The Silver Lake (32 page)

“Who, this God you can build?”

“No, not yet.” Graize turned to stare across the lake at the distant mountains and beyond. “Someone else.” His eyes narrowed as the lights crowded in on him again, fluttering in agitation. “Someone who doesn’t need Gods or temples to give him power. Someone from the north, yes, that’s it, a sorcerer living in a faraway tower on the sea, brewing magics that no one’s ever faced before and building alliances with our enemies, north and south, for just such a time as this.”

“Our enemies?”

Graize blinked. “Anavatan’s enemies for now, but they’ll be our enemies in the future.” He frowned as a golden-haired figure hovered just behind the tower. “Someone who thinks he’s hidden from me,” he continued, “someone who thinks he doesn’t need me, and who thinks he’s found someone better, but he’s wrong. He’ll hear of our victories and, smelling blood and opportunity, he’ll come to offer us his help to crack the walls around the lake of power.”

“Why?”

Graize laughed low in his throat as the lights whispered the answer in a sibilantly sarcastic hiss. “Because he’ll think he’s using us. But we’ll be using him. We’ll see him coming.” He turned a wide, luminescent gaze on Danjel’s face. “We’ve already seen him, you see, but he won’t know that.”

The gathered murmured their appreciation of this strategy, but Danjel held up one hand and they silenced.

“And this
God?
Will you use It, too?”

Graize watched as the lights paused as if they were holding their collective breaths.

“No,” he answered. “We’ll strike a bargain with It.”

The lights relaxed.

“What kind of bargain?”

Graize shrugged. “The kind that all Gods want.”

“Worship,” Danjel spat.

“Possibly.”

The bi-gender wyrdin snorted. “The Yuruk don’t pledge their worship to anyone or anything. And they don’t shackle their lives to Deities any more than they do to cities
or
to mad prophets that come out of the wild lands spouting nonsense. If they did, my abia would have ruled the Rus-Yuruk within a year.”

Graize smiled faintly as the others snickered. Around him, the lights pressed against his mind and he used the image of his beetle to shoo them away as one might a cloud of gnats. “Alliance, then,” he amended. “The God is young. It will be satisfied with that for now,” he said, sensing the truth of his words.

“For now?”

Graize shrugged. “When It’s older, It’ll want more. They always do, but so will the Yuruk. And everyone will be haggling from a position of strength by then. But for now, if the Yuruk will ride against Yildiz-Koy, the God will throw Its growing strength behind their cause.”

“With no guarantee of worship?” Danjel pressed. “Again, why?”

Above him the lights froze as if fearing to reveal the answer Graize had already guessed at.

“For the chance to drink from the waters of Gol-Beyaz,” he answered.

Danjel considered it.

“The waters will give It great strength, yes?”

“Yes.”

“Enough to manifest in the physical world?”

“No. That’s not how it’s done.”

“You’ve
seen
this?”

“I
learned
it from the priests of Oristo.” Graize raised his head. “Look into my prophecy, delos of the wild lands, and you’ll learn it, too.”

Danjel locked eyes with him at once. For a long time the two of them stared at each other, their eyes as white as the snow on the faraway mountains, while the gathered waited in impatient silence; then, finally, as one, they broke contact.

Graize tipped his head to one side.

“Well?”

Danjel frowned as his eyes returned to their jewellike green tone. “You’re playing a dangerous game,
Kardos,”
he warned, fingering the pommel of the kinjal at his belt.

“But ... ?”

“But one you just might win with our help. With
my
help.”

“And
will
you help me?”

After a moment’s thought, Danjel nodded. “Timur may not believe you and the Yuruk may not follow you, but
I’ll
help you, if only to bring my own future greatness into being.”

Graize laughed. “Yours and mine,
Kardos.
Done.” As the others broke out into excited chatter, he tipped his head back, staring into the cloudy sky with a triumphant expression. The game had begun and nothing would break it up early this time, not Havo’s Dance, nor any other God-made catastrophe, not until somebody’s stag beetle was dead.

And this time it wasn’t going to be his.

Above him, the lights grew brighter and brighter with the promise of strength and power. The spirits, however, fluttered nervously about his face, fearing a future that both Graize and the lights chose to ignore; a future where a dark-haired man and a hitherto unseen black-eyed, golden-haired woman could ruin everything with a simple glance, for creation and destruction were still far too intertwined for their comfort. But, with a dismissive wave, Graize swept them away. He would not allow past or future ghosts to interfere with his plans. Not again. Looking past the settlement to the wild lands and beyond, he bared his teeth in the direction of Anavatan.

Never
again.

“CAN YOU READ and write?”
“No.”

After the initial excitement of Brax and Spar’s acceptance had worn off, most of Estavia’s senior officers’d had no idea what to do with them. Finally, Kemal and Yashar had brought them along to the Cyan Company training yard. After the beginnings of an awkward interview, Kaptin Julide’s second-in-command, Birin-Kaptin Arjion, had pressed his fingertips to the bridge of his nose before fixing Brax with a stem expression from under his black brows.

“What weapons do you know how to use?” he amended stiffly.

“Oh. Knife and sling.”

“And?”

Brax shrugged. “Fists.”

“Is that all?”

“Pretty much.”

“I see. So, basically you’ve received no training whatsoever.”

“None you’d want to know about.”

“But you did serve a kind of apprenticeship?”

Brax straightened sharply at his tone. “I served a full apprenticeship,” he retorted. “In a year’s time, Cindar and I would have been splitting our take fifty-fifty. There isn’t a lock I can’t open and Spar could get behind you and cut your purse before you’d even known he’d moved.”

Seated to one side, his arms draped about Jaq’s neck, the younger boy nodded solemnly as the gathered warriors shook their heads. Arjion briefly closed his eyes.

“So you’re dexterous and Spar is fast,” he allowed. “Which is fine on the streets, but Estavia’s warriors meet the enemy face to face, not from behind, and they don’t split any form of
take.
They serve the God and the God’s temple provides them with all they need.”

Brax stared up at him in disbelief. “You mean, you don’t make any shine at all?” he asked in a horrified voice.

Ghazi-Priest Tersar guffawed out loud and even Kaptin Julide broke a smile, but Arjion merely raised an eyebrow in Kemal’s direction. “Clearly, your new abayon haven’t explained our terms of service to you,” he said in a voice dripping with sarcasm. “Having second thoughts?”

Brax narrowed his eyes, then gave a shrug of studied disdain. “No.” As the God’s presence tickled against the back of his mind, he frowned. “It just feels ... wrong somehow,” he added.

“As it should.”

“What?”

“Estavia’s warriors receive payment and tribute just like any other elite fighting force,” the birin-kaptin explained, “otherwise we’d be possessions, not soldiers. Does that make you feel any better?”

“So why didn’t you say that in the first place?” Brax muttered under his breath.

“What was that?”

“Nothing. How much do they get?”

“That depends.”

“All right. How much do I get?”

“Delinkon chosen to serve at the temple receive a silver soldis in recognition of their achievement and another after their first year of service. I imagine you’ll receive the same.” Arjion glanced over at Kaptin Julide, who nodded. “And considering that the temple provides food, clothing, board, and weapons,” he continued, “I’d say that’s a more than adequate sum.”

“How much do they get later on?” Brax pressed.

“Again, that depends.”

“On what?”

“Your status, based on your achievements and dedication to the God.”

Brax tipped his head to one side, debating whether to ask the most obvious, albeit the most tactless question, then gave a mental shrug. It’s not like the man would be surprised.

“How much do you get?” he asked.

Arjion merely smiled tightly. “Forty golden soldon per year.”

Spar straightened with a jerk, but Brax just nodded, his expression carefully neutral.

“When would I get that?”

“You want my best guess?”

“Yes.”

“Never.”

“Why?”

Arjion raised a fist, lifting one finger per point until he’d made an empty hand. “You’re too suspicious, you’re too argumentative, you’re too undisciplined, you haven’t had enough training, and what training you have had has obviously taught you to seek the less than honorable path. You can’t do that when you serve the will of a God. They take offense ...” he blew across his palm. “... and you end up with nothing.”

“And if that changed?”

“Why would it change? Just so you can make a lot of
shine?
There are easier ways.”

Brax folded his arms, but nodded stiffly. “Point,” he acknowledged, echoing Yashar’s phrase from earlier that morning. “But suppose I wanted to do it for Estavia? Suppose I wanted to rise in Her temple as high as I could go just for Her glory?”

“Do you?”

“Maybe. I don’t know yet. Does anybody?”

“A few serve that selflessly, yes, but they don’t tend to be interested in money.”

“But they still get it, right?”

“Yes,” Arjion sighed. “They still get it.”

“So how long would it take for me to get it?”

Arjion gave a shrug as disdainful as Brax’s own. “With tremendous effort on both your part and on the part of your instructors, forty years, give or take a few.”

“That’s a long time.”

“You have a lot of ground to cover and a lot more to make up.”