N. Jemisin - The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms

I stared at him, unsure what to be more disgusted by: his choice to urinate in a public place, where others would smell his reek for days; his utter obliviousness; or my own carelessness.

Still, I had not been caught yet. I could have ducked back down, hidden myself behind a tree, and probably gone unnoticed. But perhaps an opportunity had presented itself. Surely a brother of Scimina would appreciate boldness from his newest rival.

So I waited until he finished and fastened his clothing. He turned to go, and probably still wouldn’t have seen me if I hadn’t chosen that moment to clear my throat.

Relad started and turned, blinking blearily at me for a full three breaths before either of us spoke.

“Cousin,” I said at last.

He let out a long sigh that was hard to interpret. Was he angry? Resigned? Both, perhaps. “I see. So you were listening.”

“Yes.”

“Is this what they teach you in that jungle of yours?”

“Among other things. I thought I might stick to what I know best, Cousin, since no one has seen fit to tell me the proper way Arameri do things. I was actually hoping you might help me with that.”

“Help you—” He started to laugh, then shook his head. “Come on, then. You might be a barbarian, but I want to sit down like a civilized man.”

This was promising. Already Relad seemed saner than his sister, though that wasn’t difficult. Relieved, I followed him through the brush into the clearing. It was a lovely little spot, so meticulously landscaped that it looked natural, except in its impossible perfection. A large boulder, contoured in exactly the right ways to serve as a lounging chair, dominated one side of the space. Relad, none too steady on his feet to begin with, slumped into this with a heavy sigh.

Across from the seat was a bathing pool, too small to hold more than two people comfortably. A young woman sat here: beautiful, nude, with a black bar on her forehead. A servant, then. She met my eyes and then looked away, elegantly expressionless. Another young woman—clothed in a diaphanous gown so sheer she might as well have been nude—crouched near Relad’s lounge, holding a cup and flask on a tray. I made no wonder that he’d had to relieve himself, seeing this; the flask was not small, and it was nearly empty. Amazing he could still walk straight.

There was nowhere for me to sit, so I clasped my hands behind my back and stood in polite silence.

“All right, then,” Relad said. He picked up an empty glass and peered at it, as if checking for cleanliness. It had obviously been used. “What in every demon’s unknown name do you want?”

“As I said, Cousin: help.”

“Why would I possibly help you?”

“We could perhaps help each other,” I replied. “I have no interest in becoming heir after Grandfather. But I would be more than willing to support another candidate, under the right circumstances.”

Relad picked up the flask to pour a glass, but his hand wavered so badly that he spilled a third of it. Such waste. I had to fight the urge to take it from him and pour properly.

“You’re useless to me,” he said at last. “You’d only get in my way—or worse, leave me vulnerable to her.” Neither of us needed clarification on who he meant by her .

“She came here to meet with you about something completely different,” I said. “Do you think it’s a coincidence she mentioned me in the process? It seems to me that a woman does not discuss one rival with another—unless she hopes to play them against each other. Perhaps she perceives us both as threats.”

“Threats?” He laughed, then tossed back the glass of whatever-it-was. He couldn’t have tasted it that fast. “Gods, you’re as stupid as you are ugly. And the old man honestly thinks you’re a match for her? Unbelievable.”

Heat flashed through me, but I had heard far worse in my life; I kept my temper. “I’m not interested in matching her.” I said it with more edge than I would have preferred, but I doubted he cared. “All I want is to get out of this godsforsaken place alive.”

The look he threw me made me feel ill. It wasn’t cynical, or even derisive, just horrifyingly matter-of-fact. You’ll never get out , that look said, in his flat eyes and weary smile. You have no chance .

But instead of voicing this aloud, Relad spoke with a gentleness that unnerved me more than his scorn. “I can’t help you, Cousin. But I will offer one piece of advice, if you’re willing to listen.”

“I would welcome it, Cousin.”

“My sister’s favorite weapon is love. If you love anyone, anything, beware. That’s where she’ll attack.”

I frowned in confusion. I’d had no important lovers in Darr, produced no children. My parents were already dead. I loved my grandmother, of course, and my uncles and cousins and few friends, but I could not see how—

Ah. It was plain as day, once I thought about it. Darr itself. It was not one of Scimina’s territories, but she was Arameri; nothing was beyond her reach. I would have to find some means of protecting my people.

Relad shook his head as if reading my mind. “You can’t protect the things you love, Cousin—not forever. Not completely. Your only real defense is not to love in the first place.”

I frowned. “That’s impossible.” How could any human being live like that?

He smiled, and it made me shiver. “Well. Good luck, then.”

He beckoned to the women. Both of them rose from their places and came over to his couch, awaiting his next command. That was when I noticed: both were tall, patrician, beautiful in that flat, angular Amn way, and sable-haired. They did not look much like Scimina, but the similarity was undeniable.

Relad gazed at them with such bitterness that for a moment, I felt pity. I wondered whom he had loved and lost. And I wondered when I had decided that Relad was as useless to me as I was to him. Better to struggle alone than rely on this empty shell of a man.

“Thank you, Cousin,” I replied, and inclined my head. Then I left him to his fantasies.

On my way back to my room, I stopped at T’vril’s office and returned the ceramic flask. T’vril put it away without a word.

There is a sickness called the Walking Death. The disease causes tremors, terrible fever, unconsciousness, and in its final stages a peculiar kind of manic behavior. The victim is compelled to rise from the sickbed and walk—walk anywhere, even back and forth in the confines of a room. Walk, while the fever grows so great that the victim’s skin cracks and bleeds; walk while the brain dies. And then walk a little more.

There have been many outbreaks of the Walking Death over the centuries. When the disease first appeared, thousands died because no one understood how it spread. The walking, you see. Unimpeded, the infected always walk to wherever healthy people can be found. They shed their blood and die there, and thus the sickness is passed on. Now we are wise. Now we build a wall around any place the Death has touched, and we close our hearts to the cries of the healthy trapped within. If they are still alive a few weeks later, we let them out. Survival is not unheard of. We are not cruel.

It escapes no one’s notice that the Death afflicts only the laboring classes. Priests, nobles, scholars, wealthy merchants… it is more than that they have guards and the resources to quarantine themselves in their citadels and temples. In the early years there were no quarantines, and they still did not die. Unless they rose recently from the lower classes themselves, the wealthy and powerful are immune.