Archeth hesitated. ‘I think the Helmsmen are afraid, my lord.’
‘Afraid.’ Jhiral coughed up a short, uncertain laugh. He shifted in the chair and straightened his robe. ‘Come on. They don’t understand things like fear. You told me yourself, they aren’t anything like human. Anyway, suddenly you’re talking in plural here? How many Helmsmen have you actually spoken to?’
‘Two, my lord. Angfal, who is installed in the study in my home, and Kalaman in the fireship Towards the Candle of Vigil Maintained at the Kiriath Museum. Their attitudes are somewhat different - Kalaman is more pragmatic, less inclined to drama - but their basic responses are the same. Both give extensive warnings about what the dwenda are capable of, both are of the opinion that if these creatures are returning to this world, then the results will be catastrophic.’
‘Hmm.’ Jhiral stroked at his chin. He seemed to have been doing some thinking of his own since the night before. ‘Catastrophic for whom, though? The way you’ve explained it, this is a northern thing, this dwenda mythology. Is it possible these creatures might confine their depredations to that part of the world?’
‘They came to Khangset, my lord.’
‘Yes, in response to either the prayers and idolatry of a northerner or the presence of a type of stone found only in the north.’
‘Found mostly in the north, my lord.’ Holding down a tremor of alarm, because she could see where this was going. ‘Glirsht deposits are to be found in various parts of the Empire as well.’
Jhiral gave her a shrewd look. ‘But you don’t really believe it’s the glirsht itself, do you, Archeth? If the dwenda use this stuff as a beaconing device, it would need to be shaped in some way, crafted to its purpose. The way our little friend from Khangset crafted her idol.’
‘I don’t believe th—’
‘Don’t interrupt your Emperor when he’s thinking aloud, Archeth. It’s rude.’
She swallowed. ‘My apologies.’
‘Oh, accepted. Accepted.’ A languid gesture. ‘Now look; our trade ships don’t just steer down the coast by any old fire they happen to see on a cliff-top, any piece of brightly coloured junk floating in the water that they might pass. They look for lighthouses and marker buoys. The dwenda are going to be the same - they’re going to be looking for a specific form of this rock, something shaped. Something prepared by their acolytes, by those who worship them.’
Got to nip this in the bud, Archidi. He’ll do it, this little shit trying to fill his father’s boots, he’ll sign an order to get it done without a second thought, and you’ll watch the refugee columns form from horizon to horizon all over again ...
‘The dwenda have been gone for several thousand years, my lord.’ Voice as smooth as lack of sleep and krinzanz would let it get. ‘I think it’s safe to say that any acolytes they may once have had among humans are now dead. And this woman Elith certainly did not herself craft the idol she owns. She refers to it as an heirloom of her clan, and it certainly has the look of something many centuries old.’
‘But perhaps, Archeth,’ the Emperor said softly, ‘Elith herself is many centuries old, as well. Did you think of that? Perhaps she’s been kept alive by the sorceries of her dwenda masters, gifted with eternal youth in return for her services. Perhaps she is a witch. Or even, a creature crafted from stone and given sorcerous life.’
Archeth sat as if poised on the edge of the An-Monal crater. Lives spun past in her head, held in a balance whose mechanism she had only the slightest of influence over. She saw Elith, screaming her lungs out on the rack or pincered apart, opened and probed with red-hot steel. Thousands like her, driven from their homes, no food or water beyond what they could carry, starving on the roads, brutalised and extorted of what little they still owned by the soldiery supposed to watch over them.
She was accustomed to reading Jhiral’s face, but could make nothing of the bland expression he wore now.
‘Do you believe that, my lord?’ she asked with knife-edge caution. ‘That this woman is a ... a witch? Or some kind of golem even?’
The Emperor studied his hands, gazed critically at his manicure for a few moments before he would meet Archeth’s eyes. He sighed.
‘Oh, I suppose not. Not really, no.’
‘Then—’
A sudden, jabbing finger. ‘But - and I told you before about interrupting me, God fuck it, Archeth - what I am beginning to think is that maybe my father’s policy of resettlement after the war was a mistake. It wouldn’t be the first mistake he made, would it? You remember that godawful mess in Vanbyr. So, the way I see it, we’ve got tens of thousands of these people living among us, refusing to convert, most of them, turning their backs on the civilised benefits the Empire offers, going on with their idolatry and who knows what else besides. I don’t want to start sounding like that little twat Menkarak, but if permitting the kind of religious freedom we do is going to bring down some millennia-old curse on us all, well, then maybe we need to re-think our values. And maybe we don’t want these people inside our borders after all.’
She sat and waited.
‘Well ?’ he snapped.
‘Do I have Your Majesty’s permission to speak?’
‘Oh, mother of the fucking Revelation, Archeth, don’t sulk! Yes, speak. Speak. It’s what I pay you for, isn’t it?’
She marshalled her words with care. She’d come to the palace with the avowed intention of scaring the shit out of Jhiral. Now she wasn’t so sure it was a good idea.
‘My lord, according to the Helmsmen, the dwenda were a race with mastery of worlds that lie parallel to our own, worlds that in some way seem to occupy almost the same space as ours, that are no further away than your bedchamber is from where we sit now. I can’t say I understand how this is supposed to work, but it does correspond to some of the common Aldrain legends in the north, which claim that certain places are inhabited by otherworldly creatures in a way that is hidden from human eyes. An isolated mountain crag becomes a fairytale castle at certain hours of the night, or in the midst of a powerful lightning storm; you can knock on a forest oak and it will be opened to you like a gate, but only on certain nights of the year; and so forth. I find in these stories an echo of the Kiriath tales of voyaging here from another world, which is why I am inclined to take them seriously, but there is one major difference. My people were forced to seek out the deepest, hottest, most pressurised places in the bowels of the Earth before they could find a way to pass between worlds.’ She paused, measured her tone again before she plunged on. ‘The dwenda, it seems, can effect this passage anywhere they choose. They can enter this world at will, at any given point.’
Her words seemed to evaporate into the quiet. Small, domestic sounds seeped in from elsewhere in the palace. Banging of doors, voices giving instructions. Behind the wall, water gurgled in pipes. The Emperor looked at his hands again.
‘You’re saying this isn’t just a northern problem, then,’ he muttered.
‘I’m saying, my lord, that until we have a clear idea of what the dwenda want, geography as we understand it is largely meaningless. These creatures could show up anywhere from the Demlarashan wastes to the palace gardens right here in Yhelteth. We simply do not know.’
Jhiral grunted. ‘And this stone idol? You seemed pretty fucking convinced last night that it was the key to the incursion. Changed your mind all of a sudden?’
‘No, my lord. I still believe it is important. But it’s the first of its kind that I’ve ever seen.’ Though both Angfal and Kalaman recognised it from my description and nearly shit rivets when they did. But you don’t need to know that right now, my lord. ‘Elith brought it with her when she was re-settled, but she was already at that point a deeply disturbed woman. It is heavy, bulky and far from attractive in aspect. I think it’s safe to say such things are not a common possession of Naomic peoples, either here or in the north. A few might exist, here or there, but—’
‘We could always institute a search. House to house, immigrant
districts throughout the Empire.’
Hoiran’s fucking balls. ‘We could do that, my lord, but I am not convinced that it would be an efficient use of manpower. In fact, I have an equally direct but somewhat smaller-scale plan of action which perhaps my lord would—’
‘Yes, all right.’ Jhiral gestured wearily. ‘Don’t sugar-coat it to death. I already guessed you wouldn’t have come all the way up here at this time of day unless you wanted something. Come on then, let’s hear your bright idea.’
It felt like stepping off a bobbing coracle and on to a slippery but solid jetty. Archeth tried not to let her relief show. Carefully, then, very carefully:
‘The woman Elith and the idol she brought with her are originally from Ennishmin, more precisely from the eastern fringes of that province. ’
The imperial lip curled. ‘Yes, that’s a godforsaken corner of the world. You’d think she’d have been glad to get south to some decent weather.’
‘Uhm - yes, my lord.’
‘That was a joke, Archeth.’
‘Yes, my lord.’ She patched together a smile. ‘Ennishmin is not blessed with ideal weather.’
The look in Jhiral’s eyes hardened. ‘Don’t fucking humour me, woman. You really think I’d have put up with your drug-soaked insubordination and superior airs this long if I didn’t value you for something other than sycophancy? Revelation knows, I get enough of that from the rest of the court. You, Archeth, I trust to tell me the truth, even if it upsets me. So get on with it. Upset me, if that’s what you’re planning to do. What about Ennishmin?’
‘Yes, my lord.’ The krin was building a shrill desire to scream in his face. She held it down, barely. ‘When I mentioned the origins of the idol to the Helmsmen, both of them independently concluded that the Khangset incursion was probably a navigation error on the part of the dwenda. That they had intended to arrive in the east of Ennishmin and the relocation of the idol threw them off. Imagine trying to follow a map that’s thousands of years old. It would be easy enough to make mistakes.’
‘So these creatures are not perfect, then. Not angelic essences condensed to flesh, the way the Revelation promises. I suppose that’s some relief.’
‘They are very far from perfect, my lord. What the Helmsmen told me suggests a wildly impulsive nature, barely governed by the wisdom they must have accumulated over a million or more years of unchanging existence. And—’ She hesitated, because even remembering this next piece of the puzzle still sent a chill scrabbling up her spine. ‘According to Angfal, they may not even be sane, not as we would understand the concept.’
Jhiral frowned. I’ve heard that said about outlanders and enemies before, and I don’t generally trust it. Just too bloody convenient, it’s the quick and easy way to deal with difference. Oh, they’re not like us, they’re insane. It saves you having to think too much. They said the Majak were insane when we first ran into them, said they were semi-human beasts that howled and ate human flesh, and it turned out they were just a lot tougher than us on the battlefield. Come on, Archeth, I’ve heard it said on occasion that your people were insane by human standards.’
‘Yes, my lord. Which is precisely Angfal’s point. The mental ... changes ... that the Kiriath went through on their voyage here appear to have been the result of a single passage through the spaces between worlds, a single exposure. The dwenda, it seems, live in these spaces, inhabit them as a matter of course. I don’t like to think what that must have done to their sanity. I’m quite certain a human could not survive it undamaged.’
Jhiral sat and thought about it for a while. He rested his arm on the chair, put his chin on a loosely curled fist and stared at Archeth as if hoping she’d go away. He sighed.
‘So you’re telling me - you seriously believe this, Archeth - that these immensely powerful, possibly insane beings have some special interest in Ennishmin.’ The coughed-up laugh again, the throwaway gesture. ‘Well, I mean, they’d have to be insane, wouldn’t they? A shit-hole northern province that grows turnips or hunts swamp snakes for a living, and barely makes its tax bill each year. What possible use is it going to be to them?’
‘The Helmsmen have an explanation of sorts, my lord. It seems what is now eastern Ennishmin was once the site of a decisive battle against the dwenda. The swamps at the eastern end of the province are apparently not wholly natural. According to Angfal, they were originally created by some cataclysmic weapon the Kiriath deployed there. I wonder if that weapon didn’t have some effect on the barriers between worlds, perhaps making them easier to breach than elsewhere. Stories of hauntings and apparitions apparently persist in the local culture, and there’s some kind of trade in so-called Aldrain artefacts, things retrieved from the swamps that are reckoned to have magical powers.’
Jhiral snorted. Archeth nodded a measured dose of agreement.
‘Yes, it’s improbable, I agree. In fact, these artefacts are probably mostly bits and pieces left behind by the Kiriath armies in the past. But there may be an element of truth to the tales as well. In the markets and specialist shops in Trelayne, where Aldrain lore is an affectation among the rich, I quite often saw objects that didn’t appear to be of human manufacture, but were not reminiscent of anything my people might build either.’
‘You’re saying the dwenda have come back to the site of an old defeat. What for? Revenge?’ Jhiral shook his head. He even smiled, but she thought there was an edge of bitterness on it. ‘Well, they’ve come a little late for that. Perhaps someone should go up there and tell them they just missed their ancient enemies on the way out the door at An-Monal. Maybe then they’ll leave us alone.’
‘Or maybe not, my lord. The war against the dwenda was apparently an alliance of Kiriath and human, in much the same way as the war against the Scaled Folk. If your enemy has fled but his dogs remain guarding the hearth, what will you do with those dogs?’
Jhiral nodded. It was logic he understood.
‘So you want to go to Ennishmin. Is that it?’
‘I think leading an expeditionary force there might be advisable. A thousand men, say, with engineering support, could—’
‘A thousand men?’ Jhiral seemed genuinely aghast. ‘Where exactly do you think I’m going to snap my fingers and get a thousand men from? This isn’t wartime, you know.’
‘No, my lord. Not yet, it isn’t.’
‘Oh, that’s a ridiculous thing to say.’ The Emperor surged to his feet, stormed to the window and stood staring out. Came back. ‘And - look - even if it’s not, Archeth, even if this is the prelude to some kind of conflict - the attack came from Khangset, from the west and from the ocean. You’re asking me to commit a major force twelve hundred miles away on a completely different frontier, all staked on not much more than some mumblings from senile machinery and a theory you haven’t slept on yet.’
‘My lord, I realise—’
‘Well, I don’t think you do, Archeth.’ His voice trod hers down. ‘I don’t think you’ve noticed, in the depths of your drugged-up self-pity and obsession, that we’re trying to run an Empire here. Currently, we’ve got the Trelayne League stamping their collective feet and making angry diplomatic noises about trade restriction again - those motherfuckers certainly forgot pretty fucking fast who kept them afloat during the war - and by all accounts they’re building a new navy into the bargain. We’ve got an upsurge in piracy along the southern coast, some kind of horseshit religious schism going on at Demlarashan that’ll probably need riot control before the end of the year. And on top of that I have provincial governors marching into my throne room every fucking month like clockwork to whinge at me about supply lines and banditry and public health crises, but not one single one of them ever wants to come up with the taxes we’d need to solve those problems. The long and the short of it is, Archeth, I can’t fucking give you your thousand men, because I don’t fucking have them to spare.’
And that was that.
Archeth collected her horse and wended her way back down int
o the city, muttering to herself and grinding her teeth; clear indications - as if I fucking needed them - that she’d overdone the krinzanz. The strengthening mid-morning sun stung her eyes, layered her shoulders with the promised heat of the day to come. Worst of all was the knowledge within her that Jhiral had a point. The Empire didn’t have a lot of excess military capacity. The war dead numbered in the tens of thousands, and the devastation wrought by the Scaled Folk was massive. Across the whole imperial domain, the population was only just starting to get back on its breeding feet. Most farms and manufacturies were still desperately short of labour. The levies had been cut back as soon as a workable peace and a stable frontier could be hammered out with Trelayne, not because the Empire was weary of war, but because Akal’s economic advisers had bluntly told him that if he didn’t slacken the demand for soldiers soon, his harvests would rot in the fields and his subjects would starve. It was that as much as anything else that brought imperial ambitions in the north-west to an abrupt, conciliatory halt.
The Steel Remains (Gollancz) Page 34