Mazarkis Williams - The Emperor's knife

Tuvaini shook his head. “That man speaks no more.”

“And the slaves?”

A whisper. “Burned.”

Murdered. All murdered. Sarmin felt the blood drip from his hand. “Beyon is my brother.”

“You had other brothers, Highness.”

Sarmin remembered them all, their chubby, laughing faces: Kashim and Amile, one too young to walk, one not yet talking. Asham, Fadil, and Pelar especially. Pelar and his red ball. He bounced it in the courtyard, in the tutor’s room, and in the kitchen. He bounced it against his brothers’ backs and his sisters’ legs. Sarmin closed his hand around the dacarba, felt the flesh of his palm giving way. “Tell me of the man who killed them.”

Tuvaini startled. “It was Eyul’s duty. He carries the emperor’s Knife.”

Consecrated by my brothers’ blood.

Sarmin didn’t know how long he clutched the blade, thinking of the assassin Eyul, of the look he gave that dark night. One more for the Knife? He only heard Tuvaini saying, “My lord… my lord…?”

Sarmin shook himself back to the present. “Carrier or not, Beyon is still the emperor.”

“No,” Tuvaini pressed on, eager to explain himself, “the Carriers are not what you remember, Highness, wandering the Maze and staying to the low places. They become bold, attacking even on palace grounds. They serve some purpose, some other enemy we cannot see. A Carrier cannot sit on the Petal Throne, Highness.”

The main door rattled; the handle turned, and Tuvaini almost knocked over the table as he stood. “I must go.”

It took a moment for Sarmin to understand his urgency; the guards changed at the same hour every night, and at every changeover they turned the handle to confirm that the door was locked. It was a pointless tradition in Sarmin’s view; not once had the door ever opened to their test.

“Better run, Vizier.” Sarmin laughed again, though more quietly this time. Tuvaini hurried for the secret door.

The last Sarmin saw of him were his jewelled fingers pulling at the stone. “Next time, Tuvaini. Next time.” Sarmin spoke the words to the narrowing crack, softly, but loud enough to be heard.

He leaned back in his chair in the darkness. Shadow hid the gods above him, but he knew they were there. The others were watching, too. He closed his hand around the cut he’d made, savouring the clarity of the pain. Conversation, being rare, always left him buzzing. In the empty hours he would replay every word ever spoken to him, relive every moment, consider each nuance. But now-now the future held the excitement, not the past, and the possibilities left him intoxicated.

By two threads he was joined to the world, by his mother, and by Tuvaini, and each thread divided and divided again, spreading and reaching. The world came to him and he gathered his threads. He drew a circle with his palm, leaving a trail of blood on the wood. A spider in my web. He stood and crossed to stand at the secret door. He pressed his cheek to the smoothness of the wall, holding the dacarba in his crimson hand. “Eyul? Assassin? Can you hear me?” He brought the dacarba to his lips and kissed it. “We will have our reckoning soon.”

Mesema folded her wedding dress, careful not to snag any of the quartz beads dangling from its heavy skirt. The alterations from Dirini’s size were hardly visible; the tiny darts and shortened hems had taken only a week to complete. She’d spent those days by the fire, the murmurs from the sewing circle flowing around her like a stream. The waters whispered war, but Mesema was unmoved. The summer had already wound its way towards harvest time. Her father had clearly chosen the path of peace, and she was one of his two emissaries. The Windreaders would be expected to defend the empire, just as the Red Hooves had before finding their strange god. But the empire was not at war.

She hadn’t tried to run again. Every afternoon, Banreh left her father’s side to teach her the language of the Cerani Empire. She hoped that perhaps she would find a new way of thinking inside those rough words, some new way of considering herself a princess; but her understanding was too limited.

Not like Banreh’s.

Mesema turned and placed the dress inside her wooden trunk. She covered it with a layer of felt before reaching for her quilt, a wedding gift from her mother. It was made from the finest wool, and boasted shining threads of copper, more tiny beads, and even some pearls, bartered from the traders-who-walked. The quilt caught the sunlight as she lifted it and ran her hands along the edge. Tiny bells rang, soft as ladysong. She put it on top of her dress and folded the felt over it.

The box held all she would bring from her home, besides Tumble. She didn’t want to close it; not yet. When she opened it in Nooria, perhaps her husband would run his hands along those bells, pull the wedding dress from its wrapping. She imagined him: dark hair and flat cheekbones, black eyes full of want. Would he dig through, heedlessly breaking beads and threads with rough hands?

A shift in the tent flap, the sound of wool brushing wool. Her mother approached down the centre of the longhouse to where Mesema’s bed lay along the wall. Mesema didn’t turn, or speak. She wasn’t ready yet.

“I have something for you.” A creak of ropes as her mother sat down on the bed.

“I have until midday,” Mesema said, but more to herself than to her mother.

“Ah, but we won’t have another chance to speak privately.” Mesema felt her mother pull on her skirts. “Sit down, daughter.” Mesema sat and folded her hands in her lap. She pressed her lips together to control the trembling. She would say goodbye like a woman.

Her mother held a small pine box in her hands. She put it down on her knees and opened it, revealing an oiled bundle tied at both ends. “They will want a son from you almost before you get there,” she said, undoing the ties and pulling away the fabric. Inside was a stinking grey-brown resin.

“Your husband will come to you every night and day until it takes-your father was the same way. But it is your duty to choose the right stars for your child. You must make them wait.”

“Why-? How?” It was bad enough that Mesema had no plains-children. Now she must pretend to be barren?

“Mesema, daughter, listen. The Cerani are strange and unholy creatures. Everything must be auspicious- for us.” She put emphasis on the final words as she pinched off a bit of resin the size of a thumb. “Work this between your fingers until it’s soft, then put it inside. It tricks his babies so they won’t take root in you. In the morning, pull it out and burn it. When the Bright One is over the moon, burn it all and make your child. Do you understand me, daughter?”

“This doesn’t offend the Hidden God? He chooses the stars for every child.”

“The Hidden God doesn’t live in Nooria. Outside His dominion, you do what you can.” Mesema’s mother rolled the resin back up in its fabric and retied the ends. “I will hide this at the bottom of your trunk.” She paused. “Keep it out of the sunlight. Listen to me: if you have a son, I will send you more. Listen. You must have only one son.”

“Mamma! I should have many sons-”

“Not in Nooria you shouldn’t.”

A Rider stuck his head through the door flap. “Chief wants Mesema,” he shouted.

“I’ve done nothing wrong!” Mesema put one hand over the pine box.

Her mother drew in her breath. “Perhaps you will learn to hold your tongue among the Cerani,” she said. “But never mind that. Go on.”

Mesema kept her back straight as she walked out of the rear of the longhouse. Fabric rustled as her mother hid the resin inside the wedding trunk behind her.