by Mike Shel
Later in the hour, Lenda prophesied that the queen would soon summon Agnes and her father, and Kennah, too, to an audience. She would ask them to undertake a great task for her. The queen would provide some aid for this quest but would also have strange conditions by which they’d have to abide. And at last, Lenda gave Agnes the most ominous news: that the queen had developed a taste for human flesh, and that she had better be most careful in Her Majesty’s presence. Nothing, after all, would prevent Her Royal Highness from adding sweet and tender Agnes to her tasting menu.
When it was all over, it took Agnes well over an hour to compose herself, after consuming a little cake cooked up by the alchemists to steady her nerves—she had a new appreciation now for the alchemists. And Helmacht did his best to provide some awkward comfort. When she finally headed back to the Too-Tall Library, she nearly lost all control again the moment she set eyes on her father. He must never see the travesty she had just seen: it would murder his mind, it would tear his heart asunder. What good would his knowing of her godmother’s unspeakable, cursed existence do for him? It could only cause harm, irreparable harm. Lenda had been closer than a sister to her father, a friend to her mother, a member of their family. Her death was a blow—this was worse. Supernatural agencies were alive and playing hideous games with the world, toying with their lives—Agnes felt it more vividly than ever before.
Late on the third day of her emotional convalescence, Pallas Rae came to her cubicle, bringing with her a jug of chilled apple cider. Agnes loved it as a child, she still loved it as a grown woman, enough that she preferred it with meals to wine, making her a target of much ribbing from her Syraeic peers. The aged lictor carried it in herself, no small thing given how much she relied on the cane to ambulate these days. She poured Agnes a cupful and sat on the edge of her bed, where Agnes reclined.
“You’ve suffered much since I sent you to fetch your father, Agnes.”
Agnes didn’t answer, looking back at the old woman over the rim of her tumbler as she sipped at the sweet beverage.
“Lenda was responsible for the prophecies in the letter you delivered to your father. It was she who told us he must be brought back to the Citadel, for the events that would unfold—are unfolding. I’m sorry I could not tell you that one of the boys would be killed. But she also had told us that both messengers would die if we sent only two of you.”
Agnes scoffed. “It was stupid chance that killed Ruben. A bandit with shaky aim, younger than I was when I entered the Citadel. His death was meaningless and random. Any one of us could have caught that arrow in our eye.” Even then she wasn’t sure she believed her own words.
“Nevertheless, her prediction proved true, as did the one about the incident in Daurhim, your father’s home. Nothing she has told us has turned out false, Agnes.”
“How long has she been like that?”
“After your father brought her back to us, when our priest of Mictilin began burial preparations. We’ve kept it suppressed, of course. Only the lictors and a few other high-ranking agents knew of it. Even now the circle who know of Lenda’s existence is small, limited to only a tiny fraction of the linguists working on the Higher Djao project.”
“And what’s behind this dark miracle? Is it really my godmother?”
Rae lifted her palms up, shaking her head. “Who knows? It’s powerful necromancy, though none of our sorcerers can identify its source. She spoke to us little until we brought your father’s tumultu to her last year. Before that, I myself spoke to her only twice, soon after I was recalled from my post in the east and raised to the Lictor’s Council here. I pressed her for what I was sure were her secrets, goaded her to stop the evasive half-answers to our questions. She told me that I was impertinent, but that she would gift me with the true name of the beast that had taken my eye, thirty-seven years ago. It was a demon, in one of the Sea Lord caves in Warwede, if you haven’t heard the tale. When she whispered that name in my ear, I lost control of my bladder. I wet myself with terror. I never knew this woman in life, but from what I’ve read and heard about her from agents who did, I can’t believe that thing in the cellars is Lenda Hathspry.”
“She knows things only Aunt Lenda would know.”
Rae shrugged again. “Don’t underestimate the wiles of the Netherworld and the malign spirits who call it home, lass. She calls herself Lenda, and we oblige her. But there’s a cold…” The lictor paused, mulling over the word she needed.
“Malice?”
“Yes, malice. That captures it perfectly. She aids us now, true. But a malevolence lurks there, barely concealed. Sometimes it peeks out. And it bites, Agnes. It frightens me and haunts my dreams. As it will yours, no doubt. Forgive me for exposing you to it. Damn Olbach and his wagging tongue! If he weren’t so essential to the progress we make, I’d have him posted to the Counting House in Serekirk, rechecking translations of stelae until the homecoming of Saint Paernada. I saw no other way to shield your father from this thing. He only trusts you. I’m sorry you must shoulder this burden.”
Agnes was certain that her sleep would be haunted by this, too, though the draught the alchemists had given her provided dreamless slumber. Like every other Syraeic, she had nightmares on occasion, but strangely enough they didn’t feature what she had seen in the Busker ruins she had explored. And she had encountered some real nightmares there indeed. No, her nightmares involved her mother, hanging from a beam in their cellar, and her brother, broken in half, haunting some old Busker tomb. And her father. Dreams of incurring his disapproval, a vinegary look of disappointment. Those seem the fears of a sheltered child now, she thought sourly.
It was just before dawn the next day that the summons came from the palace, in the form of a barely legible note scrawled in a spindly hand on the richest creamy vellum.
Harken! Let no man delay the bearer of this royal command.
I, Geneviva Reges the First, Imperatrix of the Hanifaxan Isles and its dependent Duchies and Earldoms, Scourge of the Azkayans, both Mother and Father to Her People, do hereby command the immediate presence of Syraeics Sir Auric Manteo, Miss Agnes Manteo, and Sir Kennah Rolenwy on this, the Tenth Day of the Sixth Month of Y.o.E. 779. Any who impede thy swift attendance shall suffer imprisonment or other just and royal punishment.
– Geneviva Rex
“It seems you are made a knight, Sir Kennah,” commented Pallas Rae, who had assembled the three of them in her study. She again scanned the page held in her trembling hand.
Kennah scratched his beard and grunted. “With the respect you’re due, Lictor, I do not find that funny.”
“Nor do I joke, lad. You were addressed in an official communication from the crown as a knight of the realm. This slip of paper likely made its way through the royal bureaucracy. I’m sure arrangements are being made as we speak. Prepare yourself for some pomp on your visit.”
Some buried part of Agnes wanted to break out in laughter at the look of flailing chagrin on Kennah’s face. But the residue of her shock, the vision of her godmother’s loquacious, disembodied head, swam before her, casting a morbid pall over everything. Her father stood near her, hovering protectively; she caught him watching her from the corner of his eye, exuding fatherly concern. Or perhaps, she thought more darkly, he waited vulture-like, ready should her resolve crumble and the truth come bursting forth from her lips. She wanted to be rid of it, to vomit it from her insides where it lurked, bubbling evilly, like a dose of slow-acting poison.
The boy who delivered the summons had a haunted look in his eyes and a timorous demeanor. Teeth stained black like the rest of the royal family, he was some minor relative of the queen, a six- or seven-times great-grandson, performing the task of a lowly page. He told them, in an oddly distant, sing-song voice, that they needn’t primp: there would be no need for courtly attire—Her Majesty expected only alacrity. Agnes donned her leather armor, as did Kennah. Her father found a cuirass that fit
him in the League armory, his own lost in the fire. It was only when they were already on their way that Agnes noticed a bloodstain on her armor. She couldn’t be sure if the blood belonged to Ruben or the older bandit she had killed.
When she walked out into the brilliant sunlight and blue of a cloudless sky, it felt surreal, like some fairy tale she couldn’t quite bring herself to believe. She only half-listened to the nervous lecture her father delivered to her and Kennah as they walked to the palace, about court protocol and allowing him to speak for them before the queen. Agnes’s mind was a muddle. She had never been to the palace before—that was generally reserved for Syraeics petitioning access to the Barrowlands, or for those who had secured an especially sizable treasure haul from Busker ruins. But there was no excitement, not even fear at the fabulous and dreadful things she had heard about the queen and her court. How could anything be more frightening than the waking nightmare she had witnessed in the cellars of the Citadel?
Auric startled her by taking hold of her shoulder just before the three of them reached the gates of the palace. “Brace yourself, daughter,” he said in a stern whisper. “Be ready for some courtly madness…and be careful.” Her father’s warning seemed a queer thing. Wasn’t she already swimming in madness? And if not, at least she stood at the shore, having dipped her toe in its unquiet waters.
And the tide is coming in.
They were quickly ushered through the gates, met there by a gray-haired woman with a pale green peridot set in her forehead: a binding gem denoting her status as a chamberlain, a court sorcerer and person of importance. She showed no courtesy, not bothering to tell them her name, only bidding them follow with an impatient, beckoning finger. They passed through the marble-paved square and entered the grand palace complex, bristling with looming towers and ramparts, dozens of green and gold banners featuring the sword-wielding griffin rampant, emblem of the empire. The great entry hall did manage to awe her, the broad barrel-vaulted ceiling of the long chamber forty feet overhead, decorated by frescoes of gods and angels looking down from the clouds. But rather than pass through the yawning arch at the far end, the sorcerer led them through a small door hidden behind a wall tapestry. They wound through a maze of torch-lit, low-ceilinged halls, suffocating and oppressive after the cavernous entry chamber.
Agnes’s father whispered to her again, his breath hot in her ear, tinged with alarm. “This is not the right way.” She looked at him now, worried. “Chamberlain,” he said, loudly now, his words strangely muffled by their claustrophobic environs, “this is not the way to the throne room. I thought we were to have an audience with Her Majesty.”
“It is not, and you are,” was all the woman said, not bothering to look back at them.
After a few more twists and turns, the hallway ended at a wall, plain but for a weird sigil etched in the plaster. The woman tapped her fingers in a strange rhythm on the glyph, chanting some breathy words of Middle Djao. A doorway appeared, and they walked through at the invitation of the chamberlain’s outstretched arm.
The room beyond was an ornate bedchamber, an enormous bed canopied with silks at its center. The décor was rich, but the place had the stink of meat gone bad, despite the perfumed candles whose flames also provided a flickering, otherworldly illumination. Several attendants hovered around a figure, some writing in books with quills, others preparing her wardrobe. That figure was the Queen of Hanifax, wearing nothing but dingy, antique undergarments, frilly and baroque. Her flesh was a dirty bone white and as thin as a pastry flake, blue veins prominent beneath. The impossibly wrinkled flesh had worn away from her chin so that her jawbone was exposed, and her teeth were blackened with rot. But it was her eyes that most horrified Agnes: they were crimson and feral, like some prowling night predator, alive with animal menace. Agnes reached reflexively for her sword, but of course it wasn’t there. No weapons were permitted in the presence of the queen, save those of her guard.
A young maidservant—who had the look of someone tasked with feeding a bear known to take swipes at caretakers—helped fit an elaborate red wig over the queen’s nearly bare scalp, its tresses sewn through with pearls black and ivory. The girl fussed with the hairpiece, but after a few moments, the queen shooed her away with a careless swing of her hand. One of her long black nails grazed the poor maidservant’s cheek and a thin red line appeared there and began bleeding copiously. The girl emitted a cry of surprise, then burst into tears when the hand she put to her cheek came away red. She staggered backward, but was caught by two of her peers, who hustled her from the bedchamber, one muffling her agitation with a dusting cloth. This was the moment the sorcerer chose to introduce them.
“Your Highness,” said the chamberlain, hands folded and head bowed. “Sir Auric, Sir Kennah, and Agnes Manteo, here by your command.”
The queen’s head turned and fixed on them. It was as though an entire cohort of archers with arrows nocked and bowstrings drawn stood ready to launch a flurry of missiles in their direction. Agnes saw the piercing intelligence in those terrible eyes now and saw the folly of her earlier belief that the horror she experienced with her godmother Lenda couldn’t be outdone. It was as though she had challenged the gods to prove her wrong.
“Sir Auric, it is good to see you again,” said the queen, her voice incongruously that of a vibrant young woman. “We were informed that your actions last year succeeded, and the plague that afflicted the Citadel was indeed lifted.”
Her father kept his eyes averted as he spoke. “We succeeded, Your Majesty, yes. Thanks to the kind permission you provided the League.”
“But with your expedition complete, you left our capital without presenting yourself, again.”
He paused for a heartbeat before responding. “I apologize profusely, Your Highness. Having suffered some terrible losses, I was in mourning and not thinking clearly. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive my careless transgression, inadvertent though it was.”
Head bowed with her father and Kennah, Agnes risked an upward glance. The queen stared at her father with a molten intensity. She was reminded of the performance of the Blessed of Pember, on their journey to the city. The production they rehearsed was entitled The King of Calamities. Here now before her, studying her father as a viper does a mouse, was a queen who merited the title. Agnes was ready for a scarlet beam of wrath to shoot forth from those alien eyes, but then something deadly passed and the queen nodded.
“We excuse you for this failure, Sir Auric, but only because you have served us well in the past. Why do you present yourself to us now?”
Auric hesitated again. “Your Majesty, we received a summons this morning, before the cock crowed. We were to present ourselves to you immediately.”
The queen looked about her, confused—if a cadaver could appear confused. “Where is my clerk?” she asked, peering from one servant to another. One of the men with book and quill stepped forward, bowed deeply, and held the bow. “Your Highness, you did. You insisted on writing the note with your own hand soon after you rose from bed.” He reached in his book and removed a sheet of papyrus and held it out to her, eyes still focused on the marble floor. “I made a copy of it, Majesty, for the archives.”
Geneviva snatched it from him and her crimson eyes scanned the words urgently, as though they might fly away before she finished. She looked again at Agnes’s father, then to Kennah. Agnes steered her gaze back to the floor the second before those eyes lighted on her. Her heart slammed against the wall of her chest, as though it wanted to break free and flee without her.
“I do not recall writing this note, Marco,” the queen said in an icy tone. “Who else was present when this alleged summons was drafted?”
“Your Highness,” answered the clerk with a quavering tone, “I was present, as was the Lady Courlan, and Countess Ilanda. They assisted you as you were about your morning toilet, and I was taking dictation of your orders regarding the levies for
the eastern regiments. The countess reminded you of their arrival in the city and you called for ink and paper.”
The malice vanished from the queen’s voice when again she spoke. “Ah, Ilanda! Where are you child?”
“She attends the Sunrise Liturgy at the Blue Cathedral, Highness,” said a tall, plain woman in an elegant gown, elaborate make-up marking her as a member of the aristocracy. “I can affirm what Marco has told you. And the countess asked that she be summoned as well when Sir Auric and his party arrived.”
“Then depart, Lady Courlan, and see to it my darling is brought to our chambers!” Lady Courlan curtsied and left the room. The queen’s attention was drawn back to the three of them. “And you are Sir Kennah? When was it you were knighted? And by whom?”
Agnes heard Kennah stir and set eyes on the queen for the first time; unlike Agnes, he had managed to stay appropriately deferential, averting his eyes the whole time they were in the bedchamber. He made to speak, but the words caught in his throat like a poorly chewed bolus of meat.
“Good gods,” the queen shouted, “you’re an ape of a man! Are we to assume you are mute, or does that shaggy beard muffle your words?”
Kennah found his tongue, though Agnes heard the alarm in his voice. “Your Highness, it may have been an error. I have not been anointed a knight.” Agnes felt her father stiffen next to her.
“An error, Sir Kennah?” said the queen in a calm, girlish voice. “Whose error would this be? Would it be the error of the note’s author, which we were told was ourselves?”
“Your Majesty,” interjected her father, “I believe Sir Kennah refers to the error of his not being knighted before being presented to you. As you addressed him in the letter as an anointed knight, we assumed you wanted this done. Perhaps someone neglected to see the ceremony performed, or assumed you wished to bestow the honor yourself.”
“And what has Sir Kennah done to merit this elevation?” Queen Geneviva’s red eyes were still fixed on poor Kennah, who did his best to remain as motionless as a tree stump.