Part 19 (1/2)
”But of course,” he said, grinning. ”The field was mine.”
No one laughed.
Cnaiur leaned back, stared down into the palms of his great hands. ”Leave us,” he commanded. ”Everyone.”
At first no one moved-no one even breathed. Then Conphas cleared his throat. With an intrepid scowl he said, ”Do it ... do as he says.”
Sompas began to protest.
”Now!” the Exalt-General barked.
When they were gone, Cnaiur's eyes clicked onto the man's chiselled face. His own brow, even his nose, were ghosts on the fringes of his periphery...a reminder of what watched.
Cnaiur urs Skiotha ...
Conphas nodded as though he entirely understood. ”I would have lost Kiyuth,” he said, ”had you been King-of-Tribes.”
... most violent of all Men.
”That,” Cnaiur said, ”and more.”
The man chuckled into his wine bowl. Arching his eyebrows, he said, ”The Empire as well, I suppose.”
Cnaiur studied him, suffused with a faint kind of wonder. The voice was the same, yet it seemed impossible that the boy before him could be the Imperial Exalt-General who had surveyed Kiyuth that morning so long ago. That man had been all-conquering. He had towered over the pastures, and the innumerable dead had all mouthed his name. The Great Ikurei Conphas.
And now here he was, the ”Lion of Kiyuth.” His neck as slender as any Cnaiur had broken.
The Exalt-General pushed back his plate, turned to him in a manner at once jocular and conspiratorial. ”What is it that resides in the hearts of hated foes, hmm? Save the Anasurimbor, there's no man I despise more than you ...” He leaned back with a friendly shrug. ”And yet I find this ... unlikely repose in your presence.”
”Repose,” Cnaiur snorted. ”That is because the world is your trophy room. Your soul makes flattery of all things-even me. You make mirrors of all that you see.”
The Exalt-General blinked, then cackled in laughter. ”Let's not mince words, Scylvendi.”
Cnaiur hammered his knife into the heavy table. Bowls, platters, and Conphas all jumped. ”This,” ”This,” he grated. ”This! This is what the world is in truth!” he grated. ”This! This is what the world is in truth!”
Conphas swallowed, somehow managed to maintain his facade of good humour. ”And what might that be?”
The barbarian grinned. ”Even now, it moves you.”
Ikurei Conphas licked his lips. Fine features tightened about clenched teeth. Why did anger always look so bland on beautiful faces? ”I can a.s.sure you,” Conphas said evenly, ”I fear no-”
Cnaiur struck, cuffed him so hard he toppled backward.
”You act as though you live this life a second time!” Cnaiur leapt into a crouch upon the table, sent plates and bowls spinning. Eyes as round as silver talents, Conphas scrambled backward through the cus.h.i.+ons. ”As though you were a.s.sured of its outcome!”
Conphas had turned, was fighting his way clear of the depression. ”Somp-Somp-!” Cnaiur vaulted across the table, hammered the back of his head. The Exalt-General went down. Cnaiur unfastened his belt, snapped it free. He yanked it about the sobbing man's neck, hoisted him to his knees. He wrenched him back to the table, threw him onto his chest. He smashed his face against its own reflection-once, twice ...
He looked up, saw the slaves cringing in the shadows, their arms upraised. One of them wept.
”I am a demon!” he cried. ”A demon demon!”
Then he turned back to Conphas shuddering on the table beneath him.
Some things required literal explanation.
Sunrise. Light speared through the eastward columns, glazing them orange and rose. A faint breeze carried the scent of cedar and sand. It seemed he could hear all Joktha stir to the touch of morning.
Cnaiur swatted a wine bowl from the sheets. It clanged across tiles before being silenced by the carpets. He sat at the edge of the bed, pinching the bridge of his nose, then strode to the bronze washbasin set into the west wall. He stared at the geometric frescoes-ovals interlocking-while rinsing away the blood and soil smeared across his thighs. Then he walked naked onto his terrace, into the sunlight. Like a bead of oil dropped in water, Joktha spread outward as he approached the bal.u.s.trade, stark and silent in the early morning light. Sand-doves squabbled on the eaves. To the east, black against the silver-gold sea, a fleet of s.h.i.+ps lay anch.o.r.ed beyond the mouth of the harbour. Nansur Nansur s.h.i.+ps. s.h.i.+ps.
So, it would be today.
He dressed without his body-slaves, though he dispatched one with a summons for Troyatti. The Captain intercepted him on his way to the barracks' mess.
”Send men out to those transports,” Cnaiur said. ”We lower the harbour chain only when each and every one has been searched. Then I want you personally to gather Conphas and his Generals, bring them to the harbour-the Grand Quay. Take as many men as can be spared.”
The taciturn Conriyan had listened dutifully, scratching the swazond across his right forearm as he did so. He crushed his beard to his chest with a nod.
”And Troyatti-no matter what happens, make sure you secure the Ikurei.”
”Something worries you,” the Captain said.
For a heartbeat Cnaiur found himself wondering whether they were friends, Troyatti and himself. Ever since riding with him in s.h.i.+gek, Troyatti and the others had called themselves the Hemscilvara, the Scylvendi's Men. He had taught them the ways of the People-they had seemed important then-and with the strange capacity of the young to wors.h.i.+p, they had followed, and had continued to follow even after Proyas had rea.s.signed them.
”This fleet ... it has arrived too soon-I think. There is a chance it was dispatched before before Conphas's expulsion.” Conphas's expulsion.”
Troyatti frowned. ”Instead of retrieving Conphas, you think it brings him reinforcements?”
”Think of Kiyuth ... The Emperor only sent a fraction of the Imperial Army with Conphas. Why? To guard against my kinsmen, when they have been ruined? No. He saved his strength for a reason.”
The Captain nodded, his eyes bright with sudden understanding.
”Secure Conphas, Troyatti. Spill as much blood as you have to.”
After sending word to Sanumnis and Tirnemus, Cnaiur rode with several of the Hemscilvara to the so-called Grand Quay, which was essentially a stone and gravel berm built out into the water, set about with wooden docks like h.o.a.rdings upon curtain walls. Discarded oyster sh.e.l.ls cracked beneath his sandals as he strode out to its terminus. His men fanned out, press-ganging the Enathi squatters, fishermen mostly, who continually availed themselves of unused berths. Cnaiur's presence ensured the absence of incident. Drying nets were dragged away. Shanties were kicked down.
The air smelled of dank and rotting fish. Raising a hand against the sun, he watched a handful of boats row out toward the mouth of the harbour, drawing closer to the foremost Nansur carrack. They looked like overturned beetles, legs pitching water in time. Red-throated gulls drifted through the sky above, their screeches near and jarring. What had Tirnemus called them? Yes, gopas ...
He watched as more and more boats gained the fleet.
Sanumnis arrived shortly after in full battledress, accompanied by a Thunyeri chieftain named Skaiwarra, who had disembarked three days earlier with some 300-odd kinsmen-Men of the Tusk all. A combination of Eumarnan wine and diarrhea, Sanumnis explained, had delayed their departure. The chieftain was a stout, blond-braided man possessing the same pocked fierceness that characterized so many of his countrymen. He spoke no Sheyic whatsoever, but between his and Sanumnis's smattering of Tydonni, Cnaiur was able to bargain with him. It seemed Skaiwarra was a pirate of recent conversion, and as such had an abiding hatred of the Nansur and their pious fleets. He agreed to tarry yet one more day.
A messenger from Troyatti appeared during their exchange. Imyanax, Baxatas, and Areamanteras were even now being escorted to the harbour, the man said, but Conphas and Sompas were nowhere to be found. Apparently Conphas had been severely beaten the night before, and Sompas had taken him elsewhere in the city, searching for a physician.
Cnaiur matched Sanumnis's dark gaze. ”Seal the gates,” he said. ”Man the walls ... If anything happens, the city is yours-as is the Warrior-Prophet's charge.”
The Baron flinched from the intensity of his look, then nodded in resignation. Cnaiur turned back to the sunlight as he and Skaiwarra withdrew. The first of the boats was returning, rowing between the towers of the harbour's mouth, over the chain where it dipped in the water. The sun had climbed high enough for him to discern the crimson of the transport's sails, bundled against black-painted masts.