04c Dreams of Fire and Gods: Gods (28 page)

“I will always be devoted to you, Your Majesty,” Gonim said with absolute conviction. He clutched the jewel she had given him. “And I will treasure your gift for the rest of my life, as I continue to serve you.”

She smiled warmly at him. “Your devotion touches me, my warrior. And for that, I will fight for you.”

Then she disappeared.

T
RAVELING
across Dasak as the emperor was an enormous pain in the ass. Sael hadn’t done it yet, but he was told it would involve literally hundreds of armed soldiers and servants, as well as horses and pack animals. Practically an army. The council went into a tizzy at the thought of it, and Chancellor Djalleh threatened to take to his bed. Sael had wanted to visit the
dekan
in all the city keeps, as he knew his father would have done, in order to strengthen old alliances and repair damaged ones. But it would take time to organize.

All this was the reason Sael and Koreh chose to have Donegh transport them directly—and secretly—into Seffni’s sitting room in Harleh, just ten days after the coronation. Seffni, Tanum, and Geilin were already waiting for them, since their coming had been prearranged through Donegh.

“Your Imperial Majesty,” Seffni said the moment they appeared, bowing low.

Sael groaned. “Can we please do without the formalities in private? It’s really disturbing to have my older brother doing….” He pointed at Seffni. “…
that
.”

“Then I’m allowed to call His Imperial Majesty a stupid
donegh
?” Seffni asked, reminding Sael of all the mocking insults they used to throw at each other when he was a boy.

“Seffni!” Tanum gasped. Sael was pleased to see that she’d traded her mourning blacks for a much more attractive dress in shades of blue and white—similar to the colors she now wore as Geilin’s apprentice. Seffni hadn’t demanded she give that up, though the nobles of Harleh were still feigning shock and horror about it.

Sael merely smirked at him. “My bodyguard might object.” Donegh was with them, as always. He refused to allow Sael out of his sight—not unless Koreh was with him to take over the watch—and Sael had begun to trust him, despite advice to the contrary from his royal advisors.

“The
donegh
is a very respectable animal, Your Majesty,” Donegh said calmly.

“And a tenacious one. Which is probably how you came to be named after it.”

“Maybe.”

“I see we’ve just managed to catch the light,” Sael said, stepping to the glass-paned doors and opening them to walk out onto the balcony. He risked being seen, but he was wearing a simple tunic and cloak, which he hoped would prevent anyone from recognizing him—at least from a distance. In the unlikely event there were assassins climbing the walls, he trusted Donegh and Koreh to spot them. But he’d come in part to look at the valley, after what had been relayed to him through messengers.

The view was spectacular. The Eye of Atnu was just sinking below the forests to the west, casting an orange glow upon the countryside. Gyishya was still there, as was the vast forest that filled most of Harleh Valley, but the blue clouds were gone. The exact nature of the truce between the gods was unknown, but after a day and a night of spectacular explosions and thunder and lightning in the mountains to the north, the sky had cleared.

Almost immediately following, the thousands of soldiers in the pavilions around Harleh awoke, creating an enormous logistical headache for Seffni immediately upon his return. Fortunately, Sael had put aside some stores during his time as
dekan
—not much, but as much as could be managed—for this eventuality. The men had been fed, escorted to the encampment in a long procession that stretched more than a league, and handed over to the remnants of the emperor’s army. Which of course was now Sael’s army. Eventually, they would find their way back home.

The people of Harleh were wary of these new developments, but there had been talk of farmers moving back to their outlying farms, and some of the travelers camped around the city walls had begun to wander back to the ruined Worlen, in hopes of rebuilding their lives there.

So far, the gods—both Stronni and Taaweh—were silent.

Koreh joined him, coming up behind him to wrap his arms about his waist. He planted a gentle kiss on Sael’s neck.

“You’ve heard nothing?” Sael asked him.

“Not since you asked me yesterday,” Koreh chided.

“I thought you were one of them.”

“I am,” Koreh said pleasantly. “Would you like me to throw myself off the balcony to prove it?”

The thought filled Sael with dread. “No. Don’t even joke about it.”

“I wasn’t completely joking,” Koreh said, “but I’m glad you’ve spared me having to come back upstairs.” He turned Sael around and kissed him firmly on the mouth.

Sael let the kiss linger, but he wouldn’t be dissuaded from his concerns. When Koreh broke the kiss, he said, “Seffni tells me that things haven’t been going well since his return. After all, the people saw his body—they saw it burn on the funeral pyre. It isn’t like you, where we could simply say your death was a clerical error.”

Koreh laughed at that. “What are you hoping for—the Taaweh to come in and do a demonstration of resurrection in the temple courtyard?”

“I don’t know.”

“They can’t do it anyway,” Koreh added. “What I did… that’s a rare event. You heard what the Iinu Shavi said. You’ll just have to think of something on your own.”

Sael frowned and glanced past him at Seffni and Tanum discussing something out of earshot with Geilin. Donegh looked away quickly, as if to disguise the fact that he’d been keeping his eye on Sael and Koreh on the balcony. “I need the people to accept Seffni back as
dekan
of Harleh, and eventually as the
vek
of Worlen. I can’t maintain the entire kingdom, and he’s the only one I trust with the stewardship of the east kingdom.”

The
ömem
—those few who had agreed to remain in Harleh once their Sight was restored, the travel ban was lifted, and a considerable sum of gold had been paid into the Sisterhood coffers—had already examined Seffni and proclaimed him to
be
Seffni, as opposed to an imposter of some sort. But they were just as baffled by his sudden reappearance as anyone else.

“He’s a good sort,” Koreh agreed. He and Seffni seemed to be close friends these days, after their shared experience in Bashyeh.

“There’s more,” Sael said, looking him directly in the eye. “I’m hoping they’ll have a child, at last. Perhaps several, but at least one boy.”

“To preserve the Menaük family line?”

Sael shook his head. “The Menaük family tree is solid enough. But if Seffni has a son, I can adopt him as my heir, rather than some distant cousin Father would have thrown a fit over.”

“At least that would be preferable to taking a female concubine.” The option had been broached by the council, much to Sael’s distaste.

“That is
never
going to happen,” Sael growled. “I didn’t challenge my father for you, and defy the gods for you, just so the old
ghet
in the imperial council could tell me I have to sleep with someone
other
than you!”

“I’m glad to hear it.” Koreh turned his head to look at Tanum over his shoulder.

“What do you see?” Sael asked.

Lately, Koreh had been having visions, brief glimpses of possible futures. But he shook his head. “I can’t make sense out of it. There might be children—a boy and a girl. But everything comes and goes so quickly.”

“I suppose we’ll have to wait, then, like everyone else.”

Being emperor was proving onerous. Why anyone would
want
to take on the role was beyond Sael. Had his father been planning to take over the kingdom before the plague struck? Or had the plight of the common folk forced him to plot the emperor’s downfall for the good of the kingdom? Sael would never know, though he preferred to believe his father was motivated by his sense of duty to the people more than his ambition.

It was certainly duty to the people that motivated Sael to serve well as emperor, rather than his own ambitions. Aside from Seffni—who had emphatically insisted he didn’t want the job, despite being in a position to challenge Sael’s legal right to the throne—there was nobody else among the nobility of Dasak Sael could trust to look out for the common good. He’d learned that well enough during his time in the royal court.

“I suppose it could be worse,” he said, as though he’d been voicing his thoughts aloud. “The gods haven’t destroyed us, you’re alive, and we’re married in the eyes of the entire kingdom.”

Koreh caressed his cheek with one hand. “I can’t say I’m delighted to be the ‘emperor consort’ or whatever the council eventually decides to call me.” There had been much debate about the matter, and it was still ongoing. “But I’m quite happy to be your
nimen
. And after being separated from you for a century, I have no intention of letting you out of my sight again.”

This time it was Sael who pulled them together for a kiss. When they parted, he kept their foreheads touching, so he could feel Koreh’s soft breath against his lips. “I don’t think there’s much Taaweh magic can do to stop me from aging, while you remain just as you are, forever.”

Koreh chuckled softly. “I will love you as you age. And when you reach the end of your time in Dasak, I will follow you into Bashyeh. You don’t have to be old there. You can be as young as you like. And we will be together.”

“Will we have to share a castle with my father?” Sael asked, amused by the thought.

Koreh groaned. “I suspect your father might insist on it. Perhaps I can convince my family to move to the surrounding countryside. We can visit them on holidays.”

“They have holidays in Bashyeh?”

“They do,” Koreh reassured him. “And we can make some, just for us.”

W
ORLEN
couldn’t recall ever having been lost in his life, and it was irritating him immensely now. The mist seemed to go on without end in all directions, and it was impossible to tell whether the gray light around him signified early morning or twilight. The forest was completely unfamiliar, with trees that were far larger than anything he’d ever seen in Dasak. There had been rumors of trees like this in the impenetrable southern forests, but how could he have managed to get there?

How had he even left the throne room?

“Your Grace….” A voice was calling to him—a woman’s voice.

He spun around, searching. Then he saw her, standing on a slight rise, difficult to see but her silhouette slightly hunched over, as if she were elderly.

“Who might I be addressing?”

She approached, and he was startled to recognize her. He was tempted to take a step back, even to flee, but he held his ground. “I’d been told you… passed away, Sister.”

Thuna shrugged. “So they tell me. You’d never know it, with all the running around I’ve been having to do. ‘Eternal Rest,’ my foot!”

Worlen raised his eyebrows at the old woman. “Indeed….” He’d always prided himself on his ability to quickly assess a situation and determine a course of action, rather than waste time denying the reality of a situation. But he was having difficulty with the concept of chatting with a dead
ömem
.

“Well, come along, then, Your Grace.” She began to walk through the forest, and he caught up with her, loath to be left behind in this barren landscape, regardless. “Please allow me to express my condolences.”

“For what?”

“Your passing.”

“Oh.” Worlen halted, and after a moment, she appeared to notice he was no longer beside her. She stopped and turned to wait for him. “The poison,” he said.

“I do apologize, but you see I wasn’t allowed to interfere. The Taaweh… they’re basically kind, but they don’t think like we do. They see possible futures and choose the one they believe benefits us. Koreh was expected to return, but he should never have brought Seffni back with him. Bashyeh demanded he be returned or someone sacrifice himself in his stead. So they chose the future that allowed him to remain.”