Jennsen winced as the muscular guard twisted her arm and shoved her through the tent’s opening. She stumbled but was able to keep herself from falling. After riding through the sprawling camp in the bright winter sunlight, she found it difficult to see in the somber royal quarters. She squinted, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dim light. She could see the hulking shapes of guards to either side.
Jennsen turned to a commotion behind her and saw the same big soldiers pushing Anson, Owen, and Marilee, Owen’s wife, through the opening and into the tent as if they were herding animals to slaughter. Jennsen hadn’t seen much of the others over the course of their swift journey north. All of them had been kept gagged and blindfolded for most of the way to make sure that they were little more trouble to bring along than the rest of the baggage and supplies. It made Jennsen’s heart ache to see her friends back in the clutches of such evil people. It felt like a recurring nightmare.
In the distance, on the other side of the tent’s large outer room, Jennsen saw Emperor Jagang sitting behind a heavy table, eating. Dozens of candles standing to each side of the table gave that end of the room the appearance of an al
tar in the inner sanctum. Slaves waited in a line against the back wall behind the emperor. The table was spread with an abundance of food, enough for a banquet. Jagang looked to be eating alone.
The emperor’s black eyes were watching Jennsen as if she were a pheasant he was considering beheading, gutting, and roasting for the reclusive feast. He lifted a hand and with two fingers glistening with grease signaled her closer. Large rings on his fingers, as well as long jewel-encrusted chains around his neck, glimmered in the candlelight.
Followed closely by a frightened Anson, Owen, and Marilee, Jennsen crossed the thick carpets to stand before the emperor’s table. The candle stands lit a table spread with ham, fowl, beef, and sauces of every sort. There were nuts and fruits, as well as a variety of cheeses.
His terrible gaze never leaving her, Jagang used the fingers of one hand to twist the breast off a small roasted bird. He held a silver goblet in the other hand. He took a big bite, then washed it down with red wine from the goblet. She knew it was red wine because much of it rolled down from the sides of his mouth to drip all over his sleeveless lamb’s-wool vest.
“Well, well,” he said as he plunked the goblet down on the table, “if it isn’t Richard Rahl’s little sister come for another visit.”
The last time she had come to the emperor’s table she had been with Sebastian. The last time she had been a guest. The last time she had not known that she was being used. She had grown up a lot since that day.
“Hungry, darlin?”
Jennsen was starving. “No,” she lied.
Jagang smiled. “I don’t need to be a dream walker to be able to tell that you’re lying.”
Jennsen flinched when the man’s big fist slammed down
on the table. Plates jumped. Bottles fell over. Goblets spilled. The three people behind her gasped.
Jagang shot to his feet. “I don’t like being lied to!”
Fright flashed through Jennsen at his sudden rage. Veins stood out in his forehead. His whole face had gone red. She thought he might strike her dead where she stood.
Before he was able to act on his rage, a shaft of light slashed into the room. Two women ducked through the opening in the tent. The heavy wool flap hanging over the opening lowered, allowing the gloom to settle back in.
Jagang turned his attention from Jennsen to the two women. “Ulicia, Armina, any word of Nicci?”
The two, obviously taken off guard by the question, shared a brief look with each other.
“Answer me, Ulicia! I’m in no mood for games!”
“No, Excellency, there has been no word about Nicci.” The woman cleared her throat. “If I may ask, Excellency, do you have reason to believe she may be alive?”
Jagang cooled visibly. “Yes.” He sank down into his elaborately carved chair. “I’ve had dreams of her.”
“But, the link to the Rada’Han went dead. There is no way she could have gotten it off without help. Perhaps they were nothing more than dreams.”
“She’s alive!”
Sister Ulicia dipped her head in a bow. “Of course, Excellency. You would know better than I about such things.”
He rubbed his forehead with the tips of his fingers. “I haven’t been sleeping well of late. I grow weary of sitting in this miserable place, waiting for progress. I should have the men building the ramp whipped, as slow as they are. I thought the executions after the riots would spur them into being more devoted to their duty. This is for our cause, after all. Perhaps if I throw some of the slower workers from the top of the ramp that would hurry the rest of them.”
“Well, Excellency,” Sister Ulicia said as she stepped
forward, looking eager to turn his attention away from his dark and violent thoughts, “we have something that we think may make you feel a great deal better about our progress.”
He looked up sharply, then scooped his goblet off the table and took a long drink. He set the goblet back down and squeezed off a fistful of ham from the large platter of it sitting just to his right.
After taking a bite from the meat in his hand, he gestured to the two Sisters. “What is it, then?”
“A number of books were brought back with Jennsen. One in particular is…well, Excellency, we think you should see it for yourself.”
Jagang was looking impatient again. He rolled a hand.
Both women rushed forward at the command. Sister Armina held up the book Jennsen remembered seeing brought up from the secret underground room in the graveyard.
“The Book of Counted Shadows,”
she said.
Jagang looked to each woman’s eyes, then held both hands out to the side. A slave immediately stepped forward with a towel and started cleaning the emperor’s hands. When Jagang tilted his head toward the table, other slaves stepped in to start clearing platters and bowls away. After they had cleared space on the table a young woman, dressed in an outfit that revealed far more than it concealed, rushed in to wipe the wooden tabletop.
As Jagang was still having his hands cleaned, Sister Armina set the book down before the emperor. He slapped the slave’s hands away and turned to the book. He leaned over as he opened the cover and began inspecting the text inside.
“Well,” he finally asked as he turned pages, “what do you think? Is it the true copy or a false one?”
“It’s not a copy, Excellency.”
He looked up with a frown that seemed like it might turn lethal. “What do you mean it’s not a copy?”
“It’s the original, Excellency.”
Jagang blinked, unsure that he’d heard her right. He leaned back in his chair to stare up at the woman.
“The original?”
Sister Ulicia stepped close. She leaned across the table and turned the pages back to the beginning.
“Look at this, here, Excellency.” She tapped a place to show him. “This is the maker’s mark. It’s his seal containing a spell to signify that this is original.”
“So what? Maybe the seal is false.”
Sister Ulicia was shaking her head. “No, Excellency. That’s just not the way it works. When a prophet writes down prophecies in a book he puts this kind of mark in the front of his writings to signify that it’s the original, that it’s his work, in his own hand, and not a copy.
“You have many books of prophecy, Excellency, but with a couple of exceptions, they are all copies of the original. Most have no seal at all. Sometimes the man who copies the original makes his own mark so that his work can be identified and to make sure it is recognized as a copy. Such a seal to signify a copy is never like this. This is a unique sort of mark that is never put in a copy, only in the original.
“This is a maker’s mark left in the form of a spell. It’s how originals are identified. This is the original
Book of Counted Shadows
.” She closed the book and showed him the spine. “See? ‘Shadows,’ not ‘Shadow.’ It has the maker’s mark. It was found hidden behind barriers and shields. This is the original.”
“What about the others?”
“None have a seal like this. Not one of the three even has a mark of the man who made the copy. In fact, none have any kind of mark at all. They are simply copies. This is the original.”
Jagang, leaning a hand on the table, tapped the side of his thumb as he considered.
“I still don’t see why it couldn’t be a false copy. If they made a false copy and wanted to make it look real they could have put a fraudulent mark in the book to fool people.”
“Technically, it’s possible, but there are a number of things that point to it not being a fraud. There are also a variety of tests we can do to verify the authenticity of the maker’s mark. That, after all, is why he leaves a mark in a spell-form: so that it can be tested. We’ve done a few tests, and the results have shown that it is genuine, but there are some more complex verification webs we could still use to test it.”
Sister Armina waved a hand at the book. “There is also the matter of what it says in the beginning, Excellency, the part about being verified by a Confessor.”
Sister Ulicia tsked impatiently. This was apparently an argument they’d already had. She shot Sister Armina a murderous scowl before once again turning her attention to the emperor.
“The book says that a Confessor is in essence used to verify the copy, Excellency, not the original. For that reason we can’t reliably trust her to identify the original—that isn’t what she is meant to do. The maker’s mark does that, and we can do further tests on the mark. I’m confident those tests will confirm what we already know to be true.”
Jagang tapped a finger on the table as he considered her words. “Where was this found?”
“In Bandakar, Excellency,” Sister Ulicia said.
“You mean it was behind those barriers of magic for all this time?”
“Yes, Excellency,” Sister Ulicia said with obvious excitement. “That alone is evidence that this is the original manuscript.”
“Why?”
“Because, if the original could be identified by the mark, where would you hide it?”
“Behind barriers of magic,” he answered, thoughtfully.
“Excellency, this is the original of
The Book of Counted Shadows
. I’m sure of it.”
He peered up at her with his black eyes. “Are you willing to stake your life on that being true?”
“Yes, Excellency,” Sister Ulicia answered without hesitation.
Jennsen woke suddenly to the strangest sound. As she came out of a dead sleep it seemed like a roaring noise of some sort. At first she thought that it must be Emperor Jagang having another of his nightmares, but the sound was followed by a great commotion outside. Men shouted for others to get out of the way, or in fear. Metal clattered in what sounded like stacked lances being tipped over by scattering men. She heard the roar again, closer, and more shouting.
Jennsen saw the guards at the entrance to the tent peek out from the edge of the hanging covering the opening. She feared to get up from her spot on the floor. Jagang had told her to stay there. As violent as the man could become in an instant, she knew better than to test him.
Anson looked questioningly to her. Jennsen shrugged. Owen took Marilee’s hand. The three of them were obviously frightened. Jennsen shared the feeling.
Jagang stormed out of his bedchamber, still buttoning his trousers. He looked tired and groggy. Jennsen knew that with the nightmares tormenting him he was not getting much sleep.
He was about to speak when the flap over the opening pulled to the side. The noise of the pandemonium flooded into the tent.
A thin woman stepped through the opening. In the noise
and confusion, she moved with the cool, deliberate demeanor of a snake.
Just from the sight of her alone, Jennsen wished she could crawl under a carpet and hide.
The woman’s pale eyes took in the four people on the floor before looking up at the emperor. She ignored the guards. Her pallid skin stood out white against her black dress.
“Six!” Jagang said. “What are you doing here in the middle of the night!”
She regarded him almost contemptuously. “Your bidding.”
Jagang glared at her. “Well, what is it, then?”
“A matter of something I agreed to obtain for you.”
She lifted out something that she’d had under her arm. Jennsen hadn’t seen it because it was so black that it was almost impossible to see in the dimly lit tent, to say nothing of being held against her black dress.
As he stared at the thing she held out, his mood began to brighten.
Jagang’s eyes were black. Six’s dress was black. Midnight on a moonless night in a cave in a thick forest was black. None of those things, though, could compare to the black of what the woman was holding. It was black beyond anything Jennsen had ever seen before. The thought occurred to her that when a person died, that was the kind of blackness that must enshroud them.
Jagang stared, his eyes wide with delight, a smile settling into his features. “The third box…”
Six didn’t look to share his abrupt good humor. “I have kept my bargain.”
“So you have,” Jagang said as he reverently lifted the box from her. “So you have.”
He finally set the inky black box on a chest. “What of the other matters?” he asked over a shoulder.
“I burned into their forces, scattering them. I have eliminated patrols when I found them. I scouted the routes for supply trains and insured that they could safely pass.”
“Yes, they have been getting through—and none too soon.”
“It will be vastly better simply to end this,” the woman said. “Have you been able to find the true copy of
The Book of Counted Shadows
?”
“No.” He grinned. “I believe, though, that I have the original.”
She gazed at him for a long time, as if weighing the truth of his words, or maybe just wondering if he was drunk.
“You
believe
you have found the original?” A humorless smile spread on her thin lips. “Why don’t you simply use your Confessor?”
“We had some…trouble. She managed to escape.”
What ever Six was thinking she didn’t reveal it on her gaunt face. “Well, she is of limited use to you anyway.”