Chapter Fourteen

 

 

Most buildings here in Shaljir were identified by writing placed over their doorways or on plaques hanging outside. However, to Josarian's relief, a number of establishments still respected tradition enough to also hang a jashar from the top of the doorframe, dangling down far enough to brush the ground, and identifying an establishment, its inhabitants, and its history in a honorable manner. By day, a jashar kept out insects, provided privacy from passers-by, and admitted visitors with informal ease. By night, everyone in Shaljir had a heavy wooden door which was closed and locked after dark, even though the climate was usually warm down here on the coast. Even on a twin-moon night, the streets of Shaljir were lined with shadows and paved with menace, and no one could be too careful.

As night descended upon the city, Josarian finished another cup of excellent ale. It was some strange, smoky concoction Tansen had recommended upon leading him into this dark, low-ceilinged inn right in the heart of the twisting, crumbling, most ancient quarter of the city.

They didn't wear their jashareen in the streets of Shaljir, where Josarian couldn't risk being identified; but upon entering this inn, Tansen had taken his jashar out of his satchel, handed it to the keeper, and said in common Silerian, "I would like to see our old friends. This will announce me." He had said almost nothing since then, had ignored all of Josarian's questions, and had scarcely touched the ale he had ordered while the sun was still high. Now, as night settled in, Tansen also refused the food the keeper brought them.

"I am hungry," Josarian said, accepting the food Tansen had just rejected. Once it had been deposited on their simple wooden table by a window overlooking a narrow street, Josarian added, "And you should eat, whether you want to or not."

Tansen absently accepted a little of the food Josarian thrust at him, but mostly he sat in unmoving silence, his expression telling Josarian more clearly than words that he was traveling through some place in the distant past, doing and witnessing things he never willingly spoke about.

It was late by the time the keeper finally led them to a bedchamber. Though it was private and clean, it was lit only by a single sputtering candle, situated far below street level, and so small that Josarian had to crouch to keep his head from hitting the ceiling. The closeness of the room made him edgy, and Tansen's watchful silence did nothing to soothe him.

There was no bed in here, only a few mats on the floor. Josarian eased himself down onto one to prepare for sleep. Tansen sat on the floor with his back to the door.

"Aren't you going to sleep?" Josarian asked.

"Not yet. You go ahead."

"Tan—"

"Not yet."

Josarian sighed. Whatever demons chased his bloodbrother, they were fierce and long-fanged. If he was to help Tansen, then he, at least, would need rest. He lay down and settled in comfortably. He closed his eyes, thinking of Calidar, as he so often did during the last few moments of the day. He pulled her delicate scarf out of his tunic, where he usually wore it pressed against his skin. Eyes closed, he held it to his face and inhaled deeply, remembering her. Here, in this small, oppressive room in a strange city far from home, accompanied only by a haunted man who would not speak to him, memories of Calidar now embraced him, comforting him, warm and scented, soft as her whispers had been... She awaited him in the Otherworld, and perhaps, if his mind was relaxed and his heart open, tonight she would visit him briefly, giving him a taste of the eternal joy that awaited him when his work in this world was finally done.

But the one who came to him in the dark this night, the one whose soft breath touched him in the thick blackness of the room, was not his wife. Awakening with a start, Josarian's hands closed upon the cool flesh of a tiny stranger, someone as small and frail as a sickly child, someone whose cries of fear were chattered in a language he had never heard before.

"Josarian, no!"

More strange, high-pitched voices were crying out now, and tiny little hands scrabbled at his forearms. Their strength was negligible, but their unseen quickness was as frightening as the monsters of his childhood nightmares.

"Josarian, no, don't hurt them!" Tansen's voice pierced through his confusion.

Josarian felt Tansen's strong hands grabbing him now, warm where the little ones were cold, calming and familiar where the others incited him to a confused and mindless violence.

"Stop, Josarian, stop!" Tansen ordered.

Realizing that he was choking his unseen captive, and that Tansen knew it and objected, Josarian slowly released his grip, breathing hard with startled animalistic fear and trying to get control of himself.

"What... what is..." He couldn't think of what he wanted to ask.

"It's all right," Tansen said, his own grip easing. "The candle went out when they came in. I should have warned you, but I wasn't sure they'd come, and I knew it would sound so crazy if I tried to tell you what I w—"

"When who came in?" Josarian heard the soothing murmurs and relieved sighs of the little creatures who's been battling frantically with him only moments ago. "Who are they? What in the Fires is going on?"

"Where's the candle?" Tansen muttered. "Please, one of you get the candle," he said to their visitors. "I can't find it."

"You know them?" Josarian heard bodies scurrying and voices muttering.

"We've met before," Tansen hedged.

"Who are they?" Josarian repeated.

"They're—Ah! Good. The candle. And the flint box."

A moment later, the candle flickered back to life. Josarian squinted, his gaze catching glimpses of strange, improbable things as his eyes watered and adjusted to the light.

"They are the Beyah-Olvari," Tansen said. "And they see much better in the dark than you or I do."

Josarian blinked incredulously at the small, fragile blue beings who flinched away from the candle, shielding their eyes from it's glare. They were quite unmistakably the same creatures whose images decorated the walls in the cave paintings of Niran, Dalishar, and countless other sites in Sileria. They were also, as far as anybody knew, extinct.

"I think," Josarian said slowly to Tansen, "that you had better explain."

 

 

Koroll, Commander of Shaljir and High Commander of Sileria, cooled his heels in the counsel hall of Santorell Palace like some lowly servant awaiting his master's pleasure. Indeed, his master's pleasure was the cause of the delay. Although Advisor Borell was no fool, took his position seriously, and devoted considerable energy to his office, one could not deny that the man took his pleasures equally seriously.

During their short association, Koroll had already learned that Borell loved good food, superior wine, excellent music, fine art, the best clothing, intelligent conversation, skillful performers, and brilliant poets. Borell considered these pleasures as important as his thorough knowledge of political intrigues or his surprisingly extensive understanding of military tactics. The Advisor had little respect for anyone who wasn't a discriminating connoisseur of the finest things in life, and no patience whatsoever with anyone who interfered with his own disciplined consumption of them.

It was this discipline which Koroll respected in the Advisor. Borell was moderate in his habits, scheduling duty and pleasure with a precision seldom seen even on military training fields. Although he put his staff through considerable trouble to import the finest wines in the Empire, he never grew drunk. Although he hosted entertainments that could last half the night, he never slept through the following morning, but was always awake and pursuing his duties at the usual time. Although he wore the finest garments available in Sileria, he never spared them when practicing his horsemanship or swordplay, but demanded tough endurance of both his body and his splendid raiment.

Indeed, despite the Advisor's reputation as the most hedonistic Valdan in Sileria, there was only one area of pleasure in which Koroll considered Borell to be completely out of control: his mistress, a Silerian aristocrat named Elelar. Although her nocturnal visits were fairly discreet, Koroll always knew when she had spent the night at the Palace, because Borell would invariably still be abed the next morning long after he should have arisen. If the torena visited the Advisor during the daytime, Borell would often cancel all meetings without notice or explanation and give his servants strict instructions not to disturb him under any circumstances. And the gifts Borell gave that woman! Surely even a man as rich as Borell must feel the strain of such costly gifts to his strumpet.

Yes, although he had learned to respect many things about Borell, when it came to that Silerian whore—whose husband apparently didn't care that all of Shaljir knew she was warming the Advisor's bed—Koroll considered his superior to be a besotted fool.

Today, when Borell finally showed up in the counsel hall for the meeting they had planned, he dismissed Koroll's lengthy wait with a brief, absent-minded apology and listened with only half-hearted interest to Koroll's most recent reports on Josarian's known or suspected activities. Borell's pleasure-flushed face didn't surprise Koroll, nor did the scent of the Silerian woman still clinging to his skin, but it did disgust him. By the Three, it was disgraceful!

Outlookers were discouraged from sleeping with Silerians. The Emperor provided thoroughly reliable, duly inspected, conveniently housed, specially imported women to fulfill the men's needs, after all. Silerians were treacherous, dishonest, disloyal, and ungovernable, no matter how subdued two centuries of severe poverty had made them appear. Permitting the men to form liaisons with the locals in this country would be unwise, to say the least.

Koroll thought that Advisor Borell, as a government official, should set a better example for the men than taking a Silerian woman to his bed. Since coming to Shaljir, Koroll had taken a third-level Kintish courtesan as his mistress, a respectable choice worthy of the Commander of Shaljir. A man in Advisor Borell's position had a wide-ranging choice of suitable women, particularly considering his wealth. He could hire a first-level Kintish courtesan, bring a Valdani woman from the mainland to act as his official "hostess," or seek a liaison with a woman from one of the long-established Valdani families in Sileria.

There was some intermarriage between Valdani and Silerian aristocrats. Throughout history, after all, the nobility of the world had always had a way of uniting that set them apart from the common people of their own individual races. Considering such practices, Koroll grudgingly supposed that Borell, a Valdani aristocrat, might be excused for publicly taking a full-blooded Silerian as his mistress—if only Borell weren't so clearly enamored of the woman. Koroll had met her several times by now, since she was either the hostess or a guest at virtually all of Borell's social festivities. Yes, she was lovely. Any normal man had to admit that. But she wasn't the ravishing beauty he had expected, having witnessed the evidence of her influence over Borell and having heard some of the Palace gossip about her. Oh, there was unquestionably something about her—the way she moved, the tone of her voice, a look, a smile, a sigh—that transfixed a man's attention. Yes, there was something beneath her grace and elegance which put hunger in a man's belly. Koroll had felt it himself, to his consternation.

However, any man who let such women's weapons hold sway over his better judgment was a fool asking for grief; and Borell's normally sharp mind became as soft as over-ripe melon around Elelar. Perhaps the torena would be content with the gifts and privileges Borell showered upon her in exchange for her sexual favors... but she didn't strike Koroll as a simple woman, and he rather suspected that she would eventually want more. Additional land and titles? Borell's official recognition of the child she was bound to bear him sooner or later, even if she couldn't prove the brat was not her own husband's get? Even, Three forbid, a divorce from her own husband and marriage to the Imperial Advisor himself?

As Koroll told Borell about the patrols currently out searching the mountains for Josarian and explained his plans for tightening security around all Valdani operations in the district of Cavasar, he idly wondered what grief would come to Borell as a result of his foolish passion for the torena.

"And what about soliciting information?" Borell demanded, finally focusing his full attention on the conversation.

"Ah, yes, as you know, sir, getting information out of the shallaheen remains our biggest challenge in tracking Josarian. I've recently put a new man onto the problem." He paused and added, "A man who, due to the disastrous consequences of following Commander Daroll's orders while in charge of the garrison at Britar, is now most eager to prove himself to you, Eminence: Captain Myrell."

 

 

"Eight of the Empire's Outlookers were murdered here, and supplies and property belonging to the Valdani were stolen or destroyed!" Myrell paused and looked around at the people of Malthenar. He had their undivided attention. "The penalty for these crimes is death by slow torture!"

He had ridden into Malthenar before dawn with two hundred Outlookers. They had dragged the villagers from their beds, hauled them out of their miserable stone hovels, and herded them into the main square. Commander Koroll, upon releasing Myrell from custody in Cavasar, had clearly explained the price of his life and freedom: secrecy and service. Since Myrell had no wish to advertise that the disaster at Britar had been his own doing, and since he burned day and night with the desire for vengeance, he had readily agreed to Koroll's conditions. He had also agreed with Koroll's assessment that they must launch a serious offensive against Josarian, taking his allies by surprise.

Malthenar had been quiet ever since Josarian had destroyed the Outlooker outpost here shortly after the battle at Britar. With his band of outlaws busy elsewhere, it seemed certain that an assault on Malthenar now would take Josarian by surprise. The village would be defenseless, and Josarian would be revealed as a very poor protector against the Empire's fury. Above all, Myrell would make his own mission clear: terrible suffering for every peasant in these mountains until Josarian was delivered into his hands.

Myrell studied the crowd, then selected a young man who looked at him with open hatred. Myrell had him hauled into the center of the square.

"What is your name?" Myrell asked.

The young man merely glared in stony silence. Myrell called Arlen to his side, a shallah criminal who served him in exchange for staying out of the mines. Arlen wore the shorn hair and tailored clothing of a city-dweller, but he still had the dark skin and scarred palms of a shallah, and the villagers instantly recognized him for what he was.

"What is this man's name?" Myrell demanded.

Arlen glanced at the villager's jashar. "He is Corenten mar Sarshen shah Emeldari," he answered, his voice wooden.

"Corenten?" Myrell said. "Well, you match the description we have of one of Josarian's men." So, of course, did most of the other men in the village; but this one would do for now. "I hereby arrest you in the name of the Emperor and charge you with the murder of eight Outlookers. Sentence to be carried out immediately."

Fear flashed in Corenten's eyes and he tried to break away from the Outlookers who had seized him.

"Ah," Myrell said, "then you do understand Valdan?"

The shallah said nothing, simply kept glaring.

"Just in case his Valdan is not as good as it should be," Myrell said to Arlen, "I want you to translate everything I say. Make sure the rest of the villagers hear it well."

Arlen nodded, his expression sullen. When he began translating, angry grumbles and murmurs filled the air, and the word sriliah was borne on the wind to swirl around Arlen, whose shoulders hunched against the shame.

"Corenten," Myrell said, "I will give you one chance to save yourself from what, I promise you, will be a truly horrible death. I want information about Josarian."

Corenten spat in his face.

Myrell pulled out his sword and slashed Corenten diagonally from shoulder to hip. The young man's knees briefly buckled as his face contorted with pain. A woman screamed. The crowd surged forward. Myrell gave the signal, and archers fired into the crowd. Screams of agony and outrage rent the air. A baby fell to the ancient cobblestones as its mother collapsed, blood pouring from her mouth as she tore weakly at the arrow piercing her chest. A brawny man broke through the crowd and flew straight at Myrell, his weapon of sticks-and-rope—his yahr, as Myrell had learned they called it—swinging wildly. One Outlooker tripped him, and another killed him as he fell. Milling in desperate, noisy panic, many shallaheen tried to break past the mounted Outlookers guarding the perimeter of the main square. They were driven back, some of them injured in the process, several killed.

It wasn't until the crowd was subdued that Myrell spoke again. "You had one chance, Corenten, and now you have lost it." He nodded to the men who held the bleeding shallah. "Prepare him for the executioner."

Corenten's pain-clouded eyes widened with shock, and Myrell could see that he hadn't truly expected to die. He struggled wildly, cursing in his guttural mountain tongue, until one of the Outlookers clubbed him over the head. Then, dazed and helpless, he was tied spread-eagle between two posts. As the hooded executioner approached, flanked by his two apprentices, Myrell spoke again to the horrified crowd while Arlen translated for him.

"There is one last chance to save this boy's life. If someone steps forward now with information leading to Josarian's capture, I will spare this brave young man."

People in the crowd shifted uncertainly, glances flashing back and forth, heads lowering in sorrow or in shame. Finally, a woman stepped forward. She was big-boned, strong, voluptuous, and desirable even in poverty and middle-age. Her face was streaked with tears, her pale clothing smeared with dust and splotched with someone else's blood. Emotion twisted her features with pain beyond measure. Her voice, when she spoke, was low and strained.

"This woman is his mother," Arlen translated for Myrell, since the woman spoke no Valdan.

Hope surged through Myrell. "Ask her what she knows."

The woman responded to Arlen's question without ever taking her watery gaze from her son. Arlen hesitated, staring at the woman when she was done speaking.

"Well?" Myrell prodded. "What did she say?"

Arlen looked a little pale. "She says her son swore a bloodfeud against the Valdani with Josarian."

"So we've got the right man," Myrell said impatiently. "So what? Can she tell us—"

"She says that she herself will kill the first person who dishonors Corenten's bloodpact by betraying Josarian."

Myrell swayed slightly, then looked around to see if anyone in the village intended to challenge this ridiculous threat. To his disgust, heads nodded, chins came up, shoulders squared, and all gazes fixed on Corenten.

What had Koroll told him they called it—their code of silence? Lirtahar... Myrell sighed inwardly.

Knowing it would be a long, ugly day, he signaled the executioner to begin the torture. Corenten's screams of agony filled the air. His mother's proud features tightened with horrified grief as tears coursed down her cheeks, but she would not look away. The whole village watched, silent, stone-faced, and unflinching, as one of their own endured three hours of the most gruesome death Myrell himself had ever seen.

Three Into One, how he hated these people!

 

 

"In the name of Dar and all that is holy..." Basimar said, her voice heavy with horror. "What is that?"

Less than a day from Dalishar now, they stumbled across the most gruesome sight Mirabar had ever seen. She lowered her concealing hood, heedless of who might come upon them unexpectedly, and stared in shock.

The fresh corpse of a man was spread-eagled between two slender trees which grew alongside the road, his hands and feet securely tied to keep him in place. Carrion feeders had been feasting on the entrails hanging from his open belly; Basimar's scream had frightened them away, but the swarm of insects remained, as did the stench.

"This looks like..." Basimar swallowed and gagged.

Mirabar took the Sister's shoulders and turned her away from the sight. "Like who?" she choked out.

"Like Valdani torture."

Mirabar's gaze flashed to Basimar's face as the Sister fought back her nausea. "You've seen this before?"

"Once," Basimar said, her voice thick. "Years ago. A local boy who'd been sleeping with a Valdani girl. When they were caught, she claimed... she said... "

"She saved her reputation by claiming he had raped her."

"Yes."

"And the Valdani did this to him?"

"It's their... most severe punishment. Death by slow torture." Basimar was breathing in shallow gasps. "For the crimes which most offend them."

"Touching their women," Mirabar said.

"Or killing a Valdan."

"Killing a..." Mirabar gasped. "We're so close to Dalishar!"

"Mira, no!" Basimar tried to grab her as she lunged forward to investigate the body.

"It might be one of... one of... Oh, Dar, it might even be him! It might..." Quivering with disgust, she picked up a stick and pushed away mangled, dangling entrails to get a good look at the dead man's jashar.

Trying to look at anything except at what Mirabar was doing, Basimar said, "No, it couldn't be. See how his hair is shorn, how his clothes are so immodest? Tight, almost like a Valdan's? He's a city-dweller, not a..."

"His palms are scarred," Mirabar argued. "He wears a jashar."

"There's another one!" Basimar said.

Mirabar jumped and looked around. "Where?"

"No, not a body. Another jashar."

Mirabar looked up and saw that a small jashar hung around the dead man's neck. She looked down again at the man's waist, then averted her gaze from the mess there. "He is Arlen mar—"

"So die all who betray their own kind," Basimar interrupted, interpreting the jashar around the man's neck. "So die all who betray Josarian."

Mirabar backed away from the corpse, gaping in horror, unable to form a coherent thought. Basimar started weeping. Appalled by the dawning realization of what her alliance with this warrior would cost them all, Mirabar fell to her knees and begged Dar for guidance.

 

 

Torena Elelar mar Odilan yesh Ronall shah Hasnari emerged from her scented bath and began polishing her skin with the subtly fragrant oils that kept it sweet, soft, and reasonably fair beneath Sileria's passionate sun. No amount of cosmetics, of course, could make her as fair-skinned as the pale, bloodless women so prized by the Valdani, but at least their men did not seem to find her wanting in grace, delicacy, or beauty.

Faradar, her personal servant, began dressing her hair, twisting and weaving it into the elaborately coiled and braided style of a Silerian aristocrat. Then Faradar helped her don the clothes she had selected for the evening. She did not wear Valdani clothes, and she knew how the Valdani laughed at Silerians who aped their customs and fashions. Instead, her own clothes were so exquisite that she had instigated the new trend of Valdani women in Shaljir occasionally wearing Silerian clothes.

Now she laughed at them—but secretly. Yes, as she did everything in life—secretly.

Heavy footsteps outside her dressing room heralded the unexpected arrival of her husband a moment before he flung open the door without ceremony or apology. He stalked into the room, threw himself into a cushioned chair, glared at Faradar, and growled, "Get out."

Faradar glanced at her mistress.

Elelar nodded. "That will be all. You may go."

The girl bowed and made a dignified exit. Having entered Elelar's service seven years ago, two years before her mistress's marriage, Faradar was too accustomed to Ronall's tantrums to scurry away from him or cower beneath his angry scowl.

"I want to talk to you," Ronall said. His words were clear, but his eyes were glazed and unfocused. So it was Kintish dreamweed tonight, Elelar surmised, rather than Valdani liquor or Moorlander opiates.

"You're not dressed yet," she interrupted. "We'll be late."

"Then we can damn well be late!" He blinked, lost his train of thought, and asked, "Where are we going?"

"Your father's birthday celebration. Don't tell me you've forgotten?" She gazed innocently at him.

He flung himself gracelessly out of his chair and snarled, "It slipped my mind after I learned what you've been up to."

She waited, unwilling to encourage him, suppressing the flickering fear that he might have learned the truth at last. She kept her face impassive while her mind raced, wondering what Ronall could have discovered after all this time.

"You had her sent away," Ronall growled. "I warned you not to interfere."

"What?" Elelar blinked, trying to follow her husband's obscure train of thought.

"The girl... the one with the yellow hair..."

She frowned, wondering what in the world he was babbling about. "What girl? What are you—Oh!" Relief flooded her mind, the sensation so strong that she briefly wondered how she managed to live with the tension of her daily existence. "That Moorlander acrobat that you so admired at the Palace?"

"The one I wanted for myself!"

"I believe you had her for yourself, my dear. The Imperial Stables right in Santorell Square is hardly a discreet place for such activ—"

"Where is she?"

"On the mainland by now, I assume," Elelar said. "The troop was scheduled to play in—"

"She said she would stay with me."

"And she's gone?" Elelar was getting bored. "Why do you suppose that I had something to do with it? You warned me early in our marriage not to interfere in your—"

"Damn right, I did," he snapped.

"And I have never disobeyed you since then," she reminded him.

About one year after their marriage, Elelar had helped a frightened new kitchen girl escape Ronall's persistent attentions by finding her a position in another household. Ronall had learned about it and was furious enough to cause a hideous scene in front of all the servants. Since that bitter quarrel, Elelar had simply avoided similar problems by trying to ensure that none of their servants were women likely to appeal to Ronall's tastes. And, fortunately, he'd always hated Faradar too much to touch her.

"I went looking for the girl," Ronall said, apparently still convinced it was Elelar's fault that he'd lost the Moorlander acrobat. "They said a torena paid her to leave Sileria with the rest of the troop."

"Really?" Elelar paused in the act of rouging her lips. "A torena? I don't suppose you got a description of her?"

"No." He frowned in confusion. "Why should I?"

"Far be it from me to suggest that the girl was anything less than a pearl of faithful devotion to you..."

"But?" he prodded, glaring at her.

"Don't you think it possible that someone else became interested in her, too, and that perhaps that man's wife was less willing to share than I am?"

Not surprisingly, his attention was diverted away from his loss, which Elelar expected him to forget entirely by this time tomorrow, and shifted to a new grievance. "Share? As if you even notice my absence. When was the last time we shared a bed, my dear?"

Despite her revulsion for him, she never once backed down or shied away when he asserted his conjugal rights. She looked him right in the eye and said, "I am available, sir, whenever you feel capable of getting an heir."

He paled. Her arrow had struck home. "You can't blame that on me, you faithless bitch!" he raged. "How many others have been between your legs and not gotten a brat on you?"

"No one but Borell," she lied.

"And he can't fill your barren womb, either!"

"He takes precautions against bastards," said Elelar.

"You think it's my fault!"

"Did I say that?"

"You don't have to. It's written all over your smirking, superior, whoring face!"

She shrugged and turned away. "We've had this conversation before. I see no point in—"

"I do!" He struck the rouge pot out of her hand and seized her by the shoulders. "You want an heir?" Ronall snarled, his hot breath fanning her face as he pushed her up against the wall. "Then I'll give you an heir, damn you!"

She felt his body grinding against hers and realized with a brief flash of panic that he meant to do it. Unfortunately, no matter how Ronall abused his body and senses, he seldom lost the ability to service a woman—with about as much skill and sensitivity as the verb implied.

Elelar turned her face away from her husband and endured his assault with as much dignity as she could. She had learned the hard way that fighting him when he was in this mood only produced injuries that took days to heal.

This happened seldom enough, after all, she told herself. It wasn't as if he demanded her body often anymore. And it would be over soon. He never took long.

It was her wedding night all over again. Now, as then, she gritted her teeth against the pain of his biting kisses, squeezing hands, and rough, plunging invasion. Now, as then, she begged Dar to make her womb barren, because she did not want to bear a child by the half-Valdan drunkard she had married. Now, as then, she washed thoroughly the moment he left the room, scrubbing away all trace of him until her flesh felt raw.

Now, as then, she did not permit herself to weep, for she knew her duty, and the Alliance needed her courage.