The River of Shadows (5 page)

“When one of the men turns away,” said Hercól, “try to catch a glimpse of his neck.”

“You never met my sister. You couldn’t know what she looks like. I think I’m crazy, Hercól.”

“Enough of that. I’ve looked at her portrait a hundred times. It hung for years in Dr. Chadfallow’s study in Etherhorde, alongside your mother’s and your own. It hangs in his cabin now. But that portrait must be ten years old. I could not be sure it was her, until you saw for yourself.”

“But how in the blary howling Pits could she be
here
?”

“Look! There’s an answer for you, or the beginning of one.”

The older man was reaching for something on his right. He leaned forward, and his long hair fell away from his neck. The firelight showed a black tattoo, a pattern of strokes and diamonds.

“Lord Rin above,” said Pazel. “They’re Mzithrinis.”

So they were: three citizens of the Mzithrin Pentarchy, the enemy state, the rival power that had fought the Empire of Arqual to one blood-soaked draw after another, for centuries. Dr. Chadfallow had always claimed that he’d placed Neda in the hands of a Mzithrini diplomat, to save her from becoming a slave or concubine of the invading Arqualis. It could have happened, Pazel thought: she might have taken on their customs, their beliefs. In five years she might have become almost anyone.

“What should we do?” he whispered.

“I brought you here that you might help me decide,” said Hercól. “They are Mzithrini, to be sure. Which means that they, like us, have somehow crossed the Ruling Sea. But they are not common sailors. Those tattoos declare holy orders. They are
sfvantskor
s, warrior-priests. And if they choose to attack us, they will win.”

“Neda won’t attack me.”

“Pazel, if she has taken the Last Oath and become a true
sfvantskor
, she will do whatever her leader commands. In some parts of the Mzithrin the newly sworn are told to leap one by one into a covered pit. Most find the bottom filled with rose petals, but one lands on razor-sharp stakes. The rest honor his sacrifice with prayers, and taste his blood for discipline.”

“That’s horrible!”

“No worse than what a Turach endures. Those three, however, may have a special reason to detest us: the loss of their ship. The men were aboard the
Jistrolloq
when it drew alongside us in Simja. I dare say your sister was as well.”

“She spoke to me,” said Pazel suddenly. “A
sfvantskor
girl in a mask whispered to me in the shrine—she told me to turn away from evil, as if one
could—
Hercól, how can they be alive? We sank the
Jistrolloq
months ago, in the middle of the Ruling Sea.”

“Months,” said Hercól, “or two hundred years?”

Pazel froze, then lowered his face, grinding his forehead into the sand.

“If we decide to speak to them,” said Hercól, “let us take care not to speak of
that
. So far it has been a secret among the two of us, Thasha and Bolutu. Let it remain so, for now.”

“It’s not true, anyway,” said Pazel. “That part
can’t
be true.”

“Why not?” said Hercól.

“Because if two hundred years have passed, then the whole conspiracy’s failed. And the war must be long over, if it ever came to war.”

“Certainly,” said Hercól.

“And your Empress Maisa is dead, and everyone we cared about, everyone who knew our mucking names.”

“Catastrophes are only unthinkable until they occur. You Ormalis should know that.”

“I’ll tell you why, then,” said Pazel. “Because if it’s true then I really will go mad. Barking blary mad.”

Hercól’s hand slipped under his jaw. Gently, but with an iron strength, he lifted Pazel’s chin. His eyes were sharp and wary in the moonlight.

“Please,” he said, “don’t.”

The Mzithrinis could smell the rabbit crackling on the spit. It was all they could do not to pluck the carcass from the fire and devour it, raw though it surely was on the inside. They had come ashore ravenous, and found only crabs. They had lived for four days now on crabs—to be precise, on the legs and eyestalks of crabs: the bodies of the creatures had proven so toxic that their leader, Cayer Vispek, had nearly died, his throat swollen until he battled to breathe. When he recovered he cited the Old Faith proverb about the glutton who choked on the wishbone of a stolen goose, and the younger
sfvantskor
laughed.

They had laughed again when he showed them the rabbit, and asked if they would not rather wait for morning. Then it was Jalantri’s turn to quote the scripture, as he scrambled from the tent:
“And should the morning never come, how now, my soul?”

Their master smiled, but only faintly: one did not make light of the soul. It was man’s claim on eternity, his gift from the omnipotence that some called Rin or God or the Gods, but which Mzithrinis would never presume to shackle with a name.

Jalantri had scurried like a boy to build the fire. Neda had skinned and gutted the rabbit, while Cayer Vispek walked out to the beach to touch the Nelluroq, and whisper quietly to the five hundred brethren who had perished there.

By the time he had returned the rabbit was sizzling. Now, sipping their brackish tea, they felt as though the smell were already nourishing them, the appetizer to the feast.

Jalantri saw the intruder first. A youth, standing in the brush on the high eastern dune, looking down with the moonlight behind him.
“Vrutch,”
he swore. “I thought we’d driven them off.”

Cayer Vispek stopped turning the spit. “He’s the first one to come upon us from the east,” he said. “How peculiar. The land ends in just a few miles that way. Perhaps he smelled the rabbit.”

Neda glanced up at the boy and shrugged. “He can’t have any of mine,” she said.

Jalantri’s big chest rumbled with laughter. But their leader stilled him with a hand. The youth had started toward them, slide-stepping down the dune. They rose, tensing. Not one of the witless humans had ever tried to approach them, even in stealth. This one had to know he was being observed, yet on he came. The shadow of the dune hid his features. But there could be no doubt: he was deliberately approaching. They scanned the basin on every side: no companions. Neda drew her dagger. Jalantri pulled a burning stick from the fire and strode forward, waving it.

“Ya! Away!”
he shouted, in a voice for scaring dogs. The youth paused. Then he took a deep breath and continued toward them.

Cayer Vispek bent and picked up a fist-sized stone from the fire ring. “I am going to kill this one,” he informed them rather sadly. “If they lose their fear they will give us no peace. Don’t help; it will be easier if he doesn’t run.”

Neda squinted at the figure, intuition gathering inside her like a storm. Then the Cayer walked past Jalantri and waited, turned slightly away from the youth, the stone loose in his hand. He was a deadly shot. The rabbit might have been no closer when he crushed its skull.

The youth reached the foot of the dune. He stepped from its shadow, and Cayer Vispek whirled and threw the stone with all his might. And Neda screamed.

Sound flies faster than any arm—and Pazel lived because the Cayer’s mind was faster yet. He skewed the stone with his fingertips as he released it, and the shot went wide. As the youth flinched and ducked Neda ran forward, crying his name.

“Stop!” roared a voice from the dune-top. A second figure, a grown man, was flying down its shadowed face. “Harm that boy and I swear I’ll send you to meet your faceless Gods! Damn you, Pazel, I should never have agreed—”

The youth looked at Neda. He was more ashamed than afraid, standing before her without a stitch of clothing. A different body, but the same fierce, awkward frown. She had seen that look ten years ago, him standing in a tiled basin, and Neda, the older sister, approaching with a sponge.

The hug she gave him was pure instinct, as were the tears she shed in a single, toothy sob. But before he could return the embrace she released him and stepped back, glaring through her tears. A
sfvantskor
could not put her arms around him. A sister could not do otherwise.

The Orfuin Club

Who has sown the dark waters in sorghum and rye?
Who has whispered to gravestones and heard their reply?
In the deluge of autumn, who has danced and stayed dry?
Let him gaze on the River, and sigh
.

—Anonymous Hymn,
VASPARHAVEN

“Arunis, what do you fear?”

The speaker was a short, round-faced, potbellied man with thick glasses, dressed in clothes the color of autumn wheat. In both hands he cradled a large cup of tea, the steam of which billowed white in the chilly breeze on the terrace. On the table before him a red marble paperweight held down one sheet of parchment. At the man’s feet squirmed a small creature, something like an armadillo, except that it lacked any obvious head, and instead of limbs, two feathery antennae and countless tentacle-like feet emerged from its shell. The creature was foraging for insects; as it moved in the torchlight it became invisible, transparent and darkly opaque by turns.

“I fear that one of us will expire before the woman arrives,” said a second figure—a tall, gaunt man in a black coat and white scarf, ravenous of mouth and eye, who stood near the doorway letting into the club, orange firelight on his left cheek, cold and darkness on his right. “Otherwise, nothing at all. I have no time for fear. Besides, there is no safer house than yours, Orfuin. Safety is your gift to all comers.”

The doorway was framed by leafy vines, within which a keen observer might glimpse movement, and now and then a tiny form of man or woman, running along a stem, or peering from a half-hidden window the size of a stamp. From within the club came music—accordion, fiddle, flute—and the drowsy chatter of the patrons. It was always late at the Orfuin Club; by daylight the tavern’s many entrances could not be found.

“Safety from the world without,” corrected the potbellied man, “but if you bring your own doom within these walls, you can hardly expect them to protect you. What is that thing in your hand, wizard?”

“A product of a sorcery beyond my knowledge,” said Arunis, displaying the shiny, slightly irregular metal cube. “
Ceallraí
, it is called, or
mintan, batori, pilé
. The lamp you keep on the table on the third floor draws its fire from some source within the metal. It is a feeble sorcery and does not last. This one is dead; the goat-faced creature who wipes your tables gave it to me.”

“That is why he is always opening the lamp.” The man called Orfuin chuckled. “It was in his sack of trinkets, when he came to me so long ago, fleeing assassins in his own world. He loves that ugly lamp. Arunis, you resemble a human being; did you begin life as such?”

Arunis scowled, then hurled the metal object into the darkness beyond the terrace. “What can be keeping her? Does she think I have all night?”

Orfuin took a languorous sip of tea. He moved the paperweight, glanced briefly at the parchment. “You are not a frequent guest,” he said to Arunis, “but you are of long standing. And in all the time you have been coming here I have observed no change. You are impatient. Never glad of where you are. Never cognizant that it may be better than where you are going.”

Arunis looked directly at the man for the first time, and there was no love in his glance, only pride and calculation. “You
will
see a change,” he said.

The little animal scurried under Orfuin’s chair. The innkeeper looked down into his tea with an air of disappointment. Then he lowered his hand and scratched the little creature along the edge of its shell.

“I thought all
yddeks
had been exterminated,” said the mage, “but now I see that you welcome them like pets.”

“They were here before us, in the River of Shadows,” said Orfuin. “They come and go as they please. But they’re rare today, true enough. This one swam out of the River while you were inside. He’s quite a bold little fellow.”

“He is a masterpiece of ugliness,” said the sorcerer. Then, with a sharp motion of his head, he added: “I am leaving; I have urgent work on the
Chathrand
. You will inform the woman that Arunis Wytterscorm cannot be kept waiting, like a schoolboy for his coach.”

Orfuin took another meditative sip of tea, then rose and walked to the edge of the terrace.

There was no rail, and no wood or garden beyond. There was only the sheer stone edge, a few vines curling up from below, and beyond them a roaring darkness, a torrent of rising wind little illuminated by the club’s lamplight. Orfuin leaned out expertly, gazing down into the void, and the blasting air held him up. When he pulled himself back from the edge, he had not even spilled his tea.

“She is here,” he said.

Even as he spoke three figures shot past the terrace from below. They were spectral, blurred; but when the gale had carried them fifty feet above the terrace they spread their arms and slowed, and descended weightlessly, like beings of cinder. Arunis watched them with an expression of nonchalance, but his body was rigid from head to foot. The three figures alighted without a sound.

They were ghastly to behold. Two bone-white women, one black man. All three were tall—one might even have said
stretched—
with long, gaunt mouths and cheekbones, staring eyes like dark searchlamps and grasping, spindly hands. They wore finery fit for court, but it was tattered, filthy, with an air of the tomb. The nearest woman trailed yards of faded lace. She pointed a lacquered nail at Arunis and shrieked: “Where is the Nilstone, traitor?”

“A delight to see you again as well, Macadra,” said Arunis. “The centuries have left you quite unchanged.” He turned his gaze on the other two: a stocky woman clutching a dagger in each hand, and a black man, coldly observant, fingers resting on the pommel of a sword. “Your friends are younger, I think? But not too young to have heard of me.”

“Oh, you’re not forgotten,” said the black man. The woman with the daggers sneered.

“They must depart at once, of course,” Arunis continued. “You promised to come alone.”

“Promised!” said the tall Macadra. “That word should burn your tongue. Ivrea and Stoman are here as witnesses. Though if you forget whom you serve, your punishment will be too swift for trial.”

Then Arunis walked forward, until he stood one pace from the woman. “I serve no one—or no one you dare to contemplate,” he said. “You may have gained power over brittle Bali Adro, but your Order has stagnated. I have not. Think of that before you speak of punishments again.”

Macadra’s upper lip curled incredulously. Arunis let the silence hold a moment, and then continued in a lighter tone, “But if you refer to my
cooperation—
well, really, Macadra, how could I have done more? You dispatched me to Northern Alifros without gold, or guardians, or allies of any kind. Yes, you helped me escape the old regime. But at such a price! You bade me shatter two human empires, to prepare the world for its grand reunification—under the Ravens, of course.”

“Under Bali Adro,” snapped Macadra. “The Ravens are merely advisers to His Majesty.”

“And a conductor merely
advises
his orchestra to perform.”

For a moment the woman checked her rage. She looked rather pleased with the analogy.

“You have not yet killed the girl,” she said. “Are you that afraid of her?”

“Afraid of Thasha Isiq?” said Arunis, and this time he won a smile of amusement from all three of the newcomers. “No, Macadra, I do not fear her. She will die at the appropriate time, as will all of her circle. But why should I rush to kill my greatest accomplice?”

Macadra laughed aloud. “You have not changed either, Arunis Wytterscorm. Still working with puppets, are you? Painting in their faces, tying your invisible strings.”

“Shall I tell you something, madam?” said Orfuin suddenly, looking up from his tea. “Life is finite. That is to say, it ends. Why not spend it pleasantly? There’s gingerbread fresh from the oven. Leave off this scheming and be my guests. Hear the music. Warm your feet.”

His gaze was mild and friendly. The newcomers stared at him as if unsure what sort of creature he was. Then Arunis went on, as if Orfuin had never spoken:

“I have been splendid, Macadra—that you cannot deny. I took a harmless madman and built him into the Shaggat Ness, a slaughtering messiah, a knife upon which both Arqual and the Mzithrin are preparing to throw themselves. And I managed to let the Arqualis believe the entire affair was in their interests—indeed, that
they
had devised the plot, alone. What general with legions at his fingertips ever accomplished so much? Either Northern power could mount a fight to try the strength of Bali Adro—together, they might even have bested you. Instead they think only of killing one another, and will soon begin to do so with more determination than you have ever seen.”

“Your Shaggat is dead!” screamed the woman with the daggers. “A peasant boy turned him into a lump of stone!”

“The Pathkendle boy may have started life as a peasant,” said Arunis, “but he is now a
Smythídor
, magic-altered, blood and bone. The great Ramachni entrusted him with Master-Words, and one of these he used against the Shaggat. But Ramachni’s gamble was a losing one, for in so arming Pathkendle he exhausted himself, and had to abandon his friends. And for what? They wish to kill me; they cannot. They seek a new and safer resting place for the Nilstone; they will not find one. And the Shaggat—he is
not
dead, merely enchanted. He will breathe again, mark my words.”

“Suppose he does,” said Macadra. “Suppose you complete this journey, hand him back to his faithful on Gurishal. Suppose we help you to that end.”

Arunis bowed his head, as though to say he would not spurn such aid.

“What will we gain for our efforts? All I see ahead is the self-destruction of the Mzithrin in a civil war. And afterward, the total victory of the Arqualis. You will leave us with one giant foe in the North, rather than the smaller pair we face today.”

“Not if you do as I suggest,” said Arunis.

Macadra smiled. “I saw that coming ere our feet touched the ground. Show it to me, wizard. I have waited long enough.”

When Arunis said nothing, Macadra swept toward the doorway of the club, never glancing once at the proprietor. She gazed into the warm firelight. A hush fell over the patrons; the musicians ceased to play.

“Where is it?” she demanded. “Is someone holding it for you at one of the tables?” She turned him a searching look. “Is it on your person?”

“My dear lady,” said Arunis, “we must have words about the Nilstone.”

“Are you saying that you have come here
without
it?”

“How could I do otherwise? You offer me no assurance that you speak for the Ravens. I do not even have proof that yours is the same Order that dispatched me to the North so long ago.”

“But how
dare
you leave it unguarded! What possible excuse—”

She broke off, a new thought writing itself in a frown upon her colorless face. With a sharp sound of rage she drove both hands, nails first, into Arunis’ chest. Her fingers sank to the first digits; then she ripped her hands apart. The mage’s flesh vanished briefly, obscured by a sudden haze. Arunis stepped back, and the woman’s fingers emerged unbloodied.

“I told you!” said the woman with the daggers. “We make the dark journey in person; he sends a dream-shell, a mirage! He’ll never give up the Nilstone! He means to
use
it, Macadra, to use it against us all!”

“As you have just observed,” said Arunis, “I could not very well leave the Stone unguarded aboard the
Chathrand
. And why not come in trance to the Orfuin Club, this place where all worlds meet so easily—even the worlds of our dreams?”

“You should have come in the flesh
to hand over the Stone,
” growled the stocky woman, “as you swore to do two centuries ago.”

The black man looked at Arunis with contempt. “If you do not track this mage to his ship and kill him, Macadra,” he said, “you are the greatest fool who ever lived.”

“We would not be talking at all if he had already mastered the Stone,” said Macadra. “Say it, monster. What is it you want from the Ravens?”

Arunis walked to the table and took the parchment from beneath the paperweight. “You are quite right,” he said. “I cannot yet use the Nilstone, any more than you or Ramachni or any other since the time of Erithusmé. But you have misunderstood my purpose. I have never wished to make it mine. No, I seek only to finish what I have begun, what you sent me to accomplish so long ago—the ruin of Arqual and the Mzithrin, so that when Bali Adro’s ships next assault the Nelluroq, they will find the whole of the Northern world hobbled and broken, and ready for their conquest. And you Ravens, the true power behind Bali Adro—why, you shall shape this world to your liking. One rule, one law, one Empire spanning both shores of the Ruling Sea, and you at its apex. I am making your dream a reality, Macadra. But to complete it I need the
Chathrand
awhile longer—and the Nilstone.”

Macadra smiled, venomous. “Of course you do.”

Arunis held up the parchment. “This is no mirage,” he said. “Take it, read it.”

The black man leaned forward. “That’s a
Carsa Carsuria
. An Imperial decree.”

“Give me a new crew for the Great Ship,” said Arunis. “A dlömic crew, with a dlömic captain. The humans nearly destroyed her on the first crossing. They allowed her to be infested with rats and ixchel. They let a lone Mzithrini gunship come close to sinking her. They should never have been trusted with such a vessel. Take this to Bali Adro City. Make your slave-Emperor sign it, and dispatch a crew to Masalym with all possible haste.”