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Authors: R. Scott Bakker

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For the first time something like real anger surfaced in Eleäzaras’s eyes, like a glimpse of coals through a smoky fire. “We can make the world burn with our song, young Conphas. We need no one.”

Despite his uncle’s gaffes, Conphas left the negotiations confident that the House Ikurei had secured far more than it had surrendered. For one, he was almost certain he knew why the Scarlet Spires had accepted Maithanet’s offer to join the Holy War.

Few things reveal a competitor’s agenda more thoroughly than the process of negotiating a deal. Over the course of their haggling, it became obvious that the heart of Eleäzaras’s concern lay with the Cishaurim. In exchange for Chepheramunni’s signature on the Indenture, he demanded that Cememketri and the Imperial Saik surrender all the intelligence they’d amassed on the Fanim sorcerer-priests over centuries of warring against them. Of course, this was to be expected: the Scarlet Spires had gambled its very existence on its ability to overcome the Cishaurim. But there was an undeniable intensity in the way the Grandmaster uttered their name. Eleäzaras said “Cishaurim” in the same manner a Nansur would say “Scylvendi”—the way one names an old and hated foe.

For Conphas, this could mean only one thing: the Scarlet Spires had been at war with the Cishaurim long before Maithanet had declared the Holy War. Like House Ikurei, the Scarlet Spires had embroiled itself in the Holy War in order to
use
it. For the Scarlet Spires the Holy War was an instrument of revenge.

When Conphas mentioned his suspicions, his uncle sneered—initially at least. Eleäzaras, he insisted, was too mercantile to risk so much for a trifle like vengeance. When Cememketri and Skeaös also endorsed the theory, however, the Emperor realized he’d harboured the same suspicions all along. It was official: the Scarlet Spires had joined the Holy War to bring some pre-existing war with the Cishaurim to conclusion.

In itself, the conjecture was comforting. It meant the Scarlet Spires’ agenda would not cross their own until the end—when it no longer mattered. It would be difficult for Eleäzaras to make good on his threat once he and his School were dead. But what bothered Conphas was the question of what had motivated Maithanet to call on the Scarlet Spires at all. Certainly, of all the Schools, it was the most apt to destroy the Cishaurim in an open confrontation. But on the face of it, Conphas could think of no School more unlikely to join a Holy War. And as far as Conphas knew, the Shriah had approached no other School—not even the Imperial Saik, which had been the traditional bulwark against the Cishaurim through the Jihads. Only the Scarlet Spires.

Why?

Unless Maithanet had somehow learned of their war. But this answer was even more troubling than the question. With nearly every imperial spy in Sumna now dead, they had plenty of reasons to be wary of Maithanet’s cunning as it was. But this! A Shriah who had penetrated the Schools? And the
Scarlet Spires,
no less.

For not the first time, Conphas suspected that Maithanet, and not House Ikurei, occupied the centre of the Holy War’s web. But he dared not share his misgivings with his uncle, who tended to be even more stupid when afraid. Instead, he explored this fear on his own. No longer did he gloat over future glories in the dark hours before sleep. Rather, he fretted over implications that he could neither stomach nor verify.

Maithanet. What game did he play? For that matter, who was he?

The news arrived days afterward. The Vulgar Holy War had been annihilated.

The reports were sketchy at first. Urgent messages from Asgilioch related the terrifying accounts of some dozen or so Galeoth who had managed to escape across the Unaras Spur. The Vulgar Holy War had been utterly overcome on the Plains of Mengedda. Shortly afterward, two couriers arrived from Kian, the one bearing the severed heads of Calmemunis, Tharschilka, and a man who may or may not have been Kumrezzer, the other bearing a secret message from Skauras himself, and delivered, as per the Sapatishah’s instructions, to his former hostage and ward, Ikurei Conphas. It simply read:

We cannot count the carcasses of your idolatrous kin, so many have been felled by the fury of our righteous hand. Praise be the Solitary God. Know that House Ikurei has been heard.

After dismissing the courier, Conphas spent several hours brooding over the message in his quarters. Again and again, the words rose of their own volition.

. . . so many have been felled . . .

We cannot count . . .

Even though he was only twenty-seven years of age, Ikurei Conphas had seen the carnage of many fields of war—enough that he could almost see the masses of Inrithi sprawled and tangled across the Plains of Mengedda, their dead-fish eyes staring into earth or across endless sky. But it wasn’t guilt that moved his soul to ponder—and perhaps in a strange way even to grieve—it was the sheer scale of this first accomplished act. It was as though until now, the dimensions of his uncle’s plan had been too abstract for him to truly comprehend. Ikurei Conphas was in awe of what he and his uncle had done.

. . . House Ikurei has been heard.

The sacrifice of an entire army of men. Only the Gods dared such acts.

We have been heard.

Many, Conphas realized, would suspect it had been House Ikurei that had spoken, but no one would know. A strange pride settled through him then, a secret pride disconnected from the estimations of other men. In the annals of great events, there would be many accounts of this first tragic event of the Holy War. Responsibility for this catastrophe would be heaped upon Calmemunis and the other Great Names. In the ancestor lists of their descendants, they would be names of shame and scorn.

There would be no mention of Ikurei Conphas.

For an instant, Conphas felt like a thief, the hidden author of a great loss. And the exhilaration he felt almost possessed a sexual intensity. He saw clearly now why he so loved this species of war. On the field of battle, his every act was open to the scrutiny of others. Here, however, he stood outside scrutiny, enacted destiny from a place that transcended judgement or recrimination. He lay hidden in the womb of events.

Like a God.

PART III:

The Harlot

CHAPTER
NINE

SUMNA

And the Nonman King cried words that sting:
“Now to me you must confess,
For death above you hovers!”
And the Emissary answered ever wary:
“We are the race of flesh,
We are the race of lovers.”

—“BALLAD OF THE INCHOROI,” ANCIENT KÛNIÜRI FOLK SONG

Early Winter, 4110 Year-of-the-Tusk, Sumna

“Will you come next week?” Esmenet asked Psammatus, watching him pull his white silk tunic over his head then down across his stomach and his still-shining phallus. She sat naked in her bed, sheets bundled about her knees.

Psammatus paused, absently smoothing away wrinkles. He looked at her with pity. “I fear this is my last visit, Esmi.”

Esmenet nodded. “You’ve found someone else. Someone younger.”

“I’m sorry, Esmi.”

“No. Don’t be sorry. Whores know better than to pout like wives.”

Psammatus smiled but did not reply. Esmenet watched him retrieve his gown and his lavish gold-and-white vestments. There was something touching and reverent in the way he dressed. He even paused to kiss the golden tusks embroidered across each of his flowing sleeves. She would miss Psammatus, miss his willowy silver hair and his fatherly face. She would even miss the gentle way he coupled.
I’m becoming an old whore,
she thought.
One more reason for Akka to abandon me.

Inrau was dead, and Achamian had left Sumna a broken man. After all these days, she still caught her breath at the memory of his departure. She’d begged him to take her with him. In the end she’d even wept and fallen to her knees: “Please, Akka! I
need
you!” But this was a lie, she knew, and the bewildered resentment in his eyes meant he knew as well. She was a prostitute, and prostitutes hardened themselves to men, all men, out of necessity. No. As much as she feared losing Achamian, what she feared more was the prospect of returning to her old life, to the endless succession of hunger, anguished glares, and spilt seed. She wanted the Schools! The Great Factions! She wanted Achamian, yes, but she wanted his
life
more.

And this was the irony that held her breathless. For even in the midst of enjoying that new life through Achamian, she’d been unable to relinquish the old. “You say you love me,” Achamian had cried, “and yet you still take custom. Tell me why, Esmi! Why?”

Because I knew you would leave me. All of you leave me . . . all the ones I love.

“Esmi,” Psammatus was saying. “Esmi. Please don’t cry, my sweet. I’ll return next week. I promise.”

She shook her head and wiped the tears from her eyes. Said nothing.

Weeping for a man! I’m stronger than this!

Psammatus sat beside her to bind his sandals. He looked pensive, even scared. Men such as Psammatus, she knew, came to whores to escape uncomfortable passions as much as to glut them.

“Have you heard of a young priest named Inrau?” she asked, hoping to at once set him at ease and carry on a pathetic remnant of her life with Achamian.

“Yes, I have, in fact,” Psammatus replied, his profile both puzzled and relieved. “He’s the one they say committed suicide.”

The same thing the others said. News of Inrau’s death had caused a great scandal in the Hagerna. “Suicide. You’re certain of this?”
What if it’s true? What will you do then, Akka?

“I’m certain that’s what they
say
.” He turned and looked at her sombrely, running a finger down her cheek. Then he stood and hooked his blue cloak—the one he used to conceal his vestments—on his arm.

“Leave the door open, would you?” Esmenet asked.

He nodded. “Well met, Esmi.”

“Well met.”

In the gathering shadows of evening, Esmenet stretched naked across the sheets and drowsed for a short time, her thoughts wheeling through regret after regret. Inrau’s death. Achamian’s flight. And as always, her daughter . . . When her eyes fluttered open, a figure darkened her door. Someone waiting.

“Who are you?” she asked wearily. She cleared her throat. Without a word, the man walked to the side of her bed. He was tall, even statuesque, wearing a coal black coat over a silvered brigandine and a black tunic of crushed damask.
A new customer,
she thought, looking into his face with the innocence of the recently awakened.
A beautiful one
.

“Twelve talents,” she said, leaning up from the covers. “Or a half-silver if you—”

He slapped her—
hard
. Esmenet’s head snapped back and to the side. She fell face first from her bed.

The man cackled. “You’re
not
a twelve-talent whore. Decidedly not.”

BOOK: The Darkness that Comes Before

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