“Blood is blood!” Lamashizzar snapped, giving in to his anger at last. “It carries life in it, whether it’s from a goat or from a man! And no one will raise a hue and cry if we decide to sacrifice an animal once a month—if anything, they’ll likely laud us for our piety! This way raises less suspicion. You all know that.”
Next to Ushoran, Lord Ankhat straightened and swung his legs over the edge of the divan. He was less, the dilettante than Ushoran, though his family name was just as old and respected. Though small in stature, he was still trim and physically fit, with piercing eyes and a sharp mind that has hampered only by his notorious impatience. “I know that power is meant to be used, or else it is worthless.” Ankhat said, fixing the king with a steady gaze. “If we had the full power of the Usurper at our command, we wouldn’t need to fear the other cities.”
“I’m certain Nagash thought the same thing,” Lamashizzar retorted, glancing back at Arkhan as if for confirmation. When the immortal gave no obvious sign of agreement, the king continued.
“It’s different now,” Ankhat persisted. “The other great cities are but a shadow of their former glory, and the power of the priesthood is broken forever. They wouldn’t dare defy us.”
“Not separately, perhaps, but together?” Lamashizzar shook his head. “An alliance of the great cities would destroy us as surely as it doomed Nagash.”
Ankhat snorted in disgust. “Who would lead such an alliance? All the great kings are dead. All except you, that is.”
The king ignored Ankhat’s clumsy praise. “All we need is time,” he said. “Every passing year, the cities of Nehekhara grow ever more dependant on our trade with the East. Our influence reaches all the way to distant Zandri, and as far south as Ka-Sabar. In another hundred years, perhaps two, no one will dare to move against us. There is no need for bloody gambles and ruinous wars. All we have to do is wait, and everything we want will fall into our hands.”
For a moment, no one spoke. Even the stolid Abhorash seemed uncomfortable with the king’s vision. The very idea of restraint was alien to these men, who were accustomed to getting what they wanted with a snap of their fingers. Yet they could not bring themselves to gainsay the king. At least, not for now.
But for how much longer, Arkhan wondered. How long until they start to feel the creeping approach of time, and become obsessed with their fading vitality? How long until they realise that Lamashizzar’s carefully reasoned caution is a mask for something far more simple and straightforward. The man is weak. He inherited his power from Lamasheptra, and the one time he tried to gamble with it, he lost his nerve. If I hadn’t arrived at his tent outside Mahrak, he might never have committed his army to battle at all, and Nagash would very likely have won.
It still galled the immortal that he’d let Lamashizzar turn the tables on him inside the Black Pyramid. Even a weak man can be dangerous in the right circumstances, he reminded himself. Greed can sometimes be a courage all its own.
W’soran took a deep breath and folded his hands at his waist, not unlike a priest lecturing a group of acolytes. “You mention animal sacrifice and piety, great one,” he said. “Yet you fail to mention that the greatest of holy rites specify the spilling of human blood instead.” He spread his hands. “If the lifeblood of a goat is no more potent than that of a man, then why do the gods make a distinction?”
The king turned and glared at W’soran, his brow furrowing as he searched for a proper rebuttal, but here the former libertine was out of his depth. Finally he turned to Arkhan.
“Is he right?” Lamashizzar asked.
The immortal affected a shrug. “I’m no more a priest than you are, great one,” he answered carefully. He was treading in dangerous waters now. If Lamashizzar ever bothered to read Nagash’s commentaries more attentively, he would see the truth of what W’soran was getting at right away. “It’s certainly possible that W’soran has the right of it, but that isn’t really the point, is it? The question is whether creating the elixir from animal blood is potent enough to grant immortality or not. And that is something we have yet to prove one way or the other.” Arkhan gave the king a black-toothed smile. “Certainly there is still room for improvement in your performance of the incantations.”
Lamashizzar gave Arkhan a hard, penetrating stare, and for a moment the immortal thought he’d overplayed his hand. Then, abruptly, the king grinned ruefully. “There you have it,” he said, turning back to his cohorts. “It’s all my fault.”
Ushoran chuckled politely. “Spoken like a true king,” he said, raising his wine bowl in salute. The others joined in, and Arkhan allowed himself to relax. He approached the table and pretended to study the ritual symbols. He could see places where he could suggest miniscule changes to the geometries that would suggest areas of improvement without providing any real benefit to the elixir.
The immortal bowed to the king, and smiled his ghoulish smile.
“Shall we begin, great one?” he said.
Raw, burning pain gnawed at Arkhan’s nerves, banishing the thick fog of the lotus root. His muscles quivered like plucked bowstrings. Arkhan groaned, baring his ruined teeth against the pounding agony, and with an effort of will forced his stiff eyelids open.
She was standing over him, bathed in warm light from the oil lamp in her right hand. A tiny frown pulled at the corners of her perfect lips.
“Are you well?” Neferata asked. Her voice was dusky and sweet, like rich honey. Even in his wretched state, the sound of it was riveting. Large, almond-shaped eyes narrowed in concern. She raised a slender hand, and for a moment, the immortal thought she might actually reach out and lay her palm against his head, like a mother might to a sick child. The queen seemed to catch herself at the last moment, her hand pausing scant inches from his brow.
“It is nothing,” Arkhan grated. Even his jaw muscles were stiff now, despite the taste of the king’s elixir he’d received little more than an hour ago.
The immortal tore his gaze away from the queen’s face and used the end of the iron chain to pull himself to his feet. For a moment he leaned against the grimy wall and tried to orient himself. It felt as though he’d only just choked down the bitter bowl of wine and lotus root that W’soran had forced on him. He blinked in the dim light, still expecting to see the king and his cohorts moving about the chamber. “What time is it?” he mumbled.
“Scarcely an hour before dawn,” the queen replied, a note of tension creeping into her voice. “The king was here much longer than usual. I had to hide in an adjoining room until he and W’soran left. I think they were arguing.”
Arkhan managed a nod. “W’soran is growing impatient,” he said. “The old vulture covets not just Nagash’s elixir, but the rest of his incantations as well. The others are starting to agree with him.”
Neferata’s dark eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “All of them?” she asked. She turned and walked back to the paper-strewn worktable where her husband had stood just a couple of hours before. Every movement was sensuous and fluid, almost hypnotic. Like one of Asaph’s sacred serpents, Arkhan thought. The sight of her filled him with a bewildering mix of wonderment, hunger and terrible dread.
She was so like Neferem, he thought, and yet so unlike her at the same time. The women of Lahmia were famous for their seductive beauty, but the daughters of the king bore the likeness of the goddess herself. But where Neferem’s staggering beauty had been tempered by her role as the Daughter of the Sun, Neferata’s allure was darker and far wilder, like Asaph herself. A single look from her could topple kingdoms, the immortal thought. No wonder the kings of Lahmia keep their daughters locked away and their queens hidden behind golden masks.
“Well, Abhorash still seems loyal, but that’s to be expected,” Arkhan said. “Ushoran and Ankhat, on the other hand, are tired of Lamashizzar’s half-measures. They were at Mahrak. They know how feeble the king’s elixir truly is.”
Neferata stood beside the table and studied the arrangement of the papers carefully, noting t
heir precise order carefully before picking through the pile. Lamashizzar would know if a single sheet was out of place when he returned the following night. “What of Ubaid?”
The immortal shrugged. “I confess I do not know. Lamashizzar only brought him into the cabal because he needed the grand vizier’s help to maintain his secret. Since then he’s been very circumspect with his opinions.”
“Typical,” the queen observed. “But somewhat encouraging, nonetheless. And the others?”
Arkhan snorted. “The young libertines? Irrelevant. Their loyalties belong to whoever supplies them with the elixir. Frankly, you would be better off without them.”
Neferata carefully peeled back several pages until she came to a yellowed sheet depicting a complex ritual circle. It was one of several versions of the Incantation of Immortality that Arkhan had tried to recreate from Nagash’s books. To the immortal’s unending irritation, the Undying King had not committed a definitive version of the ritual to paper, no doubt to keep its secrets firmly under his control. Lamashizzar could scarcely tell the difference between one page and the next without Arkhan’s help, but Neferata’s training with the priestesses of Neru gave her a degree of insight that her brother lacked.
Since she’d begun her secret tutelage under Arkhan, some eight months before, the queen’s skill in the necromantic arts had grown by leaps and bounds. Sneaking into the cabal’s sanctum each night, right on the heels of the king and his cohorts, she learned more in a few stolen hours than Lamashizzar had managed in more than a century.
Of course, it helped that Neferata was far less squeamish about the nature of the blood she used.
The queen studied the page intently. After a few moments, she took a piece of chalk from a clay bowl on a nearby shelf and began making precise adjustments to the circle laid out on the sanctum floor.
“Things are coming to a head quicker than I expected,” she said as she worked. “We must be ready very soon now.”
Arkhan caught himself staring at the queen, watching the way her body moved in the lamplight. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “If this ritual succeeds, then you will have all the power you need,” he told her. Together, they had already created versions of the elixir that were several times more potent than anything the king had made. The immortal licked his lips. “Much depends on the quality of the base material, of course.”
Neferata gave Arkhan a sharp look. “The blood of a royal handmaiden is sufficient, I should think.”
The immortal smiled. “Younger is better than older,” he said. “Of course, a live victim is better still.”
The queen made one last change to the circle and rose to her feet. “And why is that?” she asked, as she inspected her work.
“The more youthful the blood, the more of life’s vigour it contains, of course,” Arkhan replied.
“And using a live victim in the ritual grants even more vigour?”
Arkhan hesitated, uncertain how much he should reveal. Neferata had already gleaned far more secrets from him than he’d been willing to share. “In a manner of speaking, yes.”
“Well, that will have to wait for another day,” the queen said. “For now, we must be content with what we have.”
She moved past him, to a table at the far end of the room—one well out of reach of his iron chain, Arkhan could not help but note. Neferata picked up a small ceramic jar, not much larger than a nobleman’s wine bowl, and carried it to the centre of the ritual circle. The immortal felt his turgid pulse quicken. Neferata never told him how she obtained the blood from her handmaidens, and, in truth, he didn’t really care.
Neferata knelt beside the jar and placed a number of additional marks around its circumference, then retreated to the edge of the circle. “The sun will rise soon,” she said, raising her arms towards the ceiling. “Let us begin.”
Arkhan moved to the far side of the circle, taking care not to drag his iron chain across the sorcerous glyphs. He raised his own arms—stiff and yet trembling, all the same—to mirror Neferata’s own. And then, together, they began to chant.
The words of power now rolled easily off Neferata’s tongue, and the air began to crackle with invisible energies, harnessed to a force of will as great as any Arkhan had ever known save for Nagash himself. The immortal echoed every syllable, adding his will to her own, until the ritual circle seethed with power.
The incantation was long and complex, stretching for many long minutes, and Arkhan felt the energies of the ritual building to a furious crescendo. The jar began to tremble, its lid rattling maniacally as gusts of steam billowed from the contents within. His lips peeled back in a ghastly, feral snarl as he smelled the fragrant odour of the rapidly quickening elixir. Arkhan threw back his head and cried out the words of the incantation in an exultant voice. The centuries seemed to unwind within him, and for a single instant he was once more a mighty warrior, a master of magic and conqueror who once made all Nehekhara tremble with fear.
And then, immortal and queen cried out as one, and the ritual culminated in a shower of lambent sparks from the glyphs inscribed on the surface of the jar. Neferata staggered, momentarily stunned by the force of the power she’d commanded, but Arkhan’s senses were razor-sharp. In an instant he was inside the circle, feeling the residual energies of the incantation burn across his skin as his hands closed about the curved surface of the jar.
He felt the queen’s eyes upon him. They cut through his raging thirst like a knife. He clutched the jar tightly, imagining that he could feel the strength of the elixir through the glazed walls of clay. If he drank it dry, it might give him the strength enough to tear open the collar and finally escape.
Then again, it might not, and then where would he be? Neferata would not take such a betrayal lightly. And she already knew more than enough to continue studying Nagash’s books without him, whether she realised it yet or not.
Arkhan sank slowly to his knees. With an effort of supreme will, he raised the jar to Neferata, as a servant might proffer wine to his master. “Here, great one,” he said in a hollow voice. “Drink of the fruits of your labour. Drink, and be restored.”
Neferata smiled at him, and Arkhan was secretly ashamed how it made his dead heart lurch in his chest. She came to him, graceful as a serpent, and took the jar from his unwilling hands.
The queen raised the steaming vessel to her lips and took a long draught. A delicious shudder went through her slender frame. “Oh,” she whispered. “Oh!”
Arkhan watched in silence, gripped by a helpless despair. She would drink it all. He knew it. Months ago, she’d sworn to share every draught of elixir they made, just as Lamashizzar had promised him long ago. But promises meant nothing to kings and queens, except when it suited them. Nagash had taught him that lesson well.
He was surprised, therefore, when the queen lowered the jar to him once more. “Here, favoured servant,” she said with a regal smile, her lips red with the sweet wine of stolen life. “Take your due.”
It took all the remaining willpower he had not to snatch the jar from Neferata’s hands. Still, they trembled as he brought the rim of the jar to his lips and drank.
The elixir flowed into his mouth like molten metal, setting every nerve alight. He stiffened, gulping greedily, as he felt a fraction of the old power return to his wasted limbs. It was a shadow of what he’d once felt as the Undying King’s right hand, but it was still greater by far than anything Lamashizzar had wrought.
When he was done he sat back on his heels, gasping for breath. The queen was studying him, her dark eyes thoughtful. He met her gaze directly, too intoxicated for the moment to be cowed by her supernatural beauty.
“Why, great one?” he asked. “What do you wish to gain from all this?”
Neferata’s lips curved in a crooked smile. “Besides eternal youth and power?” she asked.
“Yes.”
The queen’s smile faded. “Lahmia is in peril,” Neferata replied, “and her king is too weak and too fo
olish to protect her. So I must instead.” She cocked her head and regarded him appraisingly. “What of you? What do you wish, now that Nagash is dead and gone?”
Arkhan did not reply for a moment. He felt the power coursing through his veins and drew a heavy breath. “What do I want? I want to ride a horse again, and cross the desert sands beneath the moonlight.”
Neferata quirked a delicate eyebrow. “Is that all?”
The immortal gave her a tight-lipped smile and hefted a length of iron chain. “Forty-seven links,” he said. “That equates to exactly twenty-three and a half paces. For the past one hundred and forty years, that has been the length and breadth of my entire world. What I wish for, great one, is nothing less than paradise.”
Neferata considered this, and then, to Arkhan’s utter surprise, she reached down and laid a hand upon his cheek. Her skin smelled of sandalwood, and was warm as a summer breeze.
She bent close to him, and her eyes seemed to swallow him whole. “I know what it’s like to live every day as a prisoner,” she said softly. “Keep your oath to me, Arkhan the Black, and I swear you will see your wish fulfilled.”
Then she was gone, retreating from the circle and returning the ritual materials to the way they were as Lamashizzar had left them. Arkhan hadn’t felt her pluck the jar from his hands. He hadn’t even noticed it was gone until minutes after she’d departed.
It was a long time before Arkhan crawled from the circle and curled up like a dog at the base of the sanctum wall. When his mind finally quieted enough to let him sleep, he dreamt of endless, moonlit sands, and the music of silver bells. The warm desert air caressed his face, smelling of sandalwood.
SIX
The Barrow-thief
Cripple Peak, in the 76th year of Djaf the Terrible
(-1599 Imperial Reckoning)
Now that he had reached the mountain at long last, Nagash’s great work began in earnest. His first months were spent combing its slopes, crawling into each fissure like a spider and searching for ways to reach deeper into its heart. He’d hoped that the deposits of abn-i-khat would lie close to the surface, and that the vents were signs of ancient impacts that would point the way to the burning stone, but within the first few days he realised that his theory was only half-right. The fissures were mostly shallow crevices that narrowed quickly as they plunged even deeper into the rock. They weren’t the scars of multiple impacts, but the marks of a single, giant impact some incalculable time in the past. The burning stone had been driven deep into the mountain’s guts, cracking its granite flanks like a dropped wine bowl.
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