Shattered Pillars (17 page)

“Or perhaps I should say that Asmaracanda has been retaken. By men sworn to Kara Mehmed, who is in turn sworn to me.”

“It is very important to Kara Mehmed to reopen the trade routes,” Samarkar observed impartially.

“Oh,” said the caliph. “You
are
a delight.”

She would not allow herself to be charmed. But it wouldn’t hurt to let him wonder if he was succeeding. She sipped wine again and waited, wishing she’d already disarrayed her armor. Sitting on the lacquer skirts was less than comfortable.

“Kara Mehmed,” the caliph said, “is of the opinion that trade would be
best
served if the caliphate’s reach extended all the way to the open-water ports of Song, as well as west to Messaline.”

“It would be advantageous to any prince who could control the length of the Celadon Highway. But the challenge of pacifying and stabilizing that much territory is immense … and that doesn’t even consider the challenge of then administering it.”

“I don’t want to go to war with the steppe lords,” the caliph said. “I have seen war. I have
waded
in it. But you understand the politics of the situation with Mehmed—”

Samarkar did. Any land Mehmed could reclaim from the Qersnyk host would bolster his image. And if, as the caliph intimated, Mehmed was eager to start a new war not just for the liberation of formerly caliphate lands now held by the Khaganate but for conquest of new lands, a civil war raging between Temur and his uncle Qori Buqa was an opportunity so perfect it might have been gem-polished and set before him in a cup like a soft-boiled egg.

She said, “You want to see the situation in Qarash settled as soon and as decisively as possible, I understand that. What if I tell you that Temur Khan will not
contest
your rights to Asmaracanda, whereas Qori Buqa will—of a certainty, once he is settled in his power—bring the war to you?”

“It’s a small concession.”

“So is what we ask of you. He’ll sign a treaty to the effect.”

“Sign it Temur Khan?” the caliph asked, mocking.

Samarkar let herself laugh. “Of course. How else would he have the power to agree to it?”

The caliph made no encouraging expression, but from the way his architectural brows drew together over the bridge of his nose, Samarkar thought he was considering it. “It’s a long road from
Khan
to
Khagan
. A road drenched with the blood of family. Your young man…”

He shook his head.
Is he ruthless enough? Will he quail before the bloody work that is the building of empires?

“… he seems nice,” the caliph finished. Samarkar did not think she imagined the bitter regret that soaked his tone.

She straightened her shoulders against the weight of the armor and said, “He has been raised in war camps since he was old enough to ride, your Excellency. His uncle killed his father, to whom Temur Khan never had the chance to speak. Qori Buqa killed his older brother, for whom Temur Khan had a younger brother’s worshipful adoration. And Qori Buqa is allied with your own rebel warlord, as we have said—and that warlord has taken Temur Khan’s woman as a hostage. So you can see,
al-Sepehr
thinks Temur Khan is a threat—enough a threat to take punitive action against him.”

“His woman?” Surprise, at last. Real surprise, if only a little. “Are you not his woman?”

“A man may have more than one woman,” Samarkar answered blandly. “As I am sure your serene Excellency has reason to know.”

The caliph laughed. “He could do no better in you than if Ysmat herself stood at his right hand.” And that
was
blasphemy. “How can he then fail?”

I don’t know how we’ll succeed.

“Temur…” The caliph hesitated, toying with whatever sat upon his tongue. Tasting it. “Temur
Khan
aside—your Rahazeen rebel seems to think highly enough of
you,
Wizard Samarkar, to send his assassins into my very door-court to have done with you.”

Well, of course he knew. He was the caliph: it was his job to know everything, and he doubtless employed a great many people whose entire mandate was making sure he did so.

“They were only a little trouble,” Samarkar lied.

Uthman Fourteenth smiled at her. He
winked.
“I imagine there is very little that you would admit to perceiving as a great trouble, once-princess.” He gave her the Rasan title in a flawless accent. “Thank you for your time. I will think on what you have said—as you should think on what I have said as well.”

“Thank you, your serene Excellency.” Samarkar paused. “You said
Temur Khan,
just now.”

“I did.”

“Does that mean you will support us?”

“It means…” the caliph said. He rose to his feet, leaving his half-drunk wine. “I’ll think about it.”

Think quickly.
Samarkar bit her tongue. She dropped to her knees again, her armor rattling around her.

“Stand,” said the caliph, brushing a strand of hair away from her cheek. “We must disarray your armor.”

As she complied, as his hands unknotted and then inexpertly reknotted her bindings, Samarkar stood stolid. But behind her unfocused eyes, their subterfuge was the last thing she considered. Instead, she could not help but wonder:
And who knew to send assassins, Uthman Caliph? Who knew I was coming here today?

9

That
night, Hong-la slept at last.

But not before the great wings had spanned the marketplace; the bird, enormous beyond imagining, had struck and vanished once again, leaving executioners and observers beating out sparks and chasing embers—and the emperor and empress standing dumbstruck, side by side but not touching one another until Songtsan abruptly, impulsively grabbed his wife’s hand. Hong-la had seen Yangchen-tsa glance down in surprise and then, a long moment later, her fingers tighten over Songtsan’s. She had stepped back then, pulling the emperor within. The guards and Songtsan’s other wife had followed behind them, leaving Hong-la alone on the balcony.

It was a tactical mistake, and Hong-la could have eased it. He was not inexperienced in the arts of governance, and the thing he should have done—if he was of a mind to reinforce the emperor’s political position—was step forward. He should have raised his hands, raised his voice, and found some words to soothe the crowd and cast Tsansong as a boogeyman, a threat now vanished into the night.

If he did not, morning would find Tsansong’s escape well on its way to transmuting him into a folk hero.

Hong-la laid his hands on the balustrade and reached out with otherwise senses until he found the energy of the scattered fire below. Embers and sparks had fallen on stone, against brick—and flesh, in a few cases—and on more fertile soil. A thatched roof curled smoke. A wooden house seemed unharmed now, but Hong-la could feel the ember that glowed hungrily, patiently in a chink beside its door. Fire was a clever monster. It could wait.

But not if a Wizard of Tsarepheth called its strength to him, consumed it, transmuted it. The air around Hong-la grew warm; his tired head spun with new exhaustion. But down in the square the kindling fires died, the scattered pyre itself flickered low. He could see now that one executioner was dead or gravely injured, crushed under the fallen timbers and burned. And now, slowly, every eye below was turning back to the balcony, to Hong-la with his black coat and his height.

He should raise his hands, raise his voice, and find those words. He knew he should.

He let his hands fall from the balustrade. He stepped back from the edge, and with all the folk of Tsarepheth watching, he turned his back, the skirts of his coat swirling about him, and stiffly walked inside.

Within, all was hushed chaos. There was no sign of the royal family, but servants and guards and courtiers rushed from one place to another, their faces exactly as grim as if they were accomplishing something. Hong-la passed among them unremarked, one more striding figure with an intent expression. He straightened his spine, though the world swam with weariness. Whatever followed, besieged Tsarepheth could not afford to see a wizard weak.

Without, work went untended everywhere. Screens were rolled down over the windows of noodle and teahouses. Shops stood with closed doors. Hong-la strode through an unattended flock of the feathered, warm-blooded lizards that provided so much meat to the Rasan diet, scattering the brightly colored, hip-high creatures every which way in the street. Their attendant was nowhere to be seen.

So extreme was Hong-la’s exhaustion that at first he did not understand why it was that the lanterns lining his route began to gutter as if shaken. There should have been more—every street in Tsarepheth should have been ablaze with light—but lamplighters were no more immune to the demon-spawn infestation than any other trade. The world pitched and yawed under his feet. The stones rose up and struck his soles, and he put a hand out to a wall and felt it shiver.
Have I been poisoned?

But then he heard the rumble, the crack of thunder, the shuddering depth of sound that made his teeth feel loose in his jaw. The overcast glowed vermillion behind the Citadel, lit from within as if by a rising sun, until the clouds burned back. Like curtains drawn they revealed the tower of smoke behind them, the layered reds and oranges of the earth’s deep fires cracking upward: questing, thrusting, twisting … breaking free.

The Cold Fire was cold no longer.

For a moment, Hong-la stood in stupor—half-bent, still, one hand on the wall that supported him. Distantly, he heard cries: alarm, wonder. They did not turn his head. He had eyes only for the column of smoke and fire mounting the night, wreathed in a coruscating lace of violet lightning, too bright to look at and too terrible to look away from. The thunder rumbled softer, higher overtones to the voice of the mountain.

He reached out with his
otherwise
senses and felt the fretwork of other wizards also reaching. Felt them organize around the familiar presence of Yongten-la, seeking, gentle fingertips of the spirit and will exploring the energy trapped within and leaking from the no-longer-dormant volcano. If this were the prelude to a violent eruption, some wizards would stay behind and control the volcano for as long as possible—mollify it, redirect its energies. Others would lead the evacuation, if evacuation there could be.

The energy Hong-la felt had a strange, vile flavor—acrid and awful. He’d never felt fire from the very belly of the earth before, but the heat that soaked the sulfurous waters from the depths of the Cold Fire was soothing, and this … felt as if it should shrivel flesh.

Hong-la released an easier breath when he sensed the direction and power of the flow. An eruption, yes—and the first flakes of ash began to brush his hair and face as he thought it—but not an apocalyptic one. One that could be contained, channeled. One within the powers of the wizards whose calling it was to soothe the volatile earth under Tsarepheth.

Blessed stones, there would not be an evacuation tonight.

Hong-la walked back to the Citadel breathing through the gaps between cupped fingers to filter out the ash that blew like snow on every side and gritted underfoot. Pride alone had kept him upright until he regained the Citadel and reported to Yongten-la.

He did not remember, later, falling asleep mid-sentence.

*   *   *

When he awoke, it was on his own bed, his coat and boots removed, his shirt and trousers loosened. Tsering-la, compact and moon-faced, her braids glistening with the first few strands of silver, sat cross-legged, waiting patiently while Hong-la rubbed at crusted eyes.

She pressed a warm, damp cloth into his hand. Any wizard knew what awakening from a long slumber was like.

As Hong-la cleaned his face, the thrush in the black cage beside the window chirruped sleepily. No one had covered him, and the lamps were keeping him awake. At least it seemed the novices had kept him fed and watered in Hong-la’s incapacity.

“How long did I sleep?” Hong-la asked, dropping the used cloth in the basin that Tsering also presented.

“It’s after moonset,” she said. “You collapsed a day and a half ago.”

He would have protested the term, but it was probably fair. He was lucky his heart hadn’t simply stopped when the Citadel’s borrowed energy ran out. He would not have been the first wizard to die that way. “Did I walk to bed?”

“Carried,” she said.

He heaved himself onto his elbows and took the next thing she held out: a bowl of steaming broth and noodles, with scallions and shreds of ginger floating across the top. There was a brazier beside Tsering and sweat dewed her forehead—while he himself felt shaky with chill. He had exhausted himself past the point where his body could maintain its own warmth.

“Situation?” he asked, letting her steady the bowl as he raised it to his mouth. He had the strength for brief movements, but simply keeping his hands lifted made them tremble.

“Complex,” she answered while he drank, and went on with details. As he’d expected, the rumor of Tsansong’s escape had spread wide, and while it wasn’t precisely possible for it to grow in the telling, it had certainly become more detailed. Hong-la himself had apparently called down lightning, the better to defend the emperor when the great bird struck at him.

“I don’t remember that,” Hong-la said mildly, setting the soup bowl aside.

Tsering replaced it in his hands with a cup of salted, buttered tea. “There are plenty to remember it for you.”

“Is there rioting yet? Have Tsansong’s faction thought to claim that the bird’s intervention is a sign of favor from the Six Thousand?”

She shook her head. “There is other news.”

Strength seemed to be returning as fast as it had fled. He was warmer. His teeth did not chatter on the rim of the tea cup now. He managed it one-handed, and with the other gestured her to continue.

“Anil-la says the Cold Fire was awakened intentionally. He can read the signature of a sacrifice in its energy. And Yongten-la says the taste of Erem’s poison magic is bitter through all its emanations.”