Citadels of the Lost (7 page)

It was a wonderful illusion, Sjei thought as he stepped into the garden. One could stand here in relaxed serenity and not suspect that this place had seen more violence, blood, and death than any other rooms combined in all the Rhonas Empire. Where better to do away with one's problems than with a quick blade in a place that no one knows exists at all? All that is left is cleaning up the mess . . . and cleaning up messes was one of the things that Sjei did best.

Looking at the lithe figure standing like another statue in the garden, Sjei actually hoped that it would not come to that most final of conclusions in this case. She was young, to be sure, but she had a fine, narrow frame and long hands. The taper of the back of her head was extremely becoming and her silver-white hair—earlier fallen around her shoulders in dirty strands—was now washed, soft and pinned up over the bald area of her crown. The hair exposed her elegantly pointed ears and framed her angular, pinched face perfectly. Her white silk gown had a neckline that plunged between her small breasts down to the clasp belt at her waist, exposing the bony ridges of her chest. She was striking, Sjei thought, and as cold as the stone under her bare feet.

“Is it done?” she said.

“Yes, it is done,” answered Sjei, removing his outer mantle and folding it over his arm. “All the pieces are in play, Shebin, and they are all moving in the same direction.”

Tsi-Shebin Timuran turned only slightly toward the Ghenetar Omris. “That should please you.”

“That should please us both,” Sjei said lightly. “The Modalis exists for profit . . . but won't mind investing a bit in you as fair exchange for your help.”

“So you have your war, then?” Shebin said with her featureless black gaze fixed on the view of the Imperial City spread beneath her.

“Yes, thanks to your most convincing performance,” Sjei sat down on the edge of one of the raised gardens. The flowers recoiled slightly from him, but he was used to the reaction after so many years. “A nice private little war without a lot of Imperial fuss and division of the spoils. You have provided us with a sufficiently frightening specter in this Drakis character to provide me the excuse I needed. Arikasi will make sure that what we're doing in Nordesia remains quiet until we have succeeded. Ch'dak will keep the courts out of it, and Liau will manage what everyone hears and thinks. Kyori and Wejon are so worried about each other that they will provide us all the power we need to support the army. In the end, the story will be that the warriors of the Blade of the Northern Will were dispatched to the Northmarch Folds for training, discovered a seditious army formed in rebellion against the Imperial Will by a runaway slave named Drakis, and pursued it until it was crushed—conquering considerable northern territories as part of their prize.”

“And Drakis?”

“He's nothing,” Sjei shrugged.

“No, Sjei,” Shebin's head swung sharply around, her black eyes fixed on the Ghenetar Omris. “He is everything. He
is
our bargain. I gave you the excuse to search for him and start your little war. You will deliver him to me.”

Sjei stood slowly, allowing time to let the urge to strangle her slip from him. He might yet need her to justify the war before the Emperor. Still, he was not used to being told what to do by any citizen of lesser class, no matter how beautiful or cunning they might be. “Why do you want this one human slave so badly? I could go out in the streets right now and buy you half a dozen human males—each one named Drakis. Indeed, I think I'd be hard-pressed to find a human male
not
going by that name.”

“No, it is
this
Drakis who must be found and brought back to me,” she said, her eyes unblinking. “He is to be brought before me whole and unharmed.”

“Why?” Sjei asked in an easy voice.

Shebin turned once more to look out the window. “He owes me something . . . and I will have it from him.”

“I don't suppose you have any suggestions as to just how we might find this one and only Drakis human in all the northern lands?”

“You said there were Sixth Estate trash gathering toward this ‘prophet' in Nordesia,” Shebin answered. “Follow them!”

“That was information I should not have told you and which you had best keep to yourself . . .”

“Then find Soen!”

“Soen? The Iblisi Inquisitor that's disappeared? You must be joking!”

“He was tracking him before, and for all we know he still is,” Shebin continued. “I met him, you know. He was the one who found me in . . .”

Shebin's voice caught slightly before she continued.

“. . . He led the Quorum that found me. If the Iblisi are hunting him, then it's because of Drakis. On the other hand, if Soen has joined Drakis, then he'll be near him. Either way, if anyone knows where Drakis is, this Soen will.”

Sjei shook his head, his lips curled back around his sharp teeth. “I'd think it easier to find your human slave with a blind-and-deaf dwarf than to find an Inquisitor who doesn't want to be found. He'll be a shadow.”

“He'll be a shadow being chased by shadows,” Shebin replied. “The Iblisi won't give up their hunt for him. I would think they could tell you where they're looking. That would be a start.”

Sjei nodded. “That is true . . . at that point it would be better for Soen to find us than for us to find him. If he is looking for Drakis, perhaps I could arrange a little detour for our friend Soen . . . allow him to cross our trail so that we might find his?”

Shebin's face and posture suddenly changed. The chill that Sjei had felt from her evaporated into a stunning smile and bright, shining black eyes. Her rigid frame dissolved into the soft curve of an easy stance, shifting the folds of her gown in a way that made her stunningly pretty all at once. It was startling to see the cold and calculating Shebin transform in a moment into a warm, endearing young elven woman.

Sjei felt a strong shiver go through him. He had fought in countless wars and seen unspeakable horrors, but nothing had shaken him quite this way.

“Oh, my dear Sjei,” Shebin cooed. “I know you can do it. You
are
the Modalis and I'm here to help you. I'll be anything you need me to be—anything at all. If you want me to be the poor, helpless elven maiden savaged by the brutal slave . . . well you've already seen how good I can be in that role! If you want me to be the strong, defiant elven woman in search of justice for her wronged family and their honor; why, I can do that, too. How about a warrior woman? Would you like that as well?”

Shebin stepped softly over toward Sjei, her hands reaching up and resting on the front of his tunic.

“Who are you, Shebin?” Sjei asked quietly.

“I am whoever I choose to be,” Shebin smiled, the lids of her eyes closing and opening with languid motion. “And I choose to be more than I am.”

“Higher Estate, perhaps?” Sjei offered.

“Oh, certainly,” Shebin purred.

“Power and wealth restored,” Sjei continued.

“Oh, no,” Shebin smiled. “I wouldn't settle for some Provincial House on the frontier. No, I have more in mind.”

“Indeed,” Sjei said. He suddenly reached up and gripped both her thin wrists so strongly that she yelped slightly. “And just what did you have in mind?”

“Bring me this Drakis,” Shebin hissed through her sharp teeth, “and I think I can give you the Emperor's Throne.”

Sjei looked down into the young woman's face. “You shouldn't speak such things . . . not even here.”

Shebin eyed the various rooms branching off from the courtyard that formed the suite. “If not here, then where do you have in mind?”

Sjei slowly pushed her away. “Aren't you a little young for that sort of play?”

“Maybe I'm older than you think,” Shebin smiled.

“Maybe I'm smarter than I look,” Sjei smiled back. “This Drakis didn't assault you after the avatria fell. I read Soen's report—the real one and it cost me dearly to get it out of the Lyceum. Se'Djinka's body was slumped in front of the door when he found you. I very much doubt that he ravaged you and then took the time in a burning and collapsing building to carefully prop a corpse up just to confuse me.”

Sjei could feel Shebin's spine stiffen through his grip on her wrists.

“Yes, maybe you are older than you look,” Sjei smiled as he released her. “But I am going to do everything I can to find this Drakis. I'm going to make you the most sympathetic victim ever seen in the eyes of the Empire. You are going to be showered with the love, adoration, and outrage that our Ministry of Thought can inspire. Your name will be known in every corner of the Empire, your higher caste will be assured, wealth will flow to you, and, yes, I will bring this Drakis to you for the raw spectacle of it because it could, indeed, bring me the Imperial Throne.”

“Bring
us
the Imperial Throne,” Shebin corrected.

“Of course,” Sjei replied. “All we need is your precious Drakis.”

“And if you can't find him?”

“Then let us make offerings to the gods that we find this Soen before the Iblisi do.”

M
ALA SAT UP IN THE DARKNESS of the room, holding her knees as she peered into the night. The rain clouds that had gathered in the early evening burst with torrential rain as the sun went down. Water from the mesa above them fell now in waterfall sheets across the cavern, spilling in a river down the steps they had climbed earlier in the day. They were all gathered in what had once been the front of a small shop—a fish shop according to the dwarf. Now the roaring cascade and the rain filled her ears with noise. The darkness was complete as they had forgone any fire that night out of fear of what it might attract and from the more basic fact that they could not find anything to burn in the immediate halls, rooms and warrens of the stone-cliff buildings. The only illumination they were afforded was the lightning of the storm, which, in its fury, was nearly constant, its flashes piercing the darkness of the doorway, followed by the rumble and the crash of thunder. It was a tumultuous night, but the dwarf was snoring loudly against the far wall and everyone except herself and Ethis, who now standing guard just outside the entrance, had managed to make themselves comfortable enough for rest.

Mala watched Drakis sleep, catching images of him in the flashes of light through the door, her own thoughts as tumultuous as the storm outside.

Mala's mind had refused once again to quiet into the longed-for oblivion of sleep. Her thoughts spun unbidden through her mind, pounding like the thunder, tumbling in a roiling cascade of pain, hope, hate, longing, and fear. A waterfall of memories refused to retreat, thundering through her consciousness in a wild, uncontrolled torrent.

Forgiveness was not in her, and she devoutly wished the voices would go away and leave her alone. The elves had put them in her head, she was sure. Voices to call her back home to them at any cost. Voices that called her to a bliss-filled forgetfulness that she longed to be a part of once again. She wished everyone would go away and take her shame and her loathing with them.

Mala sat only a few feet from Drakis and hated him for who she had become.

She remembered those days in the Timuran House where she pleasantly tended the gardens and kept the house spotless as much for her own pleasure as that of her overseers and the House Mistress. Her hands moving through the warm earth while she planted flowers was a joy to her. She remembered the smell of freshly baked bread coming from the kitchens in the back of the subatria. She remembered, too, the smiles she had shared with Drakis and the desires they felt; how she had thrilled at his brushing touches and all the dreams, day and night, she had involving both of them together.

But then he had returned from the War for the Ninth Dwarven Throne, and she was forced to remember
everything else.
He had taken her from her lovely, safe garden and she hated him for that . . . and she loved him for it, too.

She tried to remember again that moment when she had awakened to all her memories in that fallen garden so far away. It was difficult to consider, for her mind only allowed her glimpses of understanding. She recalled her mind thrown into chaos, unable to reconcile one memory with another as the continuity of her ordered life unraveled in a single moment. She was in a freefall of thoughts, the cord of her mind unraveling until she slammed into a place in her past experience that had been specifically planted there for just such an eventuality. She saw it, embraced it as she had been trained to do so many years before, and a new purpose came into her mind.

This memory was a dark one and impenetrable by her conscious thought. It called her to do anything, say anything that would ensure the discovery and recovery of her fellow slaves should the spells of the Devotions be broken. It was not a thing planted there by the Aether since that would have been unraveled, too, should the magic fail. This was far more direct, far less subtle and far older than the Devotions. This was conditioned though through unspeakable means that would bend the will of a slave even against her own interest. She was a
Seinar
—a beacon—and even as the avatria of House Timuran was falling to crush her beloved garden, she knew she would betray any of her fellow slaves just to keep the demons at bay that threatened to tear her mind apart.