The Infernal City (12 page)

Slyr’s face took on a faintly sympathetic cast. “Never, I should think,” she replied.

She left, and Annaïg curled into a ball and wept quietly. She pulled out her pendant and opened it.

“Find Attrebus,” she whispered. “Find him.”

Mere-Glim wondered what would happen if he died. It was generally believed that Argonians had been given their souls by the Hist, and when one died, one’s soul returned to them, to be incarnated once more. That seemed reasonable enough, under ordinary circumstances. In the deepest parts of his dreams or profound thinking were images, scents, tastes that the part of him that was sentient could not remember experiencing. The concept the Imperials called “time” did not even have a word in his native language. In fact, the hardest part of learning the language of the Imperials was that they made their verbs different to indicate when something happened, as if the most important thing in the world was to establish a linear sequence of events, as if doing so somehow explained things better than holistic apprehension.

But to his people—at least the most traditional ones—birth and death were the same moment. All of life—all of history—was one moment, and only by ignoring most of its content could one create the illusion of linear progression. The agreement to see things in this limited way was what other peoples called “time.”

And yet how did this place, this Umbriel, fit into all of that? Because he was cut off from the Hist. If he died here, where
would his soul go? Would it be consumed by the ingenium Wemreddle had spoken of? And what of his people so consumed? Where they gone forever, wrenched from the eternal cycle of birth and death? Or was the cycle, the eternal moment, only the Argonian way of avoiding an even more comprehensive truth?

He decided to stop thinking about it. This sort of thing made his head hurt. Concentrate on the practical and what he really knew; he knew that he’d been overpowered by creatures with massive, crablike arms, snatched away from Annaïg, and brought here. He didn’t know why.

Fortunately, someone entered the room, rescuing him from any more attempts at reflection.

The newcomer was a small wiry male and might well have been a Nord, with his fine white hair and ivory, vein-traced skin. And yet there was something about the sqaurish shape of his head and slump of his shoulders that made him seem somehow quite alien. He wore a sort of plain olive frock-coat over a black vest and trousers.

He spoke a few words of gibberish. When Glim didn’t answer, he reached into the pocket of his coat and withdrew a small glass vial. He pantomimed drinking it and then handed it to Glim.

Glim took it, wondering how it would feel to kill the man. He surely wouldn’t get far …

But if they wanted to talk to him, they must want him alive.

He drank the stuff, which tasted like burning orange peel.

The fellow waited for a moment, then cleared his throat. “Can you understand me now?”

“Yes,” Mere-Glim said.

“I’ll get directly to the point,” the man said. “It has been noticed that you are of an unknown physical type, or at least one that hasn’t been seen in my memory, which is quite long.”

“I’m an Argonian,” he said.

“A word,” the man said. “Not a word that signifies to me.”

“That is my race.”

“Another word I do not know.” The little man cocked his head. “So it is true, then? You are from outside? From someplace other than Umbriel?”

“I’m from here, from Tamriel.”

“Exciting. Another meaningless word. This is Umbriel, and no place else.”

“Your Umbriel is in my world, in my country, Black Marsh.”

“Is it? I daresay it isn’t. But as interesting as this subject may be to you, it holds little appeal for me. What I’m interested in is what you are. What part of Umbriel you will become.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You aren’t the first newcomer here, but you may be the first with that sort of body. But Umbriel will remember your body, and others with similar corpora will come along in time—many or a few, depending on what use you are.”

“What if I’m of no use at all?”

“Then we can’t permit Umbriel to learn your form. We must cut your body away from what inhabits it and send it back out into the void.”

“Why not simply let me go? Return me to Tamriel? Why kill me?”

“Ah, a soul is too precious for that. We could not think of letting one waste. Now, tell me about this form of yours.”

“I am as you see me,” he replied.

“Are you some sort of daedra?”

Glim gaped his mouth. “You know what daedra are?” He asked. “The man we talked to below didn’t.”

“Why should he?” the man said. “We have incorporated daedra in the past, but none exist here now.
Are
you daedra?”

“No.”

“Very well, good, that makes things less complicated. Those spines on your head. What is their function?”

“They make me handsome, I suppose, to others of my race. More to some than to others. I try to take care of them.”

“And that membrane between your fingers?”

“For swimming.”

“Swimming?”

“Propelling oneself through water. My toes are webbed as well.”

“You move through water?” The fellow blinked.

“Often.”

“Beneath the surface?”

“Yes.”

“How long can you remain beneath before having to surface for air?”

“Indefinitely. I can breathe water.”

The fellow smiled. “Well, you see, how interesting. What Umbriel lacks, it will seek out.”

Glim shifted on his feet, but since he didn’t understand what the man was talking about, he didn’t answer.

“The sump. Yes, I think you might do well in the sump. But let’s finish the interview, shall we? Now, your skin—those are scales, are they not?”

He saw the blow coming from the shift of the Redguard’s shoulder, but it was fast, so fast his dodge to the right almost didn’t succeed, and although the edge didn’t bite, the flat skimmed his bicep. He swung his sword at her ribs, but that same quickness danced her just beyond the reach of his blade.

“Right idea, Attrebus,” he heard Gulan shout.

She backed off a bit, her gaze fixed on his. “Yes,” she said. “Try that again.”

“Got your breath yet?”

“I’ll have yours in a minute,” she replied. She appeared to relax, but then suddenly blurred into motion.

He backpedaled, but once again her speed surprised him. He caught her attack on the flat of his weapon and felt the weight of her steel smack against the guard. Then she was past, and he knew she would take a cut at his head from back there, so he dropped, rolled, and came back up.

He saw it again, that slight slumping before she renewed her attack. Again he parried and broke the distance, but not quite so much.

She circled, he waited. Her shoulders sagged, and he suddenly threw himself forward behind his blade, so that while she was starting to step and lift her weapon, his point hit her solar plexus and she went down, hard.

He followed her and—as his people cheered—put the dull, rounded point in her face.

“Yield?”

She coughed and winced. “Yield,” she agreed.

He offered her his hand and she took it.

“Nice attack,” she said. “I’m glad we were at blunts.”

“You’re very fast,” he said. “But you have a little tell.”

“I do?”

“Well, I’m not sure I want you to know,” he said. “Next time it might not be blunts.”

She seemed to be favoring one foot, so he offered her his shoulder. He helped her limp over to the edge of the practice ground, where his comrades watched from their ale-benches.

“Bring us each a beer, will you?” he called to Dario the pitcher-boy.

“Aye, Prince,” he replied.

He sat her down a bit apart from the others and watched as she unlaced her practice armor.

“What was your name again?” he asked her.

“Radhasa, Prince,” she replied.

“And your father was Tralan the Two-Blade, from Cespar?”

“Yes, Prince,” she replied.

“He was a good man, one of my father’s most valued men.”

“Thank you, highness. It’s nice to hear that.”

He focused his regard on her more frankly as the armor came off. “He was not the handsomest of men. In that, you don’t resemble him much.”

Her already dark face darkened a bit more, but her eyes stayed fixed boldly on his. “So, you … think I’m a handsome man?”

“If you were a man you would be, but I don’t see much mannish about you either.”

“I’ve heard the prince is a flatterer.”

“Here’s our drink,” he said as Dario arrived with the beer.

Beer always tasted perfect after a fight, and this time was no different.

“So why do you seek my service instead of my father’s?” he asked her. “I’m sure he would receive you well.”

She shrugged. “Prince Attrebus, your father sits the throne as Emperor. In his service, I think I would see little in the way of action. With you, I expect rather the opposite.”

“Yes,” he said, “that is true. The Empire is still reclaiming territory, both literally and figuratively. There are many battles yet to fight before our full glory is reclaimed. If you ride with me, death will always be near. It’s not always fun, you know, and it’s not a game.”

“I don’t think that it is,” she said.

“Very good,” he said. “I like your attitude.”

“I hope to please you, Prince.”

“You can start pleasing me by calling me simply Attrebus. I do not stand on ceremony with my personal guard.”

Her eyes widened. “Does that mean …?”

“Indeed. Finish this beer and then go see Gulan. He will see you equipped, horsed, and boarded. And then, perhaps, you and I shall speak again.”

Annaïg saw the murder from the corner of her eye.

She was preparing a sauce of clams, butter, and white wine to go on thin sheets of rice noodle. Of course, none of those things were exactly that; the clams were really something called “lampen,” but they tasted much like clams. The butter was actually the fat rendered from something which—given Slyr’s description—was some sort of pupa. The wine was wine, and it was white, but
it wasn’t made from any grape she had ever tasted. The noodles were made from a grain a bit like barley and a bit like rice. She was just happy to be doing something more sophisticated than searing meat, and actually enjoying the alien tastes and textures. The possibilities were exciting.