by Warren Fahy
Tecwyn and Acceber bayed as Nil’s black stallion, Indigo, answered them outside the castle doors. Mountain hounds with opal eyes and long maple fur, they both glanced back at Lelinair guiltily. “Shhh!” she scolded them as they ran skulking down the stairs, wagging their tails low as the porter raised the bolts.
Nil slipped through the door and they bombarded him as he exchanged a few jovial sarcasms about the weather with Rumbard.
She watched from the stairway after visiting the larder for a cup of warm milk to help her sleep. She had been padding back upstairs in her deerskin slippers and mink-lined robe when the dogs had bolted past her.
Nil had not visited in many weeks, preoccupied with his mad pursuits in his squalid shipyard. She sometimes looked at it from the Even Tower through the powerful spyglass her father used to view the heavens.
She scoffed now and took a step back up the stairs as a tear spilled from her eye and splashed her lip. She tasted it, and swallowed it bitterly, wiping her cheek. Inside her pocket she felt the sharp piece of lightstone she had hurled from the Even Tower a year ago.
She had searched for the crystal for three weeks in the rain. Then, when the clouds finally broke for an instant, a pink ray fell on the grass near the temple and she had seen it. She plucked the half-pebble like a flower off the grass and held it to her breast. It had been eleven years since they broke the pebble and in that time her half seemed to have grown twice its original size. Its jagged fracture was too impossibly intricate to ever fit with Nil’s half again now.
Nil rolled the hounds with his outstretched arms and roared like a bear as he lowered to his knee, letting them plaster his beard with a few licks. “Up,” he said, lifting his arms, and they stood on their hind legs until he brought down his hands. “Good girls!” Nil reached into his coat pockets and produced boiled hamhocks wrapped in paper, one for each.
It was past midnight. What was he doing here, Lelinair wondered scornfully. What would possess him to take Indigo out on a night like this, with the roads treacherous and sliding down the hillsides into the sea?
Nil noticed her then by the candle that she forgot she was holding. He strode quickly toward her. “Lelinair! Wake Poladoris and Teldon. Rouse the house! We have news from Trevin. Go now! There’s no time to tell it twice.” He squeezed her shoulders, and it was purely for Ameulis that he urged her, she sensed, and she allowed it only for that reason. But as she hurried up the stairs, she resented Ameulis.
Nil and Rumbard lit a few lamps in the conservatory and stoked the fires, and Rumbard made coffee and brandy ready as Lelinair rallied Castle Martharr to wakefulness.
Senjessi and his wife, Merania, had been staying at Castle Martharr ever since he was attacked. Some of Blox’s hired thugs had waylaid Senji on his way home nearly a year ago. They had pinned the old artist down and cut off his right hand at the wrist.
It had been a dark day, indeed, for Ameulis, though the Nekkrosites, as Blox’s supporters were called, had openly celebrated the deed, for they had denounced Senjessi’s art as obscene and too attached to the Hala world.
Thanks to his young wife’s quick resourcefulness, Senji had survived, and yet the tool he used to link his spirit to this world was gone. Merania was his right hand now, and she completed her tutelage by finishing her husband’s final masterpiece in one of Castle Martharr’s great rooms.
Senjessi and Merania led the drowsy crowd who now arrived, rubbing their eyes and tying their robes. Old Poladoris looked especially groggy. Bushy-haired Teldon yawned as he straggled along with his wife. Artimeer ambled along in a black and white robe, and last to arrive, diminutive and dour-faced, came the Queen Mother, who wore an elaborate sleeping hat over her high-braided hair, and a blue, white and red silk robe. For Nardleen had accepted the customs of royalty and wore her regal raiment well, like merely a new uniform. Still the same practical woman beneath the ostentatious trappings, she legitimized them more than they legitimized her. She chose the chair beside Lelinair near the fire as the rest of the midnight company fanned out before the hearth.
Rumbard served coffee and brandy as Poladoris grumbled, “Why in Hala did you wake us, Nil?”
Everyone else grunted.
“Forgive me,” Nil said. “Word has come from Trevin. He is trapped in the Lightstone Tower beneath the sea. Trapped, I say again for foggy minds, and barely clings to life as we speak!”
“How come you by this news?” Senjessi asked.
Nil produced a package from his pocket, unwrapped the paper, and showed them all a red minnow. The scorched letters of Trevin’s message were clearly visible on the fish’s silver scales.
“What in Hala?” exclaimed Nardleen.
“Sea creatures bearing the King’s message have been found. This fish was caught today by one of my men, who was fishing on the Lightstone Jetty. The same was emblazoned on the back of a green turtle. Word has been passed among the captains and dock masters that any like messages be disposed of at sea lest one of Blox’s eyes see it. The inscriptions are all the same: Trevin claims he has been tricked by an ancient enemy, just as Artimeer supposed.”
“Let me see that!” said Senjessi. Nil handed the fish to him and the painter took it with his left hand as his wife Merania held a magnifying glass up to his eye. “Trevin says he was trapped by Drewgor himself!” Senjessi read the scales.
“You should not say that name, Senji!” Merania said.
“Oh, bah,” Senjessi scowled. “We’d better start saying it!”
“Let me see it, Senji,” Artimeer said. “Trapped in his tower under the sea… extraordinary! Yet he must believe he might yet be rescued.”
“Captain Bohtum has donated his crew and put out word for more volunteers,” Nil said. “We should have a few dozen new hands, I wager, by the time I return. We are working through the night and need materials of all kinds to finish the Sea Mare.”
Lelinair gasped. “No…”
“Good,” Poladoris said, glancing crossly at his daughter. “The time has come, alas. Do you think she’ll be seaworthy in time, Nil?”
“With help.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Senjessi said. “I will give you enough gold tonight to buy much of what you need.”
“And I will send men with you tonight with enough gold to cover the rest,” Poladoris agreed. “Tomorrow, many will avail their gold and services to the Sea Mare.”
“No one can know all of it, and Blox can hear none of it. The Congress…” Nil shook his head.
“The Congress tomorrow!” Poladoris sighed. “We must all attend and betray no sign of what we know. Our best chance is if Blox has no cause for suspicion.”
“Then let us retire and look well-rested,” Senjessi said. “We know what to do.”
“I’m going back to the shipyard,” Nil said. “I will meet you all on the southern verandah of the Congress Hall beside the skull of Knot.”
“You’re going back tonight? You’ll break your neck,” Lelinair said. “You idiot!”
Nil looked at her with faint surprise. “Indigo will take care of me. The second coin gilds my way even through the cloud. Can you arrange for your couriers, lord?”
“Yes. Rumbard, go rouse the stable master and have him pick his best horsemen.”
The plump old porter trotted out with a wave.
“I’ll have the gold brought down to you. Go make sure your horse is watered and not warming up too much. Better yet, take my new charger, Star, and a couple men-at-arms.”
“Yes, I will, and many thanks, my lord. Indigo probably misses his stable after tonight’s run. And Lelinair.” Nil smiled at her.
For a tiny moment she smiled back at him before her lips melted bitterly. “I won’t stand for this!”
“Lelinair!” Poladoris scolded. “What in Hala is chewing your toes? For the love of Ameulis, we must all do what we can. You, as well, as a Congress member tomorrow.”
“I will not do a single thing to aid in Nil’s suicide even if it means
letting this whole forsaken country fall in ruins.”
Poladoris gasped. “You could not mean it!”
“Ameulis be damned if she would take him from me. I will not sign your death warrant, Nil Ramesis. It is I who should be Lelinair Ramesis, Father, and not Nil who should be Nil Martharr! Have you not seen it?” A thing her father could not recall ever seeing on her face since she was a child, a tear, provided the exclamation point to her proclamation. She turned her face and ran from the conservatory.
Poladoris gave Nil a puzzled look.
“You old fool,” Senjessi muttered.
“What’s that?” Poladoris pointed at Senji. “Speak up!”
“It’s before your eyes for 20 years and still hasn’t drilled through that thick skull of yours?” The old painter shook his head pitifully.
Lelinair’s mother found Nil wandering on the beach below Castle Martharr when he was six, the only survivor of a terrible shipwreck. The Martharrs reared him as their own with their own twins. Nil always felt a third wheel between them, though never because of their malice. When he kept his real father’s surname upon coming of age Poladoris attributed it to an admirable loyalty to his parents. But it was his undying love for Lelinair that had required it.
“Yes… wait… Senji, if you suspected, why did you never mention it? I’m cross that you did not!”
“Nil never showed it, but Lelinair did,” Merania said. “A woman doesn’t avoid seeing or speaking to a man for ten years unless she loves him like happiness itself.”
“Oh, Nil showed it, all right,” confirmed Nardleen.
“I never saw,” Poladoris said.
“Pathetic,” said Senji.
“Father, it is true,” Nil admitted, bending on one knee. “They all saw what you have not.”
“Am I dreaming? So do dreams reveal much to closed eyes,” said Poladoris. His owlish eyes were teary now and his sharp features melted as he regarded Nil anew. “Whether you are my son by one law or by another makes no difference.” Poladoris glanced after his daughter. “I will speak to her…”
“Please don’t, milord! Where is the red minnow?” Nil asked. “We should burn it in the fire.”
Eyes searched the room as the hounds gnawed their bones.
“Too late,” Teldon said. “Tecwyn must have eaten it.”
“Very well.” Nil’s coat steamed as he stood with the great fireplace at his back. “I will see many of you tomorrow.”
He swallowed the rest of his coffee and brandy and then knelt before Poladoris. They shared a look of father and son that would never change, and then Nil rose.
Nardleen, Neuvia’s mother, moved forward and took Nil’s hand.
“My lady,” Nil said.
“Thank you, Nil Ramesis,” Nardleen said, and she kissed his brow.
Rumbard rushed into the room. “Lord Martharr!”
“What?” Poladoris asked.
“Lelinair has taken Indigo! She’s ridden off into the storm.”
“Blast!” Poladoris said.
“I’ll go after her,” said Nil.
“No, my son. Indigo will not let her be followed. I would not stop her. You have more pressing business tonight.”
“Until the morrow then,” Nil said, and Tecwyn and Acceber groaned as he buttoned his greatcoat. “Good night!”
Blox sat in his office in the unfinished mansion he was building on a hill that overlooked the Hall of Congress. He surveyed the Gulf of Gwylor in his window that was lit by intermittent lightning. Pieces of the great bay appeared like fragments of a bronze shield.
The good Lady Martharr had retired after her long ride over the highlands.
Blox had graciously extended his hospitality to her and stabled her splendid stallion. When the time was ripe, he had another agenda for the spirited and lovely Lelinair.
For the moment she had forestalled those plans by her unexpected loyalty. On the table before him lay a smelly red minnow she had delivered, inscribed with the King’s message.
A week after Trevin sent his message, he decided to finally venture down into the tower.
He put on a thick tiger coat from his dressing chamber and descended the spiral stairs in dread.
All the rooms and all the things in them were cast in a cobalt blue glow.
It was soothing not to have the world plunged in the red twilight of the Cronus Star, despite his peril. Trevin wandered with his yellow candle now and poked into the forgotten libraries, bedchambers, parlors, hallways, galleries and baths. This was the extent of his world now, and he found himself curious about it for the first time, though he realized that Drewgor could probably see him wherever he went.
Some rooms were strangely undisturbed and others thrown completely askew. There were knickknacks Ameulintians had left behind, reading spectacles on an opened book of court etiquette, a silver platter on which a petrified wedge of cheese and dusty crackers were displayed. Some rooms seemed to be haunted; he glimpsed shy specters in their shadows. And he glimpsed a red phantom walking through the walls more than once.
The cold sliced through him and set into his bones as he reached the lower floors. When he got to the first floor he was relieved it was still dry.
He felt himself drawn to the throne room and made his way down the curving corridor, opening the door.
A blue-green lacework of light undulated in the walls. He climbed the stairs of the dais and sat on his throne, looking at the great doors sealed by Neuvia’s purple shield that held back the sea. But even as he took hope from the power of Neuvia’s will, a dark crack streaked the lightstone over the doors and two thin spouts of water arched high onto the floor.
The candle was burning now.
The highest spout grew slightly stronger, reaching farther out onto the floor.
Without the Scepter he was powerless against such forces. Without the Scepter he could not even go to Wynder.
The waterspouts grew weaker, as though Neuvia’s incantation were struggling against the ceaseless power of the deep.
He left the throne room and went to the larder, where he raised all the tins of food, dry goods and fresh water he would need. He bade them follow him in a train through the air as water spread over the floor of the corridor.
As he climbed the stairs with supplies in train, he tried to calculate how long it would take for the sea to fill the tower, which quickly became too dreadful to contemplate.
He deposited his provisions in the three floors below his bedchamber. And then he climbed the ladder to his room and closed the heavy trapdoor.
He touched one of the fragments of the Cronus Star to the floor, and a patch of lightstone glowed. He crossed his legs on the floor and rubbed his hands over the hot spot.
Gazing through the ceiling, he saw the surface of the sea glisten moonlight far above.
Chapter 18
The Congress of Ameulis
The rigid clouds sifted a silver drizzle over the tarnished city of Gwylor.
Months of rain had washed the colors from the capital that occupied the delta at the head of the great bay in the southern coast of Ameulis. The same force that had carved the valley in which the city nested had chiseled the vast gulf’s majestic palisades.
Nil Ramesis commanded an impressive view from where he stood on the marble verandah of the Congress Hall, which glistened at the edge of the precipice overlooking Gwylor. A tributary of the Thurnal River called the Feather plunged in white thunder over the cliff to the east of the Hall as the highlands sloughed off the ceaseless rains. Below, the swollen Thurnal River threaded the city’s many stone bridges and filled the canals and the fresh water estuary along the embarcadero. The overspill poured from the embarcadero through hundreds of stone waterspouts shaped like jolly fish that deposited sand and carved channels on the broad beach.
The city’s sewage passed through deeper tunnels that led through culverts to either side of the three-mile Lightstone Jetty to the edge of the deep sea.
Nil observed the pi
ers and wharves lining the city with a forest of masts along the embarcadero. Then he closed his eyes and gripped the stone balustrade, breathing the cold air to revive his blood.
“Pondering glory, Nil?” came a voice behind him.
Nil turned to see his old friend, Hallot, with whom he had been schooled as a boy by Artimeer and Poladoris. Hallot was a learned man who liked to flash a gilded tongue when he got the chance. He was short, beardless, and of an ample girth. His long, receding hair was clasped in a chestnut brown rope behind his head.
“How did you know?” Nil said.
“You usually are,” Hallot said. “It’s not a risk to wager that somewhere Nil Ramesis is dreaming of his name engraved in the halls of resplendence.” Hallot smiled to see Nil blush. But Hallot’s smile was sour. “Someday you will find that glory unattainable. Perhaps today, my friend.”
Anger sprang to life in Nil’s heart as if it had been waiting for something to shape it. “Have you heard something, Hallot that I have not? If you have, pray tell!”
Hallot was taken aback. “What could I have heard, Nil?”
“Rumors of Blox and what else?” A steel point glinted in the mariner’s eyes.
Hallot stirred uncomfortably. He enjoyed a solid rank in the Congress, having been a member in good standing for five years, so he was careful. “I have heard many rumors, Nil.” Hallot’s face became sad as his eyes sank. “Some say Blox has corrupted Rishen, our own schoolmate. Did you know?”
“We have all heard,” Nil said.
“Well. I myself wonder if Ameulis is really ill-served by Blox. He is so consumed by mercy for the unfortunate. And think of the wrong that Trevin does us. I am not sure how to weigh good and evil anymore. All seems gray these days, does it not?”
“Why have you carried your heart and your mind and your voice to this place if you do not intend to say something, Hallot?”