Sacred Fire

Chapter 14

The bells of the Temple sounded a carillon the moment the sun’s lip rose above the waters of Lake Istar. It was a delicate melody, and beautiful, and for a moment it made Cathan’s heart lurch with fear; he froze in mid- step, glancing back over his shoulder, toward the crystal dome that rose above the Lordcity’s rooftops. Even now, Beldinas would be in the basilica, leading the morning prayers. The clergy were there, too, and the masters of the city. In other times, more innocent days, he would have gone to the ceremony as well, but now he couldn’t stomach the thought. The bells were a clangor to his ears, and the loveliness of the Temple was to his mind as forbidding as a tomb.

He thought of the dream he’d had in the Garden last night, of the burning hammer falling toward the city. He understood it, now. It was the god’s wrath; about that, the Kingpriest had been right. But he’d been mistaken about its purpose. They all were mistaken. And now they were almost out of time.

He turned around, looked back down the street. He was in the city’s north quarter, the Hill of Lords. Here the boulevards ran spear-straight, lined with flowering trees, past the sprawling manors of Istar’s wealthy. The homes were walled, their gates watched by armed guards, their courtyards wide and lushly appointed. Each was larger and grander than the last: here was another wing, a bigger atrium, taller columns on the front portico. None could touch the imperial manse for sheer grandeur, of course, but in other realms some of these houses could have been the palaces of kings.

Wentha wasn’t the richest woman in Istar, but she was close. Her manor stood near the hill’s crest, on a rocky outcrop that gave an impressive view of city, Temple, and lake: On a clear day one could see the far shore, and the great foundries of Bronze Kautilya. Today mist clung to the water, obscuring it not far beyond the harbor’s breakwater. The guards-bare-chested Seldjuki warriors, each of whom could have picked Cathan up with one hand, and who carried fantastically curved sabers the size of barge-poles-saw him coming, and nodded their shaven heads, parting without a word. The silver gates opened, and he stepped into the cool of the Weeping Lady’s grounds.

There were many fountains in Wentha’s garden; she’d acquired a taste for them, and had spent a small fortune in amassing them here. Everywhere Cathan looked, there was a spray, a jet, a glittering shower. The centerpieces were warriors and maidens, dolphins and sea dragons, capering satyrs and beautiful nymphs. And there-here, of all places-was even one with the Lightbringer himself standing in its midst, tall and beautiful as he once had been. There was no trace of madness, no sign of fear in his face. It made Cathan sad to see it.

The manor had seven steps, a broad flight leading to doors of rich-grained vallenwood inlaid with gold and onyx. Those doors alone had cost more than his and Wentha’s whole village had been worth, back in Taol. Another time, he would have felt a surge of pride at his sister’s prosperity. Now, though, he barely paused on the top step to lave his hands in a golden bowl before going in.

His hands were on the doors when they opened of their own accord, and there was his sister, standing in the shadowy cool of the atrium, another fountain bubbling behind her. She was dressed for the day in a gown of crimson samite, with a necklace of blood-red jasper around her throat-her own protection against the thought-readers. She smiled when she saw him, but even her beauty couldn’t break the pall that had settled on his heart.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, her brows knitted. “Has something-oh,” She bowed her head. “You saw it, didn’t you? Fan-ka-tso.”

Cathan nodded. “He showed me. Why didn’t you just tell me yourself that he’s turned on the gods of light?”

“Would you have believed me if I had?”

He thought about that, and shook his head. “Will you help us, then?” she asked.

“Yes,” he replied, and glanced over his shoulder. There was no one around; even the manor’s guards were hidden by the trees of the garden. Even so, he felt strangely exposed, vulnerable. This was no place to plot sedition.

“Let me in, Blossom,” he said. “There is something else I must tell you first.”

Tancred was the last to arrive, and found the rest of his family in an open-air dining hall at the heart of Wentha’s manor. Jewel-colored dragonflies hummed over a pool in one corner, and blossoming lemon trees filled the air with their scent. Cathan sat at a table of polished blue-gray marble, with Wentha on one side and Rath on the other. They all looked at Tancred, their faces grim.

“Shut the door,” Wentha said.

He did. “I’m sorry I took so long to answer your summons,” Tancred said, smoothing his vestments. “The dawn-calling was longer this morning than usual. His Holiness was in a particularly sacred mood.”

Rath chuckled a little, but Wentha cut him off with a look.

“Sit,” Wentha bade. “Your uncle has something to say.”

He got himself a drink first, pouring water and wine in a jeweled goblet. He sat, took a sip, and looked at Cathan-or tried to look at Cathan, without actually meeting his searing eyes. “So, you’ve made up your mind. About time.”

“Hush;” Rath said.

Tancred’s eyebrows rose at his brother’s seriousness, “What’s happened?”

“Yes.” Wentha looked at Cathan. “Tell them what you told me.”

Cathan took a deep breath. “I spoke with Beldinas last night, at the Hall of Sacrilege, He told me everything. What he hopes to do, to rid the world of evil once and for all.”

The brothers exchanged worried looks. Cathan looked down at his hands, folded on the table. Wentha shut her eyes as if wracked by pain. Rath and Tancred leaned forward, their troubled expressions so identical it was almost funny.

“His Holiness,” Cathan said, “means to command the gods.”

“What?” Tancred asked. “Command them? Surely you mean-”

“I mean command. He has asked them to remove the darkness from the world. He has cajoled, pleaded, begged. None of it has worked. He still sees evil wherever he looks. Hence the thought- readers. Hence Fan-ka-tso. So now, he intends to demand it of them, to force the gods to do his will.”

Rath laughed aloud. “That’s folly! No man has ever commanded the gods. No man can.”

Cathan didn’t answer. Wentha put a hand to her forehead.

“Can he?” Rath asked.

“He’s done it once already,” Cathan said. “When he brought me back from death. Now he means to try again.”

“But how?” Tancred asked. “And why hasn’t he done it already, if it’s within his power?”

“It isn’t within his power. Or at least, he isn’t certain how he did it, the first time. But he thinks he’s found a way, something that will reveal the secret he seeks. The Peripas Mishakas.”

Rath spread his hands. “The Disks of Mishakal? But there are transcriptions of them everywhere. The monks in the sacred chancery are making new copies all the time. If that’s all he needs, then why-? ”

“You assume the transcriptions are complete,” Tancred said.

Everyone looked at him-Rath in startlement, Wentha with pride at his knowledge, Cathan with sorrow. “That is correct, Tancred,” Cathan said. “Beldinas thinks the lost chapters of the Disks hold the key. He believes the way to recapture what he did when he resurrected me lies within their pages. And so, he wants me to accompany him to the Vaults of the Kingpriests, to recover the true Disks, the originals scribed by the gods themselves.”

“But the Vaults are sealed,” Tancred said. “No man may enter them and live. So it is written.”

“Not quite,” Wentha murmured.

Cathan smiled, but without mirth. “The ban on the Vaults says that no living man may enter,” he said. “That’s where I come in.”