A touch on my arm startled me.
“Airene?” Nomusa asked, concern plain in her voice. “Are you alright?”
“Fine,” I said faintly. I stared at where I’d seen the vision, but it had become only ruined stones again. I shook my head. No amount of sleep could cure madness.
The Council’s small door cracked open. “Is she here yet?” an irritable man’s voice called out. Berker, I recognized with a twist of disgust. Orhan’s righthand man, and as staunch a Preservist as they came.
The male honor hurried forth from the shadows. “Yes, Low Consul. First Verifier Nomusa has come, and she has brought the other you wished to see.”
“That’s putting it strongly,” Berker growled. He revealed his pockmarked face as he opened the door further. “Well?” he barked. “Are you coming or not?”
“She has only just risen from her sickbed,” Nomusa rebuked him as we rose and walked to the door. “Have some patience for once, Berker.”
“Have care, Finch.” The large man didn’t move from the doorway. “You serve at our leisure.”
“We serve the people and the demotism,” Nomusa said smoothly. “Now, I’m sure your fellow members of the Council would appreciate if you didn’t waste any more of their time with juvenile antics.”
The man’s heavy jowls became more pronounced as he scowled, but he relented, turning and stalking back inside. Sharing an amused look with me, Nomusa led the way in.
The Council’s meeting chamber was much as I remembered it, and I couldn’t detect any changes from the battle that had waged outside its doors. It still seemed more a cave than a room, with the unshaped walls and ceiling melding into each other, and small, uncovered windows opened toward the shore. The winds were strong off the sea today as they tended to do in the spans before the monsoons arrived, and the scent of salt was heady in the air.
In the middle of the room, seated around the glass-smooth slab of gray stone that served as a table, were the nine other Low Consuls. As before, the Preservists sat on one side, while the Equalists and the two independent Low Consuls sat opposite. I did my best not to look at Feiyan, but I couldn’t help but notice her small smirk as she studied me. Jaxas, too, was present, though he stood by the windows apart from the rest.
“Airene of Port,” Orhan greeted me warmly. As usual, he was immaculately groomed and decorated, his remaining gray hair finely curled, and he wore a robe of crimson lined with gold. “I am glad to see you up and walking. I heard you took frightfully ill after the events following the Despoina’s trial.” He didn’t stand, nor did any of the others, but it was hardly surprising. As they were Low Consuls and I was presently little more than a plebeian in their eyes, decorum didn’t call for it.
I, on the other hand, was obligated to bow. “Low Consuls. I apologize for my earlier absence. As you said, I had taken ill and have only just risen.”
“You need not have rushed,” Orhan said pleasantly.
I studied him, wondering how much he meant by that.
Zehaar of the Equalists spoke next. “We have many matters to attend to, so I suggest we quickly resolve this quaint formality,” she said briskly. “Airene was elected as First Verifier by Jaxas before her illness, and was, as we have discussed at length, behind the counterplot to Vusumuzi’s plans. Her accomplishments speak for themselves.”
Berker snorted, but it was Orhan who spoke. “Indeed, they do. Which is why I am quite skeptical of her appointment.”
I looked sharply at the portly Avvadin man, but at a warning glance from Nomusa, held my tongue.
“After all,” he continued, “she was, as you say, responsible for that whole bloody debacle. If not for her, Photina would still be alive, as would many Servants and other stewards of the demotism. Your First of the Laurel Guard, Jaxas, would also be alive. The rabble that wanders our streets every evening, these so-called dusk mobs, would not terrorize our streets and markets. And if you have failed to notice, we do not even know the location of our Despot, nor have we received any demands for ransom. If, indeed, he is alive. Only First Verifier Nomusa’s report causes us to believe so, and she claims to know this secondhand by Airene’s account.”
Jaxas turned toward the rest, still standing over them. The gray light outside limned his robes and cast his face in shadow. “It is dangerous to assume you know how things might have gone otherwise, Orhan,” he said quietly. “Vusu is set on power. With or without Airene’s intervention, it would have come to blood.”
“You say one thing and contradict yourself in the same breath,” Orhan noted with a smile.
Daelya, head of the Equalist faction, leaned forward, her dark brow drawn. “Enough. Speak plainly your position, Orhan, as well as the rest of you who seem to take issue. What’s your complaint?”
Esen, the only woman among the Preservist Low Consuls, spoke now, wearing her usual severe expression. “We know too little of her, and what we do know is contentious.”
“I can vouch for her,” Jaxas offered. “It was enough for Nomusa’s appointment.”
“Except she had Feiyan’s backing as well,” Esen countered.
Despite my earlier resolution, I looked in amazement at Nomusa, then Feiyan. The Qao Fu woman wore an even smugger expression than before, while Nomusa seemed uncomfortable.
“I’m afraid I can’t speak as well for Airene as I could for her companion,” Feiyan said in a tone so full of sorrow a playwright would have applauded in approval. “She has been troublesome and tiresome in all my dealings with her. True, she has some talent for sniffing out trouble. But I cannot see her in a leadership position in the Order of Verifiers.”
“Feiyan,” Daelya said with plain exasperation. “I know you have some personal vendetta against the woman, but don’t let it color your professional opinion.”
Feiyan looked so affronted I had to fight back a smile. At least one of the Low Consuls appeared to be in my favor. Still, as I needed at least five to win the appointment, my odds were not looking good.
“Low Consuls,” Nomusa spoke up. “If you need someone to attest to her competency, you need look no further. As I told you before, she and I have worked together for the last nine years. In all that time, never once has she been less than trustworthy and dependable, and has often been the primary investigator in our cases.”
“If that’s so, why are you presently the First?” Berker smirked through his scraggly beard.
Nomusa ignored him. “Airene is entirely capable of acting as First Verifier beside me. It would be a grave mistake not to appoint her so.”
“This is taking far too long,” Zehaar snapped. “It is past time we put this to a vote.”
But Orhan leaned forward, wearing an expression that filled me with foreboding. “But what of what Vusumuzi said?” he asked softly. “He all but named you his accomplice, Airene. I would like to hear an adequate explanation if one can be provided.”
I stared at him. I’d forgotten that brief interaction, forgotten even the words Vusu had said to me. Had they actually been incriminating, or just allusive enough to arouse suspicion? Forming a defense without knowing seemed all but impossible.
So I told the truth, or as much as I could. “He insinuated that we worked together because he believed it to be so. I allowed Vusu to think that he and I were accomplices in discrediting the Despoina to ambush him.”
“Vusu, she calls him,” Berker sneers. “She implicates herself through her familiarity!”
I flushed, but before I could speak, Jaxas stepped forward. “Vote if you must. But don’t put on this mummery any longer.”
Orhan smiled, the mockery in it plain to see. “Very well, Jaxas. There’s no need to be testy. If you wouldn’t mind?”
Jaxas’ eyes flickered to me for a second, then looked down. “All in favor of appointing Airene of Port to be First Verifier alongside Nomusa in the new Order of Verifiers?”
Daelya raised her hand, then Zehaar. Verchlesa and Tychon, to my relief, followed suit. But though I
scanned the assembled members of the Demos Council, no more hands rose. Feiyan just sat back with arms crossed, a small smile playing on her lips. Fury and frustration clashed so that my vision blurred and my head grew light. I reached out for the wall to steady my balance and set my jaw. I wouldn’t collapse in front of the spiteful woman.
Jaxas’ disappointment laced his words as he said, “All opposed?”
As expected, all five of the Preservists’ hands shot up. I glared at Feiyan, expecting hers to rise as well, but still, she sat unmoving.
Jaxas’ frown deepened. “Abstain?”
Feiyan shifted, but only to rest her hands on the table. “You know,” she said slowly, her eyes still on me. “I’m still quite uncertain.”
“Then abstain,” Orhan advised pleasantly. “After all, that is what the option is for. And you seemed more than willing to practice it when you didn’t attend the Despoina’s trial.”
Feiyan ignored the gibe but continued to look at me with a small smile. “But for such an important vote, I feel it is my duty to choose one way or the other. If only I knew the proper course.”
My eyes challenged her, daring her to be so petty as to ruin me over our rocky past. She was more than capable of it, I knew well enough. Yet I couldn’t pull my gaze away.
“Stop this at once!” Berker barked. “Which way will it be, Feiyan?”
She moistened her lips, raptor eyes still on me. “I vote in favor. Let us leave it to the Archon to decide.”
Berker’s face went red, while Orhan’s smile slipped a bit. I didn’t know how to react. Why had she acquiesced? I doubted she’d suddenly found a conscience. It was just as hard to believe she was not as petty as I’d thought.
“I vote in favor,” Jaxas said at once. “So it’s decided. Congratulations, First Verifier Airene, on your new appointment.”
Nomusa put an arm across my shoulders and pulled me close. I let my gaze drift from Feiyan to my fellow First Verifier, sharing a smile with her.
At Nomusa’s whispered prompting, I murmured a thank you, then was ushered from the room. I only glimpsed Jaxas’ broadening smile before Nomusa pulled me from the Council room and out into the main chamber of the Conclave.
“Airene!” She seized my hands as soon as the door closed, heedless of the honor and guards standing nearby. “You managed it!”
“Barely.” My head felt light again, and my legs threatened to give way at any moment. “I thought you said it would be simple.”
“I thought it would be. But you know Feiyan — she loves getting a rise out of you.”
I shook my head. “That was more than enough excitement for one day. I need a large meal and a nap.”
“Very well, my fellow First Verifier. But there’s something else you should accept first.” She reached inside her neckline and drew out not one chain, but two, hidden beneath her dress. I was surprised at the eagerness with which I yearned for the medallion hanging from her hand.
Grinning, Nomusa handed me one of the Verifier medallions, and I immediately slipped it on. As it settled on my neck, the solid weight of the iron was reassuring. I didn’t hide it under my robes, though. Even if it had first been given to me by Vusu, I would now wear it openly and proudly.
“That’s better,” she said approvingly as she led me out of the Conclave. “Now, time to enjoy the fine, new quarters our position affords.”
3
Visitors in the Dark
…But though Tyurn Sky-Sea sought to assuage his kin, Clepsammia, Goddess of Fate, stepped forward and announced in a quiet, carrying voice:
‘Ruin will this Seed of Bounty bring. The fields, now abundant and green, will turn fallow and yellow. The rivers will dry into desert canyons. Your people will starve and curse your name, Father. Famine, this kin of daemons will bring, and famine will be the harvest you reap.’
But Tyurn Sky-Sea would not listen. Though his daughter had never spoken an untrue word, his hope for the Seed was too great, its whispers of power and plenty too intoxicating…
- The Seeds of Famine, a translation from the Lighted-tongue; by Oracle Kalene of deme Hull; 881 SLP
I had missed the Aviary on the carriage ride in, but found it a small disappointment. Crossing the Conclave grounds, our new home slowly came into sharper focus. It was a misshapen thing, three stories high at its tallest point, that clung to the slippery stones along the top of the cliff like an ancient lizard. Its sloped roof was covered in dark green moss and the cracks in its walls were lined with black mold. It didn’t promise the rest and retreat I’d hoped for.
Yet I saw glimpses of its former grandeur as well. Fluted columns adorned the front of the atrium, and its pediments had once been etched with great care, even if the carvings were now worn and obscured by moss and vines. From its right side rose the tower where, Nomusa informed me, some of the Conclave’s many finches were kept, which were now at our disposal.
The neglected building was starting to grow on me by the time we reached it, all the more from my exhaustion. My energy waned with each passing moment, and I felt I could sleep even on a bed of stone. But Nomusa, full of enthusiasm, insisted that she give me the tour immediately.
“Here’s the atrium, which doubles as a feast hall,” she said as we entered. Two long tables that each seated ten were in similar condition as the rest of the building. Pointing to the back corner, Nomusa continued, “Off that hallway are the kitchens. Never fear, those have been thoroughly scrubbed out.”
“What a relief.”
“Through here,” Nomusa said as she led us off to the right down a narrow hallway, “are the bedchambers. Ten on this floor, twelve on the second.”
“Where are the stairs up?”
“Off the finch tower.”
I shook my head. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“I didn’t design it, did I? Come on — you still haven’t seen the tower.”
The tower was much as I’d expected: tall and filled with small birds of every color and pattern. The stench of droppings was so strong my eyes watered. No doubt the place hadn’t seen much cleaning since its abandonment. I spotted nearly forty finches at a glance. Nets draped at regular intervals throughout the tower, allowing a swift hand to capture birds at any level from the stairs that wound around the edges.
“I’ve seen the tower. Now can I see my room?”
“Of course.” Nomusa smirked and started up the stairs.
I didn’t follow. “Why up there? I saw plenty of room down here.”
“The ones further up have more air flow and molded less. So, unless you want to be breathing that stuff in all night…”
With a heavy sigh, I followed her up.
She spared me at least by turning into the first room. “This one will do, if you don’t mind the smell of bird dung.”
“Let’s see how it is at the end of the hall.”
“You’ll be right across from me then. I can’t wait to shout conversations across the hall.”
“I can’t wait to hear one of those Conclave guards who will no doubt visit,” I muttered.
Nomusa smiled coyly.
We turned into the last room on the left, and I finally saw the state of my new room. There was nothing in the way of furniture, only a rotted frame that seemed unlikely to support a mattress. It was hard to believe there was less mold up here than the chambers below, for it spread across every surface. The open windows, with no glass or shutters to keep out the coming cold of the monsoons, had only worsened the situation, bringing in the wet winds from the sea.
“I know where our first fifteen silvers are going to,” I observed.
Nomusa laughed. “It’s not so bad, really. I didn’t know which one you’d want, so I was having Hyrol — he’s the honor who comes by — clean the main areas first. But we can have him attend to your room first.” She gestured behind her. “I’ve got a bed and a relatively clean room if you want a nap. Just don’t sleep there all night.”
I wrapped her in a hug. “
You have no idea how much this means to me.”
“From the look of you, I think I do. Now go ahead. When you wake, you’ll have food and a bed. And I hope you’ll be in a more talkative mood. I won’t wait for your secret forever.”
Nodding, I swayed into Nomusa’s room and collapsed onto her bed. Almost as soon as I closed my eyes, I fell into a heavy sleep.
My eyelids fluttered open. The dim light told of evening fast falling, yet my exhaustion had barely lessened. My hunger was sharp enough, however, that I rose and slowly descended to the atrium.
To my relief, Nomusa had been true to her word, and the pleasant aromas of fresh food filled my nose upon entering the room. Recently baked flatbread, ripe mango and soft cheese, a long, smoked fish — all waited on a covered platter on one of the long tables. I set to clearing the platter out in a manner that would have made Xaron proud.
I groaned as I thought of Xaron and my promise to find him this evening. The hunger dulled as I set into my third portion, but little energy had come with its retreat. Even sitting up and eating was a chore. My Hilarion would have to wait for another night for me to visit.
Besides, if I could move about, I had more important tasks. If I was to retain my position, I had to show the Council I took my new position seriously and make headway on their investigation of corruption, as much as that was possible. And even though Vusu hadn’t been sighted, the Manifest remained a constant threat. Most of all, I needed to learn more about the true enemy lurking behind all the others. A visit to the Acadium seemed in order come morning.
When I couldn’t manage another bite, I returned upstairs. In my haste to find food, I’d barely glanced at my room, and so hadn’t noticed the scrubbed walls, ceiling, and floors, as well as the mattress and night table, complete with a pot of yellow pyrkin, that now decorated it. The mattress sagged in the middle and the blankets looked well used, but they seemed clean. I resolved to thank Hyrol at the first opportunity as I settled down into it. Though I still needed to do something about the open windows. Even wrapped in the two blankets the honor had provided, a faint chill seeped through.
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