The Warrior Prophet (18 page)

Read The Warrior Prophet Online

Authors: R. Scott Bakker

They picked their way through blocks of stone, then clambered over the heaped walls, where they found a mosaic floor depicting Inri Sejenus, his head buried in debris, his two haloed hands outstretched. For a time all four of them simply milled about, exploring, trampling paths through the thronging weeds, wondering, Achamian supposed, at all that had been forgotten.
“No ash,” Kellhus noted, after kicking at sandy earth. “It’s as though the place simply fell in upon itself.”
“So beautiful,” Serwë said. “How could anyone let this happen?”
“After Gedea was lost to the Fanim,” Achamian explained, “the Nansur abandoned these lands … Too vulnerable to raids, I suppose … Ruins like this probably dot the entire range.”
They gathered dead scrub, and Achamian ignited their fire with a sorcerous word, realizing only afterward that he’d set the Latter Prophet’s stomach aflame. Seated upon blocks on either side of the image, they continued talking, the firelight brightening in proportion to the gathering dark.
They drank unwatered wine, ate bread, leeks, and salted pork. Achamian translated those passages of text visible across the mosaic. “The Marrucees,” he said, studying a stylized seal written in High Sheyic. “This place once belonged to the Marrucees, an old College of the Thousand Temples … If I remember aright, they were destroyed when the Fanim took Shimeh … That means this place was abandoned long before the fall of Gedea.”
Kellhus followed up with several questions regarding the Colleges—of course. Since Esmenet knew the ecclesiastical labyrinths of the Thousand Temples far better than he, Achamian let her answer. She had, after all, bedded priests from every college, sect, and cult imaginable …
Fucked them.
He studied the pinch of sandal straps across his feet as he listened. He needed new ones, he realized. A profound sorrow seized him then, the hapless sorrow of a man persecuted by even the smallest of things. Where would he find sandals in the midst of this madness?
He excused himself, wandered into the collapsed byways beyond the fire.
He sat for a time at the ruin’s edge, where the debris tumbled into the grove. All was black beneath the ironwoods, but their blooming crowns seemed otherworldly in the moonlight, slowly rocking to and fro in the breeze. The bittersweet scent reminded him of Xinemus’s orchards.
“Moping again?” he heard Esmenet say from behind him.
He turned and saw her standing in gloom, painted in the same pale tones as the surrounding ruin. He wondered that night could make stone resemble skin and skin resemble stone. Then she was in his arms, kissing him, tugging at his linen robes. He pressed her backward, leaned her onto a cracked altar, his hands roaming across her thighs and buttocks. She groped for his cock, clutched it with both hands. They joined fires.
Afterward, brushing away grit from skin and clothes, they grinned knowing, shy grins.
“So what do you think?” Achamian asked.
Esmenet made a noise, something between a laugh and a sigh.
“Nothing,” she said. “Nothing as tender, as wanton or delicious. Nothing as enchanted as this place …”
“I meant Kellhus.”
A flash of anger. “Is there nothing else you think about?”
His throat tightened. “How can I?”
She became remote and impenetrable. Serwë’s laughter chimed across the ruins, and he found himself wondering what Kellhus had said.
“He
is
remarkable,” Esmenet murmured, refusing to look at him.
So what should I do?
Achamian wanted to cry.
Instead, he remained silent, tried to throttle the roar of inner voices.
“We
do
have each other,” she suddenly said. “Don’t we, Akka?”
“Of course we do. But what does—”
“What does anything matter, so long as we have each other?” Always interrupting …
“Sweet Sejenus, woman,
he’s the Harbinger
.”
“But we could flee! From the Mandate. From
him.
We could hide, just the two of us!”
“But Esmi … The burden—”
“Isn’t ours!” she hissed. “Why should
we
suffer it? Let’s run away! Please, Akka! Leave all this madness behind!”
“This is foolishness, Esmenet. There’s no hiding from the end of the world! Even if we could, I’d be a sorcerer without a school—a
wizard
, Esmi. Better to be a witch! They would hunt me.
All of them,
not just the Mandate. The Schools tolerate no wizards …” He laughed bitterly. “We wouldn’t even survive to be killed.”
“But this is the
first time,
” she said, her voice breaking. “The first time I’ve ever …”
Something—the desolate stoop of her shoulders, perhaps, or the way she pressed her hands together, wrist to wrist—moved Achamian to hold her. But a panicked cry halted him. Serwë.
“Kellhus bids you come quickly!” she called from the dark. “There’s torches in the distance! Riders!”
Achamian scowled. “Who’d be fool enough to ride mountain slopes at night?”
Esmenet didn’t answer. She didn’t need to …
Fanim.
 
Esmenet cursed herself for a fool as they picked their way through the dark. Kellhus had kicked out their fire, transforming the mosaic of the Latter Prophet into a constellation of scattered coals. They hastened across it, joined him on the grasses beyond the heaped debris.
“Look,” the Prince of Atrithau said, pointing down the slopes.
If Achamian’s words had winded her, then what she saw robbed her of all remaining breath. Strings of torches wound through the darkness below, following the mighty ramps of earth that composed the only approach to the ruined shrine. Hundreds of glittering points. Heathen, come to gut them. Or worse …
“They’ll be upon us soon,” Kellhus said.
Esmenet struggled with a sudden, panting terror. Anything could happen—even with men such as Achamian and Kellhus! The world was exceedingly cruel. “Perhaps if we hide …”
“They know we’re here,” Kellhus muttered. “Our fire. They followed our fire.”
“Then we must see,” Achamian said.
Shocked by his tone, Esmenet glanced in his direction, only to find herself stumbling backward in terror. White light flashed from his eyes and mouth, and words seemed to rumble down like thunder from the mountain faces. Then a line appeared from the earth between his outstretched arms, so brilliant she raised hands against its glare. It flashed upward, more perfect than any geometer’s rule, taller than the brooding Unaras, striking through and illuminating clouds, on into the endless black …
The Bar of Heaven!
she thought—a Cant from his stories of the First Apocalypse.
Shadows leapt across the far precipices. The tumbling landscape winked into existence as though exposed by a lightning flash. And Esmenet saw armoured horsemen, an entire column of them, shouting in alarm and struggling with their horses. She glimpsed astonished faces …
“Hold!” Kellhus shouted. “Hold!”
The light went out. Blackness.
“They’re Galeoth,” Kellhus said, placing a firm hand on her shoulder.
“Men of the Tusk.”
Esmenet blinked, clutched her breast. For among the riders, she’d seen Sarcellus.
 
A resonant voice shouted across the darkness: “We search for the Prince of Atrithau! Anasûrimbor Kellhus!”
The many-coloured tones were unknitted, combed into individual threads: sincerity, worry, outrage, hope … And Kellhus knew there was no danger.
He’s come for my counsel.
“Prince Saubon!” Kellhus called. “Come! The faithful are always welcome at our fire!”
“And sorcerers?” another voice cried. “Are blasphemers welcome as well?”
The indignation and sarcasm were plain, but the undertones defeated him. Who spoke? A Nansur, from Massentia perhaps, though his accent was strangely difficult to place. A hereditary caste-noble, with rank enough to ride with a prince … One of the Emperor’s generals?
“Indeed they are,” Kellhus called back, “when they serve the faithful!”
“Forgive my friend!” Saubon shouted, laughing. “I fear he brought only one pair of breeches!” Hearty Galeoth cheer resounded across the slopes: laughter, catcalls, friendly jeers.
“What do they want?” Achamian asked in low tones. Even in the gloom, Kellhus could see the lines of recent pain through his present apprehension—remnants of some argument with Esmenet.
About him.
“Who knows?” Kellhus said. “At the Council, Saubon was first among those urging the others to march without the Ainoni and the Scarlet Spires. Perhaps with Proyas afield, he seeks further mischief …”
Achamian shook his head. “He argued that the destruction of Ruöm threatened to demoralize the Men of the Tusk,” the sorcerer amended. “Xinemus told me that
you
were the one who silenced him … By reinterpreting the portent of the earthquake.”
“You think he seeks reprisal?” Kellhus asked.
But it was too late. More and more horsemen were rumbling to a stop in the moonlight, dismounting, stretching weary limbs. Saubon and his entourage trotted toward them, flanked by torch-bearers. The Galeoth Prince reined his caparisoned charger to a halt, his eyes hidden in the shadows of his brow.
Kellhus lowered his head to the degree required by jnan—a bow between princes.
“We tracked you all afternoon,” Saubon said, jumping from his saddle. He stood almost as tall as Kellhus, though slightly broader through the chest and shoulders. Like his men, he was geared for battle, wearing not only his chain hauberk, but his helm and gauntlets as well. A hasty Tusk had been stitched beneath the Red Lion embroidered across his surcoat—the mark of the Galeoth Royal House.
“And who is ‘we’?” Kellhus asked, peering at the man’s fellow riders.
Saubon made several introductions, starting with his grizzled groom, Kussalt, but Kellhus spared them little more than a cursory glance. The lone Shrial Knight, whom the Prince introduced as Cutias Sarcellus, dominated his attention …
Another one. Another Skeaös …
“At last,” Sarcellus said. His large eyes glittered through the fingers of his fraudulent face. “The renowned Prince of Atrithau.”
He bowed lower than his rank demanded.
What does this mean, Father?

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