Mere days after his ascension, Mage-Imperator Jora’h went to watch the handlers prepare his father’s corpulent body for its dazzling incineration.
He had never expected to become Mage-Imperator under such circumstances, but the Ildiran Empire was his to rule now. Jora’h wanted to make changes, to improve life for his people, to make amends to those who had suffered . . . but he was bound by obligations and commitments, forced to continue schemes he had not previously known about. He felt trapped in a web woven from myriad sticky strands—unless he could find a way around them.
But first, before he could face those tangled responsibilities, Jora’h had to preside over the funeral of his poisoned father.
Attender kithmen carried his chrysalis chair into the chamber where the dead Mage-Imperator had been laid out for his final preparations. Jora’h sat silently on the spacious levitating throne, looking down at the slack features of his father. Resenting him.
Treacheries, schemes, lies—how could he endure everything he knew? Jora’h was now the mind, soul, and figurehead of the Ildiran race. It was not appropriate for him to curse his father’s memory, but that didn’t stop him. . . .
The previous Mage-Imperator had killed himself, seeing his own death as the only way to force his son to inherit the Empire’s cruel secrets. Jora’h was still reeling from the revelations. Much as he disliked what he had learned, he understood the rationale for those hateful deeds. He had never suspected the hidden danger to the Ildiran Empire or the slim, desperate hope of salvation, which could be achieved only if he continued the experiments on Dobro.
Jora’h was handsome, smooth-featured, with golden hair bound back into a braid that would eventually grow long, like his father’s. Over time, his classic features might change, too, as he evolved into his sedentary, supposedly benevolent role. His sheltered life as Prime Designate had not prepared him to imagine the awful things that were happening where he couldn’t see them. But now, through the thism, he knew everything. It was exactly as his father had intended, both a gift and a curse.
And now he was compelled to continue the same acts, when all he wanted was to see his beloved and imprisoned Nira again. If nothing else, he would free her. That, at least, he could do—as soon as he finished the transition of leadership and found a way to leave the Prism Palace.
Now, exercising extreme care, gaunt handlers washed the former leader’s heavy body, preparing it. Cyroc’h’s ample flesh sagged on his bones like a rubbery fabric that would easily peel away from his skeleton.
Diminutive servants, gibbering with despair, pushed forward frenetically to assist, but they had no place here during this ceremony, and Jora’h sternly sent them away. Some of them would no doubt throw themselves from a turret of the Prism Palace in their grief and misery. But their misery could not compare to his own dismay at all he had learned. No one could help him decide how best to rule, or what to do at Dobro. . . .
“How long will it be?” he asked the handlers.
The stony-faced men looked up from their work. Their leader said in a grim voice, “For an event of such magnitude, Liege, this must be our best work. It is the most important duty we will ever perform.”
“Of course.” Jora’h continued to observe in silence.
Wearing armored gloves, the handlers reached into pots and withdrew handfuls of silvery-gray paste, which they spread thickly and lovingly over the dead Mage-Imperator. They made certain to cover every speck of exposed skin.
Even in the dimness of the preparation room, the paste simmered and began to smoke. The handlers increased their pace, but did not grow sloppy under Jora’h’s watchful gaze. When the Mage-Imperator was completely slathered, they wrapped his body with an opaque cloth, then announced their readiness.
“To the roof,” Jora’h said from his chrysalis chair. “And call all of the Designates.”
The dead Mage-Imperator’s sons, along with Jora’h’s own children, assembled on the highest transparent platform atop the spherical domes of the Prism Palace. The dazzling light of multiple suns washed down on them.
As Jora’h waited in the bright sun, ready to fulfill his role in the ceremony, he scanned the faces of his brothers, the former Designates, who had come from splinter colonies around the Empire, regardless of the shortage of stardrive fuel. Jora’h’s own group of sons—the next generation of Designates—stood grim and respectful beside their oldest noble brother, Thor’h, who was now the Prime Designate. Pery’h, the Designate-in-waiting for the planet Hyrillka, stood next to his brother Daro’h, the Dobro Designate-in-waiting; others clustered in ranks next to their uncles, whom they would soon replace.
Their awareness that the Hyrillka Designate could not attend and still lay unconscious in the Prism Palace’s infirmary cast a deeper pall over the ceremony. Though his bruises and contusions had healed, Rusa’h remained lost and unresponsive in a deep sub-thism sleep, probably having nightmares of the hydrogue attack on his citadel palace on Hyrillka. It was doubtful the Designate would ever awaken, and his planet would soon need a new leader. Though not yet prepared, Pery’h would have to take his place without Rusa’h as his mentor. . . .
Handler kithmen delivered Cyroc’h’s wrapped body to a raised platform and adjusted magnifiers and mirrors. Everything proceeded in somber silence. Silently respectful carriers brought the chrysalis chair adjacent to the indistinct form of Cyroc’h, still shrouded in its opaque cloth.
Jora’h lifted his gaze to his brothers and sons as he grasped the thick cloth with his left hand. “My father served as Mage-Imperator during a century of peace and also in recent times of crisis. His soul has already followed the threads of thism to the realm of the Lightsource. Now, here, his physical form will join the light as well.”
In a single abrupt motion, Jora’h yanked away the cloth to expose the soft form of the dead Mage-Imperator. The intense light of seven suns pounded down, activating the shimmering metallic paste that covered the dead leader’s skin. Piercing white flames instantly engulfed the smothered, sagging body. The photothermal paste did not burn the body so much as dissolve it, making the skin and muscle and fat dissociate into the air, glowing, sparkling. . . .
The fallen Mage-Imperator vanished in a cloud of writhing steam and smoke. The air cleared. All that remained were Cyroc’h’s glowing bones, impregnated with bioluminescent compounds. His clean, empty skull was only a symbol of the great things that he had been . . . and the dreadful things he had done in the name of preserving the Ildiran Empire.
As Mage-Imperator, Jora’h’s immediate obligation was to dispatch his Designates-in-waiting to seal the process of governmental transition. Then he could finally find a way to free Nira. He turned to his sons and his brothers. “And now the Empire must move on.”