CHAPTER THREE

Northern Plains of Isembaard

A xis and Zeboath rose at the same time.

“Madarin?” said Axis to Insharah. “I thought you said he had a bellyache from eating too much eel pie.”

“That is all I thought it was,” said Insharah, “and all Madarin thought it was. But he grew very quiet during the day’s ride, and didn’t eat anything at camp. Over the past hour his pain has become immeasurably worse, and he is gray and sweating.”

“I’ll look at him,” said Zeboath, hurrying off to rummage in his pack for his physician’s bag.

Axis followed him. He hated it when men under his command fell ill. He could deal with horrific battle wounds, but somehow the silent attack of disease and illness unsettled him far more. Even in his full power as Star-Man, Axis had been unable to do anything for internal illnesses or raging fevers. He’d always had to leave it to women and physicians.

Madarin lay wrapped in blankets, curled about his belly. Even in the firelight Axis could see clearly that the skin of his face was gray and slick with sweat, and that his body trembled. He was biting his lip, trying not to moan.

Madarin was clearly very, very ill.

“Stars,” Axis muttered, “I hope Zeboath can do something.”

The physician arrived at that moment, bag in hand, shooing Insharah and Axis back, and asking one of the other soldiers to build up the fire.

“He’s in shock,” Zeboath said. “He will need the warmth.”

“Shock?” said Axis. “Why?”

Zeboath held up a hand, silently asking for time. He knelt at Madarin’s side, and very gently persuaded him to uncurl so that Zeboath might examine him.

For long, tense minutes, Zeboath probed at Madarin’s chest and belly. At times, when Zeboath’s fingers dug too deep, Madarin let out a shriek and Zeboath muttered an apology. Finally, Zeboath patted Madarin on the shoulder, told him he would mix him a pain remedy, and stood and motioned Axis and Insharah to one side.

The tight, anxious faces of the troop followed them.

“It is not good news,” Zeboath said. “He has an obstruction within his bowel, and his bowel has gone into spasm and twisted about itself. Now Madarin’s entire abdominal cavity is inflamed and, as you have seen, he has gone into shock. I need to give him some pain relief, fast.”

“But you can fix it,” said Axis.

Zeboath looked him directly in the eye. “It may resolve itself, Axis, but, no, I cannot ‘fix it.’ More likely he will develop such a massive infection within his belly from the inflammation and obstruction that he will die within days. I can relieve the pain and the spasms, but that is all I can do.”

Axis stared at him, then gave a small shake of his head. So be it.

“There must be something else!” said Insharah.

“I’m sorry,” Zeboath said. “I just can’t—”

“Perhaps I can,” said Ishbel, and all three men turned about in surprise.

She stood just a pace away.

“How?” said Axis.

“I have some skill in the, um, unraveling of intestines.”

“Skill?” said Zeboath.

“Please,” Ishbel said, “will you trust me? I can help this man, and even if not, what harm in allowing me to try?”

Axis and Zeboath exchanged a glance, then Axis nodded. “Very well.”

Ishbel nodded and stepped over to Madarin.

Like Zeboath, she sank down on her knees next to the man. She put a hand on his shoulder—Axis thought she might smile in reassurance, but her face remained grave—and rolled the man fully onto his back.

“I need you to stay straight, and still,” she said. “Can you do that?”

Madarin’s eyes were glassy with pain and shock, but he managed a tiny nod.

“Good,” said Ishbel, then she pulled back the blankets covering the man, unlaced his breeches, pulling them down to his hips, and ran a hand gently over his abdomen.

As she did so, the man’s abdomen roiled, and he cried out in pain.

There were gasps from about the circle, and many shifted uneasily.

Ishbel’s hand continued to move slowly over Madarin’s abdomen. She closed her eyes, bowing her head, concentrating, and her hand stilled.

No one moved. Every eye was fixated on Ishbel.

“You have not respected the Coil,” Ishbel muttered, her head still down, her eyes still closed. “It rebels.”

“The eel pie—” Madarin began, his voice rasping.

“Be quiet!” Ishbel said. Then, suddenly, her hand dug deep into Madarin’s belly, and he screamed in pain, his back arching so far off the ground his weight was supported only by his shoulders and hips.

Everyone moved then, stepping forward, but Ishbel’s head jerked up and her eyes blazed. “Stay back!”

Axis raised a hand, stilling everyone’s forward movement. “Stay back,” he said, “for the moment. Gods, Ishbel, I hope you know what you are doing…”

She ignored him. Her hand continued to press into Madarin’s flesh, so deeply it appeared almost to disappear from view.

Then she released its tight grip and, very gently, very quietly, began to rub her hand in a complex pattern over Madarin’s belly.

He was still shrieking, but his body had relaxed back to the ground.

Ishbel’s hand continued to move, slowly, gently, and now her own body swayed back and forth, slowly, gently, following the movement of her hand.

Axis was fixated. He could not drag his eyes away from Ishbel, now weaving back and forth almost as if she were cradling a child, her eyes closed once more, her face peaceful, her hand moving, ever more slowly, ever more gently.

She was using a power he’d never seen before.

Madarin’s shrieks eased back to moans.

“That is amazing,” Zeboath whispered at Axis’ side. “Astounding!”

Ishbel drew in a deep breath, and opened her eyes.

Her hand paused, then moved up to the bottom of Madarin’s rib cage.

Then, very slowly, very deliberately, Ishbel traced out a serpentine path with her forefinger from the man’s rib cage down to his groin.

“You are the servant of the Great Serpent now,” Ishbel said to Madarin, who was completely quiet and staring at her with wide, shocked eyes. “Revere him.”

Then she stood, slow and graceful, and walked back to the campfire she shared with Zeboath and Axis.

Far to the north, in Escator, Maximilian rode through the night. He’d led his party out of Ruen at noon, having convened a hasty meeting of the Privy Council of Preferred Nobles. He’d left his crown and his authority with the Council, Lixel as its head, and vowed to them that he would return.

As he rode, Maximilian often glanced to the east where the Outlands warred with Pelemere and Hosea, and imagined he could hear the opening clash of steel in battle and the screams of dying men.

With him rode two Emerald Guardsmen, Serge and Doyle. Egalion had recommended them highly, saying they were men of particular resource and skill.

At that, Maximilian’s mouth had twisted wryly. In their lives before they’d been condemned to the Veins, Serge and Doyle had been assassins for hire.

But Serge and Doyle did not quite make up Maximilian’s entire party. During the midafternoon Serge had gestured into the sky, and Maximilian looked up to see BroadWing and three other Icarii descending.

“We will come with you,” BroadWing had said, refusing to listen to Maximilian’s protestations. “You are not our king, so your commands have no force with us. We can help you, Maximilian. Do not refuse us.”

Maximilian hadn’t. The Icarii would be useful—more than useful—and he liked their company.

So now they rode through the night, their horses’ pounding hooves eating up the miles, while the Icarii wheeled overhead. The traveling eased Maximilian’s mind. He was doing something, he was taking control rather than being battered by circumstance, and he was traveling to snatch back the woman he loved.

Elcho Falling could wait until he had Ishbel again.

“Just a ward of the Coil, Ishbel,” Axis said as he sat down. “Really? Perhaps you may now like to explain that a little more fully.”

Ishbel sighed as Zeboath also sat. She felt drained from the energy expended in healing Madarin, but also, conversely, energized. She had always worried that the baby within her would disrupt her Coil and separate her from her powers as archpriestess.

But tonight had proved otherwise. Her Coil was as strong as it had always been.

“You are a member of the Coil?” Zeboath said, his eyes wide. “I have heard of them!”

“Well,” said Axis, “according to Ishbel she is only—”

“Peace,” said Ishbel, sighing again. She hesitated, reluctant to speak the truth even though it must now be blindingly obvious she was far more than just a ward of the Coil. But what would Axis and Zeboath say when they knew the truth? She liked both of them, and enjoyed their company, and wouldn’t want to—

“Ishbel,” said Axis, very gently, “I don’t want to judge you. I am intrigued by you, and by what you said to me last night about the ancient evil. Tell me of Serpent’s Nest, and of your life there. If you have heard anything of my life, then you must know some of my stupidities.” Axis gave a small deprecating smile. “I am the last person to judge you, and I think that after tonight’s little display Zeboath admires you far too much to even consider it. Trust us, Ishbel.”

“Yet you were willing enough to taunt me the other night with your ‘rather vile band of psychic murderers.’”

“I was wrong to say that, Ishbel, and I apologize to you for it. Tell us about Serpent’s Nest. Tell us about you.”

Ishbel studied her hands for a long time. Then, when she finally raised her head, she spoke calmly, and Axis had a glimpse of her inner strength and dignity.

“As you know, Serpent’s Nest is home to the Coil, an order that worships and tends to the Great Serpent.”

“The Great Serpent is a god?” said Axis.

“Yes. We only ever see him in visions during Readings, or on other very rare occasions when he reveals himself to us.”

“You are a member of this order,” Axis said.

“Yes.” Ishbel tilted her chin slightly. “I am its archpriestess.”

Axis drew a soft breath between his teeth, and heard Zeboath do the same. He glanced at him, and saw that the physician’s eyes were now almost popping out of his head.

“The knowledge of anatomy that you must have!” Zeboath said. “Would you mind, later, when you have the time and are strong enough, sharing some of that knowledge with me?”

Ishbel looked at him with some surprise, and Axis thought she must have been expecting judgment.

Instead, she received breathless admiration.

Ishbel smiled, just very slightly. “Well, yes, Zeboath, I will gladly do that. I am sure there is much we can teach each other.”

Axis was now a little irritated, as obviously Zeboath knew more about the Coil than did he. “Ishbel, tell me of the Coil, and what you do within it.”

“We tend to the Great Serpent, and protect and honor him as best we may. We also conduct Readings, in which the Great Serpent speaks to us, and reveals…” She hesitated. “The Great Serpent is an oracle, Axis, of great mystery. He can reveal the future to us, or for any who desire to know it.”

“What are these ‘Readings’?”

“We take a living man, Axis, and we disembowel him to reveal the Coil within—his bowel. His coil spills to the floor, then rises, taking on the form of the Great Serpent, who then speaks to us and reveals glimpses of the future or imparts information that we need to know.”

“Your knowledge of anatomy must be superb,” Zeboath muttered to one side.

Axis stared at Ishbel, wondering that so few words could describe such horror. “And the person you disembowel…?”

“Dies.”

“Sweet gods, Ishbel…”

“We take criminals destined for execution, and very rarely a man who offers us his life. In the latter instance, the Great Serpent blesses the man’s family with good fortune, and we render him insensible during the Reading, so that he feels no pain.”

Axis swallowed, dragging his eyes away from Ishbel to stare out the window. “You don’t ‘read’

women?”

“No. Their coil within is too often disturbed by childbearing, or by the waxing and waning of the womb with its monthly cycle.”

“Yet you, a female, rank at the top of the Coil?”

“When I was inducted into the Coil I relinquished all reproductive rights and workings.”

Axis nodded at her belly. “And that?”

“I cannot explain this pregnancy. I should not have been able to conceive.”

“Maximilian is a man to be reckoned with, then,” muttered Axis. “Tell me, does Maximilian know that you are the archpriestess of this order?”

“He suspects.”

Axis looked back at her. “Then you cannot blame him for thinking you might be involved with the murders Ba’al’uz committed across the Central Kingdoms. Dear gods, Ishbel, you cannot blame anyone for reacting with horror at what you do.”

“Are you repulsed, Axis?”

He sighed. “I have done many terrible things in my life, Ishbel. No. I am not repulsed, but I am saddened.” He gave a small smile. “Zeboath, on the other hand, looks as though he shall be your student for life.”

Ishbel smiled.

“Was it the Great Serpent who told you about the ancient evil?” Axis asked.

“Yes. He showed us Skraelings swarming over Serpent’s Nest, and a terrible darkness rising from the south.”

Whatever rests beneath DarkGlass Mountain, thought Axis. Or perhaps even the cursed pyramid itself.

“It is why I was sent to marry Maximilian,” Ishbel offered.

“What? Why should marriage to Maximilian help?”

Ishbel shrugged. “I don’t know.” She paused. “I didn’t want to marry him.”

“And now?” Zeboath said.

“It matters no longer,” she said, her tone bitter. “This marriage is over.”

“Ishbel,” Axis said eventually, very gently, “what is it about Maximilian that the Great Serpent felt was worth this?”

“I don’t know. And now…now I have ruined everything. I have lost Maximilian. I have failed the Great Serpent. Oh, gods…”

“Ishbel, you were stolen. You couldn’t help it that—”

“The Great Serpent wanted me to stay with Maximilian. He said I could come home eventually. I could leave Maximilian eventually. I told Maxel, we talked about this, he knew I was unhappy. He said to give it a year, and I thought I could give him that year, hand him this baby, then leave. Go home.”

“You don’t want the baby.”

“No. Maxel wants it. I don’t.” Again, a pause to collect herself. “And now…now I worry that the baby has died, it doesn’t move, and Maxel…”

What a complex woman, thought Axis. She feels guilt for everyone. The Great Serpent. Maximilian. She may have been a brilliant archpriestess, but the god she served thought it better for her to be a woman, a wife, and a queen, all roles that Ishbel had no experience in and that terrified her.

“Earlier,” Axis said, “when I mentioned the name Lister, you reacted strongly. What do you know of him?”

“I have never met him,” said Ishbel, “but I know of him. He was once the archpriest of the Coil, serving at Serpent’s Nest well before my time.”

“Lister was an archpriest of the Coil?” Axis said. “Well, well. Go on, please.”

“He vanished one day,” Ishbel said. “Perhaps a year or two before I came to Serpent’s Nest. Axis, why are Lister—whom you now style Lord of the Skraelings—and Isaiah in contact?”

“They are in an alliance to invade the Outlands and the Central Kingdoms,” said Axis. “Isaiah from the south, Lister from the north.”

“Oh, no,” she whispered. “No…”

“Lister and Isaiah use the pyramids,” Axis said, “to communicate. Lister either made these, or he has access to those who can. I admit myself highly curious about Lister, Lord of the Skraelings, and once archpriest of the Coil.”

“Please, Axis,” Ishbel said, “please—the Icarii are in the north, I have seen them, and you have talked to one of them. Let us, you and I, flee north. Dear gods, you cannot be involved in this invasion of innocent peoples! Have not enough Icarii died?”

Axis gave her a sharp look at that last. “I do not agree with Isaiah’s plans for invasion,” he said, “but I will do better here. With Isaiah. He is not a bad man.” He is a man full of mysteries himself. “I like him.

Besides, there are great puzzles to be solved here. DarkGlass Mountain, for one.”

“DarkGlass Mountain?” Ishbel said, wanting to argue more with Axis about the invasion, but unable to resist the question.

“I think it is your ancient evil,” Axis said, “or something associated with it. DarkGlass Mountain is a massive stone-and-glass pyramid far to the south, on the opposite riverbank from Aqhat. Zeboath, what do you know of it?”

Zeboath gave a small shrug. “Isembaardians know of it only as a great mystery to which only the tyrant has access.”

Axis laughed. “Well, I shall disabuse you of that rumor here and now. The tyrants have no idea what it is, either.”