by Mary Gentle
"Thirty-Six, you’re my brother. I thought I could trust you!"
"You could. You can."
A black beetle crawled in the dust on the cathedral’s back step, abandoning the rubbish piled in the corner of the door. Masonry chilled his back where he leaned against the door-arch. Candia tensed. His body shuddered, shuddered uncontrollably; the thin beam of wood falling from his hands to the paving.
"I know exactly how many people died at that hall. I can tell you their names." He shut his eyes, dizzy; opened them again to a blue-stained sunlight, and Sordio’s sweating red face. "It was better that some people should die now than most of the District die later. We had to take that decision. That was what we said. It’s better—"
He swallowed with difficulty.
"Damn you, do it, then! Here I am. I’m telling you, the Lord Decan could wipe you out like that." His boot crunched the black beetle into a chitinous smear. "And what are we to them? They wouldn’t waste time sorting out who’s in the House of Salomon conspiracy and who’s innocent. Remember Fifth District? A massacre!"
Somewhere, far away, a clock struck the quarter-hour.
A spar cracked across Candia’s hip and stomach. He screamed. Two men moved in with fists. He staggered, tried a spin and kick; fell forward into Sordio’s grip, gasping.
His brother’s fist sank deep and hard into his stomach. Candia bent double, vomiting. Water blurred his vision, and he clamped his eyes shut.
Far above, a rustle of dry wings electrified the noon sky; and a line of blood incised itself across the inside of his eyelids. A distant mockery hissed in the sun.
—Twice traitor!—
"Clear the chamber," Captain-General Desaguliers ordered. "Move."
Sleek black Rat Cadets split up, crossing the great clover-leaf audience chamber. Desaguliers took up a stance under the vaulting of one intersection, watching ambassadors complain: Ger-zarru-huk protesting volubly, leaving at last with two cadets gripping him firmly under the arms, his tail lashing; the Candovard Ambassador forcing his own contentious prince from the hall.
His scarred face creased, the smile sardonic.
"Messire, the generators? The human servants?"
Desaguliers picked his incisors with a neatly trimmed claw. Unlike the Magi, Lords and priests, he wore severe black sword-harness and studded leather collar.
"Leave ’em," he directed the young cadet. "His Majesty’ll spit blood if the precious lights don’t stay on. When this is over, sling ’em in gaol for a week or two, until they forget they ever heard anything here today."
The Cadet smartly touched her silver headband.
Desaguliers shoved through the press of bodies, checking for humans. The hot curtained morning brought a shiver to his spine. Premonitory, his scarred face creased into a frown. His black eyes, anxious for once, sought through the crowded ranks for a red jacketed priest: one among many.
"Plessiez," he muttered.
Hands resting on his plain sword-belt, he strode towards the dais and the King: narrow powerful shoulders thrusting a way between black and brown Rats. The four sets of double doors clanged shut. Cadets slid lock-bars into place, then moved to position themselves against the walls. Heat slicked Desaguliers’ fur up into tufts. The noise and confusion of two hundred nobles, Magi and priests washed over him, and he wiped the fur above his eyes.
"Secure." He made a low bow at the foot of the dais.
The Rat-King looked up from ordering pages to clear the silks and cushions, several pairs of eyes turning towards Desaguliers. The Captain-General’s spine stiffened. Standing on the lowest step of the dais by one silver-furred Rats-King, Plessiez folded sleek hands and smiled.
"Messire Desaguliers."
"Your reverence."
The actinic lights brightened. Desaguliers heard a thong crack at the back of the hall, and a treadmill creak faster. Points of hard light shot back from diamond collars, from rings, from sword-hilts and from the black eyes of Rats. The smell of heat and fur made his snout tense rhythmically.
Lords Magi took their places in the first rank of the circle surrounding the bed-throne, and he moved a step aside as the seven Cardinals-General joined them. Across the room, he met Cardinal Ignatia’s gaze, vainly searching for some hint of the future.
The Rat-King stood, one brown Rat offering a hand to the bony black Rat, the rest rising with some dignity.
The knot of their tails stood out stark, scaled, deformed. With one movement the assembly bowed. Desaguliers, straightening, saw the Chancellor crack her ivory staff against the tiles.
"Hear his Majesty!"
All voices silenced, the only sound came from the hum and spark of the generators, the creak of the turning treadmills. The Rat-King stood in a circle, each Rat facing out across the assembly. Pages hurriedly finished draping the shoulders of each with cloth-of-gold cloaks.
The bony black Rats-King spoke.
"Captain-General. "
Desaguliers bowed, hands resting on his plain sword- belt. "Your Majesty desires?"
"It seems Messire Plessiez survived the attack from the Fane."
Tension and the fear of ridicule walked hot shivers up Desaguliers’ spine. He glanced around, tail twitching. A few faces showed incomprehension. His eyes swept the Lords Magi and the Cardinals-General, seeing knowing smiles.
"Yes, your Majesty."
Desaguliers made a low bow, going on one knee on the dais steps. His sword-harness clashed. That and his studded black collar were his only ornaments: a lean ragged black Rat in middle years. He lifted his head to meet the Rat-King’s gaze.
"We should have been most interested to discover—"
"–what was said at that hall," a brown Rats-King concluded. "But you could not tell us, messire."
"You could not tell us," the bony black Rats-King smiled, "that we knew of Messire Plessiez’s mission. That he had our authority."
Desaguliers studiously kept his face turned away from the little priest.
"I’ve done my best to investigate," he judged it safe to say.
The black Rat glared down at Desaguliers, who began to sweat.
"Messire Plessiez made it clear just how long you were present at that meeting, before the Fane’s acolytes attacked. You heard all of what was said there, and thought fit not to inform us of that fact."
Desaguliers’ whiskers quivered. His dark-fingered hand clenched by his side.
"We don’t care to be deceived. We think that such an offense deserves summary dismissal—"
"–but that the little priest’s evidence is not unbiased," one of the silver-furred Rats concluded sardonically, leaning over from the far side of the circular bed. He fixed Desaguliers with eyes dark as garnets. "We might advise you to prove your innocence, messire, and in fairly short order."
The jabber and laughter of the Lords Magi and nobles washed over him. He rose to his feet, and nodded once sharply: "As your Majesty wishes."
The bony black Rats-King turned his head, searching the ranks of nobles, Lords Magi and priests. Desaguliers breathed hard, sensing a respite but no escape.
"Cardinal-General Ignatia."
The elderly female Rat stepped forward from the six other Cardinals-General of the Church, straightening her emerald-green robe.
"Your Majesty, I must protest at this sudden action of Messire Plessiez. He has been acting entirely without the authority of the Order of Guiry–"
"He has acted at all times with our authority and full knowledge."
"I don’t understand, your Majesty."
Desaguliers smoothed his whiskers down, studying Ignatia’s genuine bewilderment. A hot temper flared in his gut, and a fear. Whispered comments in the crowd located the fear: that something so obviously long-planned could occur without Desaguliers’ police knowing of it.
The bony black Rats-King waved one hand, rings flashing in the artificial light.
"It seems to us," he said mildly, "that the pressures of the generalship of the Order of G
uiry stand between you and your excellent scholarship, Cardinal Ignatia. We therefore promote a new Cardinal-General into your place, to enable you to spend even more of your valuable time in the Archives."
Ignatia opened her mouth, closed it again, and fell to grooming the fur of one arm for a few seconds. Desaguliers caught her eye as she looked up, her gaze now lusterless.
"As your Majesty wishes. Who is my successor?"
Under his breath Desaguliers could not help muttering: "You must be the only one in this room who doesn’t guess!"
"Messire Plessiez," the black Rats-King said sardonically, "we invest you Cardinal-General of the Order of Guiry. Remembering always that poor service merits loss of such a position."
Plessiez’s head turned. He stared directly at Desaguliers.
The Captain-General’s temper flared. "I think his Majesty has no reason to complain of my service!"
In the crowd, several people sniggered. Desaguliers bit his lip, straightened and, having walked into the priest’s trap, chose bluster to see him through it. He swept a curt bow to the black Rats-King.
"I do think you have no reason to complain of any service. If your Majesty doubts me, my resignation is tendered now, this morning–this moment. Let St. Cyr have the Cadets."
The silver-furred and the bony black Rats-King exchanged glances. Desaguliers stood with his spine taut. One hand caressed the hilt of his sword. His black eyes flicked to each one of the Rats-King, bright with calculation.
"Yes . . ." The silver Rat smiled. The black Rat continued: "Yes, we agree. For a while, Messire Desaguliers, we accept your resignation. Order Messire St. Cyr to us after we have spoken to this assembly. It will be politic to have him conduct this investigation. You will resume your post when proved innocent of any deception of your King."
Desaguliers opened his mouth. His jaw hung slack for a second; then snapped shut.
"Furthermore," a black Rats-King said, "St. Cyr is to have the overseeing of the artillery garden. Send your imported architect to him as soon as is convenient."
Desaguliers gave the briefest bow and turned away, not waiting for a dismissal. Fury scoured him. He shouldered past five or six Rat-Lords. Their laughter cauterized him.
At the far end of one clover-leaf, by the barred doors, he abandoned caution and summoned one of the Cadets with a fierce look.
"We must move earlier than I expected."
"Messire?"
"St. Cyr is to have the cadets." Desaguliers’ scarred face twisted into a smile. "You might say I was fool enough to give his command to him . . . Next time I’ll make sure Plessiez is a corpse. Call the others together. We’ll meet at noon. All plans will have to be advanced. Pass word on."
The tall black Rat bowed, and slid away into the massed assembly.
Desaguliers caught his breath with some difficulty, stared down the dozen or so Rats nearest to him; and then cocked his ears as the brass horns rang out again, silencing the assembly.
"We have called you here, also, to witness the promulgation of a new law."
The taller of the silver-furred Rats-King spoke, voice dropping into the expectant silence. His incisors showed in a smile.
"It is not our intention to explain our policy, but to be obeyed in what we say.
"For the immediate future, and for however long it may chance to pass–"
"–and because we are a generous sovereign, wishing nothing more than to be loved by our people—"
"–we hereby revoke the penalties of treason and conspiracy outstanding against the human rebels now fugitive here in the heart of the world."
A rumble of protest rose up into the vaulted roofs.
Desaguliers stared across the heads of the crowd, between translucent ears and nodding feather-plumes. The bright gold-cloaked figures of the Rat-King spangled light back, dazzling the assembled nobles.
"Therefore," continued the other silver-furred Rats- King, his voice proceeding with the slightest possible stutter, "and as a gesture of goodwill, we promulgate the following law: that all men and women under the gold- cross banner of the Sun may be permitted to carry weapons in the streets and dwellings of the city."
"Never!"
Against the crescendo of shouting, the Rats-King said something to the Chancellor, and that Rat slammed her ivory-and-garnet staff against the tiles and cried out: "This audience is over!"
Lights dimmed, cadets wrenched curtains open, and sun and air poured in. Desaguliers pushed through the dazed assembly to be first out. He caught one glimpse of Plessiez as he went. The little priest stood on the dais steps, deep in conversation with the silver-furred Rats- King, smiling.
The carriage drew up outside one of the smaller and older of the Thirty-Six temples of the Fane. A clock down in North quarter struck quarter to the hour of eleven.
"Shit," said the White Crow.
A granular sea-mist grayed the stone cornices and columns. The air below the mist made street-level humid, warm as bathwater. She hooked one bent frame of her spectacles in the V of her buttoned shirt, and pushed the brim of her hat up.
"I don’t think this is one of your better ideas," she remarked, dismounting from the carriage. Its springs creaked as the Lord-Architect got out after her.
"What’s more—"
She turned her head to add another word of disquiet and stopped.
The Lord-Architect Casaubon ponderously moved to position himself beside the rear nearside wheel. The White Crow’s jaw slackened as he unbuttoned the flap of his blue silk breeches, reached down, stared absently back down the hill, and urinated fully and at some length over the wooden wheel-spokes.
"Oh, really!" The White Crow’s exasperation gave way to laughter. "There is a time and a place to exercise ancient privileges, and this isn’t either one of them!"
Mist dissipated. Above the cityscape gliders flicked brilliance from their wings, circling about a central column of air.
"Nervous," Casaubon explained, buttoning himself up.
"You?"
"Wait for us," the Lord-Architect directed the carriage-driver.
The White Crow took a pace. Shadow fell cool across her back, where her linen shirt plastered sweaty skin. As if it were a talisman she raised her hand to her nostrils and inhaled human odors of heat.
A hooped arch broke the Fane’s brown brick wall. Stepping under it, she saw other arches in other walls opening off to left and right. Across a small courtyard, an arch’s bricks burned tawny in sunlight. Beyond, another lay in shade.
"Well, then."
She stretched all fingers on both hands, palms taut, flexing sinews, in a gesture that she did not remember to be one church’s Sign of the Branches. After that she tipped her speckled hat back slightly, and glanced up at the Lord-Architect.
"Suppose we leave this until another day?" she suggested.
"Suppose we don’t."
Brief shadow cooled her in the archway. In the small courtyard, heat bounced back from the worn brickwork. Silence drummed on her ears. Glancing back, the White Crow faced a blank wall: no sign of the arch by which they’d entered. She smiled ruefully.
"That one," Casaubon said.
She walked towards the further archway. The Lord- Architect’s blue satin frock-coat brushed her arm at every pace. Her left arm. Her right hand swung free, and she reached up to touch the hilt of her sword, and smiled to herself again.
"You never did miss a trick," she observed.
The sky overhead curdled hot and yellow. Storm-lightning flickered above the windowless brick walls, almost invisible in the bright day. White Crow matched Casaubon stride for stride, through three enclosed courtyards: ears tensed for any noise, eyes searching for any movement.
Her saliva began to have the metallic taste of fear. Sweat made her skin tacky at elbow and knee joints, above her lip, and on each upper eyelid. She reached up and pulled her sword from its sheath.
"Valentine."
"No. I need to," she said. White sun flashed the length of
the blade. Its grip fitted into her palm; and the weight of its pull on her shoulder felt comfortingly familiar. Anxiety tensed her back, prickled down her vertebrae.
She grinned.
"Last-minute rescues." Her voice bounced back from the bricks of a fourth enclosed courtyard. "Frantic escapes, reprieves on the gallows-steps, victory or defeat at the final instant, on the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of the eleventh day . . ."
Casaubon’s copper hair gleamed as he nodded. "In short: the Decan of the Eleventh Hour."
Urgency and excitement radiated back from the walls with the heat and light. With long-practiced ease she reached up and slid the blade back into her shoulder- scabbard.
She turned her head to do it, and to look at Casaubon as she spoke, walking under yet another arch of the brick labyrinth. Turning back, she stopped in her tracks; Casaubon’s cushioned arm bumped her forward a step; and she stumbled, wincing at her bare feet on graveled earth.
The heart of the maze of the Thirty-Sixth temple opened before her.
The White Crow moved forward slowly into the large courtyard. High walls enclosed her, of small bricks once dark brown and now sun-bleached to ocher; the sky empty and sun-filled. Black dots floated across her vision. One of them landed on her arm, crawling among the fine red hairs.
"The old English black bee . . ." She raised her arm, blew softly, and the bee flew off.
"Made extinct in an epidemic." Casaubon’s hand rested on her shoulder. "Master-Physician."
All the ground lay marked in ocher and yellow and brown gravels, a labyrinth of patterns on the earth. She began to walk the knotted pattern. She did not raise her eyes yet, to see what lay in the center of the courtyard.
Black roses thrust briars into crevices of the brickwork. The pattern brought her close to one wall, and she reached up to touch: black stem, black thorns, black petals; cold as living onyx or jet. The tiny bees swarmed about her. Their noise filled her head. She reached behind without looking, left-handed, and Casaubon’s hand enclosed hers.