“Borrowed?” said Oressa.
“The kephalos allowed it, but . . .” He didn’t know how to finish this sentence either, especially since he knew the kephalos was within the golem, listening. He warned Oressa hastily, “The kephalos seems to be foremost among the Kieba’s servants, or . . . anyway, it’s here with us, in the golem. Kephalos!”
“Gulien Madalin,” answered the golem, in the flat voice of the kephalos.
“Oh!” said Oressa, and was silent, her eyes widening. Then she said, her tone just a fraction too cheerful, “Well, I want to hear all about it later, Gulien! It’s so unfair! You got to meet the Kieba and the, ah, kephalos and you got this amazing spider-golem and all I got was taken hostage. Though,” she added firmly, “I would have escaped if you hadn’t come.”
Gulien was sure she would have. “Meeting the Kieba was . . . not something I would actually recommend.” Seeing his sister’s skepticism, Gulien tried to gather his thoughts. He didn’t know what he could safely say with the kephalos listening. He didn’t know if he dared explain that the Kieba hadn’t been what he’d expected. That she had seemed so . . . indifferent. It had been as though all the caring had worn out of her over the years, and now all that was left was . . . habit, perhaps.
Gulien hadn’t precisely realized this until he thought about it now, but he thought that it was true. It seemed to him, remembering the Kieba, that she hadn’t even really cared about the plague in Elaru. He didn’t know what to think. The Kieba he had expected, the Kieba from all the old tales, was not like that. What if the years really had at last worn out her compassion for the many peoples of the world?
“The Kieba frightened you,” Oressa said, frowning.
She had. Thinking about her now frightened him more. Though not as much as facing their father. Gulien waved this away and told his sister, “What she seems to want most . . . Listen, have you heard of an artifact called Parianasaku’s Capture?”
“Gulien. How would I know? You’re the one who remembers all those peculiar names and everything.”
“Well,” Gulien conceded. “But you hear things.”
Oressa shrugged and glanced thoughtfully up at the head of the spider-golem, thinking, perhaps, about the listening kephalos. “If Father has an artifact called anything of the kind, he never said so where I could hear him. But he wouldn’t talk about it, you know. He’s so secretive.”
“Said the lump of coal to the iron kettle,” Gulien said, recovering his balance. “Whatever it is, the Kieba wants it back, and Father won’t give it to her. Maybe can’t give it to her, to hear her explain it. But I need to get it, and apparently the only way . . . the only way is to . . .” Gulien could hardly make himself say it, and the words came out in nearly a whisper: “I need to depose Father.”
There was a short, shocked pause.
Then Oressa said in a bright, brittle tone, “Well, it’s terrible, of course, if the Kieba doesn’t like Father, but if deposing him is the price of her help against Tamarist, who could argue?”
Gulien winced, looking away.
“I’m sorry,” Oressa said, much more gently. “I’m sure you hate the idea, and I’m sorry about that. Truly. But you know I won’t be sorry if the Kieba requires you to take the throne and set Father aside. It may take some careful persuasion to get people to accept it, but I’m sure you can do it. I mean, here you are with the Kieba’s spider, saving Caras from the Tamaristan invaders! You own this moment, Gulien. Oh, you’ll have the occasional awkward moment later, I’m sure, after Father’s supporters realize they’ve lost their influence and start trying to make trouble for you. I’ll help—you know that—but Baramis will be difficult, and so will Erren, and that’s just to start with. But that’s for later, and by then lots of other people will support you.”
Gulien shook his head, far less confident. “I know few people love our father, but he’s been a good king for Carastind—tough-minded, decisive. He’s kept us strong. Without him we might well have been trapped into a second Little War with Estenda. Or worse. A lot of people trust Father to keep us safe.”
Oressa scowled at him. “Strong!” she said derisively. “I suppose so! Ruthlessness may make a king strong, but if a king’s to be trusted, he has to be just; and if he’s to be loved, he has to be kind. You’ll be a far better king than Father. You’ll show people you can be ruthless when you depose him, and then you’ll show them you’re also just and kind, and of course they’ll support you! Besides, you were always going to be king someday, which everybody knows. Why not now? Give people a month and they’ll forget why they ever worried.”
Gulien slanted a look at his sister, appreciating her confidence, though he feared it was misplaced. He said after a moment, “I grant, riding into Caras on the Kieba’s golem will surely help.”
“I should think so!” Oressa agreed with great enthusiasm. She patted the golem’s steel neck with a proprietary air. But then she asked in a more cautious tone, “Just how angry with you is she likely to be about you borrowing her golem? Even if her—her kephalos, or whatever, let you, so it hardly seems fair for her to blame you, does it? Kephalos, is the Kieba going to blame Gulien for anything?”
The kephalos didn’t answer. Gulien asked, “Kephalos?”
“Unknown,” stated the kephalos.
“You see,” said Gulien, and sighed.
“Well,” said Oressa in a bracing tone. “Even if she does blame you, maybe she won’t still be angry about it after you depose Father and get Parian-whoever’s Thing back for her. Here’s what we’ll do: You tell everybody that the Kieba hates Father and wants you to be king instead. Tell everyone she saved us because you went to her and asked her. Then, when she comes to take back her artifact, it’ll already be arranged. Everybody will cheer and celebrate and tell her how wonderful she is and how grateful they are that she supported us against Tamarist. Then she’ll be ashamed to punish you.”
“I suspect the Kieba will do exactly as she pleases, no matter what we do.”
“Well, but can it hurt? Anyway,” said Oressa firmly, “if she wants somebody to be angry with, she can be angry with Father. That’s fair, especially if he stole an artifact of hers. Anybody can see that’s true.”
Gulien began, “Oressa—” Then, finally glimpsing the palace ahead of them, he said, horrified, “All gods dead and forgotten! Look at what that son of a misbegotten cow did to our palace!”
The white lights in the sky were a little dimmer now, but still more than bright enough that he could see exactly what Gajdosik had done to the palace.
“I told you,” said Oressa. “I did tell you. He said he had people put black powder under the walls.”
“He had agents in Caras?” Gulien was outraged.
Oressa only shrugged. “Obviously. I guess they blew up our cannons at the harbor too.”
Gulien stared at the broken stones that littered the courtyard, then tipped his head back to gaze at the ragged timbers dangling high above. A roof tile fell suddenly, shattering on the stones below with a clearly audible sound.
“And you were on the roof!” said Gulien, turning suddenly to stare at his sister. “You little fool!”
Oressa said in a small voice, “After I told Father where you’d gone, I wanted to get out of his way. I thought the roof would be safe.”
Gulien put an arm around her shoulders, hugging her against his side, forcing his mind away from thoughts of his sister falling, her body broken on the lower roofs or the flagstones of the courtyard, crushed by falling rubble. He might have come home to that. He didn’t know whether to curse Prince Gajdosik for blowing up the palace, or whether to be grateful his men had gotten her safely away from the wreckage. He stood up on the golem’s back, putting a hand against one of the spines to balance himself, looking more closely. He could see that the eastern wing of the palace was less damaged—well, it must be less damaged, or the whole structure would have come down.
He was right about that, at least. The east side o
f the palace was in much better shape than the south. The courtyard there was crowded. Everyone in the whole city seemed to have followed them here. Gulien had never realized there could be so many people in one place. Or how disorderly and noisy they could be. But the noise ebbed. All the people, as they glimpsed the war golem and turned to look, stared and nudged their neighbors and stared some more, and silence spread out from them until all the clamor had died away. People coughed and muttered to one another, but that wasn’t the same. The war golem shone brilliantly in the pale light that filled the courtyard. Absolutely everyone was staring at it. Gulien was used to being the center of attention, but this was different and he knew he had flushed.
“Do you see Father?” Oressa asked, not seeming to notice the crowd. “Gulien, you are going to depose him, aren’t you? Gulien?”
“I don’t . . .”
“Gulien!”
“I know,” Gulien said, helplessly wretched. “Don’t go on about it!” Then he stopped, as their father appeared between the wide-open doors at the top of the stairs. Everything stopped. King Osir Madalin, tall and grim and disapproving, seemed somehow entirely in control of the situation, even though that was outrageously untrue.
“Gulien . . . ,” Oressa began, her voice going small. She tried to tuck herself behind her brother, but there wasn’t room. Instead, she knelt down on the golem’s back, bowing her head, seeming suddenly diffident and meek. But she whispered, “You have to tell everyone that the Kieba supports you and wants you to be king. Gulien, you have to tell everyone that! If you stole her golem and now you defy her again—”
“I know. I know! He won’t give it up to me or to her just for the asking, Oressa. I know that.” Gulien took a deep breath. “I’ll do it,” he said. “I will. The Kieba’s the important thing. We can’t let her turn her golem against us and call Gajdosik back—”
“She won’t! She can’t!” Oressa said. “We’ll make sure everyone cheers you, and her for supporting you, until she has to forbear for very shame. You’ll be fine. Look, everyone’s here. There’s Baramis and Erren. I don’t see Ramak. Or Meric. Oh, I hope nothing’s happened to Meric! But there’s Lorren. That’s good. You need influential men as witnesses. Oh, look, Gulien, there’s Lord Paulin. He is showing his age, isn’t he?”
This made Gulien laugh, though he still felt rather sick. He said, “Kephalos, can you tell the golem to carry us toward the king, slowly? Give people time to get out of the way.”
The golem moved smoothly forward.
“That statue in the center of the courtyard is close enough,” Gulien said after a moment. “Stop us when we get that far.”
But the golem didn’t stop at the statue. Even when Gulien repeated more urgently, “Stop the golem now, kephalos!” And then desperately, “Kephalos!”
There was no answer.
“Gulien!” Oressa said, sounding frightened.
Gulien swallowed. He knew exactly what had happened. He whispered, “Gods remembered and forgotten,” but very quietly, almost like a prayer. Then he said, much more clearly and formally, “Kieba, please. I beg you will grant me just a little more time. I am so nearly finished here. Please, let me finish this.” It was surprisingly difficult to speak to her when he could not see her, even though he had found her unreadable in person. He closed his eyes and said, “Of course you are angry—you are justly angry—but grant me the use of your power for just an hour longer. I’ll depose my father. I swear I will.” His voice shook but then steadied. “I’ll take back the gods’ artifact and return it to you. I swear I will. This will be so much faster and more certain than working your will through the Tamaristans, Kieba!” He stopped and waited.
There was no answer. The golem did not pause.
Gulien said in a low, intense tone, “Kieba, please! Do anything you wish with me and with my father—”
Oressa opened her mouth. Gulien caught her arm, shaking her to make her be quiet. She hissed in pain, but he ignored her. He said urgently, “But before you punish me, let me help my sister take the throne. Let me help her set Caras in order—I swear to you, she’ll do well by Carastind! You have been our patron for hundreds of years! Surely we still matter to you at least a little!”
The war golem stopped. It had come nearly all the way to the foot of the stairs. All around them, people pressed back out of its way. Osir Madalin stood above, gazing down at them.
The king of Carastind was a tall man, and thin, with a lean face and hooded eyes. There was a small crease between his brows, which made him look disapproving and faintly disdainful. He wore a sword, but it was only for show, with pearls on the scabbard and a ruby set in the hilt. Gulien was faintly surprised none of the Tamaristan soldiers had stolen it. Maybe Prince Gajdosik had meant that as some kind of empty courtesy toward a defeated king.
King Osir looked mildly interested and mildly annoyed. That was false—a mask. Gulien knew that none of his father’s real thoughts or emotions were out on the surface. One always had to wonder what was hidden behind the king’s indifferent gaze. Then one started to be afraid of what might be hidden. The king created that effect that on purpose, of course. It worked on everyone. Even on Gulien.
Gulien could not meet his father’s eyes. He gripped one of the golem’s spikes to steady himself. His other hand was shaking, and he tucked it into his belt. He said quietly, “Golem, move one step closer to the stairs and then stop.”
He was sure the golem would not respond. But it did. It took one precise step closer to the base of the stairs, and then it stopped. Gulien let out the breath he had been holding. He let go of the spike he had been holding, straightened his shoulders, and looked directly into his father’s face. He was distantly surprised to find that they were almost exactly at a level: the king at the top of the stairs and Gulien on the golem’s back.
The king began to speak, but Gulien cut him off. “The Kieba is willing to be Carastind’s ally!” he declared in a clear, hard voice that sounded amazingly confident, considering how tense he felt. “But she is not your ally, Osir, king of Carastind. She declares you have misused her gift, and now for dislike of you, the Kieba would allow any Tamaristan prince to ravage here as he pleases before she would set a hand between Carastind and our enemies!”
In the whole courtyard, there was hardly a sound. Nobody spoke. Nobody coughed. The king gazed at Gulien in mild surprise, as though at a child who spoke out of turn. Gulien wondered what his father was really thinking. His father drew breath to speak, but Gulien cut him off. “I have given the Tamaristan prince Gajdosik an hour to clear our lands!” he declared. “In another hour, Gajdosik and all his people will be gone! But we will still have men who are injured! We will still have rubble in the streets and a shattered palace! If we have time to heal our men and repair our city, it is because the Kieba has chosen to be our ally! She will not abandon us—unless we choose to be ruled by a king who has defied her, a king she reviles!”
His father took one precise step forward, to the very edge of the landing at the top of the stairs. He said, “That is enough.” His voice was flat and hard. “The Kieba does not choose the kings of Carastind.”
This one statement would probably have swayed most of the gathered people back to the king’s side, except that everyone in the city had just seen Caras conquered by Gajdosik’s swift, unexpected campaign and then seen the Tamaristan soldiers thrown out of Caras just as unexpectedly by the Kieba’s war golem. Gulien, standing high above the crowd, atop a golem made of magicked steel, with the Kieba’s white lights shining down on him, was so clearly master of the moment that no one at all moved to support the king.
“She will depose at least one,” Gulien said, not declaiming for the crowd this time, but speaking more quietly, directly to his father. “Indeed, she has. I’m sorry for it. I am most heartily sorry for it. But it’s done. It is the price of her support against Carastind’s enemies. You should have returned her artifact when she asked.”
“I have no doubt you
will hurry to do her bidding,” said his father, his contempt like the flick of a whip.
Gulien did not let himself flinch. When he looked deliberately from one of his father’s attendants to another, each man dropped his gaze. When he said, “Magister Baramis. Lord Paulin. Magister Lorren. I will see you all in half an hour, in the green map room—is that still there? Good. Lord Meric as well, if he—if possible. Captain Erren, you may escort my father to his tower apartment, if those rooms are still intact.”
All of the men he addressed moved to do as he said.
The king said nothing at all, but gave Erren a disdainful look that stopped him in his tracks and turned on his own to go into the palace. Erren looked nervously at Gulien, bobbed his head in apology, gathered up two guardsmen, and followed the king.
“He’s too shy of Father,” Oressa said to Gulien, lifting her head and straightening her back now that their father had gone out of sight. “And too full of his own splendidness, and nothing like as clever as he thinks he is. Ramak’s cleverer, but even if he were here, he’s mean and a sneak and I hate him. Kelian would do better.”
“Tomorrow,” Gulien said distractedly. He stared after their father, who was no longer in sight. “We’ll sort it out tomorrow, Oressa.”
His sister gave a little nod. “Well,” she said optimistically. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Her voice was bright and brittle again. She said, “You’re doing everything right! You see, the Kieba has forgiven you after all! But fast is better than slow.”
“Yes,” said Gulien, though he wasn’t nearly so confident of the Kieba’s forgiveness as his sister. When the war golem crouched and eased forward until it touched the stairs, he took a breath and followed the implicit command, stepping down to the stairs and holding out a hand to steady his sister as she followed him.
The Mountain of Kept Memory Page 10