Empire Ascendant

by Kameron Hurley

  In the vestibule outside her brother’s quarters she could already hear him hacking. Two flat-headed slaves exited the room, carrying bloody linens. Those born into service were the only slaves she let care for him. Even then, rumor was difficult to quash. The Patron of Saiduan dying bloodily from a rotten liver was a hard thing to keep quiet. She pushed into Rajavaa’s quarters. His personal surgeon knelt at his side, drawing fluid from his extremities. Rajavaa was a slim man, but in the advanced stages of his disease, he had swelled.

  “Leave us,” she told the surgeon.

  The surgeon finished bandaging the wound and stood, without meeting Maralah’s gaze. When she was gone, Maralah sat at her brother’s bedside. She took his hand.

  “What can I get you?” she asked.

  He rolled his eyes at her. They had taken on a yellow tinge. “A drink,” he said, and showed his teeth.

  “You told me you stopped drinking when you became Patron. That was months ago. Yet here we are.”

  “Got the rot. Told you.”

  “Surgeon said if you stopped drinking immediately you could have–”

  “Where is Taigan? You promised Taigan could heal me.”

  “I promised Taigan, so you kept swilling a barrel a day? You’re a mad man, Rajavaa.” She released his hand.

  He moaned. “You haven’t seen what I’ve seen.”

  “I’ve seen more,” she said. She wanted to call him weak, like their mother, a man who could not stop drinking even when he poisoned his body, and the country with him. But what she saw now was not a cowardly man with no backbone. She saw the last of her kin, dying from an illness neither of them could combat while Tira was in decline, and Taigan a continent away. He would always drink. He would never stop.

  “The pass is open,” she said. “Taigan will be here soon.”

  “Soon enough?” His eyes were wide, his tone hopeful, like a child’s. Her heart clenched.

  “I thought you’d resigned yourself to die of the rot.”

  “Morsaar could not survive that.”

  She could, though, and he knew that, didn’t he? She could survive the death of everything.

  “Who will take your army, then?”

  He broke into a fit of coughing. It racked his whole swollen body. Blood flecked his lips. “Who? Who will take the army? You will take the army, Maralah. What is left of it. You keep spinning us all around, trying to avoid it. But it’s coming. You know it, don’t you?”

  “They will not listen to me. An ataisa, maybe, but not a woman. You know that.”

  “Dire times,” he said. “Times for miracles.”

  She leaned over him. “Then perform a miracle,” she said. “Live.”

  He gazed at the twining branches of the living hold that made up the ceiling, all painted in red and amber stripes. “Para is in decline.”

  She patted his hand. “Para is ascendant for another year. It will be some time before we see Sina, and without my star I am just a sanisi like any other.”

  “You could kill me cleanly, then, take my soul and arm yourself with it.”

  “You promised me at least a year. Taigan will come.”

  “You say that,” Rajavaa said. “But I don’t think it’s me you’re saying it for.” He broke into another fit of coughing.

  She needed Taigan. But would he really come when she called him? That was the fear of every master – that one day the dog would no longer answer the call.

  8

  Zezili fought her way out of her own house like a woman eager for her first bedding. She argued with Daolyn, and the dajians, and once she was on the road, she argued with the keepers of the way houses she stayed at, though most of those arguments were one-sided. The moment people glimpsed her face, they shut down, like cheap puppets with broken strings. She rode across Daorian as spring woke across the country. It was her first solo journey since her mauling, and everything hurt. When she heaved herself off her new dog in the courtyard of the Empress’s hold, her boots crunched across dead and dying plants poisoned by the hold’s fastidious dajians. She had a tremor in her left hand. She had not been able to still it.

  She was dressed for her meeting with the Empress – a short red coat embroidered in silver, long dark trousers. She wore her sword. She kept her hair knotted back, no matter that the simple style made her look like a servant. Let the world see her face.

  Zezili had spent the morning practicing in the yard of the nearby way house to loosen her up for this walk. She had burned most of the stiffness from her body. Now she pressed her left hand to her side to still the trembling.

  The Empress’s dajian secretary, Saofi, greeted Zezili outside the banquet hall. But instead of ushering her into what was sure to be a vacuous affair stuffed with pretty ministers and profiteers, Saofi said, “The Empress awaits you in the vestibule with Syre Storm.”

  “Storm? You mean Lasli, that man?” Syre Storm – given name Lasli Laodysin – was the Empress’s only male legion commander. He was not permitted to pick up a sword and do violence¸ but he could send others to do it in the Empress’s name.

  Saofi inclined her head.

  “Well,” Zezili said. “This should be interesting.” She watched Saofi’s face for any hint of disturbance at Zezili’s appearance, but Saofi betrayed nothing, as ever. Those who served the Empress a long time had to be too loyal to consider treason, or too fearful. Zezili once considered herself somewhere in between. Now she wasn’t so sure. If all went as Zezili hoped, she would never see Saofi, or Daorian, ever again.

  Saofi led her to the common vestibule outside the banquet hall, a long walk for Zezili. She was breathing heavily by the time they arrived, and paused outside the door a moment, looking for a way to catch her breath.

  “You know invaders are coming,” Zezili said, stalling. “Will you stay here in Daorian?

  Saofi’s gaze got as high as Zezili’s shoulder. “You speak as if there’s a choice for people like us,” Saofi said.

  Zezili raised her brows at that, but it was no longer worth denying that she and Saofi were different. In the eyes of the invaders, they were both dajians. Perhaps in the eyes of the Empress, too.

  “I’m not property,” Zezili said, tapping the wall. “Not like the hold. I have legs. As do you.”

  Saofi played with the bands of her chatelaine. “Don’t let the Empress think you believe that property has choices.” She opened the great banded iron door of the vestibule. The room was long and narrow. Zezili heard laughter and music from the banquet room adjacent.

  The Empress stood motionless as a statue on a dais at the far end of the room. Her mouth was a painted red smudge, drawn down at the corners. She had caked on a thicker layer of bronzer that matched the belled fabric of her dress. Her head was tilted toward Storm, who stood uncomfortably next to her at a low table near the blazing mouth of a hearth so grand Zezili could stand upright in it. Storm was a broad, tall man, easily fifty pounds heavier and two hands taller than Zezili. She despised men who took up space. Storm slouched, showing abhorrent posture, but typical for large men who sought to minimize their sprawl. When he saw her, something like relief passed over his face. Difficult to tell with the scraggly black beard he wore, but it was certainly less strained. He ceased his rambling and raised a hand in greeting.

  No one had ever shown relief in her presence, and it concerned her immediately. It meant whatever the Empress was talking to him about was far worse than Zezili’s face.

  “Syre Zezili,” he said. He winced when she stepped into the light. Ah, so he’d not caught the full measure of her face yet.

  The Empress beckoned Zezili forward.

  Zezili halted a few paces from the Empress. She stooped painfully to one knee. Bent her head.

  “I am, as ever, yours.”

  “Join us,” the Empress said, and gestured expansively to the table. On the table was a great map of Grania, and the countries it hosted – Dorinah, Dhai, Tordin, Aaldia.

  As Zezili took up her position opposi
te Storm, she saw he was sweating profusely. How long had he waited here for her? What had they spoken of before she arrived? Her skin crawled at the idea. She didn’t like being kept in the dark.

  “I’ve chosen you both to take on a most glorious task,” the Empress said. She scratched at the map with one of her gold-powdered fingers, rigid and unmalleable, like a claw.

  A tingle of fear rode Zezili’s spine. She peered at Storm. He was a good tactician – any woman would give him that – but he was barred by law from committing direct violence. Men who committed violence were sacrificed to Rhea without exception. He was dressed for a festive dinner, not battle, but so was she, and she wore a weapon. He did not. Not even a utility knife. He wore billowing black trousers and a broad purple tunic and long coat stitched in silver. Lovely work, no doubt. Both his mother and his wife’s families were terribly wealthy, and despite his size, they ensured that he dressed the part of a noble man of standing. His face was powdered in gold, his eyes lined in coal, and his black hair was carefully curled and bound in silver ribbons. Storm was not the Empress’s best asset. And Zezili, the traitor, wasn’t a shining paragon of virtue either. Whatever the Empress wanted the two of them to collaborate on wasn’t going to be glorious. Why choose them?

  The voices in the banquet chamber opposite rose. A heated argument had broken out.

  “Who’s in attendance?” Zezili asked, tilting her head at the wall.

  “No concern of yours,” the Empress said. “I have called together my many friends for a discussion of our situation. Look to your own task today. I have many pieces in motion, and your pieces are integral to the rest. I have a weapon, if you will, that has been waiting for me to awaken it. You will go south to Tordin with a force of two hundred to its resting place. All you need do is uncover where it lies and awaken it. The rest will happen in its own time.” She, too, tilted her head at the banquet room, as if in mocking imitation of Zezili.

  “How do we awaken this weapon?” Zezili asked. “Is this why you let them kill the dajians? Did you make a bargain?”

  The Empress smiled and pressed a clawed finger to her lips. Then said, “When we first arrived, my sister Penelodyn and I put this weapon in Tordin for safekeeping. Then that fat man, Saradyn, made a mess of things. A few of us had to wait for Rhea to return. Now she is rising. And we will rise again with her. Myself and my… weapons.”

  “This is a heavy responsibility,” Storm said. Zezili glanced sharply at him. He must see how suspicious this looked. Why was she sending her half-dajian and her single male legion commander to Tordin? Maybe sending Storm made sense – the man who called himself King Saradyn was said to be more sympathetic to men – but Zezili’s part in this was shadowy.

  “Why two legion commanders?” Zezili said.

  The Empress was blunt. “I expect losses.”

  “Oh,” Storm said.

  “You wish to win this war against the Tai Mora, Zezili? My dearest one, this is what I planned from the start. It is why I could sacrifice Seekers and dajians. This is was my end goal, do you see it now? I am not so strange, am I? Not so impossible to understand? You will save this country, Zezili. The two of you together will preserve Dorinah to take its glorious place in ascendance when Rhea’s eye once again beams over this world.”

  “Why send me?”

  The Empress brushed Zezili’s cheek. Zezili flinched. “You have been punished for your disobedience, but I know you acted as you did to protect Dorinah. Now the astromancers tell me Rhea is close enough that they can sense it in their lenses. It won’t be long now. You must set my weapon free.”

  “How do we awaken it?” Zezili said.

  “Storm and I have already discussed that,” the Empress said sharply. “There will be some wards that need cleaning up. I have five very special jistas who will accompany you – they have already been instructed on what they must do after you open the way.”

  “I had hoped we’d be leading a campaign to take Tordin,” Storm said.

  Zezili was glad he’d said it before her. If she could burn down Dorinah and Tordin at the same time, she’d do it.

  “All in time,” the Empress said. “As of this moment we must look to our shores. First we secure Dorinah, then we take the world.”

  “The world?” Zezili said.

  The Empress smiled. Her teeth were long, slightly yellow. “The world,” she said, and needled one of her cold golden claws into Zezili’s soft stomach. “Are you hungry?” she said absently, and sashayed to the door leading into the banquet hall. The voices had subsided. “My friends are eager to meet you.”

  Meet me and eat me alive, Zezili thought. She saw the flash of the cats’ teeth again, felt the searing pain of their claws.

  “I’m not hungry,” Zezili said.

  The Empress smiled delicately. “No,” she said, “I expect you are not.” She licked her fingers. “Guard your thoughts, Zezili. This is not going to turn out the way you imagined.”

  9

  The dying woman stank like a moldered corpse. The stink was so strong Lilia smelled her from ten paces away. Taigan stood when she saw the woman and her litter bearers approach, and drew her blade. Lilia thought drawing a blade was a foolish thing – what was the old woman going to do, bite them?

  Lilia and the caravan of refugees were still three days away from Kuallina, the great stronghold at the center of Dhai where the Kai had agreed to house and feed the six hundred until they could be assimilated into the clans. That put them just outside Clan Raona, eating rice and camping out along a very contaminated stretch of road. She had requested parajistas to accompany them, but the Kai only gave them one, and she had a very long night of running up and down the road killing virulent plant life that tried over and over again to devour the people camping along the road.

  The militia boy who had asked Lilia to cure his grandmother had met them there with a gaggle of his relatives, pulling the old woman behind them. Now Lilia stood at the entrance to the tent they had placed her in, trying not to gag at the smell.

  Beside Lilia, Gian put a hand to her own nose. “I told you it was very bad,” Gian said.

  The militia man stood well outside with his other family members. Lilia glanced back just once at him, then entered the tent where Taigan was already kneeling.

  “I’m Lilia.”

  The old woman winced. Her face was a doughy, wrinkled map. But though her face and belly were plump, her hands were withered claws. Lilia thought perhaps Oma’s breath would allow her to see some part of the woman she could not see through her other training, but when she pulled on Oma’s breath, it gave her no special sight.

  She sat back on her heels.

  “I am Mahinla Torsa Sorila,” the woman said.

  “You have pain?” Lilia asked.

  “Always.”

  Taigan leaned into Lilia, so close she nearly brushed Lilia’s ear with her chin. “You intend to heal her?” she said. “You can see it’s cancer.”

  Lilia shook her head.

  “Oma is a fickle star,” Taigan said. “You haven’t been trained. It’s like wondering why you can’t speak a word you’ve never heard.”

  “You can cure her?”

  “The cancer? I can kill it, yes. But then her body must reabsorb it. She also has arthritis, two failing kidneys, and an aging digestive system. She is, in a word, old. Bodies fail. They are imperfect things.”

  “But we can save her?”

  “For a year? Two? Certainly.”

  Mahinla raised her voice. “Girl? Lilia?”

  Lilia bent back over the woman. “What is it?”

  “May I take your hand?”

  Lilia looped her good hand into the old woman’s. Mahinla moved her arm, but did not try to close her fingers. Lilia imagined it hurt terribly.

  “My grandson is a good boy,” she said. “Takes me to good jistas.”

  “We will help you,” Lilia said.

  “No, no,” the woman said. She sighed. “I am a hundred and for
ty-three years old. It’s enough.”

  “He’s asked a favor,” Lilia said, and caught herself. What he wanted had no bearing on this woman’s wishes.

  “I, too, am asking a favor,” Mahinla said.

  “You do not consent to being healed?” Lilia said. “Why? I would give–”

  “I am tired,” Mahinla said. “You don’t know what that is, yet, to be tired of this world.”

  “But why did you–”

  “I wanted to see the girl who opened the gates of Liona.”

  Lilia glanced over at Taigan. Taigan shrugged. “I know what it is to want to die,” Taigan said. “You’ll understand one day, too.”

  It took some time to sort things out between Mahinla and her grandson. Great-great-grandson, Lilia amended. After some tears and a few soft words from Gian – who gave them each a sticky rice ball she had secreted away in her tunic pockets – they called the boy’s sisters and the three of them hauled Mahinla away.

  As they did, Mahinla called Lilia over one last time.

  “I had stopped believing,” Mahinla said, “when my granddaughter was killed on the other side of Liona. I thought Faith Ahya had turned her face from us. But she has not. She gave us you.”

  Lilia watched them go. Taigan came up behind her. “Good stories, there.”

  “Is everything political?” Lilia asked, disgusted.

  “Of course,” Taigan said. “All you have to decide is whether you’ll take advantage of it or let it run its course. In this case, I suggest you pursue it.”

  “How?”

  “I can take care of it, if you wish.”

  “You won’t hurt anyone?”

  “Not every task I perform is that crude. What do you think, Gian? I suspect planting stories in people’s ears is something you have some skill at.”

  “What do you know?” Gian said. She rummaged through her pack and triumphantly pulled out an apple.

  “Gian and I will take care of it,” Taigan said. “It’s a long way to Kuallina still, and we can spread very good stories about you as we go.”

  Lilia watched the little family trundle off into the woods.