To die, only to return, is to never escape. Never escaped… anything.
Wounds closing, he had lifted himself up, onto his hand and knees, still gripping the cursed sword, the weapon that would not let go. Weeping, drawing in ragged breaths, h crawled towards the throne, sagging down once more whe: he reached the dais.
Nisall had stepped out from where she had hidden moments earlier. Her mind was numb-the suicide of he king-her lover-and the Eunuch, Nifadas-the shocks one upon another in this terrible throne room, the deaths, tumbling like crowded gravestones in a flooded field Triban Gnol, ever the pragmatist, knelt before the new Emperor, pledging his service with the ease of an eel sliding under a new rock. The First Consort had been witness, well, but she could not see Turudal Brizad now, as Rhulad, hlood-wet coins gleaming, twisted round on the step and bared his teeth at Hannan Mosag.
‘Not yours,’ he said in a rasp.
‘Rhulad-’
‘Emperor! And you, Hannan Mosag, are my Ceda… Warlock King no longer. My Ceda, yes.’
‘Your wife-’
‘Dead. Yes.’ Rhulad lifted himself onto the dais, then lose, staring now at the dead Letherii king, Ezgara Diskanar. Then he reached out with his unburdened hand, grasped the front of the king’s brocaded tunic, and dragged the corpse from the throne, letting it fall to one side, head crunching on the tiled floor. A shiver seemed to rack through Rhulad. Then he sat on the throne and looked out, eyes settling once more on Hannan Mosag. ‘Ceda,’ he said, ‘in this, our chamber, you will ever approach us on your belly, as you do now.’
From the shadows at the far end of the throne room there came a phlegmatic cackle.
Rhulad flinched, then said, ‘Now you will leave us, Ceda. And take that hag Janall and her son with you.’
‘Emperor, please, you must understand-’
‘Get out!’
The shriek jarred Nisall, and she hesitated, fighting the urge to flee, to get away from this place. From the court, from the city, from everything.
Then his free hand snapped out and without turning he said to her, ‘Not you, whore. You stay.’
Whore. ‘That term is inappropriate,’ she said, then stiffened in fear, surprised by her own temerity.
He fixed feverish eyes on her. Then, incongruously, he waved dismissively and spoke with sudden weariness. ‘Of course. We apologize. Imperial Concubine…’ His glittering fece twisted in a half-smile. ‘Your king should have taken you as well. He was being selfish, or perhaps his love for you was so dleep that he could not bear inviting you into death.’
She said nothing, for, in truth, she had no answer to give him.
‘Ah, we see the doubt in your eyes. Concubine, you have our sympathy. Know that we will not use you cruelly.’ He fell silent then, as he watched Hannan Mosag drag himself back across the threshold of the chamber’s grand entrance-way. A half-dozen more Tiste Edur had appeared, tremulous in their furtive motions, their uncertainty at what they were witnessing. A hissed command from Hannan Mosag sent two into the room, each one drawing up the burlap over the mangled forms of Janall and Quillas, her son. The sound as they dragged the two flesh-filled sacks from the chamber was, to Nisall’s ears, more grisly than anything else she had yet heard on this fell day.
‘At the same time,’ the Emperor went on after a moment, ‘the title and its attendant privileges… remain, should you so desire.’
She blinked, feeling as if she was standing on shifting sand. ‘You free me to choose, Emperor?’
A nod, the bleary, red-shot eyes still fixed on the chamber’s entranceway. ‘Udinaas,’ he whispered. ‘Betrayer. You… you were not free to choose. Slave-my slave-I should never have trusted the darkness, never…’ He flinched once more on the throne, eyes suddenly glittering. ‘He comes.’
She had no idea whom he meant, but the raw emotion in his voice frightened her anew. What more could come on this terrible day?
Voices outside, one of them sounding bitter, then diffident.
She watched as a Tiste Edur warrior strode into the throne room. Rhulad’s brother. One of them. The one who had left Rhulad lying on the tiles. Young, handsome in that way of the Edur-both alien and perfect. She tried to recall if she had heard his name-
‘Trull,’ said the Emperor in a rasp. ‘Where is he? Where is Fear?’
‘He has… left.’
‘Left? Left us?’
‘Us. Yes, Rhulad-or do you insist I call you Emperor?’
Expressions twisted across Rhulad’s coin-studded face, one after another, then he grimaced and said, ‘You left me, too, brother. Left me bleeding… on the floor. Do you think yourself different from Udinaas? Less a betrayer than my Letherii slave?’
‘Rhulad, would that you were my brother of old-’
‘The one you sneered down upon?’
‘If it seemed I did that, then I apologize.’
‘Yes, you see the need for that now, don’t you?’
Trull Sengar stepped forward. ‘It’s the sword, Rhulad. It is cursed-please, throw it away. Destroy it. You’ve won the throne now, you don’t need it any more-’
‘You are wrong.’ He bared his teeth, as if sickened by self-hatred. ‘Without it I am just Rhulad, youngest son of Tomad. Without the sword, brother, I am nothing.’
Trull cocked his head. ‘You have led us to conquest. I will stand beside you. So will Binadas, and our father. You have won that throne, Rhulad-you need not fear Hannan Mosag-’
‘That miserable worm? You think me frightened of him?’ The sword-tip made a snapping sound as its point jumped free of the tiles. Rhulad aimed the weapon at Trull’s chest. ‘I am the Emperor!’
‘No, you’re not,’ Trull replied. ‘Your sword is Emperor-your sword and the power behind it.’
‘Liar!’ Rhulad shrieked.
Nisall saw Trull flinch back, then steady himself. ‘Prove it.’
The Emperor’s eyes widened.
‘Shatter the sword-Sister’s blessing, just let it fall from your hand. Even that, Rhulad. Just that. Let it fall!’
‘No! I know what you want, brother! You will take it-I see you tensed, ready to dive for it-I see the truth!’ The weapon was shuddering between them, as if eager for blood, anyone’s blood.
Trull shook his head. ‘I want it shattered, Rhulad.’
‘You cannot stand at my side,’ the Emperor hissed. ‘Too close-there is betrayal in your eyes-you left me! Crippled on the floor!’ He raised his voice. ‘Where are my warriors? Into the chamber! Your Emperor commands it!’
A half-dozen Edur warriors suddenly appeared, weapons out.
‘Trull,’ Rhulad whispered. ‘I see you have no sword. Now it is for you to drop your favoured weapon, your spear. And your knives. What? Do you fear I will slay you? Show me the trust you claim in yourself. Guide me with your honour, brother.’
She did not know it then; she did not understand enough of the Edur way of life, but she saw something in Trull’s face, a kind of surrender, but a surrender that was far more complicated, fraught, than simply disarming himself there before his brother. Levels of resignation, settling one upon another, the descent of impossible burdens-and the knowledge shared between the two brothers, of what such a surrender signified. She did not realize at the time what Trull’s answer would mean, the way it was done, not in his own name, not for himself, but for Fear. Fear Sengar, more! than anyone else. She did not realize, then, the immensity’ of his sacrifice, as he unslung his spear and let it clatter to, the tiles; as he removed his knife belt and threw it to one side.
There should have been triumph in Rhulad’s tortured eyes, then, but there wasn’t. Instead, a kind of confusion clouded his gaze, made him shy away, as if seeking help. His attention found and focused upon the six warriors, and he gestured with the sword and said in a broken voice, ‘Trull Sengar is to be Shorn. He will cease to exist, for ourself, for all Edur. Take him. Bind him. Take him away.’
Neither had she realized what that judgement, that deci-sion, had cost Rhulad himself.
Free to choose, she had chosen to remain, for reasons she could not elucidate even in her own mind. Was there pity?
