Irona 700 (41 page)

In the anteroom they found Ledacos 692 and Banahaw 688 already waiting. The herald asked Komev to join them, but he ushered Irona straight into the meeting room, where he helped her position her foot on the low stool kept there for her. As he left by the corridor door, the First entered through the one that led from his own quarters. As usual, Irona made a token effort to rise, and he gestured for her to remain seated.

Ranau 674 had always been a small, spry man. She could remember him as the most junior Seven when she was chosen. Despite his age and snow-white hair, he was still spry, still alert. And now he was very much the ruler of Benign. He ignored his official red chair and took one beside hers, turning it to face her, leaning an elbow on the slate table. He did not smile.

“Bad news,” she said. “Not from Vult already?”

He nodded. “A good man, 730.”

“What of my son?”

“It looks bad. Irona, I'm sorry. We don't know for certain. We have no eyewitness accounts and no body, but Vult has been sacked.”

Too many thoughts stormed into her head all at once. Her son, always wayward, always willful. But always loved, always blood of her blood. Vult, that incredible rock of a fortress. The trogs. Vlyplatin. Those bones at Svinhofdarhrauk. Podakan as a child, screaming with frustration when he wanted to do something and couldn't manage—throwing, jumping, anything. He would keep trying until he collapsed from exhaustion. Podakan the hero, making her heart burst with pride.

“I am sorry to be the bearer of such appalling news,” Ranau said. “We gave him up for dead once before, remember, and he came through triumphant.”

“No. If Vult has fallen, he is dead.” She must cling to that thought, must believe that. The alternative was worse. Trogs …

“Which,” Ranau said with a steady stare of bright eyes, “is what that Koriana woman has been telling you for months.”

Ooof!
Irona had hired all the new servants herself. … But what did that matter? She managed to hold his gaze. “I did not know the Geographical Section spied on Chosen.”

“Geographical spies on everyone, Irona, and its reports come first to me, as you must know or should have guessed. I can forbid any further distribution and often do.”

Not just Koriana—he was telling her that there were spies in her house also. Who? Edziza, who had been with her so long? Or even Veer? Oh, not Veer!

Ranau read her thoughts and confirmed them. “It spies on Sevens, also, and I pray to the goddess that it keeps a close watch on the First, in case I'm ever tempted to abuse my powers.”

“Koriana is insane.”

“Koriana is a witch.”

Irona closed her eyes briefly while she took a few deep breaths. When she opened them, Ranau was no longer watching her.

“She could be, I suppose,” she said. “Her family has that reputation. But I believe she is mad. You are not going to send the daughter of the king of kings to the sea death, are you?”

Ranau's normally kindly face was frighteningly rigid. “We should, but since she wants to go home, I think we will just put her on a boat without delay. That is what she wants, is it not?”

“But her children? My grandchildren!”

He shook his head.

Oh, no, no!

“Geographical Section won't vouch for all of them, but it is confident that at least four of the six are likely not your grandchildren. Possibly none of them, even the eldest. Your son certainly knew that his wife spread her favors widely. If anyone in that palace was insane, it may have been him, Irona.”

“Or he was bewitched,” she insisted. “But what happened or did not happen is not their fault. I regard them as my flesh and I love them. May I say farewell to them, later today?”

He nodded. “Tomorrow will do. Geographical has taken over custody already, and we'll have her out of here in a couple of days. I'll see the Property Commission gives her a fair price for the house and contents.”

Irona could find nothing else to say. Her world had collapsed around her—her son, her grandchildren, and the Empire itself perhaps. When she did not speak, Ranau rose and strode over to open the private door.

The man waiting behind it came in and knelt to Irona, who recalled him as a fresh-faced youngster on
Invincible
at Kell, so many years ago now. She greeted him by his name, Marapi Kembar, and he beamed at being remembered. Time had weathered him and bulked him up, but mere time would not have brought him his reputation for courage and reliability. He had been sent to Vult as Lascar's commodore, so why was he back here in Benign, reporting to the First? Why he? Why not the admiral, the Chosen?

She told Kembar to rise; he apologized for having brought such terrible news; she absolved him, and by that time the head of state had opened the other door like a common porter. Other Sevens filed in: Komev, Banahaw, Ledacos, Dallol, and Pavouk. Knowing that Irona had been called in ahead of them, they had guessed why. They nodded somberly to her and took their seats in silence. Only two of them knew Kembar, who had returned to his knees.

Ranau closed the door and went to his chair and rapped his seal ring on the table to call the meeting to order.

“Fialovi 694 is reported to be inspecting the new dock. This business seems urgent enough that I propose to start without him. Any objections? Good. I invited Commodore Kembar to report to us. Commodore, please rise and tell us in your own words what happened. I will read out Honorable Lascar's report later, if it seems necessary.”

“Y'r Rev'nce, Y'r Honors. …” The commodore went to stand behind Fialovi's empty chair and look over his audience. A marine faced enough storms, swords, and missiles in his career that a gaggle of geriatrics around a table did not overawe him. “The goddess sent us fair seas and we made good time to Fueguino, but we found it burned to the ground. We hunted for survivors and found no one, not a dog nor cat, Y'r Honors. We did find three corpses floating in the harbor, and there were some charred bones, that's all.”

The listeners sighed. The news changed everything. The war of their ancestors had returned.

“His Honor asked our advice—me and the captains—and we advised proceeding to Vult, as planned, because there we could hope to find news and maybe reinforcements. He said that was his own wish and instructed me to do so.

“I've been to Vult before, Y'r Honors. Found it much changed. The rock's abandoned and the weir breached, so the lake has drained. It's all mud and a few wavy channels now. Stank like … like you can't believe. Boats and the entrance stairs had been burned on the shingle, including the galleys
Shark
and
Moray
. We found gnawed bones in the ashes. With His Honor's permission I had a party climb up to the entrance. … No easy climb, that! Three men went in, armed. They popped out like coneys chased by ferrets, begging your pardon. They'd almost gotten eaten by a rock worm.”

Ledacos said, “If the worms—”

“Questions later,” Ranau snapped. “Continue, Commodore.”

“Aye, Y'r Rev'nce. A couple of youngsters managed to climb all the way to the summit. One of them fell on the way back down. … Th' other reported that the buildings up there had all been burned, and the stairway filled in with rubble. Whoever done it made a good job, Y'r Honors.”

Outside the windows of the First's Palace, songbirds were hailing summer. Inside was midwinter. Irona could not recall a report more dire than this one. She sensed an epoch ending and another already begun.

“And what happened then?” the First prompted.

“His Honor had us move down to the river mouth, to camp on the beach overnight. In the morning he sent me home in
Orca
to report to Y'r Rev'nce. He reckoned that whoever had trashed Vult had hit Fueguino too, so he was going to take th' other two ships down the coast and see if he could get ahead of them and warn the villages in their path. If Tokachi was still safe, he would prepare to defend it.”

Ranau nodded. “I think you covered everything the admiral wrote in his report.” He smiled. “Tell them how many days ago you left the mouth of the Vunuwer River.”

“Thirteen, Y'r Rev'nce.” Kembar smirked, displaying several gaps in his teeth.

Komev said, “Great Goddess! Did you never sleep?”

“Lads were pretty hungry and thirsty when we got to Brandur, Y'r Honor.” He was saying that they had cut across open ocean instead of following the coast. He did not say whether Lascar had ordered such a gamble. From Brandur they could have island-hopped home.

“We'll see they all get a bonus,” the First said, “and you, too, Commodore. You have brought us the worst news Benign has heard in centuries, but we do not punish messengers. Admiral Lascar admitted in his report that he had no firm evidence, but he thought the most likely explanation was that Governor Podakan led the garrison, or most of it, inland to attack Eldritch and was defeated in a battle. That left no one to stop whatever dwells in the Dread Lands from sacking Vult. Do you agree with that assessment?”

The marine nodded. “That was what we all thought, Y'r Rev'nce.”

“Questions now? You had one, '92.”

“It doesn't matter now,” Ledacos said. “When did this happen?”

“I'm not certain, Y'r Honor. …”

“Of course not. If you'd been there, you'd be dead too. But didn't you even try to estimate?”

Unflustered by such petty efforts to browbeat him, Kembar said, “The corpses at Fueguino were floating. They'd need some days to bloat up in water that cold. The lads thought at least two weeks since Fueguino was hit, which means more'n a month ago now, Y'r Honors.” A flotilla of three galleys would usually include at least one man with personal knowledge of anything imaginable, so those estimates were probably reliable. “Vult happened in winter.”

“How can you possibly know that?”

“Grass was growing through the bones, Y'r Honor; and they'd been picked clean. Gulls and rats, likely. Rain had washed the ashes well.”

The First caught Irona's eye. Winter was when Koriana had started insisting that Podakan was never coming home.

The gloom deepened. Benign would need at least two months more to put an adequate army in the field. Evil had broken out of its ancient cell. How far could Maleficence have advanced in a month? How much farther in two more?

Dallol 672 had a voice like dry leaves blowing across a yard. “I always understood that there was no way along the coast from the Dread Lands to Fueguino and the Empire.”

“If there isn't,” asked Pavouk 708, “then why do we bother keeping a stronghold at Vult?”

“To keep our own people from trading for fixes, of course. But how did Maleficence get around Cape Imun to Fueguino? Has Maleficence itself taken to the sea now?”

Kembar hesitated, then said, “The boats we saw were all burned or smashed, Y'r Honor. Both places.”

“Good reasoning,” said Banahaw 688. “When I was sent up there, years ago, we had orders to survey the coast from Vult back to Fueguino, to see if there were any recent settlements we didn't know of. Most of it's sheer cliff dropping into deep water. It's gashed by fiords, so any path along the coast would be much longer than the route a ship takes. I don't say that nimble men, well prepared, couldn't work their way along there in time, but the logistics are impossible. A man can pack only so much food on his back. I'd doubt anyone could carry more than a week's rations over terrain like that, and it would take months to scramble on hands and knees from Vult to Fueguino. They must have come over the mountains.”

Surely Maleficence would have crossed the Rampart Ranges long ago if it could? The destruction of both Vult and Fueguino must be more than just coincidence. Kembar said nothing, but Irona thought he would like to.

“What's your opinion, Commodore?” she asked. “You've had longer to think about it than we have,”

He avoided her eye. “Dunno the mountains, Your Honors, and the little I've seen of the coast agrees with what Honorable 688 just said.”

Irona said, “The problem would be the same either way—carrying enough rations. You can eat birds' eggs in springtime, but a few gannets' eggs won't feed an army.” Then she realized what he was thinking, and it was the worst jolt yet. “
Oh, Goddess!
Like the Gren in Achelone? The garrison? The trogs drove their prisoners ahead of them and ate them as needed?” Had Podakan ended as trog dinner?

“That is wild speculation,” the First said firmly, “and must not be repeated outside this room. I have a question. If you found so few bodies at Fueguino, isn't it possible that the inhabitants fled inland, or south along the coast, leaving their town to be burned?”

“Could be, Y'r Rev'nce,” Kembar said doubtfully.

But there were other possible explanations. The people could have been herded away as livestock. Or they could have been conscripted—
consumed
. Ranau did not mention those possibilities.

“If there are no more questions, Your Honors, I would accept a motion of thanks to Commodore Kembar and his crew for a job well done, with a directive to the Navy Board to issue appropriate bonuses.”

There were rumbles of agreement.

“Unanimous. Thank you, Commodore.”

Kembar bowed and left by the corridor door.

Now came decision time.

For a compromise candidate, Ranau 674 had turned out to be an excellent First, perhaps the best Irona had served under in all her years as a Seven. He had grown into the job very quickly and now ran meetings like a captain running a ship. Power changed people, a truth too often overlooked.

“This is an extraordinary crisis, Your Honors, and an urgent one. We must summon the Seventy to meet as soon as possible, but only you can decide what to advise them.” A hand rose. “708?”