Come Armageddon Page 7

  “And if he does? Or someone else does?”

  “We can’t afford to wait,” she answered. “Ardesir has followed Tiyo-Mah to Shinabar, and Sardriel has taken two-thirds of the Treasury to buy mercenaries so we can fight the barbarians on the eastern rim, perhaps hold them long enough for Camassia to find its heart again, and its courage.”

  “Barbarians ...” Kor-Assh said the word slowly, tasting its ugliness, and looking slowly around the soft colour of the walls, the perfect proportions of beauty. The hurt of its spoiling was plain in his face.

  Tathea followed his eyes, and realised with chill that the soldiers storming in, trampling it, scarring the wood and stone, would be like a personal violation. Did millions of people the earth wide love their homes like this? Was war the ruin of loveliness, the spoiling of places where people had created peace and learned reverence for work, love, the treasures of mind and of form?

  And the answer was immediately in her mind. No. It was not physical. It was corruption of the soul Asmodeus wanted.

  “The barbarians are only part of Armageddon,” she said suddenly. “Perhaps the catalyst. They may be worse than before, but they are human. They can hurt us, even kill us, shatter our homes and pillage our land, but they cannot touch who we really are, and I very much doubt they would even understand such an idea.”

  “Then what are we to do?” Kor-Assh said levelly. His eyes never left hers. He was searching for her meaning far deeper than the words between them. She could almost see his memory fighting to recall something frightening and precious beyond all else, which eluded him.

  Should she try to tell him? Was that what he was asking, but would not put into words? Was that not what everyone yearns to know above anything—who am I?

  “Kor-Assh ...” she began. How odd that name sounded on her lips, when her heart was saying “Ishrafeli!”

  His look answered her, waiting.

  Surely that was her mission now, to teach him the enormity of who he was? His courage was ready for the unknown, but he had no conception of what it would be, or what it could cost him. And yet he was ready to enter battle with Asmodeus himself.

  He was still waiting for her to speak.

  In the silence she heard footsteps along the passage. Outside, below the window, someone laughed.

  “Our greatest battle is of the spirit. All men can wield a sword,” she answered at last. “We must do far more than that. We must recognise the true face of the enemy, because it may not be what we expect. We must walk so passionately and so wholly in the light that we cannot be misled or deceived with lies no matter how subtle or how sweet.”

  She was watching his face. “We must find the sixth warrior, and prepare the Island against attack whether it is from outside, or from within, or both. Above all, we must seek the mind of God, so we never pick up an evil weapon, even to defend the good. Sardriel has a love of the truth, a wholeness of heart that is greater than any man’s I have known. He will face heaven or hell, and not turn from it. That is his weapon.” She breathed in and out slowly, trying to still the emotion in her. “Ardesir has a power to endure, never to give up or allow failure or disillusion to break his faith. His spirit never wearies of trying. That is his. I used to think Sadokhar ...” her throat constricted at mention of his name, “... would fight beside us ... lead us ... but now I know his path was the greater sacrifice.” She saw the admiration shine in his eyes, and knew she had no need to say more.

  “And yours?” he whispered.

  “I am not certain. I brought the Book in the beginning. Perhaps mine is done until the end.”

  “Who opens the Book again?” he asked. “Is it not you?”

  “I don’t know. I thought it would be Sadokhar.”

  “And what of me?” His voice trembled. “What mission have I?” He looked at the staff still in her hands. “What does it mean to name all things?”

  She saw the hunger and the dreams in his eyes. His whole being burned for some calling of equal beauty with those she had described for others.

  “It is not given me to know.” Her voice cracked as she spoke. “First you must do what Sadokhar would have—reaffirm the allegiance of all the Island Lords, and warn them what is to come. Keep patience for the rest. You will know it when you need to.”

  “Will it—” he began, then stopped.

  She knew what he wanted to say—would it be as great? Would it ask of him all he could give?

  “Yes,” she answered his thought. “And more.”

  “You ... know?” He was asking her more than that, leading towards the bond that lay between them, feeling it without knowing what it was.

  “Yes,” she answered.

  He put out his hand, his fingers gentle on her arm, warm through the fabric of her tabard. Then suddenly he withdrew it as if it had been a guilty gesture. He stepped back. His eyes met hers only for a moment, then he looked away.

  She felt a rejection so sharp it was as if he had closed a door just as she had put her hand to it, slamming it, locking her out. She almost heard the bolts slide in her mind. It was absurd to have the tears prick her eyes. To him they were strangers, barely met. Certainly they were united by a common cause, but that was no kind of familiarity, not yet even friendship, let alone love. You could not demand love, you could not even earn it. It was freely given, a grace never deserved, only burning the heart with gratitude and lifting the soul on wings.

  She must never remind him that once they had loved, on the soul’s first journey, with pure passion of the spirit, awaiting completeness here in the fullness of this world with its flesh, its pain and its glory. To do so would be to reduce to words a memory that had been the meaning of her life, and to him would be an embarrassment, the intrusion of a stranger into the intimacies of the heart.

  She turned away also, so he would not read her face or see the uncontrolled tears spill over her cheeks. It took all her strength to keep her voice from choking.

  “I pray I shall be equal to it,” he said gravely.

  “Of course you will be equal to it!” she rejoined. “Do you think God mocks any one of us by asking what He knows we do not have?” It was herself she was telling. God would not ask her to bear a pain beyond her either. She must believe that. “Don’t look to know what you are not yet ready to understand. You must have faith!”

  “Yes ... yes, of course,” he answered, hurt, his voice low and a little rough. Then she looked up and saw a shadow in his face, different, touched with shame.

  She did not understand.

  “It is hard to know what is right,” he said softly, the words drawn out of him. “Lantrif is an uneasy land. I have done all I can to leave peace behind me, but I don’t know how long it will last. I am not Lord by birth, but by marriage. My wife has poor health ...”

  Tathea did not hear the rest of what he said. The words were senseless sounds beating around her ears while her heart shrivelled inside her. It was incomprehensible, and hideously clear. Why had she imagined he could not be married? But she had assumed it as if it were a destiny to which she had a right.

  He was still talking, his voice quiet and clear. He was telling her of his wife’s suffering, and how she needed his support. Tathea had grasped none of it. It could have been in a foreign tongue. There was only one meaning in it all that touched her, and that was too bitter to absorb. It was amazing that the room was still filled with sun and her heart still drove the blood through her body.

  “But I will fight the Enemy wherever God wills it,” he said, watching her face, seeing the change in her and not understanding what had wrought it. “I gave Sadokhar my word, and I repeat it to you. As long as I do not betray my own people to tyranny and civil war, I will do whatever you ask me.”

  Her lips were dry. “Yes ... I ... I know you will.” She tried to swallow but her throat was too tight. “We shall prepare to go north ... and ... and see if we can ally Ulfin to our cause. Perhaps he is the last warrior.” She should care that he was, it should
matter intensely, and now it meant almost nothing.

  “I shall be ready.” He hesitated only a moment, finding nothing else to say, then he turned and walked to the door and went out, closing it softly behind him.

  As soon as he was out of earshot Tathea went to her rooms, flung herself on to the bed and wept as, she had not done in years. She wept for loneliness, for grief too great and too certain, for loss of Sadokhar and for fear of all that was to come which she could not see.

  Chapter IV

  ARDESIR STOOD ON THE deck of the ship as the bow cut through the blue water towards Shinabar. The great lighthouse of Tarra-Ghum was clear in the distance, a white needle against the cobalt of the sky. But he would have to travel inland to Thoth-Moara, that is where Tiyo-Mah would be, at the heart of power. He remembered it so clearly that in his mind he could already smell the bitter herbs in the wind off the desert and feel the scorching heat and the prickle of the ever-moving sand on his skin.

  How would he find Tiyo-Mah? Tathea had described her, and surely there could not be two like her? Would she have the Lords of the Undead with her, or would they remain in hiding until she had established her power?

  Ardesir still had friends in Thoth-Moara and he knew the city. It was not so long since he had left, but whom could he trust with a weight such as this?

  He thought back, memories crowding his mind.

  Thoth-Moara was so like his home in Pera to the east, and yet the differences were sharp. The enamelled domes of Pera had a unique grace, the blue and green walls inlaid with tiles, the sudden flashes of gold in the sun. Columns were slender, some twisted or spiralled, not like the massive buttresses of Shinabar. They were more fanciful. Sudden oddities surprised the wanderer, a spark of humour graced a tower, or an eccentricity made one laugh aloud.

  In those days he had been young and dreamed of creating something so beautiful men would marvel at it, and he would give it to one special woman, and she would love him because of it. So he had gone to Shinabar, the heart and source of all subtlety and ancient half-rhythms, colours that faded one to another, and yet never died, and they knew the arts of falling water that cooled the air.

  He had learned even more than he hoped—tricks of wit and grace, embellishments of loveliness—but most profoundly the true connections between purpose and beauty, exactly how to use each material to its utmost advantage.

  He had never been afraid of ideas, however strange or enormous. His intellectual courage was boundless. It was his soaring mind, the limitless flight of his dreams that had won him Tathea’s regard when they had first met a decade earlier. And that regard was more precious to him than he ever admitted, even now.

  From her he had learned a concept of love that transcended anything he had thought of before, something that encompassed the earth itself, and everything that had being upon it. As they had walked the narrow streets of the ancient quarter, or ridden the silent desert and shared laughter and pain, talked of good and evil, and what was written in the Book, the passion to fight in the last great war was born in him.

  As the ship drew closer to the shore the harbour was plain to the sight. Ardesir recognised the large wharfs and warehouses in which were stored the goods of the world. Great triremes lay at anchor; barges and skiffs moved easily over the smooth, inner waters, dark blue under the brilliant sky. At a glance it all seemed just as it had been when he left to follow Tathea to the Island, and offer his zeal and his honour in the cause. But now, as the ship swung round the outer wall and slowed, he could see the shabbiness of the stone, the broken edges, the faded colours where once they had been bright. One of the largest wharfs was unusable, its piers too badly eroded to be safe.

  He was struck with a sudden grief. This land had sheltered him and taught him, and it had once been great. It was like returning to visit a beautiful woman one had loved, and finding her raddled and strangely vulgar. For an instant he wished he could have avoided coming.

  Then he heard voices shouting across the water in the familiar Shinabari tongue with its subtlety and music, and he understood why it had to be here that Tiyo-Mah began to build her power before she could spread it across the world. These were the people she knew; the shell of empire was still here, the wisdom and artifice that could be corrupted by her knowledge.

  Ardesir disembarked, feeling the familiar heat scorch his arms and face, beating back from the stones and, even here by the water’s edge, the ever-present prickle of sand shifting and whispering in the wind off the desert.

  He must find a caravan going inland to Thoth-Moara. No one willingly travelled the desert alone. Unless you were native to it, it was safer to join the merchants and traders who moved with up to fifty horses at a time, thirty of them pack animals laden with goods. There was no time to waste. Tiyo-Mah would not have lingered; neither must he.

  The caravan masters still met where they always had, in the shade of the great covered market, and he saw three before he even had to enquire for them. It was customary to bargain and it was expected. He approached the first. One must not look too eager. He strolled casually, as if it were of little importance to him whether he went or stayed.

  The master was a lean man, but with blunt features, not the hawk nose and hooded eyes of the desert princes.

  “Leaving soon?” Ardesir asked conversationally.

  “Depends,” the master replied, looking him up and down with calculating eyes.

  Ardesir gazed upwards as if judging the weather, then back at the master again. The heat shimmered around him, pressing on his skin. He did not need to speak his thought.

  “It’s good enough,” the master said guardedly. “In a hurry?”

  “Not at all,” Ardesir denied. “I’ll go when you’re ready or unless you have no places left?” He smiled, knowing the man would not be here, were he not still open to business.

  “You wish passage to Thoth-Moara?” the master asked, freeing his hand from his robes ready to take the money.

  “I think so ...” Ardesir still wished to sound indifferent.

  “Eleven pieces of silver,” the master replied.

  Ardesir was surprised. It was dearer than it used to be.

  The man must have seen his expression. “Dangerous days,” he explained, shaking his head. “Have to have outriders, well armed. It all costs money.”

  “Against whom?”

  The master’s black eyebrows rose. “Barbarians, of course. Where have you come from?”

  “The Island at the Edge of the World,” Ardesir replied, then the instant he had said it, with some pride, he knew it was a mistake, but it was too late to take it back.

  The caravan master’s eyes flickered and a secret, smug satisfaction touched his lips. “Then you can hardly be expected to understand our problems. You dealt with your pirates. I hear it is very easy there now. You have had a decade or more of peace, isn’t that right?”

  It was pointless to argue. It was known everywhere. “Yes. But I thought this far north you’d hardly be troubled?” He made a question of it.

  The master pursed his lips. “Only because we are always careful. Personally, I’ve never lost a traveller.” His hand stayed extended for the money. “Not to sandstorm or thirst either ... or heatstroke. Bad risk that, for those not used to the desert.” His eyes were hard as stone. “Needs a skilled master to make sure he doesn’t lose anyone, no matter what. A man would die in hours ... alone.” He smiled suddenly, but the threat was as real as the curved and jewelled knife at his belt.

  Ardesir glanced past him to the other caravan masters waiting.

  “We all know it,” the one in front of him warned softly. “You won’t find anyone to say differently.”

  It was true. Ardesir understood it with a sick certainly. They were all watching him. If anyone wanted to get across the desert to Thoth-Moara, or anywhere else, they would pay for protection from barbarians a thousand miles away, or the risk of being lost and left behind, denied water, or whatever kind of murder one wished t
o call it. But they would pay.

  He took out the eleven pieces of silver and passed them across.

  “Better be safe,” the caravan master said silkily. “Another couple of pieces, and we’ll look after you specially. Plenty of water.” His smile widened, showing his teeth.

  There was no escape. Ardesir must be in Thoth-Moara. What were two pieces of silver, or even yielding to corruption, although it burned him like acid, compared with failing to learn what they needed to know?

  He gave it, struggling to hide his rage and contempt.

  The master took it with satisfaction. “We’ll start out tonight, at sundown. Good travelling to you ... safe travelling!”

  Ardesir did not reply.

  The beauty of the desert night swept away his anger, and riding what was admittedly an extremely good horse, alone in the darkness with the silence, the milky dazzle of the stars across the summer sky, the enormity of creation in its infinite value, dwarfed everything else. A million corrupt men could not darken the ultimate light. He turned his face upward, and his soul ached with prayer. He would fight anything at all to preserve this, and be worthy to remain a part of it.

  As soon as they reached Thoth-Moara Ardesir left the caravan, and went in a roundabout way into the ancient quarter of the city. He even went to the exact corner where he had first met Tathea. He remembered it so clearly. There had been such sadness in her it had startled him. Of course now he knew why. It was for Sadokhar, who had at that time refused his high calling, with the sacrifice it would ask of him.

  Ardesir found a catch in his throat as he thought how little Sadokhar had understood then! He had seen only the giving up of the sweet, domestic comfort he had hungered for, instead of the lonely path of leadership.

  But Tathea had seen him choosing mere decency, instead of the greatness possible for him, and it tore at her heart.

  And she must surely also have thought of Tiyo-Mah, who had lived in the ancient palace with its high carved doors. And with the mention of Tiyo-Mah had to come the grief of loss for her child, murdered in the coup. Surely she could never have thought of the dowager Empress without also thinking of Habi, and remembering the night of his death?