Darkness Descending

die, while he forgot himself one piece at a time . . . He shuddered. And he was woolgathering again, this time about woolgathering.

Vexed, he gave the answer that should have come sooner: “If the powers above were kind, we would watch from the north until the last Algarvian and the last Unkerlanter beat in each other’s heads with clubs.” His shrug was mournful. “Life is seldom so convenient as we would wish.”

“There, your Excellency, you touch on a great and mysterious truth, one that holds even for kings,” Shazli said. He got to his feet, a sign he had given Hajjaj all the time he intended to spare today.

Grunting, his knees clicking, the foreign minister also rose and bowed to the king. As kings went these days, Shazli was a good sort: not a sharp-tempered martinet like Mezentio, much less a tyrant fearful of his own shadow like Swemmel. But then, the clan chiefs of Zuwayza ceded fewer powers to their kings than did the Algarvian nobles, while the old Unkerlanter nobility, these days, was largely deceased, replaced by upstarts. Swemmel had so much power because no one around him had any.

After formal farewells that used up another quarter of an hour, Hajjaj made his way through the corridors of the palace to the foreign ministry. The building was as cool a place as any in Bishah: its thick walls of sun-dried brick could challenge even the Zuwayzi climate.

“Nothing new to report to you, your Excellency,” Hajjaj’s secretary Qutuz said when the foreign minister poked his head into his office.

“I thank you,” Hajjaj replied. He eyed Qutuz, a solid professional, with a wariness he hoped he kept covert. He’d trusted the man’s predecessor, who’d proved to be in the pay of Unkerlant. No matter how well his new secretary performed, Hajjaj knew he would be far slower in warming to him, if he ever did. He said, “So long as things are quiet, I think I shall knock off early for the afternoon. Would you be so good as to summon my driver?”

“Of course, your Excellency,” Qutuz said. Before long, Hajjaj’s carriage was rolling up a narrow, twisting road into the hills above Bishah. Houses perched here were young fortresses, dating back to the days when any clan’s hand was likely to be raised against its neighbor.

Hajjaj’s home was no exception to the rule. Back in the days before mages learned to liberate great blasts of sorcerous energy, it could have stood siege for months. Even now, his large household included gate guards; no telling when some local lord might try to settle a score that had simmered, unavenged but unforgotten, for half a dozen generations.

After the guards let the carriage roll through the entranceway, Hajjaj’s major-domo Tewfik came waddling up to meet him. “Hello there, young fellow,” Tewfik said, bowing to Hajjaj. He was the only man alive entitled to greet the foreign minister thus. He had been in the household longer than Hajjaj had been alive. Hajjaj thought he was about eighty-five, but he might have been older. As surely as Hajjaj ran Zuwayza’s foreign affairs, Tewfik ran Hajjaj s domestic ones.

Returning the majordomo’s bow, Hajjaj asked, “And how are things here?”

“Well enough, lord,” Tewfik answered with another creaking bow of his own; his back didn’t bend very far these days. “Peaceful, one might even say, now that that woman is no longer here.”

That woman, Lalla, had until recently been Hajjaj’s juniormost wife: a pretty amusement with whom to while away some time every now and then. She’d become an increasingly willful and expensive amusement. Finally, to the relief of everyone else in the household, she’d become too expensive and willful for Hajjaj to stand anymore, and he’d sent her back to her own clanfather. Formerly respected for her position, she’d become that woman in the blink of an eye.

Tewfik said, “The lady Kolthoum will be glad to see you, your Excellency.”

“And I, of course, am always glad to see my senior wife,” Hajjaj answered. “Why don’t you run along ahead and let her know I will attend her shortly?”

“Aye.” And off Tewfik went, not running but plenty spry for a man of his years. Hajjaj followed more slowly through the buildings and courtyards and gardens that filled the space within the household’s outer wall. Kolthoum would be irked if he didn’t give her enough time to prepare herself and to ready refreshments for him.

When he did step into her chamber, she was waiting with tea and wine and cakes, as he’d known she would be. He embraced her and gave her a peck on the lips. They rarely slept together these days, the scrawny diplomat and his large, comfortable wife, but they were unfailingly fond of each other. Kolthoum understood him better than anyone else alive, save possibly Tewfik.

“Is it well?” she asked him, as usual cutting straight to the heart of things.