The Braided Path: The Weavers of Saramyr / the Skein of Lament / the Ascendancy Veil

by Chris Wooding

  ‘Shh,’ she said softly. ‘I only want a kiss.’

  She moved her lips to his as fast as a snake taking a mouse, and sucked.

  The fishmonger went rigid as something seemed to tear inside him, something not physical, and gush out through his mouth and into hers. It glittered, this thing, and sparkled; a rushing, bright stream that flickered between their lips as she robbed it from him. For a few long seconds, he felt as a ghost must, fading in the rays of the dawn; and then the horror in his eyes waned, and his pupils grew dark and dim, and his body relaxed in death. Asara let him go with a gasp, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. His head smacked hard against the tiled floor with a nauseating sound. She took a few heavy breaths in and out, relishing the swelling warmth inside her, and then she got off him.

  She had no understanding of what it was in her body that made her this way. There was no anatomical comparison for her to draw against. Arbitrarily, she thought of it as a coil, a tight whorl of fleshy tubing nestled just behind her stomach and before her spine. When glutted, it was thick, and she could feel its warm presence there; when starved, it was flaccid and thin, and the space where it had shrunken from ached with an emptiness a hundred times worse than hunger. Using her talents drained it, like exercise promotes appetite. When she had no need of them, the hunger came on her only rarely; just enough for her body to keep at bay the onset of age. But recently, since her first encounter with the shin-shin, she had been forced to excessive use.

  Healing herself after Kaiku had left her near death had almost been too much for her. She had been helped by two foresters who had come to investigate the blaze and found instead a scorched and disfigured handmaiden. The sustenance they provided restored her health more than any care they could offer. Sloughing off the burned skin of her face and hands, regrowing her hair: these took time and effort and strength, and that strength had to come from somewhere. Altering her features was more of a whim, executed after she had restored herself to her satisfaction. She had been careful not to seem outstandingly beautiful while posing as Kaiku’s handmaiden, and settled for being merely pretty for two years. But she had a vain streak, and she decided that the time had come to indulge it once again. The slightest shift in aspect rendered her from pleasant-faced and demure to an object of lust. How awful it must be, she thought, for those who are condemned with the face they are born with.

  But then, she reflected ruefully, she never knew hers.

  Seized by a suddenly maudlin air, she walked over to the woman and pushed her head back. A black bruise was already forming on her cheek. She was unconscious, still breathing. Asara tilted her head first to one side, then to the other. She was not pretty, but possessed of a certain voluptuousness that Asara found faintly intoxicating. If she had not come in, had not seen Asara’s face, then Asara would have let her live. But now, she could not.

  Asara enfolded the woman in her arms and flicked her hair back over her head, then put her lips to the partly open mouth of her victim.

  The Empress Anais tu Erinima stalked along the corridors of the Imperial Keep, in a foul mood. She had barely had time to get into her bath after a day of meetings, arguments and reports before she had received the news that Barak Mos, her husband’s father and the power behind Blood Batik, had arrived with an important message for her. Anyone else she would have let wait – with the possible exception of Barak Zahn – but Mos was too important to take even the slightest risk of offending. Batik was the single strongest ally she had, and she needed all she could get right now.

  Her route took her around the edges of the Keep, where sculpted arches looked out over the soft night beyond. Neryn was peeking out from behind her mighty sister Aurus, a pale green bubble on the edge of the mottled, pearl-skinned disc that loomed huge in the star-littered sky. Thin streamers of moon-limned cloud drifted in the lazy warmth of the summer darkness. Below, the city was a net of lantern lights, deceptively peaceful and quiet. She had wanted nothing more on this night than to relax on a balcony and sip wine, and let the cares of the past weeks ease out of her; but it was not to be, it seemed.

  Every day was like this now. She had barely a moment to herself in daylight, and her nights were no longer sacrosanct either. Each morning brought a new crisis: a protest demonstration somewhere, news of the famed agitator Unger tu Torrhyc stirring trouble among the people, another noble who wanted to beg favour or make veiled threats, an allegiance changed, a suspicion of deceit, an appointment, a dismissal, an oath . . . everything was important now, everything had to be attended to. She had stirred up Saramyr, for better or worse. Now she was surrounded by enemies, and few of them wore their colours overtly.

  The one positive aspect of all this chaos was a surprising one. Her relationship with her husband had smoothed somewhat; in truth, a part of her tiredness was due to the fact that she took out her frustrations on him in the bedchamber, vigorously and every night. With all the cares of the realm clamouring for attention, and each day more hectic than the last, her need for release manifested itself with increasing intensity. Durun matched her, which was more than she could say of most men. And though they still could not be said to like each other, Durun had at least ceased to be quite so antagonistic to her, and she noticed he had stopped finding excuses to be absent from the Keep so he could be in the bedchamber when she got there.

  She should have realised it before. The best way to keep him on a leash was to keep him in her bed. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement, but no more than that. Not to her, anyway.

  She was sweeping along the corridor, her shoes tapping on the veined lach of the floor, when she saw the Weave-lord Vyrrch emerge from a door ahead of her. A familiar worm of disgust twitched in her gut at the sight of the shambling, bent figure, buried under a robe of patchwork rags, mismatched material stitched haphazardly layer over layer. The hideous, immobile bronze face turned to her within the frame of his tattered hood.

  ‘Ah, Empress Anais,’ he croaked, with feigned surprise. She knew by his tone that this meeting was no accident, but she had no patience for it.

  ‘Vyrrch,’ she acknowledged, curt enough to be rude.

  ‘We must talk, you and I,’ he said.

  She passed him by without slowing. ‘I have little to say to one who desires the death of my child.’

  Vyrrch wasted a moment on surprise, then followed her with his peculiar, broken gait. Twisted and corrupted his bones might have been, but he was not as slow as his appearance suggested.

  ‘Wait!’ he cried, outraged. ‘You dare not walk away from me!’

  She laughed at his bluster. ‘The evidence points to the contrary,’ she replied, relishing his discomfort as he hobbled along, falling behind her.

  ‘You dare not!’ he hissed, and Anais felt herself suddenly wrenched as if by some great force, an invisible hand that seized her and whirled her around to face him. She tottered, stunned for a moment; and then the hand was gone.

  Vyrrch regarded her icily from behind his Mask.

  ‘I should have you executed for that,’ Anais said, her cheeks flushed with fury.

  Vyrrch was not cowed. ‘We are displeased with you, Anais. Very displeased. If you get rid of me, no Weaver will take my place. We are bound to Adderach above all other loyalties, and you are working against the interests of our kind. None of us will claim the title of Weave-lord if I am removed. Do you think you will survive the civil war you are bringing upon us all, without a Weaver to defend you?’

  ‘My Weaver works to betray me,’ she hissed. ‘Do you think I am not aware of that? Perhaps I would be better with none.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ he replied. ‘Though without any way to contact your far-flung interests – unless, of course, you care to revert to horse messengers or carrier birds – I cannot imagine you will make an effective empress any more.’ She thought she could hear a smile in his withered and broken voice, and it angered her more; but she reined herself in, made her anger go cold and hard like new-forged metal plunged into i
ce water.

  ‘Do not threaten me, Vyrrch. You know well that if the hand of the Weavers was suspected of meddling in the politics of the land, then my enemies and allies alike would destroy you. Your insane kind are an accessory to government, not a part of it; and you know as well as I that the high families would sooner see an Aberrant on the throne than a Weaver. You may have ingratiated yourself so much that we think we cannot do without you; but you are here on our sufferance, and you would do well to remember that. Like rebellious dogs, you will be put down if you try and bite your masters. And the Weavers grow altogether too bold.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ Vyrrch mocked. ‘Perhaps, after you have persuaded the people to accept an Aberrant freak as their ruler, then you will persuade the high families to get rid of us? I don’t think it likely, do you?’

  ‘Do not speak of freaks to me, you vile thing. I have no interest in the Weavers’ displeasure. You are not part of the government of this land, and you have no say in it. Now I am late for a meeting.’

  She turned and stalked away, and Vyrrch did not call her again; but she felt his gaze burning into her back all the way along the corridor.

  Barak Mos was a man of great presence, though physically he was not as tall as his son. He was broad-boned, with a wide chest and shoulders and thick arms, and there was a squatness about him – with his strong, bearded jaw, flat head and short limbs – that lent him an impression of impressive solidity. At just under six feet in height, he towered over Anais; but she had never faced him in anger, and she knew him to be gentle towards her. She had dealt with enough of the son’s tempers to be able to field his father’s, anyway.

  She met him in a room of her chambers that she particularly liked, dominated by a massive ivory bas-relief of two rinji birds passing each other in flight, their long necks and white wings outstretched, their ungainly, sticklike legs curled up beneath them. The three-dimensional effect of one bird occupying the foreground as it flew between the viewer and the other bird had always appealed to Anais. It appealed to Mos too, apparently, for he was admiring it as she entered.

  ‘Barak Mos,’ she said. ‘I apologise for keeping you waiting.’

  ‘No trouble,’ he replied, turning towards her. ‘Rather, let me apologise for the inconvenient hour. I would not have come, but I have grave information.’

  Anais gave him a curious look and then invited him to sit. For such a gruff man, he was being excessively polite. The apology was a pleasantry; to get Barak Mos genuinely to say sorry was like getting blood from a stone, which is why she had been so impressed when he had asked her forgiveness for his son’s debauched ways.

  Two elegant couches were arranged around a low table of black wood, looking out across the room through a partition to the open balcony beyond. On the table was a bowl of kama nuts, giving off a fragrance that was bitter and fruity and smoky all at once. It was the recent fashion among young ladies of the court to keep some kama seeds in their pockets to lend them this enticing fragrance, and Anais had grown to like the scent.

  They settled themselves, Anais reclining and Mos sitting on the edge of his couch, leaning forward with his hands clasped before him. She noticed suddenly and with embarrassment the lack of refreshments in the room. Mos caught her gaze and waved absently.

  ‘Your servants came,’ he said. ‘I sent them away. I won’t be here long. Order something for yourself, if you like.’

  That was more like the Mos she knew; tactless. As if she needed his permission to call for refreshments in her own home. She decided against it, more concerned with hearing the Barak’s news.

  ‘I don’t have to tell you that this goes no further than us,’ he said, giving her a serious gaze.

  ‘Of course not,’ she replied.

  ‘I am only telling you this out of concern. For you, for my son, for my granddaughter.’

  A small smile of surprised gratitude flicked over the Empress’s face at the term. She had not expected to hear him acknowledge Lucia so.

  ‘I understand,’ she replied.

  He seemed satisfied. ‘Your Weaver, Vyrrch. Weave-lord, sorry. Why is that?’

  ‘Why is what?’

  ‘Why is he a Weave-lord?’

  Anais was bewildered. She thought a man in Mos’s position should know that, at least. ‘It is the title bestowed upon the Emperor or Empress’s Weaver. Usually it is also because they are the best at their craft.’

  Mos harumphed, seeming to digest this. ‘Do you trust him?’

  ‘Vyrrch? Heart’s blood, no. He would murder my daughter if he thought he could get away with it. But he knows what would happen if the high families thought a Weaver had slain the Heir-Empress. Aberrant or not.’ She hesitated to use the word, but there was no other that fitted her purposes.

  ‘That’s true enough,’ he said, shifting his broad bulk. ‘Let me be blunt, then. I suspect that Weave-lord Vyrrch and Barak Sonmaga tu Amacha are working together against you.’

  Anais raised an eyebrow. ‘Indeed? It would not be a surprise to me.’

  ‘This is bad business, Anais. I have spies, you know that. I don’t much approve of them, but they’re as necessary as Weavers are in the game we play. I sent them to find out what they could after this whole business began, and I suppose one of them struck lucky. We heard about a man named Purloch tu Irisi. He’s a cat-burglar of some renown and great skill. I can vouch for that: he got into this Keep, and into the roof gardens, and he got to Lucia.’

  Anais felt a jolt of terror. ‘He got to Lucia?’

  ‘Back when all this started. Weeks ago. He could have put a knife in her, Anais.’

  The Empress was rigid on her couch. Why had Lucia said nothing? Of course, she should not have been surprised. A life of being hidden had made her secretive, and she was so unfathomably introverted at times. At those times, Anais did not understand her child at all. It made her sad to think of the gulf between them, that her daughter would not mention something so important. But that was just her way.

  ‘Murder wasn’t his mission, though,’ Mos was continuing. ‘He got a lock of hair instead. He wasn’t after her; he didn’t know anything more than what he was sent for.’

  ‘Why? Why the hair?’ Anais asked, her eyes darkening.

  ‘His employer needed proof she was an Aberrant, so he could spread the news and stir up the nobles. The Weavers have some test, some way of telling. The gods only know the ins and outs of their science. But they need a part of the body: skin, hair, something like that.’ He shrugged. ‘Anyway, this Purloch was clever. He wouldn’t take on a task like that without insurance. Too smart to be someone’s pawn. He wanted to know who it was that hired him; so he traced the middlemen back to their source. Sonmaga.’

  Anais nodded to herself. She had never solved the mystery of how this furore suddenly started, how the high families all seemed to know at once about her child being different. Sonmaga! It would be him.

  ‘Do you have proof of any of it?’

  Mos looked momentarily embarrassed. ‘Purloch disappeared directly after he had completed his task. There is no testimony against Sonmaga, and if there were, it would be useless. A thief’s word against a Barak’s?’

  ‘Did this . . . Purloch know about Vyrrch’s involvement?’

  ‘He knew nothing, or he said nothing,’ said Mos. ‘There is no link, or at least none that anyone but a Weaver could follow. But there was one thing that sat uneasily with me about the whole affair. Purloch’s fee was huge. All that effort and expense on Sonmaga’s part, just to hire a man to steal a lock of hair. Points to one conclusion.’

  ‘Sonmaga must have suspected,’ she said.

  ‘He already knew she was Aberrant,’ Mos agreed with a nod. He seemed to have no problem with the word, used in conjunction with the one he had called ‘granddaughter’ moments ago. She took heart in that.

  ‘Because somebody told him so,’ she concluded. ‘Vyrrch.’

  ‘He found out somehow,’ Mos said. ‘It’s the only answe
r.’

  ‘Not the only answer,’ Anais replied cautiously. ‘Others knew. Tutors, a few servants . . .’

  ‘But none more likely than Vyrrch,’ Mos countered. ‘None with so much to lose by an Aberrant taking the throne. What if she does become Empress? She’ll know the Weavers would have killed her at birth, given the chance. What if she stops the Weavers killing Aberrant children? What if she tries to undermine them, drive them out? The Weavers know they could not thrive in a realm where an Aberrant ruled. They would suddenly find they have to fear retaliation for over two hundred years of rooting out deviancy.’

  ‘Maybe it’s what we need,’ Anais said, thinking over her conversation with Vyrrch. ‘Gods-cursed parasites. We’d be better off without them. We should never have let it get this far, never have allowed them to become indispensable.’

  ‘You’ll find no stronger agreement than mine,’ Mos said. ‘I despise their slippery ways. But beware of setting yourself squarely against them, Anais. You walk a precarious edge.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Anais, musing. ‘Indeed.’

  FIFTEEN

  The compound of Blood Amacha was enormous, the largest in the Imperial Quarter of Axekami, larger even than that of the ruling family, Blood Erinima. It rested on a flat tabletop of land, a man-made dais of earth that raised it up above the surrounding compounds by a storey. Within its walls, a virtual paradise was wrought: lush tropical trees imported from distant continents, sculpted brooks and pools, wondrous glades and waterfalls. In contrast to the usual minimalism of Saramyr gardens, this place was abundant to the point of gaudiness; but even here, the tendency towards neatness was still in effect, and there were no fallen leaves on the paths, no chewed branches left on the trunks, no blighted leaf uncut. Unfamiliar fruits hung in the branches, and sprays of strange flowers nestled amid the bushes. There were even foreign animals here, chosen for their beauty and wonder – and their inability to harm those who wandered the gardens of the compound. It was like stepping into another land, a storybook realm of magic.