The Weavers of Saramyr (41 page)

A tribute to the skill and learning of their leader, then, that they had got this far, and were ready when the long-expected crisis came. The Heir-Empress had been discovered by the world at large. Now was the time for the Libera Dramach to take action.

Cailin turned her mount and headed down the grassy ridge towards the Fold. There had been several new arrivals of late, and the moment had come to bring them all together.

‘I can scarcely believe it all,’ Kaiku said. She stood fearlessly at the lip of one of the uppermost plateaux of the Fold, above the main mass of the buildings, and gazed in wonder at the landscape

tumbling away from her below, the maze of different-shaped rooftops an overlapping and multi-layered jigsaw. The packed-dirt streets were seething with people from all over Axekami, a collision of makeshift fashions such as Kaiku had never seen. The afternoon sun beat down on her skin, warming her with its rays; birds winged and jagged through the sky overhead. She tilted her face up, closed her eyes, and felt Nuki’s eye looking down on her, a red glow behind her lids. ‘It is perfect.’

Asara sat on a large, smooth rock that towered aslant out of the grassy plateau. She did not know what Kaiku was referring to as perfect: the Fold, the sunlight, or a more general expression of contentment? She dismissed it, anyway. Kaiku’s spirits had been restored with a vengeance since leaving Fo and taking the River Jabaza back towards Axekami. They had disembarked some way north, warned by sailors coming upriver that Axekami was in turmoil and no boats were getting in. Taking the horses they had gained in Chaim, they rode south, crossed the Kerryn by ferry east of Axekami, and then made good time to the Xarana Fault. There, Asara had taken them by one of the few relatively safe routes through the maze of broken land, and thence to the Fold.

The journey had been a strange one. Kaiku appeared to have surmounted her loathing of herself, perhaps because there was nobody left that she cared much about who could leave her or hurt her. Her family were dead; Mishani and Tane had betrayed her by their reactions to the news that she was Aberrant. Rock bottom was a wonderful place in which to re-examine oneself, and she seemed finally to have accepted what she was and made the decision to live with it. Her initial despair at the impossibility of the oath she had sworn to Ocha had warmed and turned to determination, a rigid focus, an unswerving direction she could cling to. By the end of their journey, Kaiku had been urging Asara on, desperate to get to the Fold as quickly as possible and begin to assess what chances she had of avenging her family against the unassailable might of the Weavers.

And yet, though there was this general lightening of heart about her, she had closed up to Asara again, just when she was beginning to feel something like trust in her former handmaiden. Asara told herself that the release of passion in that cold, draughty room in Chaim was a demonstration of Kaiku’s decision to discard the old rules that no longer applied to her as an Aberrant, proof to herself

that she had no boundaries left; only that, and nothing more. But she had stirred something between them that refused to go away, and it hid in glances and loaded comments and darted out unexpectedly to sting the other. Kaiku was wary of Asara for another reason as well. She had never asked what had happened in that room, when Asara’s kiss turned to something more than lips and tongues, and she sought to suck the breath from Kaiku’s body; but she had sensed the danger on an instinctive level, and now she would not allow her guard down again.

Still, she was here, in the Fold. Asara had discharged her duty, an agreement taken on more than two years ago now. She felt something of a satisfaction in herself. She lounged on the warm rock, observing Kaiku’s back as she admired the vista before her and soaked in the simple glory of a summer day.

‘You have my deepest thanks, Asara,’ Cailin purred next to her. Asara was quick enough to prevent herself starting and giving away her surprise at the dark lady’s appearance. ‘You have kept her safe. She is quite a precious asset to me.’

‘I am afraid I did not do quite the job of keeping her safe that I could have done,’ Asara replied, not looking up. ‘But we have such things to tell you, Cailin.’

Cailin arched an eyebrow at her tone. ‘Really? These I must hear.’

‘Later. In private,’ Asara said. She would pick the time and place. Let Cailin be reminded that she only watched over Kaiku as a favour, not because the Red Order made her. ‘She has already started to get her
kana
under control,’ Asara added. ‘It is still wild, but not untameable. That is a rare thing, I understand.’

‘Rare indeed,’ Cailin replied, never taking her eyes off Kaiku. ‘But then, we knew she would be strong. And you have put yourself in great danger for my sake. Once again, I thank you.’

‘Not for your sake,’ Asara corrected. ‘For mine. She interests me. I have watched her lose everything, and become the thing she most despised; and I have watched her fight back and regain herself again. In my time in this world, I have seen the same loves, hates and struggles played over and again in endless monotony; but hers is a rarer story than most, and she still surprises me even now. I almost feel guilty for bringing her into your sphere of influence. You may fool her with your altruism, but not me. What are you planning, Cailin?’

‘I believe you are fond of her, Asara,’ said Cailin, a smile in her voice as she avoided the question. ‘And I thought you too cynical for such fancies.’

‘My heart and soul are not dead yet,’ Asara replied, ‘only dusty and jaded from lack of interest.’

Cailin laughed, and the sound made Kaiku turn and notice them for the first time. She walked over to them, away from the precipice.

‘I am glad to see you are a woman of your word,’ Cailin said, inclining her head in greeting. ‘Did you find what it what it was you were looking for?’

‘In a manner of speaking,’ Kaiku said, and did not elaborate.

‘The time approaches for action,’ Cailin said, studying Kaiku from within the painted red crescents over her eyes. ‘That is partly why I asked to meet you here.’

‘What kind of action?’ Kaiku demanded.

‘Soon,’ Cailin promised. ‘But first, I have some people you might like to meet.’ She waved a hand at where two newcomers were approaching along the plateau.

Mishani and Tane.

For a moment, Kaiku could not find the words to say, nor dare to think what this might mean. But then Mishani approached her, seeming strangely smaller now than before, her immense length of hair tied in a loose knot at her back, she hesitated for an instant, and then put her arms around Kaiku; and Kaiku embraced her in return. She sobbed a laugh, clutching Mishani tight to her. ‘I’m so happy you’re here,’ she said; but the last of the sentence was incomprehensible with the tightening of her throat, and the tears that fell freely from her. Cailin flashed a triumphant look at Asara, who quirked her mouth in a smile.

The two of them held each other for a long time, there in the sun. Kaiku had no idea why she had come, or what had turned her around, but she knew Mishani well enough to realise what it meant. Eventually they released each other, and Kaiku looked to Tane, who smiled awkwardly.

‘I had a little time to think,’ he said, and that was all, for Kaiku embraced him too. He looked faintly abashed by the contact, but he held her also, and was a little disappointed when she withdrew much sooner than she had with Mishani.

Kaiku wiped her eyes and smiled at Cailin, who was watching her benevolently with her deep green gaze.

‘People have a way of turning up when you least expect them to, Kaiku,’ the tall lady told her. ‘The four of you walk a braided path; your routes are intertwined, and they will cross again and again until they are done.’

‘How can you know that?’ Kaiku asked.

‘You will learn how I know,’ said Cailin. ‘If you choose to take the way of the Red Order.’

‘Is there a choice for me?’

‘Not if you want to live to see the next harvest,’ Cailin answered simply.

Kaiku demurred with a shrug. ‘So, then.’

Cailin laughed once again, throwing her head back, her white teeth flashing between the red and black of her lips. ‘I have never had an offer accepted with such poor grace. Do not be afraid, Kaiku; this is not a lifetime commitment you are making. A Sister of the Red Order is nothing if she is unwilling. All I ask is that you let me teach you; after that, you may choose your own way. Is that acceptable?’

Kaiku bowed slightly. ‘I would be honoured.’

‘Then we shall begin as soon as you are ready,’ she said.

There were three Sisters in the room apart from Cailin. All of them wore the accoutrements of their order: the black dress, the red crescents painted over their eyes, the red and black triangles on their lips like teeth. Asara found their poise uncanny, but not unnerving.

In the conference chamber of the house of the Red Order, lanterns glowed against the night, placed in free-standing brackets in the corners. The red and black motif was mirrored in the surroundings: the room was dark, its walls painted black but hung with crimson pennants and assorted other arcana. Its centrepiece was a low, round table of the same colour on which a brazier breathed scented smoke into the room. The Sisters all stood, but Asara lounged in a chair. She had digested the importance of the news she brought long ago; it amused her to watch the reactions of the Sisters now.

‘Do you trust her?’ one of the Sisters asked, a slender creature with blonde hair.

‘Implicitly,’ Asara replied. ‘I have known her for years. She would not lie; certainly not about this.’

‘And yet there is no proof,’ another pointed out.

‘Not unless any remains in her father’s apartment in Axekami,’ Asara said. ‘But I doubt that.’

Cailin bowed her head thoughtfully. ‘This bears research of our own, dear Sisters. If a single scholar can assemble enough evidence to convince himself to travel all the way to Fo for proof, to risk himself and his family…’ She trailed away.

‘We must contact our Sisters further afield,’ suggested another.

Asara raised an eyebrow. The Red Order had their ladles in more pots than anyone knew, she suspected. Though she had no clear idea of their membership, they were careful never to gather in one place in any great number. Indeed, four was the most she had ever seen together. She had gathered hints from Cailin that the Sisters were scattered all over Saramyr and beyond, engaged in hunting for new recruits like Kaiku or inveigling themselves into other organisations; but she believed there was another reason why they never congregated. They were paranoid. They knew well how fragile they were, how small their Sisterhood, and they feared extinction. While they were all connected by the Weave, there was no need to gather together, and hence no way the whole could be destroyed. Oh, she did not doubt that each of them was using their powers to further the Sisterhood, but she suspected fear was at the root. They were selfish, and sought power to stabilise themselves. The Red Order and the Weavers were not as different as Cailin would like to think.

‘There is another matter,’ Cailin pointed out. ‘The caged Aberrants Kaiku came across. What do they mean?’

‘Perhaps they are studying the effects of the witchstones on living beings. Perhaps they are searching for a cure to Aberrancy.’

‘Perhaps,’ Cailin replied. ‘Perhaps it was merely a product of their insanity. Or maybe it is a clue to something much greater.’

‘We should think on this,’ agreed one of the other Sisters.

‘But this changes nothing,’ Cailin said, her voice rising decisively. ‘Kaiku’s discovery is only a first step, a breakthrough that demands our attention. But we have other, more pressing concerns now. This can wait. We must disseminate the information and ensure it becomes spread so wide that it cannot be suppressed, we must plan and research and investigate… but all that is for the future.’ She made a sweeping gesture as if to clear it from their minds. ‘For now, we have another task. Axekami is falling apart; the city is in the midst of revolution. The Imperial Guards cannot contain it. The

armies of Blood Amacha and Blood Kerestyn squabble just outside the city. The Weave-lord Vyrrch works from within to undermine the Empress and kill her child.‘ She paused, and her eyes flicked to each of them in turn. ’This must not be allowed to happen. She is the only hope we have of turning the people of Saramyr away from the Weavers’ teachings, making them understand that Aberrants are not the evil they imagine us to be. I do not care who takes the reins of the Empire if Blood Erinima is overthrown, but I will not lose the Heir-Empress. I have met her in her dreams, and I know something of what she can do. She is too rare and powerful a creature to die on the end of some ignorant foot soldier’s blade. Perhaps Blood Erinima will emerge triumphant, but I count the chances as slim. The Empress has set herself squarely against the world. If she loses, Lucia dies.‘

‘Then what do you propose to do?’ Asara asked.

‘The plans are in place, between ourselves and the Libera Dramach, to ensure the Heir-Empress’s safety the only way we can,’ Cailin replied. ‘We propose to kidnap her.’

Twenty-Six

The door crashed inward, wrenched off its hinges with one swing of the short, heavy battering ram that two of the Imperial Guards held between them. Guard Commander Jalis led the way inside, clambering over the fallen obstacle, passing from bright daylight into the gloomy murk of the narrow stone stairway. Already a hue and cry was being raised somewhere beneath. He raced downward, the tarnished white and blue plates of his armour clinking as he descended headlong towards the basement of the tannery. The stench of the place was even worse down here than it had been in the open air, and it crowded him in and almost made him gag. He swallowed the reflex. His heart was pounding, his blood up. Behind him two cohorts of Guards were cramming down the stairway, their rifles and swords clattering. Running blind into who knew what, and none of them cared. They had found the bastards at last, and they were in no mood to go easy on them.