The Godspeaker Trilogy (173 page)

Frozen silence. The witch-men's wind died. Dexterity let go of Zandakar's arm and retreated. The wild blue flame faded. Rhian held out her hand.

“Give me that knife, Zandakar.”

She heard his stunned intake of air. “Rhian hushla —”

“ Give me the knife !”

He placed the blade in her outstretched hand. She closed her fingers round its ugly hilt and stepped back, taking her own blade-point from his throat.

“Thank you.”

The moment he'd relinquished the blade its blue flame died. It was just a knife again, not worth looking at twice. She kept her gaze fixed to his face.

“Did you burn Sun-dao with this blade?”

Slowly, he nodded. “ Zho .”

“But that's not what killed him,” said Dexterity. “On Hettie's grave, I swear it. It was the effort of reaching Jatharuj, and trying to call up that storm, then spiriting us away from Mijak's warriors before they could kill us, and then the murder of all those slaves. It was all those things, Majesty. Really, Sun-dao killed himself for us, and for Ethrea.” The strangest look flitted over his face. “He was a very brave man.”

She turned to Han. In his eyes, pain had drowned the anger. “Well?” she said. “Will you accept that as the truth?”

Han said nothing, only rested his gaze on his brother's still body. Waves slapped at the two Tzhung boats. An unsummoned breeze shivered the canvas sails. Then Tzhung-tzhungchai's emperor nodded.

“I will,” he said.

Rhian didn't dare glance at Alasdair, though she wanted to, badly. Her heart pounding so hard she felt sick, now she looked at the knife she'd taken from Zandakar.

Carved bone and forged steel, its oddly sinuous blade gleamed with a blue sheen. Its hilt was indeed ugly, carved like – like a scorpion . Horrible creature. She'd seen ugly knives before, though. This one was different. It was freezing cold in her grasp, and in her blood it sang for death.

Shuddering, she gave it back. Ignoring Alasdair's protest, the witch-men's hissing, she said, “Bring it to life again. Show me how it works.”

Zandakar turned. Pointed the knife at the boat he and Dexterity had sailed in. A thin stream of blue fire erupted from its point and struck the Tzhung vessel at its centre. A crack of sound. A flare of blue light. Blue flames rising to the stars. Then the Tzhung boat shattered in a rain of splinters and fire, hissing and dying as they struck the water.

What remained swiftly sank.

Rhian realised she'd cried out. Even Alasdair and Han had made a sound. But Zandakar was silent, and Dexterity appeared unsurprised.

She looked at him. “Mister Jones?”

“Do you remember what I told you of Garabatsas? The gauntlet Dmitrak wore? I think that gauntlet and this knife are somehow the same.”

Alasdair stepped closer, and stared at the blue-flickered blade. “Where did it come from?”

“Vortka,” said Zandakar.

Rhian frowned. “Why would he give you such a weapon?”

“I burned again in Jatharuj, Majesty,” said Dexterity. “Through me, God spoke to this priest. I don't know what I said, but I think Vortka gave Zandakar the knife because he wants to stop Mijak.”

“He didn't stop the murder of those ten thousand slaves, did he?” she snapped. “Are you certain he's going to be of any help?”

Zandakar stirred. “Vortka will try.” His fist struck his heart. “Vortka gajka .”

An odd look passed between him and Dexterity, then. “What?” said Rhian. “What haven't you told me?”

Dexterity fixed her with a clear, steady gaze. “Nothing, Majesty. Except – well – I went to Icthia with Zandakar willingly, because Hettie said I should. She said it was important. I think perhaps this knife is why.”

Hettie. Of course she's mixed up in this . Shoving her own blade back in its sheath, Rhian risked a glance at Alasdair and Han. They looked serious but not precisely disbelieving.

“Can that knife destroy Dmitrak's gauntlet?” said Alasdair.

Zandakar shrugged. “ Wei know, Alasdair king.”

“But if you had to, could you use it against him? Against your own brother?”

Silence. Then he nodded. “ Zho .”

Rhian stabbed Zandakar with another stare. “Can I trust you with it? Or should I treat you like a little boy who mustn't be left to play with knives?”

“ Tcha !” said Zandakar, insulted. “You say?”

Alasdair rested his hand on her shoulder. “She does, and so do I. If you can't control your temper, Zandakar, hand the blade back to Queen Rhian.”

“ Wei ,” said Zandakar, and shoved the scorpion knife inside his shirt. “You trust. I say.”

Rhian turned to Han. “And you. You'll not use your witch-man powers to punish him for burning Sun-dao. I grieve for your brother, Han, and for you. But if we're to defeat Mijak we must stand side by side. I am tired of saying this. And I'm tired of being ignored . You say the wind sent you to me? Then hon-our the wind .”

She watched her words strike home. Watched the last tension drain from Han's face. He raised a hand to his witch-men. They retreated, sliding back through the shadows to stand beside the boat's mast. She looked to Dexterity.

“Are you given any insights, Mister Jones? Can you say for certain what Mijak will do now?”

“Now they've brought back the trade winds? Majesty, unless Vortka performs a miracle, they'll sail. And they have so many warships. I couldn't count them all. They crowded Jatharuj harbour like salt herrings in a barrel.”

She looked at Zandakar. “How many warriors in Mijak's army, do you know?”

“Many,” he said soberly. “Thousands and thousands.”

Of course there were.

And what do we have? Half-trained soldiers with swords, who've never drawn them in anger. Farmers with pitchforks. Zandakar's knife. Han's witch-men, who it seems are limited. And a gaggle of allies who aren't allies at all. Oh, dear God.

“There's only one hope for us,” she said, and let her gaze touch all of them. “Those Mijaki warships must never reach Ethrea.”

Alasdair pulled a face. “Well yes, that would be best. But without an armada…”

“We will have an armada,” she said, defiant. “I will make the trading nations listen. I will make them give us as many ships as we need! I will not surrender Ethrea without a fight!”

“How?” he demanded. “How will you do it?”

“No more ambassadors, Alasdair. I'll make my arguments to the leaders themselves.” Heart pounding, skin slicked with sweat beneath her linen shirt and black leathers, she rounded on Han. “Will you help me?”

Han lifted an eyebrow. “Help you how?”

“Will you witch me to the courts of the trading nations' rulers, the way Sun-dao witched Dexterity and Zandakar to Jatharuj?”

Han's expression hardened. “Tzhung-tzhungchai is an empire of secrets. Would you make me the emperor who shares those secrets with the world?”

As though they were alone, as though they stood in her Long Gallery, or her gardens, or somewhere free of prying eyes, she stepped close to Han and let her gaze dwell on his smooth face.

“No. I would make you the emperor whose secrets save the world.”

Han said nothing. His dark eyes showed her nothing. He was a secret, and she could not see his heart.

She touched her fingertips to his silk sleeve. “Please, Han. I'm begging you. I can't do this alone. I need you. I need Zandakar. I need every weapon I can find.”

Overhead the stars shone, so pale. The moons threw down their thin light. Beneath their feet, beneath the Tzhung boat, the ocean danced its ancient hotas .

Han nodded. “I will help.”

J
atharuj was a charnel house after the deaths of those ten thousand slaves. Two highsuns later and the air was still rank with blood, with the stench of bodies burning to ash and splintered bone.

Numb with pain, struck dumb by guilt, Vortka sat by Hekat's side in her palace, and held her hand as she regained the strength she had poured into killing so many.

The children…the mothers…the old, sick men…

His newly-woken heart was weeping. Before those slaves came to Jatharuj, he did try to save them. He tried to help Hekat hear the god's true voice in her heart. But what he had told his son was true: Hekat's heart was full of blood and death.

She has listened to a false voice for so long, I do not know if she can hear the truth.

Mijak saw him as the god's high godspeaker but Hekat saw him as Vortka, a fellow slave, and less important than she. Always he had been forced to remind her that he too was godchosen and precious. He knew she never truly believed it. He knew she thought the god saw her first. Saw her only.

I minded, but it never mattered. It matters now.

He had failed the god.

Was I wrong to send Jones and Zandakar away? If I had shown her that burning man, if I had shown her living Zandakar, would she have listened? Or would she have danced them dead?

He did not know the answer. All he knew, to his shame, was he would rather drown in the blood of ten thousand slaves than see Zandakar murdered at his feet.

When those slaves came to Jatharuj, he could not stop Hekat from killing them. Fired at first with angry passion, she had killed and killed with a swift, sure blade. But too soon that angry strength was spent, and sacrifice swiftly turned to butchery.

At last, no longer able to bear the pitiful screams of the dying, he took out his own knife and gave those slaves a merciful death.

It is my duty, it is my scorpion wheel for tasking.

He could not kill them fast enough, so he summoned his godspeakers and together they finished what Hekat began. She stayed at the slave pens by the harbour, she would not withdraw. A shell of warriors tended her, they called it an honour. Dmitrak led them, he was not honoured, he had no choice. Hekat would not let Nagarak's son sacrifice the slaves.

It took almost two full highsuns to kill them. When it was over, Mijak's godspeakers were soaked in blood. The waters of Jatharuj harbour were turned from blue to red. Blood soaked the waiting hulls of the warships.

Half-fainting, Hekat had smiled. “Do you feel it, Vortka? Do you feel the god grow?”

Of course he had felt it, though it wasn't the god. He wanted to tell her that, he wanted to kiss her and hold her and tell her the truth. If he did that now, his blood would be spilled. He would die and the truth would die with him. He could not die now. He must live until he could make her hear it.

“I can hear the demons screaming,” she whispered. “I hear them screaming in my mind. They are defeated, they cannot conquer Hekat. I have danced my snakeblade into their hearts.”

Whatever she had done – whatever he had helped her to do – he could feel it with all his godspeaker senses. His skin was crawling, the blood burned in his veins. His eyes saw too clearly, every whisper was a shout.

Hekat laughed. “The god is pleased, Vortka. You and I have pleased the god.”

No. They had pleased the thing that was not a god at all. The thing godspeakers had created in panic, by mistake. A thing of ravenous hunger, whose appetite for blood could never be sated. In seeking to save themselves, in that sinning time spoken of in the high godspeaker histories, so long ago now it was all but forgotten…those frightened godspeakers had set in motion Mijak's doom.

I am the only godspeaker living who knows Mijak's true god. The true god of Mijak spoke to me in flames, with love.

And how he would ever convince Hekat of that, he did not begin to know.

Aieee, god, you must help me, you must show me the way.

Kneeling beside Hekat at the slave pens by the harbour, his nostrils clogged with the foul stench of death, surrounded by warriors and godspeakers and Dmitrak, he could not tell her that what she worshipped was a lie.

“Yes, Hekat,” he said, despairing. “Mijak's bloodthirsty god is pleased.”

Lowsun on that second day of slaughter was approaching. Dmitrak carried his mother back to her palace, she did not complain. She was silent. Asleep.

Because he was Vortka high godspeaker, he had stayed by the harbour while the burning of the dead slaves began. Then he washed the blood from his skin and his scorpion pectoral and returned to the palace, to see how Hekat fared.

“High godspeaker,” said Dmitrak, in Hekat's private chamber. “All the demons are dead. How soon before the trade winds blow in Icthia?”

Hekat was sleeping. Vortka took Dmitrak by the arm and guided him onto the balcony, so their voices would not wake her.

“I do not know, warlord.”

Dmitrak's face was twisted with ugliness. “You are high godspeaker, and you know so little. You did not want Hekat to kill those slaves. You said the god did not want their blood. Why did you say that? Why do you say the god does not want the world?”

He stared at Nagarak's son, unyielding. “I am Vortka high godspeaker. I do not answer to you.”

“Hekat is weak, Vortka,” said Dmitrak, he smiled like a wolf. “Every highsun she grows weaker. Every highsun you heal her, you cannot heal her forever. I am the warlord, I will be emperor. When I am emperor you will answer to me. You are loved by Hekat. You were loved by Zandakar. Vortka high godspeaker, you are not loved by me.”

Dmitrak was a dangerous man. Only one man breathing had the power to stop him. If Dmitrak knew his brother was alive he would swim to Ethrea so he might kill him. He would kill Zandakar with his bare hands and teeth.

“Warlord, you do not need to love me,” he said. “You need to obey me, for I am the high godspeaker. My scorpion pectoral kisses wicked, sinning men. It kisses them to death, warlord. You have been warned.”

Dmitrak had hissed, then, and stormed from Hekat's palace. Vortka stood on the balcony and watched him stride down the street, far below. He was an enemy, there was no friendship there.

Feeling empty, feeling wicked, feeling sick from the stink of death hanging over Jatharuj, he'd returned to Hekat's bedside to pour his healing power into her, and wait for her to wake.

Two highsuns passed. And as he waited for Hekat to stir from her long sleep, fear gnawed his bones. What if she never listened to his truths? Did that mean he should let her die? Would he save the world from Mijak if he let its empress die?