The Darkness That Comes Before

by R. Scott Bakker

  He turned to Skeaös. “Someone brought you a message, old friend. Was it news of Conphas?” A mad question, but strangely trivial when asked in the absence of breath.

  When the Counsel hesitated, the tremors returned.

  Please . . . Sejenus, please.

  “No, God-of-Men.”

  Dizzying relief. Xerius almost staggered.

  “Well, then? What was it?”

  “The Fanim have sent an emissary in reply to your request to parlay.”

  “Good . . . good!”

  “But not just any emissary, God-of-Men.” Skeaös licked his thin, old-man lips. “A Cishaurim. The Fanim have sent a Cishaurim.”

  The sun went down, and so it seemed, all hope with it.

  Like tattered cloth in the wind, the braziers fluttered in the small courtyard Gaenkelti had selected for the meeting. Surrounded by dwarf cherry trees and weeping hollies, Xerius squeezed his Chorae tight, until it felt his knuckles would burst. He probed the gloom of the adjoining porticoes, unconsciously counting his shadowy men. He turned to the lean sorcerer on his right: Cememketri, the Grandmaster of his Imperial Saik.

  “Do you have enough?”

  “More than enough,” Cememketri replied, his voice indignant.

  “Heed your tone, Grandmaster,” Skeaös snapped from Xerius’s left. “Our Emperor has asked you a question.”

  Cememketri bowed his head stiffly, as though against his will. Twin fires reflected in his large wet eyes. “There are three of us here, God-of-Men, and twelve crossbowmen, all bearing Chorae.”

  Xerius winced. “Three? Only you and two others remain?”

  “It could not be helped, God-of-Men.”

  “Of course.” Xerius thought of the Chorae in his right hand. He could humble the pompous mage with a touch, but then that would leave only two. How he despised sorcerers! Almost as much as he despised needing them.

  “They come,” Skeaös whispered. Xerius clenched his Chorae so tight the script engraved across it felt a brand in his palm.

  Two Eothic Guardsmen entered the courtyard, bearing lamps rather than arms. They took positions on either side of the bronze doors, and Gaenkelti, still dressed in his ceremonial armour, filed between them, accompanied by a cowled figure draped in black-linen robes. The Captain led the emissary to the designated spot, where the spheres of light cast by the four braziers overlapped. Despite the illumination, Xerius could see only portions of the man’s lips and left cheek beneath the cowl.

  Cishaurim. For the Nansur the only name more hateful was Scylvendi. Nansur children—even the children of Emperors—were weaned on tales of the heathen sorcerer-priests, of their venereal rites and their unfathomable powers. To simply speak the name was to strike terror in the Nansur breast.

  Xerius struggled to breathe. Why send a Cishaurim? To kill me?

  The emissary drew back his cowl, pulling it wide over his shoulders. Then he lowered his arms so that the robe fell to the ground, revealing the long saffron cassock he wore beneath. His bald scalp was pale, shockingly so, and his face was dominated by the black sockets beneath his brow. Eyeless faces always unnerved Xerius, always reminded him of the dead skull beneath every man’s expression, but the knowledge that this man could nevertheless see awakened a pang at the back of this throat, one that could not be silenced by swallowing. Just as his childhood tutors had claimed, a serpent coiled about the Cishaurim’s neck—a Shigeki salt asp, black and shining as though oiled, its flickering tongue and surrogate eyes suspended next to the man’s right ear. The sightless pits remained fixed upon Xerius, but the asp’s head bobbed and turned, slowly scrutinizing the breadth of the courtyard, methodically tasting the air.

  “Do you see it, Cememketri?” Xerius hissed under his breath. “Do you see the mark of sorcery?”

  “None,” the sorcerer said, his voice tight with the fear of being overheard.

  The snake’s eyes lingered for a moment on the dark porticoes that flanked the courtyard, as though assessing the threat posed by the shadows within. Then, like a tiller swinging on a greased hinge, it turned to Xerius.

  “I am Mallahet,” the Cishaurim said in flawless Sheyic, “adopted son of Kisma, of the tribe Indara-Kishauri.”

  “You’re Mallahet?” Cememketri exclaimed. Another indiscretion: Xerius had not given him leave to speak.

  “And you are Cememketri.” The eyeless face bowed, but the snake’s head remained rigid. “Honour, to an old foe.”

  Xerius sensed the Grandmaster stiffen next to him. “Emperor,” the sorcerer murmured, “you must leave at once. If this is truly Mallahet, then you’re in grave danger. We all are!”

  Mallahet . . . He had heard that name before, in one of Skeaös’s briefings. The one whose arms were scarred like a Scylvendi.

  “So three are not enough,” Xerius replied, inexplicably heartened by his Grandmaster’s fear.

  “Mallahet is second only to Seokti in the Cishaurim. And only then because their Prophetic Law bars non-Kianene from the position of Heresiarch. Even the Cishaurim are fearful of his power!”

  “What the Grandmaster says is true, God-of-Men,” Skeaös added in low tones. “You must leave at once. Let me negotiate in your stead . . .”

  But Xerius ignored them. How could they be so hare-hearted when the Gods themselves had secured these proceedings? “Well met, Mallahet,” he said, surprised by the steadiness of his voice.

  After a brief pause, Gaenkelti barked: “You stand in the presence of Ikurei Xerius III, the Emperor of Nansur. You will kneel, Mallahet.”

  The Cishaurim wagged a finger, and the asp swayed with it as though in mockery. “Fanim kneel only before the One, before the God-that-is-Solitary.”

  Out of reflex or simple ignorance, Gaenkelti raised a fist to strike the man. Xerius stilled him with an outstretched palm.

  “We shall rescind Protocol for this occasion, Captain,” he said. “The heathens shall kneel before me soon enough.” He cupped the fist holding the Chorae in his other hand, driven by an obscure impulse to conceal it from the serpent’s eyes. “You’ve come to parlay?” he asked the Cishaurim.

  “No.”

  Cememketri muttered a soldier’s curse.

  “Then why have you come?” Xerius asked.

  “I have come, Emperor, so you might parlay with another.”

  Xerius blinked. “Who?”

  For a moment, it seemed the Nail of Heaven flashed from the Cishaurim’s brow. There was a shout from the blackness of the porticoes, and Xerius raised his hands before him.

  Cememketri intoned something incomprehensible, dizzyingly so. A globe, composed only of ghostly trails of blue fire, leapt about them.

  But nothing had happened. The Cishaurim stood, as motionless as before. The asp’s eyes glowed like amber coals in the firelight.

  Then Skeaös gasped, “His face!”

  Superimposed like a transparent mask over Mallahet’s skull-like visage was the face of another, a grizzled Kianene warrior who still bore the desert’s mark on his hawkish features. Appraising eyes peered from the Cishaurim’s empty sockets, and a phantom goatee hung from his chin, braided in the manner of a Kianene Grandee.

  “Skauras,” Xerius said. He had never seen the man before, but somehow he knew he looked upon the Sapatishah-Governor of Shigek, the heathen scoundrel whom the Southern Columns had fenced with for more than four decades.

  The ghostly lips moved, but all Xerius heard was a far-off voice speaking in the lolling rhythms of Kiani. Then the real lips moved beneath, saying, “Excellent guess, Ikurei. You, I know by your coins.”

  “So what is this? The Padirajah sends one of his Sapatishah dogs to confer with me?”

  Again the alarming lag of lips and voices. “You’re not worthy of the Padirajah, Ikurei. I alone could break your Empire over my knee. Be thankful the Padirajah is a pious man, and abides by his treaties.”

  “All our treaties are moot, Skauras, now that Maithanet is Shriah.”

  “Even more reason
for the Padirajah to spurn you. You too have become moot.”

  Skeaös leaned and whispered in his ear. “Ask him why the theatrics if you’ve become irrelevant. The heathen are afraid, God-of-Men. That’s the only reason they come to you thus.”

  Xerius smiled, convinced his old Counsel had merely confirmed what he already knew. “If I’ve become moot, then why these extraordinary measures, hmm? Why make your better your messenger?”

  “Because of the Holy War that you and your idolatrous brethren would wage against us. Why else?”

  “And because you know the Holy War is my instrument.”

  The wraithlike expression smiled, and Xerius heard distant laughter. “You would wrest the Holy War from Maithanet, would you? Make it the great lever you’d use to undo centuries of defeat? We know of your petty schemes to bind the idolaters to your Indenture. And we know of the army you’ve sent against the Scylvendi. The ploys of a fool—all of them.”

  “Conphas has promised to pike a road of Scylvendi heads from the Steppe to my feet.”

  “Conphas is doomed. No one possesses cunning or might enough to overcome the Scylvendi. Not even your nephew. Your army and your heir are dead, Emperor. Carrion. If so many Inrithi did not muster on your shores, I would ride to you even now and bid you drink of my sword.”

  Xerius clutched his Chorae tighter to silence the tremors. An image of Conphas bleeding at the feet of some wild Scylvendi reaver flashed before his soul’s eye, and he relished it, despite the horror of its implications. Then Mother would have only me . . .

  Again Skeaös’s voice in his ear. “He lies to frighten you. We heard from Conphas just this morn, and nothing was amiss. Remember, God-of-Men, the Scylvendi crushed the Kianene not eight years past. Skauras lost three sons in that expedition, including Hasjinnet, his eldest. Goad him, Xerius. Goad him! Angry men make mistakes.”

  But of course, he’d already considered this.

  “You flatter yourself, Skauras, if you think Conphas is as foolish as Hasjinnet.”

  Ethereal eyes blinked over empty sockets. “The Battle of Zirkirta was a great woe for us, yes. But a woe you will share very shortly. You attempt to injure me, Ikurei, but you merely prophesy your own destruction.”

  “The Nansurium,” Xerius said, “has endured far greater losses and survived.”

  But Conphas can’t lose! The omens!

  “Well enough, Ikurei. I’ll grant you that trifle. The Solitary God knows you Nansur are a stubborn people. I’ll even grant that Conphas may prosper where my own son faltered. I’ll not underestimate that snake charmer. He was my hostage for four years, remember? But none of this makes Maithanet’s Holy War your instrument. You hold no hammer above us.”

  “But I do, Skauras. The Men of the Tusk know nothing of your people—even less than Maithanet. Once they understand they war not only against you but against your Cishaurim, the leaders of the Holy War will sign my Indenture. The Holy War requires a School, and that School happens to be mine.”

  The disembodied lips grinned over the dour line of Mallahet’s mouth.

  Again, the uncanny, far-away voice. “Hesha? Ejoru Saika? Matanati jeskuti kah—”

  “What? The Imperial Saik? You think your Shriah would cede you the Holy War for the Imperial Saik? Maithanet has plucked your eyes from the Thousand Temples, hasn’t he? Do you see, Ikurei? Do you finally see how quick the sands run beneath your feet?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Even we know more of your accursed Shriah’s plans than you.”

  Xerius glanced at Skeaös’s face, saw concern rather than calculation furrow his crinkled features. What was happening?

  Skeaös . . . Tell me what to say! What does he mean?

  “Speechless, Ikurei?” Mallahet’s surrogate voice sneered. “Well, choke on this: Maithanet has sealed a pact with the Scarlet Spires. Even now, the Scarlet Magi prepare to join the Holy War. Maithanet already possesses his School, one that dwarfs your Imperial Saik in both numbers and power. As I said, you are moot.”

  “Impossible!” Skeaös spat.

  Xerius whirled to face the old Counsel, stunned by his audacity.

  “What’s this now, Ikurei? You let your dogs howl at your table?”

  Xerius knew he should be outraged, but such an outburst from Skeaös was . . . unprecedented.

  “But he lies, God-of-Men!” Skeaös cried. “This is a heathen trick, meant to extort concessions—”

  “Why would they lie?” Cememketri snapped, obviously eager to humiliate an old court foe. “Don’t you think the heathen want us to possess the Holy War? Or do you think they’d rather treat with Maithanet?”

  Had they forgotten the presence of their Emperor? They spoke as though he were a fiction whose usefulness had come to an end. They think me irrelevant?

  “No,” Skeaös retorted. “They know the Holy War’s ours, but would have us think it’s not!”

  A cold fury uncoiled within Xerius. There would be much screaming tonight.

  Either the two men remembered themselves or they sensed something of Xerius’s humour, because they abruptly fell silent. Two years past, a Zeumi had entertained Xerius’s court with trained tigers. Afterward, Xerius had asked him how he could command such fierce beasts with looks alone. “Because,” the towering black-skinned man had said, “they see their future in my eyes.”

  “You must forgive my zealous servants,” Xerius said to the wraith inhabiting the Cishaurim’s face. “You can be assured that I will not.”

  Skauras’s visage flickered then reappeared, as though nodding in and out of some unseen shaft of light. How the old wolf must be laughing. Xerius could almost see him regaling the Padirajah with descriptions of the disarray in the Imperial Court.

  “I shall mourn them, then,” the Sapatishah said.

  “Save your dirges for your own folk, heathen. Regardless of who possesses the Holy War, you are doomed.” The Fanim were doomed. Outrageous insolence aside, what Cememketri had said moments earlier was true. The Padirajah wanted him to possess the Holy War. One could not bargain with fanatics.

  “Ah, strong words! At last I speak to an emperor of the Nansur. Tell me, then, Ikurei Xerius III, now that you understand we both bargain from a position of weakness, what do you propose?”

  Xerius paused, possessed by a calculating cold. He had always been at his canny best when wroth. Alternatives tumbled through his soul, most of them foundering on the sharp fact of Maithanet and his demonic cunning. He thought of Calmemunis and his hatred of his cousin, Nersei Proyas, heir to the throne of Conriya . . .

  And then he understood.

  “To the Men of the Tusk you and your people are little more than sacrificial victims, Sapatishah. They speak and act as though their triumph is already inked in scripture. Perhaps the time will come when they respect you as we do.”

  “Shrai laksara kah.”

  “You mean fear.”

  Everything now hinged on his nephew, far to the north. More than ever. The omens . . .

  “As I said—respect.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE JIÜNATI STEPPE

  It is said: a man is born of his mother and is fed of his mother. Then he is fed of the land, and the land passes through him, taking and giving a pinch of dust each time, until man is no longer of his mother, but of the land.

  —SCYLVENDI PROVERB

  . . . and in Old Sheyic, the language of the ruling and religious castes of the Nansurium, skilvenas means “catastrophe” or “apocalypse,” as though the Scylvendi have somehow transcended the role of peoples in history and become a principle.

  —DRUSAS ACHAMIAN, COMPENDIUM OF THE FIRST HOLY WAR

  Early Summer, 4110 Year-of-the-Tusk, the Jiünati Steppe

  Cnaiür urs Skiötha found the King-of-Tribes and the others crowded across a ridge that afforded them a panoramic view of the Hethanta Mountains and the Nansur army encamped below. Pulling his grey to a stop, he studied them from a distance, his heart hammering as though
his blood had grown overthick. For a moment he felt like a boy excluded by his elder siblings and their snide friends. He half-expected to hear taunts sailing on the wind.

  Why would they disgrace me like this?

  But he was not a child. He was the many-blooded chieftain of the Utemot, a seasoned Scylvendi warrior of more than forty-five summers. He owned eight wives, twenty-three slaves, and more than three hundred cattle. He had fathered thirty-seven sons, nineteen of the pure blood. His arms were ribbed with the swazond, ritual trophy scars, of more than two hundred dead foes. He was Cnaiür, breaker-of-horses-and-men.

  I could kill any of them—pound them to bloody ruin!—and yet they affront me like this? What have I done?

  But like any murderer, he knew the answer. The outrage lay not in the fact of his dishonour but in their presumption to know.

  Flaring between snow-capped peaks, the sun bathed the assembled chieftains in pale morning gold. They looked like warriors from different nations and ages, despite the spiked Kianene battlecaps worn by the veterans of the Battle of Zirkirta. Some sported antique scale corselets, others mail hauberks and cuirasses of varying manufacture—the spoils of long-dead Inrithi princes and nobles. Only their scarred arms, stone faces, and long black hair marked them as the People—as Scylvendi.

  Xunnurit, their King-of-Tribes by election, sat in their midst, his left arm braced imperiously on his thigh, his right raised to the distance. As though at his direction, the rider next to him raised the indented crescent of his bow. Cnaiür glimpsed a birch arrow sailing across the sky, saw it vanish in the grasses partway to the river. They measured distances, he realized, which could only mean they planned their assault.

  Without me. Could they have simply forgotten?

  Cursing, Cnaiür urged his mount toward them. He kept his face turned to the east, sparing himself the indignity of their smirking looks. The River Kiyuth wound across the valley floor, black save where frosted by shallow rapids. Even from this distance, he could see the Nansur army teeming along its banks, chopping down the remaining poplars, dragging them away with teams of horses. Fortified by earthworks and a palisade, the imperial encampment lay a mile or so beyond, a great oblong of innumerable tents and wains beneath the mountain the memorialists called Sakthuta, the “Two Bulls.”