, they probably wouldn’t even notice that they’d been robbed.
Soon, Jaya realised she had secreted more booty about herself than was easy to hide, and with some regret she slipped a bundle of coins back into the coat of the man she had taken them from. Wondering what on earth life had come to, she moved nearer to the dais, to get a better view of her odd lover.
It had been a strange thing when he’d told her who he really was. He’d done it after he’d come to fetch her from Kadass jail, where she’d been imprisoned for vandalising the property of the fat noble Assicon Cydus. Throne Naphur had promised Bel that the charges against Jaya would be dismissed, and even in the uproarious aftermath of Baygis’s murder, Bel had gone to the jail to make sure the promise was kept. In truth, the Throne probably had not cared one way or the other by that stage.
The two of them had gone immediately to The Wayward Dog where, in the afterglow of lovemaking, he had told her that he was the blue-haired man. Surprisingly, she’d believed him. The closeness of their connection made it hard to doubt him, for she felt she would easily spot any lie, and the story he told was too wild not to be true. There had been the possibility, of course, that Bel believed what he was telling her simply because he was insane, but then he had taken her to Fahren, who had confirmed the tale. And if any doubt had lingered, visiting the mage Tomeo the previous morning had certainly erased it.
Believing it, however, did not mean she wasn’t also dumbfounded by the news. What were the chances that she would end up sharing the bed of the blue-haired man? For Arkus’s sake, she hadn’t even known there was a blue-haired man in Kainordas. Well, she had thought, what are the chances of anything, really? What are the chances that a particular bird would be singing in a tree at a particular moment on a particular day? Yet if I saw a bird singing in a tree, I would not disbelieve it.
‘What are you smiling about?’ Bel sounded amused. She hadn’t noticed him approach, but now that he was by her side the rest of the court was staring at her – no doubt wondering who she was. She ignored the attention – it too was something she was going to have to get used to, she supposed.
‘Oh nothing, little bird,’ she replied. ‘Nothing that need concern you, anyway. What has torn you away from your sandal-licking new friends?’
Bel grinned. ‘I am sent for by the Throne.’
‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Well, you had better be on your way.’
She realised he was giving her a funny look.
‘What?’
‘Are you coming?’
‘Oh,’ she said, suddenly very happy. ‘Yes, of course.’
As they made their way down the many stairs to the bottom of the Open Castle, Jaya’s happiness at being included suddenly galled her.
‘So,’ she said, half to herself, ‘this is how it will be? I’ll follow you around dutifully?’
‘What?’ He turned, surprised.
‘Well, I seem to have become attached, somehow, to this great fate of yours. Not really the future I had planned out for myself.’
‘I didn’t think you had a future planned out for yourself.’
‘That was the plan,’ she muttered.
Bel frowned. ‘What’s brought this up all of a sudden?’
‘Not sure.’ She shrugged. ‘Maybe seeing you up there, in the court . . . it made it all very real.’
‘It is real, Jaya,’ he sighed. ‘Look, I don’t want you to feel trapped by this. By . . . me.’
Jaya fell silent. She had always prided herself on the fact that she depended on nobody, that she could come and go as she pleased . . . but now that her soul had up and decided Bel was the one for her, there was nothing she could do about it. She could always leave him, she supposed – but how the blazes could she ever follow through with such a thing? The idea of being without him was maddeningly unthinkable.
‘Damn man,’ she said. ‘If you were anyone else, I’d lock you in a cupboard and tell you only to come out when I want you.’
He smiled, but she could tell her words troubled him.
‘I’m only doing what I need to do,’ he said. ‘I was never given much choice in the matter.’
‘I know, I know. It’s just . . . well, in my wildest nightmares I never saw myself as the supportive woman behind a man.’
‘Supportive woman?’ chuckled Bel. ‘Is that what you are?’
‘A year ago such devotion would have made me retch.’
‘Well, if it does, I’ll be there to hold back your hair,’ said Bel. ‘Jaya . . . the support I need is hardly to have someone staying home baking bread and squeezing out my pups. We’re talking about taking on the world.’
‘Well,’ she said, ‘when you put it like that . . .’
‘Besides,’ said Bel, ‘I don’t think of you as the woman behind me. You’re at my side. And I’m at yours.’
His words were somewhat comforting, although she bit her tongue on pointing out that, even if they were at each other’s side, they were still facing a direction dictated by him. He did not seem to realise how much his decisions affected her. Still, even though she did not enjoy admitting it herself, she loved him more deeply than she had ever loved anything, and so
with him she would stand.
‘So,’ she said, ‘we’re in this together, it seems.’
‘Aye,’ he said, and reached over to squeeze her hand.
•
As Bel walked out of the Open Castle, despite the warmth of Jaya’s hand in his, a certain short-lived peace left him. It had been good having something to concentrate on, and installing Fahren as Throne instead of that worm Thedd had been a positive step in the general direction of his enormous goal. However it had been a distraction at best, and now that it was done with, he was back to wondering what he was supposed to do next. He had his mission from Arkus, but still no idea how to go about achieving it. Even if he did manage to find the Stone, that was only one step, beyond which he could not see the next. It all seemed so insurmountable, yet he was impatient to get started. Couldn’t Arkus have given him some clues as to how? Or was it possible that a god could not know everything?
They arrived at the entrance to the Open Tower.
‘You’ve never been in here before, I imagine?’ said Bel.
Jaya gazed up at the towering pinnacle. ‘Not that I recall.’
At the top they were let into Fahren’s quarters by a guard. Inside, they found the old mage sitting at his round table, using a fine quill to write on a tiny piece of parchment, while a sundart pecked happily at a bowl of seed.
‘Ah,’ Fahren said, and his gaze came to rest on Jaya. Bel wondered if he would have to insist that Fahren could speak openly in front of her. It wasn’t as if she wouldn’t find out everything anyway. Apparently Fahren came to the same conclusion, for he gestured at two seats opposite him. ‘Please, sit. Both of you.’
He rolled up the parchment and attached it to the bird’s leg. ‘No rush, my friend,’ he said, stroking the creature lightly. ‘You finish your meal.’ The bird chirped, head down in the seed. ‘Yes, yes,’ said Fahren. ‘I know you’d no intention of doing otherwise.’ He picked at his teeth, as if there was something caught there, then shook his head. ‘Funny thing,’ he said. ‘When you open an empathic connection with animals, you feel some of what they feel. For a moment, I thought I had a seed stuck in my teeth.’