Elizabeth Haydon - The Assassin King

“Step within the circle, then. Rial, Anborn, and Gwydion were reporting on the preparations Sorbold is making for war.” said Ashe, sitting down beside Rhapsody. He ran a hand gently over his son’s head. “It would appear that Roland, and perhaps the other members of the Alliance, are the targets of “Eventually,” the Patriarch agreed, coming within the protective light. Some will fall before you, others after, if Tanquist has his way. The silence in the room thickened until it was palpable. Tell us what you mean, Your Grace,” Ashe said finally. The old man’s searing blue eyes caught and held the lanternlight, reflecting and intensifying it. “The first place Talquist will attack is Sepulvarta. His troops are massing even now on the mountain rims and in the foothills to our south. The holy city-state is the doorstep of Roland and the Middle Continent; Talquist will wipe his feet upon us as he crosses the threshold into your lands. I have no doubt of this.”

“The holy city?” Gwydion said, his words slow with shock. “How is that possible? Sorbold is an adherent to the Patrician faith! One of the five elemental basilicas is within their domain. Even in the most ferocious of battles in the Cymrian War, when all else was left in desolation, Sepulvarta was spared. It would be an affront to the All-God—” Was it not an affront to the All-God, or the One-God, as the Lirin call Him, when the Third Fleet sacked the holy forest of Gwynwood a thousand years ago? We burned the Outer Circle, and even attacked the Great White Tree,” Anborn said bitterly. “I—Elynsynos’s own grandson—led those attacks. In war, nothing is held sacred. That Sepulvarta has remained unscathed until now is purely a coincidence—a miracle.”

“The Lord Marshal speaks the truth,” Constantin affirmed. War is coming to us first; it has already begun. It is one of tree things I have traveled here, in secret, to warn you about, Lord Cymrian. I have also come to tell you that Nielash Mousa, the Blesser of Sorbold and one of my chief benisons, is dead or dying. He has given his life in the defense and protection of Terreanfor, the basilica of Living Stone, in Jierna’sid.”

“There was an assault on Terreanfor?” Achmed asked as Anborn started to become agitated. “Why would Talquist attack the only one of the five basilicas within his own nation?”

“The attack was not from without, but from within,” said the Patriarch. “Terreanfor, being the sacred basilica of elemental earth, is the greatest known repository of Living Stone on the continent. Talquist has been secretly harvesting that precious commodity of the basilica for his own purposes. The man who told me of his treachery witnessed it personally; partook in it, unwillingly. This blessed element, this gift of die Earth-Mother, has been made use of in the unholiest of ways—I suspect the assassination of the Dowager Empress and the Crown Prince Vyshla was the first of these events, but I have no idea how Living Stone could have caused that to happen.”

“The Dowager Empress was a withered crone well past her deserved time to live,” said Anborn. “And her fat bump of a son could hardly rise from his own chair without assistance. What makes you think their deaths were not of natural causes? It is gravely important that we not attribute to malice that which should rightly be explained otherwise; we will become lost in what threat is real and what is not.”

“True,” said the Patriarch. “But while I cannot prove their sudden and mutual deaths to be regicide, I do know that Talquist rigged the Weighing on the Scales of Jierna Tal to have himself anointed emperor. All the modesty and the humble choice to remain regent for a year was an act; Talquist has been planning his ascension for a long time.” The searing blue eyes narrowed. “I have known this man, and his cruelty, for many years.” The small earthen room fell silent, even to the flickering lantern. Not much was commonly known about the origins of the Patriarch; he had appeared from seemingly nowhere at the first Cymrian Council of the new age, mixed in among the Diaspora of descendants of the exodus from the lost island of Serendair. Ashe and Rhapsody exchanged a glance with the two Bolg; they all knew his story, but had never revealed it. “You needn’t expound further, Your Grace,” said Ashe. The Patriarch shook his head. “If these men are your most trusted councilors, they deserve to know,” he said, eyeing An-born, Rial, and Gwydion. “A war is brewing that has the potential to lay waste to much of the Known World. Any secrets of my past are insignificant now—it is better that all hidden things be known, so that we can hope to stave off at least part of the destruction that is to come. It is as the All-God would want it.”

“As you wish,” Ashe demurred. “No man here is likely to judge you.”

“The Lord Cymrian speaks the truth,” said Rial. “All of us are less than perfect in the One-God’s eyes. Go on, Your Grace.”

“In my youth, I was a slave in the gladiatorial arenas of the borough of Nikkid’sar, in the city-state of Jakar in Sorbold,” the elderly man said. “And while I am an aged man, since that time of my bondage only a few years have gone by in the sight of the world. Being born of demon blood—a misbegotten offspring of the last known F’dor to bedevil this land—I was a brutal killer, knowing no remorse, only bloodlust.” He paused as Gwydion, Anborn, and Rial blinked in astonishment. “It was the Lady Cymrian who saved me—and you, Lord Marshal, when you rescued both of us in the process, though you undoubtedly do not recognize me.”

“I certainly do not,” said Anborn. “And if I had had my way, the gladiator that Rhapsody pulled from the arena in Sorbold would have died by my own hand. Had she not stayed that hand, your tainted soul would be roasting in the Vault of the Underworld now, if you are that wretch, that spawn of the demon.” The Patriarch nodded, no offense visible in his expression. “I am the same man who, four years ago, Rhapsody took behind the Veil of Hoen, to the mystical domain of the Lord and Lady Rowan, that place on the doorstep of death, where the near-dying find healing of one kind or another, either passing through the Gate of Life to the Afterlife, or being restored to health, to return for a greater purpose in the material world.” His gaze fell on Ashe. “I believe you know this realm.” The Lord Cymrian smiled slightly. “I do.”

“So, having been healed there yourself, you know the weight of the responsibility that comes with that second chance at life. When that which was demon was removed from my blood in that drowsy place of healing between the worlds, I had little left of me; all I had known was violence and murder. So I remained there in study, allowing much of my life to pass in absorbing the healing arts and the wisdom of the Rowans. My excessive longevity— bequeathed to me by the Cymrian mother I never knew—allowed me to spend centuries on that side of the Veil without dying there. When I finally returned to this side, I was old, had lived the equivalent of six hundred years, but only a short time had passed in the eyes of the world. For this reason, no one recognized me. The name of Constantin had been associated only with the young, hale killer of the Sorbold arena. I made no attempt to shield myself, have not altered that by which I was called, but no one has made the association—not even Talquist, who owned me when I was a gladiator.”

“It does not surprise me to know that Talquist engaged in the promotion and propagation of bloodsport before he ascended the throne,” said Rial. “But how has he come by so much power so quickly, without even being officially crowned?” The Patriarch looked down at the Ring of Wisdom on his hand; it was a simple ring, with a clear, smooth stone set in a plain platinum setting. Inside the stone, as though internally inscribed, were two symbols on opposite sides of the ova.l gemstone, resembling the symbols for positive and negative, the signs of balance between Life and Void, the two great constants of the universe. “Before he rigged the Weighing and stole the throne of Sorbold, Talquist was a merchant,” he said quietly. “While the royalty, the nobility, and even the military tend to view the merchant class as lower, inferior, in truth they have always had the greatest base of power, because they control the trade, and the contact with the outside world, of a nation. Talquist has long had access to allies in foreign lands that the Dowager barely maintained diplomatic relations with. He has a fleet of merchant vessels that have been plying the seas for years, keeping abreast of all that is going on in the Known World. I suspect he is an ally of the Magnate of Marincaer and the Baron of Argaut, both of whom also own large shipping concerns on the other side of the Central Sea and the world. He has been trafficking the goods of the mines and linen factories of Sorbold for decades; I suspect he is a far richer and well-connected man than anyone knew. Now that he has the Sorbold navy under his command as well, he rales the sea from the southern tip of Tyrian all the way to Golgarn in the east. And probably beyond.”