He was facing his own work, the frieze of the Twelve Bright Ones. He found it unsatisfying. Nowadays he always used models. Back then he had been content to rely on invention, and now the results seemed bland and unconvincing. Holy Veslih stood out from all the rest because She bore a strong resemblance to Ingeld herself— gorgeous, slender, vibrant, like a living flame. He had improved on Odok by combining copper luster with gold to achieve a closer match to robes and hair, and so far the results seemed to be stable. Holy Weru had a look of Bloodlord Stralg as he had been on that frightful morning outside Celebre, fifteen years ago. A few other faces were vaguely recognizable.
His gaze settled on holy Eriander. The temple displayed the god-goddess as an obscene combination of the sexes, a repulsive collage of organs. Benard had depicted a hermaphrodite youth, draped, taller than the women and shorter than the men. No one had objected to this innovation, even High Priest Nrakfin, and the statue in the Pantheon would be done the same way. The face ... Knowing no hermaphrodites, Benard must have invented those ambiguous features, and yet they were annoyingly familiar. He was still trying to remember who might have inspired them when his eyelids became too heavy to stay open any longer.
nine
INGELD NARSDOR
preferred to practice pyromancy at night, with sparks and voices twining upward to the stars above the hypnotic thunder of drums. Then the Daughters became swirling pillars of flame in their dance around the hearth, while glowing coals flickered myriad images. The ritual lacked the same drama in daylight, yet today's images had been unusually clear. Any fool could see pictures in a fire; the god-given skill of the pyromancer was to know which pictures mattered, to tease out divine resolve from the infinity of the possible.
The seers claimed that all prophecy was vain because the gods could not be bound. There was some truth in that, and at times Ingeld thought she could watch sixty-sixty futures dancing, as if the Bright Ones debated their plans in a vast divine committee. But the Maynists were not entirely correct, for Veslihans never claimed to see beyond their own realms. The peasant wife muttering prayers to her cooking fire differed only in degree from Ingeld, initiate of the highest level and first among the Daughters, seeking guidance on the future of Kosord in the sacred flames at the summit of the temple. One ruled a hovel and the other a palace, but both of those were households sacred to holy Veslih. If the goddess chose to make Her intentions known, the other gods would not interfere.
Last night, as was her custom, Ingeld had led the acolytes in prayer in the adytum. Inexplicably, she had seen Benard Celebre in the dark between the embers, indicating danger. That he was in peril was no surprise and she was overdue to warn him of the latest troubles, but the omens seemed to imply that the danger was to the city, which made no sense. She had been sufficiently concerned to send a herald around to his shack. He had not been home and she needed no divine guidance to guess that he was sleeping elsewhere, for he still had an astonishing ability to inspire women to mother him. At dawn she had visited the adytum again; again she had seen him, and this time heading for the palace. Images in a brazier could not compare with those in the sacred hearth itself, so she had decided on a full pyromancy, sending Sansya to the assize in her stead and warning Molith to admit Benard when he arrived.
That he was bound for Horold's audience had never occurred to her, but in the very first true images, she spied him already in the balcony of the court. The portents for Kosord were clearer than any she had seen in years—a baby shining, a letter shadowed, a boat that was sometimes good, sometimes bad. Those would be the sparks to ignite the blaze, but beyond them she spied only tumult and confusion and shadow. Time and again as images formed, the coals collapsed, obscuring them as if the gods had determined to set great events in motion without agreeing upon their outcome. But why everywhere Benard? Wherever she'd looked, there was Benard in the background. Baby, letter, boat, death, death, death... and always Benard. Why was he suddenly so important?
¦
Pyromancy was an ordeal that left her simultaneously exalted and exhausted. When it was over, two acolytes supported her while she addressed the anxious crowd that had gathered.
'I foresee no great evil,' she told them. 'Unsettled times approach, but the gods are merciful. Be mindful of them and the troubles will pass.' They knelt to her as she descended the steps; she entered thankfully through the bronze doors, out of painful sunlight into the women's quarters, shadowed and cool.
Fortunately, she had other—mortal—sources to inform her what had been happening in Horold's audience, and old Molith nodded when queried with an eyebrow. So Ingeld was forewarned not to go charging into her bedchamber with a retinue.
Pleading a need to rest, she entered the room alone and even managed to close the door without slamming it in fury. Just as she had feared, Bena was stretched out on her sleeping platform, dead to the world. No doubt he had spent most of the night rollicking with some slut.
She swept across the room like a pillar of fire, fully intending to haul him off the platform by his ear. But the closer she came, the more her resolution faltered, until she came to a stop, staring down at him in aching wonder. Oh, Bena, Bena! He was no beauty by day, being dark and hairy even by Florengian standards, with quarryman chest and shoulders that belied his noble birth. His face was as solid as battlements, all jaw and forehead and cheekbones. And yet, boy and man, he had always been beautiful in sleep, with those incredible lashes spread on his cheeks; awake, he could melt any woman with one glance of an artist's eyes—gentle, limpid, all-seeing.
She turned to look at the twins' smiling faces in the tiles. Had they lived, they would be this age now—mature but still young, in the prime of their strength and yet untamed by the withering of dreams. And back to Benard... Strong but never aggressive, easygoing in most things and infinitely stubborn in the rest, combining wrestlers' brawn with the delicate touch of butterflies.
Especially she remembered Benard in that terrible summer six years ago, when Finar and Fitel had set off to join their uncle in Florengia. Horold had been away suppressing some minor revolt or other, but word of the avalanche had gone first to him. Ingeld had learned of it from his letter ordering Cutrath into Werist training, breaking the promise he had given her when she agreed to bear him another son. One blow had deprived her of all her children and all pretense of a marriage.
In her agony and rage, she had sought comfort from a boy half her age, a boy even younger than the twins she mourned. Benard had given it unstintingly, knowing his compassion might cost him his life. At first she had asked only the solace of holy Nula, but as he held her in his arms through a long night of tears, holy Eriander had come to offer support also. If either mortal had invoked that god, it had been she, not Benard, although even then he had been no innocent. He could easily have refused her, telling her to remember her age, and his, to reflect that she was the light of Veslih on Kosord, who performed countless marriages every year and lectured every bride on the
