Seven Kings

by John R. Fultz

  He had no doubt of their religion now. They must worship this night-dark sea and the demons that haunted its depths. To either side of him along the rocky strand worshippers dropped to their knees, sniffing at the glimmering wavelets. The red-robed priests were the only ones who remained standing. Tong lost sight of his guide among the crowd of identical beastlings. There were hundreds, perhaps thousands gathering by the black waters. Understanding washed over him like a warm rain.

  They mean to call up some blind Water God and offer my flesh to appease it.

  So death would find him quick enough. He would not be a slave after all, but a sacrifice.

  He smiled at the thought.

  “Rise up, God of Beasts,” he said, voice lost beneath the cadences of the eyeless priests. “Come and devour me! I give myself freely!”

  Matay… At last I come to be with you.

  He spread his arms wide, raised his face to the cool wet breath of the underground sea. The ceremony went on for some time, and the dark tide rose to lick at his feet. The water was cold and numbing. The song of the red priests continued, unbroken, swirling, and maddening.

  Perhaps there was no beast-god. Perhaps they were simply mad, these blind cave dwellers. How long would their wordless rites continue? Were they waiting for him to do something? He walked forward, up to his waist in the chilling water. Nobody stopped him. He would let the nameless sea freeze and drown him. The eyeless ones would have their sacrifice either way.

  Suddenly the black surface erupted, sending a spray of chill mist across the multitude. The force of displaced water knocked Tong back, and he struggled to keep his footing. Now a cold rain fell upon him. The sound of falling water replaced the song of the eyeless ones. They had fallen mute upon the instant. Something huge rose from the black depths, shedding water and glistening in the reflected light of fire pits.

  The breath fled from Tong’s lungs as he stared up at the God of Beasts. It rose like a colossal viper from the waves, its flesh as pale as the skin of the eyeless ones. Its body was as thick as one of the cavern’s stone columns, lined with gleaming scales. It had no arms or legs, but two great gills spread behind its triangular head like transparent bat wings. Unlike its worshippers, it stared ahead with a pair of bulging oval eyes, scintillant with shifting colors. Its open mouth was full of fangs, with two incisors dominating the upper jaw, two more on the lower. A pair of convulsing nostrils mimicked the snouts of the eyeless ones, and its red, pointed tongue was akin to theirs, though many times longer and thicker. The massive head reared dripping above Tong, mystical eyes shedding their own subtle light upon him.

  It might have swallowed him whole, so great was its size. Yet it only swirled and coiled about him, hissing softly to rival the sounds of the rushing water. Tong stood stiff and terrified in its presence. He closed his eyes again, ready to feel the sting of those great fangs as they impaled his body. Yet the pain never came. The beast glided about him and slithered up onto the beach. There it slithered among the eyeless worshippers, who bowed and sang to it. They came forward to caress its chromatic scales and lick the translucent slime from its back. Tong watched the culmination of the rite and recognized it as a ceremony of adoration. The great White Serpent flowed among its people and licked at them, but it did not crush, rend, or bite. The red-robed ones kneeled before it and began a new melody.

  Childhood tales of Serpents and the Ancient World danced in the back of Tong’s memory. Such beasts once ruled the world, breathing fire that scorched the northlands to ash. The Gods had sent Giants to battle the monsters. He had never truly believed such stories until this great Serpent reared before him. Yet there was no fire in this beast’s gullet, or surely the waters would have quenched it. Neither did it have dozens of clawed legs like the mythical Serpents. Yet what else could it be?

  For the first time in many years, Tong thought of old Trissus, who used to tell his fellow slaves outlandish tales and legends by the light of the evening fires. He had taught Tong everything he knew about the world beyond the fields, until the day he was whipped to death for some offense against an Overseer. Such deaths were common among Tong’s people. He had only been a boy when Trissus died, but the old man’s stories lingered in the fields long after his death. They were retold by his sons, his brothers, and his cousins, who taught others to tell them in turn. Legends, unlike Men, never seemed to die.

  The Serpent’s body was as long as a Khyrein tower was tall. In the gentle atmosphere of its presence Tong realized that he would not die today. He fell to his knees in the cold water. He should drown himself now, while the eyeless ones worshipped their scaly God.

  The utter strangeness of his situation was broken by the even stranger sound of a human voice. It spoke his native tongue.

  “Welcome to Sydathus, Tong of Khyrei.”

  Tong raised his face from the black water. An old man stood before him on the shore. No, it was a man whose true age was unknowable. He stood ankle-deep in the foam, wearing an orange-red robe of finely stitched silk. His hair was long and silvery gray, his short beard and mustache that same color. A thin band of gold sat upon his high forehead, and a dancing blue flame on a silver chain burned upon his chest. His skin was brown in the sun-kissed manner of a trader from the eastern or northern lands. No matter how long Khyreins spent under the hot sun, their pale flesh never darkened. So this man was definitely not one of Tong’s countrymen. The jewels upon his fingers glowed less brightly than his eyes. He had the eyes of the White Serpent: a shifting blend of scarlet, emerald, violet, azure, and pearl. They gleamed and sparkled with an alert calm. He smiled at Tong with perfectly white teeth and offered his hand.

  The Serpent was gone. The horde of beastlings stood tranquil about them, even the children holding still in the presence of the one who had come. The one who spoke now with the voice of a Man. Tong accepted his hand and met his curious gaze.

  “Who are you?” Tong asked. “What are you?”

  The ageless man grinned. “I am a Man, like you,” he said. “And so much more… also like you.”

  He led Tong from the beach, back toward the great city-column. The eyeless ones walked about them, sniffing and prancing. The priests formed a broad ring about the two Men as they moved. The scents of roasting vegetables filled the cave air as they approached the settlement.

  “How do you know me?” asked Tong.

  “I know many things,” said the ageless one, “and have forgotten many more. Such are the perils of old age.”

  “What is this place?”

  “I told you,” said the stranger. He lifted his arms to indicate the stupendous network of cave dwellings carved into the monolith. “This is Sydathus, one of the world’s oldest cities.”

  The priests led the two men up a flight of stairs between the city-column and the beach, where a crudely carved stone chair sat overlooking the black ocean. A smattering of crystals gleamed along the seat’s back and arms. The eyeless ones gathered about the rough throne and the ageless stranger sat himself in the chair with a sigh. He turned his prismatic eyes upon Tong once again.

  “I apologize that there is no chair for you upon this dais,” he said. “Please… sit.” He motioned to the stone platform, which was covered by a mass of reed carpets.

  Tong could think of nothing else to do, so he sat before the chair, crossing his legs. He groaned a little at the slight pain in his side.

  “Are you healing well?” asked the stranger.

  Tong nodded. “Well enough.”

  “The Sydathians are quite skilled at medicine. You would have lain helpless much longer if not for their good care. Are you hungry?”

  Tong shook his head. The stranger smiled. “So they have fed you well. Once you accept their uncommon appearance, their benevolent nature becomes plain.”

  Tong rubbed his face with hands still wet from the freshwater sea.

  “Please… ” he said. ”I don’t understand any of this. Why must you torment me so?”

  The stran
ger gave him a quizzical look, his eyebrows knotting. “Torment?” he repeated Tong’s word. “I’ve saved your life. Or rather… they did.”

  “But why? Tell me why.”

  The stranger raised his head and took a long breath. He nodded, as if recognizing some forgotten need, or remembering some lost detail.

  “Forgive me,” he said. “Your confusion must be great. I have been remiss.”

  Tong waited. The silent Sydathians about the throne mirrored his calm.

  “You were a slave,” said the stranger. “But you are free now. A free man. Your life is your own.”

  Tong leaped to his feet. “I do not want it,” he said. The eyeless ones moved uneasily as his voice echoed about the cavern and was lost in the darkness. He clenched his fists at his sides.

  “You only long for death because you have not tasted life,” said the stranger.

  “I have!” said Tong. “I have tasted it enough to know its sweetness. And now she is gone.”

  The stranger nodded. “A great loss. You have known agony and pain and a lifetime of suffering. Yet these things are behind you now. Believe me—”

  “Who are you?” shouted Tong. Anger boiled in his blood now, making his scars throb, his head ache.

  “Men call me Iardu,” said the stranger. “And other names. Yet Iardu will do.”

  Tong looked at the Sydathians basking in the glory of this Man who was also Serpent.

  “Are you their God?”

  Iardu rubbed his pointed beard and considered the question. “You might say that,” he said. “I am an old friend to Sydathus.”

  “A sorcerer,” said Tong, remembering the tales of Trissus. “A warlock…”

  Iardu smiled, white teeth gleaming. “As good a term as any.”

  “You know me. Somehow you made them find me in the jungle and save me when all I wanted was vengeance and a quick death.”

  Iardu leaned forward, placing an elbow on the arm of the stone seat. “I sought you because you sought vengeance. Your desire for your own death is of no concern to me.”

  “I’ve had my vengeance.”

  “Have you?”

  Tong wondered now if the warlock was mocking him. “I killed three Onyx Guards. I killed an Overseer.”

  “A mere handful of wicked lives.”

  “They are enough,” said Tong.

  “Tell me,” said Iardu, leaning back in his chair. “How many soldiers guard the walls of Khyrei? How many legions walk its streets? How many innocents suffer and die at their whim? How many ships carry fresh slaves into the city from distant lands? How many generations have passed since your own ancestors were stripped of their holdings and sent into the fields to work and die like animals?”

  “You mock me,” Tong said. But his rage had subsided.

  “No,” said Iardu. “Consider all these things and answer one more question: have you truly had your vengeance?”

  Tong stood silent for a while, listening to the sound of the waves beating upon the stone shore. Iardu’s eyes glimmered red, blue, and golden, while the blue flame on his chest burned low.

  “No,” Tong grunted.

  Iardu nodded. “How much longer will it stand, this empire of blood and cruelty? How many more generations must live and die under the yoke of the Khyrein Emperors? The one who reigns now is called the Undying One… Gammir the Bloody. They call him this because he subsists on the blood of his own people, treads upon their bent backs like the flagstones of his filthy streets. He, too, is what you would call a warlock. And, like me, he is far more.”

  “I know these things,” said Tong. “Why do you remind me?”

  “Because you are going to bring it all down. The tyranny of Khyrei will crumble, the blood-hungry Gammir will be deposed, and your people set free to discover the joy of living. All this will happen… if only you desire it.”

  Tong stared into the prismatic eyes. They dazzled him with brilliant depths. They were deep as oceans. Oceans of power.

  “Do you desire it?” asked Iardu.

  The face of Matay flickered like a dream in Tong’s mind. The morning sun glittered in her eyes the way Iardu’s power gleamed in his. Tong thought of the men and women, thousands upon thousands, working in the fields even now. Year in and year out, always the same pain and tragedy. Suffering in the streets beyond the black walls… dying beneath the heels of the Onyx Guard. He thought of the hopeless children pulling weeds, shucking crops with their tiny hands, raised in a world of endless toil and boundless brutality. He thought of all the children not yet born, and of his own son who would never see Matay’s beloved sunrise. All the future generations of slaves with no hope and no savior.

  “Yes,” he told the sorcerer. “I desire it.”

  “Good,” said Iardu, eyes blazing. “Very good.”

  One of the Sydathians brought the Khyrein sabre and offered it to Tong. Its blade and hilt had been cleaned and polished. Tong wrapped his right hand about the grip. It felt solid and dangerous in his fist. Something reckless leaped into his chest, a jungle tiger raging to break free and carve a bloody path. A path to freedom.

  “There is always time for death,” said Iardu. “All Men find it eventually.”

  Tong slid the weapon into its bronze sheath.

  He could not die yet. But Matay would wait for him.

  “Where is my knife?” he asked.

  6

  Two Hearts, One Kingdom

  The bloodletting started with a slit throat in a Palm Street brothel. The son of a lord from House Burillus fell to squabbling with the cousin of a lord from House Tyllisca. The two lads had been fast friends until the discord between the Twin Kings divided the royal house into factions. Too much wine and too many hot words led to the drawing of blades and the spilling of Uurzian blood across the cobbles. The lords of House Burillus supported Tyro’s drive toward war, while Tyllisca stood behind the Scholar King. It was unclear who struck the first blow, but a Son of Burillus was the first man to die in the argument for peace.

  The killing set houses against one another, each lord calling upon his private legions and fortifying his estates as if the Khyreins were about to march out of the south and lay siege to the city. Twelve houses claimed allegiance to Lyrilan, fifteen to Tyro. In three weeks of waggling tongues, raised fists, and logical stalemates the unity of Uurz had been shattered. In the days since the Burillus lad’s death, two skirmishes had broken out in the Central Market and six servants had been found dead in gutters or stuffed into dry wells. The city’s commoners began to reflect this unrest, so that companies of city guards marched on constant alert. Fights broke out every night in taverns, gambling dens, and even on the steps of temples. Men died for poorly chosen words or careless bravado.

  The long dry nights brought no relief from the heat of the day. In the torrid lack of rain, the Uurzians had begun to water their city with the blood of their fellows.

  The specter of disunity brought palace life to a standstill. Lyrilan stayed sequestered in the western wing with Ramiyah and his chief advisors. The Green Legions paced along his towers and walls, while the Gold Legions fortified Tyro’s apartments in the eastern wing. The two sides had not yet come to blows, yet there was little love between the commanders of the divided army.

  Lyrilan sat most days in his high tower and discussed ways to mend the broken court. He missed the Royal Library, where he usually went to do his best thinking. Now, if he dared enter the middle precincts of the palace, he must take a cadre of legionnaires with him. How could he possibly think with all those clattering spears and tromping boots surrounding him like a pack of snuffling hounds? At least here he could keep the guards outside the doors of his quarters. He could send for the books he needed, but that was no substitute for walking among the forest of bindings and scrolls and shelves. It was his own private temple, and he resented being driven from it.

  “This is not what my father wanted,” he complained to Ramiyah. “It is everything he feared for his empire.” She listen
ed patiently, as she always did. She smiled sadly and rubbed a hand across his back. The sunlight through the casements of their bedchamber glittered on her golden hair.

  Ramiyah took a green and silver robe from a servant and bade her husband stand while she helped drape it about his shoulders. “Tell them,” she said.

  “I have told them,” he said. “They listen, they nod, they sympathize. But what can they do? What one of them can reach my brother’s ear, let alone his heart?”

  She placed a necklace of opals, centered with an eight-sided topaz, about his neck. “Your brother surrounds himself with wicked men, hawks eager for blood and glory. He listens to their flattery and their lies. And she is the worst of them…”

  Lyrilan nodded, adjusting his slim crown. He raised his feet one at a time while the servant slid tall boots onto them.

  “Talondra wants vengeance, that is all,” he agreed. “I understand that. Who would not want it? Her entire family died when Shar Dni fell… along with thousands of others. The tragedy of her loss blinds her to everything else, sweeps aside all other considerations.”

  “As it blinds your brother,” said Ramiyah. He watched as attendants finished dressing her in a gown of green silk trimmed with white roses. She added silver accoutrements chosen carefully from a coffer of jade. She would not wear gold while the division lasted. Nor would any of the Scholar King’s followers. Gold was the color of Tyro’s legions, and therefore the color of war. Lyrilan hated this random assignation of pigment and metals. For twelve centuries Uurz had been the green-gold city. Now its colors were split, as were its people.

  He gazed upon his beautiful wife in all her glory. He reached out to stroke her soft hair, drew her close to him in a rustle of royal silks. Her blue eyes locked onto his, and he wished he could dive into those pools of azure. It was the color of love, undiluted by ceremony or guile.