“We had an agreement,” said the she-demon. “We were on the same side.”
Alron nearly laughed. He bit it off in time, and struggled for a moment to contain his mirth. “Please,” he finally managed, “you must understand my position. I can only fight the fights that I can win. I assure you, it pains me to see that horrid buffoon Steiner gain command of the Army of Torovan, and with the archbishop's blessing at that. The coming years shall be dark indeed for my house, as we shall be forced to pay obeisance to uncultured heathens at every turn. House Steiner's power in Petrodor shall grow, and there shall be very little I or my allies can do about it…” he shrugged, “I have struggled very hard to prevent such an eventuality.
“And yet, here we are. The archbishop beseeches the people to make war on Saalshen, and I cannot very well go against the archbishop, can I? He says the serrin are the enemy, he makes the believers of Petrodor and Torovan believe the serrin are the enemy…should I sacrifice my house, my family and partners in trade for Saalshen? Would you sacrifice Saalshen for me and mine? I think not.”
“They say in Petrodor, it is death to break a deal.”
“My Lady,” Alron said with exasperation, “you are not being reasonable. House Maerler required an alliance with Saalshen in the short term because, although it pains me to admit it, the southern stack is a lesser stack than the northern one. Then, that alliance served some useful purpose. Now, it simply cannot be. I am very sorry that you feel betrayed, but…” again, he shrugged, “this is Petrodor, my Lady. The archbishop was nicely contained until he and some other assorted thugs of Steiner's started murdering the counterbalancing priests, and so he comes to this, the incitement of the crazed and desperate masses. You have suffered their wrath, my Lady, and I am sorry for it. Surely you could not expect me to volunteer for the same fate?”
It seemed that the serrin actually smiled beneath her silken handkerchief. Her snow-white hair was covered too, leaving only the green eyes visible, hovering in the dark.
“Fear not, dear Alron,” she said. “All is not lost.” She reached into a hidden pocket and withdrew a gleaming, golden object. Tossed it to him. A weight landed on Alron's middle. He looked with a frown…and his eyes widened. It couldn't be. “It is yours now,” she said mildly. “You can do with it as you please. Should you proclaim to lead the Army of Torovan to replace the star in the Enoran High Temple yourself, I am sure that many would follow.”
“You utter fool,” Alron breathed. He did not reach for or touch the golden object. He wished to, but his hands refused to move. “What have you done?”
“I have given you power, Patachi Maerler. Power such as Marlen Steiner does not possess. Nor, indeed, the archbishop.”
“You've started a war.” Alron stared at her in disbelief. “Steiner and the archbishop will rally the dukes and burn the southern houses to the ground when they hear of my possession. They…they've…damn it woman, look what they did to Dockside, all to reclaim this one golden trinket!”
“Fear not the archbishop,” Rhillian said softly, almost pleasantly. “His days are now finished. Another shall soon take his place, and if we do not like his propositions either, perhaps another, and then another.”
Alron shook his head slowly. His heart galloped like a frightened horse. “You…you didn't.”
Rhillian shrugged, a faint motion of the silver sword in the dark. “I sent my most capable person. I am standing here before you. I assure you, these days the archbishop is far more lacking of faithful protectors than you are. Many of his own people liked him not.” The sword-tip tapped the golden star, gently. “So surprised, Patachi Maerler? So shocked? What's another little assassination between Petrodor adversaries? One of you would have done for the archbishop soon enough.”
“That is a business between the men of Petrodor!” Alron insisted angrily.
Rhillian nearly laughed. “Oh, but you invited us to play, Master Maerler! Do not be such a poor sport. One can hardly complain if one invites an acquaintance into a game of dice and the acquaintance ends up taking all of your money. And please, do not think of denying you have possession of the star. You have on your staff several agents of Steiner, as you surely know, but one of them is actually an agent of ours. Already she has told Steiner that she has seen you in possession of the star.”
Alron stared down at the golden weight on his chest. Beside him, a girl with only a little time left to live watched on in mute disbelief. Rhillian sauntered closer. “Think of the power, Master Alron,” she whispered. “Long have you chafed at the brutishness of the Steiners. You fear to lose, but what if you win? What if the faithful rally to your cause? What if it is you who leads the victorious Army of Torovan into Enora and returns the holy star to its rightful place after two hundred years of absence?”
Alron wanted to touch it. He wanted to feel its weight so badly that his fingers itched. “I have Duke Abad of Songel,” he said slowly.
“You have Duke Abad,” she agreed. “He told me of his loyalty himself. And the Duke of Cisseren.”
Even in the dark, the symbols on the golden disk seemed to glow enticingly. Alron Maerler's fingers traced their outline in the air above…Ancient Enoran. The Scrolls of Ulessis themselves were written in Ancient Enoran.
“Flewderin are disinterested,” he said slowly. His heart was beginning to pound, but for a different reason than fear. His father and grandfather had dreamed of great prestige for Maerler and the southern families of Petrodor. The prestige of respect and glory, not of wealth and gaudy trinkets. Would his forebears have flinched should providence have delivered such a gift into their hands? Were they looking down from heaven even now, damning him for his cowardice? What a gift this was! The she-demon was a pagan, after all, and surely had no true concept of its significance. “You yourself have talked with Duke Rochel of Pazira?” He looked up, eyes burning with possibility.
“I have. Many times. Duke Rochel is most displeased at the prospect of war, and dislikes Patachi Steiner intensely, as you know.”
“Neither is he a great friend of mine,” said Alron with a frown.
“It is well known that the proud blood of Rochel takes unkindly to the perceived usurpers in Petrodor, be they northern or southern. But it is clear, Patachi Maerler, that if there were one patachi alone to come to prominence in Petrodor, he would prefer it to be the least powerful of the two. As you have so honestly admitted to me just now, that is you.”
Alron nodded slowly. “He feels he can control me more easily than Marlen.”
“But you will have the star. Such power is difficult to control. The champion of the masses, you will be. Think on it.”
Patachi Maerler took a deep breath. He looked up and smiled. “M'Lady Rhillian,” he said. “I thank you. You may go.”
His fingers closed on the cold metal chain. Immediately, the trembling stopped.
Alexanda Rochel threw his mug of tea at the wall. It struck the stone and bounced, splashing tea over a garden painting, then across an upholstered chair. The messenger-a soldier of Captain Faldini's-stood in the doorway, and said not a word. Alexanda put both hands into his thick, untidy hair and tried to come to terms with the calamity of the message. A teacup was not enough. He picked up the whole tray and threw it with a clatter and crash of breaking crockery. Then he threw a chair.
Varona entered, wide-eyed, her hair falling haphazardly from her half-completed style, tied up with curlers and pins. A pair of young maids hovered behind, anxious with hot irons in hand.
“Alexanda?” Varona looked angry at first then dismayed as she saw the broken crockery. Her husband could be ill-tempered, but he rarely broke things. Then, as she gazed at him, she began to feel frightened. Alexanda stared at her, bleakly and rubbed at his face.
“Patachi Maerler has the star,” he said at last, tiredly.
Varona stared at him for a moment. “I'd heard…” she ventured. “I mean, Elisa was just saying that she'd heard…someone saying that the archbishop was dead?”
Alexanda let out a long breath. She didn't understand. She was a damn sight smarter than many of the men who thought to advise him, but she was from a different world.
“Yes, the archbishop is dead,” he said wearily, leaning heavily on the tabletop. The table was all set for breakfast, rows of ornate plates and cutlery gleaming in the morning light. A breakfast with his favourite earls and their wives, a rare pleasure. He should have known better. “Of course he's dead, our girl Rhillian is sweet and civilised on the surface, but she's certainly no saint. If someone had ordered a massacre of my friends and family, I'd have done the same and worse.”
“You think Rhillian killed the archbishop?” Varona looked shocked.
“Her or one of her talmaad. It makes no difference, dearest, that's not what's important here…”
“Rhillian could never do such a thing! She's…she's such a sweet girl, and she respects human customs all too much!” Alexanda sighed and looked at the ground. Varona came close, upset and clutching the Verenthane medallion about her neck. “I…I heard that he'd been killed horribly, Alexanda! Elisa heard…she heard that he'd been…that he'd been…”
“He was found in very small pieces piled into a bucket, yes,” Alexanda said flatly. “The bucket was found on his bed, the archbishop's hat perched on top. There were guards standing watch outside his chamber. They never heard a thing.”
“There won't be enough for a proper burial coffin,” Varona breathed, horrified. “The rites will be…I mean, his soul…”
“Whatever soul that man had deserves hellfire and damnation for what he ordered,” Alexanda told his wife grimly. He took her hands in his. “He was not a true Verenthane, my sweet. Do you understand that? He was an impostor, and he betrayed every true believer with what he did.”
“But…but to kill a man of such stature in that way…I'd…I'd have thought the serrin had more principles!”
“The serrin are pagan, my dear. Principles mean different things to them. Just because they're well-behaved in polite society doesn't mean we should mistake them all for saints. They're also very frightened. The forces arrayed against them are formidable, and set on the annihilation of their entire people. Worse yet, Rhillian's friends were massacred before her eyes. Imagine you should see such a thing happen to me, to Bryanne, to Carlito and-”
“Oh Alexanda, stop!” Varona glared at him, horrified. “I will not contemplate such a thing!”
“What would you want to do, dearest, to the man who ordered it?” Alexanda gazed at her firmly. There was fear in his wife's lovely eyes. Fear and concern. Dear gods, he loved her so much. “Varona, Patachi Maerler has the Shereldin Star. I have no idea how, but perhaps some suspicions. He has declared himself its rightful guardian, and invited all who follow its cause to unite behind him as leader of the Torovan Army on the grand crusade.”
“And what will you do?” Varona asked fearfully.
“I will do what I have to do,” Alexanda said. “I will do what I've been desperately trying to avoid since the first moment I arrived in this gods-forsaken city. I will pick a side.”
Barely had the barricades been abandoned than they were being manned again. Grim, tired Docksiders stood in rows, improvised weapons at the ready. As late afternoon shadows fell across the incline, upper Petrodor was burning. Sasha sat atop a Dockside roof and polished her sword. There were fires everywhere. Famous houses were ablaze. Smoke blackened the sky and, when the wind shifted, there would come loudly the screams, shouts and clashing steel of battle.
A man climbed out the trapdoor nearby and sat beside her. It was Bret, his previous thin beard now shaved to allow easy access to a shallow cut on his jaw. He gazed up at the battle.
“They're not fighting with sticks and knives up there,” he observed.
Sasha kept polishing. The blade was so brilliant now she could see her reflection.
“They say Rhillian gave Maerler the star,” Bret added when Sasha did not reply. “Makes you wonder why Maerler didn't just have his brother priest bring him the star, if he wanted it so badly.”
“Some priests have morals,” Sasha said darkly. “Some serrin don't.” Bret just looked at her, long and wordlessly. Sasha kept polishing, crosslegged on her chair. “Maerler's a damn fool. Even Patachi Steiner didn't try to take possession of the star directly. He at least knows no one will ever confuse him with a saint.”
“Patachi Maerler has always been a proud and vain man,” Bret agreed. “Patachi Steiner is just greedy. Rhillian must have decided to chance Maerler's vanity.”
“Her opinion of humans is at its lowest ebb,” Sasha muttered. “And we keep fulfilling her expectations.”
“What do you think she intends?” Bret asked, nodding toward the conflagration. It would take months, Sasha was sure, for the smell of ash to wash from the Dockside. “I mean…what does this gain her?”
“She wants to see Petrodor bleed. She sets humans at each other's throats. She hopes there'll be nothing left with which to fight a war.”
“She's mad,” Bret said softly. “All she'll create is a single victor. And then we'll have tyranny.”
“She doesn't think it could get any worse.”
Bret shook his head sadly. “These serrin, they think they know everything. She hasn't seen anything yet.”
More to the left, a new mansion was on fire. Nearer to Sharptooth, now. The fighting seemed to be heading that way. Perhaps Patachi Maerler was losing, but Sasha knew that it was rarely so simple. More likely, the two sides would batter each other to a bloody draw. Just taking one ridgetop mansion would cost the lives of many soldiers. By the time Steiner's forces managed to smash their path all the way to Maerler House atop Sharptooth, most of the army would be dead.
A mansion's roof caved in, followed by a rumbling crash of collapsing masonry and a billow of sparks. Gasps and exclamations went up from the neighbouring rooftops. Some children sounded excited and their parents were not discouraging them. Many Docksiders seemed happy to see the upper slopes burning for a change. Sasha wondered if they'd be quite so pleased when Bret's prediction came true.
Bret looked at her for a moment longer. “Kessligh has forbidden it, you know.” Sasha gave him a blank, questioning look. “Going after Errollyn.”
Sasha returned her attention to her sword. “I'm not going after Errollyn.”
“And you'd never lie to me, would you Sasha?”
“If you're so unsure that you need to ask the question, what possible use would my answer be?”
Bret took a deep breath. “Rhillian won't hurt Errollyn, Sasha. She hasn't gone that far yet.”
“Kiel would.”
“But Kiel's not in charge, is he?”
“They're serrin, stupid,” Sasha muttered. “They don't understand the concept. Kiel follows Rhillian on the big picture, but on smaller matters he does as he pleases.”
“Sasha…wouldn't it just be better to let it all end here? Everyone's suffered enough.”
“There was a great warrior in Lenay legend named Tragelyon,” said Sasha, still polishing. “He led his people to a new land and settled them in an uninhabited valley. His neighbours didn't like it and gathered a warband to attack. Tragelyon challenged them to single combat, and drew a circle in the dirt around him with his sword. Every attacker who entered that circle died.
“That's where we get the tachadar circles from today. Tachadar in old Taasti means space, but more than space. A personal space, to which every man's honour entitles him, no matter if he is in his homeland, or travelling in a strange land. That's why we don't hug and kiss so much as Torovans do. You only enter that tachadar when invited. When stepping into the circle for sparring, we always ask permission on the other person's honour.
“I have my tachadar, Bret, even in this city. And Errollyn has his, even though he's not Lenay-he speaks it well enough, and he fought for Lenayin, he's earned Lenay honour. Rhillian didn't just spit on it, she pissed on it-mine and his. It's unacceptable.”
“But Errollyn is more than your friend,” Bret said quietly. Sasha didn't look up. “And maybe Rhillian felt, by taking him into your bed, you crossed her circle.”
“No,” said Sasha, very firmly. “You can't claim another person unless they want you to. Errollyn came into my bed by choice. He left Rhillian's service by choice. She pissed on that too.”
“Sasha…here in Petrodor, we also have tales and legends. There is one of two sisters who loved each other very dearly and both married powerful men from different families. Those families have a falling out, which turns to conflict. The carnage is great and, with each family member killed, the two sisters grow to hate each other more and more. Finally, one day, they find that all of their families are dead, and only the two of them remain…and yet, despite their families having been the only cause of their hatred, they still cannot bring themselves to reconcile.”
Sasha gazed at him. For the first time since Bret had sat down, she stopped polishing. “What happened to them?”
“They died together, each impaled on the other's sword.” Sasha swallowed hard and gazed up at the flames. “It is a terrible thing, Sasha, to fight a friend.”
“And is a friend still a friend,” Sasha asked quietly “when she destroys those things I most care for?”
“Errollyn is not dead, Sasha. Nor will he be.”
“Yesterday Errollyn. Today Petrodor. What tomorrow, Bret? For how long must she desecrate my circle and expect me to sit here on my hands and do nothing?”
Alexanda Rochel strode up the winding, firelit road and tried not to look too hard at the bodies of the dead. Ahead, a wall had collapsed, spilling brick and stone across the cobbles. Amidst the debris lay men in the colours of several southern-stack houses, and others in the maroon and gold of Pazira. Some lay locked together where they'd fallen, arms about the other like old friends. Several soldiers tried to bind the wounded arm of a sobbing comrade. Burning buildings lit the men, walls and bodies in a dancing, hellish glare, and smoke seared at the back of Alexanda's throat.
Petrodor atobas-2 Page 55