Authors: David Eddings
‘You can’t order
me
around like that!’ an overdressed courtier exclaimed to Khalad in an outraged tone of voice. ‘Don’t you know who I am?’
‘Of course I do,’ Sparhawk’s young squire replied in an ominous tone of voice. ‘You’re the man who’s going to pick up that shovel and start digging. Or if you prefer, you can be the man who’s crawling around on his hands and knees picking up his teeth.’ Khalad showed the courtier his fist. The courtier could hardly miss seeing it, since it was about an inch in front of his nose.
‘It’s almost like old times, isn’t it?’ Kalten laughed. ‘Khalad sounds exactly like Kurik.’
Sparhawk sighed. ‘Yes,’ he agreed soberly, ‘I think
he’s going to work out just fine. Get the others, Kalten. We need to talk.’
They gathered beside Ehlana’s carriage. The queen was a bit pale, and she was holding her daughter in her arms.
‘All right,’ Sparhawk said. ‘Who were they?’
‘Lamorks, evidently,’ Ulath said. ‘I doubt that anybody else would be able to speak Old Lamork.’
‘But why would they be speaking in that language?’ Tynian asked. ‘Nobody’s spoken in Old Lamork for a thousand years.’
‘And nobody’s worn bronze armour for even longer,’ Bevier added.
‘Somebody’s using a spell I’ve never even heard of before,’ Sparhawk said. ‘What are we dealing with here?’
‘Isn’t that obvious?’ Stragen said. ‘Somebody’s reaching back into the past – the same way the Troll-Gods did in Pelosia. We’ve got a powerful magician of some kind out there who’s playing games.’
‘It fits,’ Ulath grunted. ‘They were speaking an antique language; they had antique weapons and equipment; they weren’t familiar with modern tactics; and somebody obviously used magic to send them back to wherever they came from – except for the dead ones.’
‘There’s something else too,’ Bevier added thoughtfully. ‘They were Lamorks, and part of the upheaval in Lamorkand right now revolves around the stories that Drychtnath’s returned. This attack makes it appear that those stories aren’t just rumours and wild concoctions dreamed up late at night in some ale-house. Could Count Gerrich be getting some help from a Styric magician? If Drychtnath himself has actually been brought into the present,
nothing’s
going to pacify the Lamorks. They go up in flames at just the mention of his name.’
‘That’s all very interesting, gentlemen,’ Ehlana told
them, ‘but this wasn’t just a random attack. We’re a goodly distance from Lamorkand, so these antiques of yours went to a great deal of trouble to attack
us
specifically. The real question here is why?’
‘We’ll work on finding an answer for you, your Majesty,’ Tynian promised her.
Berit returned shortly before noon with three hundred armoured Pandions, and the rest of the journey to Chyrellos had some of the air of a military expedition.
Their arrival in the Holy City and their stately march through the streets to the Basilica was very much like a parade, and it caused quite a stir. The Archprelate himself came out onto a second-floor balcony to watch their arrival in the square before the Basilica. Even from this distance, Sparhawk could clearly see that Dolmant’s nostrils were white and his jaw was clenched. Ehlana’s expression was regal and coolly defiant.
Sparhawk lifted his daughter down from the carriage. ‘Don’t wander off,’ he murmured into her small ear. ‘There’s something I need to talk with you about.’
‘Later,’ she whispered back to him. ‘I’ll have to make peace between Dolmant and mother first.’
‘That’ll be a neat trick.’
‘Watch, Sparhawk – and learn.’
The Archprelate’s greeting was chilly – just this side of frigid – and he made it abundantly clear that he was just dying to have a nice long chat with the Queen of Elenia. He sent for his first secretary, the Patriarch Emban, and rather airily dropped the problem of making arrangements for Ehlana’s entourage into the fat churchman’s lap. Emban scowled and waddled away muttering to himself.
Then Dolmant invited the queen and her prince consort into a private audience chamber. Mirtai stationed herself outside the door. ‘No hitting,’ she told Dolmant and Ehlana as they entered.
The small audience chamber was draped and carpeted in blue, and there were a table and chairs in the centre.
‘Strange woman that one,’ Dolmant murmured looking back over his shoulder at Mirtai. He took his seat and looked at Ehlana with a firm expression. ‘Let’s get down to business. Would you like to explain this, Queen Ehlana?’
‘Of course, Archprelate Dolmant.’ She pushed his letter across the table to him. ‘Just as soon as you explain this.’ There was steel in her voice.
He picked up the letter and glanced at it. ‘It seems fairly straightforward. Which part of it didn’t you understand?’
Things went downhill from there rather rapidly.
Ehlana and Dolmant were on the verge of severing all diplomatic ties when the Royal Princess Danae entered the room dragging the Royal Toy Rollo by one hind leg. She gravely crossed the room, climbed up into the Archprelate’s lap and kissed him. Sparhawk had received quite a few of the kind of kisses his daughter bestowed when she wanted something, and he was well-aware of just how devastatingly potent they were. Dolmant didn’t really have much of a chance after that. ‘I should have read through the letter before I had it dispatched, I suppose,’ he admitted grudgingly. ‘Scribes sometimes overstate things.’
‘Maybe I over-reacted,’ Ehlana conceded.
‘I had a great deal on my mind.’ Dolmant’s excuse had the tone of a peace-offering.
‘I was irritable on the day when your letter arrived,’ Ehlana countered.
Sparhawk leaned back. The tension in the room had noticeably relaxed. Dolmant had changed since his elevation to the Archprelacy. Always before, he had been a self-effacing man, so self-effacing in fact that his colleagues in the Hierocracy had not even considered
him for the highest post in the Church until Ehlana had pointed out his many sterling qualities to them. The irony of that fact was not lost on Sparhawk. Now, however, Dolmant seemed to speak with two voices. The one was the familiar, almost colloquial voice of their old friend. The other was the voice of the Archprelate, authoritarian and severe. The institution of his office seemed to be gradually annexing their old friend. Sparhawk sighed. It was probably inevitable, but he regretted it all the same.
Ehlana and the Archprelate continued to apologise and offer excuses to each other. After a while they agreed to respect one another, and they concluded their conference by agreeing to pay closer attention to little courtesies in the future.
Princess Danae, still seated in the Archprelate’s lap, winked at Sparhawk. There were quite a number of political and theological implications in what she had just done, but Sparhawk didn’t really want to think about those.
The reason for the peremptory summons which had nearly led to a private war between Ehlana and Dolmant had been the arrival of a high-ranking emissary from the Tamul Empire on the Daresian continent, that vast land-mass lying to the east of Zemoch. Formal diplomatic relations between the Elene Kingdoms of Eosia and the Tamul Empire of Daresia did not exist. The Church, however, routinely dispatched emissaries with ambassadorial rank to the imperial capital at Matherion, in some measure because the three western-most kingdoms of the empire were occupied by Elenes, and their religion differed only slightly from that of the Eosian Church.
The emissary was a Tamul, a man of the same race as Mirtai, although she would have made at least two of him. His skin was the same golden bronze, his black
hair touched with grey and his dark eyes were uptilted at the corners.
‘He’s very good,’ Dolmant quietly cautioned them as they sat in one of the audience chambers while Emban and the emissary exchanged pleasantries near the door. ‘In some ways he’s even better than Emban. Be just a little careful of what you say around him. Tamuls are quite sensitive to the nuances of language.’
Emban escorted the silk-robed emissary to the place where they all sat. ‘Your Majesty, I have the honour to present his Excellency, Ambassador Oscagne, representative of the imperial court at Matherion,’ the little fat man said, bowing to Ehlana.
‘I swoon in your Majesty’s divine presence,’ the ambassador proclaimed with a florid bow.
‘You don’t really, do you, your Excellency?’ she asked him with a little smile.
‘Well, not really, of course,’ he admitted with absolute aplomb. ‘I thought it might be polite to say it, though. Did it seem unduly extravagant? I am unversed in the usages of your culture.’
‘You’ll do just fine, your Excellency,’ she laughed.
‘I must say, however, with your Majesty’s permission, that you’re a devilishly attractive young lady. I’ve known a few queens in my time, and the customary compliments usually cost one a certain amount of wrestling with one’s conscience.’ Ambassador Oscagne spoke flawless Elenic.
‘May I present my husband, Prince Sparhawk?’ Ehlana suggested.
‘The legendary Sir Sparhawk? Most assuredly, dear lady. I’ve travelled half-round the world to make his acquaintance. Well met, Sir Sparhawk.’ Oscagne bowed.
‘Your Excellency,’ Sparhawk replied, also bowing.
Ehlana then introduced the others, and the ongoing exchange of diplomatic pleasantries continued for the
better part of an hour. Oscagne and Mirtai spoke at some length in the Tamul tongue, a language which Sparhawk found quite musical.
‘Have we concluded all the necessary genuflections in courtesy’s direction?’ the ambassador asked at last. ‘Cultures vary, of course, but in Tamuli three-quarters of an hour is the customary amount of time one is expected to waste on polite trivialities.’
‘That seems about right to me too,’ Stragen grinned. ‘If we overdo our homage to courtesy, she becomes a bit conceited and expects more and more obeisance every time.’
‘Well said, Milord Stragen,’ Oscagne approved. ‘The reason for my visit is fairly simple, my friends. I’m in trouble.’ He looked around. ‘I pause for the customary gasps of surprise while you try to adjust your thinking to accept the notion that anyone could possibly find any fault in so witty and charming a fellow as I.’
‘I think I’m going to like him,’ Stragen murmured.
‘You would,’ Ulath grunted.
‘Pray tell, your Excellency,’ Ehlana said, ‘how on earth could anyone find reason to be dissatisfied with you?’ The ambassador’s flowery speech was contagious.
‘I exaggerated slightly for effect,’ Oscagne admitted. ‘I’m not really in all that much trouble. It’s just that his Imperial Majesty has sent me to Chyrellos to appeal for aid, and I’m supposed to couch the request in such a way that it won’t humiliate him.’
Emban’s eyes were very, very bright. He was in his natural element here. ‘I think the way we’ll want to proceed here is to just lay the problem out on the table for our friends in bold flat terms,’ he suggested, ‘and then they can concentrate on the real issue of avoiding embarrassment to the imperial government. They’re all unspeakably clever. I’m sure that if they put their heads together, they’ll be able to come up with something.’
Dolmant sighed. ‘Was there no one else you could
have selected for my job, Ehlana?’ he asked plaintively.
Oscagne gave the two of them a questioning look.
‘It’s a long story, your Excellency,’ Emban told him. ‘I’ll tell you all about it someday when neither of us has anything better to do. Tell them what it is in Tamuli that’s so serious that his Imperial Majesty had to send you here to look for help.’
‘Promise not to laugh?’ Oscagne said to Ehlana.
‘I’ll do my best to stifle my guffaws,’ she promised.
‘We’ve got a bit of civil unrest in Tamuli,’ Oscagne told them.
They all waited.
‘That’s it,’ Oscagne confessed ruefully. ‘Of course I’m quoting the emperor verbatim – at his instruction. You’d almost have to know our emperor to understand. He’d sooner die than overstate anything. He once referred to a hurricane as a “little breeze” and the loss of half his fleet as a minor inconvenience.’
‘Very well, your Excellency,’ Ehlana said. ‘Now we know how your emperor would characterise the problem. What words would
you
use to describe it?’
‘Well,’ Oscagne said, ‘since your Majesty is so kind as to ask, “catastrophic”
does
sort of leap to mind. We might consider “insoluble”, “cataclysmic”, “overwhelming” – little things like that. I really think you should give some consideration to his Majesty’s request, my friends, because we have some fairly strong evidence that what’s happening on the Daresian continent may soon spread to Eosia as well, and if it does, it’s probably going to mean the end of civilisation as we know it. I’m not entirely positive how you Elenes feel about that sort of thing, but we Tamuls are more or less convinced that some effort ought to be made to fend it off. It sets such a bad precedent when you start letting the world come to an end every week or so. It seems to erode the confidence people have in their governments for some reason.’
Ambassador Oscagne leaned back in his chair. ‘Where to begin?’ he pondered. ‘When one looks at the incidents individually, they almost appear trivial. It’s the cumulative effect that’s brought the empire to the brink of collapse.’
‘We can understand that sort of thing, your Excellency,’ Emban assured him. ‘The Church has been on the brink of collapse for centuries now. Our Holy Mother reels from crisis to crisis like a drunken sailor.’
‘Emban,’ Dolmant chided gently.
‘Sorry,’ the fat little churchman apologised.
Oscagne was smiling. ‘Sometimes it seems that way, though, doesn’t it, your Grace,’ he said to Emban. ‘I’d imagine that the government of the Church is not really all that much different from the government of the empire. Bureaucrats need crisis in order to survive. If there isn’t a crisis of some kind, someone might decide that a number of positions could be eliminated.’
‘I’ve noticed the same sort of thing myself,’ Emban agreed.
‘I assure you, however, that what we have in Tamuli is not some absurd little flap generated for the purposes of making someone’s position secure. I’m not exaggerating in the slightest when I say that the empire’s on the brink of collapse.’ His bronze face became thoughtful. ‘We are not one homogeneous people as you here in Eosia are,’ he began. ‘There are five races on the Daresian continent. We Tamuls live to the east, there are Elenes in the west, Styrics around Sarsos, the Valesians on their island and the Cynesgans in the centre. It’s
probably not natural for so many different kinds of people to all be gathered under one roof. Our cultures are different, our religions are different, and each race is sublimely convinced that it’s the crown of the universe.’ He sighed. ‘We’d probably have been better off if we’d remained separate.’
‘But, at some time in the past someone grew ambitious?’ Tynian surmised.
‘Far from it, Sir Knight,’ Oscagne replied. ‘You could almost say that we Tamuls blundered into empire.’ He looked at Mirtai, who sat quietly with Danae in her lap. ‘And that’s the reason,’ he said, pointing at the giantess.
‘It wasn’t my fault, Oscagne,’ she protested.
‘I wasn’t blaming you personally, Atana,’ he smiled. ‘It’s your people.’
She smiled. ‘I haven’t heard that term since I was a child. No one’s ever called me “Atana” before.’
‘What’s it mean?’ Talen asked her curiously.
‘Warrior,’ she shrugged.
‘Warrioress, actually,’ Oscagne corrected. He frowned. ‘I don’t want to be offensive, but your Elene tongue is limited in its ability to convey subtleties.’ He looked at Ehlana. ‘Has your Majesty noticed that your slave is not exactly like other women?’ he asked her.
‘She’s my friend,’ Ehlana objected, ‘not my slave.’
‘Don’t be ignorant, Ehlana,’ Mirtai told her crisply. ‘Of course I’m a slave. I’m supposed to be. Go on with your story, Oscagne. I’ll explain it to them later.’
‘Do you really think they’ll understand?’
‘No. But I’ll explain it anyway.’
‘And there, revered Archprelate,’ Oscagne said to Dolmant, ‘there lies the key to the empire. The Atans placed themselves in thrall to us some fifteen hundred years ago to prevent their homicidal instincts from obliterating their entire race. As a result, we Tamuls have the finest army in the world – even though we’re basically a
non-violent people. We tended to win those incidental little arguments with other nations which crop up from time to time and are usually settled by negotiation. In our view, our neighbours are like children, hopelessly incapable of managing their own affairs. The empire came into being largely in the interests of good order.’ He looked around at the Church Knights. ‘Once again, I’m not trying to be offensive, but war is probably the stupidest of human activities. There are much more efficient ways to persuade people to change their minds.’
‘Such as the threat to unleash the Atans?’ Emban suggested slyly.
‘That does work rather well, your Grace,’ Oscagne admitted. ‘The presence of the Atans has usually been enough in the past to keep political discussion from becoming too spirited. Atans make excellent policemen.’ He sighed. ‘You noted that slight qualification, I’m sure. I said, “in the past”. Unfortunately, that doesn’t hold true any more. An empire comprised of disparate peoples must always expect these little outbreaks of nationalism and racial discord. It’s the nature of the insignificant to try to find some way to assert their own importance. It’s pathetic, but racism is generally the last refuge of the unimportant. These outbreaks of insignificance aren’t normally too widespread, but suddenly all of Tamuli is in the throes of an epidemic of them. Everyone’s sewing flags and singing national anthems and labouring over well-honed insults to be directed at “the yellow dogs”. That’s us, of course.’ He held out his hand and looked at it critically. ‘Our skins aren’t really yellow, you know. They’re more…’ He pondered it.
‘Beige?’ Stragen suggested.
‘That’s not too flattering either, Milord Stragen.’ Oscagne smiled. ‘Oh, well. Perhaps the emperor will
appoint a special commission to define our skin tone once and for all.’ He shrugged. ‘At any rate, incidental outbreaks of nationalism and racial bigotry would be no real problem for the Atans, even if they occurred in every town in the empire. It’s the unnatural incidents that cause us all this concern.’
‘I thought there might be more,’ Ulath murmured.
‘At first, these demonstrations of magic were directed at the people themselves,’ Oscagne went on. ‘Every culture has its mythic hero – some towering personality who unified the people, gave them national purpose and defined their character. The modern world is complex and confusing, and the simple folk yearn for the simplicity of the age of heroes when national goals could be stated simply and everyone knew precisely who he was. Someone in Tamuli is resurrecting the heroes of antiquity.’
Sparhawk felt a sudden chill. ‘Giants?’ he asked.
‘Well.’ Oscagne considered it. ‘Perhaps that is the proper term at that. The passage of the centuries blurs and distorts, and our cultural heroes tend to become larger than life. I suppose that when we think of them, we
do
think of giants. That’s a very acute perception, Sir Sparhawk.’
‘I can’t actually take credit for it, your Excellency. The same sort of thing’s been happening here.’
Dolmant looked at him sharply.
‘I’ll explain later, Sarathi. Please go on, Ambassador Oscagne. You said that whoever’s stirring things up in Tamuli started out by raising national heroes. That implies that it’s gone further.’
‘Oh, yes indeed, Sir Sparhawk. Much, much further. Every culture has its hobgoblins as well as its heroes. It’s the hobgoblins we’ve been encountering – monsters, afreets, werewolves, vampires – all those things adults use to frighten children into good behaviour. Our Atans
can’t cope with that sort of thing. They’re trained to deal with men, not with all the horrors the creative genius of aeons has put together. That’s our problem. We have nine different cultures in Tamuli, and suddenly each one of them has taken to pursuing its traditional historic goals. When we send in our Atans to restore order and to re-assert imperial authority, the horrors rise up out of the ground to confront them. We can’t deal with it. The empire’s disintegrating, falling back into its component parts. His Imperial Majesty’s government hopes that your Church can recognise a certain community of interest here. If Tamuli collapses back into nine warring kingdoms, the resulting chaos is almost certain to have its impact here in Eosia as well. It’s the magic that has us so concerned. We can deal with ordinary insurrection, but we’re unequipped to deal with a continent-wide conspiracy that routinely utilises magic against us. The Styrics at Sarsos are baffled. Everything they try is countered almost before they can set it in motion. We’ve heard stories about what happened in the City of Zemoch, and it is to you personally that I must appeal, Sir Sparhawk. Zalasta of Sarsos is the pre-eminent magician in all of Styricum, and he assures us that you are the only man in all the world with enough power to deal with the situation.’
‘Zalasta may have an exaggerated idea of my abilities,’ Sparhawk said.
‘You know him?’
‘We’ve met. Actually, your Excellency, I was only a very small part of what happened at Zemoch. When you get right down to it, I was hardly more than a channel for power I couldn’t even begin to describe. I was the instrument of something else.’
‘Be that as it may, you’re still our only hope. Someone is quite obviously conspiring to overthrow the empire. We
must
identify that someone. Unless we can get to
the source of all of this and neutralise it, the empire will collapse. Will you help us, Sir Sparhawk?’
‘That decision’s not mine to make, your Excellency. You must appeal to my queen and to Sarathi here. If they command me, I’ll go to Tamuli. If they forbid it, I won’t.’
‘I’ll direct my enormous powers of persuasion at them, then,’ Oscagne smiled. ‘But even assuming that I’m successful – and there’s little doubt that I shall be – we’re still faced with an almost equally serious problem. We must protect his Imperial Majesty’s dignity at all costs. An appeal from one government to another is one thing, but an appeal from His Majesty’s government to a private citizen on another continent is quite another.
That
is the problem which must be addressed.’
‘I don’t see that we have any choice, Sarathi,’ Emban was saying gravely. It was late evening. Ambassador Oscagne had retired for the night, and the rest of them, along with Patriarch Ortzel of Kadach in Lamorkand, had gathered to give his request serious consideration. ‘We may not entirely approve of some of the policies of the Tamul Empire, but its stability is in our vital interest just now. We’re fully committed to our campaign in Rendor. If Tamuli flies apart, we’ll have to pull most of our armies – and the Church Knights – out of Rendor to protect our interests in Zemoch. Zemoch’s not much of a place, I’ll grant you, but the strategic importance of its mountains can’t be overstated. We’ve had a hostile force in those mountains for the past two thousand years, and that fact has occupied the full attention of our Holy Mother. If we allow some other hostile people to replace the Zemochs, everything Sparhawk achieved in Otha’s capitol is lost. We’ll go right back to where we were six years ago. We’ll have to abandon Rendor again and start mobilising to meet a new threat from the east.’
‘You’re stating the obvious, Emban,’ Dolmant told him.
‘I know, but sometimes it helps to lay everything out so that we can all look at it.’
‘Sparhawk,’ Dolmant said then, ‘if I were to order you to Matherion but your wife ordered you to stay home, what would you do?’
‘I’d probably have to go into a monastery to pray for guidance for the next several years.’
‘Our Holy Mother Church is overwhelmed by your piety, Sir Sparhawk.’
‘I do what I can to please her, Sarathi. I am her true knight, after all.’
Dolmant sighed. ‘Then it all boils down to some sort of accommodation between Ehlana and me, doesn’t it?’
‘Such wisdom can only have come from God,’ Sparhawk observed to his companions.
‘Do you mind?’ Dolmant said tartly. Then he looked at the Queen of Elenia with a certain resignation. ‘Name your price, your Majesty.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Let’s not tiptoe around each other, Ehlana. Your champion’s put my back to the wall.’
‘I know,’ she replied, ‘and I’m so impressed with him that I can barely stand it. We’ll have to discuss this in private, revered Archprelate. We wouldn’t want Sir Sparhawk to fully realise his true value, now would we? He might begin to get the idea that we ought to pay him what he’s actually worth.’
‘I hate this,’ Dolmant said to no one in particular.
‘I think we might want to touch briefly on something else,’ Stragen suggested. ‘The Tamul Ambassador’s story had a certain familiar ring to it – or was I the only one who noticed that? We’ve got a situation going on in Lamorkand that’s amazingly similar to what’s happening in Tamuli. The Lamorks are all blithely convinced
that Drychtnath’s returned, and that’s almost identical to the situation Oscagne described. Then, on our way here from Cimmura, we were set upon by a group of Lamorks who could only have come from antiquity. Their weapons were steel, but their armour was bronze, and they spoke Old Lamork. After Sir Ulath killed their leader, the ones who were still alive vanished. Only their dead remained, and they seemed to be all dried out.’
‘And that’s not all,’ Sparhawk added. ‘There were some bandits operating in the mountains of western Eosia. They were being led by some of Annias’ former supporters, and they were doing all they could to stir up rebellious sentiments among the peasantry. Platime managed to get a spy into their camp, and he told us that the movement was being fuelled by Krager, Martel’s old underling. After we rounded them up, we tried to question one of them about Krager, and that cloud we saw on our way to Zemoch engulfed the man and tore him all to pieces. There’s something afoot here in Eosia, and it seems to be coming out of Lamorkand.’
‘And you think there’s a connection?’ Dolmant asked him.
‘It’s a logical conclusion, Sarathi. There are too many similarities to be safely ignored.’ Sparhawk paused, glancing at his wife. ‘This may cause a certain amount of domestic discontent,’ he said regretfully, ‘but I believe we’d better think very seriously about Oscagne’s request. Someone’s harrowing the past to bring back people and things that have been dead for thousands of years. When we encountered this sort of thing in Pelosia, Sephrenia told us that only the Gods were capable of that.’
‘Well, that’s not entirely true, Sparhawk,’ Bevier corrected him. ‘She did say that a few of the most powerful Styric magicians could also raise the dead.’
‘I think we can discount that possibility,’ Sparhawk disagreed. ‘Sephrenia and I were talking about it once, and she told me that in the forty thousand years of Styric history, there have only been two Styrics who had the capability, and then only imperfectly. This raising of heroes and armies is happening in nine nations in Tamuli and at least one here in Eosia. There are just too many similarities for it to be a coincidence, and the whole scheme – whatever its goal – is just too complex to have come from somebody who doesn’t have an absolute grasp on the spell.’