The Spirit Gate (50 page)

“Come,
Your Majesty, you won’t
pretend with me that you haven’t
begun to find Fiorella the least bit comely and companionable? Why else have
you kept such close company with her these past weeks?”

Why indeed? At the moment, Michal Zelimir was at a loss to
explain that. Well, yes, the girl did seem more . . . alluring.
He had even found himself comparing her to a deep garnet jewel that graced a
ring on his left hand. Yet, what was that compared to the price he was asked to
pay for her? At this moment, he had no answer to that, only the clear understanding
that what Benedict said was true. The Mongol forces could be pushed back now,
or they could be pushed back when Tabor was in ruins and Polia had been
trampled under the feet of their wild ponies.

He raised his head and looked Benedict in the eye. “I will have an answer
for you at dawn on Celek. I must pray and meditate. I must make peace with my
God. I must speak again to my advisers.”

“They
will advise you, Majesty, as the envoys from Khitan and Teschen and Sandomierz
have advised you—do
what must be done to protect your provinces.”

“I
will have an answer for you on Celek,” Zelimir repeated, and left his throne room. He meant to retire to the
cesia to pray, but his heart drew him to seek out Zofia. She could not advise
him, but she could comfort him and offer him distraction and solace.

He was at the mouth of the corridor that led to her rooms
when he thought of Fiorella and of the Shrine she had showed him in her rooms.
It was a Shrine to the female deity Mariam, she’d said, but to Zelimir the carved wooden figure
with the gentle, mother’s
face represented Itugen. It mattered not at all that the Franks insisted on
calling her something else.

There were no such shrines in Amadiyeh’s rooms; her Prophet
had forbidden them, and he knew that it would dismay her to know that he had
prayed once at Fiorella’s
Shrine of Mariam-Itugen. It had brought him no sense of contact with the
Goddess, but when he had raised his head and turned his gaze to the Lombard, he
had found her eyes upon him. Something in the dark, colorless gaze had awakened
desire in his soul. It was not the white-hot, rage of emotion he felt for
Kassia when he thought of her too long, or sensed her too near, but it pulled
him nonetheless. It pulled him now, and so he changed his direction, turning
west instead of east and moving along a different corridor. He thought briefly
of Zofia; he knew more certainly with every passing moment that he must soon
send her away.

Even as the king sought comfort, and Benedict reveled in his
obvious advantage over the pagan monarch, the vanguard of the Turkish troops,
flying from outposts some leagues beyond the southern reaches of Khitan’s western sister,
Teschen, caught up the rear flank of the Mongol forces. They caused no more
than mild distress at first, but when the balance of the Sultan’s northern armies
reached them several days later, they became much more than an annoyance. Turks
and Mongols faced each other across the Khitani countryside while two men, far
removed from the physical combat, sweated out the battle and, more than either
warring leader, determined its outcome.

It was not a matter of strategy but of style that placed
Mengli Khan where the Turkish forces were able to ambush him and take him
prisoner. The Bishop of Tabor exerted strong and direct control over his
puppet, whereas Lukasha, knowing himself to be no military strategist, sent to
the Sultan only motive power—a
desire to defend the country where his great-niece now resided and might rule
as queen. The Sultan directed his generals, and the campaign—with a direct goal and
a defined target—was
prosecuted by men of greater military experience and knowledge than Lukasha of
Dalibor.

During the telling battle, Lukasha, sitting in the locus of
his dais, legs crossed, spell balls set about, brow glistening sweat in the
light of spirit lamps, could feel the frantic efforts of Benedict to control
his puppet forces. In the end, he could even sense the utter confusion of the
trapped Khan when his motivator at last abandoned him. With the light,
unimportant pop of a bubble bursting, the Frankish bishop gave up his foothold
in the Tartar mind, his rage leaving behind only a sour, smoky smell.

A smile crossed Lukasha’s lips. He sent to the Turkish Sultan a
presentiment of victory and rose from his dais to tend to other tasks.

Celek came, and Zelimir prepared to welcome a Turkish envoy
to his court. His promise to give Benedict an answer had been put aside, for he
believed the Turks had solved his military and political problems. It made all
sense now to marry the lovely, if demur Amadiyeh, to take Zofia as a second
wife—allowed him
by Turkish reckoning—and
send the Lombard, with her strange appeal, back to her homeland. The Turkish
would serve to keep the Frankish forces out of Polia indefinitely. It made all
sense. It would save Polia with little compromise. It would please the God and
Goddess and relieve the Mateu, especially his old friend, Lukasha.

Zelimir told himself he was victorious. That somehow the
Bishop Benedict had erred in thinking he could be manipulated, bullied. He
would bring the Turkish envoy into his presence and there announce that he
would wed the Sultan’s
great-niece. He would, moreover, announce it before the bishop and his Lombard
Duchess, though neither would expect it after his recent attentiveness.

In the throne room, before an assemblage of Polians, Franks
and Turks, Zelimir was less sure of himself. He felt Benedict’s regard like an
oppressive weight, and sought Zofia’s
eyes as a ward against it. But the lady’s
eyes were cold and aloof, and Amadiyeh’s
were veiled, and so he ended his search for support with Fiorella, who stood,
as always, behind her bishop. Her eyes welcomed him with smoldering embrace.
Dear God, could he have ever thought her dull or plain? She was a jewel.

The Turkish ambassador, one Haji Husayn-i-Shirazi, seemed
agitated, and immediately after the ceremonial and diplomatic overtures had
been made, he requested leave to speak. Zelimir was quick to grant the request,
it put off his own announcement that much longer.

“Your
Majesty, King Zelimir,” Shirazi said, inclining his head only slightly. “I come to you, as you know, with the news that your
enemy, Mengli, Khan of the Gherai is captured and his forces dispersed to the
four winds. My lord, the victorious and successful sultan, the ruler aided by
God, the shadow of the Provider, up-lifter of the banners of Religion, ruler of
the two easts and the two wests, namesake of the apostle, Sultan Mehmet Osman
Khan, sends greetings and asks after the welfare of his nephew’s daughter.”

“You
may inform the Sultan that his great-niece is well,” Zelimir answered and prayed
the ambassador would say more. He did, but it was not what the king expected.

“Is
she? The Sultan—king
of kings who are numbered as the stars—is
under the apprehension that the lady Amadiyeh is to be betrothed to Your
Majesty. Yet I arrive here to find that there are yet two other bride
candidates within you royal household, and that one of them is a daughter of
the Frankish Empire—a
great enemy of the Sultanate.”

Zelimir opened his mouth, willing himself to say the words
that would defuse Shirazi’s
growing anger, but the words would not come.

“I
had come to Tabor,” the Turk continued, “hoping
to take the glorious Sultan news of his great-niece’s marriage into this royal house. I am dismayed
that this does not seem to be the case. The Sultan of the two continents and of
the two seas will also be dismayed. In the belief that we supported an ally, we
extended our troops into your territories and aided in the thwarting of your
enemies. Are you the ally of the Osmanli Empire, King Zelimir, or are you the
ally of her enemy?” He glanced obliquely at the Bishop of Tabor, who merely pursed his lips.

Zelimir’s
eyes slid from the Turk to the bishop to Fiorella, now at His Grace’s shoulder. Her eyes
were huge, bottomless. They pulled at him and, in a moment of great clarity, he
realized that he desired her as he had desired no other, would pay whatever
price to possess her. Kassia was forgotten, or might have been if Master Antal
had not chosen that moment to clear his throat, calling his King’s eyes to himself for
but a moment. The sight of the Mateu’s
white garment recalled Master Lukasha, and Kassia’s white hair, and her marriage to Zakarij all at
once.

The king gasped and steadied himself, both hands gripping
the arms of his throne. Beside him Bogorja stirred. “Sire, are you ill?”

Am I ill? My kingdom is trapped between two forces bound
by dogma and habit to be at each other
’
s throats. I am trapped between
these same forces personified. Am I ill? I am dead.

Zelimir raised his head and gazed out over the small crowd
assembled before him. The Frankish Empire or the Osmanli. One would be his
ally, the other his enemy. Did it matter, really, which was which? If he married
Amadiyeh, he would have the Osman Turks at his back to defend his borders
against both Mongol and Frank. If he married Fiorella (a shiver coursed through
him) he would have the Frankish forces to stand against Turks and Tartars
alike. Zofia . . . Zofia might be offered concubinage, and
Kassia . . .

He had had a pleasant daydream once of riding to Dalibor and
sweeping white-haired Kassia away to some Carpathian stronghold where neither
of them could be found. That was only a daydream; this would define his life
and the life of his people forever. He knew Benedict’s plans for Polia—absorption into his Empire and his religion. Of the
Sultan he was not so sure. It was written in the Holy Book of the Arabian that
his followers were to teach by example only, but he had heard rumors that this
teaching was not always observed.

He focused his eyes on the Turkish ambassador, but they
would not stay there. He tried to bring them to Amadiyeh’s face, but he could not. He could feel the sweat
beading upon his brow.

“I
have had a difficult decision to make,” he said, his voice a husky croak. He felt every ear take in the words. “Of all the women
brought to me, these three are the only ones who remain. (
Kiska
!)
They are, all three, fair of form and face, all intelligent and companionable.
(
Kiska
!)
All are dear to me. (No.
Kiska
!) Yet, I have had to choose but one of them.”

“You
have made this choice, my lord?” asked Shirazi.

“I
have. I will wed . . . (
Kiska
!) I will wed none other
than . . . the Duchess Fiorella Orsini. (
Dear Goddess
!
Kiska
!)”

A gasp went up around the throne room and those in
attendance showed their contentment or their shock or their great dismay. Of
all the reactions, Michal Zelimir noted only one. The lady Zofia Varyusha ran
from the room, her elderly companion struggling valiantly to follow her. When
he could no longer see her, his eyes swept the agitated assembly, looking for
the woman upon whom he had laid his favor. She was not hard to find, for a
small knot of people had gathered around the spot where she had swooned upon
the gleaming floor.

King Zelimir rose from his throne and, with Chancellor
Bogorja at his side, removed himself to his private study where he seated
himself at his writing table, put his hands over his face and wept.

oOo

At the moment of the king’s revelation, Kassia was with Devora in the back of
her shop, laughing, holding up a length of the green fabric that would become
her wedding gown. Michal Zelimir’s
voice struck her ears as if he were in the room with her, his anguish and need
pierced her heart as deftly as an arrow. Five times he called her name, then
drowned her in a wordless rush of fear and sorrow.

She could tell only vaguely what lay at the center of his
anguish—it
concerned Zofia; it concerned Fiorella and Amadiyeh; it concerned her. She
waved aside Devora’s
anxious questions and tried to strengthen the tenuous link. There was someone
else involved in Mishka’s
welter of pain, someone who was very likely the cause of it—Benedict.

With the frenzy of one possessed, Kassia drew out a mandorla
on the stone floor of Devora’s
kitchen and sent herself the short distance up the mountain to Lorant.

Led by instinct, Kassia stepped out of the enchanted
corridor, not in her own studio as she had expected, but in her Master’s. The place was
empty. Frustrated, she was on the verge of conjuring up a Locator when her eye
caught upon a group of three spell balls sitting on a shelf behind Master
Lukasha’s work
table. She couldn’t
say what drew her to them—perhaps
that one of them was obviously iron, a metal seldom used in the Mateu’s art—but as she neared the
shelf, she realized that the one of colored glass contained the earring she had
given her Master.

Puzzling. Kassia picked up the glass ball and turned it over
in her hand. Inside, the earring dangled from a short silver chain, tinkling
musically against the glass. The second ball was copper. Shaking it produced a
silken sound as if very fine dirt with some larger bits of sand were trapped
within it. The iron ball was empty, the little metal cap that would safeguard
its contents not yet in place.

Kassia lit a spirit flame and held the orb containing Shurik’s earring up to it.
Fine fibers of silver were woven into the milky blue glass. This was Water. And
the copper globe was Fire. A Battle. A Twilight Battle. Her eyes strayed to the
empty iron ball. And that would be Earth. Iron instead of gold. A chill raced
up her spine. Lukasha had replaced a light element with a heavy one, which
meant he intended to use magic that had not been performed in these halls since
Marija of Ohdan had used it with such disastrous results. Yet, even Marija had
used gold.