Citadels of the Lost (19 page)

Ch'drei stiffened on her throne. “A single person, you say?”

“Yes. An elf.”

Ch'drei ran her long tongue over her thin lips. “And what, may I ask, did this singular elf do?”

She does know him, Sjei thought,
a thrill of triumph running through him.
That leaves only one question to be answered.
“The details have not yet reached us and the reports we have are vague at best—but we believe that he used Aether magics to create a diversion. Some reports even say that this elf held office among the Iblisi . . .”

“That is not possible,” Ch'drei responded decisively.

“No?”

“I know where all my children are to be found,” Ch'drei replied again with a forced smile. “This elf, whoever he is, is not one of my Order.”

“I am pleased to hear it,” Sjei replied with a slight bow. “I suspect these reports are of an imposter on the frontier who has lied about his importance at the expense of the honor of your esteemed Order.”

“Such an—imposter must not be tolerated,” Ch'drei replied. “The honor of my House is challenged. It is our fervent hope that your Legions crush this imposter's corpse beneath their boots as well as all those who have sided with him in his rebellion.”

Sjei nodded. The moment had come for him to tell the lie he had hoped to tell. “Then I am pleased to report that your honor is vouched safe. This imposter is already dead.”

Ch'drei held perfectly still. “Dead?”

“Yes, my field commanders report that this elf who made possible the escape was killed before he himself escaped,” Sjei said, clasping his hands in front of him and shaking his head. “The reports are, as I said, still incomplete but I have been told his body remained on the field.”

“I am somewhat interested in this imposter,” Ch'drei said with carefully crafted apathy. “Perhaps I could spare a few of my own Inquisitors and Assessia in recovering the body and determining this imposter's origins. I would gladly offer whatever assistance I could to . . .”

“Which was my purpose in coming,” Sjei said, opening his hands. “I am as concerned about this imposter as you are, Keeper, but the Legions themselves are still in pursuit of these rebel forces, and determining the disposition of one corpse from among the thousands on a battlefield would be a disservice to the Imperial Will. Nevertheless, I assure you that I have made inquiries and should be able to report to you a proper location within the next two to three weeks. But if you could send some of your own Inquisitors to discover the body and retrieve it, then your generosity would serve us both in the Imperial Will.”

The lie. The elf in question was Soen as they both well knew and was anything but an imposter. Ch'drei would never take his word for it that Soen was dead but she might consider the possibility enough to divert those who were looking for the living Soen to search a battlefield for a dead one. There were enough elven dead on the verge of the Shrouded Plain to keep them occupied for some time. Sjei just hoped that it was enough to buy him time to find Soen first as his armies pressed northward along the Shadow Coast.

It was only a matter of time before he caught up with Soen—and Soen would lead him to Drakis.

If he could keep the Iblisi looking in the wrong place.

Ch'drei drew in a deep breath. “Then this imposter is certainly dead.”

“Yes . . . and may the gods grant your Iblisi their favor in finding him.”

T
HE SUN WAS LOW on the horizon when Ishander steered their boats to the outside bank of a curve in the river. There, a stone carving jutted out from the surrounding ferns overhanging the river. The youth braced his feet wide on the platform at the back of the boat and reached up with his bladed staff, catching the carving. The boat swung around with the current but Ishander stood fast. Urulani, seeing what the young native was doing, moved to the back of the boat and reached up to catch the stone as well. The second boat passed Drakis, Ethis, and the Lyric, swinging with a bit more violence as its tether went slack and then suddenly tightened once more, pulling the bow sharply around against the current.

“Are we there?” Urulani asked the young man.

“No,” Ishander answered. “We wait.”

“Wait for what?” Ethis asked, but the boy gave no answer.

Time passed as slowly as the river drifting past them. Drakis had long since exhausted speculation and was never very good at small talk. The boy kept his staff lodged against the stone, holding them in this position, shifting only occasionally to keep his balance.

The sun was nearly setting by the time he spoke again.

“We have been welcomed by the clan,” Ishander announced. “You may let go of the stone, lady.”

Urulani raised her eyebrow slightly. Drakis could not be certain whether she was surprised or affronted by the remark but she let go of her hold, her dark arms falling to her sides, shaking them to relieve the aching.

“Did you see any signal?” Drakis whispered to Ethis.

“No,” the chimerian answered quietly, “but not seeing one does not mean there was none. We must be close.”

The boats drifted around the bend, running down a straight section of the river that moved swiftly before slowing again as it turned to their left.

“You are the guests of our Clan-mother, Audelai El,” Ishander spoke without preamble. His voice was overly loud and carried a stiff, pompous quality. “As guests, you shall enjoy the privileges of our great city and the protection of its fortress walls. If you are to remain our guests, you will acknowledge the law of the Ambeth Clan as your own, our customs will be your customs and our justice your justice. Do you submit your will to that of the clan?”

“I do,” Mala answered at once.

“And I submit myself even more than she does!” piped in the Lyric.

“Might I ask a question?” Ethis said as he raised one of his four hands.

Ishander looked momentarily troubled, as though someone had sung a wrong note in the expected melody of his song. “You . . . a question?”

“Yes,” Ethis continued. “What if we don't want to submit our will to the clan?”

Ishander blinked. “What if you . . . what?”

“I mean, we don't know what the clan expects of us or what its rules are or whether we're breaking them or not,” Ethis continued. “So what if we don't agree to this will of the clan?”

Urulani turned to cast a look of gentle warning in the direction of the chimerian.

Ishander stuttered for a moment before recovering, indignation blossoming in his features. “Well . . . you . . . you would . . . you would be horribly executed as cowards and enemies of the clan!”

“Oh, well, then!” Ethis said with an exaggerated shrug. “I guess we
do
submit to the will of the clan.”

“What about the short one?” Ishander asked, pointing his pinkie finger at the second boat.

Mala reached under the covering tarpaulin at once and raised Jugar's limp hand. “So does the dwarf!”

“We all do, Ishander,” Urulani said, her dark eyes fixed on the young man. “But will you teach us the ways of your people? We do not wish to offend your Clan-mother.”

The young man smiled. “Of course! I am a Far-runner and I know the ways of many places and peoples—but I have never met anyone like you. Were you a Clan-mother where you come from?”

“Something like that,” Urulani said. “I was the captain of a ship—like you—only my ship was larger and held all my clan.”

The boy's eyes grew wide with wonder, but he managed to recover his composure and regain his studied, stoic expression.

“You gave your speech very well, Ishander,” Ethis said. “Is giving that speech also part of the clan's law?”

“Yes,” Ishander answered. “We Far-runners must learn it before we may leave our clan strongholds. It is to be given to all those the Far-runners bring from the outside into our city.”

“And how often have you given this speech yourself?” Drakis asked.

The boy glanced at Drakis and then fixed his eyes back on the river. “Once.”

“And that was to us?” Drakis continued.

Ishander ignored the remark, launching once again into his recitation. “Tremble before the wonder that is Ambeth! Clanhold of the Ambeth people and symbol of its might and glory! Look upon our wondrous works and despair!”

Drakis turned to look forward where the river again twisted, this time to the right, and caught his first sight of Ambeth.

His first thought was that the young man was making fun of him.

“Ah,” Ethis said from behind him. “So this is what has become of the mighty human empires of the north.”

As they came to the bend in the river, Ambeth appeared not so much a fortress as a stockade. Vertical logs had been driven into the ground to form a defensive wall. An attempt had been made to keep the jungle cleared outside the wall far enough from the stockade so that its defenders might see trouble coming before it was upon them, but the jungle was uncooperatively encroaching on the space. There were stockade towers erected on either side of the river and at intervals down the wall but these were barely twenty feet tall—not even as tall as the subatria wall that had surrounded House Timuran and that had been considered only for show.

Drakis craned his head, trying to see beyond the gap in the wall where the river ran between two of the watchtowers and was dismayed.

Ambeth was little more than a collection of low, thatched-roof huts scattered over a spit of land that formed a long, slow curve in the river. Here and there among the huts, the crumbling walls of what may have been a former settlement jutted upward in jagged defiance toward the sky but were generally ignored by the surrounding architecture of the hovels. There was a “Keep” of sorts—a second stockade wall atop the rise looking over the river that surrounded a single tower. Even that structure was a sad one, cobbled around the remains of a former stone tower now patched together with wood framing.

As they passed slowly between the watchtowers, Drakis took in the totality of the village of which Ishander had so generously boasted. On their right, the stockade wall ran a short distance up from the shore and then angled back toward the river at a watchtower. There, barely past the river's edge, the stockade wall abruptly ended, as though the river would protect the village and further extension was not required. To his left, the land rose gently from the river, creating a shallow beach toward which Ishander steered them. There were many boats on the beach and small homes beyond. Smoke rose from numerous chimneys and hung in a layer just above the village, turning blue and gray in the deepening sunset.

His warrior mind instantly conceived of a dozen different plans by which he could overwhelm the defenses of this village—the place where they staked their survival.

But it was the sound, at last, that attracted his attention.

The sound of children laughing.

Human children.

Drakis stared in wonder at the beach ahead of them. From the hovels and the homes, the dirt streets and alleyways, the broken ruins and the thick bushes and plants they came: humans. Young, old, men, women, warriors, and artisans, they came toward the beach.

The wonders he had seen, Drakis realized, the ruins of greatness and power that they had witnessed in Pythar were the legacy of these people. Their ancestors had built these ruins. They had been a great people—a people who had challenged the Rhonas Empire itself.

One question kept nagging at him as they pushed toward the shore and the line of guards quickly gathering there.

What happened that they should have fallen so far?

“All kneel before the Clan-mother of the Ambeth!” thundered the broad-shouldered human who stood a full head taller than Drakis.

Drakis had been considering what it might take for him to disarm the warrior and, on reflection, believed he could do it. Still, it would not be proper to insult the only hosts they knew within a thousand leagues who could supply them with food and water.

Drakis knelt along with Ethis and Urulani. Mala and the Lyric were behind them. The dwarf had, for good or ill, regained consciousness and lay again on his makeshift litter struggling to sit up.

“Where are we?” Jugar demanded.

Drakis pushed him back flat on the litter. “We're in Ambeth. Hold still.”

“Ambeth?” the dwarf responded with a quizzical look on his face. “Where or what is an Ambeth?”

Drakis pushed Jugar back flat once again. “Hold still and listen . . . then perhaps we can all find out.”