Craig Saunders - Tides of Rythe

j’ark looked around their camp, taking in the small fire, with the evening’s catch roasting, the warriors, all fine and staunch companions. He knew he would die for them. Worse, he knew he would kill for them, too.

“I believe in the greater good. Sometimes, though, I just don’t know what it is.”

“This world is protected by the twin sentinels of light and hope — Carious and Dow. It is from them that we get our strength. You know their will.”

“Once I knew,” said j’ark, nodding to the sky. “But it is dark now.”

Quintal nodded sadly. “And darkness yet to come.”

Reih sobbed into her sleeves. Great, hacking coughs accompanied her tears, her chest heaving with exertion as she desperately tried to stop. Her ally had been murdered within her halls — and she had no choice but to watch it.

Reih’s friend and fellow councillor had been talking to one of the Protectorate. The Protocrat’s face was covered by the cowl of his hood but that did not matter. Reih could see who it was easily enough despite that. The oversized hands, pale and stark against the black robe. There was no doubt in her mind that it was Tun, head of their Search Division — a not so secret police force within the obscene mass of the Protectorate’s forces.

But still, with the Kuh’taenium’s sickness…some of the memories were already fading, imperfect. It could so easily have forgotten, but it had held onto this memory and forced it upon its sister, Reih. She wished she had remained ignorant, but it was too late for that.

Through a clearing mist that enveloped her mind, as it always did when the Kuh’taenium communicated with her, she heard Guy say, “You’ve got spies all over the place, it is not good enough! This must stop if the human council is to function.”

She saw that the Protocrat had smiled under his hood, the light of the halls illuminating only his lips — his teeth did not show. There was no mirth in that smile. “It does not matter,” Tun told Guy. “The Kuh’taenium is finished anyway. It is just a matter of time — it is sickening because the Protectorate are weakening it by taking away the living beings inside — all the councillors.”

Guy had known he would die. He had signed his own death warrant within council chambers when the Interpellate had petitioned for Tirielle’s disbarment. Still, she had not expected that such a barbaric act would, or could, take place within the pristine halls of the Kuh’taenium.

The scene, through her link with the building, played over in her mind. She saw through hazing vision a knife and/Guy lunges for the Protectorate. She heard the tang as the thin blade hit the metal under the robes/diagonal hoops of metal all through the ranking officer’s armour. Not the greatest defence and a blade will still go through but as the hoops cannot be seen by an attacker they would not know their location. She watched the blade fall to the floor and/it was suddenly protruding from Guy’s gagging throat, the councillor slain by his own blade. He died and hit the floor. The assailant did not move while Guy lay dying, but she could imagine a cold smile played on Tun’s face as he watched Guy’s life drain into the stone.

Reih sobbed for her friend and for herself. That the attacker had been Tun was not the most troubling thing. Nor that Tun must know she had seen him. No, it was that the Kuh’taenium itself was no longer safe from the Protectorate. Its protections meant nothing. It was all ending. She did not understand why the Protectorate were only now destroying the council. That, she thought, was the most important thing to remember. If she could discern the reason for this attack on the seat of human government, perhaps she could fight it. Did the Hierarchy know what was going on? Was it on their orders that the Protectorate acted, or were their dogs free of their leash?

She didn’t know, but of one thing she was certain — to save the Kuh’taenium, she must find out.

The Protectorate knew, as she did…the Kuh’taenium remembered.

Further to the south, Klan Mard was unaware of Tun’s assignment. Jek, the leader of the Speculate and thus the iron ruler of the Protectorate’s forces, failed to inform any of the Speculatae of all his plots. As Speculate, it was expected for him to retain a certain degree of autonomy. He was a juggler — the Speculate’s other twenty members the knives. Klan knew this. He also knew that it was acceptable, within certain parameters, for any Speculate member to do what they thought was necessary for the good of the whole.

He was, in his own mind, fulfilling that very requirement while he visited his favourite creation in the depths of the library. He breathed in the musty odour of ancient parchment and vellum, the dust heavy and cloying, but Klan appreciated the smell.

Soft candlelight flickered within the gloom, creating waves of light. One of these granted sparse illumination to the book Fernip Unger was absorbing. Within its glow, Klan put one hand on the Protocrat’s shoulder, leaning forward to absently flick the pages of the book, to the consternation of the reader.

Klan himself was a man of letters. He chuckled to himself — his bones were carved from letters. He had, in a moment of inspiration, etched the entire archive of the Protectorate onto his bones, a feat he accomplished even though he had been newly ascended at the time. His bone archive was his to peruse whenever he had the time, but there were many books outside the archive that only a Protocrat with a true scholar’s mind could understand. There were too many ancient languages, riddles and obscurities contained within the Ordanal’s vast library. It took a man of specific talents to discern what was important and what was mere chaff, to be ignored (never discarded, though). That was Fernip Unger’s job.

Fernip, on the other hand, was not quite as keen as Klan. When it came to feelings, Fernip had even less than his master, the leader of the Anamnesors. Partly it was because he had never been a passionate creature, partly because he was dead. The dead tend to be a less emotional than the living.

Fernip sighed, and more dust joined the musty air. His lungs no longer required oxygen, but his muscles still worked and breathing was a habit that was hard to forget. He had been rejuvenated, so that he looked like a much younger man, but in reality he was in his hundreds. But then, what does age matter when you are immortal?

Klan had needed the best for his elite division, and he had not let terminal cancer spoil his plans. He had healed the ancient reader of his illness, but in the process had created a walking, talking cadaver.

A mild side effect, thought Klan. He should be happy, but no, he frowns constantly and shows me no gratitude when I come to visit.

Klan sighed inwardly — he was not one to make friends easily. He understood this. Still, if he wanted companionship, and a friendly face, he always had his delegation.

The thought of his collection of grinning faces, which adorned the ceiling of his quarters, gave him comfort. Holding the thought in his mind, he turned his attention back to the reader.

“Any news for me today, Master Reader?”

“I haven’t been to the toilet for months.”

Klan smiled without humour. The dead could be so droll.

“I meant, Master Reader, have you discerned the location of the red wizard’s resting place, as I asked?”

“I have too few scrolls to work with. Much of what was written about the wizard is merely fantasy and legend. I need access to a wider library. I fear there is little within our archives I have not already trawled.”

“Well, what have you found? I did not give you the gift of immortality so you could while away your time engrossed in frippery and erotic tales.”