Part 18 (1/2)

'Who can say why?' Hrathen had asked himself the same question. It must be because Brugan wants to see if the Many can be put to work for the Empire It must be because Brugan wants to see if the Many can be put to work for the Empire, he had decided. Khanaphes is simply the most convenient testing ground Khanaphes is simply the most convenient testing ground. But there was more to it than that, and he guessed that the detachment of Rekef agents he had brought were to be involved in it. 'Perhaps some citizen of Khanaphir has insulted our Empress ... It only matters that the Empire wishes it done.'

'And the Empire wishes me to do it,' Jakal said.

'Do you not wish to do it?'

'If the riches of Khanaphes could be mine, I would already have taken them. Do you think I would have stayed my hand?'

'You need stay it no longer, then,' Hrathen told her. 'For the gifts I bring you are weapons. I bring two thousand crossbows and more, supplied with bolts, and the men to teach you in their use.'

'We know of crossbows,' said Jakal coolly, but he could see the interest in her eyes.

'Also, we bring a dozen siege engines leadshotters, they are called,' he continued. 'The walls of Khanaphes shall stand in your way no more than the walls of this old city here.'

They did not cheer at that. Instead they stared at him avidly, whilst word of what he had said was pa.s.sed back and back, until the whole usurped city knew it.

Nineteen.

'What is this place?' Che asked, feeling as though she had stepped into another world. From the fierce, dry heat of the sun outside they were suddenly plunged into a thick, muggy, sticky humidity. The daylight had dimmed to a coloured gloom as it filtered through tight-stretched canvas, silk and linen. Ahead of them the emaciated Khanaphir had stopped again to wait for them.

'The Marsh Alcaia,' Trallo p.r.o.nounced. 'Even a city as polite as Khanaphes needs somewhere to break the law. At least when the guard come looking, they know exactly where to go. People will always have vices they need to indulge.'

'But this?' Che took a few steps deeper, beneath the cloth ceiling. It was like walking under water. She felt an almost physical resistance to her intrusion.

'Don't worry about that, worry about why our friend seems so fond of you,' the Fly advised her.

'What do you mean? I I sought sought him him out.' out.'

'I mean that he could have run while we were bickering in the open house, and he could still run now, and we'd never find him in here. Think about it.'

She tried to, but here, in the stale heat, it was hard to match the pieces. Their guide was drawing ahead again, making them hurry to catch up with him. All around them were Khanaphir and foreigners intent on their purposeful errands. Amid the fragile aisles lined with people crying their wares, the sounds and smells were overwhelming.

He always stayed just in sight, always paused by each new turning he took, and always looking back at them at her her with that hollow, hungry gaze. Trallo was right: it was not because she was a foreigner, or anything to do with the money she might carry. Instead, something had sparked inside him, as soon as he had taken a proper look at her. with that hollow, hungry gaze. Trallo was right: it was not because she was a foreigner, or anything to do with the money she might carry. Instead, something had sparked inside him, as soon as he had taken a proper look at her.

Is this really what I am looking for? The stifling air was making her feel dizzy, while odd thoughts and feelings kept pa.s.sing through her mind. The stifling air was making her feel dizzy, while odd thoughts and feelings kept pa.s.sing through her mind.

'Wastes, but we're going in deep,' Trallo observed. 'Never been this far into the Marsh Alcaia.' He cast a glance backwards, teeth bared, and Che drew back, suddenly feeling trapped. She opened her mouth to suggest turning back, but then something twisted in her mind and she saw it. There, just beside the skeletal, hurrying figure of their guide, she saw the air seethe and darken: something of the night fighting to be seen, to make itself known to her. She imagined she even saw it pointing after him, urging her onwards. After that she had no choice.

Again, the lean man was waiting for them at the turn, leading into yet another alleyway. Roofed with heavier cloth, it was cooler there, and the air was thick with darkness. Che let her Art cut through it, spying a tent at the far end, with four or five figures seated there.

'This must be it,' she told Trallo. He nodded grimly. She saw that he held his hand near his knife-hilt.

The thin man was now kneeling in front of the tent: a low, ragged structure, patched and filthy, its original colour lost beyond recall. The doorway was hung with charms and lockets, little bits of bra.s.s and bronze and tin that dangled and jangled on slender chains. Someone inside was speaking slowly in a low voice, as Che paused before the entrance to reach out for one of the swinging fragments of metal. It had been crudely cut with a symbol that reminded her of the stone carvings to be seen everywhere about the city. Again she felt a stab of antic.i.p.ation.

'Why have you brought these here?' demanded the voice. Only now did Che identify it as a woman's, so deep and rough it sounded.

'She was asking, asking questions, and she found me,' the lean man explained. 'Mother, when she asked ... I saw ...'

Che saw a bulky form s.h.i.+ft within the tent, half hidden by the hanging drapes. 'I see her. She is foreign Beetle-kinden. I know them and they have nothing. They are lost to the old ways. She is wasting her time. You are wasting mine.'

'Only look at her, Mother!' the lean man almost howled.

'May I speak?' Che intruded, trying to keep her voice steady. She saw the figure s.h.i.+ft again, still shapeless behind the drapes.

'Come forward at your own risk,' the half-seen woman replied, and Che could hear the soft whisper of daggers and knifes tasting the air.

'I mean you no harm,' Che persisted and, although Trallo was shaking his head fiercely, she crouched to enter the tent on her knees.

There were three Khanaphir inside, two men and one woman who each held a leaf-bladed dagger and stared at her with mute hostility. Another denizen was a halfbreed, Khanaphir mixed with something else to produce skin of a green-black hue. He was hollow-cheeked and thin-shouldered and yet with a gut that bulged over his belt. Che's eyes were now fixed on the woman beside him, the one whom the thin man had called 'Mother'. She was another halfbreed, and a halfbreed of halfbreeds, until it was impossible to tell just which kindens' blood ran through her veins. She was grotesquely fat, her huge frame shuddering with each breath even as she reclined on silken cus.h.i.+ons. Her face was round and sagging, a dozen vices writ large there in pocks and blemishes, a true degenerate except for the eyes. Her eyes were blue and clear and piercing and, looking into them, Che felt an almost physical shock, like sudden recognition.

'Well, now ...' the woman called Mother rumbled.

Che heard Trallo step in behind her, staying close to the door.

'My name is Cheerwell Maker,' she said. 'I ... I come seeking ...'

'Enlightenment.' Mother p.r.o.nounced the word as though she were eating a sweetmeat. 'Oh, yes, you do, don't you.' She leant forward, her shapeless body bulging. 'What are you, little traveller? Do you truly know what we do here? The thing they call the Profanity?'

'Tell me,' said Che, and the woman smiled slyly.

'O Foreigner,' she said, 'you know nothing of the Masters of Khanaphes, and yet here you are. You have been led here by what, I wonder?'

'I have heard of these Masters, but n.o.body will tell me anything about them,' Che replied, and some of her frustration must have leaked out, because Mother chuckled indulgently.

'Then listen, O Foreign child,' she said. 'Once, many, many generations ago, the Masters walked the streets of Khanaphes, and exercised their power over the earth as naturally as we ourselves would breathe and eat. They were lordly and beautiful, and they knew no death, nor did age afflict them, or disease or injury. Their thought was law, and the city of Khanaphes knew a greatness that today is only a shadow.'

'Only a shadow of a shadow,' murmured the halfbreed man, and then the three Khanaphir in chorus. Che felt Trallo s.h.i.+ft nervously.

'But that was our Golden Age, and all things fade. So it came about that the Masters were seen no more on the streets of Khanaphes, and the decline of our people began. Oh, the Ministers will claim that they hear the voices of the Masters, that the Masters reside still within their sealed palaces, ready to save the city should they be called upon, but we know that the true glory of our city is long pa.s.sed, and it is many hundreds of years since this soil knew the tread of the Masters.' Her brilliant eyes were fixed on Che and she licked her lips thoughtfully.

'So what is it that you do here?' Che asked her. I am almost there. Just a handful of words and surely I will understand I am almost there. Just a handful of words and surely I will understand.

'Though the Masters are gone, they have left their legacy. There are those that possess some spark, some trace of their old blood,' Mother said slowly. 'They find the world of today hostile and confusing, perhaps? They are tormented by dreams and visions? They long for something more ...?' Her lips split in a smile. 'I thought as much. O Foreigner, I see in you something of their touch, their mark. All who are here with me are your kin. We carry within us the bloodline of the Masters, and were the Ministers just, we would be elevated and praised for it, instead of hunted like criminals.'

Che glanced at the others, and she noticed now that even the Khanaphir had a strange cast to their features, uneven, slightly disfigured, perhaps some distant trace of mingled bloods. A cynical part of her said, It probably does not take too much belief to turn a wart into the blood of the Masters It probably does not take too much belief to turn a wart into the blood of the Masters. Another voice was saying, Are they talking about Apt.i.tude? Is it the lack of it they discern in me? Is all this a memory going back to when this city was Inapt, before their revolution? And were the Masters their seers, who were cast out after they discovered their new artifice? Are they talking about Apt.i.tude? Is it the lack of it they discern in me? Is all this a memory going back to when this city was Inapt, before their revolution? And were the Masters their seers, who were cast out after they discovered their new artifice?

'But ...' Mother continued, and let the word hang for a moment in the stuffy air, 'there is a way for those of us that still bear the ancient gift to touch those far-off days. There is a substance that can yet wake memories of the golden days of Khanaphes.'

'Fir,' Che suggested, and the woman nodded ponderously.

'It brings true visions, echoes of the past, a sight of the Masters perhaps. There is nothing else in the world. It is our only link with our birthright and heritage.' She had reached out for the halfbreed man to give her a pot in which something glistened. 'O Foreigner,' said Mother, 'having come so far at the call of your blood, will you not eat Fir with us?'

Che glanced back at Trallo, who was staring wide-eyed. For the first time ever her capable Solarnese guide seemed out of his depth.

Why else have I come so far, if not for this?

'Let me eat of it,' she agreed. 'I need to understand.'