S Farrell - A Magic of Nightfall

“On that point, you’re right, O’Teni,” Eneas answered. “That’s exactly what Cenzi tells me.” With that, the o’teni glanced at Eneas strangely, but Eneas gave him no chance to say anything else, bowing to him and moving off quickly across the plaza toward the street that the man had indicated. He whistled a tune as he walked, a Darkmavis song that his matarh had sung to him, long ago, back when the world still made sense to him and Kraljica Marguerite was still on the Sun Throne.

He found the Numetodo building easily enough-the carving over the lintel of the main door was a seashell, the sign of the Numetodo. There was an inn across the lane from the building, and he went into the tavern and ordered wine and a meal, sitting at one of the outside tables. He sipped the wine and ate slowly, watching the place of the Numetodo as the sky went fully dark above him between the buildings.

Three times, he saw someone enter; twice, someone left, but neither time did Cenzi speak to him, so he continued to wait, eating and occasionally touching the leather pouch on the ground alongside him for reassurance. It was nearly two turns of the glass later, with the streets having gone nearly empty before refilling again with those who preferred the anonymity of night, that he saw a man leave the Numetodo building, and Cenzi stirred within him.

That one… Eneas felt the call strongly, and he shouldered his pack, left a silver siqil on the table for his meal and wine, and hurried after the man. His quarry was an older man: bald on the top with a fringe of white hair all around. He was wearing tunic and pants, not a bashta, and was bareheaded-it would be difficult to lose him even in a crowd.

It was quickly apparent why Cenzi had chosen this one; he walked down the street toward the temple plaza. The teni-lights were beginning to fade, and there were few people in the plaza, though the temple domes themselves were still brilliantly lit, golden against the star-pricked sky. Eneas glanced quickly around for an utilino and saw none. He hurried forward, and the Numetodo, hearing his footsteps, turned. Eneas saw the spell-word on the man’s lips, his hands coming up as if about to make a gesture, and Eneas smiled broadly, waving at the man as if hailing a long-lost friend.

The man squinted, as if uncertain of the face before him. His hand dropped, his lips spread in a tentative returning smile. “Do I know-?”

That was as far he got. Eneas pulled the leather sack of pebbles from his pocket and, in the same fluid motion, struck the man hard in the side of his head with it. The Numetodo crumpled, unconscious, and Eneas caught the man in his arm as he sagged. He draped a limp arm over his shoulder and pulled up on the man’s belt. He laughed as if drunken, singing off-key as he dragged the man in the direction of the temple’s side door. Someone seeing them from a distance would think they were two inebriated friends staggering across the plaza. Eneas cast a last look over his shoulder as he reached the doors; no one seemed to be watching. He pulled on the heavy, bronze-plated door, adorned with images of the Moitidi and their struggle with Cenzi: that much hadn’t changed-the temple doors were rarely locked, open to those who might wish to come in and pray, or to the indigent who might need a place to sleep during the night at the price of an Admonition by the teni who found them in the morning. Eneas slipped into the cool darkness of the temple. It was empty, and the sound of his breathing and his boot steps were loud as he dragged the Numetodo’s dead weight up the main aisle, finally dropping him against the lectern at the front of the quire. He unslung the pack from his shoulder and put it on the Numetodo’s lap, uncoiling the long cotton string from the top. He fed it out carefully as he backed down the aisle.

I will show you your own small Gift, Cenzi had told him only this afternoon. I will show you how to make your own fire. The chant and the gestures had come to him then, and though Eneas knew it was against the Divolonte for someone not of the teni to use the Ilmodo, he knew that this was Cenzi’s wish and he would not be punished for it. He spoke the chant now near the temple entrance, and he felt the cold of the Ilmodo flowing in his veins and the Second World opening to his mind: between his moving hands there was an impossible heat and light, and he let it fall to the end of the cord and the fuse began to sputter and fume.

“Hey! Who’s there! What’s this!”

He saw a teni come from one of the archways leading off from the quire-the o’teni he’d spoken to earlier-and Eneas ducked down quickly, though the spell left him strangely tired, as if he’d been working hard all day. He heard the teni give a call and other footsteps echoed. “Who’s this? What’s going on?” someone said, as the fire on the fuse traveled quickly away from Eneas toward the lectern. When it was nearly there, Eneas rose to his feet and ran toward the door. He caught a glimpse of the o’teni and few e’teni, walking quickly toward the slumped, unmoving Numetodo, and someone pointed to Eneas…

… but it was already too late.

A dragon roared and belched fire, and the concussion picked Eneas up and threw him against the bronze doors. Half conscious, he fell to the stone flags as bits of rock and marble pelted him. When the hard, quick rain passed, he lifted his head. There was something red on the floor in front of him: the Numetodo’s leg, he realized with a start, still clad in his loose pants. Near the front of the temple, someone was screaming, a long wail interspersed with curses. Groaning, Eneas tried to sit up. He was bleeding from cuts and scrapes and his body was bruised from his collision with the bronze doors, but otherwise Cenzi had spared him. The doors of the temple were flung open in front of him, and an utilino rushed in and past Eneas, blowing hard on his whistle. Teni were rushing in from the alcoves. The high lectern had toppled, laying broken in the aisle, and there was blood and parts of bodies everywhere. The Numetodo… he could see the man’s head and the top of his torso, torn from his body and tossed into the aisle. The rest of him, where the bag of black sand had lain… Eneas couldn’t see the rest.

For a moment he felt nausea: this was too much like the war, and the memories of what he’d seen in the Hellins threatened to overwhelm him. Acid filled his throat, his stomach heaved, but Cenzi’s voice was in his head, too.

This is what they deserve, those who defy Me. You, Eneas, you are my Moitidi of Death, my chosen Weapon.

But I don’t want this, he wanted to say, but even as he thought the words, he felt the anger of Cenzi rising up, a heat in his brain that made his head pound, and he went to his knees, clutching his skull between his hands.

Everything was confusion. People were pushing past him. He could still hear the wounded teni screaming. “… Numetodo… I recognize him…” Eneas heard the word amidst the chaos, and he smiled. As more people entered from the plaza, shouting and calling, he took the opportunity to slink to the side and into the shadows.

He went out into the night, feeling Cenzi’s presence warming him.

You are fit for the task I have set for you. Now-go to Nessantico, and I will speak to you there…

The Council of ca’ for Nessantico met on the first floor of the Grande Palais on the Isle a’Kralji, where they had several suites of rooms and a small staff of palais servants dedicated entirely to their needs. The Council of Ca’, for most of the great Kraljica Marguerite’s reign, as well as that of her son Kraljiki Justi, had been largely a social organization, coming to the palais to sign the papers passed to them by the Kralji and the royal staff-a task they performed with little thought or discussion, otherwise spending their time relaxing in their sumptuous private offices or socializing in the well-appointed dining room and lounges of the Council’s section of the Kralji’s Palais. For many decades, being a “councillor” was mostly an honorary position, their duties ceremonial and hardly taxing, and their stipend for serving on the Council generous.