The Merchant Emperor (37 page)

“You may very well have compromised your own outcome, Talquist,” the Diviner said darkly. “I told you a
lamb
, not a man of middling years. Do you have any idea how likely it is that he is ritually impure?”

“Highly unlikely, actually,” Talquist said defensively. “He was committed to the service of the All-God in this very basilica as a toddler; he has never lived outside of the manse. He assured me that no one living there, which included himself, was anything but a virgin and a vegetarian. I assume that his advanced age, along with his humanity, make him the most powerful, ritually pure receptacle possible—am I incorrect?”

The Diviner exhaled. “We shall see. Let us hope that your hubris has not been both of our undoing.”

He turned to the implements that Gregory had provided—a ritual vessel known as a lachrymatory, four large linen sheets, three large canopic urns, a sewing needle and heavy thread, a brazier filled with incense, an enormous cinerary bowl, often used for storing ashes, a bag of cedarwood flakes and dried rose petals, and a series of horrifically shaped knives, saws, and tongs of all sizes.

“Light the brazier,” he instructed Talquist while he gently uncorked the lachrymatory, covering its mouth with his fingers and drawing forth some of the oil in it. He anointed his eyes and ears, and Gregory’s mouth and abdomen; then, as the smoke from the burning incense began to rise, he picked up the first of the thin knives.

“Step away from the altar,” he said to the emperor. “Ask your question—and take care with your phrasing; you will only have one chance.”

Talquist took a step back, lost in thought. Finally he spoke.

“Who and where is the Child of Time, and what must I do with or to it in order to successfully achieve immortality, without aging, for myself?”

The Diviner held the knife up to the dome of the basilica, then placed the tip of the knife at the base of the corpse’s throat. He then proceeded to slice open the sexton’s thoracic and abdominal cavities, using the implements of the gruesome ritual, all the while chanting the prayers of his office. As if in a trance, he muttered the words to the rite in a language Talquist had never heard as he methodically removed lungs, liver, and intestines, depositing each in a separate canopic urn. With great care he examined each organ and the cavity from which it had come, finally reassembling the flaps of skin and wrapping the bleeding body in the heavy linen sheets. He placed his index and middle fingers on the sexton’s now-bloodless lips; his eyes rolled back as his head tilted upward.

Around the Diviner’s head, a circle of smoke from the brazier seemed to gather. An alien voice, both the Diviner’s own and yet very different, came forth from his mouth.

“The Child of Time hides from the eye of man; who, where, and what it is remains unknown. But if it can be found, an ageless immortality can be achieved by one who eats the beating heart of the Child of Time at the moment between life and death. Then the hold that Time itself has over the one who consumes the heart of the Child will shatter, and the Child’s lore shall be conveyed unto his very blood as it dies.”

*   *   *

Grunthor’s other hand quickly came to rest on Rhapsody’s shoulder, and he tightened his grip as he watched the blood drain from her face.

“Shhh, darlin’,” he whispered. “Hold on, now.”

Achmed saw the blue light begin to dim; he looked at Gyllian, who had noticed the same thing and nodded slightly.

*   *   *

The circle of smoke vanished.

The Diviner looked down and shook his head, his eyes returning to normal.

“The best we could hope for,” he said softly to Talquist, who was still standing away from the altar, listening intently. “You must have been right about this poor sexton; a middle-aged virgin whose lips never touched blood meats or strong drink. The only thing more horrible than the way he died was the way he lived. Oh, well.”

“I suppose the only sex the man had in life was in his title,” Talquist said humorously.

The Diviner scowled at the emperor. Carefully he poured more oil from the lachrymatory over the organs in the canopic urns and lit them on fire. As they burned, he filled the sexton’s abdomen with the cedarwood flakes and the rose petals, then proceeded to stitch the corpse up, working as carefully as a tailor on a robe for a royal court.

When at last he was done, he wrapped the rest of the linen sheets around the body, then combined the ashes of the organs in the cinerary bowl, which he handed to Talquist.

“Take these out with you when you leave and commit them to the wind,” he said brusquely. “I will stand vigil until morning. Then you must have the body taken and ritually burned; given the death and destruction that has been visited upon this city, I assume they know how to do that.”

Talquist ignored the slight.

“I thank you most assuredly for your efforts on my behalf, Hjorst,” he said quietly. “Did you get any sense, any fragment of the whereabouts or identity of the child—if it’s a boy or a girl?”

“None whatsoever.” The Diviner’s voice was testy.

Talquist trod lightly. “I have reason to believe it is a baby, an infant of approximately four months of age. No idea of the name or the sex, but I had some indication that it might be the child of our friends, the Lord and Lady Cymrian.”

“Well, that would prove most interesting if it were true,” said the Diviner, continuing to wipe the blood off the altar.

“Indeed. I sent a cohort several months ago to Haguefort, which, sadly, never returned. The intelligence says that the Lord Cymrian has moved on to his new fortress at the site of the old House of Remembrance—but that there is no sign of the Lady or child.”

“Perhaps she has taken refuge among the Bolg in Canrif,” the Diviner said. He tossed the flaxen sheet, now red as a rose petal, into one of the canopic urns and set it alight as well. “She is said to be a close friend of the Bolg king. If that be the case, you will most likely never find them. Canrif is unassailable.”

“Indeed,” Talquist agreed regretfully.

“You may need to search for another wellspring of immortality, or speed up your war efforts to double time.” The Diviner handed the last of the ashes to the emperor. “I am done here. Good night, Talquist. May your reign be long and fruitful.”

*   *   *

The blue glow in the center of the Lightcatcher vanished from view.

Rhapsody turned in Grunthor’s grip and buried her face in his massive chest as his arms came around her, keeping her from collapsing to the ground. The rest of the witnesses to the ritual looked at each other in the dark.

*   *   *

“Tomorrow, just after dawn, if anything came to me from the auspicy, I will leave you a written message here on the altar,” said the Diviner, cleansing his hands with oil. “Perhaps the flight patterns of whatever birds are left in Sepulvarta will give me a direction as to the whereabouts of the Child of Time.”

“Thank you again, Hjorst,” Talquist said. “A carriage is waiting to take you back to the guesthouse after your vigil.”

“No, thank you, I’d much rather walk,” said the Diviner. “It will be bad enough having to endure another week in one of your carriages taking me to port as it is.”

“Will it disturb your vigil if I send the guards in to remove the woman from the narthex?”

“No,” said the Diviner, “as long as they do not enter the sanctuary, and are silent.”

“Very good. It shall be ordered so.”

“When I arrive back in the Hintervold I will alert my generals and field commanders to be on the lookout for your messages when the time comes for us to wade into the fray. I wish you luck in finding the Child of Time. Perhaps you could ask the Scales when you get home.”

Talquist’s smile broadened.

What an outstanding idea,
he mused.
Not the Scales you are thinking of, Hjorst, but a scale was used nonetheless. If all has gone well, the assassins may even be in Canrif already.

“My thanks again,” he said as he made his way down the concentric rise. “I will be certain to make it worth your while, Hjorst, if I ever have the opportunity.”

The Diviner’s voice was distant from the altar as Talquist made his way to the basilica door.

“If you wish to make it worth my while, never speak to me of it again, and forget about ever requesting another augury, unless you want me to gut you as I did the sexton. Good night.”

The emperor turned and smiled at his friend, then left the basilica.

Then he tossed the ashes into the wind and then gave the guards instructions to have the woman sleeping in the narthex brought to his waiting carriage. He made his way down the front steps, past the defiled fountain, and climbed into the coach, where he waited impatiently.

By the time the carriage arrived at the guesthouse, a mere five streets away, the acolyte could no longer be successfully sacrificed for an augury.

*   *   *

“M’lady, please don’t panic,” Gyllian said sensibly. “I know that was terrifying to hear, but take courage—they both agree that Canrif is unassailable. As long as you and your son are here, they will not even attempt to find you.”

“That’s right, miss,” Grunthor said, squeezing her shoulders again. “You can just stay ’ere ’til the end of the war.”

“That’s not my understanding,” Rhapsody said nervously. “Ashe and I have always assumed that I would need to fight. There are but three elemental swords in the Known World, and I have the most powerful of them.”

“Your husband and grandson both have such weapons as well,” said Achmed quietly. “Their priority was your security; you don’t need to be adding to their worry by risking your life, and that of your brat. As long as you’re here, Talquist can’t touch you.”

ABOVE THE GROTTO OF ELYSIAN, YLORC

The five men had arrived at the rim of the canyon hidden in the depths of the forbidding mountains.

Quietly Dranth wiped the sweat from his forehead and surveyed the panorama of peaks rising even higher behind him than the ones they had summited had been. Born of the red sand desert in Yarim, the windy high peaks of Ylorc were a torment to him and the others.

But it mattered little.

A sight that had burned his eyes a year before filled his memory again, as it did during many of his waking moments, and all of his sleeping ones.

The head of the guildmistress, a woman he had loved and served since her childhood.

Slashed from her neck, her eyes still open.

Tossed unceremoniously into a box, wrapped carefully in paper and shipped back to him at the tile foundry of Yarim Paar.

It was an image that haunted him.

But not as much as it inspired him.

“Careful,” he said to Colhoe, one of his subordinates from the Raven’s Guild, as he lowered a coil of rope down the side of the wall that formed the underground canyon. “This is the greatest honor we will ever have—let us make it memorable.”

*   *   *

“Heed the advice of your friends, m’lady,” the Patriarch said, placing a hand on her arm, then turning to the Firbolg king. “I will take my leave of your mountain at week’s end after my last prayer ritual, Your Majesty. Thank you for allowing me to learn of your Lightcatcher, and to rebuild part of the Chain of Prayer from your kingdom. When it has been re-formed, I will make certain your safety, and that of your subjects, is foremost in my offerings. And, of course, anything I saw within your realm will never be spoken of.”

Achmed smiled slightly. “Thank you. Travel well.”

“I’d like to see your son before I leave, if you don’t mind,” Constantin said to Rhapsody. “I will offer my blessing to him again. You will both be in my prayers at all times.”

Rhapsody, still pale, nodded numbly.

“Thank you. We will need every entreaty we can obtain,” she said.

33

SEPULVARTA

The next morning, after he had finished with the weeping acolyte again, Talquist dressed and made his way to the basilica.

“Is the Diviner gone?” he asked the guards standing watch at the main door.

“Yes, Majesty. He left just after dawn. The carriage driver had his belongings, and said he was taking him to port in Ghant. A cohort accompanied them.”

“Good, good. And has anyone else entered the basilica?”

“Just the workmen, sire.”

“Workmen?” Talquist’s eyes narrowed.

“Yes, Majesty. Your orders to cover and remove some of the frescoes and stained-glass images are being attended to.”

“Ah, good. Carry on.” Talquist waited as the door was opened for him, and then strolled into the basilica.

Where the night before there had been darkness, twisting shadows, and gleaming ethereal radiance, this morning there was dusty sunlight raining through the glass windows atop the dome. Talquist made his way hurriedly through the narthex to the sanctuary, nodding perfunctorily at the artisans who stopped in their work, carrying ladders and hanging cloth, to bow before him.

Atop the altar, a scroll was waiting.

The emperor climbed the stairs made of concentric circles until he stood before the altar. It was all he could do to keep from snatching the rolled parchment and tearing the seal open, but he controlled himself and picked up the scroll with dignity, trying not to call attention to himself.

As he broke the seal, he cast a glance around and noted that the artisans had returned to their work, almost as if he wasn’t there.

Good,
he thought.

He unrolled the paper and looked down at it.

Northeast,
the coarsely written script said.
It looks to be an early winter as well. I expect the next of your ships to dock at Verne Hys to be delivering berries and several cases of a fine single malt.

Northeast, the Diviner noted.

Canrif.

He looked up from the scroll and glanced around the basilica again.

A dozen or so laborers were setting about removing tiles from mosaics and stripping paint from frescoes that had been indentified as celebrating Cyrmian history, rather than elemental lore. All seemed engaged except for one, who looked perplexed, studying a fresco on one of the walls of the nave.