The Kingdom of Gods (42 page)

“Itempas,” she said at last, sounding abruptly weary. “He is the key. Stop being stubborn, Sieh; just talk to him.”

“But —” I clamped my teeth down on what I would have said. This was what I’d asked her to give me. I had no right to complain just because it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. “Fine.”

With a sigh she opened her eyes, which were human again. When she straightened and stepped off the pattern, carefully removing her toe from its center without disturbing it, I saw the lingering sheen of magic within its lines.

“Go away now, Brother,” she said. “Come back in a million years, or whenever you think of me again.”

“I won’t be able to,” I said softly. In a million years I would be less than dust.

She glanced at me, and for just an instant her eyes flickered strange again. “No. I suppose you won’t, will you? But don’t forget me, Brother, amid all the new mysteries you’ll have to explore. I’ll miss you.”

With that, she turned to her clam boy and offered him her hand. He came and took it, rising, his face alight even as she suddenly grew four additional arms and wrapped all six of them
about him tightly. She would probably let him live, given that he had helped her. Probably.

I turned and headed back over the dunes, leaving my sister to her dance.

It had been a busy month since my trip to see Deka. A week later had come the expected announcement: Remath Arameri was bringing her beloved son home at last. Dekarta had begun his journey toward Sky amid great fanfare and three whole legions of soldier escorts. They would make a tour of the procession, visiting a dozen of the southern Senm kingdoms before reaching Sky-in-Shadow on the auspicious summer solstice. I had laughed on hearing about the tour. Three legions? That went beyond any need to protect Deka. Remath was showing off. Her message was clear: if she could spare three legions just to protect a less-favored son, imagine how many she could bring to bear for something that mattered?

So Ahad had kept me on the move visiting this noble or that merchant, spending a night on the streets in a few cities to hear what the commonfolk thought, sowing rumors and then listening to see what truths sprang up as a result. There had been more meetings, too, though Ahad invited me only when he had to. Nemmer and Kitr had complained after I loosened the legs of their chairs one time. I couldn’t see what they were so upset about; neither had actually fallen.
That
would have been worth the broken collarbone Kitr gave me in recompense. (Ahad sent me to a bonebender for healing and told me not to speak to him for a week.)

So, left to my own devices, I’d spent the last few days tooling
about Tema. Beyond the beach dunes stood a city, shimmering through the heat haze: Antema, capital city of the Protectorate. It had been the greatest city in the world before the Gods’ War and was one of the few cities that had managed to survive that horror mostly unscathed. These days it was not quite as impressive as Sky — the World Tree and the palace were just too stunning for any other city to top — but what it lacked in grandeur it made up in character.

I admired the view again, then sighed and finally fished in my pocket for the messaging sphere Ahad had given me.

“What,” he said, when the sphere’s soft thrum had finally gotten his attention. He knew exactly how long to keep me waiting; an instant longer and I would’ve stilled the activation.

I had already decided not to tell him about my visit with Spider, and I was still considering whether to request a meeting with Itempas. So I said, “It’s been a week. I’m getting bored. Send me somewhere.”

“All right,” he said. “Go to Sky and talk to the Arameri.”

I stiffened, furious. He knew full well that I didn’t want to go there, and why. “Talk to them about what, for demons’ sake?”

“Wedding gifts,” he said. “Shahar Arameri is getting married.”

It was the talk of the town, I discovered, when I got to Antema and found a tavern in which to get very, very drunk.

Teman taverns are not made for solitary drunkenness. The Teman people are one of the oldest mortal races, and they have dealt with the peculiar isolation of life in cities for longer than the Amn have even had permanent houses. Thus the walls of the tavern I’d fallen into were covered in murals of people
paying attention to me — or so it seemed, as each painted figure sat facing strategic points where viewers might sit. They leaned forward and stared as if intent upon anything I might say. One got used to this.

One also got used to the carefully rude way in which the taverns were furnished, so as to force strangers together. As I sat on a long couch nursing a hornlike cup of honey beer, two men joined me because there were only couches to sit on and I was not churl enough to claim one alone. Naturally they began talking to me, because the tavern’s musician — an elderly twin-ojo-player — kept taking long breaks to nap. Talking filled the silence. And then two women joined us, because I was young and handsome and the other two men weren’t bad-looking themselves. Before long, I was sitting among a laughing, raucous group of utter strangers who treated me like their best friend.

“She doesn’t love him,” said one of the men, who was well into his own honey horn and growing progressively more slurred in his speech because of it. Temans mixed it with something, aromatic sea grass seed I thought, that made it a fearsomely strong drink. “Probably doesn’t even like him. An Amn, Arameri no less, marrying a Temaboy? You just know she looks down her pointy white nose at all of us.”

“I heard they were childhood friends,” said a woman, whose name was Reck or Rook or possibly Rock. Ruck? “Datennay Canru passed all the exams with top marks; the Triadice wouldn’t have confirmed him as a
pymexe
if he wasn’t brilliant. It’s an honor to the Protectorate, the Arameri wanting him.” She lifted her Amn-style glass, which contained something bright green, and out of custom, all of us raised our drinks to answer her toast.

But as soon as our arms came down, her female companion scowled and leaned forward, her locks swinging for emphasis. “It’s an insult, not an honor. If the damned Arameri thought so much of our Triadice, they would’ve deigned to marry in before now. All they want’s our navy to guard against the crazy High Northers —”

“It’s an insult only if you make it one,” said one of the men, who spoke rather hotly because there were three men and two women and he was the homeliest of the group, and he knew that he was most likely to go home alone. “They’re still Arameri. They don’t need us. And she genuinely likes him!”

This triggered a chorus of agreement and protest from the whole group, during which I alternated my attention between them and a set of peculiar masks hanging on one of the tavern’s walls. They reminded me a bit of the masks I’d seen in Darr, though these were more elaborately styled and decorated, in the Teman fashion. They all had hair locks and jolly faces, yet somehow they were even more distracting than the staring mural people. Or perhaps I was just drunk.

After the argument had gone back and forth a few times, one of the women noticed that I had been quiet. “What do you think?” she asked, smiling at me. She was a bit older, relatively speaking, and seemed to think I needed the encouragement.

I finished the last of my horn, gave a discreet nod to the waiter for more, and sat back, grinning at the woman. She was pretty, small and dark and wiry as Teman women tended to be, with the most beautiful black eyes. I wondered if I was still god enough to make her faint.

“Me?” I asked, and licked spoiled honey from my lips. “I think Shahar Arameri is a whore.”

There was a collective gasp — and not just from my couch, because my voice had carried. I looked around and saw shocked stares from half the tavern. I laughed at all of them, then focused on my own group.

“You shouldn’t say that,” said one of the men, who had also been giving me the eye — though now, I suspected, he was rethinking that. “The Order doesn’t care what you say about the gods anymore, except Itempas, but the Arameri …” He darted a look around, as if afraid Order-Keepers would appear out of nowhere to beat me senseless. In the old days they would have. Lazy sots. “You shouldn’t say that.”

I shrugged. “It’s true. Not her fault, of course. Her mother’s the problem, see. She gave the girl to a god once, as a brood-mare, hoping to make a demon-child. Probably let your
pymexe
have a free ride, too, to seal the deal. You say he’s a smart man. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind treading in the footsteps of gods.”

The waiter, who had been on his way to me with another horn, stopped just beyond the couch, his eyes wide and horrified. The man who had been thinking about me stood up, quickly, almost but not quite before his third companion, who’d ignored me entirely up to that point, leapt to his feet. “Canru is my second cousin, you green-eyed half-breed nobody —”

“Who’s a half-breed?” I drew myself up to my full sitting height, which made me nowhere near as tall as he was. “There’s not a drop of mortal in me, damn it, no matter how old I look!”

The man, already opening his mouth to roar at me, faltered to silence, staring at me in confusion. One of the women leaned away, the other closer; both had wide, wondering eyes. “What did you say?” asked the closer-leaner. “Are you a godling?”

“I am,” I said gravely, and belched. “Pardon me.”

“You’re as godly as my left testicle,” snapped the furious man.

“Is that very godly?” I laughed again, feeling full of mischief and rage and joy. The rage was strongest, so before the man could react, I shot out my free hand and grabbed at his crotch, correctly guessing precisely where his left testicle would be. It was child’s play — for a mean child, anyway — to grasp the thing and give it a sharp, expert twist. He screamed and doubled over, his face purpling with shock and agony as he grabbed at my arm, but dislodging me would’ve necessitated a harder pull on his tender bits. With his face inches from mine, I flashed my teeth and hissed at him, tightening my fingers just enough for warning. His eyes went wide and terrified for some reason, which I could tell had nothing to do with the threat to his manhood. I doubted that my eyes had changed; there wasn’t enough magic left in me for that. Something else, maybe.

“These don’t seem very godly to me,” I said, giving his balls another jiggle. “What do you think?”

He gaped like a fish. I laughed again, loving the flavor of his terror, the thrill of even this paltry, pointless sort of power —

“Let him go.”

The voice was familiar, and female. I craned my neck back, blinking in surprise to see that Glee Shoth stood behind my couch. She stood with her hands on her hips, tall and imposing and so very Maroneh in that room full of Temans. The look on her face was somehow disapproving and serene at once. If I hadn’t spent several billion years trying to provoke that precise expression on another’s face, I would have found it wholly disconcerting.

I beamed at her upside down and let the man go. “Oh, you are
so
his child.”

She lifted an eyebrow, proving my point. “Would you care to join me outside?” Without waiting to see if I agreed, she turned and walked out.

Pouting, I got to my feet and swayed a bit. My companions were still there, to my surprise, but they were silent, all of them regarding me with a mixture of fear and distaste. Ah, well.

“May both my fathers smile upon you,” I said to them, gesturing expansively and making a genuine effort to bless them, though nothing happened. “If you can manage to get a smile out of them, anyway, the ill-tempered bastards. And may my mother kill you all gently in your sleep, at the end of a long and healthy span. Farewell!”