Robert Redick - The Rats and the Ruling sea

'She outlawed funerals, this queen.'

'Did she.'

The spymaster nodded. 'When a citizen died she sent men for the bodies at once. She injected them with preservatives, bandaged them, soaked them in sesame oil, and lastly encased them in clay. Before the clay dried she would arrange the corpse in some lifelike position — the farmer with his hoe, the smith at his anvil, the child bent to tie a shoe — in a specially built dungeon beneath her chambers. Quite creative: the dungeon was constructed around a coal furnace, so that it might be heated like a kiln. In this way she baked the corpses hard as stone. Not as quickly as young Pathkendle dispatched the Shaggat, but effective nonetheless.'

He knows what happened yesterday, thought Isiq. He still has spies aboard!

'The queen had the idea that the ghosts of the dead made her powerful, and that they would linger so long as the bodies themselves did not perish. She became known as Queen Mirkitj of the Statues. She was hated and feared beyond description — even before she modified the practice for use on the living.'

'You will be remembered as her soul's kindred,' said Isiq.

'I will not be remembered at all. Oh, there will be rumours — for a generation at the most — rumours of an old spy who was behind Arqual's triumph. But no histories shall name or describe him. My own disciples will see to that. Your memoirs, for instance, will not be published, or archived, or even left in private hands. Your letters will be retrieved and burned.'

'Why have you kidnapped me, Ott?'

The spymaster ignored the question. 'When Queen Mirkitj died at last, the palace was razed, and the upper levels of the dungeon with it. But the queen had made thousands of these statues, and the dungeon ran nine levels deep — one for each Pit of the Underworld. In any case, only the first three levels were discovered, until rather recently. We are in the seventh.'

'Now I see,' said the admiral. 'You will subject me to this ancient torture unless I do your bidding. What can be left for you to want, though? What but your bidding have I done these many years, although I knew it not?'

'Not the least thing,' agreed Ott, smiling. 'But you're wrong again. I will inflict no pain on you if I can avoid it. For many years it was necessary to poison you — necessary, not especially pleasant — but that time is done. I merely intend to prepare you for the next phase in your service to the Emperor.

'Your daughter is dead. My cause is defeated. Gloat if you will. You are retired, and need not show a soldier's dignity any longer.'

'You lie. You haven't given up at all.'

'I never give up — that is true. But my great plan is thwarted. The Shaggat Ness is a block of stone, and the wedding cancelled, and the prophecy I spread in Gurishal among his worshippers cannot come true.

'Gloat then, but listen: you have some years of service left in you, Isiq. But they cannot be spent here. You have insulted the king of Simja. It is unthinkable that you should serve as ambassador.'

Isiq pressed ice to his temple. He studied Ott. A corner of the iris of the man's wounded eye was clouded by blood. Opaque, as of yesterday. Blind.

'In the drawer of that table,' Ott was saying, 'is a letter of writ from the lord admiral, countersigned by the Emperor himself. It appoints you to a lectureship in the naval academy at two hundred cockles a year.'

Isiq snorted. 'Does it come with directions to the almshouse?'

'What nonsense. That mansion on Maj Hill should fetch you enough to live out your days in comfort, albeit in tighter quarters.'

'I still own, it then? Free and clear?'

Ott was silent a moment. 'There may be certain duties owing, taxes-'

'Ha!' said Isiq. 'Who have you promised it to, Ott? Have you plucked another girl out of the slave school on Nurth? One who just happens to have reason, like Syrarys, to take a dried-up old murderer like you to bed now and then — as part of her service to the Emperor, of course.'

To Isiq's infinite satisfaction he saw Ott's mouth betray a certain tightening. He was getting through to the man.

'We should trade stories, don't you think?' Isiq pressed. 'Did she give you the same sort of massage I was used to, starting at the nape of the neck? Did she whisper the same words to both of us, in the same intimate moments?'

'You are reckless,' said Ott quietly.

Blary right I am.

'Which of your men was she grooming to kill you?' he pressed. 'You must have some idea. Why should she stay with you? A broken-down, gap-toothed butcher with rhinoceros skin and nothing to live for but conspiracies and lies. You must have guessed she'd try to dispose of you soon. Did you kill her yourself yesterday, before she could admit that she hated you?'

'I would dodge it,' said Ott.

'What?'

'Your fist. When you think me entirely distracted by rage, you are, I suspect, planning to strike out with your right fist as hard as possible, hoping to smash my head back against the wall, leaving me stunned. Then you would lift me by the shirt and slam me down over and over, perhaps pausing first to stuff that rag into my throat. You noticed my eye. But I have never let that arm of yours slide into my blind spot, Admiral, and I should merely have dodged it, and dealt with you.'

Isiq felt naked. Ott had described his intentions almost perfectly.

'Anger, like fear, hones the senses to a razor's edge,' the spymaster went on. 'You'd have done better to raise some intellectual point. Abstract thought slows our defences. Even I am not entirely immune.'

He arched his back against the wall, at his ease once more. 'Shall I tell you what fascinates me at present? The Nilstone. I did not believe it existed, and I laughed at Dr Chadfallow, who did. But as we both know, the Stone is terribly real. And it seems that long before Arunis took the Red Wolf from the depths, and melted it to reveal the artefact, someone else aboard the Chathrand knew as well.'

Ott took a scrap of parchment from his vest pocket, unrolled it, and passed it casually to Isiq. 'That came from the ship's hold. My man took it from the jaws of a rat, if you can believe it. Probably getting set to make it his dinner.'

Isiq tilted the parchment towards the candlelight. The scrap was crumbling, and burned on two sides, but he could still make out a spidery hand.

'-call't it DROTH'S EYE, or en Arqual fe NIL-STONE, a cursed fing t'be sure, es it slays whoms'ever shel touch it, with a swiftnef hideous to bihold, all save fe littlest vermin, who furst suffer grotesqueries of change.

Fis stone yur Wizardess hath entombed in fe WOLF OF SCARLET IRON, lately taken by fe arch-heretic NESS, and lost in fe havoc of his fall.

'The language is a mystery,' said Ott. 'Almost Arquali, but not quite. One might think it simply an antique variant, except that it speaks plainly of the Shaggat's theft of the Red Wolf, just forty years ago. It is not Arunis' hand: we have samples of that in the purchase-orders he wrote out as Mr Ket; nor is it like the sorcerer to commit any of his secrets to writing.

'Here we have the strangest of circumstances, no? Someone aboard the Chathrand knew what was to come — not only that we were bound to find such a thing as the Red Wolf, but also that said Wolf contained a horror called the Nilstone.' Ott gave him a sudden direct look. 'You wouldn't have any thoughts as to who such a person might be, would you?'

Isiq returned the parchment. 'Now you wish me to bargain for the liberty you will never grant.'

'Ah, but can you be certain?' said Ott. 'I discard nothing that is of use to our Emperor. Help me see you again in that light, as I have these several decades, and anything is possible.'

'Really?' said Isiq. 'Can you bring my daughter back to life?'

Ott gave a noncommittal shrug. 'Close your mind to nothing, Admiral. But for today let us speak no more of women. What of Ramachni? Who or what is he?'