Burning Tower (44 page)

Squirrel felt lonely. Then she felt a presence behind her.

“He is awesome,” Coyote's priest said. “Even to you and me. Think of how he appears to those not blessed with Coyote's vision.”

 

Night came. The walls glowed with soft light, and the banquet tables were filled again with food. Regapisk sat at one place from the center of the high table, to the right of where Arshur would be, only Arshur wasn't there.

“Lord Regapisk, may I join you?”

Regapisk grinned. “Certainly, Cousin. And welcome. Has Bison Woman done with you?”

Sandry poured a cup of wine and sipped. “Yes. Her scribes wrote out the contracts, and they'll be witnessed and signed in multiple copies, so Quintana and Aunt Shanda will be satisfied. They'll have to be.”

“But not through with Tower,” Regapisk said. He pointed to the corner table where the scribes were writing furiously.

Sandry laughed. “And never will be, I think. She keeps coming up with other details, things she remembers from some other girl's wedding, or things her mother told her, and she wants it all.”

Regapisk grinned. “The Supreme One can afford it.”

“That he can,” Sandry said. “How's the king holding up?”

Regapisk laughed. “He's still Arshur. He likes everything about being king but the work itself.”

“What work is that?”

“The king is the only bearer of bad news,” Regapisk said. “No one else can tell the Emperor anything bad, because he might be blamed, or he might be sent to the gods as a messenger to tell them.”

“Sent to the gods. You mean his heart goes in the wall?”

Regapisk nodded. “So everyone tells things to the king and the king tells the Supreme One. Only there hasn't been a king for so long that a lot of bad news piled up.” Regapisk shrugged. “So far it's gone well, though. King Arshur has sent off half a dozen expeditions to deal with minor tax revolts. He said something about asking your advice, maybe asking you to take charge of something.”

Sandry grinned. “I'm getting married, Cousin, and I will have more pleasant things to think about than leading an army to beat up tax delinquents. And then I'm going home.”

Regapisk nodded.

“Sorry. I guess that's a delicate subject,” Sandry said.

“Yeah. Okay, I figured out why you didn't buy me loose from the ship. It was because I talked about going back, wasn't it?”

Sandry nodded.

“I know better now.” Regapisk grinned. “But I'm still a Lord, and I'm rich, I can make my home anywhere I want except Lordshills, and who needs that place anyway?”

“That's the spirit.”

Regapisk watched Coyote's priest and Coyote's daughter. He said, “It looks something like a seduction and something like a duel. Sandry, what do you think?”

“Something like a game of solitaire too,” Sandry said. “They serve the same god, but one serves the Emperor. They may not know themselves what they're looking for. Ah. They are finished with Tower.” He stood.

Burning Tower came over, her eyes blazing with excitement. “It's going to be wonderful,” she said. “They are making a wedding robe. I think I'll look beautiful!”

Sandry smiled. “You will always be beautiful.”

“I hope so.”

“Doubts? Misgivings?”

“No, not really.” She looked around the banquet hall. “Who are the girls?” she asked.

“They serve the king for the evening,” Sandry said.

“You sound wistful.”

“No, my love. Impatient, but not wistful.”

Tower looked again. “Pretty. But
eight
? Arshur is magnificent, but he's a bit old.”

Regapisk blushed.

“Oh. They reward both the king and his companion, then.” Tower picked at her dinner. There were a dozen dishes, enough food for a hundred, delicacies that few Lords and no Lordkin or kinless could ever afford to taste, all set out for the visitors and the priests. “All this,” Tower said. “What will happen to it all?”

Regapisk and Sandry looked at each other and smiled. “Servants always dine well,” Regapisk said.

“Oh. Yes, I suppose they do,” Burning Tower said. “We have servants at home at New Castle, of course I knew that. I guess I got used to being on the roads with the wagon trains.”

“It has been pleasant, but I will be glad to go home again,” Sandry said.

“Will we be welcome?”

Sandry smiled thinly. “Lord Quintana was ready to welcome us both if we returned alive from Condigeo. Now—”

“Now,” Regapisk said, “you will stand so high that you can ask any favor you like of the Congregation of Lords Witness.”

“Not
any
favor,” Sandry said.

Regapisk tried to smile. “No? I bet you could. We can talk another time.”

The chief servant of the king's palace came to their table and bowed. “The king asks in what rooms you wish your beds.”

“I'll stay with Clever Squirrel. Put our beds in one room, and Sandry's in another. I think.” She looked down the table to where Clever Squirrel was still lost in conversation with Coyote's priest. “We won't disturb her. Yes, put her bed in a room with mine.”

The majordomo bowed. “When you are ready, I will send a maid with a light to guide you to your rooms. This palace can be confusing.”

“I'll go now,” Tower said. “It has been a very long day.”

“As you wish, mistress,” the majordomo said. “I will send the maid.”

The servant had one of the ever-burning torches that gave no smoke. Tower stood.

“Good night, love,” Sandry said.

She smiled dreamily. “Good night. Not long now!”

“No.”

She lifted her face to be kissed. Sandry made their good night a lot shorter than he wanted it to be and noted Regapisk's barely concealed amusement. He wasn't the only one. Why did people always think it was funny to watch two people before they were married? But they did.

“How's the arm?” Sandry asked.

Regapisk winced. “The feathers, you mean.”

“Well, yes.” Sandry grinned.

“They itch,” Regapisk said. “And so far, no one has been able to cure them. The Many Gods priest thinks he has cast a spell that will get rid of the damn things if I ever get to a place with no manna. It takes a lot of manna to make feathers grow on a man. Or so they say.”

“So you can take a chariot and go off into the desert for a while,” Sandry said.

“Maybe. King Arshur is talking about sending me off with an army.” Regapisk laughed. “Me. The only guy to flunk out of military class!”

“Well, not the only one,” Sandry said. “But you didn't last long.”

“And I still know more than anyone else here! They have so much manna that they never learned how to fight. That's what I think, anyway. They use magic because they can, and they don't need to know anything else.”

Sandry nodded agreement. “Sounds right to me. But it's not my problem.”

“No, you can go home again,” Regapisk said. “I can't, so maybe it is my problem.” He put his hand inside his robe. “Cursed thing wouldn't be so bad if it didn't itch. Women find feathers fascinating.”

There were giggles from the other end of the table—Clever Squirrel, amused by something Coyote's priest had said. She answered, and both of them laughed.

S
andry found Tower at breakfast in the banqueting room. Tower scowled and said, “Clever Squirrel was gone when I woke up around midnight. Any idea what happened to her?”

“I haven't—Tower? I slept alone.”

“Sorry. Just—pay no attention.”

Squirrel came in while they were piling shells with corn, potatoes, and bird meat. Sandry pointed with his nose. “Shall we ask?”

They didn't have to ask. Squirrel was bubbling. “There's a face behind the mask. Good-looking man, with some tattooing that makes him like a coyote—but no name. They all give up their names when they turn archpriest. The one with no mask, you don't name him at all. Coyote is Coyote, even in the blankets. A lot like my mother described the god.”

“How?”

“Well…vigorous, of course, but…vain. Playful. He's playing games, and he knows I know it, and that's part of the game. Hey, so am I. I learned a lot, Tower, and I think I didn't give up much, but—Sandry, I don't understand war, or the kind of bloody games you play, and that's a good thing. He asked about you a
lot
. I didn't have to hide anything…?”

“Right,” said Sandry. She seemed to need reassurance. “What I know can't be taught with just words anyway. It takes years of practice.”

“I don't know why he's so interested in you when he doesn't give a curse for the terror bird priests we've been at war with.”

“What else did you learn?”

“Middle of the night, we broke to take a sweatbath. It was wonderful. Just right. We've got to build some sweatbaths when we get home.”

Sandry and Tower exchanged edgy looks.

“He asked about you, Tower. I tried to explain why…approaching you would be a bad idea—”

“I'd kill him,” said Sandry.

“I explained that. Sandry won't accept excuses, I said. Being Coyote is no excuse; being drunk wouldn't be either. He might do it anyway. Coyote loves danger.”

Tower was staring.

“What, sister?”

“He was Coyote! And Coyote was your father!”

Squirrel looked serious. “Burning Tower, I have told you before, Coyote's ways are not meant to be followed by everyone!”

“Well—”

“Think on it,” Squirrel said urgently. “Your father was Lordkin, and as a Lordkin acted in ways that the Bison Tribe would never accept.”

“Bane,” Burning Tower remembered. “Firegift—”

“Bison Tribe, men and women, always acknowledge their children,” Squirrel continued. “Lordkin don't. They don't even believe in fatherhood. And the Lords! They are very concerned, but mostly because of inheritances. And in Bison Tribe, hasty marriages are hardly unusual.”

“My mother harnessed the one-horns on her wedding day!” Tower insisted.

“Your mother was kinless, and takes such things even more seriously than ever did the others of Bison Tribe,” Squirrel said. “My mother has children by four men she never married, and it was Whandall Feathersnake that Coyote rode when I was conceived.” Squirrel laughed. “I am Coyote's daughter and Coyote's bride, and our ways are not your ways, little sister.”

Sandry frowned. “Nor mine. Make certain Coyote knows that!”

Squirrel grinned. “He knows.”

Tower continued to brood.

Sandry frantically tried to change the subject. “All right,” he said. “What else did you learn?”

“The Emperor knows things have been going wrong. He doesn't do much about details. That's up to the bureaus. When everything comes apart, then a whole bureau can be executed in a public ceremony. The bodies are eaten and the hearts go in the wall.”

“It gives me the creeps, that wall. I think we should have looked at it closer. I'll ask Reggy to take me back,” Sandry said.

“Bad idea,” Squirrel said earnestly. “People who get curious about the wall—something bad can happen to them, particularly outsiders. The wall is one place where the Emperor does look at details. Taking care of the king is another. And when I wanted to know more, Coyote laughed. We're missing something obvious, something very funny.”

“Something Coyote's priest thinks is funny?”

“And Coyote too, and he won't let me know.”

Sandry said, “Ah.”

“What?”

“He doesn't even hide it!” Sandry gathered them in his arms, Tower's and Squirrel's heads against his, his mouth concealed in their hair. “This is not to be told to anyone else. We all saw the Emperor's belly—”

“It's awful. Scarred,” said Tower. “But he doesn't…hide it.”

“But
I've
seen corpses after a battle,” Sandry said. “After we killed the Toronexti, we walked the field, and some of the older soldiers…pointed out…But
my
point is, there are organs missing inside the Emperor's torso.”

He released the women. They drew back as if he'd turned into a snake. “I want to see the wall,” he said.

 

The king's hospitality included the stables, where a dozen of the big four-wheeled chariots were ready at all times. After breakfast that day, their second in Aztlan, they used the chariots to visit Flensevan's shop. It faced the River Road, away from the Little Rainbow River. Flensevan and his two sons showed them around. Sandry, Tower, and Squirrel all bought gifts, magical items that weren't for trade. Willow would have a talisman like Tower's, a tiny carved turquoise tree. Twisted Cloud would have a tiny tornado.

They still had time to visit the wall. Markings on the king's chariots got them past the guard, but before they could approach the wall, three more ornately dressed guards and an officer appeared. The soldiers did not speak, but they watched.

They walked its length, always aware of the following eyes. The wall was old and often repaired. The Emperor was supposed to be a thousand years old, wasn't he? And the wall assuredly was, and some of the niches. None of the niches were marked in any way, except that new bricks were obvious and randomly scattered. There were open niches, lots of them, each a little bigger than a man's two fists. They too were scattered in no apparent pattern.

“I'm no wizard,” Sandry said later, his voice lost in traffic noise, “so I'm asking. Squirrel, if you took out a man's heart, could you enchant it to make it beat forever? And he'd go on living too, wouldn't he? Unless someone found where he hid it.”

“I couldn't do it. No one I know could. But there are old stories like that,” Squirrel said. Old stories of magic were generally true, though many had become impossible in an age of fading manna. “Would we be looking for just a heart?”

“At least the heart. Maybe kidneys and a liver in separate niches. But would it be safe to look?”

“Not to look, not to ask, not even to be curious. Drop it, Lord Sandry.”

“Squirrel, is that you or Coyote speaking?”

“Both. Forget the wall. Never mention it again.”

“Done. I'm glad Reg isn't with us. He might get the wrong idea.”

 

Arshur went daily to meet the Emperor and came back to plan strategy with Regapisk and the masked priests. At breakfast on the third morning, he and Regapisk found time to ask Sandry's advice regarding military matters.

“I know too little,” Sandry protested.

“That is easily changed,” Arshur said. He clapped his hands.

Captain Sareg appeared. He bowed to Sandry.

“Your escort,” Arshur said. “High Captain, show Lord Sandry the King's Guard. Listen when he comments.”

“With pleasure. And with my personal thanks, Lord Sandry.”

“For what?”

“You brought King Arshur to the realm, and because of you, we survived the battle at Sunfall. And from that came my promotion to High Captain in the King's Guard.” Sareg smiled warmly. “You do not know it, but now my rank is sufficient that I may court a Great Mistress.”

“Aha!” Regapisk said. “Hazel Sky.”

“Of course, Lord Companion,” Sareg said. “I can say now, it was a great strain to be captain of her guard but unable to tell her of my feelings. Nor could she speak of the matter. Not then, and this went on for months! Now, we are together, in Aztlan.”

Arshur grinned. The grin faded when another official came forward with reports of tax delinquencies.

 

Sareg's chariot, like all the chariots of Aztlan, was too heavy. The increased weight made it more comfortable to ride in, but slow and less maneuverable. Sandry pointed this out on the way to the barracks.

“But how would you fight?” Sareg demanded. “They must be heavy to hold four.”

“I fight with two. Why do you need four?”

“A driver, a shieldsman, a wizard, and his apprentice. Do you not do things that way in…”—he fumbled for the words—“Lordshills?”

“Magic is costly,” Sandry said. “We find other means.”

 

He spent the day at the barracks. He worked with the Emperor's soldiers. He did passably well at mock fights, yucca sword, chariot duel, horseback, and barehanded. He never tried to compete at archery. The Aztlan bows were simple bows crudely made. They'd have little accuracy. Sandry thought of his own bow in its case on his chariot, even now coming to Aztlan with Spike and the other animals. The emperor expected presents, but perhaps he wouldn't be interested in a bow.

The Emperor's officers wanted to talk. Sandry tried to trade stories, but the Emperor's men had few. Their tales of combat were all older than they were, and there were no tales of defeat. For a thousand years, they had kept the Emperor's peace. The Battle at Sunfall was the greatest battle in their lifetimes, and they made Sandry and High Captain Sareg tell it over and over. Sandry noted that each time the story was told, Sareg made Sandry a greater hero. It was always Arshur and Sandry who had won the battle.

“High Captain Sareg is too modest,” Sandry said. “He stood with Arshur the king and faced the birds without magic. If the birds broke through there, it would have been all over.” Sandry paused. “And that's the lesson, you know. Battles are not won by a few heroes. When everyone stands together and does his part, then you get victory.”
And don't I sound like an old Lord!
He recalled a class. Everyone wanted to laugh at the elderly instructor, but they didn't dare, not under the watchful gaze of Master Peacevoice Waterman…

They asked other details of the battle. They were curious about the bow he'd used, and how it outranged the Thunder Bows of the Office of Rain, but they never asked how it was made. From what Sandry could see, the Empire didn't really care about military technology. They had magic.

And each time he told the story, no matter how he tried to minimize his part in it, the officers looked at each other excitedly; then, led by High Captain Sareg, they bowed to Sandry. That was what they did in the presence of Arshur, and the bowing made Sandry uneasy, but he couldn't have said why.

 

Tower had better luck.

A woman seen with a guard
must
have wealth. She could go anywhere, and there was more to shop for than gems. She tried on wondrous garments that shaped themselves to her, and had to reject them: she was sure they'd disintegrate where there was no manna. Half sure. Where was Squirrel now that Tower needed her advice?

 

On the fourth day, they walked about the city. Sandry and Tower attempted to dress like natives. Their clothing was too rich for that. They didn't stand right; they gawked at wonders that must seem commonplace to those around them. They still enjoyed themselves.

Squirrel was off somewhere with Coyote's priest.

Word reached them that the animals had arrived. Tower and Sandry arrived at a kraal below Mesa Fajada. Sandry's chariot stood in a thicket of apprentices and cadets. They were cleaning and shining every part. Sandry smiled to himself. Polish wasn't the secret.

Or was it? Gleaming armor impressed people, and sometimes that was enough, much better than fighting. How much of magic worked that way?

Two stallions, two bison, and Spike: all combed and groomed, all well fed and watered. The Emperor's minions had been told to treat the animals well, and they knew how. Four young girls attended to Spike, who seemed larger than ever in the manna-rich air of Aztlan. Burning Tower bade a long farewell to the one-horn. Tomorrow she would see him only to give him away.

 

Coyote's temple was a hole in the ground, a hidden place whose entrance was just inside the city gates. It looked like the entrance to a basement below an inn. Crowds passed it every minute of the day.

Inside…it wasn't big, but it was magnificent. Daylight came through from somewhere overhead, and a brushfire burned without smoke. On the stone altar stood offerings: two fat prairie dogs in a cage, and a closed urn. Not just a temple, but a lair. Clever Squirrel was in awe.