The Living Throne (The War of Memory Cycle Book 3) (119 page)

He stared at them.  He'd thought they'd spoken in the Guardian's voice—low and rich but sexless—but it sounded strange now.  Echoing.  And their words were wrong...

'Blot out the Light.'

'End the Empire.'

'Bring them down, bring them all down to me.'

He looked again to the water and saw his empty face staring back at him, mouth moving, words ringing in the still air. 
'Bring them all and we will save them, we will keep them.  Still and perfect, untouchable, unharmed and endless...'

Brine surged from his mouth.  He tried to bite it back, swallow it down—no longer sure why it mattered, why he struggled at all.  But it wouldn't stop.  It forced apart his teeth, not just water but black fronds like seaweed pouring out from his throat, staining the clear water like a toxin.

He looked up to see his parents' figures distant, small.  The shore had receded, leaving him knee-deep in the shallow sea, nothing between him and them but inky waves that seethed like snakes.  No ruins, no fallen trees, no old debris.

Behind him, the great deep oceanic darkness.

Stubborn, defiant, he waded forward, but the weeds coiled thick around his shins and dragged at his heels.  The seabed felt like broken glass, biting at him with every step; the cold sapped at him like never before.  And from the shifting, rippling waters came the whispers, sourceless, endless:

come

join

stay

sleep

A black frond coiled around his hand.  Delayed by weariness, he didn't snap it away until it had been drawn down and almost engulfed; even broken, the dark material clung for a while before falling off in single strands.

He couldn't look down or see that hollow face, couldn't look up without despairing at that unreachable shore.  Finally, desperately, he closed his eyes and gripped his antlers with both hands, as if they could anchor him to reality—bring him home.

Something tore in his skull, like roots being pulled from rock.

A crack in the sky, a sudden light—

An itch in his head, burrowing into his mind—

Wings—

“Hold him up, hold him up!”

Hands on him.  Gauntlets, agreeably solid.  Whiteness.  “He's having some kind of—“

“It's called a seizure.  Keep him up, it's already passing.”

“What now?” boomed the Field Marshal's voice, distinct and dire.  “If this is a trick...”

“Oh yes, my famed 'life-threatening brain-spasm' trick.  Cob, are you in there?  Cob?”

Something impacted his cheek sharply.  His skin buzzed, eyes full of sparks, body heavy in the grip of his captors.  The air came thinly to his lungs, his head a lead weight on the weary column of his neck.

“You call that a slap?” said the Field Marshal.  “Limp-wristed little prick.”

“Stand back and be silent.  Cob?  Pike's sake, Cob, can you hear me?”

He felt the Guardian withdrawing from his limbs, collecting at his scar—hiding from both him and the magic that pinned it in place.  Immediately his right arm began to itch, and he jerked at it, desperate to scratch.  The gauntlets clamped tighter.

“Ah, so life remains after all,” said Enkhaelen.  A few blinks and he regained enough sight to make out the necromancer's silhouette, the Field Marshal looming over his shoulder like a cliff.

“He's conscious?”

“Pupillary reaction is back, at least.”  The necromancer passed a hand before his face, then nodded.  “He's there.”

“And the Guardian?”

Enkhaelen's eyes narrowed slightly as if in thought.  Behind him stood his blue twin, the same expression on his face.  “It attempted to escape, which caused the seizure.”

“But it remains trapped?  You, mages, report.”

“The bonds are unbroken, sir,” said an unfamiliar voice, “but that assurance is not absolute.  We are no spiritists; we cannot see it, only—“

“Enkhaelen, you can see it, yes?  Make it raise its antlers again.”

“I don't think it has the strength just now.”

“Then give it the strength!”

A moment's silence, during which a vicious little smile spread across Enkhaelen's face.  He turned to regard the Field Marshal.  “You want me to feed energy to the Guardian?”

The big man's face darkened at his mistake.  “I—  No.  Not until we stand before the Throne.”

“You're certain?  We still have some walking to do.”

Lifting his head slightly, Cob saw that it was true.  Though the tunnel was gone, they stood now within a vast expanse like a white caldera, laced with lakes and bridges and delicate canals, low ornate buildings and distant towers.  Ahead, the Imperial Palace rose in splendor like the brow of a crown, its great spires so high and fine that they seemed to disappear into the frozen sky.  Its doors stood wide, admitting all manner of pilgrims, petitioners and servants into its vast heart.

The Field Marshal glared balefully at the necromancer.  “Yes.  I'm certain.”

“As you say.”

The procession resumed, but the necromancer's blue twin didn't move.  His face had gone from thoughtful to resigned, and as Cob was pushed closer, he said,
'I'm sorry.  You've become too dangerous to use.  Guardian...'

Inside, he felt the spirit rise in response—flooding upward to the spot on his cheek where the splinter had pierced his bonds to get in.  The phantasm's fingers entered that point, kindling a blue light and an all-too-familiar sense of attenuation.

Then the phantasm walked through him, bearing the Guardian away.

Chapter 32 – Midwinter Rites

Linciard raised his head from the bucket, swallowed, then grimaced and spat another bilious mouthful of saliva down with the rest.  “Water?” he croaked.

A tin cup intruded into his peripheral vision, and he took it.  A heavy hand rested briefly on his head.  “It should ease soon.” said Rallant.  “I had to use too much to bypass the inoculation's resistance.  But don't worry.  It will be better next time.”

Wiping the sick sweat from his face with the back of his hand, Linciard gave no answer.  The inoculation had made him queasy for an evening but this was full-on puking, plus constant sweats and tremors, wobbly vision and a persistent feeling of seasickness.  Now he knew how the Brother Islanders had felt.

And beneath it all, a craving.  The subtle knowledge that all these side-effects would vanish with another shot of that sweet venom.

He swished the water in his mouth, spat, then rose shakily, ignoring the throb in his stitched-up toes.  The two of them were on the bunk-side of his office as always, the lantern on the folding side-table casting their paired shadows against the privacy screen.  To look at those overlapping splotches of darkness, one might think that the men attached to them were close as well, but Rallant had stayed perched on the bed throughout Linciard's bout with the bucket.

Now, sharp fingernails traced the sweat-damp skin of his back and came to rest at the nape of his neck.  “You're sure you'll last?” said the senvraka, very close.

It took all of Linciard's strength to shrug him off and step away.  “I'll be fine,” he mumbled.  “Nothing left in me.”

“Only we can't have you puking during the ceremony...”

“I know.  I won't.”

“You're absolutely sure?”

“Are you concerned for me or for your piking reputation?” he said caustically as he flipped up the lid of his footlocker.  His dress uniform was in there: new, crisp and tailored to fit during one of the few down-moments he'd had since arriving in Bahlaer.  The lieutenant's fledges gleamed in silver thread on the shoulders and above the heart, making the jacket alone the most expensive thing he'd ever owned.

He hated the idea of wearing it now, but protocol demanded either a dress uniform or a worshiper's whites during the Midwinter ceremony—especially since tomorrow was Darkness Day.  The temperate Illanic weather made it feel weird to be celebrating; he was used to seeing snow up to his eyebrows at this time of year.

But then, there wasn't much to celebrate.

Behind him, Rallant said, “For you, of course.  And you need to wash up before you put that on.  Here, I'll help.”

The trickle of water pouring into the basin, and the splish and drip of a washcloth being wrung out, made Linciard's shoulders hitch tight.  His knuckles whitened on the lid of the footlocker.  In the back of his mind, a cold voice said,
Enough.

“Enough,” he echoed, then louder as he turned: “Enough!”

Rallant, washcloth raised and barely a step away, blinked at him.  The golden teardrop hung bright around his neck—his only adornment.  His façade.  “Erolan?” he said quizzically.

“Don't—“  It was difficult to maintain his anger under that amber gaze, but Linciard steeled himself and grabbed Rallant by the wrists, pushing him back.  “Stop doing this to me.”

“Doing—“

“All of it.  Everything.  Leave me alone.”

“I'm sorry it made you ill...”

“It's not that!”

“Then what?”  If the grip bothered Rallant, he didn't show it.  He moved unresisting with Linciard's push.  “What have I done?”

“You controlled me.  You
thralled
me.”

Rallant smiled sadly.  “Oh Erolan, I did that to protect you.  To protect
us
.  You didn't listen when I told you to run, and that could have killed us both.  So I had to hide it.  Thralls' minds are too difficult for mentalists to penetrate, so that was my only choice.  Don't you understand?”

“We're gonna die anyway!”

“No.  You will be converted.  I will...”  He trailed off, gaze drifting away.  “I will be rewarded or punished at my masters' whim.”

“I don't want to be converted!”

“You have no choice.  Though perhaps, if I am rewarded, I will be granted a request.”  He twisted a hand from Linciard's grip and reached out to trace fingers along his stubbled jaw, ignoring his scowl.  “Your thralling was temporary, but it can be made permanent.  You need not go to the Palace.”

Linciard ground his teeth.  “I don't want that either.  I don't want any of this.”

“Since when has that mattered?  We are tools in the hands of our lords and leaders, and that will never change, no matter who they are.  The Crimson Army has been sheltered compared to the others, but if we wish to bring the world to the Light, we must be of the Light ourselves.  No matter our personal wishes.”

“But—“  Linciard struggled for words, for reasonable opposition.  “But we don't have to force people!  We don't have to turn them into—we don't have to change them.  It's not real if we do that.  It's just fear and domination!”

“Welcome to the world, Erolan.”

“Shut up!  You're not right.  I don't know why you believe this shit.  The Light I was brought up on is sheltering, protective, kind!  It's not this...this—”

Rallant caught his gesturing hand and tried to lace his fingers with Linciard's, but Linciard wouldn't let him.  “It is,” he said.  “It always has been.”

“No.”

“It always will be.”

“I refuse to believe you.”

“You don't need to believe, because soon you will know.  You will know as that little wretch Weshker now knows—“

“What?”

“—and your good friend Vyslin should be learning it as we speak.  There is no escape from the Light, Erolan.  Its gaze is everywhere, its beneficence and its castigation both without limit.  Soon the Crimson Army will be cleansed of its flaws, and we will hammer down the walls of those Dark-lovers and False Light heretics that would keep us out.  We will bathe all the world in the purifying flame of our faith, and remake it in our god's image.”

Staring into the fevered gleam of Rallant's eyes, Linciard felt his heart creep into his throat.  He'd thought—hoped—that there was something to salvage in this man, but this was a level of madness no less than that of Messenger Cortine's.

Wasn't it?  Cruel and manipulative as they were, they couldn't be right—could they?

“You should accept my offer,” said Rallant.  “Thralls lose much of themselves when they are made permanent, but it is far safer than the conversion.  Only one in ten survives without being primed, and only the Maker can do it right.  We seem to be clashing with him, which bodes ill for the converting.”

“
What?
”

Rallant smirked.  “How many men took the Messenger up on his offer?  Eleven, including your Vyslin?  It's possible they're all dead by now, especially the weak or faithless.  Vyslin is probably a mindless husk, or fodder for the ahergriin, unless they don't even bother converting him and just feed him to the hounds like that fool Serinel—“

Until that moment, Linciard hadn't thought he had it in him to strike a lover.  Even as he yanked from Rallant's grip, even as his fist connected, a part of him still couldn't believe it.  The way Rallant's head snapped to the side, the way his eyes flew wide—he wanted to take it back.

Instead he committed to it, and stepped in to deliver the second punch.

Rallant was faster.

Snake-like, he lashed a hand out to clamp on Linciard's upper arm, nails biting in hard.  His other latched onto Linciard's throat just under the chin, and though Linciard managed to get his arm locked over it, he couldn't twist away.  The senvraka was too strong.

Then Rallant was pushing him backward, madness in his amber eyes, until Linciard's shins hit the footlocker and made him half-stumble, half-fall into the wall.

“How dare you?” Rallant snarled, pressing close, his teeth a bare inch from Linciard's upthrust chin.  “I thought you were better than the others.  Different.  But no, you won't listen, you won't let me help, and now you dare to strike me!”

Linciard scrabbled at Rallant's fingers but they just clamped harder.  He felt his trachea bend, air coming thin.  Blood pounded in his ears.

“I have sheltered you from so much,” the senvraka continued, his snarl taking on a buzzing plurality.  “Your backwoods naivete and misplaced loyalties would get you killed in the Field Marshal's army, and I don't want that.  Light only knows why!  And then you think you can lay a hand on me?  You think I'll let you get away with that?  You are not the one in power here, Erolan.  It is only by my generosity that you even have a choice.”

With a last contemptuous shove, Rallant released Linciard and stepped back.  Linciard's hands rose to his throat, to the incipient bruises, and as he hacked out a few harsh coughs he felt where damage had nearly been done.

Nearly, but not quite.

Through watery eyes, he stared at Rallant and saw his own tension, his own misery mirrored back.  Then Rallant's face tightened, and he turned away.

“Wash yourself,” he said as he stalked off beyond the privacy screen.

Lacking any better option, Linciard obeyed.

*****

Captain Sarovy looked up at the sound of a slamming door.  Above the stairs where he stood was the balcony that led to the command offices, storage and meeting room.  Lieutenant Linciard stood there outside his own door, dressed in uniform red, with Lieutenant Rallant at his side in white like a couple prepared to enter a ballroom.

An unhappy couple, to judge by the nascent bruises on both.

Sarovy exhaled through his teeth and beckoned at both to come down.  Rallant reacted first, and for a moment Sarovy feared he was in control again, but then Linciard looked over as well and he realized it wasn't control that fogged the man's gaze, but defeat.

Though he felt the same, it pained him to see it.  He wanted desperately to act, but there was nothing he could do now that would make things better, and so much that could make it worse.  The colonel had already condemned Blaze Company, but there was still time left for suffering.

As the two descended toward him, Linciard's gaze slid away.  His face had assumed a mask of weary indifference, so different from the concern and engagement Sarovy was used to that he seemed a different man.  Sarovy opened his mouth, trying to find words for this—an apology maybe, or a demand for resistance—but nothing came.  They passed him in silence, Rallant with the poise of a long-time courtier and Linciard heavily, obediently, to take their positions on the steps below him.

Lieutenants Vrallek, Korr and Herrick made room for them.  The latter two had only been in their roles for two days—Korr replacing his own lieutenant and Herrick pulled from the specialists to lord over Arlin's infantrymen.  And lord he did.  Sarovy had lost count of the men Herrick had dragged into the yard for a whipping, for Arlin had been well-liked by his platoon and Herrick had no social graces at all.

There might have been a mutiny already if not for the fact that it was Midwinter.  Crown Prince Aradysson's army had never officially observed the holy days, but had allowed its men to do so in private, and even the heretical westerners celebrated the turn of the year.  In the Empire, formal Midwinter Rites demanded observation starting at midnight and ending at dawn for each of the four festival days—the Light's Vigil—as if the act of prayer and constant attention could raise the sun anew.  This being a Dark year added a fifth festival day—Darkness Day—to the center of Midwinter, along with a special rite of cleansing and sacrifice.

This was only the second night of Midwinter, but already the men down below looked exhausted from the need to stand Light's Vigil.  They still slept in shifts because even though they had been confined to the garrison, they were not safe; the Shadow Cult had already broken in once to steal away the men from the basement cells.

Sarovy was not sure whether to hope those men were alive, or wish them the mercy of death.  Since the loss of Presh, more than two dozen men had vanished, and he had no idea what had become of them.  The little lump of glass and metal in his jacket pocket—the eiyetakri—might gain him answers, but he feared the Dark too much to use it.

Or do I fear the truth?

“Are all in attendance, captain?” said Messenger Cortine from above.  Sarovy looked up past the railing to see the priest approaching from the storeroom that had been cleared and outfitted for his purposes.  As had become the norm, he was flanked by his white-robed aides and trailed by Scryer Yrsian and Magus Voorkei.  Warder Tanvolthene brought up the rear.

Magus Voorkei was collared and shackled, but Scryer Yrsian had been blindfolded as well, and by the rumpled look of her robe and hair she had obviously had it rough.  No bruises showed, but Sarovy knew all too well that trauma need not be physical, and anger clenched in his chest.  Their alliance had been professional but he had come to rely on it—maybe even to consider her a friend.  That she would suffer for his actions was—