Path of Revenge Read online

  But soon she would be. Soon they would all believe her. The hole in the world was large now, hundreds of bright threads hanging loose in the devouring blackness, and every time she checked her calculations a few more threads separated and another node fell out of the pattern. It was not natural, whatever Mahudia said. Lenares now had the means to locate the circumference of this hole, using strange numbers she had invented to give shape to the shapeless. To fight the nothingness that was destroying her ordered world. This knowledge was to be her gift to the Emperor, the father of the Amaqi, the wise, great man whom Mahudia had taught her to love.

  The Emperor, however, was not a great man. He did not deserve to be loved. He behaved more like the bullies she’d been tormented by throughout her miserable childhood. She hated bullies. Why should she share her great discovery with such a person?

  Lenares nibbled at a strand of her hair, then pushed it up between her lips and her nose. She always did this when she was thinking. We have lost our way. What if the threads they were travelling ended at the hole? What if the next node was unreachable? What if their nodes were the next to be engulfed? She needed time to do more calculations, but all people wanted to do was talk. Even Mahudia, who was so nice to her, talked far too much. Sometimes she could not stand it.

  ‘The Emperor will not listen to us,’ Lenares said. ‘I think he is part of the problem. He is a weakness in the pattern. When I do my calculations I will find his node, and the hole will be nearby.’ As she said this, she knew it to be true. She could always tell whether or not words fitted the pattern. No one could lie to her.

  Mahudia looked troubled by this. ‘We must try,’ she said, then plucked at her bottom lip in a characteristic gesture. Lenares knew exactly how many times she had seen Mahudia do this. It was a thread, giving meaning to the node that was the Chief Cosmographer.

  ‘When I work out where the hole is, I want to go and look at it,’ Lenares announced.

  ‘I thought you might.’ Mahudia’s face was stern. ‘I won’t let you. It would be dangerous. Wouldn’t you rather calculate some way we can put a stop to it, heal the gash, put the world back together?’

  ‘I’m going to my room,’ Lenares said, unable to bear her mentor’s face. She didn’t like Mahudia when she wore her angry face.

  ‘Find out how much time we have left,’ Mahudia called to the retreating figure, and received the usual shrug in response.

  The summons came early the next morning. The day was already hot and promised to grow much hotter—in more ways than one, Mahudia reflected. All seventeen cosmographers, and the one who was to be raised, had been invited to attend upon the Emperor within the hour. They were to present themselves at the Gate of the Father, and would be received in the Garden of Angels. Such honour. They were to be properly grateful. They were not to be late.

  Mahudia sent young Galla around the rooms to wake her charges. ‘Swiftly, girl; one hour is not long.’ The cosmographers were not a presentable lot. Obsessives never were, and one could not be a true cosmographer without having such a nature. They would need the full hour to stumble out of their beds and into their unfamiliar best clothes, such as they were. Only the Blessed Three knew how they were to travel across the city to Talamaq Palace in time for their appointment.

  ‘My lady!’ It was Galla, returned from her errand, her whining voice like rhubarb on the tongue. ‘Lenares won’t come out of her room.’

  Not today, please the Son, let her not be taken by one of her humours. Mahudia rushed down the cold stone corridor, which was unadorned by painting, cloth or art—meaningless irrelevancies—but still managed to trip on a flagstone and bruise both her palms and her left knee. She was in poor humour herself by the time she arrived at Lenares’ room.

  The Chief Cosmographer found the girl sitting at her desk, wide-eyed and crying. She had clearly been upset for hours, by the state of her. All the rubbish on her desk—insect husks, pieces of paper, feathers, myriad other incongruous objects—had been moved about, as happened whenever Lenares was agitated. Something in her world has changed, and she has rebuilt it all over again. Mahudia sighed, dismayed. So powerfully gifted, so difficult to love, so impossible to control.

  ‘Lenares?’ she hazarded. ‘Our new cosmographer?’

  A pasty-white face turned to her, and Mahudia took an involuntary step backwards. All expression had been stripped from the girl’s features. Her enormous eyes were dull, her pale cheeks hollow and her honey-coloured hair hung lankly over her face. All the gains of the last eight years appeared to have been wiped away.

  It was the face of a violated young girl, a face Mahudia had not seen for a decade, since a certain alley one late summer afternoon when she and Palaman had driven the last of the youths away. The day they found Lenares, saw her for the first time, naked, dirty and unresponsive, answering only to her inner voices, perhaps unaware—they had never been sure—of what the youths had been doing to her. Of how they had ruined her.

  Years passed before they found a way through the seemingly impervious casing around the girl. They had no intention of training her as a cosmographer, not then. She was clearly subnormal, a thin, troubled waif who spent her uncommunicative days collecting plants and making piles of them in her room. Leaves, roots, stems, petals, branches everywhere. Palaman had hoped, though, to use her as a servant. Money was tight; the Emperor seemed to have forgotten about the cosmographers, and their stipend was reduced every year by some court functionary. But Lenares proved little use as a servant. Even when she understood what was required of her, she was apt to wander off on errands of her own devising, offering no apology and indifferent to the beatings that followed.

  Palaman, the head of their order, died without seeing Lenares bloom. Mahudia tried to look after the difficult girl, but without Palaman there seemed little point. One day, no different to any other day, she had taken the girl with her when she taught the acolytes’ class. They were studying ilm al-raml geomancy, the ancient technique of discerning the nature and activities of the gods from the shape of the physical landscape, and as usual the new recruits struggled with the simplest locational task. Mahudia turned away from them as she did every year, affecting disgust, and made to point at the map of Elamaq spread across the wall.

  To her astonishment, one of the girls piped up. ‘Marasmos.’

  The newly-appointed Chief Cosmographer spun around. ‘Marasmos, ma dama,’ she corrected testily, trying to cover her shock with brusqueness while raking the class with her stare. Who had spoken? Nobody ever got the answer right. Was this a lucky guess?

  ‘Marasmos, ma dama,’ came the voice again. She jerked her head around but could not locate the speaker. Which of her pupils…

  ‘It was Lenares, ma dama,’ one of the girls—she had forgotten which one, all the faces blurred after a while—said to her.

  ‘Lenares Lackbrain,’ another girl muttered, and a few of the class laughed. Their laughter stopped short at the look on their teacher’s face.

  ‘Lenares, did you speak to me?’ Shock gave way to a heady exhilaration. Could it be possible?

  ‘You asked what project could only be undertaken because of the expanding influence of the Son,’ the blessed girl said in an animated voice, startlingly different to her usual monotone. ‘The Amaqi under Emperor Pouna III diverted the Marasmos River to deprive the Marasmian people of their major water source. The river was harnessed to allow the city of Talamaq to grow, and now waters the Third of Pasture. A year later an Amaqi army led by Pouna the Great destroyed the weakened Marasmian kingdom, eliminating the last resistance to Amaqi domination of Elamaq. Ilm al-raml geomancy was crucial in this success. I think cosmographers calculated the movement of the Son closer to Talamaq, and moved the river to follow Him. Am I right? Can I see the calculations? Have they been kept?’

  Complete, stunned silence met this discourse. Mahudia could not have been more shocked if the cosmographers’ pet goat had spoken to her. Less, actually, as there was at least historical
precedent for talking goats, if the legends were to be believed.

  ‘You have the date of the river damming wrong,’ the girl continued. ‘It was a year later than you told us. It must have been. Check your notes. The Son could not have come closer to Talamaq on the date you said.’

  Having finished her revelation, Lenares turned back to her battered desk and continued to arrange the small collection of leaves she carried with her at all times. A deeply troubled Mahudia had checked her notes that afternoon and discovered a transcribing error she had perpetuated for at least fifteen years.

  From that day on the girl blossomed, learning to interact with others in at least a limited fashion, showing a talent for cosmography so rare as to have been thought extinct in this secular age. She grew taller than the other girls, adding to her otherworldly appearance. Her plain, sorrowful face had changed with her personality, becoming progressively more expressive.

  Until today.

  ‘Oh, Lenares, what has happened?’

  An almost imperceptible shake of the head was the only reply.

  The tears did not stop, even after Mahudia washed and dressed her new cosmographer, just as she had done every day for two years after they’d first found her. Until the day Lenares had spoken in that acolytes’ class. The hour allowed them by the Emperor had long passed before the cosmographers made their way from their quarters to the Talamaq Palace. Lenares wept the whole journey, almost unconsciously it seemed, a picture of desolation. Mahudia worried more about her protégé’s state of mind than about how the Emperor, notoriously capricious, would respond to their lateness. After all, the Emperor was most likely to censure them at worst. Hopefully. The world would be deprived of far more if Lenares’ talents were lost.

  A thick heat haze squeezed down upon the city, making the spires and minarets appear out of the gloom as though from the sleeve of a trickster. Were the cosmographers merely standing in the morning heat they would sweat; hustling daughterwards across the Third of Glass the perspiration poured from them. To their right the plastered houses on Money Hill, above the worst of the haze, shimmered in the heat. The usual crush around Gold Souk and the money exchange forced them through two dark, noisome alleyways, the second of which brought them back to Hadrami Avenue. Another five minutes and they reached the cobbled Avensvala, the wide avenue encircling the Talamaq Palace, panting and puffing like blown horses, irretrievably late. The three golden rizen-stone towers of Talamaq loomed out of the haze like impatient sentries, ready to rebuff their excuses.

  As they were admitted by unsmiling guards to the Garden of Angels, the girl muttered something. Mahudia heard it as much through her skin, holding the girl’s cold, thin hand in hers, as through her ears. Patience. Lenares often repeated herself.

  When the words came again, the Chief Cosmographer had to bend to catch them, delivered as they were without inflection, on the edge of hearing.

  ‘The hole in the world. It is coming. To the garden.’

  The self-styled Philosopher-King, the Emperor of the Amaqi, ruler of the known world, remained motionless on his bench despite his burgeoning impatience. He refused to rub his aching buttocks. His favourite spot in the entire garden, the place he visited to forget the troubles associated with ruling an empire, would not be sullied by his anger.

  His two Omeran bodyguards matched him for stillness, though only because they did not have the intelligence to be distracted. The perfect guards.

  Torve, his beloved companion, hovered discreetly a few paces away, bent over a rose.

  ‘What do you think I should see planted in the new bed, Torve?’ The Emperor prided himself on his green fingers.

  ‘Given the poor quality of the fertiliser, ma great sor, we should think carefully about which specimens might grow.’ Torve lifted his dark, inhuman face from the pure white rose he cupped tenderly in his hand. ‘Perhaps some kind of spikegrass?’

  The Emperor laughed. ‘Excellent choice. Fool’s Felt, then?’

  ‘Ma great sor, Fool’s Felt is too long-lived for that bed.’

  The sally drew a smile from the Emperor. Clever beast, clever indeed. An Omeran with the ability to think, to read, to discuss philosophical texts. Ought to have been crushed under chariot wheels, of course, as soon as its freakish intelligence showed itself. Instead it was given to him as a pet when he was but the young heir, and he indulged it shamelessly. And now the result: a life-long companion. Totally loyal, completely discreet. The product of generations of Omerans bred for obedience.

  ‘Something insignificant. Nondescript. We will think more on it.’ The Emperor scratched at his beard under his mask.

  His Omeran companion returned to contemplating the roses. Strange species, Omerans, the Emperor reflected, not for the first time. Some scholars even claimed a common ancestry with humans some time in the distant past. Possible, he supposed, but unlikely. The Amaqi valued intelligence above all things, and the Omerans were clearly deficient in this regard, Torve notwithstanding. All speculation was moot, regardless, as Emperor after Emperor down through the centuries declared Omerans emphatically non-human. Self-serving, of course, but something could be both self-serving and true.

  Today the Emperor had his Omeran dressed in pale lavender, an echo of his own royal purple. Torve’s tunic was threaded with lemon, intricate designs of hummingbirds and flowers set off by bright yellow button work. The message—that the Omeran supped constantly from the Emperor’s largesse—could not be mistaken. The pantaloons were a plainer cut, lest the courtiers and Alliance members took offence. The feet were clad in soft white leather shoes, not very practical in the Garden of Angels but certainly comfortable in this heat.

  No matter how the Omeran was dressed, its heritage could not be disguised. Dark brown skin, much darker than the golden Amaqi tone. A high forehead above a broad face, the eyes wide apart, square-jawed and thick-necked, distinctly simian features that were echoed in hairy knuckles and exaggerated musculature. Brutish physical features that appeared inexpertly carved from some hardwood tree.

  He himself wore purple, of course, threaded with gold. His jacket depicted summer showers, the bounty of the Emperor falling on his subjects from golden clouds, and the subject of a private joke between himself and Torve. Pantaloons of overlapping cloth created a rippling effect when he walked, something his seamstresses had come up with recently and which was already becoming something of a sensation at his court. The golden mask he always wore in public sat easily on his face, the weight borne by the bridge of his nose. He had a permanent callus there. His shoes were gilded leather, his hat fashionably square with a tassel of gold thread, and he wore kid-leather gloves. He was very pleased with the effect, and refused to spoil it by rubbing at his sore buttocks.

  The Gate of the Father opened inwards, and the wretched cosmographers filed into the Garden of Angels. Relics of a religious past, an anachronism in the secular world with its emphasis on the ever-present Now, the cosmographers were hated by the Amaqi precisely because they reminded everyone of their history. In a culture that chose to focus on the present, this was a major failing.

  The Emperor doubted they were aware of this.

  He watched them as they filed slowly across the lawn towards his bench. The Chief Cosmographer, Son sear her soul, held hands with a young woman who looked none too happy at the fact. Was this why she—the Emperor searched his mind for her name, appended to countless petitions for audiences, how could he have forgotten?—was this why Mahudia joined with the cosmographers? To dally with the acolytes? The daughter of Hudan, leader of the Elborans, one of the most important Alliances, could live in luxury if she chose. Late thirties, if he remembered correctly. Fine features, full-breasted, and with a fortune in trust from her father, she could pick and choose from the noblemen of the city. Had she chosen perversion instead?

  The cosmographers were an unkempt group. He looked on their attire: dishevelled, unfashionable clothing, purple bibs faded from repeated washing. What fool Emperor had gra
nted them the right to wear purple? Why were they once held in such honour? Dishevelled bodies, dishevelled minds. What was the woman running? A shelter for undesirable girls? And what was she doing with the generous stipend he granted them? Clearly not using it to purchase cloth! The Emperor suspected the Chief Cosmographer lined her own pockets. There were questions to be asked.

  The young woman accompanying Mahudia looked unwell, in point of fact. Pale face, red eyes, weeping. Puffy lips moving as though cursing someone. She had been punished, then. For what transgression? Resisting the attentions of her mistress?

  The cosmographers made their obeisance, prostrating themselves thrice as required. The Emperor observed Mahudia drag the young woman to the ground for the first obeisance, directing her unmistakably vacant stare to the grass. A half-wit, no doubt of it. Half-wits in normal society were ritually strangled to death when so assessed, preserving the clear distinction between humans and Omerans. The cosmographers were supposed to be intellectually gifted, yet they sheltered such a one among them.

  Not for much longer.

  ‘Arise,’ he commanded them. ‘You may kneel on the grass before us.’ The cosmographers had been checked for weapons at the gate, and his guards were capable of overpowering any treasonous attack from the men and women before him.

  ‘We trust you found yesterday’s court instructive.’ He spoke to Mahudia; the others listened. He had cultivated a compelling voice, had trained it for years, and used it ruthlessly. ‘The black is not often seen by ordinary citizenry. You have been privileged. And you are further privileged today.’