The Ruling Sea (8 page)

“I am nameless,” he said, and his voice carried a surprising distance. “My holy office is my fate: there is nothing more. I am Father-Resident of Babqri City, Master of the Citadel of Hing, Confessor to His Serene Majesty King Somolar. I am the sworn foe of things evil, forever.

“Two thousand years ago the shrines of the Old Faith stood on every isle of this archipelago, and the Gátri-Mangol, the White Kings of Mangland, presided over an age of wealth and order. Here where we are gathered rose one of the most beautiful shrines of all, destroyed by the rising sea in the Worldstorm. Twenty-six years ago I sent a letter to a monarch, new to his throne but wise beyond his years, and begged a great favor, and he granted it. We of the Faith bow before thee, Oshiram of Simja, first king of these isles to allow the rebuilding of a Mzithrin house of prayer.”

And with that the Father descended to his knees, placed the scepter with infinite care before him, and bent his forehead to the ground.

The king fidgeted, cleared his throat. “You’re welcome, Father, very welcome. Now do rise.”

Slowly, the Father took to his feet.

“This house is young, but its founding-stones were recovered from the old shrine, and they are sacred. Therefore will I take my place beneath the great arch and bar the path to those whom devils claim. They may not enter here. Let them fear the attempt.”

He raised the scepter high, and the sun gleamed on the crystal at its tip, but the dark heart was not illuminated. Then with a last fierce look he turned and marched into the shadows.

“Oh happy day,” muttered Neeps.

Thasha elbowed him. “His scepter,” she whispered. “There’s a drawing of it in the
Polylex
, or of one just like it. Something blary special, it was. Oh, what was its name?”

Pazel sighed. Thasha owned a copy of the most dangerous book ever written: the forbidden thirteenth edition of
The Merchant’s Polylex
, the mere possession of which was punishable by death. Earlier editions, and later ones, were to be found in every ship’s library and seamen’s club; they were simply huge (and untrustworthy) one-volume encyclopedias. The thirteenth, however, was crammed with the darkest secrets of the Arquali Empire. But the book was more frustrating than useful, for the author had hidden those secrets in over five thousand pages of rumor and hearsay and outright myth. It was a wonder that Thasha found
anything
within its pages. The priest’s scepter, now—

A terrible thought came to him suddenly. He gripped Thasha’s arm.

“What if he’s a mage?” he said, looking from one face to another. “What if he
can
keep evil from entering the shrine?
All
evil?”

Neeps and Fiffengurt paled. Even Hercól looked alarmed. Thasha seemed to have trouble catching her breath.

“In that case …,” she stammered. “Well. In that case—”

She was interrupted by a burst of song from the Mzithrini women. It was a frightful sound, nearly a shriek. At the same moment the men raised their glass pipes and began to whirl them overhead by the straps, faster and faster, until they became mere blurs of color in the sunlight. Astonishingly, although their orbits crisscrossed endlessly, the pipes never collided. And from them came a hundred eerie notes, high other worldly howls, like wolves in caves of ice. It was the summons to the bride.

Thasha turned and looked back at her father. Isiq raised a trembling hand, but she was too far ahead of him to touch. She looked at each friend in turn, and longest at Pazel, who was fighting an impulse to shout,
Don’t go in there
. Then she left her entourage and walked quickly to the steps.

The men fell back, still whirling their pipes, and so did the chorus of wailing women. And as Thasha climbed the stair a new figure emerged from the shrine. He looked to be in his thirties, nimble and straight, with a martial air about him: indeed he wore a kind of dark dress uniform, with a red sun pendant on his chest.

“Prince Falmurqat the Younger,” said Hercól.

“He’s not young enough if you ask me,” growled Fiffengurt.

“A capable officer, according to Chadfallow’s informants,” Hercól continued, “but a reluctant one. Above all things his father desired a soldier-son, but until the Treaty raised the prospect of ending the long war, the son refused to have anything to do with the military. I gather he paints quite beautifully.”

“You’re a lucky girl, Thasha,” said Pazel.

“And you’re an idiot,” she said.

Behind the man came his parents, Falmurqat the Elder and his gray princess, and with them another Mzithrini holy man. This one was old, but not as old as the Father, and dressed not in black but a deep blood-red.

Thasha and the prince met exactly as planned, on the step below the boy with the silver knife. The singing ceased; the men stopped their whirling display. Thasha looked utterly serene now: she might have just climbed the steps of her own house on Maj Hill in Etherhorde. Without a word she lifted the knife from the boy’s knees, turned and raised it to the watching thousands, and replaced it. Then she curtsied before her prince, and he bowed in turn.

Thasha held out her hand, palm upward, and the prince studied it for a moment, smiling curiously. He spoke a few words in a voice meant for Thasha alone. Then he took up the knife and pricked her thumb.

Instantly the red-robed cleric held out a small clay cup. Thasha let seven drops of blood fall into the milk it contained. The cleric swished it seven times. And laughed—a deep, almost manic laugh. He raised the cup high.

“Mzithrin!” he boomed. “The Grand Family! Brothers and sisters of Alifros, learn but this one word in our tongue and you learn the essence of the Old Faith. None stand alone! None are worthless, none sacrificed or surrendered, every soul has a destiny and every destiny is a note in the music of the several worlds. Before us stands Thasha Isiq, daughter of Eberzam and Clorisuela. What is to be the destiny of the Treaty Bride? I look into this milk and cannot see the gift of her blood. Has it ceased to exist? Only a simpleton could think so—only a heretic or a fool! So I ask you: can it be the fate of Thasha Isiq to vanish, dissolved in our gigantic land?

“We of the Old Faith do not believe it. The blessed milk in my cup has not destroyed her blood. No, her blood has changed the milk, irreversibly and forever. The milk we tint red is a bond and a vow. Drinking it,
we
are changed: a part of this daughter of Arqual enters us, and remains. Blessings on your courage, Thasha Isiq! Blessings on our prince! Blessings on Mighty Arqual and the Holy Mzithrin, and all lands between! Blessings on the Great Peace to come!”

The crowd erupted. All that had been said until this moment left them confused, but they knew what peace was, and their cry was a surging roar of hope and excitement and remembered loss. Beaming, King Oshiram looked at his new ambassador.
Smile, Isiq! One would think you were at an execution, you queer old fellow
.

“But the time to drink is still a moment off,” shouted the red-robed cleric, over the lasting cheers. “Enter now, Thasha of Arqual, and be wed.”

4
A Sacrifice

7 Teala 941

Seven thousand candles lit the shrine’s interior: green candles with a sharp camphor scent. The place was smaller than Pazel had imagined. When the king’s retinue, the foreign royals and dignitaries and Templar monks were all seated on the little stools brought in for the occasion, and the Mzithrinis (who considered chairs unnecessary, but not unholy) were seated cross-legged on the floor, there was scarcely room for the wedding party itself.

But squeeze in they did. Thasha and the prince stood on a granite dais; their families and closest friends stood below them in a semicircle. All save Pazel: as the holder of the Blessing-Band he merited a place on the dais, where he could tie the ribbon to Thasha’s arm at the required moment.

One way or another, of course, that moment would never arrive.

The last of the invited guests were still filing in past the Father, who glared like a fury, now and then making threatening bobs with his scepter. The guests, all cultured and important people, were not so awed by the man as the great throng outside. Some hurried past him with a shudder. A few rolled their eyes.

Last of all came Arunis. Pazel held his breath. The sorcerer looked exactly like what they had all once taken him for—a thickset merchant, rich and rather tasteless, dressed in dark robes as expensive as they were neglected. He wore a little self-mocking smile and kept his pudgy hands folded before him like a schoolboy. Less than a day had passed since those hands had worked spells of murder aboard the
Chathrand
.

“Kela-we ghöthal! Stop!”

The Father brought his scepter down like a nightstick, square against the mage’s chest. Arunis halted, blinking at him. Pazel saw Thasha glance up in fear. The Father was chanting in a rage: Pazel heard something about a devil’s chain and a Pit of Woe.
Aya Rin
, he thought helplessly,
this can’t be happening
.

Every eye in the shrine focused on the two men. Arunis smiled timidly, like an obliging citizen at a military checkpoint. He made a wobble with his head, as folk of Opalt do when they wish to show either goodwill or confusion, or both. The Father answered with a growl.

Arunis dropped his head. He shrugged, his lower lip trembling, and even those who knew better saw him for an instant as a good soul, one used to being last in line, one who had never dreamed he would be lucky enough to witness history in the making but who even now would give it up rather than cause any trouble. He turned to go. But as he did so he glanced once more at the Father.

Their gazes locked. Arunis’ cold eyes glittered. Then quite suddenly the Father’s ferocious glare went dull. Like an automaton he took the scepter from Arunis’ chest and stepped back, waving him through the arch. Smiling, the mage scurried inside.

Pazel closed his eyes.
If he had been turned away! Oh, Thasha! We thought of everything but that!

He was so relieved that he barely noticed the ceremony itself—the monks’ recitation of the Ninety Rules, the song of the Tree of Heaven, some baffling Simjan custom involving an exchange of horsehair dolls. But he noticed other things. Prince Falmurqat was smiling genuinely at Thasha—the poor dupe. And the Father, who had come forward into the shrine, seemed to have recovered both his hawklike gaze and his wrath. But he never directed these at Arunis—indeed, he seemed to have forgotten the man altogether.

Stranger still, one of the aspirants beside the Father kept turning to look at Pazel himself. It was one of the mask-wearers—man or woman Pazel could not tell. And of course he did not know if the gaze was kindly or cruel, or merely curious. But why should a young
sfvantskor
be curious about him?

Then he caught Thasha’s eye, and saw her courage and clarity, and even a hint of the mischief that was hers alone in all the wide world. And suddenly his fear for her leaped out, like a predator from the grass, and he could think of nothing else.
Stop it, stop the ceremony, get her out of here!

It was time: Thasha and her groom were kneeling down on the stone. Once more the cleric raised the knife and cup. Falmurqat held out his thumb, and seven drops of his blood were added to the milk already tinted with Thasha’s own.

“Drink now,” said the cleric, “that your fates be mingled, nevermore to be unbound.”

He sipped, and handed the cup to Falmurqat the Elder. The cup made its way around the dais, everyone taking a tiny sip. But when Pazel’s turn came, he froze—furious, horrified, his brain on fire. The cleric prodded him, whispering:
“Drink, you must drink.”
The Mzithrinis stared with the beginnings of outrage. Thasha flashed him a last look, impossibly fearless. He drank.

The guests breathed a collective sigh, and the cup moved on. Pazel took the Blessing-Band from his pocket and held it in plain view. Thasha and her betrothed drank last. The cleric took the cup again.