Mage's Blood (60 page)

She sucked in her breath. In one sentence he had cut to the bones of her greatest fear. ‘Ella?’ she called, her voice quavering.

‘Elena is in the Jade Tower exercising – unless she’s
busy
somewhere with Lorenzo di Kestria,’ he added archly.

He’s testing me and I will not respond
. But the queasy sense of fear his words aroused became a flash of temper. ‘Ella slew your Sydian whore!’ she fired back.

Gyle smiled blandly. ‘Elena Anborn leaves a trail of destruction wherever she goes, girl. She has neither pity nor remorse. Do you think she’s on your side? She’s on her own side and none other.’ His voice sounded pained, even regretful. ‘I could tell you all about her, girl.’

His words awakened all her fears and she batted them away. ‘Liar!’

‘Calm yourself, girl.’

‘Rukka-tu, Neferi!’

‘Such language, Princessa!’ His voice was condescending. He stood, effortlessly floating on the air. ‘Cera, you have a choice: align Javon with the Crusade and you and your family will live and prosper. Choose the shihad and you will lose everything.’

She opened her mouth, but he was already gone.

She stumbled backwards to her chair and huddled in it like a child.

When Elena came soon after, freshly washed and glowing, she just
knew
that Gyle had spoken truly about her and Lorenzo. She couldn’t articulate why the thought of her protector and her first knight together made her ill, but it did. So she didn’t mention Gyle’s visitation at all.

Hebusalim, Dhassa, Antiopia
Thani (Aprafor) 928
3 months until the Moontide

Casa Meiros was in a state of semi-celebration since a healer-mage had confirmed Ramita’s pregnancy. Antonin Meiros openly wept for joy, and treated her like an apsara sent from on high. He had told her a dozen times a day that she was the bravest and most wonderful bride in all of history, and his kindness had further softened her heart towards him.

It also doubled her guilt and shame, and she felt like the worry was driving her insane. The city was suddenly fearful as rumours of Keshi armies on the move intensified, and increased security meant no visitors. But Huriya was endlessly inventive, and persuaded Ramita to ask Meiros for the chela from Omprasad’s temple to come and light candles for their peace and safety. So Jai and Kazim duly visited Casa Meiros, improvised some prayers to the Omali gods and then
took tea in the outer quarters. Ramita was so desperate to talk to Kazim she could barely contain herself, but Kazim was clearly full of a different need. He kept glancing over her shoulder at the doorway, but the servants were hovering.

‘Settle down, Kazim,’ Huriya hissed in Lakh. ‘You’re like a bull in the mating season.’

‘I
am
a bull!’ he retorted. He looked at Ramita and groaned. ‘How are you, my love?’

‘How do you think I am? Pregnant to the wrong man, in daily danger of discovery and stoning, in a city where war could break out any moment!’ Hysteria was threatening to break through any moment. ‘We need to talk, Kaz, not go to bed.’

‘But Mita—’

Ramita felt a sudden and alarming urge to slap him. ‘Listen to me: I’m going to have a child, probably more than one, if my mother’s line holds true, and when he realises they aren’t his, my husband will have no choice but to hand me over for stoning. And don’t think he won’t come after you too. He may be old but he is Antonin Meiros, and he will pull you apart.’ She dropped her voice to a hiss. ‘You have to run, Kaz: go home, go anywhere, but go.’

‘I’m not going anywhere without you, Mita. I love you—’ His voice was almost loud enough to reach the ears of the housemaids. Huriya shushed him.

Ramita found herself wishing he had never come. ‘Kaz, please listen to me: your only chance is to be so far away that he can’t find you. Please go – you don’t know what it’s like here now. He’s so happy, and I feel sick, having to lie and pretend. I could betray us with a stray thought at any second. I can hardly bear it. The only way I can endure this is if I know that you’re safe. When Huriya next visits you at the temple, all three of you run.
Please
, if you truly love me.’ She felt close to tears.

Kazim was unmoved. ‘No, Mita, there is another way. I have friends who can help us. We don’t have to leave you behind.’

‘I can’t come with you, Kaz. They might not pursue you, but they will come after me, whether they believe the children are
his or not. No man can tolerate an adulterous wife and maintain face.’

‘You’re not thinking clearly, any of you,’ Jai put in quietly. ‘I have found a woman who can remove unwanted children from a woman’s womb. If we can bring her here, pretending she’s a midwife—’

Huriya looked at him scornfully. ‘Antonin Meiros is never going to let some backstreet hag from the eastside near Ramita and his precious babies, you idiot. He’s got magi-healers watching over her.’

‘What if we bring the woman to the Sivraman temple and then have Ramita visit?’

‘Oh and the soldiers are just going to stand by as this woman sticks a poker up Ramita’s passage, are they? That’s even assuming Meiros lets her leave the palace grounds now she’s pregnant.’ Huriya glared at Jai. ‘What did you need to find such a woman for, anyway? Is your Keita knocked up too?’

Jai nodded miserably, and Ramita felt like someone had punched her in the throat. ‘Jai? You’ve got Keita pregnant? Oh, sweet Parvasi, what are you boys thinking with?’ She stood. ‘Just get out! You’re children, not men.’

Kazim grabbed her arm, then looked round. The servants were fortunately chatting amongst themselves, not paying them any attention. ‘No, Mita, please: hear this. I have a plan.’

‘You have a plan? Two thoughts that follow one another in logical sequence? I wouldn’t have thought it possible – what on Urte did I ever see in you, you fool?’ she hissed harshly.

Kazim flushed. ‘Mita, we’re doing this for you – I love you, you know that. I have a plan, and good people who will help.’ He leaned forward. ‘Don’t give up hope. Just hold on a few more weeks, then everything will be resolved.’

‘In what way? What is your plan?’

Kazim leaned forward, his face intent. ‘We’re going to kill him.’

She felt the colour drain from her face and her bones weakened.
No – that is wrong. It is
impossible.
It would be evil
. No— ‘You can’t,’ she whispered. ‘You cannot.’

Kazim shook his head, misunderstanding her. ‘Don’t worry, it will
be well planned. We can do it.’ His voice brimmed with suppressed excitement. ‘We will kill him and become heroes of the shihad.’

Her husband lay behind her in the gathering dusk, his body pressed against her back, his arm around her. The air was warm, even though the sun had gone and the silver of the waning Mater-Luna lit the room. Three weeks had passed since she’d last seen Kazim and Jai. She would have bled this week, had she not been truly pregnant, but she hadn’t, of course. Her belly was swelling, even this early. Her breasts were tender and she woke queasy most mornings.
I will have twins, even triplets, like Mother
.

That night, to celebrate, Meiros had produced a dusty bottle of wine and prevailed upon her to enjoy a glass of heady pale amber fluid that had tasted divine: a chard from Bres, he’d told her. ‘This is to celebrate the conception of our children, Wife.’ He was so clearly relieved and happy that she found herself feeling genuine affection for him. And then he had done patient things with his fingers that had brought her as much pleasure as she had ever derived from her body before entering her gently. Despite the guilt and the fear, there had been long moments of bliss in their coupling.

‘It will not harm the babies?’ she had asked anxiously, but he had just laughed and reassured her.

Now he sat up abruptly, a decisive look on his face. ‘Wife, there is something I need to tell you.’

She sat up also. ‘What is it?’ she asked anxiously.

He stroked her arm. ‘Do not fret; this is good news, not bad. I had hesitated until your condition was better-established, but it can be delayed no longer. I apologise that I have not spoken sooner, but this is something you must know, about when a male mage mates with a female non-mage. The act of carrying the child to term necessitates a sharing of body tissue between mother and child, and this results in a manifestation of the gnosis in the mother. Normally it is temporary, and minor – too minor to have any real effect. But I am Ascendant, and you are carrying twins, and I believe the manifestation will be potent and permanent.’

Ramita sat up and hugged her knees. ‘What do you mean, lord?’ she whispered. It sounded like nonsense, but it was clearly important to him.

Meiros put a hand on hers as if to comfort her. ‘What it means, my good and brave wife, is that in a few weeks those first manifestations will become apparent.’

‘“Manifestations”? What does that mean?’

‘Manifestation of the gnosis, my dearest wife. You will gain the gnosis and become a mage.’

Was once not enough? No, for the hunger of Shaitan is insatiable
.

G
ODSPEAKER
G
HIZEK OF
B
ASSAZ
, 916

Hebusalim, on the continent of Antiopia
Thani (Aprafor) 928
3 months until the Moontide

The Hadishah had many safe houses and hideaways dotted about the city, and it was to one such house Jamil brought Kazim and Jai on a market day in the third week of Thani. The streets were growing tense and the legionaries were patrolling in larger numbers. The mighty Rondians were nervous, and the whole city sensed it.

They were afraid of the Hadishah more than anyone else, Jamil told them. The cruelty of the Jackals of Ahm was legendary: they stole Rondian children, then sent back the mutilated corpse once
they’d secured the ransom money. They torched captured legionaries alive. Many Hebb thought them too extreme, un-Amteh – but the Hadishah were fighting when so many weren’t, and though people deplored their methods, all of northern Antiopia cheered their successes. While the sultans prevaricated, the Hadishah were making war.

Jamil and Kazim were sparring when Huriya, clad in a bekirashroud, burst in. She was shadowed by the doorman of the safe house. She was bursting with news she insisted Kazim’s superiors needed to know, and ten minutes later Jamil was leading them along an alleyway and beneath the street into a long cold room lit only by guttering torches. Rashid sat cross-legged at the head of a low trestle table set about with squat cushions. He looked tense. Jamil bowed low to Rashid. ‘Master, this is Huriya Makani, the maid of Ramita Meiros.’

She prostrated herself, but Kazim could see his sister’s eyes calculating.

Rashid eyed her with interest. ‘Jamil tells me you have news of some development, girl?’

Huriya spoke quickly, her voice frightened. ‘Lord, the Magister told my mistress that in bearing his child, she will become a mage herself. She told me that it is like an infection. Is this possible?’

Kazim heard himself gasp, ‘No!’

Rashid stroked his chin. ‘I know women bearing mage-children gain a weak and temporary form of the gnosis. This is known.’

‘But Meiros has told Ramita it will be strong and permanent,’ Huriya insisted.

Rashid and Jamil exchanged dubious looks ‘I’ve never heard … I will need to make enquiries.’ He looked at Huriya with more interest. ‘You have shown a quick wit in coming straight to us, girl. What is your mistress’ state of mind?’

‘She is distraught, lord. She does not know who the father of her children is. If it is the Master, signs will soon appear of this “gnosis”.’ She looked imploringly at Jamil. ‘All our lives we have been told that the devilry of the magi is derived by communing with demons, but
Ramita is a good person, lord! It is not her fault that she was picked out by the Master!’ Huriya’s eyes looked moist with tears, but Kazim knew his sister; she seldom cried needlessly.

Kazim’s own mind was reeling. How could his sweet Ramita be
poisoned
in this way? But … ‘Surely this is irrelevant, sister – I am the father of the child, not Meiros.’

Huriya flashed him a pitying look. ‘And what if you are, brother? Lord Meiros says she will begin to display signs within the next month.
What will happen if she does not?
’

Kazim finally understood and he felt his stomach lurch. ‘We must strike—’

Rashid chopped his hand down and said impatiently, ‘Be silent, Kazim Makani. Let me think!’ He stood and began to pace. ‘Antonin Meiros will be at Domus Costruo all next week, then he will be with his inner circle at Southpoint the following week. To strike at the old man openly would be suicidal; the only chance is when he is in repose, and the only person who can do that is his wife.’ He looked at Huriya. ‘You are closest to Ramita Ankesharan. You have reported that she has been severely abused. She is sympathetic to our cause?’