S Farrell - A Magic of Nightfall

He would have faith in that: a grim, dark, and uncompromising faith.

Archigos Kenne patted his hand and whispered more words he couldn’t hear. The Regent Sergei’s shoulder pressed against his to the left. Kraljiki Audric wheezed on the other side of the Regent, his labored breath louder than the chanting of the teni. He heard Varina weeping softly in the pew behind him.

The fire-teni stirred around the green-wrapped body. Their hands moved in the dance of the Ilmodo, their voices lifted in a unison chant that fought against the choir’s ethereal voices. They spread their hands wide as if in benediction, and the fierce blaze of Ilmodo-fire erupted around Ana’s body. The heat of the magical flames washed over them, savage and relentless. There were no sparks, no pyre feeding them: while the Kralji and the ca’-and-cu’ burned in flames fed by wood and oil, the teni burned their own with the Ilmodo-quickly and furiously. The Ilmodo-fire consumed the body in the space of a few breaths, the metallic-green fabric turning black instantly, the heat shimmer so intense that Ana’s body seemed to shake within it. As Karl watched, as his body instinctively leaned back against the fierce assault of the heat, Ana was taken.

The flames died abruptly as the choir ended their song. Cold air rushed back around them, a wind that tousled hair and fluttered cloth. On the altar now, there was nothing but gray ash and a few fragments of bone.

The mortal cage of Ana was gone.

“She is back in Cenzi’s hands now,” Archigos Kenne said to Karl. “He will give her solace.”

And I will give her better than solace. He nodded silently to the Archigos. I will give her revenge.

“ It was not a sign.”

Fynn slammed his fisted hand hard on the arm of his chair. The servants standing ready along the wall to serve dinner shivered at the sound. The long scar down the right side of his face burned white against his flushed face. “I don’t care what they’re saying. What happened was a terrible accident. Nothing more. It was not a sign.”

“Of course you’re right, Brother,” Allesandra told him soothingly. She paused-a single breath-and gestured to the Magyarian servants: they were taking supper in Allesandra’s rooms within the palais. The servants moved forward, ladling soup into the bowls and pouring wine. Fynn sat at the table’s head; Allesandra at the foot. Archigos Semini and his wife were to Fynn’s right; her son Jan to the left.

Allesandra had heard some of the rumors herself. Hirzg Jan is upset that Fynn has taken the crown, not his daughter… The Hirzg’s soul cannot rest… I heard from one of the servants in the palais that his ghost still walks the halls at night, moaning and crying out as if angry… There were dozens of the tales surging through Brezno, twisted depending on the agenda of those who spoke them, and growing larger and more outrageous each time they were told. Cenzi sends a warning to the Hirzg that the Holdings and the Faith must become one again… The souls of all those the Hirzg killed-the Numetodo, the Nessanticans, the Tennshah-pursue him and will not allow him to rest… They say that when the sealing stone fell, those in the chamber heard the old Hirzg’s voice call out with a curse on Firenzcia…

The soup had been served and the silence had stretched too long. Allesandra could hear the breathing of the servants and the distant, muffled clatter of the cook and the kitchen help a floor below them. “I understand that the other lancer has died also,” Allesandra commented when it was apparent that no one else was willing to start a conversation.

Fynn glared at her down the length of the table “That was Cenzi’s Blessing,” he said. “The man would never have walked again. The healer said his spine was broken; if I were him, I’d rather die than live the rest of my life as a useless cripple.”

“I’m sure he felt the same as you, Brother.” She kept her voice carefully neutral. “And I’m sure that the Archigos did what he could to ease his passing.” Another pause. “As far as the Divolonte would allow, of course,” she added.

Francesca let her spoon clatter back to the table at that. “You may have been soiled by the beliefs of the false Archigos during your years with her, A’Hirzg,” she declaimed coldly, “but I assure you that my husband has not. He would never -”

“Francesca!” Semini’s rebuke caused Francesca to snap her mouth closed, like a carp gulping on a riverbank. He glared at her, then clasped hands to forehead as he turned to Allesandra. His gaze held hers. Allesandra had always thought that the Archigos had exquisite eyes: powerful and engaging. She had also noticed that when she was in the room, Semini often paid close attention to her. That had never bothered her; she enjoyed his attentions. She’d thought, back when her vatarh had finally ransomed her, that he might have married her to Semini, had he not already been tied to Francesca. That would have been a powerful marriage, allying both the political and religious powers within the state, and Semini might have been someone she could have come to love, as well. Even now… She closed off that thought, quickly. She had taken lovers during her marriage, yes-as she had known Pauli had also done-but always carefully. Always discreetly. An affair with the Archigos… that would be difficult to conceal.

“I apologize, A’Hirzg,” Semini said. “Sometimes my wife’s, ahh, devotion to the Faith causes her to speak too harshly. I did give the poor lancer what comfort I could, at the Hirzg’s request.” He addressed Fynn then. “My Hirzg, you shouldn’t be concerned with the gossip of the rabble. In fact, I will make it clear in my next Admonition that those who believe that there are portents in this horrible incident are mistaken, and that these wild rumors are simply lies. I’ve already had people begin to make inquiries as to who is spreading all the vile gossip-I would say that if the Garde Hirzg takes a few of them into custody, especially a few of those of lower rank, and, ahh, convinces them to recant publicly before they’re executed for treason, that would certainly act as a lesson to the others. I think we’d find that all the talk about what happened at your vatarh’s burial would vanish as quickly as snow in Daritria.”

Francesca was nodding at her husband’s words. “We should treat these people no better than we would the Numetodo,” she agreed. “Just as the Numetodo are traitors to the Faith, these rumormongers are traitors to our Hirzg. A few bodies swaying in gibbets will adequately shut the mouth of the populace.” She glanced at Allesandra. “Wouldn’t you agree, A’Hirzg?” she asked, her voice far too gentle and far too eager. The woman actually leaned forward at the table, emphasizing her humped back.

“I think it’s dangerous to equate rumormongering with heresy, Vajica ca’Cellibrecca,” she began carefully, but Jan interrupted her.

“If you punish people for gossiping, you’ll convince them instead that the rumors are true,” her son said, the first words he’d spoken since they’d sat at the table, then shrugged as the others looked at him. “Well, that’s the truth,” he insisted. “If you give them the sermon you suggest, Archigos, you’ll just be drawing more attention to what happened, which will make people believe the rumors even more. It’s better to say and do nothing at all; all this talk will fade away on its own when nothing else happens. Every time one of us repeats the gossip, even to deny or refute it, we make it seem more real and more important than it is.”

She followed Jan’s gaze from Semini to the others at the table. Semini was glowering, his eyebrows lowered like thunderclouds over those captivating eyes; Francesca’s mouth gaped open as if she were too stunned for words at the boy’s impertinence; she gave a cough of derision and waved a hand like a claw in Jan’s direction, as if warding off a beggar’s curse. Fynn was staring down at the tablecloth in front of him. “It’s better to say and do nothing,” Jan repeated into the silence, his voice thinner and more uncertain now, “or what happened will become a sign. You’ll all have turned it into one.”