The Goblin Emperor (38 page)

“The bathhouse—not a separate building, for there are no separate buildings on the height of Eshoravee—was a long cavernous room built along one side of one of Eshoravee roofed courtyards. The courtyard was serving as a makeshift dog-fighting pit, and as we bathed, we could hear the snarls and howls of the dogs and the snarls and howls of the men.

“The scullery boy, overworked and sullen, had not thought to tell us how to get back to the servants’ hall, and although our sense of direction is normally quite acute, it is perhaps not surprising that we became lost. No matter which way we turned, we could not seem to get away from that courtyard and the stench of blood and smoke, and finally we went out to see if someone could spare their attention from the dog fights long enough to give us directions.

“Eshoravee has long been the favorite manor of the Dukes Tethimel, despite the fact that it is both inaccessible and primitive. It is staffed almost entirely by locals, and they do not fear outsiders so much as they resent them. The first man we approached shrugged us away; the second man cursed us. We were trying to choose a third man who might be less hostile when Dach’osmer Tethimar found us.

“We were fifteen, Serenity, and it was not the first time we had been propositioned—as we said, couriers are known to be…” He hesitated, searching for a word. “Amenable. But Dach’osmer Tethimar did not so much proposition as
grab.
We did not know who he was, and we disengaged ourself with more force and less tact than we would have if we had known. In point of fact, for he was very determined and, of course, very skilled in unarmed combat, we bit him.”

“You
bit
Dach’osmer Tethimar.”

“It is very likely that he still has the scar,” Csevet said. “It made him angry, Serenity. He cursed us and slammed us against the wall of the courtyard and pinned us there, and we saw murder in his face.

“He backhanded us, knocking us to the ground, and by then there was a clear space, and all attention was on us. ‘What do you say, boys?’ cried Dach’osmer Tethimar. ‘Fox and hounds?’ There was a roar of approval, for this was something better than a dog fight, and Dach’osmer Tethimar said to us, ‘We will give you five minutes’ head start.’ He pulled out his pocket watch—and that was when we realized who he was, for he dressed no differently than any of his men—and said, ‘Starting …
now.
’

“Serenity, we bolted. We did not know Eshoravee, which we knew was what Dach’osmer Tethimar was counting on, but every minute we could buy ourself would be one more minute that he had not caught us. And Osreian or Salezheio or
someone
offered us a blessing that evening, for we found a staircase before the ‘hounds’ found us. We heard them laughing and shouting, and it did sound like the baying of hounds. We do not think Dach’osmer Tethimar made them wait the full five minutes, either.

“The stair we had found was a servants’ stair, for it was narrow and steep, and we climbed it in the dark, using our hands as much as our feet, but it twisted all the way up to the attics, and there we found a ladder which led us to a trapdoor which led us to the roofs. And there we spent the night, curled against a chimney for warmth. In the morning, we descended as soon as there was enough light to see, hiding from every noise of footsteps or voices. We made it out of Eshoravee without meeting anyone save the guard at the gate, and he did not recognize us as the ‘fox’—or had not been part of the hunt at all. We abandoned our saddlebags and everything in them, and made our way down the switchbacked road, skidding and half-crawling and praying that no one had sent a message to the ostlers to hold us for Dach’osmer Tethimar’s pleasure. No one had, and we were away from Eshoravee before the sun had fully cleared the hills. Before it set that evening, we were feverish with a bronchine that nearly killed us. And that, Serenity, is why we fear Dach’osmer Tethimar.”

The pause was uncomfortable—Csevet was clearly longing to be anywhere else—but there was one more question Maia had to ask. “What do you think they would have done to you if they had caught you?”

“We imagine,” Csevet said, dry and bitter, “that being beaten to death is the best we could have hoped for. And, Serenity, we must tell you that no one would have cared. The Duke Tethimel received his message, and that, after all, is what matters.”

“According to
whom
?”

Csevet’s ears dipped and he sounded taken aback when he said, “Serenity, it was many years ago. And we survived.”

“Yes. We are sorry. We are…”

“Shaken and fatigued,” Kiru struck in, and Maia smiled at her gratefully.

“We will not accept the Tethimada’s hospitality,” he said to Csevet. “You need have no fear on that account.”

“Just so, Serenity,” Csevet said, and gracefully changed the subject to Maia’s next responsibility. There were people who had to be reassured in person, including the mayor of Cetho and the preceptors of the Vigilant Chapters of both northern and southern Thu-Cethor. The preceptors glared and stalked around each other like rival tomcats, and Maia made a mental note that perhaps an inquiry into the conduct of the Vigilant Brotherhood would not be amiss. He was not at all sure whose authority they came under: the Archprelate or Captain Orthema? He would have to ask Csevet—merciful goddesses, how often in a day did he think that? He remembered Csevet’s anxiety the day before and realized that, from a certain angle, it was not as unfounded as it had seemed to him.
Thou must become less dependent,
he told himself as Isheian cleared the plates from a dinner he had barely noticed eating, and wondered how he thought he was going to manage it.

And then he looked at the clock and realized it was time to go.

He set out for the Mazan’theileian accompanied only by Telimezh and Kiru, saying rather tartly to Lieutenant Echana that if armed soldiers were going to overrun the Untheileneise Court, they would already have done so, and his nohecharei could defend him for anything less. “It is, after all, their purpose,” he said, and Echana unhappily gave way.

The Mazan’theileian was not part of the Untheileneise Court proper, but had been connected to it by a covered bridge during the reign of Edretanthiar III, in the delicate lacelike stonework typical of that era. The bridge was called Usharsu’s Ladder, for the Adremaza who had commissioned it, and aspirants to the Athmaz’are spoke of “climbing the Ladder” or “falling off the Ladder” in describing their progress.

Kiru told Maia all this, not as one attempting to make conversation—which Maia would almost certainly have rejected—but simply as if she wished to share the information with him and Telimezh and the stones of the bridge. And Maia listened with a desperation he prayed did not show, trying not to think about what awaited him.

They were met at the end of the bridge by a boy of sixteen or so with a bad complexion and hair too fine to stay neatly in a braid. Unprepossessing, but his bow was graceful and his voice, when he spoke, the antithesis of his appearance: deep and warm and astonishingly well controlled for a boy so young. “Serenity,” he said, “the Adremaza bade us welcome you and escort you to the Visitors’ Room. We are Ozhis, a novice of the Athmaz’are.”

“Thank you,” Maia said, and could only be grateful his voice didn’t crack.

The Visitors’ Room was small and rather bare, but shining with cleanliness. There was only one chair, which both Ozhis and Kiru indicated strongly Maia was to sit in. He sat, composed himself, and waited. It was no more than five minutes before Dazhis was brought in. His hair had been cropped, and he wore, rather than the maza’s blue robe to which he was no longer entitled, a black and shapeless garment that would be his shroud. He was flanked by two grim-faced mazei who bore the black stripe on their robes betokening them canons of Ulis. Dazhis went down on his knees almost before he cleared the doorway. He was weeping, in horrible racking sobs.

Maia had not the least idea what to do.

There was no comfort he could offer—Dazhis had committed a dreadful crime, and Maia could not help him escape the consequences. Nor could he say that he forgave him, for the truth was that he was not sure he did. Nor could he say he understood. But to stay silent was agonizing.

He had almost made up his mind to say something, though he did not know what, when one of the canons said, “Revethvoris, you must speak.” His tone was not cruel, but it was perfectly inflexible, and Dazhis responded to it, gulping against his sobs and finally achieving a state in which he could force his voice out.

“Serenity, I am to beg your pardon.” No formal-first, and Maia understood that even as he instinctively recoiled from the nakedness of it.

“Yes?” he said; Setheris, with a lawyer’s eye for logic-chopping, had made very sure that Maia understood the difference between an apology and a statement about an apology, and in this instance, he found he could not settle for the lesser.

“I … I am sorry for what I did.”

It wouldn’t have been enough for Setheris, who would have made him spell out what he had done, but Maia did not have that kind of viciousness in him. And there was something he needed very badly to know: “Why? Why did you do it?”

Dazhis began sobbing again; Maia had the unwelcome suspicion that this was more an effort to evade the question than any sign of true grief.

“Revethvoris,” said that same canon.

“
You
know,” Dazhis cried, turning to him. “Why can’t
you
tell him?”

“Because it was thy choice,” the canon said flatly. “Not ours.”

“Thou must answer,” said the other canon.

Dazhis got himself under control again and said, “They promised me, the Princess Sheveän and Lord Chavar, that if I helped them, I should become Adremaza when Sehalis Adremaza dies.”

And possibly the Adremaza’s death would be sooner rather than later. As my own would have been.

“And?” said one of the canons.

“And they promised I should be Prince Idra’s First Nohecharis,” Dazhis said in a whisper. “And they would not … his government would not…”

“We understand,” Maia said, and flinched at the coldness of his own voice. Dazhis had lacked the courage to rebuke him to his face, but Maia had been a fool to think that meant his disapproval could be discounted.

No,
said that astringent inner voice that was not Setheris.
Thou art emperor. It is no place of thy nohecharei to approve or disapprove of thee, and it is certainly no place of thine to court their approval. It is Dazhis who is in the wrong here. Not thee. Do thou remember that, Edrehasivar.

He would try, but it was hard not to feel that he had done something wrong, something that had led to this.

“Have you anything else to ask the revethvoris, Serenity?” said one of the canons.

“No,” Maia said. He had other questions, but none that he could bear to ask

“Revethvoris?” prompted the other canon.

And Dazhis looked up at him for the first time and said, “Serenity, will you stay?”

“Stay?” Maia said. “You wish us to witness your revethvoran?”

Dazhis nodded. “I know it is an … an imposition and I should not ask it. And I will not fault you, Serenity, I promise, if you will not. But … Please, Serenity.”

“But why would you wish…?” He couldn’t even find a way to finish the question.

One of the canons said, “Serenity, you are under no obligation to the revethvoris,” but under that he heard Dazhis’s reply: “I have no one else.”

Maia was ashamed, suddenly and bitterly, that he did not know enough about Dazhis to know whether he meant that he was an orphan, that his family lived far away, that he was alienated from them already, or simply that they would not come. Chenelo would have known; Chenelo would have expected
him
to know. He said, “We will stay.”

“Thank you,” Dazhis said.

The canons looked at him dubiously, but seemed to decide they did not have the authority to argue with the emperor. “The revethvoris must also speak to Lieutenant Telimezh,” one said.

“Yes,” Maia said. “We will step outside with Kiru Athmaza, for what is between them is no business of ours.” Also, he had to escape from this tiny, imprisoning room, from Dazhis’s misery and his own inability to respond.

Kiru followed him and stood beside him in the great vaulted hall of the Mazan’theileian, saying nothing. The hall was almost empty, and there was a hushed tension in the atmosphere that Maia hoped was not usual. The one or two mazei who passed them were almost scurrying, heads down—although perhaps that was his fault for being here?

He turned to ask Kiru, but at that moment the door to the Visitors’ Room opened and Telimezh came out with one of the canons. Telimezh’s face was bone-white and grim, and he did not meet Maia’s eyes. The canon bowed and said, “Serenity, the revethvoran will take place at moonset, two hours from now, in the Lesser Courtyard, which Kiru Athmaza can show you. You may return to the Alcethmeret to wait if you wish, or if you prefer…”

It was the first sign of hesitation Maia had seen in either canon. “Yes?” he said.

“It is customary, Serenity, though by no means required, for the witnesses to a revethvoran to spend some time in prayer beforehand. We would be honored to open the Ulimeire of the Mazan’theileian to you and to Lieutenant Telimezh.”

Maia did not need Kiru’s sudden tenseness to tell him he was being accorded a signal honor, nor did he need any further explanation of the canon’s hesitancy in broaching the subject. Piety was not fashionable at court, was in fact regarded with a certain amount of suspicion: another reason Chenelo had been so bitterly unhappy. The canon must have expected to be turned down—and possibly with a stinging rebuke.

Even if Maia had shared the court’s opinion, he didn’t think he could have rejected the offer—not knowing how rare it was for an outsider to be invited into any of the mazei’s precincts, much less a holy place. He could not think why they would make him such an offer—emperors had been denied before, and at least one of them had had an army at his back—but he said, “We, too, would be honored. Telimezh?”