demean his blood as to use the banners of one of the Lesser Chosen?'
Aurum fixed Vennel with a baleful eye. This is no time for blood pride, my Lord. Have I to remind you once more of what is at stake? Pomp will be fatal to our mission: the lack of it, to our speed. If we take the leftway as ourselves all the world will soon know what transpires in Osrakum. Only under the banners of another might we hope to pass unnoticed.'
'If the Great Ones might allow me to interject…?' said the Legate, making vague gestures of apology. Suth asked for his words with his hand.
'I intended to lend the Great Ones the banners of my state.'
'And your cyphers?' asked Suth.
'Indeed, Great Lord, those would be essential. The Great Ones would be concealed if they were carried in palanquins. Then they could use the leftway. My duties oftentimes take me inland into the heart of the Naralan, as far as the city of Maga-Naralante, so such a party would excite little notice or question. Beyond Maga-Naralante' – he lowered his head – 'matters might be more difficult.'
Suth nodded and looked at the other Masters. 'I find this idea to have merit.'
Vermel's face was like freshly fallen snow. 'Will My-Lord-who-goes-before accept the responsibility for such an action before the Wise?'
'He will,' said Suth.
'Very well. I shall bow to your will expressed. Now I shall retire. My Lords.' He gave a curt bow, slipped his mask elegandy over his face, then turned to go down the steps. Carnelian watched him sink into the platform's edge like a ship into the horizon.
The Legate moved quickly to the top of the stairs and called after Vennel, 'Any slave you find beyond the door, Great One, will be able to guide you to your chambers.'
'You should go too, Carnelian,' said Suth, 'to make sure the household is set in order for my coming.'
Carnelian stood looking at him, resenting the dismissal, but he could think of no way to defy it.
'As my Lord commands,' he said and put on his mask.
From the platform's brink the steps looked perilously steep. He gazed out across the cavernous space. The lanterns on the floor were undulating bands of light over the walls. He could see the raised walkways that led to the door, and the audience pits on either side. He began descending.
When he reached the foot of the stairway he looked back up but he could see nothing of the Masters, only the window's glow. The murmur of their talk was like the rumble of a distant storm.
Up ahead, Vennel was passing under one of the tower lanterns. Sections of its shaft moved round, turning its rays like spokes. Carnelian began to follow him along the walkway on the journey to the door.
In token of his deafening, the slave's ears had been shorn off. The Legate's cypher, a sheaf of reeds, had been cut into the man's face and traditional tattoo-blue had been used to fill the scar channels. He had been loitering with others beyond the door. Carnelian had to show him the chameleon glyphs on the lining of his sleeve to indicate where he wanted to go. The slave's eyes flickered in the swathe of blue stain as they followed Carnelian's hand-speech. He must have understood for he lit a lantern and, cringing, beckoned Carnelian to follow him into the darkness.
Carnelian followed the small figure through a bewildering series of chambers whose frescoed walls gleamed faintly in the dark. After much walking they came to a hall into which fell shafts of red light regularly spaced off into the distance. Along the left-hand wall Carnelian could just see the archways staring blindly with their Lordly warding eyes. Within the nearest archway was a stone door, bronze-riveted, with niches empty on either side, presumably for guardsmen.
Accompanied by echoes, they walked past several doors until they came to one where the crescents of Vennel's banners told of his presence somewhere beyond.
Some men came out from the niches with their sickles. The cypher gashed across their faces made them seem in awful mirth but their real mouths gave a different impression. Carnelian rushed by, even as they began prostrations, relieved to see his own House colours further down the hall.
'Master,' came a cry of relief from up ahead. Then figures came rushing at him, dappled red, their faces becoming familiar in the light of the slave's lantern. His men surrounded him, bobbing, touching the hem of his cloak. They spoke all at once and grinned and frowned alternately.
'Be quiet,' said Carnelian. 'Come on, quieten down. Do you want to embarrass me?'
The life went right out of them. They became so still, it alarmed him. The Legate's slave was gaping slack- eyed. He dismissed him before turning to his men. 'Don't worry, I'm not angry.' Their shoulders had a subservient hunching he did not like. 'Let's get indoors.'
They led him off to an arch and wrestled its door open. Some light spilled through, and something of the familiar smell of home. More of his people shuffled out to welcome him. Carnelian spotted Crail there among them, squinting, searching for something. When their eyes met, the old man's face scrunched up into a crooked frown. Carnelian dropped his mask into his hand and glared at him.
'You were told to stay hidden. Out of harm's way.'
The man scowled at him. Carnelian laughed. He took the old man's head between his hands and kissed it. There was a murmur of approval. The old man's smell was so familiar he wanted to hug him. Instead, he pushed him gently away.
He noticed Keal standing there behind the others, trying to hide uncertainty, and gave him a smile. 'Glad to see that you survived.'
Keal rewarded him with a grin. 'Many times I thought we'd sink.'
There were mutters of assent.
'In the future, let's try and avoid the sea,' Carnelian said.
Many of them beamed and nodded. Keal pushed his way through. The Master?' 'He'll be here soon and sent me ahead. Is everything ready?'
Keal grinned again, pointed at the arch's wards. These are proper Masters' rooms.' He reached out to caress his hand up the jamb, and Carnelian saw where the veined marble had been clumsily painted with the chameleon glyph. 'I did it myself.'
'Neatly done,' said Carnelian, wanting to be kind. He warmed when the other flushed.
Keal indicated the banners, somewhat crumpled from the journey, their poles locked into bronze rings near the door. He reached out tentatively, took Carnelian's arm and drew him through the arch.
The faces inside looked at Carnelian as if he were a fire in winter. Braziers had been lit. The balms the Master preferred were spiralling perfumed smoke up into the vault. Chameleoned blue canopies had been hung up to muffle the echoes. Mosaics had been polished. From somewhere they had managed to get bunches of irises and had sunk their purples and blues in vases of gold.
'It feels like home,' said Carnelian loudly, meaning it, enjoying their smiles. He turned to Keal. 'Where's Tain?'
'He's coming up with the rest of the baggage.' Carnelian nodded. 'Have I a room of my own?'
'Certainly you have, Carnie. I'll show you where it is.'
Keal left him. Malachite patterned the walls with the green of ferns in a dark wood. Smooth doors whispered open with a cinnamon waft. There were several chambers. One had a window paned with alabaster that softly lit a sleeping platform draped with feather blankets. In another, water ran waist high in a channel from which various sinks could be filled. In that chamber the floor was incised with runnels.
Back in the sleeping chamber, Carnelian discovered shutters and folded them back. Warm green-scented air seeped in. The purple vein-oranged sky made his eyes water. He fitted his face into his mask and stepped out onto the balcony. The balustrade was still warm but he dropped the mask when he found that the balcony was deep in shadow. It was an eyrie looking south. Half in shadow, the valley he had seen from the sea stepped its green terraces down from blue distance. Nearer, limes faded into dusty brown. Nearer still, a swathe of mudflats ran to a crisp edge of indigo sea. A causeway curving like the wingbone of a bird crossed the lagoon and wound the road it carried up into the terraces. Here it was already spring.
A sound from the chamber made him go back in. Tain stood by the door, panting, leaning back under the weight of a trunk his arms barely managed to embrace. Ointment boxes hung from cords around his neck. Clothes tubes were strapped to his back like quivers. He gave a thin smile, then looked alarmed, bent sharply over as a tube slipped from his shoulder. He managed to catch its strap in the hook of his elbow as Carnelian rushed
