Haven: A Trial of Blood and Steel Book Four (26 page)

A few people raised cheers for Alfriedo Renine, the new Lord of Rhodaan. Many in Rhodaan had been waiting two centuries for this, the restoration of rightful powers to the nobility, and Family Renine as the undisputed rightful heirs to that gods-given power. Yet Alfriedo only looked angry.

“Please,” he said loudly at the temple doors, “I will hear no cheering. We are Tracatans and our city is occupied, ravaged and humiliated. I see nothing to cheer about.”

The temple was only small, but quite lovely with its high arches and wall columns. Family Renine had long held all its important functions here, away from the Council-controlled establishments of the high city, and their lickspittle priests. Now, some of those lickspittle priests were assembled here before the altar: thirty-two in total, the heads of each major temple within Tracato. All looked anxious.

“Thank you for coming,” said Zulmaher. “Firstly, the Lord Alfriedo would hear of your concerns. The past days have been trying on us all. If he is to assume lordship of all Rhodaan, he shall start with Tracato, and if he assumes lordship of Tracato, he shall start with its temples.”

The priests talked, tentatively at first, then with increasing forthrightness. They were not happy. Their parishioners were sometimes scattered, and in a few cases slain. Many tried to organise assistance, and to provide shelter to those who required it. The Black Order did not treat the local priests with respect. High town temples, frequented by Council supporters and Nasi-Keth, were shunned entirely. The only priests invited to an audience with the Archbishop were the more traditional men from Reninesenn, and others favored by supporters of Alfriedo Renine. But those were also displeased.

“He does not listen,” said one old man. “He lectures. He told us that our sins are deep and that such sins can only be cleansed by blood. I presume he means ours.”

“My friends,” Zulmaher said, “we are all alike dismayed, I am sure. Our Lord Alfriedo may have won back his rightful seat in the command of Rhodaan, yet that shall count for nothing if we cannot win back authority over our own land, and our own city. I am but a man, as is my Lord Alfriedo, and we cannot challenge the Archbishop's authority. But you are priests. You carry the authority of the gods. The first step in reclaiming Rhodaan from these invaders shall therefore lie with you.”

Alfriedo was frowning up at him, wondering what he was thinking. The priests looked no different.

“We cannot stand up to the Archbishop,” one exclaimed. “He is an archbishop, we are just common priests!”

“It is the convention within the Bacosh, is it not, that each province shall have an archbishop of its own?” Zulmaher asked. “It was the serrin who ended the practice two hundred years ago. They thought to break the power of the Rhodaani priesthood by depriving them—all of you—of a leader.”

And to look upon you all today, he thought sourly, it worked.

“You will appoint an Archbishop of Rhodaan?” All the robed men stared at each other. Some fearful, some frowning, and others with dawning calculation.

“A lord cannot appoint an archbishop,” said another. “Not even the Lord of Rhodaan.”

“Then you shall choose,” Zulmaher told them. “Surely you have not forgotten the procedures?”

The robed men regarded each other in silence. An old man cleared his throat. “I have studied the process well,” he said. “In old books.” And added with irony, “In a library the serrin built.”

“Very well,” said Zulmaher. “We shall leave you to it. This temple is yours until you have selected your archbishop. Please begin.”

He retreated and took Alfriedo with him. The priests did not look convinced, and many would have pressed with further questions, but Zulmaher did not wish it to sound like a request. Priests had obeyed lords in Rhodaan for the last two centuries, as they sometimes did not in the west. He should be wary, however, of what would be created by this act.

“An Archbishop of Rhodaan will still not have the authority to challenge the Archbishop of Sherdaine!” Alfriedo exclaimed in a frustrated whisper as they walked to the temple's entrance.

“An Archbishop of Rhodaan,” said Zulmaher, “with his boots upon home soil, will have as much power as his people grant him. All Rhodaanis have lost their old leaders, their Council, their Justices. They are looking for someone to stand up on their behalf, yet are afraid to challenge an archbishop for fear of their souls. This appointment will take that fear from them.”

“I am not comfortable with this,” Alfriedo declared. “Kessligh Cronenverdt warned me of precisely this. He said that the rule of nations cannot be left to men, it must be left to laws. Yet here we appoint men, and pathetic men like our soft and pampered priests, to make decisions on behalf of all.”

“Decisions that we shall control,” Zulmaher assured him.

“So you say,” Alfriedo said sharply. “Can you promise it, in truth?” Zulmaher thought about what to say. “My mother promised that she could control events also. Look where that brought her.”

“This time it shall be different.”

“I don't believe you,” Alfriedo said darkly. He turned for the door. “I don't believe anyone anymore.”

The party sat in the common hall of the guardhouse on the Ilduuri side of the Shalaam Canyon. Sasha sat in borrowed clothes and ate well. Outside the stone walls, rain continued to fall and thunder rumbled a distant displeasure. Daish was in bed, resting, and needed to remain so for several more days at least. Perhaps he might follow them to Andal later.

“He would have killed you all,” Rulsten explained. He was the soldier who had let them in the gate, and sent the Ilduuri Nasi-Keth to his death. His helm now removed, he looked an older man, with wavy grey hair. “Last week, we had word that two Enoran messengers who passed through this way never made it to Andal.”

“You're saying someone ordered them killed?” Rhillian asked, frowning over her meal. Her white hair, newly short, was neat and brushed after her wash.

“Not someone,” said Captain Aster. “The Remischtuul. It's policy.”

All three lands of the Saalshen Bacosh had replaced the rule of kings and lords with something else. In Rhodaan and Enora, it had been Councils of supposedly ordinary folk. In Ilduur, it was a single grand Council, known in the local tongue as the Remischtuul, meaning “large house.” One institution within which all the important factions of Ilduur would be represented—from artisans to farmers, builders to priests—every guild, every class of society, had a seat within the Remischtuul. Or so it went in theory.

“Policy to kill every foreigner?” Sasha asked.

“Every foreigner bearing bad news,” said the captain. “They do not want to become involved in this war. There are many in Ilduur who disagree, but lately it has become dangerous to disagree. Those who speak out in favour of supporting our Rhodaani and Enoran brothers are called warmongers and agents of foreign powers. Some have been charged with treason, and jailed awaiting execution. Others have disappeared. The Stamentaast are everywhere.”

“Stamentaast?”

“They serve the Remischtuul. They move through our cities and promote social order.” There was bitter laughter from the soldiers. “They watch for unpatriotic attitudes, and recruit agents of their own. Some they recruit with fear, others with genuine belief. Lately it has become intolerable, they report on everyone, and you can smell the fear when you talk to people about them.”

“I don't understand,” said Arendelle. Of the four serrin present, he was the least accustomed to human ways. “Why must the Remischtuul have foreigners killed?”

The captain sighed. “We Ilduuri have never been agreeable neighbours. We have our mountains, they have been our defence. Before the serrin came, we feared them, and called them devils as others of the Bacosh do. We defended our mountain kingdom with fervour, and rarely did a non-Ilduuri even visit Andal.

“But then came King Leyvaan. In his great rise to power he cajoled and threatened, and gathered a force so large even the Ilduuri agreed we should join with it, if only because he promised to rid us of the terrible serrin. But that force, of course, met with disaster in Saalshen, and left us undefended from the serrin's retribution.

“When the serrin did come, they did not murder us and eat our souls, but remade our society. We flourished, as they did. But perhaps the serrin trusted us too well and thought us reborn in those two hundred years. We never did lose our distrust of foreigners, always it hid beneath the surface. We built grand new institutions like the Remischtuul, and the Nasi-Keth grew strong, and serrin teachings spread in Ilduur. But always it was selective teachings, the men of power learned the words that suited them best and ignored others. From what I know of serrin lore, I do not think serrin intended it to be that way.”

“Nasi-Keth,” Sasha said in disbelief. “I've seen Nasi-Keth in Rhodaan doing stupid things, but even after that I find it hard to believe anyone in any Nasi-Keth group could argue for letting Saalshen's enemies win. I mean, if the serrin fall, the Nasi-Keth are finished.”

“They don't see it that way,” said Rulsten. “They're pacifists, or so they say. Serrin teachings are of peace—”

“They are not,” Kiel interrupted. “Only a fool would interpret the
uthal'es
so simply.”

“Well, you said it,” Rulsten said wryly. “It's like the captain said, they learn what they want from the serrin and discard the rest. They think the Ilduuri should be pure, shouldn't mix with foreigners. That means not getting involved in foreign wars, so pacifism suits them.”

“Yes, while murdering their enemies with violence,” said another soldier, sourly.

“Nasi-Keth elsewhere are interested in creating bonds between serrin and human,” said Captain Aster. “Here, they're interested only in using serrin knowledge to benefit Ilduur. Nothing else. Some may claim otherwise, but that's the gist of it whatever they say.”

“But the Ilduuri Steel think differently?” Rhillian pressed.

“Not all,” Aster admitted, “but most. It goes back to the Tournean War. Only fifteen years after Ilduur came under serrin control, Tournea decided to attack. They reasoned that if they captured Ilduur at its weakest moment, they would gain a fortress from which to attack Saalshen and Enora. The Ilduuri Steel were new and untested. Rhodaan and Enora came in force to our defence, and together we won a great victory that we would surely have lost had we faced the threat alone.

“Other Ilduuris forget, but the Steel never did. We've shared officers ever since; we send cadets to learn at each others’ officer schools; we make good friends in foreign lands and assist those friends in their wars. We would have liked to do more, but the Remischtuul protests, and says we must remain to defend the homeland. Over time, the city folk who hold most power in the Remischtuul stopped sending their sons to join the Steel. The Steel are mostly country folk now, who have less of a voice in the Remischtuul. Most of us here are from the lands of Saadi Maal in the east, none of us have friends or relatives in Andal. It seems almost a foreign land to us, for all we suffer to defend it.”

“We must get to Andal quickly,” said Rhillian. “We need to convince the Remischtuul to send help to Jahnd, our forces retreat there.”

“Jahnd?” asked one of the soldiers.

“Haven,” another told him, in Saalsi.

“You cannot just confront the Remischtuul,” said Captain Aster. “They'll have you locked up and executed.”

“Then I must meet with other captains of the Ilduuri Steel,” said Rhillian. “Either way, they must march to Jahnd. If they do not, Ilduuri freedom as you know it is finished, perhaps not today or tomorrow, but soon.”

“Little enough Ilduuri freedom today,” someone muttered.

“The Steel are sworn to obey the Remischtuul,” said the captain, frowning. “We were founded on that promise—that the strong men of war would never turn their swords on their own people. To betray that is to betray everything good that the serrin helped to make Ilduur.”

“We don't ask you to turn your swords on the people,” Sasha told him. “From what you say, the Remischtuul have become a tyranny. What use is the freedom that the Steel have sworn to fight for if you will not fight for it here in Ilduur?”

Captain Aster gnawed at a thumbnail and stared at the wall.

“It may be a tyranny,” said Rulsten, “but it's a willing tyranny. If you could ask them, I'll warrant a fair majority of Ilduuri don't want this war either. The Steel are a minority. A very large minority, perhaps, but a minority nonetheless.”

Kiel sighed in disbelief. “Your people are idiots. Ilduuri may not see themselves as a serrin civilisation, but the Regent does and so do his priests. They'll demand the Remischtuul disbanded, the Steel destroyed, to say nothing of the Nasi-Keth. They are so strong that even your mountains cannot protect you. Your civilisation is the antithesis of the world that the Regent wishes to build, do you understand that?”

“It is not me who needs to understand,” Aster said sombrely. “But you speak of turning the Steel against the Remischtuul. We cannot fight our own people, however misguided they may be.”

“Then Jahnd is finished,” said Rhillian. “And with it, the combined armies of the Rhodaani and Enoran Steel, the Army of Lenayin, and much of the
talmaad.
Saalshen will be next, for the Regent will not repeat Leyvaan's mistake of frantic haste. Saalshen is easy prey for a large, dedicated, and patient army, even more so now that the Regent has captured some of the Steel's weaponry, and will no doubt take the time to learn how best to employ it.”

“As ever with Saalshen,” Kiel murmured, “we cut our own throats.”

Rhillian shrugged. “And at some stage in these events,” she continued, “the Regent shall turn his attention to Ilduur. The Ilduuri Steel must decide whether it is more important to uphold a pleasant-sounding ideal, or to ensure the survival of their civilisation and their people.”

“You ask the Steel to fight a tyranny by becoming one,” Aster said flatly.

“Yes,” said Rhillian. “Only this tyranny shall not need to murder small children by the thousand to achieve its ends. The same cannot be said of the other.”