by Nat Russo
“If you are indeed Religarian, you would do well to mention it now.” Donal said. His gaze swept downward at Mujahid’s robe. “You favor their…mode of dress.” He looked straight into Mujahid’s eyes without lifting his head.
This wasn’t about Religar at all. Mujahid dressed like a Council magus, so Donal would think him sympathetic to the archmage. He would have to quell this fear immediately.
“I merely seek sanctuary within your borders.”
That should grab his attention.
“Sanctuary?” Donal smiled. “You’ve missed your mark by about three hundred miles. The Pinnacle is in the Sea of Arin.”
“It’s the Pinnacle I need sanctuary from, Majesty.”
Donal lost his smile. He leaned forward in his chair. “Clear the court.”
Definitely grabbed his attention.
The doors shut with a loud crash, Donal spoke. “You are leaving me with few choices. I need to know precisely who you are and why you’re here.”
“I was an acquaintance of your Majesty’s kingly father. He was known for his sense of honor and fairness. Unusual quality for the first king of a dynasty. I was sad to hear of his passing. But the king I see before me assuages my sadness. A powerful man rules in Tildem.”
“I would prefer your identity to flattery, magus.”
Mujahid straightened in his chair. “Then know that I am Mujahid Lord Mukhtaar, banished Prime Warlock of the archmage Kagan.”
The king’s face lost some of its color.
“Need I remind you that necromancy is outlawed in the three kingdoms, Lord Mujahid? Mukhtaar Lord or no, if the archmage closes the temples, the people will revolt. Tell me why I should help you, and choose your words with care.”
“Many years ago I was granted a prophecy by the goddess Shealynd,” Mujahid said. “I believed in the fulfillment of that prophecy for decades.”
“You no longer believe?”
“May I ask your Majesty how much you know about the creation of the Great Barrier?”
“An armada of Barathosian ships threatened Erindor, and the archmage created the barrier to keep them out. He blamed the attack on necromancy and outlawed the old religion. I’ve read the histories.”
“I’ve lived the histories,” Mujahid said. “They’re incomplete. Did your father tell you of the infant who disappeared when the Great Barrier was formed?”
“A rogue necromancer kidnapped the babe. Some say you were that necromancer.”
“The child was kidnapped, but not in any manner you or the chroniclers suspect. The boy was taken to another world by a force I do not yet understand, and returned to us by that same force.”
Mujahid recounted Nicolas’s story. Donal appeared awestruck that Nicolas was gone forty years, but seemed to age only twenty.
Donal stood and paced for a short time, furrowing his brow. His expression became deadpan once more.
“What I’m about to show you could bring about the downfall of my dynasty,” Donal said. “I trust you’ll see we hold each other over the same barrel.”
Mujahid felt a release of power, and for a moment he expected an attack, but no attack came. A crackling sound filled the room, and an undead penitent appeared from nowhere and stood before Donal. A brief struggle registered on Donal’s face as the penitent raised its arm over its head to strike. Mujahid embraced power, preparing to expel a wall of force.
The penitent lowered its arm and backed away.
Mujahid sat in stunned silence before finding his voice. “I was correct in more ways than one when I said a powerful king rules in Tildem.”
Donal was a necromancer, and that changed everything. But Mujahid was concerned. Donal had awakened to his power, but his skills were no better than a novice.
“You lack control,” Mujahid said.
“I have had no one to guide me other than a letter from my father. I would appreciate your wisdom, Lord Mukhtaar.”
“This explains your position on necromancy,” Mujahid said. “My first advice to you, King Donal, is tell no man about this unless you are certain you can trust him with your life. As for my second advice…you may find it disturbing.”
“Speak your mind.”
Mujahid told Donal about the army setting up camp across his northern border.
Donal swallowed.
“Do not lose hope just yet, Majesty. There is still time to gather information and deal with the real threat.”
“I know of no greater threat to my kingdom.”
“If you sever the head of a snake, its body withers and dies.”
“Did you find anything in the Great Library?”
“I must speak with the Bishop of Arin. He knows something he hasn’t shared with the rest of us.”
“The bishop is an approachable man.”
“There’s a complication,” Mujahid said.
Donal cocked his head.
“I discovered this information in a secret history of the order,” Mujahid said. “It’s a wonder the book was there. Were it not for your librarian, Saul, I would have never thought to search for it. The idea of finding—”
“What did you say?”
“It was in a secret history. The order will never divulge—”
“No. The librarian,” Donal said. “The Great Library of Rotham did, indeed, have a librarian named Saul. He was my tutor when I was a child. But he’s been dead for ten years.”
Mujahid recalled the feeling of nausea when he met Saul. But Saul was flesh and blood.
“Majesty, with respect…the man who stood before me was alive. I am sure you know enough of the art to understand how I am certain of that.”
“I’ll pay a visit to the library myself. If my old dead tutor is roaming the halls, I would know of it. In the meantime, I can assist you with the complication you mentioned.”
“I would be indebted to you, Majesty. That is no small thing.”
“I’ll have quarters prepared close to mine. A sealed letter will arrive there shortly. Present it to the Bishop, seal intact. It should loosen his lips for you.”
“Thank you, your Majesty.”
“About that debt you spoke of,” Donal said. “You mentioned my skills lack control?”
Mujahid smiled and nodded. “I will train you personally, Majesty, throughout the length of my stay in your city.”
King Donal nodded and left the audience chamber.
Mujahid had never met a ruler worth protecting…until today.
Mujahid waited in his quarters reeling from the knowledge that Donal was a necromancer.
A Tanmor king who was a necromancer was precisely what the world needed right now, and Mujahid was certain Zubuxo would have known that decades ago.
Zubuxo’s hand was all over this. A Mukhtaar Lord could offer his clan mystical protection, but a king could offer political protection. And sometimes political protection was more valuable.
It didn’t take long for the sealed letter to arrive, which was a relief. He was anxious to be off for the Temple of Arin.
Every couple of blocks he saw another stack of rotting corpses, which, he was told, the people had taken to calling death piles. He had to cover his nose and mouth to protect himself from the fetid odor whenever the wind would shift. Religious law forbade cremation and mass graves, but certainly leaving a pile of decaying bodies in the street was worse than violating a moral code of questionable origin.
Two guards pulling a wagon approached the rotting stack and started loading it with bodies.
Finally. Someone is doing something.
“Where are you taking them?” Mujahid asked.
“Where do you think?” A guard said. “The Orm.” He lifted the legs of the next corpse as his partner grabbed the arms.
Mujahid had a hard time concealing his shock. “These are people. You can’t dump them in the river like trash.”
The guard looked at Mujahid. “You been living in a cave? The Death Collectors take them. We load the barges, and off they go to th
e gods know where.”
“Why aren’t they buried? Don’t their families object?”
“Don’t you get it? Quakes are killing people faster than we can collect the bodies. The temple priests can’t keep up with the funerals. If you want to be helpful, grab an arm or shut up.”
“What about—” He almost said the undead. With necromancy outlawed, a prime source of manual labor was no longer available.
Mujahid passed two other death piles on the way to the library, but he saw no other wagons.
He tried to refocus on the task at hand. He needed a cool head and a discerning eye.
Similar to the Great Library, the Temple of Arin shone like a white gem in the otherwise filthy streets. Great stone buttresses leaned against the sides of the Temple as if the builders thought it might fly apart. Crenelated towers, slightly taller than the main building, surrounded the temple, and the entire structure was crowned by three domes, the center dome being the largest. A statue of the Great Helm of Arin rested on top of the center dome, almost as large as the dome itself.
The smoky interior offered some respite from the smell of Rotham. Candles made from fragrant insect wax gave off a mild honey scent and cast ethereal shadows that danced around the marble columns lining the nave.
Quartz panels, stained in numerous vibrant colors, lined the temple’s apse and formed a mosaic of the god Arin, resplendent in his golden helm and armor. A multihued orb rested at Arin’s feet, and the spiraling iridescent colors on its surface reminded Mujahid of how they swirled around the surface of the real orb.
Chanting priests brought his attention to a funeral taking place in the apse. The bodies of several people lay across a table while the priests performed some invented ceremony designed to assuage the grief of the friends and loved ones.
In days past, a necromantic funeral—a real funeral—would take place in a temple of Zubuxo. Surviving members of the family would be allowed to communicate with the deceased, if the state of the corpse didn’t make such an act unseemly. But now the temples were gone, destroyed during Kagan’s Great Purge of necromancy. Arin’s temples became flooded with people who had questions the Arinian priests couldn’t answer.
Mujahid reconsidered. He would have to show these priests more respect. Their job was more difficult than his, because they possessed no real power.
The ceremony ended and Mujahid began the long walk down the temple’s nave. The Bishop and priests started toward the sacristy, a room used for ceremonial garments and vessels, but when Mujahid approached, the bishop stopped and turned.
“May I be of assistance, Magus?” the bishop asked.
Mujahid had to look twice. It had been forty years, but he recognized the man as Archbishop Jonathan Kalim, General Superior of the Order of Arin. The archbishop once ran the largest community of Arinian priests in Erindor, at the High Temple on Pilgrim’s Landing, until Kagan claimed authority over the temple and banished the archbishop.
An expression of surprise appeared on Jonathan’s aging face. “I know you. But no, he had a twin. Forgive me sir, but may I presume it is Nuuan Lord Mukhtaar that stands before me?”
“No, Excellency,” Mujahid said. The look of relief was obvious on Jonathan’s face.
“Mujahid Lord Mukhtaar,” Jonathan said in a hushed voice. “I wouldn’t believe it if I didn’t see you standing here with my own eyes. You survived the Purge.”
“I wish our reunion was under better circumstances. I come to you for clarity on a matter I’ve recently become privy to.”
“I will try,” Jonathan said, shrugging. “My aging mind may not be up to the challenge, I’m afraid.”
“You’re as clever as you ever were, I’m sure, Excellency,” Mujahid said. He was under no illusions about the archbishop’s mental capacity. There was a fine line between religion and politics, if one existed at all, and a man didn’t rise to the top of his order if he wasn’t a master politician.
Jonathan smiled, but Mujahid knew his friendly demeanor wouldn’t last.
“What do you know of the Great Debate?” Mujahid said.
Several of the priests gasped, and Mujahid offered them an innocent smile. On the list of things he enjoyed in this life, surprising people was near the top.
“Forgive me, Lord Mujahid.” Jonathan’s face became an expressionless mask. “You’re straying into territory I cannot assist you with.”
Mujahid handed the archbishop the sealed document from King Donal, making sure the Tanmor royal seal was visible.
Archbishop Jonathan read the letter and looked up.
“There is a reason that information is privileged, Lord Mukhtaar.” The anger in Jonathan’s voice was unmistakable, and he waved the letter at Mujahid. “These are matters not meant to be discussed outside of the order. If you have a shred of decency, you would reconsider your request.”
“I’m usually a decent person. But I’m afraid you caught me on a bad day.”
“I’m tempted to have you removed, necromancer, and deal with the king myself. He was probably misled by your air of authority. There is no greater god than Arin.”
The archbishop threw the royal letter at Mujahid’s feet.
Mujahid stepped toward the archbishop until he could feel the man’s breath on his face. “I wish to neither reveal your order’s secrets, nor use them against you. But if you don’t give me the information I seek, I’ll slit your throat and take your secrets from your corpse. Then you’ll discover just how expensive the sins of a priest are.”
A bead of sweat rolled down the archbishop’s face and splashed on the ground next to the letter.
“Leave us,” Jonathan said over his shoulder.
When the last priest disappeared behind the veil of the sacristy, Jonathan faced Mujahid. “Ask your questions.”
“Why did the Order refuse to help the Pinnacle?”
“We acted in your defense, you know.”
“Me?”
“We knew the archmage planned to outlaw necromancy, but none of us understood why. Not until he requested the use of the orb. There can be no purification without necromancy, everyone knows this. I’m no fool.”
“Why did he need the orb?”
“Some of us deduced he intended to channel a new form of energy — vitapotency—into the orb. He believed it would stop the Barathosian Empire.”
Mujahid raised his eyebrow. “Channeling energy into an orb of power is usually ill-advised.”
“The Orb of Arin is the only means we have to verify the authenticity of the god’s communication scrolls. As far as we know, if the orb were destroyed, Arin may not be able to communicate with us at all. We could not allow him to have it.”
“Yet he has it.”
“The Pinnacle guard overpowered us and took it by force. Archmage Kagan commanded our silence.”
Mujahid remembered entering the Grand Sanctuary with Kagan during the Rite of Manifestation all those years ago. The orb shouldn’t have been there…but it was.
“Was that what your order refers to as the ‘Last Word of Arin’?” Mujahid asked.
Jonathan shook his head and frowned. “No. You don’t understand at all. As far as we know, communication with Arin ceased forty years ago.”
“That’s not possible.” Tithian’s chilling words returned…The last time you saw the gods was the last time I saw them.
“We may not possess mystical powers like the priests of Zubuxo, Lord Mukhtaar, but we do recognize our god’s voice when we hear it. And I can assure you, his voice is not to be found in any Pinnacle proclamation since the formation of the Great Barrier.”
“This…no. You must be mistaken.”
“There is something you should see.”
Jonathan turned and headed toward the sacristy.
Mujahid picked up the king’s letter and read while he walked.
Archbishop Kalim,
You may find yourself reticent to divulge the information requested by Lord Mukhtaar. You have my understanding and s
ympathy. I do, however, caution you against refusing. The climate at the Pinnacle is not conducive to good health for renegade bishops.
His Majesty, Donal Tanmor.
Mujahid was going to get along well with this king. He tucked the letter into his robe and followed the archbishop.
The sacristy was a long, rectangular room, ten feet wide by twenty feet deep. Incense and the honeyed scent of candle wax hung heavy on the air from centuries of constant ritual. But there was another smell that caught Mujahid by surprise. Wood. A lot of wood.
An ornate maple cabinet, with inset cherry borders and copper fixtures, hung on a wall above a long mahogany counter. A matching mahogany kneeler, inlaid with gold leaf images of Arin and the Great Orb, rested beneath it next to the counter. A reddish-brown hickory wardrobe ran the length of the opposite wall.
The wood in this room, if divided and sold, would feed Clan Mukhtaar for a century.
Jonathan side-stepped the kneeler and opened the cabinet, taking from it a large cherry box covered in gold and silver filigree. The ends of two maple posts stuck up from the top of the box, which Jonathan was careful not to catch on the rim of the cabinet. He kissed the filigree pattern, and then carried the box to the mahogany counter, where he unlatched a locking mechanism and opened it. Inside the box a fabric scroll wound around the two carved maple posts, which Jonathan also ritually kissed. He took the scroll from the box and laid it down on the counter as if he were handling a precious egg. He reached under the counter to a mahogany shelf and retrieved a collection of loose parchments. He set them on the counter next to the scroll and rolled the maple posts apart.
“The wood you’re ogling is nothing next to this,” Jonathan said. “This is the most valuable relic we possess. Within this scroll are the collected words of our god, spoken throughout history at the Rite of Manifestation, and verified by the Orb of Arin. Every time Arin speaks during the Rite, the scroll expands. When the Orb is present, the words change from black to gold.”
Mujahid smirked. “You’re telling me that with a quill and some ink I could take control of your order?”