Fire Sea

18

“A message, Your Majesty, from Jonathan, the duke of Rift Ridge.”

“Duke of Rift Ridge? Isn’t he dead?”

“The younger, Your Majesty. You recall, Sire, that you sent him and his wife to deal with those invaders on the far shore—”

“Ah, yes. Quite.” The dynast frowned. “This is in regard to the invaders?”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“Clear the court,” the dynast commanded.

The Lord High Chancellor, knowing that this matter would be dealt with circumspectly, had deliberately spoken in low tones, intended for His Majesty’s ears alone. The order to clear the court came as no surprise, nor did it present difficulty. The Lord High Chancellor had only to meet the eyes of the ever-watchful chamberlain to have the matter accomplished.

A staff banged on the floor. “His Majesty’s audience is ended,” announced the chamberlain.

Those with petitions to present rolled their scrolls up with a snap, tucked them back into scroll cases, made their bows, and backed out of the throne room. Those who were merely court hangerson, who spent as much time near His Dynastic Majesty as possible, hoping for notice from the royal eye, yawned, stretched, and proposed to each other games of rune-bone to ease them through another boring day. The royal cadavers, extremely well preserved and well maintained, escorted the assembly out of the throne room into the vast corridors of the royal palace, shut the doors, and took up positions before them, indicating that His Majesty was in private conference.

When the throne room no longer buzzed with conversation and affected laughter, the dynast commanded, with a wave of his hand, that the Lord High Chancellor was to commence. The Lord High Chancellor did so. Opening a scroll, he began to read.

“His Grace’s most reverent respect—”

“Skip all that.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

It took some moments for the Lord High Chancellor to make his way through compliments showered on the dynast’s person, compliments showered on his illustrious ancestors, compliments showered on the dynast’s just rule, and so forth and so on. The chancellor finally found the heart of the message and delivered it.

“ ‘The invaders come from the outer circle, Your Majesty, a land known as Kairn Telest, the Green Caverns, due to the ... er ... former amount of vegetation grown in that region. Of late, it seems, this region has experienced bad fortune. The magma river has cooled, the people’s water source has dried up.’ The Green Caverns, it seems, Your Majesty,” the Lord High Chancellor added, looking up from his perusal of the message, “could now be called the Bone-Bare[7] Caverns.”

His Majesty said nothing, merely grunted in acknowledgment of the Lord High Chancellor’s wit. The Lord High Chancellor resumed his reading. “ ‘Due to this disaster, the people of Kairn Telest have been forced to flee their land. They have encountered innumerable perils on the journey, including—’ ”

“Yes, yes,” said the dynast impatiently. He fixed his Lord High Chancellor with a shrewd look. “Does the duke mention why these people of the Green Caverns felt it necessary to come here?”

The Lord High Chancellor hastily scanned the message to the end, read it over again to make certain he’d made no mistake—the dynast had a low tolerance for mistakes—then shook his head. “No, Your Majesty. It might almost seem, from the tone, that these people stumbled on Necropolis by accident.”

“Hah!” The dynast’s lips parted in a thin, cunning smile. He shook his head. “They know, Pons. They know! Well, go on. Give us the gist of it. What are their demands?”

“They make no demands, Your Majesty. Their leader, a Prince”—the Lord High Chancellor referred again to the paper to refresh his memory—“Edmund of some unknown house requests the opportunity to pay his respects to Your Dynastic Majesty. The duke adds in a concluding note that the people of Kairn Telest appear to be in a most wretched state. It has occurred to the duke that it is probable we are in some way responsible for the aforesaid disasters and he hopes Your Majesty will meet with the prince at your earliest opportunity”

“Is this young duke of Rift Ridge dangerous, Pons? Or is the man merely stupid?”

The Lord High Chancellor paused to consider the question. “I don’t consider him dangerous, Your Majesty. Nor is he stupid. He is young, idealistic, ingenuous. A touch naive as concerns politics. He is, after all, the younger son and was not raised to have the responsibilities of the dukedom thrust on him so suddenly. Words come from the heart, not his head. I am certain he has no idea what he is saying.”

“His wife, though, is another matter.”

The Lord High Chancellor appeared grave. “I am afraid so, Your Majesty. Duchess Jera is extremely intelligent.”

“And her father, deuce take him, continues to be a confounded nuisance.”

“But that is all he is these cycles, Sire. Banishing him to the Old Provinces was a stroke of genius. The earl must do everything in his power merely to survive. He is too weak to cause trouble.”

“A stroke of genius for which we have you to thank, Pons. Oh, yes, we remember. You needn’t keep reminding us of it. And that old man may be struggling to survive but he has enough breath left in him to continue to speak out against us.”

“But who is listening? Your subjects are loyal. They love Your Majesty...”

“Stop it, Pons. We get enough of that muck shoveled over our feet from everyone else around here. We expect some sense from you.”

The Lord High Chancellor bowed, grateful for the dynast’s good opinion; knowing, however, that the flower of royalty would cease to grow unless it was nurtured by the aforementioned muck.

The dynast had withdrawn his attention from his minister. Rising from the throne made of gold and diamonds and the other precious minerals that were so abundant in this world, His Majesty took a turn or two around the large gold—and-silver-inlaid dais. Pacing was a habit of the dynast’s; he claimed that movement aided his thought processes. Often the dynast completely discomfited those presenting suits to him by leaping up from the throne and circling it several times before returning to it to pronounce judgment.

At least it kept the courtiers on their toes, Pons reflected with some amusement. Whenever His Majesty rose to his feet, everyone in the court was expected to cease conversation and perform the ritual, reverent obeisance. Courtiers were forever called on to cease their conversation, fold their hands in their sleeves, and bow with heads practically to the floor whenever His Majesty took it into his head to walk out a problem.

Pacing was just one of the dynast’s many little eccentricities, the most notable of these being a love of tournament combat and an addiction to the game of rune-bone. Any of the new dead who had been at all proficient in either game during their lives were brought to the palace, where they performed no other service except to offer His Majesty sparring partners during the waking half of the cycle or play at rune-bone with His Majesty far into the sleeping half. Such peculiarities led many to misjudge the dynast, considering him nothing but a shallow-minded gamester. Pons, having seen those many fall, was not among them. His respect for and his fear of His Dynastic Majesty were both deep and well founded.

Pons waited, therefore, in respectful silence for His Majesty to deign to notice him. The matter was obviously serious. The dynast devoted five complete revolutions around the dais to it, his head bowed, hands clasped behind his back.

In his mid-fifties, Kleitus XIV was a well-formed, muscular man of striking appearance whose beauty, when young, had been highly praised in poetry and song. He had aged well and would, as the saying went, make a handsome corpse. A powerful necromancer himself, he had many long years left to stave off that fate.

At last His Majesty ceased his heavy tread. His black fur robes, treated with purple dye to imbue them with the royal hue, rustled softly as he once again settled himself into his throne.

“Death’s Gate,” he muttered, tapping a ring on the arm of the throne. Gold against gold, it gave out a musical, metallic note.

“That’s the reason.”

“Perhaps Your Majesty worries needlessly. As the duke writes, they could have come here by chance—”

“Chance! Next you will be talking of ‘luck’ Pons. You sound like an inept rune-bone player. Strategy, tactics—that’s what wins the game. No, you mark our words. They have come here in search of Death’s Gate, like so many others before them.”

“Let them go, then, Majesty. We have dealt with such madmen before. Good riddance to bad rubbish—”

Kleitus frowned, shook his head. “Not this time. Not these people. We dare not.”

The Lord High Chancellor hesitated to ask the next question, not truly certain he wanted to know the answer. But he knew what was expected of him, the echo chamber for his ruler’s thoughts. “Why not, Sire?”

“Because these people are not insane. Because . . . Death’s Gate has opened, Pons. It has opened and we have seen beyond!”

The Lord High Chancellor had never heard his dynast speak like this, had never heard that crisp and confident voice lowered, awed, even . . . fearful. Pons shivered, as if he felt the first flush of a virulent fever.

Kleitus was staring far off, staring through the thick granite walls of the palace, gazing at a place the Lord High Chancellor could neither see nor even imagine.

“It happened early in the waking hour, Pons. You know that we are a light sleeper. We woke suddenly, startled by a sound that, when we were truly awake, we couldn’t place. It was like a door opening... or shutting. We sat up and drew aside the bed curtains, thinking there might be some emergency. But we were alone. No one had entered the room.

“The impression that we had heard a door was so powerful, that we lighted the lamp beside the bed and started to call for the guard. We remember. We had one hand on the bed curtain and we were just drawing the other back from lighting the lamp when everything around us ... rippled.”

“Rippled, Your Majesty?” Pons frowned.

“We know, we know. It sounds incredible.” Kleitus glanced at his chancellor, smiled ruefully. “We know of no other way to describe it. Everything around us lost shape and substance, dimension. It was as if ourselves and the bed and the curtains and the lamp and the table were suddenly nothing but oil spread over still water. The ripple bent us, bent the floor, the bed, the table. And in an instant, it was gone.”

“A dream, Your Majesty. You were not yet awake . . .”

“So we might have supposed. But in that instant, Pons, this is what we saw.”

The dynast was a powerful wizard among the Sartan. When he spoke, his words brought sudden images to the mind of his minister. The images flashed past so swiftly that Pons was confused, dazzled. He saw none clearly, but had a dizzying impression of objects whirling about him, similar to an experience in childhood when his mother had been wont to take him by the hands and twirl him around and around in a playful dance.

Pons saw a gigantic machine, whose metal parts were fashioned after the parts of a human body and which was working with frantic intensity at nothing. He saw a human woman with black skin and an elven prince waging war against the prince’s own kind. He saw a race of dwarves, led by one in spectacles, rising up against tyranny. He saw a sun-drenched green world and a beautiful shining city, empty, devoid of life. He saw huge creatures, horrible, eyeless, rampaging through a countryside, murdering all who came in their path and he heard them cry, “Where are the citadels?” He saw a race of people, grim, frightening in their hatred and anger, a race with runes traced on their skin. He saw dragons . . .

“There, Pons. You understand?” Kleitus sighed again, half in awe, half in frustration.

“No, Your Majesty!” the chancellor gasped, stammered. “I do not understand! What—where—how long—”

“We know nothing more about these visions than you do. They came to us too fast and when we tried to lay hold of one, it slipped away, like the laze through our fingers. But what we are seeing, Pons, are other worlds! Worlds beyond Death’s Gate, as the ancient texts write. We are certain of it! The people must not come to know this, Pons. Not until we are ready.”

“No, of course not, Sire.”

The dynast’s face was grave, his expression hard, resolute. “This realm is dying. We have leeched off other realms to maintain it—”

We have decimated other realms to maintain it, Pons corrected, but only in his own thoughts.

“We’ve kept the truth from the people for their own good, of course. Otherwise there would be panic, chaos, anarchy. And now comes this prince and his people—”

“—and the truth,” said Pons.

“Yes,” agreed the dynast. “And the truth.”

“Your Majesty, if I may speak freely—”

“Since when, Pons, do you do anything else?”

“Yes, Sire,” The Lord High Chancellor smiled faintly. “What if we were to allow these wretched people admittance, establish them—say—in the Old Provinces. The land is almost completely worthless to us now that the Fire Sea has retreated.”

“And have these people spread their tales of a dying world? Those who think the earl a doddering old fool would suddenly begin to take him seriously.”

“The earl could be handled—” The Lord High Chancellor emitted a delicate cough.

“Yes, but there are more like him. Add to their numbers a prince of Kairn Telest, talking of his cold and barren realm, and his search for a way out, and you will destroy us all. Anarchy, riots! Is that what you want, Pons?”

“By the ash, no!” The Lord High Chancellor shuddered.

“Then quit prattling nonsense. We will portray these invaders as a threat and declare war against them. Wars always unite the people. We need time, Pons! Time! Time to find Death’s Gate ourselves, as the prophecy foretold.”

“Majesty!” Pons gasped. “You! The prophecy. You?—”

“Of course, Chancellor,” Kleitus snapped, appearing slightly put out. “Was there ever any doubt in your mind?”

“No, certainly not, Your Majesty.” Pons bowed, thankful for the chance to conceal his face until he could rearrange his features, banish astonishment and replace it with abiding faith. “I am overwhelmed by the suddenness of ... of everything, too much happening at once.” This, at least, was true enough.

“When the time is right, we will lead the people forth from this world of darkness to one of light. We have fulfilled the first part of the prophecy—”

Yes, and so has every necromancer in Abarrach, thought Pons.

“It remains now for us to fulfill the rest,” Kleitus continued.

“And can you, Your Majesty?” asked his chancellor, obediently taking his cue from the dynast’s slightly raised eyebrow.

“Yes,” answered Kleitus.

This astonished even Pons. “Sire! You know the location of Death’s Gate?”

“Yes, Pons. At long last, my studies have provided me with the answer. Now you understand why this prince and his ragtag followers, arriving at precisely this moment, are such a nuisance.”

A threat, Pons translated. For if you could discover the secret of Death’s Gate from the ancient writings, then so could others. The “ripple” you experienced did not enlighten you so much as terrify you. Someone may have beat you to it. That is the real reason this prince and his people must be destroyed.

“I stand humbled before your genius, Majesty.” The chancellor bowed low.

Pons was, for the most part, sincere. If he had doubts, it was only because he had never quite taken the prophecy seriously. He hadn’t even truly believed in it. Obviously, Kleitus did. Not only believed in it, but had gone about fulfilling it! Had he actually discovered Death’s Gate? Pons might have been dubious, except for the sight of those fantastic images. The visions had sent a thrill through the chancellor’s mind and body as nothing else had done these past forty years. Recalling what he’d seen, he felt, for a moment, quite wild with excitement and was forced to discipline himself severely, wrench himself back from bright and hopeful worlds to the dark and dreary business at hand.

“Your Majesty, how are we to start this war? It is obvious the Kairn Telest do not want to fight—”

“They will fight, Pons,” said the dynast, “when they find out that we have executed their prince.”