David Drake - The Gods Return

Though if Chalcus was here, he with his sword as sure as the sting of a hunting wasp and me with a silken lasso to tangle even a creature as big as this ghoul – Chalcus was dead. And Ilna wasn't dead, not yet, so she had duties. "There's another way, I think," said Usun. "I know you're a wizard, mistress, but wizardry won't work on him. How are your nerves?" Ilna sniffed. He wasn't trying to insult her.

"Adequate," she said. Saying more would be bragging. The little man giggled. "So I thought!" he said. "So I thought! Well then, Ilna, this is what we'll do…" *** "The most important thing in the world I'll tell you freely," Platt said, sitting upright on the couch in Dysart's office.

The desks at which several clerks would during the day transcribe documents had been moved into the hall, so there was room for the unusual number of people present. "Lord Scorpion is God. Worship Him or infallibly be destroyed!" "When did you leave your former position as priest of the Shepherd, Master Platt?" Dysart asked. He was quiet and polite, a clerk from the tips of his toes to his thinning hair.

Sharina had directed-over the protests of Lords Ascor, Tadai, and Quernan of the Pandah garrison-that Dysart should handle the interrogation. She'd accept Liane's judgment on most matters, and Liane had put Dysart in charge in her absence. "I didn't leave the Shepherd," Platt snapped. "The Shepherd is dead! All the old gods are dead. Lord Scorpion is Lord of the cosmos!" "Why, you puppy!" said Lord Quernan. He raised his hand and stepped forward. Two of Dysart's agents grabbed him by the elbows and thrust him back. "Out," said Sharina with a flick of her left index finger toward the door. "But that's blasphemy!" Quernan protested. Other spectators made way for him; one of Tadai's clerks even opened the door. "As well worship a dead donkey as your Lady!" Platt cried. Sharina had been afraid that other soldiers would protest, but instead of equally clueless aides, Quernan had brought Prester and Pont. They remained at attention, as if nothing important was happening. Knowing the two old soldiers, they might have brought themselves. They'd met Sharina in a hard place years ago. Because she'd performed to their approval, they seemed to have adopted her. She suspected that a number of junior officers over the years had had similarly good luck. Platt let out a broken laugh.

"Do you think to frighten me?" he said. "The disciples of Lord Scorpion need fear nothing. I am assured of my salvation!" "But you were trying to escape us in the graveyard, weren't you?" Dysart said.

"Your Scorpion didn't save you then, Master Platt. You're obviously a clever man. You know in your heart that he's not as powerful as what you preach to the rabble." "Salvation is of the soul, not the body,"

Platt muttered. He was sweating profusely. His thin hair was plastered down so that his pink scalp showed through. "Is your ankle comfortable?" Dysart asked. "I'm sorry about the injury, but we had no choice. For as long as you're in my charge I'll see to it that you receive medical care, though my department's facilities are too limited for any but the most important prisoners. I can only hope that the City Prefect will be able to manage something if you have to be transferred to the jail." "Are you out of your mind, Dysart?" Tadai said in a deliberately affected voice as he inspected the curve of his fingernails. "Mybudget doesn't stretch to doctors for a lot of drunks and vagabonds." "How often to you meet with your fellow priests, Master Platt?" Dysart said as though the previous exchange hadn't occurred. He sat in the chair behind his desk; the prisoner was in the couch beside him. Everyone else stood along the inside wall. Burne padded from door to window ledge and back, his whiskers twitching. "I don't," said Platt, squirming uneasily. He'd lost his bravado. "We don't have to meet, I mean. We, ah… I do at least, I suppose the others. God speaks to me in dreams, through his acolyte Black. I've never met another priest, though I know there's many of us. Preparing for the day!" "You claim to get detailed instructions from your dreams, Master Platt?" Dysart said. He didn't raise his voice, but Sharina could hear the hint of a frown in it. "Yes, that's true," the prisoner said. He'd lost the defiance that'd begun to creep back into his tone. "Black tells me where to preach and when. But I know there are many of us, throughout the world." As far as information reaching Sharina went-both from Liane's clandestine service and the reports of regional governors-Pandah was the only center of Scorpion worship. It gave her a feeling of comfort to know that Black lied to his own acolytes-but he was real enough in her own dreams, and she was responsible for Pandah besides. "Do you send messengers to chalk notices on walls to let the worshippers know where you'll be preaching?" Dysart said. "Or does somebody else do that? We've found the notices, you see." "I…," Platt said. He frowned in surprise.

"I don't know, I never wondered. Lord Scorpion speaks to me, that's all. I suppose He speaks to others. People bring me food and hide me during the day, but I don't know who they are. I'm not from Pandah, you see. I came here from Valles when Lord Scorpion called me in the night." "We'll need the names and lodgings of those who help you,"

Dysart said. His hands were tented on his lap, but clerks in opposite corners of the room were making notes on waxed tablets. "They'll already be in our records, but now they'll be cross-referenced with you." "I don't know any of them!" Platt said in agitation. "It wouldn't matter if I told you-Lord Scorpion rules the world. You can't harm Him with your foolish opposition. Join Him!" He raised his eyes from Dysart and swept them across the faces of those watching the interrogation. Sharina had never before seen such terror in a gaze.

"All of you!" Platt cried. "Worship Lord Scorpion! Worship the living God!" Burne leaped to the top of the window casement and came down with something squirming between his forepaws. His chisel teeth clicked efficiently. Platt screamed and fainted. Dysart grimaced and used two fingers to check the pulse in the prisoner's throat. "He'll be all right when he comes around," he said. "It can't be helped, I suppose." "No," said Sharina, "it couldn't be-unless we were willing to let Black's agents hear the rest of the interrogation. I don't think we were going to get any more of real value from him regardless." "Surely he's lying about how he communicates with the rest of his cult?" said Lord Tadai. "About Black and the dreams, you mean?" Sharina said. "I suspect that's true." "How does your highness wish to proceed?" Dysart said. His agents were tying Platt's hands and feet again; he'd been loosed for comfort during the interrogation, but Sharina had seen how quickly Liane's men could move when they had to.

"I'm going to send him to Tenoctris," she said, crystallizing murky thoughts into a plan of action. "I doubt that Platt knows any more than he's told us, but I think Tenoctris can use him as a focus from which she can learn a great deal more. I hope she can help us." She looked down at the unconscious prisoner. "The Lady knows we could use some help," she said. Burne sat upright, cleaning his muzzle. Scraps of black chitin lay scattered about him. "Oh, I don't know, Sharina," the rat said. "We're not doing so badly ourselves." *** Garric waited while Tenoctris dropped chips of white marble inside the ring of trees. They were bald cypress, their bases swollen.

The roots which thrust knees up to breathe in the wet season crawled over dry ground, now; the waters which must sometimes turn this place into a marsh had receded. The regiment that'd escorted them the mile from the main camp murmured in the surrounding darkness. The troops weren't within twenty double-paces of the trees, but nothing could pass through the scores of encircling watch fires without being seen.