Above the Snowline (5 page)
‘It -
she
- is a Rhydanne, a predator fresh from the biting wastes and freezing summits of Darkling. Uncivilised she may be, ninety per cent carnivore she definitely is, but she has travelled here alone, facing untold dangers and overcoming who knows how many tribulations in her haste to bring a secret message to the Castle for the ears of none but the Emperor San himself!’
she
- is a Rhydanne, a predator fresh from the biting wastes and freezing summits of Darkling. Uncivilised she may be, ninety per cent carnivore she definitely is, but she has travelled here alone, facing untold dangers and overcoming who knows how many tribulations in her haste to bring a secret message to the Castle for the ears of none but the Emperor San himself!’
‘Wow.’
‘So shut up and let us in.’
They turned to each other and pushed the doors wide. Dellin looked at the ornate lock, at the curlicued hinges. The deep architrave of solid amber had been carved into voluminous honey-coloured drapes, as if frozen in time, mid-flow. Jant grasped her shoulder firmly, since if she ran in unaccompanied the Imperial Fyrd guards might take fright and shoot her. He led her through the doors with a few quiet words. ‘I told her not to fear the Emperor.’
‘She is bound to,’ I said. ‘We all do.’
Dellin paused and a delighted expression broke over her face. She looked around but no one can take in the whole Throne Room at once; only the Emperor, at the centre of the perspective, can see the main aisle and the side aisles together, all the way to the great rose window at the end. She examined the glittering, mosaic-covered arches and looked up to the archers on the gallery. Twelve Imperial Fyrd archers stand there, six on each side. Seeing them, she crouched again and fingered a large horse’s incisor on her necklace.
‘She thinks it’s a trap,’ I said.
‘I know, I know,’ said Jant. He spoke to her rapidly. He stood over her, blocking her view of the bowmen, shielding her - as she would see it - and her bony fingers curled around his with a powerful grip. She rose to her feet and stood with a hunter’s readiness.
‘She doesn’t like archers for some reason,’ he said.
‘I can see that,’ I said. ‘I will go first and she will see they won’t move.’ I walked down the aisle and through the highly carved screen to where the Emperor was sitting on the sunburst throne. I bowed low before him and went to sit on the end of the front bench nearest the throne, so in relating these events to you I am easy in my mind that I heard every word spoken that day.
Tornado and a few other immortals were assembled on the benches at the far side. Since the last few years had been relatively peaceful many of us were residing in our apartments here rather than at the Insect front. Tornado smiled and raised his hand to me in a familiar salute, then when Dellin and Jant came in, he hefted to his feet and boggled at her.
The sunlight shone through the walls pierced with so many pointed arched windows they were nothing but stone frames for stained glass, casting heraldic light on the benches, arches and dais. Jant and Dellin seemed unreal, moving effortlessly through the slanting rays. Citrine, azure and malachite green slipped over them until they reached the end of the scarlet carpet, where Jant tried to manoeuvre Dellin in front of the throne. She shook herself free. She ran to the dais, pushed her bangles loose, leaving embossed red lines around her arms, and looked up at the Emperor. Jant swept an elegant bow but she just stood there, knees slightly bent, very tense as if to pounce. Jant was puzzled and annoyed that she didn’t kneel. He placed his hands on her shoulders and tried to push her down but she just snatched herself away, her hand on her thigh where her dagger should be.
‘Comet,’ said the Emperor. ‘That is no way to welcome a guest.’
‘My lord,’ Jant announced. ‘Shira Dellin has come from Darkling and wishes an audience with the “silver man”. I found her waiting in Carillon - she can only speak Scree, so I will translate.’
The Emperor made a strident sound, directly to Dellin. Jant’s mouth dropped open, and so did his wings. Dellin smiled, showing fine white teeth, and started chattering eagerly. The Emperor said something to Jant, who was still too astonished to do more than make a clipped, automatic bow and sit down next to me.
‘What’s going on?’
He leant to whisper, ‘The Emperor speaks Scree! My first language . . .’
‘What did he say?’
‘He told me to sit down.’
I chuckled. ‘Serves you right. You underestimate everyone, even San. Now do something useful and tell me what she is saying.’
‘Um . . . She just called him a flatlander.’
‘What an excellent diplomat!’
He leant back on the hard ebony seat - there are no cushions, to remind us that we must be vigilant and dutiful at all times - stretched his arms along the top of the backrest, crossed his legs and spoke quietly. ‘She just said, “My name is Dellin Shira, but I call myself Shira Dellin, putting my caste name first because I am not afraid of being a Shira, born out of wedlock. Why should I be blamed if my mother ran too slowly?” Hear, hear! I couldn’t agree more.’
Other immortals were arriving all the time, and filing into the benches. From the footsteps behind the screen I could tell the mortals’ benches were filling up too; the news of a Rhydanne in the Throne Room was making its rounds and everyone was coming to see for themselves.
The Emperor pointed at Jant and crooked a finger in beckoning. Jant shuddered and rose to his feet. San said, ‘I wish everyone to hear her words. Translate for the benefit of all.’
Dellin stepped from side to side, warily watching the Emperor. The silence intensified as everyone listened and Jant prepared to echo her. She began. ‘People are like flint. It is hard and resists much harsh treatment, but when it does break its edge is sharper than steel. The Rhydanne are starving. The hunters are famished, and I was too, before I left. The Awians have taken the promontory; they are killing the game and driving us away, either with their feathered darts or on horseback. They . . .’ She mimed an archer in the same way Jant had.
‘Shoot,’ he said.
‘Shoot,’ she copied, feeling the word. ‘Shoot Laochan. My husband. ’ She rubbed the back of her hand across her eyes, which suddenly wet with tears, but whether from grief or frustration I couldn’t tell. ‘Now I have no husband, nobody to defend me if other men chase me, or to tend me if I am injured or pregnant. I have to hunt alone, but what is the point in hunting now? Any animals the Awians haven’t trapped and slaughtered they have frightened away with their noise and bad tracking.’ She paused. ‘Laochan Dara was from the summit of Klannich. It took me many years to find a hunting partner since I am a Shira. I may never find another. The Awians murdered him and they shoot at others, too. They don’t let us onto the promontory. I don’t understand why.
‘I have been travelling since the melt season, till I saw the pinnacle of this house on the horizon. The silver man must live in the biggest house in the flatlands, I thought. I was right. Here you have silver in abundance, more colours than all the mountain flowers, and you must be great hunters.’
I realised that she could not have spoken to anyone for six months and, savage as she was, I began to feel warmth for her. Half a year alone may not be much for a Rhydanne, but she must find the Plainslands strange and the Castle daunting. I admired her determination. Even immortals, Challengers and kings freeze in fear when they face the Emperor, but Dellin’s fortitude shone like a standard. She kept glancing up into the spire lined with gold mosaics, as if its point had pierced the sun and siphoned out liquid flame to run down inside and coat the galleries.
Without turning her back on the Emperor, she swept a glance over the massed immortals, taking in our unfamiliar clothes. She saw Tornado and gaped at his bulk, shook herself and returned to gaze at the Emperor through fine fronds of her black hair. The other Eszai entering were amazed at her lack of respect, and there was so much whispering going on I could hardly follow Jant’s translation.
The Emperor said, ‘Why did the Awians shoot Laochan?’
Dellin ducked her head. ‘We were hunting . . .’
‘What were you hunting?’
‘Some horses. We were starving so we ventured close and took one.’
‘You killed one of their horses?’
‘We took three!’
‘I see.’
‘They enclosed their animals on land where anyone may walk. All animals are fair game.’
‘Only in the hunters’ minds. Do you often prey on herders’ animals?’
‘Yes, goats and llamas.’
‘Would you expect them to defend their livestock?’
‘They try.’
‘Would they kill you if they could?’
‘Yes.’
‘So you do know you are stealing their property. Why is stealing from Awians any different? That the Awians used bows and arrows when you were expecting slings and stones is not something for which we can blame them.’
She hissed in frustration. ‘Do you mean we must starve? I do blame the Awians because they force us from the land where we have always run and they take the food and shelter that should be free for all. All things on the mountainside are for the taking and we gather them if we can. But the Awians are building fences over it as if they are goats penning themselves. The whole mountainside is not the Awians’ shieling, my-friend-the-silver-man.’
‘Indeed not.’
‘Nor is it their pen. But they would corral the mountain itself. I know they want to take the rocks themselves away - the shiny stones - and the very trees. If they could pick Carnich up and carry it down to the flatlands, they would.’
‘Carnich!’ Jant said. He spread his wings excitedly. ‘Carniss, my lord - where the king sent his brother!’
The Emperor nodded, as if this fitted something he had already concluded. A rustle of interest flurried over the benches. Anyone who read the papers knew the story. Last year it had been the main subject of conversation from Summerday to Ghallain, but as my manor borders Rachiswater and I am a friend of the king, I had been in the thick of it.
The Rachiswaters are a recent dynasty. King Tarmigan Rachiswater’s grandfather had taken the throne from the bankrupt Tanager dynasty only sixty-two years before, and they were an even more ambitious and vigorous warrior family than the Tanagers had been. It was natural for dynasties of my country to begin in such a fashion. King Tarmigan, who was rather profligate, had been interested in Darkling for years, as the mountain rock yields silver and the terrain other precious goods. He was the first king to formally extend Awia in fifteen hundred years. He founded a new manor adjoining his on the slopes of the Awian highlands and sent his twin brother to administer it as the first governor of Carniss. This neatly served as a way of distancing his brother from him, as there was bad blood between the two.
Dellin thought for a while and the Emperor, giving her time, did not say anything. She extended one leg, turned her toes up and looked thoughtfully down the length of her leg at her foot. She rubbed at the palest beige patch on her thigh, rendering it as grimy as the rest of her trousers. Then she took a couple of steps almost too fast to follow and raised her face to San again.
‘The featherbacks themselves are more like antler than flint - they are spreading and branching out. More wheeled sledges arrive every day. Since the melt season before last they have been building a house of stone. It grows every day, boulders climbing around a timber frame as if it is a grey adder sheathing on its skin.’
‘How large is it?’ said the Emperor.
She glanced up into the heights of the spire above his head. ‘Not quite as big as this, but very big. Nearly as big as Coomb Mhor. Diédre Pinnacle . . . As tall as the round bulges in the wall outside . . .’ She gestured expansively, her bangles jangling, and indicated the rear of the Throne Room beyond which was the north curtain wall.
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