The Chosen sdotc-1

by Ricardo Pinto

  Carnelian nodded.

  'Well, let us give thanks that at least we have managed that.'

  Carnelian sighed his relief as the Sinistrals carried him away from Jaspar. Behind him came dragonfly-faced guardsmen leading two blind slaves. Once they were out of sight of the pool, Carnelian settled into the gentle rhythm of his chair. They had to pass other halfway houses with their encampments of retainers. When at last they had left these behind, Carnelian was isolated in the rushing wind, watching the graven gods slip by or gazing out over vertiginous views of the crater.

  The air grew progressively cooler until Carnelian was forced to pull his robe tightly round him for warmth. The crater had become a remote floor. Several times when the stair doubled back at a northern landing, he glimpsed the disc of the Plain of Thrones. However high they climbed, there always remained a vast mass of the Pillar looming above.

  In a keening gale, they came to the Rainbow Stair's last step. Towering up behind it, the Skygate was an immense oblong of bronze studded with turtleshell sky glyphs. Carnelian's Sinistral bearers put him down and backed away to allow his Imago guardsmen to flank him as he climbed out of the chair.

  Carnelian felt a surge of euphoria. Strangely, even the thought that his father's death might soon be confirmed did not darken his mood. More Sinistrals appeared wrapped in flapping cloaks of green and black. Collared with tarnished silver, eyes averted, their half-black faces looked out from horned casques.

  Carnelian was about to shout to them over the wind when they opened a path in their midst leading to the gate. Bending to keep his cowl from blowing off, he walked along it trailing Jaspar's men. He struck the gate and waited. Glancing up he saw one of the sky glyphs hanging over him as large as a chariot. The Skygate gasped open and a thick perfumed exhalation streamed past him. He walked through. The ground shook as the gate closed behind him, cutting the wind off like a tongue with a knife.

  A cavernous hall ran off to what seemed to be the edge of a forest. Quilted with a tang of lilies, the air was pulsing. Carnelian thought he was hearing his own blood, but when he pushed his hand to his chest he found his heart was beating faster. Concentrating, he thought perhaps it might be a drum playing somewhere in the faraway forest.

  'Seraph Imago, you were not expected till the morrow.'

  The voice made Carnelian start. He turned to see the silver face of an ammonite beside him. He could not think what to say.

  'Which of the Seraphs Imago are you?'

  For answer Carnelian removed Khrusos' ring and handed it to the ammonite, who examined it, then returned it.

  'Will he that is to be Imago be joining you, Seraph?' Carnelian shook his head.

  'Fortunately, chambers have been made ready to receive you, Seraph. If the Seraph would deign to follow.'

  Carnelian reached out to stop the man turning away. 'I must see the Ruling Lord Suth.'

  The ammonite's silver mask regarded him as if he were mad. ‘Seraph, even if you were Imago, it would take days to arrange an audience with the Regent.'

  The Regent? He is well, then?'

  The ammonite shrugged. ‘Seraph, I do not understand.'

  The man hunched his shoulders, beginning to fall into the prostration.

  'I assure you that he will want to see me.'

  The ammonite made vague gestures with his hands but would not look up at him. 'Seraph, perhaps I should go and fetch one of my Masters?'

  'No,' Carnelian said, feeling a stab of fear. The Wise must not be involved. Carnelian thought furiously. 'If I had something that I wished to give the Regent, could you make sure that he received it?'

  The ammonite took a step back. 'My Masters, perhaps…?'

  Carnelian reached into his robe and pulled out the chain with his father's Ruling Ring. He snapped the chain to unthread the ring. This should be given to the Regent. It belongs to him.'

  The ammonite hesitated. Carnelian grabbed his hand and forced the ring into it. The silver mask regarded the hand.

  'Give it to your Masters if you must, but get it to the Regent.'

  The ammonite put the ring away into his robe, bowed, and then led Carnelian and his Imago guardsmen down the hall. He found a door down the left-hand side. The Sinistrals who guarded it stood aside and the door opened into a corridor of more human proportions that curved out of sight, its left wall regularly set with doors. They walked down this until Carnelian had given up counting the doors.

  At last the ammonite stopped at one, opened it a little, jerked a bow and moved quickly away. Carnelian pushed the door fully open. It gave into a long narrow chamber that had steps at the end rising to another door. He crossed to open it and found another similar chamber.

  Seven such chambers brought him to a flight of steps leading up to a more imposing door. He climbed to open it and walked into a bedchamber. Over the rattle of shutters, he could hear the wind careening through the sky outside. He returned to the door and urged the Imago retainers to make themselves comfortable, then he closed the door and went to sit on the bed to wait. The distant heartbeat was the loudest sound in the chamber. He listened to it with the taste of copper in his mouth, wondering if this was a symptom of the sky sickness.

  SYBLINGS

  My reflection was my brother

  Wheresoever I did go He was bound to follow

  (Chosen nursery rhyme)

  Carnelian skimmed sleep like a flying fish. Beneath its waves slid nightmare shadows, driving him to struggle out of the water's leaden coat up into the air. He longed for their mouths to swallow him and end the nausea of fear, but still with a slap and a flick he managed to evade each lunge and fly free, winnowing the wind, frantically rowing the air. He would see the fire in the chamber, perhaps his stone fingers, the gloom pulsing with his heart, and then first his head and then his spine would suck back into the sleeving sea.

  He was shaken awake. All he could hear was his beating heart.

  'Carnelian.'

  Impossibly, his father's voice, his father's face quivering with the drumbeat of Carnelian's heart. It was his father sitting on the bed in the flickering firelight clad in some peculiar close-fitting garments. Carnelian reached out for him and they clung to each other.

  Suth pushed him gently away and looked at him. 'Why are you here?'

  Carnelian's head throbbed. He reached up to feel for the spike hammering into it. 'My heart,' he said, not understanding how this could rhythm his father's words.

  His father frowned, looked puzzled. He turned his head to one side, listening. 'No, not your heart, the God Emperor's.' His face darkened. 'Why are you here, my Lord?'

  'I came to…' He saw the Ruling Ring on his father's finger and pointed. 'Good, they gave it to you.'

  His father looked at his ring, frowning. He rubbed his finger over its cypher and showed Carnelian the ink stain on his skin. Carnelian felt that his father's eyes were seeing into his head. This is not the time to examine what has transpired in the coomb, but be assured, my Lord, that you will have to provide me with a full account. Now, why did you come?'

  The ache in Carnelian's head made it difficult to think. 'Your letter-'

  'Contained nothing about your coming here.'

  Carnelian began shaking his head but stopped when it increased the hammering.

  The look in his father's eyes softened. 'You are in pain, my son?'

  'Just an ache… The letter you sent purported to be from you but was written in another's hand.'

  'I should have explained that in the letter. The drugs the Wise have been giving me-'

  'Your wound, Father!' Carnelian felt sick that he had forgotten it.

  'Do not concern yourself. Under their supervision it heals well enough.' Suth rifted trembling hands. 'But you see how it affects me?' Carnelian stared at his father's hands. They looked so frail. His father rested them on his knees. 'What did you hope to achieve by coming here?'

  To discover if you were still alive. To make sure that Aurum was not using your…'
r />   '… corpse?' His father snorted a smile. Then his face hardened again. 'What part has Jaspar played in this?'

  'How do you-? Of course, his people outside. Are they suffering like me?'

  His father made a dismissive gesture. 'Not as much as you. Why are they here?'

  Carnelian grimaced. 'It was the only way I could think of getting to court.'

  His father's eyes narrowed. 'Who put this idea in your head?'

  Carnelian considered it. ‘Spinel, I suppose.' 'Did he indeed. Was it also his idea for you not to come as yourself?'

  Carnelian nodded.

  His father rolled his eyes. 'What price did Jaspar ask for aiding you in this farce?' 'None.'

  'Do you really believe the Lord Jaspar would do this from kindness?'

  'His father's murder made him my natural ally.' 'What do you mean?' 'Ykoriana murdered his fath-'

  Suth slapped his hand over Carnelian's mouth. 'You must not make such accusations,' he hissed. 'Here, you must take care even when speaking that name.' He looked round as if there might have been ears lurking in the shadows. 'We are in the very heart of her power.'

  'Still. You can see what I mean, Father?'

  'What you suggest is utterly impossible.' 'Ammonites…'

  'No. The Wise would never conspire with her to give her the leverage to topple the Balance.'

  'Surely you could not imagine that any of Jaspar's household would have dared such an act?'

  His father shook his head. There is another suspect.'

  'An enemy among the Great?'

  'Someone much closer to home.'

  Carnelian thought it through. His jaw dropped. 'His own father …'

  Suth nodded slowly, giving his son time to let it sink in. 'While we were crossing the sea, she gained control of Imago, and with him their faction.'

  'But to kill his own father… surely he will be punished.'

  Suth made a sign of doubt. 'If there were proof, the Wise and the Clave together would send him for ever into the outer world… but he will have left no proof.'

  Carnelian saw again the crucifixion. 'Even now he washes away his guilt with their blood.' Carnelian shook his eyes free of the nightmare and looked at his father. 'Why did he bring me, then? To curry favour with you?'

  'No, to make me vulnerable through you.'

  Carnelian sagged and his head felt close to exploding. Then I must return immediately to the coomb.'

  That would change nothing. The damage is done, but perhaps we can still turn this to our advantage. Whether you stay or go you must remain here at least until you have recovered from the sky sickness.'

  'Jaspar did warn me but I chose not to listen.'

  His father smiled. 'It is better to be free of him. Besides, by tomorrow it will have gone.' As he stood up,

  Carnelian noticed that he was clutching his side. Suth caught his look. 'It spasms sometimes, that is all.'

  Carnelian reached up to touch his father's arm. 'I would rather stay.'

  'We would hardly see each other. The machinations of the election are interminable and alas, I am at their centre.'

  'I would find ways to amuse myself.' That is what I am afraid of,' his father said through a crooked grin.

  Carnelian did not recognize the mask his father put up to hide his face. Its right eye sprayed sun rays over the cheek and forehead. Wearing it, his father could have been an angel peering down indulgently upon the little world of men.

  'I shall dismiss Jaspar's men and leave some of my Ichorians to make sure you are not disturbed. They will attend to you. In their presence you may remain unmasked. While I am He-who-goes-before they perform the function of our tyadra. Please, do not leave this chamber until either I come myself or send a summons. Will you do that for me, my son?'

  Carnelian nodded, smiling, but his smile crumbled as he watched his father's painful walk across the floor. Turquoises and iridescent blues streaked across the opening door. For a moment Carnelian glimpsed the two half-black men standing guard outside wearing the lictors' golden fish-scales, then the door closed. As he lay back, it felt as if his head were being nailed to the bed.

  Carnelian found that if he paced about, the pain in his head became more bearable. The shutters drew him with their fevered shaking. He ran his fingers up the bright crack where they met. The smooth wood led his touch up to a cold mechanism. Bringing his fingertips to his nose, he could smell bronze. He brought a lamp to see the handles, then yanked them down. The lock clicked and the shutters slapped against his hands. As he opened his arms, air and light broke over him like a wave. For moments he was blind and blinking but then a round shape formed in the glare: the Plain of Thrones. Beyond lay the Skymere's fading blue. The looser curve of the Sacred Wall hardened up from its edge. Over it, the Guarded Land was a patchy lilac layer squeezing away under a colourless sky. He was so high that he imagined his outstretched arms were wings lifting him soaring above the crater of Osrakum.

  Next day, Carnelian was fretting. He had thrown the last of the sickness off as he slept. With his vigour fully returned, he regretted the promise he had made his father. The chamber felt like a cage. He climbed out of bed and was putting more wood on the fire when there was a knocking at the door. Eagerly he grabbed his mask, hid his face and bade whoever was outside to enter.

  A two-headed monster came into the chamber. Carnelian backed away, looking round for something to use as a weapon. The monster kneeled on its three legs and bowed its heads. 'Seraph,' two voices chorused in Quya.

  Carnelian pressed his mask to his face to see the creature better through the eyeslits. His head jerked up as another of the creatures came into the chamber. This was four-legged and its two abdomens each had its own head. It was carrying a long box with the outermost of its four arms.

  'Seraph?' said the monster still kneeling in front of him.

  Carnelian looked down. It was offering him a letter in its tattooed hand. He reached behind his head to tie on his mask and then he took the letter gingerly, as if the hand offering it were fanged. Keeping an eye on the creature he turned the letter and saw that it was sealed with his father's Ruling Ring. He broke it open and read:

  Carnelian. Hopefully, you will have recovered. I have sent syblings to prepare you and then to convey you to me.

  He heard the door closing and looked up to see that the second monster had disappeared. The box was in the middle of the floor. He looked again at the first monster, still kneeling. 'Please… please rise.'

  As the creature rose up onto its three legs it looked up at him and in the firelight he saw it had a pair of beautiful girls' heads. One was tattooed and had eyes of jet like wet tar; the other was unmarked marumaga honey with living eyes that caught the light. They might have been two girls of heated wax pushed together so that their waists and touching legs had melted into one. The left of the pair was all tattooed. Tiny glyphs poured their ink down from her head, swirled her shoulders and arms, one leg and half the one she shared with her sister. Under her gleaming tattoos the continuation of her sister's golden skin showed like cracks in a glaze. The eyes of the unmarked girl moving down his body made him aware of his nakedness.

  He blushed behind his mask. 'You… you are syblings?'

  Their heads inclined together. The living-eyed one flashed her pearl teeth in a grin. Her jet-eyed sister frowned. 'Why yes, Seraph.'

  'I had heard of you… in fairytales, but…'

  'Fairytales?' The living-eyed sybling giggled.

  Her sister hesitatingly touched his hand with hers. 'See, we are flesh and blood, Seraph.'

  'You are…?' said Carnelian, still feeling the fading warmth of her touch.

  'We are the Quenthas.'

  'Both of you?'

  'I am Right-Quentha,' said the living-eyed sybling. She slipped an arm around her sister's shoulders. 'And this is Left-Quentha, my better half.'

  Left-Quentha gently slipped her torso free of her sister's arm. 'Will the Seraph allow himself to be prepared?'
>
  Carnelian managed a nod.

  The syblings walked round their middle leg to turn to face the chest. They knelt. Their outer arms pushed back its lid while the inner ones began fishing inside. Carnelian gaped as all four arms began taking objects out, laying them in a crescent on the floor. Their movements reminded him of spiders walking. They stood up and turned. Right-Quentha had a smile on her lips. 'Would the Seraph be so kind as to stand here?'

  Obediendy, Carnelian moved to the spot her golden hand suggested. She produced a copper mask green with verdigris and carefully placed it over her face. One of her sister's hands helped her tie it on. As all their arms rose up to remove his mask, Carnelian was relieved to see the copper mask had no eyeslits. He looked from one to the other as they cleaned him. It would have been difficult to believe they were anything other than two girls standing close together, except that their arms moved with such a confounding, cuttlefish co-ordination.

  'Are there many… people like you, here?' He blushed again.

  Left-Quentha jerked her hand back from his cheek as if she had felt its burning. 'Does the Seraph mean Ichorians?'

  Her sister's copper mask turned to her. 'I think he means syblings.'

  The other frowned. 'You must not speak about the Seraph as if he were not here.'

  'I was asking about syblings,' Carnelian said quickly to demonstrate he had taken no offence.

  Left-Quentha unstoppered a jar that exhaled sickly myrrh.

  Carnelian groaned. 'Do we have to use that?' The Law demands it, Seraph.'

  Carnelian submitted and they began painting him with the gum.

  'We form four cohorts, Seraph,' said Right-Quentha. 'Of attendants?'

  'Of blood guards, Seraph. We also are Ichorians,' said Left-Quentha, touching the silver collar at her neck.

  Carnelian looked at their delicate melded body showing the first sweet swellings of womanhood. 'But… you are women, and… and…'

  'And one of us is blind, Seraph?' said Right-Quentha, as they bent together to pick fans up from a cloth they had laid out on the floor.