The Court of Broken Knives
But behind it stood the Great Temple. It too was old. Not old like the square was old, but old like the stars are old. Old like the sea is old. Old like the cut of a knife.
It had stood before Sorlost was a village. It had stood before the desert dried. It had been built by gods, by demons, by dead men quarrying stone with their bare hands. It was vast and terrible, and once a man stared at it he could not stop staring. It gaped like a diseased wound in the centre of the city, holy and blind. If a man left Sorlost for a while, he saw it every night in his dreams.
The first inhabitants of Sorlost had built it, or found it, or dreamed it into being, and then they had built their marketplace and their houses and their shops around it, as though it was a human thing. Their descendants had taken a village in the desert and built or dreamed it into an empire. Their descendants in turn had lost an empire and retreated into their dreams. But the Temple still stood as it had always stood. It was the most perfect thing in all Sorlost. Perhaps the most perfect thing in all the world.
A square of black marble, in which blood was shed and the living kept alive.
The litter stopped. The square was crowded, people milling around, merchants and shoppers, street sellers offering flowers and cakes and skewers of roast meat, beggars, a mendicant magician pulling green fire from a young boy’s ears, a poet with the hatha sores selling little scrolls of his work. Their arrival attracted a general degree of attention, the fine quality of the litter’s silks and the uniforms of the bearers indicating the wealth and status of its occupants even before Bil’s shimmering gown and jewelled headdress caught the morning sun. She, at least, was recognizable to some of the onlookers. Might have been the subject of poems herself, if they were not too cruel to write.
As they walked towards the Temple, Orhan realized that he had assured his sister only a few days before that Bil was certainly not pregnant. Mildly vexing. She’d be irritated with him, even think he had lied to her. And disappointed, too: at the moment, her snivelling little son was the de facto Emmereth heir. Please let it be a boy, he thought again. A good strong boy with Sterne’s good clean peasant strength.
They mounted the six steps to the doorway of the Temple, so old and worn that they dipped unsteadily in the centre, ground away by the tread of endless, countless feet. The great door was closed – was always closed – but moved easily on its pivots as Orhan pushed. Taller than a man, taller than two men standing one on the other’s shoulders, but narrow, so that only a single man could walk through at one time. It put one in mind of a great rat-trap, or a blade coming down. Black wood, hard as stone, uncarved, unadorned, the grain dark stripes like animal fur, the knots like watching eyes, like the eyes on Bil’s dress. Three long claw marks ran down the door at the height of a man’s head.
The door gave onto a long black tunnel, thin and tall as the door itself. Bright light shone at the end of it. The sensation of walking through the narrow dark was stifling, the high ceiling magnifying the sense of oppression, the dead air above a great weight pressing down. Crushing. Drowning. Eating one alive. It could hardly be a long corridor, perhaps ten paces’ walk, but it seemed very long. Orhan shuddered, felt Bil shudder too behind him, walking very close to him.
This is what it feels like to die, the thin dark corridor whispered, and then they stepped out into the Great Chamber and the light whispered that this is what it feels like to live.
The Great Chamber of the Great Temple was vast. Its walls and ceiling were lined with bronze tiles, making it shimmer and glitter and burn with light, the light as tangible and oppressive as the dark from which they had come. Orhan thought of the firebox at Eloise’s party, of the mirrored facade of the House of Silver, of his sister’s red silk litter: they had shone and danced with fire; this was fire, like being in a fire, like being burned. The floor was black stone, worn like the steps with a thousand years of reverential footsteps. Thousands of candles made the air sweet. They burned in sconces on the walls, on black stone altars, in trailing patterns like dances across the black floor. Hushed voices muttered prayers, the same words repeated over and over. Like birdsong. Like rainfall.
‘Dear Lord, Great Tanis Who Rules All Things, from the fear of life and the fear of death, release us,’ Bil said slowly, bowing her head. Orhan hesitated then took her hand. They walked across the room, their footsteps ringing on the hard floor. A well-dressed young woman kneeling before a small side altar turned and looked at them.
The Lord of the Rising Sun seen publicly holding hands with his wife in the Great Temple. The news would be around the gossip-mongers of the city in the time it took to light a flame.
They approached the High Altar. It was closed off from the rest of the room by a bar of iron that glowed red in the light. Behind this, the High Priestess knelt in prayer. Her black hair hung down around her face, veiling her from prying eyes. A night and a day, she must kneel there, before the evening’s sacrifice. She was still as something carved from stone, the only decorated thing in the Temple. Her eyes fixed on a single lamp that burned deep red like a pool of blood. She looked very small and slight, bent on her knees before the great monolith of the altar stone.
Just visible behind the High Altar was the curtained entrance to the room beyond. The room one did not speak of. The room in which a child would already be lying, waiting to die.
Orhan turned away. Don’t look. It is necessary. But don’t look. God’s great hunger for lives was a mystery of which he and most other educated men did not speak. As a boy he had thought briefly of volunteering, as all children briefly did. The greatest and most sacred choice, his teacher had told him. But he had known, even then, that to choose it would have been somehow wrong, that his teacher and parents would have been outraged if he did. The greatest and most sacred choice, unless someone you knew made it, when it became something else. Something shameful, although he still could not quite say why. A bad thing.
Death is a bad thing. What a profound man you are, Orhan Emmereth.
A young priestess bustled up to them, smiling. ‘My Lord, My Lady,’ she said sweetly, ‘are you looking for something? Would you like to see someone?’
‘Yes.’ Orhan fidgeted. They were here now. No going back. ‘My wife and I, we would like … My wife is newly with child. We would like to make a prayer and an offering, and seek a blessing.’ He pitched his voice clear. Loud.
The priestess smiled more broadly. Happiness in her eyes. ‘It is an auspicious day for it,’ she said, glancing towards the High Altar, and the kneeling figure, and the curtained doorway beyond. ‘I will fetch one of the senior priestesses.’ She slipped away, returned a few moments later with another priestess.
‘My Lord Emmereth. Helase tells me that you have great joy to make known to our Lord.’ Bil flushed with pride and happiness at her words. ‘Come.’ The woman indicated a low altar to the left of the great iron bar, topped with three yellow candles, two almost burned down to stubs, one new and tall. ‘Kneel.’
Orhan knelt uncomfortably on the cold floor, helping Bil down. She moved awkwardly in her heavy dress. The old priestess held out a candle to Bil.
‘Place it on the altar.’
Bil contemplated the altar for a moment before placing the candle carefully at the very centre.
The priestess said slowly and loudly, ‘Great Lord Tanis. These two come before You, to ask Your blessing of the child they bear. Grant that it will live and die, as all things must live and die. Grant that it will know sorrow, and pain, and happiness, and love. Grant that it will endure Your blessing and Your curse. Grant that it will be alive, as we are alive in You. Dear Lord, Great Tanis Who Rules All Things, from the fear of life and the fear of death, release us.’
‘Dear Lord, Great Tanis Who Rules All Things, from the fear of life and the fear of death, release us,’ Bil repeated, her voice shaking.
‘Place your hands on the candle,’ the priestess instructed. Bil glanced at Orhan, then reached out and placed the palm of her right hand on it, fingers pointing up towards the unlit wick. Hesitantly, Orhan did likewise. Bil’s skin was rough and warm beneath his. Whorls and twists of scar tissue, like the molten wax on the altar.
‘Good. Now remove them again, and ask for His blessing.’
Bil bowed her head, her lips moving silently. Her hands folded over her stomach.
The candle flickered into flame, bright and beautiful, its light dancing on the bronze wall.
Chapter Six
‘I hear we should congratulate you.’ Darath Vorley gave Orhan a lazy smile as he slid into his seat. The Temple business had gone on rather longer than he’d expected and he was slightly late. The assembled High Lords of the Sekemleth Empire turned to him irritably and shifted round slightly to make more room. The power and brilliance of an Imperial meeting: eight backstabbing men in various states of ignorance, boredom or general decay gathered round a slightly too small table in a room that hadn’t been redecorated in nigh on a century.
‘Congratulate him?’ echoed Cammor Tardein. Always quick on the uptake, that one.
‘Lady Emmereth is with child,’ Darath said. ‘Or did you want to break the joyous news yourself, Orhan? I’m terribly sorry for stealing your thunder if so. But you did announce it in such a very public manner this morning.’
‘Congratulations,’ said Holt Amdelle stiffly. ‘And I’m sure my wife will be equally delighted.’ Oh, come on, thought Orhan wearily. Don’t pretend you didn’t both know. Your spies are so good, you probably knew before I did. You probably knew before Bil did. Celyse’s questions at the Verneth party: nothing wrong, I trust?
‘Quite an achievement,’ said Elis Vorley. ‘A most unexpected piece of good news, I must say.’
‘That was rather cheap, brother dear,’ said Darath. Smiled elegantly at Orhan. ‘We all knew Orhan had it in him. And his wife is after all so dedicated to the family name.’
Lord Aviced ground his teeth and muttered something, his face scarlet. Orhan shot him an embarrassed glance. You married her to me. No need to look quite so shocked. But it smarted, still, that they should mock so openly.
They were interrupted by the crash of metal on the doors of the room. A rich strained voice calling them to worship: ‘The Emperor! All kneel for the Ever Living Emperor! Avert your eyes and kneel and be thankful! We live and we die! The Emperor comes! The Emperor comes!’ The High Lords of the Sekemleth Empire got carefully to their feet and assumed kneeling positions on the floor around the table. Small but aching differentiations of rank in the postures they adopted: Lord Emmereth and Lord Verneth knelt upright, heads bowed but bodies erect. The Lords Vorley were crouched lower, Lord Aviced so low his grey hair almost brushed the floor. The minute graduations of status in the high families, mapped out in a man’s closeness to the dirt on the Emperor’s marble floors.
The Emperor entered slowly, a youngish man with a heavy face and a heavy stomach, dressed in black that drained the colour from his skin. He was not a handsome man, and knew it. He was not a clever man, and knew that too. The thin band of yellow silk round his forehead dominated him but improved his looks. ‘The Emperor! The Emperor comes! Kneel and be thankful! The Emperor comes!’ Nodded to his lords and gestured absently for them to rise. They did so slowly, elegantly, a subtlety in their manner, as if they simply happened to be rising at that moment, not because their Emperor had commanded it. Whether the Emperor noticed this or not was uncertain. Probably not. So the great lords of the Sekemleth Empire had risen for centuries, before the fishmonger or stable hand or innkeep’s boy whom the High Priestess in her wisdom had recognized as the next incarnation of the Asekemlene Emperor, the Ever Living, the Eternal, the Husband of the City, he who had watched Sorlost grow from a desert village to an all-powerful empire to a gold-sodden husk.
A servant poured goblets of honeyed wine. ‘You are all well, My Lords?’ the Emperor asked absently, playing with his cup. Eyes flickered, looking at his cup moving, his hands, anywhere but his face. Eyes down and averted. The Golden Emperor, the Sun As It Rises, the World’s Dawn, the King of Golden Life. A youngish man, not handsome, not clever. One should not fear such a man. The High Lords of the Sekemleth Empire, who had once been richer and more powerful than gods: they should not fear such a man. A fish merchant’s son! But their hands shook, beneath the careful perfect nonchalance of their poise.
The Secretary coughed, flinched at the tension, shuffled silver paper, coughed again, began. A domestic issue: the guard house at the Maskers’ Gate to the east of the city was crumbling, should an extra tax levy be imposed on the few merchant caravans still daring the old road to Reneneth in order to fund repairs? Orhan agreed without interest that they should, as did most of the other lords. A petty concern, almost below their notice, except that as Lord of the Rising Sun and thus somehow intimately connected with the eastern edge of the city he might otherwise be called upon to pay for the repairs himself. He spoke shortly to nod the plan through, his mind mostly occupied by the striking new serving boy fussing with the wine jug.
‘Prince Heldan has reached marriageable age,’ the Secretary said. Orhan blinked and realized they’d moved on to foreign affairs. Rather more interesting, although usually equally depressing. The Emperor’s attention wandering, also eyeing the servant and the wine jug. The High Lords of the Empire relaxed a little, now they were onto less important things.
‘I know,’ said March Verneth. ‘My mother’s been talking about it for months. He can have one of my girls. Both, if he promises to be nice to them.’
Laughter at that. The Secretary flushed. ‘What I mean, My Lords, is that King Rothlen seems to be looking for a marital alliance with Ith or Immish.’
Holt Amdelle shuddered. ‘Ith? I wouldn’t marry a Calboride if you paid me twice her weight in diamonds.’
‘Ith would be preferable, however,’ said Darath. ‘If he won’t take one of your girls, of course, March.’
‘I agree,’ said Orhan thoughtfully. ‘Chathe and Immish in close alliance would be catastrophic, as things stand. We’d be hemmed in badly.’ The other men half rolled their eyes. Harping on about Immish again, Lord Emmereth? Can’t you find anything more interesting to think about? They’ve only raised twenty thousand men in two years, tripled our trade levies and crushed the Telean uprising so savagely even we felt upset about it for a few weeks. Anyone would think you suspected them of something untoward … ‘Though a half-Calboride heir to Chathe probably isn’t ideal, either …’
‘Oh, come on,’ Elis Vorley snorted. ‘The Calborides haven’t been different from any other great family for centuries now. Whatever his ancestors might have been or done, Selerie has always seemed perfectly reasonable; in fact, his brother was quite charming when he was here.’
‘Blood’s blood,’ said Holt darkly.
Elis laughed. ‘I’d rather be descended from a false god than a well-documented money-lender.’
‘There’s also been news from the east,’ said the Secretary loudly. ‘The Altrersyr Prince is dead.’
‘Took him long enough,’ Tam Rhyl murmured. ‘I’m amazed he lasted this long.’
‘The younger boy’s already been named as heir. King Illyn is reported to be rather pleased, as you can well imagine.’
‘For the best, I suppose,’ said Darath. ‘Though it would have been interesting to see how things turned out, if he’d survived long enough to rule.’ He stroked his chin thoughtfully. ‘The younger boy was here a few years ago, seemed to like it … We should make overtures.’
‘Overtures?’ said Tam Rhyl darkly. ‘An assassin would be more like it.’
Ah, yes. Of course. That. Not really the kind of thing someone forgot or forgave. Pathetic stupidity, the whole thing. But still … The High Council looked sympathetically at Tam, trying not to snigger. Orhan gave the man what he hoped was a soothing smile.
‘I can appreciate your feelings, Tam. But even you must agree it’s a better outcome politically.’
‘We’ll need to send some kind of formal missive of, uh, condolence and congratulation,’ said Cammor. ‘Carefully crafted, of course. Sensitive subject, children.’
The Secretary gave him a crisp smile. ‘It’s already been written and dispatched, My Lord.’
‘His mother was a Calboride, wasn’t she?’ said Lord Amdelle, still stuck in his previous musings. ‘Calboride and Altrersyr blood … bad combination, that, if ever there was one.’
God’s knives, the man was obsessed with genealogies. Terrible overcompensation: anyone would think he was ashamed of his own. As if blood meant anything. Your great-great grandfather did something nasty and suddenly you had bad blood. Nobody ever spoke about the peasantry like that. They were just people, good or bad, fat or thin, mad or sane. But one of the curious things about being high-born was the way you were entirely defined by your ancestors. Thus interesting to see how the next Lord or Lady Emmereth turned out.
‘And there’s been another outbreak of deeping fever in the southern Chathe,’ the Secretary went on hurriedly. ‘Reports are confused, of course, but at least three villages seem to have been affected. No known survivors, although one can’t be certain.’
‘Put extra soldiers on the gates, question anyone travelling from the north. Have them dispatch anyone travelling from the north who seems sick,’ said Tam quickly. Orhan nodded agreement. He’d read several accounts of deeping fever.
‘That’s a little extreme, isn’t it?’ Holt Amdelle began, just as the Secretary said, ‘It’s already been ordered, My Lord. If the number of villages affected grows beyond six, they’re to kill anyone with a Chathean accent or garb, whatever their state of health.’
‘Might finally have an effect on the hatha merchants,’ said Samn Magreth. Orhan was pleased to see that March had the decency to look embarrassed. He’d felt vile for the best part of a day after Eloise’s party.
The Secretary flashed Orhan a cold smile. ‘Finally, my lords, a curious rumour has reached us. Perhaps My Lord Emmereth could enlighten us further … It would appear someone or something has killed a dragon out in the desert to the east. A caravan driver lost the road, followed a flock of crows and claims to have found a very large corpse. He was irreparably insane with sun exposure by the time he was found, of course, but still …’ He gazed blandly in Orhan’s direction.
A dragon killer in the eastern desert? Orhan flushed. ‘I’ll … look into it,’ he said hurriedly. The particular absurdity of his title as Lord of the Rising Sun. He should have known about it. And it was not ideal having people talking about certain places right now. Someone or something with a sword …
‘Man’s been busy with his beloved wife,’ said Darath. Flashed a nasty grin at Orhan.
‘Thank you, My Lord,’ said the Secretary in a smooth voice. ‘Any other business, My Lords? Your Eminence?’ He bowed in the direction of the Emperor, who had sat silent throughout, dozing over the prattling of his lords. A show, this meeting of the Emperor and his Friends and Counsellors, a piece of fiction drawn out for weary centuries, since the days when the high families of Sorlost were as powerful as emperors and their Emperor more powerful than gods. All faded now, like the frescos on the wall. The high families ruled a city of crumbling plaster, the Emperor an empire of empty sand. What could they do now, these god men? Refuse to levy a tax to pay for repairs to a gate?
The Emperor rose and his counsellors rose with him and swept back onto their knees. The Emperor walked slowly out of the room, the Secretary following him. The guards pulled the doors closed behind him, the harsh voice called out distantly ‘The Emperor! All kneel for the Ever Living Emperor! Avert your eyes and kneel and be thankful! We live and we die! The Emperor comes! The Emperor comes!’ in case a stray servant should cross his path without grovelling in the dust.
The great lords of the Sekemleth Empire got up neatly and brushed down their silk-clad knees.
Orhan and Darath Vorley strolled down the Street of Closed Eyes together, heading in a general way towards the House of the East. Sterne and Amlis and Darath’s escort followed at a respectful distance, knives drawn.
‘I think it fair to say Holt won’t be receiving an invitation to His Eminence’s next private banquet,’ said Darath. ‘Most unfortunate. “Blood’s blood”! Did you see the Emperor twitch?’
‘Your brother was on rather dangerous ground, too, as far as I can see.’
‘My brother knows it and doesn’t care. Holt Amdelle doesn’t know it and does. Care. Vile upstart man.’ Darath laughed. ‘I’ve got Calboride blood myself, you know.’
‘Have you? I didn’t know. Your divinity shines through you but darkly, then,’ said Orhan.
‘You didn’t used to say that.’ Darath shot him a smile. Their eyes met and Orhan smiled back. ‘My great-great-great grandmother. But still. My honour demands I should feel offence. Unless you feel offence on your sister’s behalf that I am offended?’
Orhan sighed. ‘She knew what she was getting into. We Emmereths have pride enough we can happily sell ourselves and not care about it.’
‘That what you did, is it? And I always imagined you just lay back and thought of the state of your roof. Oh, don’t frown like that. I fully appreciate my own intense good fortune in having a younger brother to churn out little Vorleys for me when necessary.’
They turned into the Court of the Fountain. The crowds milled around them, bright and thick in the evening light. The air smelled heavily of grilled meat and perfumes and sweat. Slanting sunlight caught the water of the fountain, flashed on the beaded headdress of a woman dancing beside it, hands twisting and fluttering like butterflies. Her bare feet pounded out her rhythm, the sound of her bells and the sound of the water her only accompaniment. Across the square, a piper played a tune at a different pace to the dancing woman, mournful and slow.
Black skin and golden curls, arms raised in triumph …
‘Can we talk seriously now?’
‘I thought we were.’ Darath wandered over to a woman selling grilled meats, bought two skewers. He gave the woman a talent and smiled at her brilliantly. She stared back at him.
‘Here.’ He passed a skewer to Orhan. ‘Harder to lip-read if someone’s got a mouthful of rancid grease.’
Orhan bit down on the meat. Stringy and overcooked but well-seasoned, with the pleasant sweetness of honey and cinnamon and a bitter tang of vervain that clung in the mouth. They continued walking, slowly but purposefully, gazing around them at the sights and spectacles of the square. No one seemed to be following them directly, although there were always watchers of one kind or another. It had been absurdly, typically reckless of Darath to even mention it at Eloise’s party.
‘So …’ Darath said through a mouthful of meat, ‘you owe me three thalers, Lord Emmereth.’
‘Oh, come on. You can’t possibly have found out.’ Not even managed to tell the people actually doing it the new date yet, following all Tam’s messing around.
‘What do you want me to do, shout it out loudly in front of all these people? If you really want me to prove it …’ Darath’s voice rose: ‘Ladies and gentlemen of Sorlost, the Lord of the Rising Sun has some burning news he would like to impart to you …’
‘Lord of Living and Dying, Darath, you are the most insufferable man alive.’ Orhan dug his hands into his purse. ‘Here, you can have a talent and three … four dhol.’
Darath took the coins, grinned triumphantly at Orhan then tossed them to the nearest beggar. They missed and skipped across the paving stones. Two hollow-eyed children dived for them, shrieking. The beggar, crippled in both legs, half blind, blinked dazedly after them.