rule, one law, one Empire spanning both shores of the Ruling Sea, and you at its apex. I am making your dream a reality, Macadra. But to complete it I need the Chathrand awhile longer-and the Nilstone.”
Macadra smiled, venomous. “Of course you do.”
Arunis held up the parchment. “This is no mirage,” he said. “Take it, read it.”
The black man leaned forward. “That’s a Carsa Carsuria. An Imperial decree.”
“Give me a new crew for the Great Ship,” said Arunis. “A dlomic crew, with a dlomic captain. The humans nearly destroyed her on the first crossing. They allowed her to be infested with rats and ixchel. They let a lone Mzithrini gunship come close to sinking her. They should never have been trusted with such a vessel. Take this to Bali Adro City. Make your slave-Emperor sign it, and dispatch a crew to Masalym with all possible haste.”
“Don’t, Macadra!” hissed the stocky woman. “He’ll just slip away again! Don’t let him!”
Arunis closed his eyes a moment. “Your servants prattle like children. I have no desire to slip away. Indeed I hoped to persuade you to sail with me. You could be of great help with the Red Storm-I know how intensely you have studied it, Macadra-and besides, you could keep your eye on the Stone.”
The black man laughed. “Sail with him on the Chathrand. Just walk aboard that spell-ridden hulk, straight into his lair.”
“With a crew that answers to your Emperor,” said Arunis. “As for the humans: simply hold them in Masalym until the charm breaks and the Shaggat returns to life. After that they are of no consequence.”
Still Macadra did not reach for the parchment. “We help you cross the Ruling Sea again,” she said. “We guide you through the time-trap of the Storm, and let you take your Shaggat to Gurishal. He rallies his worshippers, leads them into a doomed but damaging civil war inside the Mzithrin. And when the Mzithrin stands gasping and wounded over the corpse of the Shaggat’s rebellion, their old foe Arqual strikes them from behind, presumably-”
“Unquestionably,” said Arunis. “Their monarch dreams of it night and day.”
“As well he should!” shouted Macadra. “That is where your plan collapses. It will take us two decades to build a fleet that could brave the Nelluroq and seize the Northern world. How do you propose to keep the Arqualis from using that time to make a fortress of those lands?”
For a moment Arunis looked at her in silence. Then he took her arm and drew her toward the tavern door, not far from where Orfuin sat glumly, the little animal flickering in and out of sight beside his feet. Looking back to make sure the others had not followed, Arunis murmured into her ear.
“What?” screamed Macadra, breaking violently away. “Are you joking, mage, or have you taken leave of your senses?”
“Come,” said Arunis. “Don’t pretend it’s not the solution you’ve been hunting for. The South is free of humans already, unless you count the degenerate tol-chenni. This will merely finish the job.”
“It would finish far more than humankind,” she said. “You cannot control such a force!”
“I can,” said Arunis. “Through the Nilstone, and the puppet we call the Shaggat Ness. Help me, Macadra. I know the Ravens wish it done.”
Macadra stared at the parchment. “You speak as though we were devils.”
“That is what you are,” said Orfuin.
He rose, startling them all. “The bar is closed. I will give you two minutes to conclude your business here.”
The four mages gaped at him. “You can’t mean it,” said the black man, smiling uncertainly. “You’re famous for your neutrality, old man.”
“That and my gingerbread,” said Orfuin, “and precious little else. Goodbye, Arunis. Plot your holocaust elsewhere.”
He clapped his hands sharply. At once several dozen tiny figures, shorter even than ixchel, emerged from the vines with brooms and began sweeping the terrace before the arch. The guests within the tavern slammed down their mugs and rose, shuffling for the exits as though obeying some irresistible command. The little yddek scurried across the terrace and flung itself into the night.
“This is unprecedented,” said Arunis, “and if I may say so, unwise.”
Orfuin shrugged. “Neutral or not, the club is my own.”
“But we have nowhere else to meet!” said Macadra.
“Then you have nowhere to meet.”
He entered the bar and began snuffing lights. Stoman, face twisting with fury, stamped dead one of the tiny sweepers; the rest fled back into the vines. One by one, like wary dogs, the tables and chairs slid of their own accord through the archway. The wind grew suddenly louder. The four figures stood alone.
“Devils in this life,” said Arunis, looking only at Macadra, “but in the next something else altogether.”
He held out the parchment. Macadra met his gaze, snarled, and took it from his hand. She placed it inside her dress and raised her arms.
“Do not think us fools, sorcerer. We will send you a crew indeed! And when your work is done the Nilstone will return to the Ravens.”
“When my work is done I shall not need it,” said Arunis.
Somewhere a door slammed shut. Then the archway became a wall, and the vines closed in like scaly curtains, and suddenly there was nothing beneath their feet but the roaring immensity of the darkness, cold and mighty as a vertical river, bearing them away from one another and toward the lee shore of their dreams.
Brothers and Blood
22 Ilbrin 941
221st day from Etherhorde
Introductions were strained. The two younger sfvantskors had some Arquali, learned in preparation for Treaty Day; Cayer Vispek spoke barely a word. Pazel, on the other hand, spoke Mzithrini better than his sister. Vispek and Jalantri listened with open suspicion.
“You say you learned such diction, such grace with our tongue… from books?” the elder sfvantskor demanded.
Pazel glanced uneasily at Neda. “That’s how it started,” he said.
“It’s the truth, Cayer,” said Neda. “Pazel is a natural scholar. He taught himself Arquali by the time he was eight. Other languages, too. But they were mostly just nonsense from his grammar books, until our birth-mother cast the spell.”
“The one that changed him, but not you,” said Jalantri.
Neda shrugged, dropping her eyes. “It gave me white hair for three months.”
Cayer Vispek shook his head in wonder. “And made him able to collect languages as easily as a boy puts marbles in a bag.”
“Not that easily,” Pazel objected.
Neda sat between her brother sfvantskors and looked at Pazel much as they did, with doubt that was nearly accusation. Of course Pazel was shocked to learn that she had become a sfvantskor. But how much greater had her shock been! During the invasion of Ormael she had watched Arquali marines beat him senseless, while their fellow soldiers rampaged through the family house, smashing everything they could not eat or slip in their pockets. Five years later, hidden by a mask, she had seen Pazel with Thasha Isiq: daughter of the very admiral who led the invasion.
Every Mzithrini youth learned to hate Arqualis. There were reasons of history, war stories from uncles and teachers, scars on temple walls. But few of Neda’s age had as many reasons as she.
Nine of those reasons had crowded into a single hour. Nine reasons who had dragged her screaming into a barn.
Now her brother served those same Arqualis-cared for them, loved them maybe. Neda had known about him since the morning of Treaty Day, more than four months ago. But the thought still made her want to scream.
For she too had spoken but part of the truth. Her mother’s spell had done more than change the color of her hair. It was an augmentation hex; it took an innate gift, whatever one was naturally best at, and strengthened it a
