The Gods of Amyrantha (13 page)

'I told you,' Lukys reminded him. 'He died.'

Cayal leaned forward and placed his glass on the low railing on the edge of the terrace. 'You haven't told me how.'

Ignoring his guest's impatience, Lukys finished off his drink before answering. 'Has it never occurred to you, Sparky, in the depths of your relentless, self-obsessed depression, that your futile quest for a way to end your own life is a dire threat to the rest of us?'

'It's
my
existence I want to end,' he said. 'It's not a threat to anyone else.'

'But if you succeed in dying, then the rest of the immortals can be killed, too. Effectively, we'll cease to be immortal.'

Cayal remained unmoved. 'I really don't care, Lukys.'

'You
might not care, Sunshine, but you need to be aware that others do. Hard as I know you find this to grasp, some of us don't mind the idea of living forever. If our immortal brethren thought you might actually succeed in your insane desire to commit suicide, they'd go to a great deal of trouble to stop you.'

'But if what you're telling me about Coron is right, you
have
succeeded, Lukys. Why aren't
you
battening down the hatches and preparing for the siege?'

He shrugged. 'Because nobody knows about it, yet. And I'm counting on the fact that you don't plan to spread the news.' Lukys rose to his feet, looked out

over the desert for a time and then turned to look at Cayal. 'In fact, I'm willing to wager anything you name that you'll keep it quiet.'

'You seem very certain of that,' Cayal replied with a frown. Since he'd first confided his desire to put an end to his insanely long life to Lukys, more than a thousand years ago, the older man had taken to teasing him about his morose outlook, 'Sparky', and 'Sunshine' being some of the least offensive names he had for the Immortal Prince.

'I am,' Lukys told him confidently.

Cayal gave an exasperated sigh. 'You're going to make me ask why, aren't you?'

'Oh, yes, I most certainly am.'

'Very well, Lukys. Why are you so certain I won't shout how to kill an immortal from the rooftops to anybody who'll listen, as soon as you tell me what it is?'

'Because we'll need quite a few of the others to do it,' Lukys replied. 'And if they knew what you were up to, none of the others would help. You're not going to say a word.'

'Then how do I get them to help me die?'

'By doing the thing we do best, old son. Lying about it.'

Cayal shook his head doubtfully. 'So you intend to share this news with me, only provided I agree to lie, cheat and manipulate several other Tide Lords into helping us do me in?'

'You always were a sharp lad,' Lukys remarked. 'A bit unstable, perhaps, but you never lacked for intelligence.'

'What's in it for you?'

Lukys looked wounded. 'My desire to help an old friend isn't enough, Cayal? Nothing more. I swear.'

'Bullshit,' Cayal retorted pleasantly.

He treated Cayal to an ingenuous smile. 'Would you believe I'm motivated by idle curiosity?'

'Not for a moment. What do you intend to get out of this, Lukys, other than my death?'

'Very well,' the older man replied after a moment. 'I want to be God.'

'I thought we'd decided immortals who want to be God were a really bad idea, Lukys.'

'Did we?'

Cayal nodded. 'The name Kentravyon leaps to mind.'

'Ah, but there's a difference between me and that lunatic,' Lukys said, sitting on the edge of the railing. 'I want to
be
God, Kentravyon thought he
was
God.'

'There's a difference?'

'Absolutely! I
know
I'm not God, Cayal. I'd just like everyone
else
to think I am. Kentravyon, now ... he believed he really was God. That's what made him so unstable.'

'And you think killing me will somehow prove to everyone that you're a god?'

'Better than that,' Lukys said, shaking his head. 'By killing all the other immortals, I'll prove I'm
the
God.'

Cayal stared at him for a moment, remembering Medwen's warning thousands of years ago in the chilly darkness of Brynden's castle that Lukys had his own agenda and it probably included ruling the entire galaxy.

'Let me get this straight. You want
my
help to kill me
and
all the other immortals?'

'In a nutshell,' Lukys agreed.

'You're a maniac'

'Only from a certain perspective.'

'What makes you think I'd have anything to do with such an idiotic plan?'

'Why do you care, Sparky? If you're dead, what matter is it to you what happens to the others?'

'They'll try to stop us.'

'Only if we tell them what we're doing.'

'Suppose they realise you're trying to kill them?'

'I was planning on keeping that small but pertinent detail a secret, you know.'

Cayal studied Lukys for a moment and then shrugged. Lukys was right. What did he care? 'Why not?'

Lukys smiled. 'I had a feeling you'd say that, Sparky.'

'Hence the reason you came looking for me,' Cayal concluded, Lukys's sudden desire to seek him out after all these years starting to make sense. 'How do we do it?'

'You don't need the details just yet. First thing we need at least another three immortals. And they have to be of the nine. A lesser mortal hasn't got the power to get the job done. This will require the power of a Tide Lord.'

'Any ideas?'

'I thought I'd ask Maralyce first. She's always been fond of you.'

Cayal frowned, unable to imagine Maralyce agreeing to anything that involved working in concert with another Tide Lord. She didn't care enough for the others, one way or the other, to do anything about removing them, either.

'What if she says no? Who does that leave? Brynden? He and I haven't been on speaking terms since Kinta and I ... well, she's not speaking to me, either, for the same reason. Pellys is too unreliable. Kentravyon's still doing his icicle impression in Jelidia. That just leaves Tryan and Elyssa. I can't imagine any circumstance where Tryan would lift a finger to help me. As for Elyssa, she's —'

'Had a crush on you for eight thousand years,' Lukys finished for him.

Cayal gave Lukys a baleful glare. 'You
cannot
be serious.'

The older Tide Lord looked at Cayal for a moment and then raised a questioning brow. 'How badly do you want to die, Cayal?' Lukys asked.

CHAPTER 12

The canine Lord Ponting assigned to guard Tiji on her way back to Herino to report the whereabouts of the Emperor and Empress of the Five Realms and their vicious Tide Lord offspring proved to be an intimidating, yet taciturn sort of creature. He was easily the largest canine she'd ever met, with a pelt of red-brown fur, liquid brown eyes and a tail that gave away a lot more than he intended about his mood. He was efficient, admittedly, and civilised enough if you could get him talking, but he was a hard nut to crack.

And he wouldn't even acknowledge that she'd spoken to him if Tiji called him Cecil.

The journey from Hidden Valley took more than a week on foot. Tiji was glad of the change of pace, not to mention the warmer weather, although this being Glaeba, even in summer it rained incessantly. Caelum was a mountainous, chilly place, and her month-long journey home had been a tense and harrowing affair.

Tiji looked outwardly human from a distance, but her silver-scaled skin always attracted attention. Not only was she a lone female travelling along notoriously dangerous roads, she was a member of a race usually enslaved, and as such, rarely travelled without a master somewhere close by. To further complicate matters, chameleon Crash were rare enough to cause comment wherever they went.

Nobody cared about, or paid much attention, to a canine or a feline passing by, but a chameleon would be the talk of a small Caelish village for months. Even

more worrying, if word got back to Tryan that a reptilian Crash was seen heading toward Glaeba, Tiji didn't think it would take him long to realise that given their rarity, it was probably the same chameleon he'd caught lurking in the Ladies Walking Room in the Caelish Royal Palace.

To stay hidden on the way back from Caelum, she'd had to shed her clothes and use her natural camouflage ability to slip past danger, sneaking a ride on one of the many ferries that plied the well-worn trade route across the lake between Cycrane on the western shore and Lebec on the eastern side of the Lower Oran. But it had meant being cold, travelling with next to nothing in the way of supplies, and spending an awful lot of time standing still as a post, pretending she wasn't there.

With Cecil as her escort — or Warlock as he preferred to be called — Tiji didn't have to worry about any of that. They carried papers marking them the property of the Earl of Summerton, travelling to Herino to report to his mother, the dowager Baroness, Lady Tilly Ponting. Warlock's size meant nobody bothered them along the road, and because Aleki had made sure they had plenty of coin, they were able to stay at inns along the way instead of camping in the open, a rare luxury Tiji was relishing, all the more because of the wet weather.

After two days on the road, however, Tiji grew annoyed with Cecil's long bouts of silence. It was rare for her to have a travelling companion and it irritated her to think she got just as much conversation with this big brute who was supposed to be protecting her, as she did when she was on the road alone.

'Why don't you like being called Cecil?' she asked on the third morning of their journey as they trudged south toward the capital. They'd spent a comfortable night at a place near Lebec called Clyden's Inn and the owner had surprised them both by allowing them

rooms with proper — albeit dangerously rickety — beds rather than insisting they sleep in the stables, which was the common reaction to any Crash looking for a room at a Glaeban inn.

As she suspected, Tiji's question got an immediate response from her large, canine companion. 'My name is Warlock.'

'But that's your kennel name. Your slave name. Don't you want a name that proclaims you're free to be who you want to be?'

'I am who I want to be. I am Warlock.'

She stared up at him for a moment, amazed at his stubbornness. 'I couldn't wait to change my name.'

'Isn't Tiji your kennel name?'

She shook her head, shouldering her pack a little higher. 'Tides, no!'

'You didn't mind that Captain Phydeau forced you to change your name?'

'I wasn't forced, I was delighted,' she said, as they walked along the road. Traffic was light so far. Anybody heading out of Lebec for Herino wouldn't catch up or pass them for a few hours yet. 'Tiji means "strikes in darkness". It's from one of the ancient languages. I'm not sure which one. It seemed appropriate, though. And it was a damn sight better than being called
Slinky.'

The big canine glanced down at her, a rare smile on his face. Even his tail wagged for a moment. 'Slinky, eh? Yes ... now I look at you ... I can imagine you being called Slinky. In fact, it suits you.'

Tiji glared at him. 'I'm glad you find it amusing.'

'May I call you Slinky?'

'Not if you expect me to answer you.'

The canine's smile faded and his tail drooped a little. 'That is how I feel about being addressed as Cecil.'

She smiled up at him. 'If I promise to call you Warlock from now on, do you think you could utter more than one word a mile?'

He seemed quite surprised by her request. 'I wasn't aware you wanted to talk.' 'You never asked.'

Warlock shrugged, wagging his tail just enough to make Tiji believe he was probably not as unfriendly as she'd assumed. 'What would you like me to speak of?'

'Tell me about the Immortal Prince,' she said.

They reached Herino three days later, making their way straight to the townhouse belonging to Lady Ponting. The capital was set on an island that jutted into the Lower Oran, the largest of the Great Lakes that divided Glaeba from Caelum. Joined to the mainland by three wide, majestic bridges carved of the local dark granite and dominated by the royal palace — located in the peak of the only real hill on the island — the city had grown so much it had started to spill onto the shores of the lake surrounding the island. Many of the city's elite, in fact, had opted to build lake-shore villas, rather than live in the cramped and crowded houses they were forced to put up with in the city. Lady Ponting's townhouse proved to be one of the latter.

Although small and cluttered, her house was only four streets from the palace in a quiet but expensive street where most of the houses had high walls surrounding the perimeter to ensure the privacy of the occupants. It took Tiji and Warlock most of a wet and miserable day to find it, and when they did, it was to discover the lady of the house wasn't even in residence. Tilly Ponting had returned to her home in Lebec, the housekeeper informed them, and wasn't expected back until the Autumn Ball, some nine weeks from now. The new slaves were expected, however, and the Crash steward welcomed them into the house, gave them towels to dry off, organised a hearty meal, and sent a messenger to the palace to fetch Declan Hawkes.