Pride of Empires (The Powers of Amur Book 3) Read online

“Nor should you,” Veshta said. He took a small square of cotton from his pocket and wiped his brow. “Is that what you’re here for?”

  Navran leaned back in the chair and heard the reeds squeak underneath him. “Not exactly. Today I want an explanation.”

  “Ah, an explanation. But you see, ah, my lord and King….” He flustered and began to twist the cotton square in his hands. He glanced at Dastha, then back to the cotton square.

  “Dastha,” Navran said, “wait for us in the antechamber with the others.”

  “You will be safe here, my lord and king?” Dastha asked.

  “Yes.”

  Dastha bowed and marched smartly back to the ablution chamber. When he was gone, Navran said, “Better?”

  Veshta did not look any better. He continued to wring the square in his hands, and he did not look up to meet Navran’s eyes. “You see I would not give Josi to any man who did not understand what he acquired.”

  Navran waited a few breaths for Veshta to continue. When he didn’t, he said flatly, “What would I acquire?”

  Veshta looked into the shadows of the colonnade around the courtyard. “I would rather not, Navran-dar.”

  “I would rather have a Purse who doesn’t run from me. Should I replace her?”

  “Oh, no. Her work in the palace has delighted her more than anything since—” He took a deep breath.

  “If you don’t want to give Josi to me, say it.”

  “It’s not a matter of whether I want to give Josi to you. In many respects it would be a most desirable thing. We have often had marriages between the Heirs and the House of the Ruin. My aunt Uparthi was also Mandhi’s aunt, though she was older than both of us. She passed away some time ago. But, alas….” He sighed again and put the cotton square back into his pocket. “Josi is not a suitable pair for the Heir of Manjur.”

  “Explain.”

  “There was a scandal with Josi some years ago, you see. When she was young.”

  “Scandal?”

  Veshta looked again into the shadows of the colonnade, peering carefully down all four walls of the courtyard. He leaned in and spoke in a quiet voice. “You know Habdana. My page, the boy who brought you tea a moment ago.”

  “Yes.”

  “By law and custom, he is my brother Adjan’s son. Habdana and Kidri, both Adjan’s children, remained here in Virnas while Adjan sailed out of Uskhanda, where Adjan’s wife Dhanmi and Josi lived. Until they all came here, that is.” Veshta peered around again, to be sure that no one listened. “But he is not Adjan’s son.”

  Navran picked at the weaving of the chair. A strange feeling of relief flooded through him. He had feared that he was the problem, that Josi was repulsed by his scars or disdainful of his position. It hadn’t occurred to him that the obstacle was Josi’s.

  Veshta went on, gesturing urgently. “Habdana himself doesn’t know. In fact, in Virnas no one knows openly except for me, my siblings, and our mother, and one saghada. Some others may suspect, but no one speaks of it. Cauratha knew, and he counseled us how to handle the situation. Josi went to Uskhanda with Adjan to bear the child, and when they returned with Habdana, he was already called the child of Adjan and Dhanmi.”

  Navran folded his hands. “And Habdana’s father?”

  “We don’t know.”

  Navran raised an eyebrow. “Surely Josi knows.”

  “She would never tell us, though we begged her. She was betrothed at the time, and we assumed it was him. But her betrothed disavowed the child and annulled their betrothal.”

  “And what was his name?”

  Veshta shook his head. “No, I won’t spread the shames and trials of another family.” He looked at Navran with face pinched and spoke in a tone of earnest pleading, “You understand, I’ve invited you into the most painful secret of our family. I implore you to guard your knowledge and your tongue.”

  “Of course,” Navran said. And who could he possibly be tempted to share this with? His own sorrows and failures bubbled up from the depths of his mind, and he felt himself growing hot with shameful memories. He was in no position to gossip or judge.

  “So Josi stayed in Uskhanda with Adjan and Dhanmi,” Veshta said, “to serve as their clerk, or maid, or whatever else Adjan could find to put her to use. Apparently he set her to keeping books—not something that I would have picked for my little sister, but apparently she likes it. It was as good an arrangement as could possibly be made. Please, don’t disturb it.”

  “Won’t disturb anything.” At least, not more than he had already disturbed it, by allowing his desire for Josi to grow and daring to say it out loud. “I’m sorry to make you say it.”

  Veshta sniffed and wiped at the corner of his eyes. His breath was labored, and he covered his face for a moment, trembling. “We were sorry to have it happen. But it was several years ago, and it ended as well as such things can be expected to end. As for the question before us….” He sighed and looked at Navran earnestly. “I think you understand why Josi would not be an acceptable bride for the Heir and the King of Virnas. Even if you should ask for her, I could not give her to you with a clean heart.”

  “I understand.” And he raged. Veshta was being entirely reasonable and honorable. Navran was not owed any explanation beyond a simple denial, nor was he even owed the scruples which barred Veshta from acquiescing. Veshta gave him a gift of great value, a gift of honesty and integrity—and he didn’t want it.

  He rose to his feet with a groan of pain. Veshta stood up after him and bowed from the waist. “My lord and king, I’ve kept you long enough with these stories. Shall I call for Habdana?”

  “Have Habdana bring Dastha,” Navran said. “You didn’t keep me too long. But I’ll go.”

  Dastha escorted Navran through the ablution chamber and the outer rooms of Veshta’s house, where they reacquired the herald and the rest of Navran’s personal guard. Navran was quiet until they passed the white post that marked the edge of the Uluriya district.

  The herald ahead of them called out, Navran-dar, the Heir of Manjur and the King of Virnas every few steps, and the women, beggars, and dhorsha stopped and bowed as they passed. In a pause between his proclamations, Navran leaned over to Dastha and said, “Do you remember when we gambled in the guesthouse by the river?”

  Dastha raised an eyebrow, then grinned. “Of course I remember.”

  “What did we do after a good night, when both of us won?”

  “Oh, that didn’t happen often.”

  Navran laughed. “True. But you remember the girls by the docks.”

  Dastha rolled his eyes. “I don’t remember anyone in particular, but I know the place.”

  Navran was quiet for a while. The gray walls of the palace loomed ahead of them, and above the chatter of the crowds they could hear the grinding of the doors being opened.

  “Do you want to marry?” Navran asked.

  “You sound like my mother. She’s constantly telling me to return to the village so she and my father can find me a girl. But during my term of service under Thudra I wasn’t allowed to marry.”

  Navran shook his head. “Your service to me is permanent. I allow you to marry.”

  Dastha shrugged. “Then maybe I will. I still have to tell my father so he can arrange something.”

  “My mother wanted me to marry,” Navran said. “But I was well past her ability to arrange anything. I have to arrange it myself. And I’m failing at it.”

  “Your conversation with Veshta didn’t go as you hoped.”

  Navran looked down. “It’s complicated.”

  They passed beneath the gate of the palace and entered the stone-paved courtyard. White banners painted with the pentacle in silver snapped in the breeze. Sunlight glinted off of the green-tiled archway of the primary entrance into the palace. A silver pentacle hung over the door.

  “The pentacle,” Navran said reluctantly. “It means that the palace is clean. But I was never clean. Never good. Not until it was forced on me.”

>   “You weren’t,” Dastha agreed. He laughed. “But when you had to, you were pretty good at it.”

  Navran let a finger trace the scar on his cheek. “Good enough to be burned. Good enough to be hurt.”

  Kirshta

  Kirshta shoved Crossing the Mountains to the Serpent across the carpet toward Vapathi. She sat cross-legged on the floor of the Lotus’s room, with a few feet of woven carpet between them and books stacked haphazardly on each side.

  “This is not a very good book,” Kirshta said. “In fact, it’s one of the worst books I’ve ever read.”

  Vapathi laughed at him. She picked up the pale brown book case, rapped it against the floor, and tossed it into the air.

  “So then why are you reading it?”

  “Because Ruyam was reading it,” Kirshta said.

  “You’re still trying to understand the logic of his library?”

  “It’s clearly part of the theme.” Kirshta picked up the piece of slate with WHY TERNAS scribbled across the top. He tapped at the chalk. “It’s about a man who travels from somewhere near Rajunda, through Ternas, across the mountains, and to a colony of thikratta on the shores of the Serpent Sea.”

  “Thikratta on the shores of the Serpent Sea? There’s nothing on that shore but lizards and dead fish.”

  “It’s from hundreds of years ago. Evidently there were a few thikratta there at the time. The author’s purpose was to accompany a novice from Rajunda to one of those colonies for study. But the author is credulous and naive and never had even the first stanza of poetics, so I’m not sure what to believe of his book.”

  Vapathi laughed. She stretched out her legs and touched a wooden bookcase with her toe. “I’ve never had the first stanza of poetics, but you manage to speak to me.”

  “You’re not trying to write a book.”

  “I should start. There’s a demand for terrible books by the uneducated, it seems.”

  Kirshta groaned, leaned over, and pulled the book back from Vapathi. “If that’s your threat, I’ll have to take the book away from you.”

  “Kirshta, there must be something. He passes through Ternas, you said. So what does it say about Ternas?”

  “Oh, he doesn’t like it,” Kirshta said. He carefully thumbed through the pages until he found the place. “He says, here, ‘it has nothing at all compared to the great monasteries of Rajunda, and its monks haven’t done any nice work.’”

  “‘Nice work’?”

  “I told you, his style is awful.”

  Vapathi laughed. “And is that all?”

  Kirshta breathed deeply and scratched at the healing scab along his torn ear. The scab was beginning to flake away, leaving behind a lumpy ridge of cartilage. “There is one more bit. A page later… The thikratta he’s traveling with tells him that the lama of Ternas is supposed to have a book which contains the secret knowledge of the Powers. But the man asks to see it, and the lama denies that it exists.”

  “If it’s a secret, he would have to.”

  Kirshta nodded. He glanced up at the beam of sunlight filtering into the room from the high window. The edge of the sunlit square barely touched the corner of the rug. He still had time before he had to meet with Chadram.

  “I agree,” Kirshta said. “But the author is a fool. It’s possible that it’s a rumor.” He sighed and closed the book. “And the rest of the book is just his complaining about crossing the mountains.”

  Vapathi traced her finger around the edge of the book. “Don’t be so quick to dismiss that. Complaining about what?”

  “The altitude and the exhaustion. The thikratta companion says he can’t meditate.”

  “Perhaps… Kirshta, there was never anything like a thikratta among the mountain people, was there?”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean much. Thikratta are rare. Most people in Amur have never seen one.”

  “Yes, but I don’t remember hearing about anything similar until we came to the lowlands. But everyone here knows them at least as legend.”

  A shiver shook him. A memory of black stones and the icy teeth of the Holy. “I don’t think about our childhood much.”

  “Me neither,” Vapathi said.

  A cold silence chilled the room.

  Vapathi stirred. “Never mind. In the mountains we knew only the terror of She Who Devours, and not even the legend of the thikratta. And the thikratta who passed through the mountains could not meditate. It might not be a coincidence.”

  “But Ternas?” Kirshta said. “In that case, why would Ternas be built at the doorstep of the mountains?”

  Vapathi shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  The sunlight streaming through the window crept to the edge of his page. He glanced up. Afternoon was getting on.

  “I should meet with Chadram,” he said.

  Vapathi rose to her feet. “You should. Where is Apurta?”

  “I don’t know. I gave him the afternoon off, since I’ll be occupied.”

  “Ah,” she said and glanced at his bed. “Then I’ll let you prepare.”

  She left. Kirshta quickly dressed himself in the yellow silk of the Emperor’s Lotus. Praudhu had sent him a servant for this, but Kirshta had sent him away just as quickly. He preferred to be alone, and he did not like to be touched. He took a satchel with the accoutrements of his office and headed out.

  The servants and khadir in the halls of the Ushpanditya moved to allow him to pass. At the Horned Gate, the gatekeeper directed him to the room that had been set aside for him and Chadram, a cleaned-out storeroom just inside the Dhigvaditya. The room smelled faintly of oiled wood and the dust of a whetstone when Kirshta entered. Chadram was nowhere to be seen. Kirshta took an incense burner from his satchel and lit a stick to prepare the atmosphere, then settled himself into the Lotus posture.

  The inner stillness came to him as soon as he began to meditate. For a moment he merely floated, letting his thoughts dissipate into the void, bringing his vision in line with the vision of the Powers. Then he began see.

  Praudhu facedown in a pool of blood.

  He pushed that aside. That vision was ever-present, but now was not its time. He set it aside and let the eyes of his farsight rove.

  In his practice over the last weeks, he had learned to direct his farsight enough to peer into those around him. The trick was to not fall entirely into the trance but to keep an awareness of the world, and to look with the eye of farsight on those whom his physical eye perceived. It required more concentration than simply falling into the stillness and swimming in that timeless space. But when it was done correctly he saw through walls like air, and the souls of those around him grew clear as water.

  And so he saw Chadram and Vadya coming a few seconds before they arrived. He opened his eyes in time to see them enter the room and said, “Vadya. I don’t believe that we’ve met.”

  The man accompanying Chadram raised his brows. He was a little taller than Chadram, with the ropy muscles and deeply lined face of an old soldier. He wore a red kurta with a lieutenant’s insignia on it. With his eyes attuned to farsight, Kirshta saw a crackle of distrust pass between them.

  “You must be the little thikratta,” the man said. “How delightful that you know my name.”

  “He’s here for a witness,” Chadram said, settling himself on the ground next to Kirshta. He gave Kirshta a friendly nod. “Kirshta makes sure no one cheats. But the two of you don’t ask any questions.” He looked pointedly at Vadya.

  “I’m here at the Emperor’s request,” Vadya said. He gave them an oleaginous smile. “We’re all trying to ensure the Emperor safety, no? But we’ll do things as you specify.”

  “Yes we will. Are you ready?” Chadram asked Kirshta.

  The touch of the inner stillness was on his mind, and the eyes of his farsight were open. “I’m ready,” he said.

  A young soldier entered. His beard was thin and his jaw was wide, and he wore only a dhoti with the red sash of the imperial guard. His eyes twitched with fear. He stood
in the Cane posture before Chadram.

  “What is your name?” Chadram asked.

  “Viksha,” the man said. He was as stiff as a palm tree. Too stiff. It looked like Kirshta could push him over.

  “Were you in Dumaya’s company here in Majasravi?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “So you didn’t go to Virnas?”

  “No, sir.”

  Chadram nodded and glanced at Kirshta. Kirshta had nothing to say yet: the man’s answers were true, and his farsight didn’t offer him any perception beyond what the mortal eyes could see.

  “Did you support the Emperor of all Amur, Praudhu-daridarya, whose name we say with fear and trembling, when he appeared at the gates of Majasravi?”

  “Yes, eventually.”

  Chadram raised a finger. “What do you mean, eventually?”

  The man stammered and shifted on his feet. “I was in the Dhigvaditya with Dumaya. I couldn’t run out and join the Emperor’s legion, not immediately.”

  “And why not?”

  “My commander was here.” The man seemed at a loss. “My squadron. I couldn’t just leave them.”

  There was a ripple in the darkness of Kirshta’s farsight, like the shape that water makes passing over a stone. The man didn’t lie, not exactly, but his words tugged at something buried deeper. Kirshta leaned over to Chadram. “Keep asking. There’s something he hasn’t told us.”

  Chadram scratched his beard and looked the boy up and down. He whispered to Kirshta, “He seems harmless to me.”

  Kirshta shrugged. “Perhaps he is harmless. But we have to find out, no?”

  Chadram turned back to Viksha. “So when the gates were opened for the rightful Emperor of all Amur, did you fight on his side?”

  The man relaxed a little. “Yes, yes I did.” But his answer caused another swirl in the darkness.

  “And are you loyal to Praudhu-daridarya with all your heart?”

  “Yes.”

  A glance passed between Chadram and Vadya, who sat with his arms crossed, taking in the suspect soldier with narrow eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, but Chadram raised his hand. He sighed and asked, “Do you serve Praudhu-daridarya willingly and with joy?”