by Glen Cook
Isabeth said, “I’ll have to inform Peter. He’ll have decisions to make. And you. You can’t waste time. Go preach to your people.”
He had other obligations, too. And might succeed in fulfilling none.
The dying man’s most dire visions had presented as the most determined futures.
And Tormond was dying. No doubt about it. He had given them a choice of three dates, all inconvenient. Two could be beaten by taking action to prevent them. Action entirely within the domain of Father Fornier.
Brother Candle suggested, “Whatever you do, be clear and don’t sugarcoat. Your husband’s choices will be hard. He deserves the best information possible.”
Isabeth considered him for several long seconds. She was no child. And she was not her brother. If anything, she could be hasty making decisions. “You accept what he told us, Master?”
Brother Candle did not correct her usage. She had done that deliberately, for the benefit of her companions. Most Direcian nobles were solid Brothen Episcopals, if openly contemptuous and defiant of the Patriarch himself. They were willing to exterminate the inquestors of the Society — mainly because those fanatics presented a threat to the nobility’s temporal power.
Isabeth was suspect religiously. She sprang from this nest of heresy. She had to tread carefully.
Brother Candle said, “I accept his visions. My creed tells me I must accept what is. The Night is. The Instrumentalities are. None of us can deny those facts because they’re inconvenient.”
Nothing he said contravened Chaldarean doctrine. So long as no one accorded the Instrumentalities any status but that of devils or demons.
Truths like that did not please the kind of soul that found completion only in a Society for the Suppression of Sacrilege and Heresy. A soul determined to coerce God Himself to conform.
Brother Candle said, “I’ve played the part your brother created for me. Which was to make sure he got his say and you people listened.”
Isabeth was skeptical.
She was a tired, graying woman who had spent her adult years enmeshed in the politics of her brother and husband. She had seen little of the stylish court life enjoyed by most women of standing. From the moment the Connec went into continuous crisis she had scant opportunity to enjoy the company of her husband or son. Who would be walking and talking and making life an adventure for his nurses, now. And whose name, Brother Candle realized, he did not know.
Embarrassed, he asked.
Isabeth rattled off a string of names. Direcians liked to get their favorite ancestors and saints involved. “But just Peter, or Little Peter, for everyday.” Wistfully.
Brother Candle got away soon afterward. Bicot Hodier accompanied him to the citadel gate. “I can’t walk you all the way, Brother. Tormond will need close watching now. He sometimes suffers after using Fornier’s infusion.”
“I understand. I know the way. I’m not senile yet. I just walk slower.”
***
The Perfect did not walk alone. He soon realized that he had a tail, a brace of rogues who did not appear to be moved by benign intent. But they suffered a change of heart soon enough. A half-dozen Direcian troopers came jogging down from Metrelieux and by coincidence seemed headed whatever direction the Perfect was.
***
“I don’t know what that was all about,” Brother Candle told the Archimbaults when they got home from the tannery.
Archimbault hazarded, “Must have been Society thugs. The capture of the notorious heretic Brother Candle would be quite a coup.”
The Perfect did not argue. Archimbault might be right. There was no fathoming the reasoning of some people. “Possibly. I need to get back on the road. Before I become a distraction.”
He could become one in a huge way.
After reaching the Archimbault home and making sure he was safe from stalkers and prying eyes, he retrieved the packet Duke Tormond had slipped him.
The contents could rock the Connec.
Within it were the ducal seal, the ducal ring of office, and a relic of Domino that had been in the Duke’s family since Imperial times. Each was an item only the true Duke of Khaurene could possess. They were the talismans of the office. Also included were documents inscribed in a tiny hand, copies of the legal instruments that confirmed Duke Tormond’s family as lords of the End of Connec. The originals went all the way back to Imperial times. Each copy was signed with incontestable sworn attests that it was an exact and true copy in every respect. Multiple signatories had witnessed every page of every document. The names ranged across the spectrum of Khaurene’s religious leadership.
The key document, the prize that could shake the world, was one in which Tormond IV legally adopted Count Raymone Garete of Antieux and made the Count his heir in all respects.
That would upset everyone. People had been jostling for position for years. Peter of Navaya led the pack. Isabeth had been Tormond’s only heir for a decade.
Adoption had not been much employed since Imperial times, when the more thoughtful emperors used it to assure the Empire of a competent successor. But adoption remained a viable legal maneuver. So long as it could be established beyond challenge.
Brother Candle considered the list of witnesses. Every man was highly respected, excepting Bishop LeCroes. And LeCroes had been rehabilitated.
There were too many of them. Honest men all, yes, moved by loyalty and the best of intentions, surely. Yet someone would say something to someone. That was human nature. The news would leak, if it had not done so already. Someone with ambition and a streak of villainy would start trying to undo Tormond’s scheme.
Thus, Brother Candle saying he had to get on the road. He needed a good head start before anyone began to suspect that a lapsed, superannuated Maysalean Perfect had smuggled the emblems of state out of Metrelieux for Tormond IV.
Brother Candle considered taking Archimbault into his confidence. Archimbault was as good a soul as they came. And the man thought better of Tormond than did most of his subjects. Archimbault could be valuable in the effort to execute Tormond’s plan. But Archimbault had a life, a wife, a family, a career, and an important role in the community. He did not deserve such cruel peril.
Archimbault and his wife both tried to talk the Perfect out of going. The Maysalean community did not want to share him. They did not like Brother Purify, who was the only other Perfect available.
Identical arguments were offered later, once the evening meeting started. The Seekers enjoyed themselves. Debate became spirited. And, to a soul, they insisted that their gatherings were never so enjoyable when the Perfect was not there to teach. Meaning, by implication, to referee.
Brother Candle put more into the evening than usual. The Seekers had to be warned that dark times would return. “The trial that’s coming will be harsher than ever the Captain-General was. The Captain-General was a gentler, more honorable man than the commanders we’ll see now. And that time of tribulation, terrible as it was, lasted only a few seasons. The next trial might last for generations. Till the last Seeker has been burned.” The Society had shown a fondness for burning heretics.
Tormond had not mentioned prolonged persecutions. His focus had been on the near future. But the crushing darkness of the deep future had been implicit in his every word.
Brother Candle finished the evening by saying, “Please awaken me early. I want to be on the road to the Altai with all the day ahead.”
He felt badly about the misdirection. Which, no doubt, would be of little efficacy, anyway. Anyone chasing him for what he might be carrying would know that he had to take it to Count Raymone. In which case, he ought to head into the Altai after all, then travel eastward through the wilderness.
***
Brother Candle reached the northernmost of Khaurene’s several gates only to find it shut. A lot of military activity was under way. There had been a bloody fight in the assembly area just inside the gate.
The soldiers and militia were not looking for an o
ld man smuggling the emblems of state. Brother Candle approached a Direcian who did not appear to be overwhelmed, asked what had happened and when the gate would open.
“King Regard’s men are outside, Father. They tried to capture the gate during the night. They had inside help. They failed. The survivors are licking their wounds but they haven’t gone away. If you want out you’ll have to use another gate. They won’t be watching them all. They’re too busy here.”
Brother Candle thanked the soldier and backed away. The man had not said so but it looked like the troops were getting ready to sortie.
He was amused by having been called “Father.” Though for a Direcian that could be a term of respect for the aged, not necessarily a title for a cleric.
Brother Candle headed for the eastern quarters. One of the gates there should let him get to one of the roads to Castreresone.
16. Other Worlds
There was no night in the Realm of the Gods. The Ninth Unknown assumed that there must have been, once. The Aelen Kofer must have taken the diurnal and seasonal cycles with them, leaving only a changeless silvery gray sameness.
How long had he been there? There were no temporal milestones. Not even the sonic rhythm of the world changed. Hunger only worked till the food ran out. Bowel movements became erratic before that. His digestion did not tolerate traveler’s iron rations well.
For a time he had concentrated on reaching the Great Sky Fortress without having to walk the broken rainbow bridge. A young warrior, a hardened commando type, might have climbed that sheer gray stone. If there were no traps and no hazards less obvious than those Februaren saw from points he could reach riding his own weary flesh.
He had to admit he was a bit past his prime.
Maybe the ascendant could make the climb without using the bridge. He could change into something built for that. But the ascendant was not here to help.
Februaren had not yet gotten a ghost of a hint of a means of opening the way between the worlds. Nor of escaping himself. No good trying to call on the Construct, either. From inside the Realm of the Gods there was no sign that great growing engine existed.
He had dropped himself into a room without doors.
He was not powerless. If anything, his sorcerer’s abilities were enhanced. But they were no help, except insofar as he could charm his stomach into believing that it had not gone out of business.
Despair did not defeat him. There was that of the “northern thing” in his character. No surrender. Battle on till the Choosers of the Slain arrived. Or whichever deathlord followed on after the Gray One’s beautiful daughters.
He prowled the dwarf town till he knew it like he had been born there. He found nothing of value or interest. The Aelen Kofer would have taken the wood and mortar and stone had they not been loaded down with night and the seasons.
They had that reputation in myth and legend.
Must be a lot of truth in the old tales. Februaren had yet to uncover a contradiction to the little he knew of the Old Ones.
But in the Night everything was true.
In time spells no longer silenced his hunger. Soon he would stop thinking logically and linearly. Something dramatic needed doing.
In desperation he fashioned crude fishing apparatus. Something lived out there in the oily gray water of the harbor. The surface often stirred to movements underneath. He had no bait. He would have devoured that long since had he been able to find anything. He made a shiny lure and stained it with his blood, then went down to quayside. He boarded the derelict tied up there, began fishing off its bow. He hoped he was a better fisherman than hunter.
He had enjoyed no luck trying to catch the few rats, squirrels, other vermin, and birds still inhabiting the Realm of the Gods. As desperately hungry as he, they were the fiercest survivors of their species, too fast for an old man not used to hard work. He thought they might be hunting him.
Not even sorcery availed him. These creatures were indifferent. Maybe they were immune, simply by always having lived inside the supernatural.
He expected no better luck with the denizens of the harbor. But in just minutes he felt a tug on his line so determined it was clear something down there was fishing for dinner, too. Februaren pulled. The thing pulled. The old man had more success. He glimpsed something like a miniature kraken. A squid. He had eaten squid all his life. Squid was popular throughout Firaldia. Too bad he had no olive oil or garlic.
This squid was miniature only by comparison to the krakens of nautical legend. It outweighed the Ninth Unknown. And had the reach on him, too. Its long tentacles were a dozen feet in length. It failed to take Februaren only because the old man had the better leverage.
The monster would not give up.
The Ninth Unknown was just as stubborn.
Tentacles slithered up over the edge of the quay. The monster began to lift itself out of the water. It turned, tried to reach over the rail of the hulk. Its eyes …
Startled, Februaren stared down at a face almost human, contorted in desperate effort. Those eyes were intelligent but mad with hunger.
It let go the quayside, hoping to topple Februaren with its weight. He did stumble but not enough to go over the rail. Just enough to see the tentacles reaching. Enough to see the water suddenly churn and give up three heads that looked almost human. Shoulders and torsos and weapons followed. Short harpoons in manlike hands plunged into the monster’s unguarded back.
Februaren surrendered his fishing gear. It was time. Time to get off the hulk, too. He watched the struggle as he went. The people of the sea were gaunt with starvation. They were weak. Though they were three and the monster one he knew they would get the worst of this. The kraken would feed.
He employed his last resources once he reached the quay, hitting the monster with a spell meant to paralyze. The spell would immobilize a human for hours. This kraken was not human. But its struggles did turn sluggish.
Februaren collapsed.
He went down with enough reason left to make sure he kept stumbling away from the water as he did.
***
Someone was singing. The voice was remote and eerie and the words were alien but the melody was familiar. It went with a love song sung first in the dialect of the western Connec a hundred years ago. Cloven Februaren recalled making love to the refrain out of the Khaurenesaine.
He smelled a powerfully fishy stench.
He lay where he had fallen, right cheek hard against cold, damp stone, palms burning from abrasions. He cracked the eyelid nearest the pavements. What he saw so startled him that he gave himself away.
Five feet away, seated cross-legged, facing him, was a young woman, singing while she worked. She wore nothing that had not been on her at the moment of her birth.
Had he the strength he would have turned away. She might be without modesty but he had his, even after all these years. But he was too weak to do more than flop and make noises even he did not understand.
The song faded into gurgling laughter.
The mer got onto her knees. Putting those together. She extended a hand with something in it. The fishy stench grew more powerful. “Eat!”
After struggling into a seated position, Februaren could see what the mer had been doing. Carving flesh from a tentacle.
He was much too hungry to worry about what that flesh used to be. Or how badly it smelled now.
His stomach would soon rebel. But sufficient to that moment the evil. He seized the food.
The girl said, “I have … been sent out … to watch. Our debt. Your spell saved … many lives.” Clearly, she was not accustomed to speaking a human language. But she did warm up quickly.
The little Cloven Februaren knew about the people of the sea he had learned from books. They could change shape and walk among men but only for a short while. Only in extraordinary circumstances would they put themselves through the pain necessary to gain legs. The change, in this case, had been perfectly mimetic. And the mer had deliberately revealed that.
She cautioned, “You don’t eat too much. Small bites. Chew, long times. Or get sick. When you get stronger, make fire. Cook.”
She spoke a dialect of the northern Grail Empire. One he had known well as a youth but had not heard in a century. He gestured at her to keep it slow. He took her advice and ate slowly, too.
She stopped needing thought pauses between words and phrases but never spoke at a conversational pace. “You are not the only sorcerer. But you are the one who had the right spell.”
The raw kraken lost its savor. Februaren supposed that was his own body telling him to stop eating. So he tried to concentrate on the girl. Without having his gaze drift downward.
She was admirably equipped, there, just a hand below her chin.
He supposed her capacity to distract was why she had been chosen to speak for the mer.
“You may think we fed you in gratitude for your help. In less desperate times that would be true. We are a peaceful, hospitable people. But that luxury has been taken from the mer who are trapped here. We feed you, instead, by way of investing in our own survival. You have legs. You can make the journey even the greatest hero of the mer could not endure.” To his frown she replied, “I cannot go far from the water. I have to return to the wet frequently. Please. Tell your story.”
Little splashes behind Februaren told him he had an audience broader than a single shape-changed girl.
He told ninety percent of the truth. And no deliberate lies.
The girl said, “We are after the same thing. The opening of the way. Otherwise, we all die. And the world of men will follow. Unless …”
“Yes? Unless?”
“We are at the mercy of the Aelen Kofer. Only the Aelen Kofer can open the way. Only the Aelen Kofer have the skills to rebuild the rainbow bridge. Only the Aelen Kofer can save the Tba Mer. And …”
The girl wanted him to ask. “And?”