Mistress of the Empire (68 page)

The ascetic mage’s eyes snapped open to show a spark of affront. ‘Talk is quite different an expenditure of energy from empty chatter!’

As the thin magician’s glare swiveled toward the portly
leader of the party, it was Hochopepa’s turn to look offended. Yet before he could find something heated to say in his own defense, Fumita hustled him ahead. ‘Save your energy,’ he said, hiding a grin behind solemnity. ‘What inspiration we have we’d better muster for the council chamber. They are probably quarreling like Midkemian monkeys down there, and here we go rushing in to make it worse.’

Without further discussion, the three hurried down the corridor to the entrance to the Great Hall.

The debate Mara’s supporters hastened to join continued for days. Many times in the course of the Empire’s history arguments had divided the Assembly, but none before had raged so long and so hotly. Stray winds ripped through the great chamber that served as meeting hall in the City of the Magicians, as more and more members gathered. The high, tiered galleries were nearly filled to capacity, an event only equaled in recent times by the occasion of the debate of Milamber’s exile and the abolition of the office of Warlord. The only absentees were Great Ones in their dotage. The air grew stuffy with the crowding, and since no meeting of the Assembly ever adjourned without a final decision, the proceedings dragged on day and night.

Yet another dawn seeped grey through the high windows of the dome, silvering the lacquer floor tiles and revealing weariness in every face present. It lit in drab colors the only activity: in the middle of the vast chamber, a stout magician paced back and forth, declaiming.

Fatigue etched Hochopepa’s face. He waved one stout arm, and grated on in a voice made hoarse by hours of nonstop oratory, ‘And I urge every one of you to consider: great changes have begun that will not be undone!’ He raised his other arm, and clapped his palms together to emphasise his point, and several of the elderly Black Robes
started in their seats, roused from dozing. ‘We cannot simply wave our hand and have the Empire return to the old ways! The days of the Warlordship are finished!’

Shouts of disagreement sought to interrupt his argument. ‘Armies are marching while we deliberate,’ cried Motecha, among the more outspoken of the Great Ones who disapproved of the late Ichindar’s policies.

On the floor, the stout magician held up his hand for silence, actually grateful for the momentary respite. His throat was scratched raw from speaking. ‘I know!’ He waited for stillness to settle and went on. ‘We have been defied. So I have heard many of you repeat over and over’ – he glanced around the room, aware of a change that rippled like the movement of the tide through his audience – ‘and over and over.’ Even the more staid members of the council were now shifting in their seats. Their backsides were numb from sitting, and no longer were they content to settle back and politely listen. More than just the impatient had started to cry out interruptions, and not a few were standing belligerently on their feet. Hochopepa admitted to himself that he would have to yield the floor at last, and hope Fumita or the wily Teloro could find a strategy to draw the discussion out further.

‘We are not gods, my brothers,’ Hochopepa summed up. ‘We are powerful, yes, but still merely men. For us to intervene rashly with force, from pique or fear of the unknown, would but increase the chance of lasting damage being visited upon the Nations. I caution all that no matter how inflamed passions may be, the effect of our act will be lingering. When emotions at last cool, shall we regret having done that which even we cannot undo?’ He ended his speech with a slow lowering of his arms, and an even slower shuffle across the floor. The heaviness in him as he sank into his seat was not feigned; he had successfully tied up the floor for two and a half days.

The current spokesman for the Assembly returned onto the floor blinking as if a bit bemused. ‘We thank Hochopepa for his wisdom.’

While the huge chamber echoed with the rising buzz of conversation and dozens of Black Robes vied to speak next, Fumita leaned across Shimone and whispered to his wilted companion, ‘Well done, Hocho!’

Drily Shimone interjected, ‘Perhaps for the next few days we will be blessed with a less loquacious companion when we gather over our wine.’

Spokesman Hodiku said, ‘We shall hear Motecha!’

The short, hook-nosed elder, whose two cousins had once been known as the Warlord’s Pets, arose from his seat. Motecha moved with spry steps across the floor, and spun with a flutter of robes. His sharp, narrow-set eyes passed over the assembly briefly, and he said, ‘While it has been interesting in no sparse measure to hear our brother Hochopepa recount the history of events, in great detail, this does nothing to change fact. Two armies are even now jockeying to engage in combat. Skirmishes have already occurred between them and only those of us who are fools do not see through the sham of masking their house colors behind the banners of clan cousins or allies! Mara of the Acoma has defied our edict. Even as we speak, her warriors march and engage in illicit warfare!’

‘Why name her ahead of Jiro of the Anasati?’ the impulsive Sevean called back.

Teloro seized the opportunity of the interruption to add fuel to the argument. ‘You call the actions of these armies defiance. I urge remembrance upon us all: the Light of Heaven has been murdered! It must be contested, Motecha, that circumstances have forced a call to arms. Lord Hokanu of the Shinzawai would naturally defend the royal family. Mara was Ichindar’s staunchest supporter. Jiro, I submit, builds siege engines and hires
engineers to plot for his own ambition, not to stabilise the Empire.’

Motecha folded his arms, emphasising his round-shouldered posture. ‘Was it circumstance that led both Jiro of the Anasati and Mara of the Acoma and her consort to order their armies into the field? Neither of their home estates was threatened! Is this conflict in truth inevitable? Did the supposed “Good of the Empire” “force” Mara to order the secondary garrison from her natal estate to prevent Anasati forces and allies from their use of the public roads to Sulan-Qu?’

‘Come now!’ cracked Shimone. He had an authoritative voice, when he chose to raise it, and now his stillness held pent-up ire. ‘How do you know it was Mara who instigated the attack, Motecha? I heard of no battle, but only a skirmish that ended with a drawing of lines. Do we whimper civil war when there has been little but a calling of names and an exchange of insults and some sporadic bowfire?’

Teloro expounded a second point. ‘I would have you note: the banner at the fore of the lines near Sulan-Qu was not Acoma, but that of Lord Jidu of the Tuscalora. He may be Mara’s vassal, but his estate lies directly in the path of Jiro’s march. The Lord of the Tuscalora could legitimately be defending his lands from invasion.’

Motecha narrowed his gaze. ‘Our colleague Tapek went to the field and observed, Teloro. I may not be the student of history that your friend Hochopepa is, but I can certainly hear the difference between a defensive position and an army launching an assault!’

‘And Jiro’s collection of siege engines in the forests outside
Kentosani
are for defense?’ Shimone cried back, but his point was drowned by the hubbub of other voices.

The Spokesman shouted for order. ‘Colleagues! The business at hand requires order.’

Motecha shrugged his robe straight like a jigacock puffing its feathers. He stabbed a finger at the galleries. ‘Arrows have been fired between a vassal of Mara’s and Anasati warriors masquerading under the banner of Clan Ionani. Are we going to sit about arguing until our edict is defied a second time? Tapek reports that troops have felled trees for buttresses to give their archers better cover.’

Clearing his throat, Hochopepa croaked hoarsely, ‘Well then, Tapek could have ordered a stop to the shooting.’ This brought laughter and an upwelling of derogatory comments. ‘Or was it the fact that stray arrows show little regard for the majesty of a Black Robe that gave our friend Tapek pause?’

At this, Tapek sprang to his feet, his red hair brilliant against the black robes behind. He shouted, ‘We already told Mara to stop once! Has she so swiftly forgotten the troop of warriors we destroyed as an example upon the field?’

‘Motecha has the floor,’ objected the Spokesman. ‘You will stay seated unless you are formally given leave to lead the discussion, friend Tapek.’

The red-haired magician subsided to his seat, muttering to the contingent of young friends who sat with him.

Motecha resumed his point. ‘I submit that Jiro of the Anasati has made no move in aggression. His siege engines may surround the walls of Kentosani, but they do not fire! And they may never do so, if Mara is prevented from linking up with her support inside the Imperial Precinct.’

‘What support? Do you imply that Mara has been party to treachery?’ called Shimone. ‘That she had no hand in the Omechan plot to kill Ichindar has been documented!’

Again the Assembly erupted into disorder. For several minutes Spokesman Hodiku had to hold up his hands to restore quiet. The muttering subsided reluctantly, with Sevean caught still gesticulating as he expounded
some point to a colleague. He lowered his voice, looking sheepish.

Hochopepa mopped sweat from his brow. ‘It begins to look as if I did not need to spend my voice in speech making.’ He chuckled under his breath. ‘Our opponents are doing a fair job of tangling the issue by themselves.’

‘Not for much longer, I fear,’ Shimone said ominously.

Motecha added further accusations, more outspoken than any of his predecessors’. ‘I say Mara of the Acoma is the culprit! Her disregard, no, her contempt of tradition is well documented. How she came to wear the honored title of Servant of the Empire is for others to conjecture. But I suggest that she and the late Emperor had an … understanding. It is Mara’s son, Justin, she would raise as pretender to the golden throne, and I endorse Jiro’s right to defend against this unconscionable show of Acoma ambition!’

‘That ends it,’ Fumita said gloomily. ‘Sooner or later, the adoptive privilege of Mara’s children had to be raised. Someone had to drag the boy into the quarrel.’

There was true sadness in his tone, perhaps in his personal remembrance of the son he had renounced upon his call to join the Assembly. Yet whatever else he might have added became drowned in a wave of shouting. Magicians sprang to their feet, and several seemed to glow with the light of inner anger. Through the tumult, Spokesman Hodiku waved his staff, and when he was ignored, gave over the floor to a young mage named Akani.

That many a seasoned elder had been passed over in favor of a Black Robe barely out of his apprenticeship effected an immediate and resounding silence.

Akani kept command of it with the voice of a powerful orator. ‘Assumption of facts not in evidence,’ he summed up crisply. ‘We know nothing of any plotting by Mara of the Acoma. We cannot deny she has lost her firstborn
son. Justin is her sole heir. If she were party to a plot to raise him to the Emperor’s station, she would hardly have set such intrigue in motion while she was absent from the court. Only a fool would leave the boy to fend for himself through a change in succession without Acoma or Shinzawai defenders. Justin is housed with Ichindar’s children, in the imperial nursery, which I remind you was quarantined upon his death for twenty days of mourning! A child’s life could be lost to a thousand mishaps in such a span of time. If Acoma troops march, they do so to spare their future Lord. Companions, I suggest,’ Akani finished tartly, ‘that we not be swayed by
speculation
and
street gossip
in the making of our decisions.’

Shimone raised his grey furred eyebrows as the young magician continued a reasoned, dispassionate argument. ‘Good choice of argument. The boy thinks like an imperial court litigator.’

Hochopepa chuckled. ‘Akani studied for that post before his magical powers forced him to be recognised as a Black Robe. Why do you think I called in a favor to ask Hodiku to choose him when the discussion swung toward violence? Jiro’s supporters, like our outspoken Tapek, must not be permitted to stampede us into acting rashly.’

And yet even Akani’s skills as litigator could not keep the floor tied up for long. Feelings ran hot, and by now even those Black Robes who had been neutral to the contention were clamoring for decision, if only to bring the long, tiresome session to an end.

Pressure from all sides erupted to draw the proceedings to a close. Akani had exhausted his eloquence, and in fairness to his earlier ruling, the Spokesman Hodiku had to yield the floor to allow Tapek his say.

‘Trouble now,’ Shimone said flatly.

Hochopepa’s brow wrinkled, and Fumita became statue-still.

Tapek wasted no time in convincing oratory. ‘It is fact, companions, that the Assembly acted as a body once before and ordered Mara not to attack Jiro. For the Good of the Empire, I demand her life be forfeit!’

Hochopepa shot to his feet, astonishingly fast for one of his girth. ‘I dissent.’

Tapek spun on his heel to face the stout magician. ‘What mortal in all our long history has ever been allowed to live after defying our edict?’

‘I can count several,’ Hochopepa shot back, ‘but I doubt that would settle the issue.’ The stout magician’s voice was stripped down to gravel. Now he abandoned flowery, long-winded phrases. ‘Let us not act impulsively. We can kill Mara at our leisure, should we so decide. But this moment we have more pressing problems to consider.’

‘He’s going to force a vote,’ Fumita murmured worriedly to Shimone. ‘That could precipitate disaster.’