The Last Hour of Gann (23 page)

Meoraq went and since nothing more happened that day (it remained the longest and strangest conversation he was ever to have with Master Tsazr,
who never mentioned it, or the name, if it was a name, of Nuu Sukaga, again), he let the memory go and brought himself gradually back to the present to think about what it meant.

Because each word did change the truth in all the others, and this memory did present an entirely new alternative to his present situation. Surely that was why Sheul had brought it to his attention so vividly.

“Honored one?”

Meoraq stirred and opened his eyes. He gazed into the light of the holy forge (which had been renewed at some point during his meditations, he saw), before turning an expectant eye upon the nervous usher who bowed beside him. “What is it?” he asked.

“The abbot sends his apologies for this intrusion on your prayers, honored one, but requests that you send your demands to the provisioner as soon as possible.”

“A reasonable request,” said Meoraq after a moment. “Have you the means to make a list?”

“Yes, sir.” The usher produced a wax tablet and stylus from the inner fold of his robe.

“Very good. Write small,” he advised. “And see to it my demands are sent specifically to Exarch Ylsathoc
, for I know it was he and not the abbot who sent you to me, although I believe it is only the abbot who apologizes for it.”

The boy’s first mark in the soft wax was a meaningless gash of
guilt. “Sir?”

“
Foremost, I require a tea box,” Meoraq began in a musing way. “A nice one…”

5

M
eoraq woke at the sound of voices while they were still in the hall. He raised his head without opening his eyes, listened until he had identified one in particular, and settled back into his bedding.

His door crashed open. “I don’t care if I wake him up!” Exarch Ylsathoc
Hirut shrieked to someone in the hall. “I
want
to wake him up! I want him to explain himself and this…this insult!”

Meoraq smiled sleepily into his cushion.

Expensive-sounding slippers slapped rapidly across the room. A soft fist struck the mantle above his cupboard in the fearless manner of a man who has never challenged a Sheulek. “Insult, I call it! Do you hear me, you…you…”

“Honored Sword of Sheul?” Meoraq suggested, still smiling.

“You get out here this instant!” the exarch screamed. “I demand to know the meaning of this…this…extortion! A new samr and kzung! I can see your old ones right there! There is nothing wrong with them! What is this? Boots! Buckles! A new tent! A quilted mat! Blankets, cushions, a new pack…and a full mending kit! What could you possibly need to mend when everything is new?”

“I like to be prepared for every eventuality.”

“Is that a
joke
? Are you
joking
at me? No, no,
this
must be the joke! An inlaid
tea box
?!”

“I trust you also received my list of favorite teas.”

“This is an outrageous abuse of power and I will not honor it! I refuse! You will have a brick of cuuvash and a change of clothes and nothing more from me! I am a son of Ylsathoc!”

Meoraq slapped his palm flat against the cupboard door and shoved it open. He leaned out, no longer smiling, and yanked the exarch down by the neck of his fine white robes until their eyes were on level. “And I am a son of Sheul,” he said quietly.

The exarch glared, breathing hard and fast, the color strong at his scrawny throat, but he said nothing.

“Honored one…” Unnoticed in the doorway, the abbot of Xi’Tothax now came into the room and
bowed again, both arms open. “Please, the temple is proud to make provision for you.”

“But I do not ask the temple.” Meoraq released Ylsathoc with a shove and swung himself out of the cupboard to stand in the exarch’s place, naked and damned glad he was naked, just to see Ylsathoc flinch. “I ask the man who gave my name at the gate—what did I hear, six times?—and who ordered the sentries of my c
onquered city to carry me in to him as if I were his errant cattle! Do not speak to me of insult, priest. You will meet my demands and you will thank Sheul at every one that I ask only your material goods and not your fucking hand!”

He made himself stop there and take a slow count of six breaths before he really lost his temper. He’d had too little sleep…which was a poor excuse and he knew it. A Sheulek was supposed to be the master of his emotions at all times, even when dealing with insolent, self-important bureaucrats. If he had to wake up to someone this early, why couldn’t it be a woman?

‘And now I want a woman,’ he thought, striding to the table to reclaim his clothing. He didn’t mind being naked in front of another man as long as he looked intimidating while he did it. He minded very much being extruded and undignified.

“
If the temple wishes to show its obedience, it can bring me hot nai and a meal,” Meoraq said, strapping on his loin-plate and cinching it biting-tight. “The exarch here shall see to my rations for travel, but he had best be quick about it. I mean to be on my way by fifth-hour.”

The abbot gave his assurances and bowed his way out. Ylsathoc watched him go and then watched Meoraq dress. His spines were stiff enough to quiver slightly with his pulse. The scales at his throat were still striped with yellow as bold and bright as paint.

“Have you something more to say?” Meoraq asked.

“Forgive me,” said the exarch, sounding anything but apologetic. “But how does the honored one expect me
to meet his demands before fifth-hour? I did not come to Tothax with a tea box.”

“Inlaid,” Meoraq reminded him. “And I expect you to purchase whatever you do not have, the same as any other man must do when a Sword of Sheul takes his conqueror’s privilege. If I learn that you have turned my list into your own and demanded it as gifts from this city, I will see you judged for theft.”

The exarch was quiet for a time, although Meoraq could see the yellow patches at his throat moving with unformed words. At last, in a voice as edged as any blade Meoraq carried, Ylsathoc said, “I will have to purchase several things on credit to meet your demands.”

“So?”

More silence. More hard, hoarse breathing. More yellow.

Meoraq put his boots on and pretended not to notice or care. He waited, grimly enjoying himself and reminding himself to meditate on the cause of that enjoyment because it really was a terrible sign of his true character.

“My father will have to pay those notes.”

Meoraq finished buckling the last strap on his boot, then straightened up and looked the exarch directly in
the eye. “You have your orders. Leave me.”

Ylsathoc managed half a stiff
bow and then burst out, “This is spitefulness and nothing else! What did I do but my given duty in informing you of your House’s need?”

“You did not inform me,” said Meoraq. “You summoned me. And then you stood me in your borrowed chamber and dared to interrogate me, much as you are daring to protest to me now.”

“I am an exarch over all the eastern lands! My father’s House stands as champion over Chalh, the city that champions all Gedai! I had every right to—”

“I do not care if you are the high chancellor over all the city-states of Gann,” said
Meoraq, folding his arms. “All men bend before the honor-blade.”

Ylsa
thoc looked at those blades now and at Meoraq’s hands so close to them. He lowered his voice before he used it again, although he still spoke with an indignant hiss. “You cannot need half these ridiculous things for your journey!”

“You sound very sure.”
Meoraq leaned forward, holding the other man’s stare. “Where is it you think I am going?”

“Why, to—
” Exarch Ylsathoc frowned. The yellow stripes at his throat finally began to fade, just a little. “To Xeqor,” he said after a long, puzzled pause to search Meoraq’s eyes. “Your House requires a steward.”

“And if that is Sheul’s will, it will be me,” Meoraq agreed. “But first I will know that it is Sheul’s will.”

“I don’t understand.”

“It is not necessary that you do. Your role in this is ended, or will be as soon as you have met my demands.”

“But…” Ylsathoc retreated a step, then appeared to suddenly notice the tablet still in his hand. He looked at it as if reading it for the first time. “But all these things…Where are you going?”

Meoraq smiled faintly. “Xi’Matezh.”

The exarch rocked back and stared at him with such astonishment that Meoraq could not resist twisting the knife. He leaned in even closer, close enough to be threat as much as insult, and smiled. “Seen in that light, I haven’t asked for too damned much at all, have I?”

“That will take…days!” Ylsathoc sputtered
, backing away again. “A brace of days! Two braces at the least!”

“
Three is far more likely.”

“Winter is
all but at the gate! The cold season—”

“I know
about cold.”

“You will never make it there and back across the mountains before the snows!”

“I do not expect to.”

“You cannot mean to leave your House empty so long!” Ylsathoc grappled visibly with the humility he had been warned to demonstrate, but outrage soon defeated him. “
It is the founding House of Uyane’s bloodline, the line of that great oracle’s descent! Its steward champions all Xeqor, who champions all Yroq, who sits at the very heart of all that is left of this land! Where is your sense of duty?”

“I have a duty to more than one father,” Meoraq replied. “He who sired my clay would surely understand that I serve He who hammered my soul first. Sheul has called me to a pilgrimage
. Have my things waiting at Eastgate by fifth-hour and if you dare to protest just once more, I swear to you here in the sight of Sheul that your father will receive a note for the cost of your funeral along with the rest of your expenses.”

Ylsathoc looked down at the list and up again. He opened his mouth.

Meoraq waited, ready to draw. He was well aware of his own propensity to be impatient, particularly with those of the lesser castes, and he would even admit to the spitefulness Ylsathoc had alleged (although never to the other man’s face), but in spite of his divine right and his frequent threats, he had never killed anyone just for rudeness. Scarred a few, though. And he’d by-Gann be scarring this one if he said one more word.

But Ylsathoc only sighed and shut his mouth again. He bent his neck in a sullen sort of bow and swept out past the returning abbot, reading his list and muttering about impropriety to himself in much-offended and very soft tones.

The abbot waited in the doorway while the boy he’d brought labored his food-laden tray over to Meoraq at the table and poured the nai. Then he said, without reproach, “It is a mark of great favor to be born under the sign of the Blade, honored one.”

Meoraq grunted and broke open his bread. It had been stuffed with gruu, fried in fat to a crunchy paste and should have been very good, but Meoraq could not eat without thinking of the previous night’s t
rial and how a few rows of gruu, more or less, had killed a Sheulteb. All things served God and Meoraq knew he’d done His work well, but still it made the bread bitter this morning.

“Fewer yet are called to be Sheulek,” the abbot continued.

“No one feels that privilege more deeply than I, priest.”

“But do you feel the privilege, honored one, that He continues to show you? Not one Sheulek in s
ixty will ever stand as steward of his bloodline or Lord of his House. You are the Sword He raises highest.”

“No,” said Meoraq, tossing his inedible bread down on the tray. “I am the Sword He has sheathed! And if that is His will, I accept it, but before I submit to that end, I will hear it in His own voice.”

The abbot’s boy gaped at him. The abbot himself merely bowed.

Meoraq looked at his untouched food, then drank off his nai and banged the cup down empty. “I am done with this,” he said brusquely. “I am taking the rooftop. See that I am not disturbed.”

“Yes, honored one.”

“I want to wash first,” said Meoraq, which was not the truth. He did not want the bath; he wanted the woman whos
e task it would be to bathe him and he didn’t care who knew it.

The abbot bowed again, silent in his assent. He gestured to his boy, who took up the tray. They left, shutting the door softly behind them.

Meoraq sat alone, staring at the ceiling and counting his breaths.

“Fuck,” he said, and went to the roof without his bath. He still wanted the woman, but
he suspected he needed to pray.

* * *

Somewhere between the third hour and the fourth, the rooftop door scraped open.

Stretched out on a bench to watch the clouds roll by, Meoraq raised the samr he had been idly tapping against his boot and called, “I do not wish to be disturbed.”