He snorted. ‘Because of the stories based there, more than anything else.’ He paused. ‘Are you saying that every story about Pelesei was made up? But Rojak must have told me a dozen or more—’
‘My herald knew.’
‘Knew what?’ Ilumene asked. ‘Piss and daemons,
what
? That Pelesei never existed? Don’t tell me that; it can’t be true.’
‘It did exist, a long way south.’
Ilumene didn’t speak for a moment as he thought the matter through. ‘But the stories are fiction, so the only thing it was notable for was - existing a long way away? So no one much travelled there . . . it’s a much more exciting setting for a story if it doesn’t trade much, because it means anything might go on and no one’s likely to correct you. No wonder Rojak used it as a setting. The minstrel loved his lies, but those that changed history were always his favourite!’
He laughed loudly, his voice echoing back from the wall of the valley. Here it was nearly vertical, but twenty yards ahead the slope became a little shallower; it would be possible to climb bits of the cliff there - not that there was anywhere to go or any sort of path to the top . . . As they approached, Ilumene saw futility hadn’t stopped someone: a glow of light illuminated a figure slumped on a rock ledge with its bare feet hanging over the edge.
‘Looks like he’s dead or drunk,’ Ilumene commented, getting as near as he could without actually climbing himself. He peered forward. ‘It’s that mage who popped up yesterday,’ he said to Ruhen. ‘Our friend in Scree’s dogsbody.’
‘Dog needs a master.’
‘So who’s his master now?’ Ilumene wondered aloud. ‘Might be he’s a Menin man all the way through, but who’d trust a necromancer? Styrax wouldn’t, so he knows he’ll never reach an inner circle there. His best bet would be Lord Larim; don’t all Chosen of Larat put together a coterie of acolytes?’ He felt the little boy on his shoulder nod.
‘So why isn’t he down in Ismess trying to make nice to the new Lord of the Hidden Tower? He’s adaptable, from what we saw in Scree. If I was Larim I’d want the odd-footed git in my coterie, to make the others second-guess themselves as much as anything else. There’s nothing more likely to cause trouble than mages thinking they’ve got a secure position.’
Ruhen pointed up at the figure on the ledge, which hadn’t moved. Most of Nai’s body was wrapped in the thick blanket against the evening chill; only his head stuck out. ‘Light,’ the little boy whispered.
‘Fuck me,’ Ilumene exclaimed, ‘look at that!’
Nai flinched at the raised voice. He stared up at the cloud-covered sky for a moment before looking down at the pair watching him. He rubbed a hand over his face, brushing his hair out of his eyes, before pushing himself a little more upright. ‘Not good language for a little boy to hear,’ he said, with a slight slur to his voice. ‘What you want?’
‘How about a light?’ Ilumene called.
Nai flinched and cast a guilty look at the lamp beside him. Almost immediately the light dimmed considerably and began to flicker in the normal fashion.
‘Fine spot you got there,’ Ilumene continued, grinning evilly. ‘Perfect for a quiet drink.’
Nai raised the flagon beside him and saluted Ilumene. It looked as if the half-gallon flagon had very little left in it.
‘There other spots like that?’
‘Ah, no.’ Nai looked around at the valley, although there was little to see in the deepening gloom. ‘Well, maybe, don’t know really.’
‘You just picked a ledge and got lucky?’
Nai nodded enthusiastically. ‘Figured I’d find a quiet corner to finish my beer. I didn’t feel it till I got here. The dead area’s about twice the height of a man.’ He laughed abruptly. ‘Sure I read somewhere magic was heavier than air.’
Ilumene felt a tug on his ear; Ruhen wanted to move on. ‘I’ll leave you to your beer then,’ he said, giving the necromancer an ostentatious salute. ‘Your lord’s won back there, but you’ve got a few more hours until they admit it.’
As Nai looked back at the Scholars’ Palace, Ilumene continued down the path as quickly as he could, trying not to attract the necromancer’s notice - he might be one of those drunks with the tendency to recall inconvenient details the next morning, and this was one crowd they didn’t want to stand out in.
The path was stony underfoot, there was a smattering of gravel as much to mark the way as anything else, and it made enough noise for Ilumene to be able to talk without fear of Nai hearing them. ‘Didn’t expect to see that,’ he said. ‘I’d heard the whole valley was a dead place.’
‘Palace,’ Ruhen contributed.
Ilumene stopped dead. ‘Scholars’ Palace?’ He pursed his lips. ‘You’ve got a point there; his explanation doesn’t hold water, does it? The upper floors are much higher than where he was sitting.’
He turned back to make sure: the ground sloped, but Nai’s position was nowhere near the same height as the upper floors of the building he’d just left.
‘So that just leaves us wondering if he knew about that place in advance, or was told to look for cracks in the glaze. Where’s your money?’
Ruhen didn’t answer. Ilumene guessed the child was thinking. He had a clump of Ilumene’s hair bunched in his little fist. The boy was a strange one, displaying the traits both of a child and an immortal. He had noticed more than a few childish mannerisms slipping out unconsciously, which made him sure there was a trace of the mortal soul remaining. When Ruhen had ordered him to tell the story of the God of Vain Men, it hadn’t been just a reassertion of dominance on the part of Azaer; just as the body the shadow wore needed clothes and food, so the sound of a voice telling a story satisfied some ill-defined need within the child.
So this is me playing Dad; didn’t see that coming!
‘Why choose?’ Ruhen said eventually.
‘You think they’re both true?’ Ilumene shrugged. ‘Could be right, I suppose. Lord Styrax sending him fishing is the simplest answer, but Nai was part of Zhia Vukotic’s inner circle. No reason she’s not still got her hooks into him - he plays the middle ground which is where she’s happiest too.’ He started walking again, resolving to keep going for as long as he could, but juddered to a halt.
‘What do you think Lord Styrax is up to here?’ he asked abruptly. ‘If he’s got Nai checking the boundary of the library, it must interest him more than we realised. What if he’s got something up his sleeve?’
‘Have faith.’
‘Hah. Emin always said, “Better to have faith in your preparation”. If it’s all right with you, I’ll think it through a bit more.’
‘Good.’
Ilumene waited, but there was no further advice forthcoming.
Damn it, do you deliberately act like Emin to goad me, or was Rojak right in saying you’re defined by your enemies?
‘If he does have something planned, then it’s a worry - it could pull everything here out of balance. Linking Lord Isak to Lord Styrax pits the two greatest powers against each other; the Farlan will only win a war on home soil, but they still have to last long enough. If Styrax gains a significant edge he might roll up the West too fast for us to exploit. The Devoted aren’t ready for a saviour, the balance has to be maintained.’
‘And if it cannot?’
He slipped Ruhen from his shoulders and gently placed the little boy on the ground before kneeling before him. ‘You’d abandon your plans?’ he asked, stunned. The shadow was patience itself, its steps slow, but played out over years, decades, even centuries. ‘I’ve never seen you step away from anything before.’
‘There was never need.’
Slowly Ilumene nodded. ‘You can’t control them; by your very design the players are beyond the playwright’s power. What contingency plans can we prepare? We can’t insert prophecies into the Menin history!’
‘What am I?’
‘A child,’ Ilumene began hesitantly, aware the obvious answers would direct him, however foolish they sounded. ‘A boy, a saviour, a mortal . . . a son.’
‘A son and a saviour.’
‘The Devoted are primed to worship a saviour,’ he breathed, realisation dawning, ‘while Styrax’s only weakness is his son - but you can be both, and preserve the balance that way?’
He paused for a dozen heartbeats while he thought it through. Eventually he shook his head. ‘No, this goes against every instinct I have. No general abandons a successful tactic for the untried, let alone one his forces are ill-suited for. Your disciples are all carefully positioned, your plans primed to bear fruit at specific times - how can we change now?
‘Before offering battle a general must place himself beyond the possibility of defeat; it is a crucial precept of war. To throw away years of preparation flies in the face of everything I ever learned about warfare. And you have always told me to treat this as a campaign.’
Ruhen was quiet for a while, long enough for Ilumene to wonder whether he had overstepped the mark. Rojak had told him many stories of those servants of Azaer who had incurred the shadow’s wrath. King Emin’s secret scribes wandered the Land, collecting tales of hauntings and horror, and Ilumene knew that not all of them were people who had opposed Azaer - some had merely failed him. Their endings were the worst.
‘Even the most perfect fruit may decay,’ the child said at last. There was something in his voice that Ilumene had not heard before, and it made the hairs on his neck rise. With every passing day Ruhen grew faster and faster, growing into the powers he had possessed as a shadow, but it was in a very human manner. After countless centuries of incorporeal weakness, the shadow had grown impatient with its few months of helpless childhood. ‘Consider the forces we play our games with. Corruption is inevitable. We must not fear it.’
Ilumene smiled. ‘So speaks the festering remains of Rojak’s soul.’
Ruhen nodded, shadows dancing in his eyes.
‘Of all my curses, womanly and immortal, I reserve especial hatred for you.’
Nai jerked awake again. He could see no one in the dark valley, but that was not necessarily a good sign.
‘Ah, Mistress Zhia?’ he ventured in a croak, his throat dry.
‘Don’t give me “Mistress Zhia”, you stub-footed worm,’ came her velvety growl in his left ear.
Nai flinched, half-falling off the ledge before his fingers found purchase on the stone. He turned all the way around, still seeing nothing more than black stone and the extinguished lantern beside him.
This time the voice sounded in his right ear. ‘Your idiocy is boundless; redeem yourself soon or I will pull out your intestines and hang you with them.’
Nai was ready for it this time and managed not to shy away. In the alcoholic haze of his mind, the necromancer reflected that it would be frighteningly easy for her to carry out the threat.
‘I’m here as you told me to be.’
‘Did I tell you to announce it to the whole fucking valley?’ Zhia snapped. ‘Forgive me for omitting the order to stay sober and not be seen doing something supposedly impossible!’
Nai glanced around guiltily. He couldn’t see the empty flagon; he must have knocked it off the ledge as he dozed.
At least I didn’t attract any guardians
, he thought with a small sense of relief.
She really would have killed me then
. A gust of wind whistled over his body and he pulled his leather coat tighter around himself. He didn’t respond to Zhia’s words, knowing anything he said would only further enrage her.
‘I didn’t show you this spot just so you could announce it to everyone present; for your sake I hope you didn’t risk it for no good reason.’
‘No Mistress,’ Nai said quickly, glad for the chance to change the subject. The snarl of an infuriated vampire had done wonders to clear his head. ‘There is news: Lord Styrax’s men took the Fist this afternoon.’
‘I know that,’ she scoffed. ‘He does like to show off. The foolish boy has been playing with daemons again; he got five of them to incarnate and smoked the garrison out. I felt it happen all the way back to Byora. Tell me what he’s doing in the library.’
‘The library?’ Nai looked confused. ‘Negotiating the surrender of the quarters, you know that.’
‘So far from his troops, in a place where he can’t use his greatest weapons? Don’t be stupid. However wrecked it may be, the Litse Army in Ismess is far larger than the guard he brought - Styrax remains vulnerable all the time he is in here even if he does have his wyvern somewhere nearby. Is he planning on staying more than a day?’
‘I believe so,’ Nai said hesitantly. ‘I overheard him talking to General Gaur earlier; I got the impression he had some research to do here. He was warning the general to keep an eye on Kohrad.’
‘Anything more?’
‘He gave me a project: to walk the perimeter of the valley and mark the places where I could feel energies in the air.’
There was silence for a few moments. Nai half-turned to look up at the cliffs behind him and was rewarded with an icy blast of wind whipping past his eyes.
‘If you find any, be sure to tell me also.’
Nai nodded, though he was unsure what to make of the order. There was a trace of the vampire in the air: her delicate scent, so faint it could almost be a memory evoked by her voice. Zhia’s understanding of magic far surpassed what Nai could learn in his lifetime - it might be that when he returned in the morning, this ledge would just like the rest of the valley. Perhaps magic could be driven a little way into the perimeter from outside; or perhaps energy simply surrounded her like a diving beetle’s bubble of air.
‘Is there anything else, Mistress?’
‘You’re the one making the report,’ she said, drily.
‘Ah yes, of course. Knight-Cardinal Certinse is giving the orders in Akell; he arrived a few weeks ago.’
‘Specifically here, or passing through to Embere?’
‘I do not know.’
Zhia paused. ‘I hear he’s got four or five legions with him; that’s more than he’d need to take over Akell; Sourl doesn’t have the guts to rebel against his superior. I can’t believe he’d pull so many troops out of Narkang lands just for that, and that man is ambitious. More likely he has some grander plan that requires actual tangible control over the Order, rather than just official control. The best way to do that is with Raland’s goldmines, and Telith Vener is in control there these days. He’ll have accepted Certinse’s authority over the Order when Certinse was in distant parts and Duke Nemarse ruled Raland, but not now.’ She paused to think, but Nai could tell by her tone that Zhia was satisfied with her logic.