Steph Swainston - No Present Like Time

“The year after, a soldier turned highwayman picked a duel with my father, who knew his identity. The robber waited on the road for him on the way back from the pub. My father did not return. I searched for him-I never stopped-but three days later the river washed his damaged and dirty body onto the sandy bank right in front of the governor’s house. It was so badly beaten that we could not tell how he died.

“I borrowed some rich clothes to disguise myself and I went looking for the highwayman. I rode up and down the Lowespass Road until he held me up. I disarmed the swine in a minute and he knelt, begging for mercy. Before I handed him over to the magistrate-he was hanged-I…I cut him…I took him apart. Until he told what he had done to my poor father.

“The first night he buried the body in the woods outside town. He could only scrape a shallow hole because tree roots blocked the soil. The following day he fretted that a passerby might find the grave and unearth his crime. So the second night, in raw weather, he dug it up, carried the body to the Miroir moor and buried it in a deep hole. But then the idea tormented him that the moorland peat would preserve it forever and the disturbed grass would reveal the grave. So the following night he dug it up again. He threw it into the river from the top of a rocky outcrop. The river’s flow brought the broken remains straight to Governor Merganser’s door…I am sorry for what I did to the highwayman…”

San made no comment, so Wrenn continued. “Anyway…when I knew that I was alone, I decided to travel south. If I had stayed in Summerday I would still be there now, gradually forgetting everything I dreamed of. I went to Tanager and joined the ranks of the Select Fyrd. I helped clear Insects from Rachiswater and the land around the River Oscen. I conducted myself well, I’m proud to say, and when Skua was killed I was made division captain. Then I saw the future stretching out, always the same. I was thwarted. I sparred with all-comers. I gave the gentry scratches but they came back wanting more, unable to believe they had lost to a smallholder’s son. In the end I beat them all. Well, yes, I resent them…But that doesn’t matter now, does it? I’ve done something they could never do.

“My dreams of the Circle returned. Thank god, my skill rather than my background is what matters to the Castle, I reckoned; there’s a way out of this circus. For five years solid I spent all my off-duty time training. I was full of doubt and hope. I thought I was a dupe and a wretch to consider fighting the Swordsman. I nursed the idea for years and did nothing about it, then one night on a mad impulse I sent a letter to him. He chose to fight using rapier and dagger, which is my forte…Um…” Wrenn’s speech filled the hall and it seemed to him that his voice droned on. “I am twenty-five years old,” he whispered, looking at the backs of his hands. He stuttered and fell quiet. He realized that in a few minutes he would be twenty-five forever and their appearance would never change.

“Answer my questions,” said the Emperor. “Have you ever fought Insects alone?”

“Yes, my lord. I’ve killed Insects one at a time in the Rachiswater amphitheater and hunted a couple found lurking by the town.”

“Have you ever felt fear?”

Wrenn hesitated, wondering what the best answer was. I knew that doubt well; in my initiation I had to confess all kinds of crimes to the whole Circle. I saw from his panicked expression that we seemed more forbidding and the Throne Room door looked tempting. I thought he was going to make a dash for it.

“Yes…” he said eventually. “I have never been as frightened as I am right now. But I master my fear.”

San asked, “Do you have a partner to bring into the Circle?”

Wrenn shook his head. He tried to smooth over his exhaustion with confidence but it could still be seen like the shape of wings under velvet. “I’ve made no time in my life for girlfriends.”

There is no way you can lie with the Emperor’s gaze on you; it’s impossible to hide anything. Wrenn squirmed uncertainly and stared at the floor. “You want me to tell? I spent my nights in the brothels instead. Well, it’s easier. I’ve been planning this Challenge for years; I couldn’t afford the time to have relationships.”

We all privately remembered how terrible it is to speak alone in that vast space and felt sympathetic. I had witnessed the ceremony as an Eszai three times before, firstly when Tern joined at my wedding, and most recently when Ata Dei became Mist. I glanced at Mist; she looked shifty, probably recalling how during her initiation she tried to lie but instead found herself confessing that she murdered her husband for his place in the Circle.

San stated, “You swear to serve me, in my service to the Fourlands, in god’s name, for as long as I give you life.”

“I swear,” said Wrenn, forcefully.

The Emperor raised his right hand, bony fingers and prominent joints. “Come forward.”

Wrenn climbed the dais steps, wondering at the great transformation about to take place. I could practically hear him thinking: this is it. He braced himself for immortality as if it would burn through him. It’s nothing like that. It doesn’t hurt, in fact when it happened to me I could feel no sensation.

The Emperor extended his hand to Wrenn. Wrenn grasped and pressed his lips to it for a second. The Circle took him in.

Wrenn looked up finally to the Emperor’s eyes. San announced, “Now you are the Swordsman. Your name is Serein.”

A smile broke slowly over Serein’s face. He dropped to his knees at San’s feet, in silence. Then as if he could not bear such close proximity to the Emperor and aware that the rite was over, Serein quietly backed down from the dais, turned and passed the benches. We all stood as he passed. Lightning and Rayne glanced at each other; they had felt the ripple in the Circle as San made the exchange: one out, one in. After the transfer they’d feel Wrenn’s presence as slightly different from Gio’s, like a new person joining an inhabited room. Serein walked down the aisle, seeming to diminish in size, and left the Throne Room by himself. Lightning would join him outside; he made it his responsibility to greet new immortals and give them some much-needed advice. One by one we bowed to the Emperor, who was always last to leave the court, and followed Serein. As I passed through the door I grabbed two pocketfuls of confetti and glitter, swept up my hands and threw it over our heads.

A babble of a hundred conversations hung in the air of the Great Hall. I wanted to climb up to my rafter where I customarily sit, legs dangling, to watch the party. But I couldn’t do that with my arm around Tern. I led her through a dozen conversations.

“Is he here yet? I want to meet the boy. I’ve questions to ask him…”

“He’s twenty-five, bless. How rare it is to be so adept so young.”

“Try the smoked venison, it’s excellent.”

“Eleonora? Busy revitalizing the kingdom. She’s good, by god, I only hear praise.”

“But the court’s full of scandal. What she does with chambermaids, I-”

“‘For an Eszai everything is easy.’ Ha! How can they think that?”

“Look! There’s Comet. He’s back! Hais-gelet, Jant?”

The Emperor was seated at the high table on a raised stage. He did not touch the feast before him. Tern swayed her skirt a little to the music-a young lad slammed away at the piano, lissome women in jasper red played fiddle reels.

Confetti on the carpet, candelabra; people leaned on the oak paneling, kissed under the arches. Frost was building a cantilevered bridge out of forks and salt cellars. Rayne and Hayl played chess with marzipan pieces on an enormous pink and yellow cake shaped like a chess board.