The Hollow King, page 22
‘Talking to him here… that might have been a mistake,’ said Jakinda.
‘Please just–’
‘I mean here, this does not really fit with serious talk about succession and continuance of rule.’ She flicked a hand over the room. It was small by the standards of what the palace held. A wide, square space, under a wooden-beam roof. Worn dragon heads grinned and snarled from the beam ends. Low stools sat in a loose circle on a worn rug that coiled with more dragons, some indigo, some violet. Steam rose from the dew-tea poured and untouched in its clay cups. The shutters on the shadeward side were open and the breeze sent the soul-flutes piping and swinging.
‘That was what I was trying to…’ He shook his head. ‘I thought that maybe here… he might be different, you know?’
‘What? Because of memories of happier times?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Oh, my poor brother, you really don’t see all the angles of this, do you?’
She came and sat down opposite him. She was a shade taller than him, a fact that had been true for most of their lives, and she never failed to remind him of. It was part of fate trying to balance out him being born half a turn earlier, she said. Younger by the blade stroke of midnight: she was his twin, tormentor, ally and the first and last person he wanted there just then. There was just too much truth in her for comfort.
‘Tell me,’ he said.
‘You do not want to be king.’
‘I don’t,’ he snapped.
She held up a hand. ‘So you bring our father here to tell him? Here? To the place where he and mother came to pretend we were like any other family?’
‘Where we were a family.’
She shook her head. ‘A dream, my brother, a lovely dream that was given to us to dream, and now must fade.’
‘Do you honestly try to talk like a page from the prophet books?’
Jakinda sighed. ‘All right, here it is – you are saying that you don’t want the throne you have been raised to. You are saying that you will not take the responsibility you are being raised for, and you are doing it in the room where our mother played at heroes and monsters with her children. You are saying that you don’t even begin to realise the gravity of what you are asking. You are saying that you are a child, Cado. A child who wants to stay a child.’ She picked up one of the cups of dew-tea and took a sip. ‘Is that plain enough for you, brother?’
He closed his eyes, shook his head. ‘How would you have done it then?’
‘I wouldn’t be so naive to try, but… It’s the throne, Cado. The rule of this kingdom of shades, all the way from the Silus Mountains to the Sickle Sea. Dragons rise to the call of our line. The dead sit and give us counsel. Truth and justice sit in our hands. I would have tried to make my…’ She shut her eyes. ‘My act of supreme foolishness feel like a decision made with deliberation. The decision of a prince, who could be king. I would have done it in court, kneeling before the whole lot of them in the armour of our ancestors. I would have made them respect what I was asking for.’
‘You could do it for me.’
Jakinda snorted. ‘I won’t. For starters it would not work. Second, I am not about to enable your idiocy, and third, I am not going to make myself as much of a fool as you.’
He flinched, and felt his face harden. He stood up. His face was flushing. He could feel hot anger behind his eyes.
‘Maybe you’re right,’ he snapped. ‘Better I am king than you having to sit on the throne yourself. I mean, what would you do then? You couldn’t watch and snipe and give advice whether anyone asked for it or not. And what would you do when you had to decide rather than comment on everyone else’s choices? It’s easy when it’s not you that has to… has to…’
‘Be a king.’ The words were cold.
Cado shook his head. Jakinda had gone very still.
‘I am sorry. I didn’t mean…’
‘Yes,’ she said, voice still cold. ‘Yes, you did.’
She stood and went towards the door.
‘You would be better than me,’ he said, suddenly. She looked back at him, face unreadable. ‘I mean it. You would. You are second in line by moments. It could be you. It should be you.’
A smile flickered across her face but did not reach her eyes.
‘Thank you, brother. Nice to hear you say so. Kind, but… You know what I have learned being second for all these years? That a throne is a curse. This kingdom, its line, all the power, it leeches the life from whoever rules it. Once I thought, I don’t know… that we could both bear the crown, split the rule… but no. That’s not the way it works. I saw that a long time ago.’ She gave a mirthless laugh. ‘I don’t want to be you, Cado. I pity you. This is your kingdom, brother, and you are welcome to it.’
Cado heard the door open but did not see his sister pass through. The sunlight of the past mottled to black.
This time he did not think the memory was real as it faded.
‘I was such a fool,’ he said aloud.
~You were only fourteen summers old,~ said Solia.
He shook his head. ‘I did not realise…’
Solia was silent in the swirling dark.
‘What now?’ he asked, but something caught in his throat. He coughed. Solia was not there. Just the swirl of black. He could not tell if his eyes were shut or open. He felt air rake into his lungs. The blackness of the night was thick, swirling, cloying. He forced his eyes open, and–
Woke with the smell of smoke thick in his throat.
He was older now. That was the thought that clung to him. Older… A king. A king yet to see a full circuit of the seasons. But older… a king… a king whose first breath was full of smoke.
‘Majesty,’ came the cries. Doors opening, footsteps clacking on stone. ‘Majesty, the southern forests are burning.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
A memory of fire…
The great drake folded its wing. Cado swung up into the saddle. Muscles shifted under scales, tensed. Then Herezai launched into the air, wings unfolding to beat the smoke-filled sky. They curved up. The clouds were silver-grey and dark blue under the dome of the night sky. They were moving too, boiling and spiralling, fizzing with blue lightning. Cado could feel the charge in the air, the burnt-sugar taste on his tongue. Magic, great and terrible magic. He turned towards it. Around him, others of the royal guard and household followed. They rode a menagerie of creatures. Shades followed them, fluttering in the wind.
Only he rode without an entourage of the dead. The iron rings lay beside his throne, still, empty of the spirits that would attend him through his reign. One more task that he had to complete but which remained undone. So much undone that he should have made time for…
‘His majesty must choose a court,’ Udio had said, in that delicate brittle voice that held as much scorn as deference. ‘And tradition is our protection against repeating the mistakes of the past.’
‘My father,’ Cado said.
The major-domo inclined his head. ‘Your father, glory to his living reign, moved beyond only two seasons past. It will be seen as an unseemly brief time to let his spirit rest before binding. Besides, it is not considered wise to include in the court a monarch who sat upon the throne within two generations.’
‘So I may only take advice from a relative if I don’t know them.’
‘Only if they sat on the throne, sire. There is good reason to it.’
‘What are those good reasons, Udio?’
The ancient major-domo smiled slightly at the irritation in Cado’s voice.
‘That the rulers of the past do not try to recapture their rule by influencing the living monarch.’
‘My father was–’
‘A most wise and just king, and a noble man who understood the importance of continuity and restraint in all things.’
‘I have advisors – Solia, Idyon, my mother. Drake’s teeth, I have more people who can give me advice than I have moments to talk to them in.’
‘And all those people have their place, but that place is amongst the living. A king must have the wisdom that only the dead can know.
‘So that one who sits on the throne does not fail to see something that they should.’
‘Talk to me,’ Idyon had said. ‘Not as a king but a friend.’ He had waited until the rest of the royal council had gone. The heat of the late-summer day had been draining from the air. The breeze stirring the window hangings was cool and touched with the promise of rain. Cado had not moved from the throne since the start of the council.
‘Kings do not have friends,’ Cado replied. ‘They have advisors and enemies and allies.’ He rubbed his eyes. He was bone-and-blood tired. His thoughts would not settle.
‘Now you are just talking piss and dung,’ said Idyon. He smiled.
Cado gave a weak smile back. ‘How do you do it? Keep so sharp and clear. You are Speaker. No one else has greater responsibility, but you… It’s like you are carrying nothing.’
‘I think the Marshal, and your mother, and my king – if he would pull his head out of his arse – would all make a good case that they carry more responsibility than me.’
‘All our heritage of arcane lore.’ Cado began to count on his fingers. ‘The care of the spirits who make this realm. The training of all those who would learn our traditions of magic. Chief intermediary between the unspeaking dead and the living. I forget how many of the best and most powerful in this kingdom answer to you, but I know it’s a lot. Oh, and you must help your old friend not make a ruin of it all from his throne. I would say that you can’t argue out of that being a great weight of responsibility, but something tells me you could both make that argument and win.’
‘No, you are right,’ said Idyon dryly. ‘Honestly, I am just very, very good.’
They both laughed.
‘You should talk to me,’ said Idyon, his expression grave again, ‘but I can see you won’t. That is your prerogative.’
‘As friend or king?’
‘As both.’ Idyon drew a breath, and Cado noticed there was something about his friend’s nature that he had missed before: a kernel of shadow in the orange embers of his eyes. ‘You do not need to talk to me, but I need to talk to you.’
Idyon held his gaze steady. Cado frowned. ‘Something you didn’t want to say in front of the council?’
‘Everything I didn’t want to say in front of the council.’
Cado raised his eyebrow, gestured. ‘Well? What?’
‘I…’ Idyon hesitated now.
Cado noticed then that his friend had closed his hands tight. His soul-rings were glowing deep red at the edges as though still cooling from the fire.
‘Idyon,’ said Cado carefully. ‘What is going on?’
‘There is magic at work, magic like I have never heard of. It is changing things, altering memories and truth.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘That… name I said. Can you remember it?’
‘Name? What are you talking about?’
Idyon nodded. ‘I told you a name. Just a moment ago.’
‘No, you didn’t. You said that you knew…’ Cado felt the words falter on his tongue. He blinked. Idyon and he had been laughing, and then… He could not–
Idyon gripped Cado’s hand. The iron rings on his fingers were burning. Cado snarled and yanked his hand back, but Idyon gripped harder.
‘I told you about troubles in the south, about cults of masks, and the vanishing messengers, of people who we are forgetting.’
Cado stood up then, eyes wide, tiredness gone.
‘Idyon, what is this? Tell me now!’
‘I told you a name,’ said Idyon, pressing on as though he had not heard Cado’s command. There were spirits peeling from Idyon’s rings, tattered images spiralling through the air in a sphere around them. Cado could feel pressure inside his skull, and behind his eyes. The spirits were a blur of ghost-light now. He couldn’t see past them. Frost sparkled on Idyon’s skin. He was breathing hard. ‘There are monsters amongst us. They are called the Burning Hand.’ He closed his mouth as though biting the end of the words off before they could slide free. ‘They are here. They may be many. They may be one.’
Cado felt his head swimming. ‘What are they?’
‘Sorcerers. Worshippers of something that we have all forgotten, something outside the circle of the cosmos. Their magic… It’s old, Cado, old and dark and powerful, and it’s everywhere. It’s cutting reality to hide them. There are spells that eat memories and vanish names. Even the dead. They have eaten souls to protect their presence.’
‘How did you find them?’
‘Chance, patience. They are moving. Inside the holes they cut, they are moving.’
‘To do what?’
‘I don’t know, but they are getting close to what they want. I think I have told you this before. I think we have lost a lot of time.’ The pressure in the circle of spirits was crushing. Cado could barely draw breath. ‘Above all, you must remember what I have told you, Cado. You must remember.’ Idyon was reaching for the ring on his small finger on his left hand. ‘I found a way to hold on to the memories – a dead soul bound and shielded who holds it for you and pours it back into your mind as it vanishes.’ He pulled the ring from his finger. The sphere of spirits flickered and thinned. Idyon staggered as though trying to push himself up against a great weight. He held out the ring.
‘Take this and remember.’
‘Whose soul does it hold?’
‘A strong one, new from life.’
‘Who?’
‘Your father.’
‘No.’
‘Take it. I cannot hold our thoughts outside the world for much longer. When this circle collapses, only the one with this ring will remember. It must be you. The Burning Hand are a long way along the road to wherever they are going. If they know you know, they will either steal your memory or move sooner.’
Cado did not move.
‘Take it!’ shouted Idyon. ‘Take it, Cado. You are our king, sire. Save your kingdom.’
Cado took the ring. Idyon fell back. The halo of spirits vanished. The warm air filled his lungs. He looked around. The curtains were stirring across a view of the sun setting over a late-summer day.
‘The Burning Hand…’ whispered a voice in his skull. ‘Remember…’
He looked down at the ring in his hand, a narrow circle of iron. He could feel the past sliding away out of sight. He pushed the ring onto his left little finger. The iron was cold against his skin. He blinked. Sharp memories filled his mind. His head snapped around, part of him expecting to see masked figures standing in the shadows. There was no one there. Only Idyon, groaning from where he lay on the floor.
‘What happened?’ he asked.
Cado looked down at him. He felt his mouth open.
‘If they know you know, they will either steal your memory,’ Idyon had said, ‘or move sooner.’
Cado closed his mouth and forced a smile. ‘I would have thought that slipping and falling over your own feet would be something that was beneath the dignity of our worthy and wise Speaker.’
‘Worthy and wise?’ said Idyon, rubbing his scalp. ‘Are you sure you didn’t somehow hit your head too?’ Cado held out a hand. Idyon looked at it. ‘Talking of dignity, I am not sure that the king should be helping one of his councillors up off the ground.’
‘I won’t tell if you don’t.’
Idyon grinned, gripped Cado’s hand, and hauled himself up.
‘What were we talking about before I fell? The floor must have shaken it out of my head.’ Cado felt the smile fix on his face.
‘Nothing of note.’
‘You have chosen a soul-ring?’ said Idyon, pointing at Cado’s left hand. ‘When did you do that?’
‘Just today.’
‘Udio will be pleased. Or at least his disappointment will shift to why you haven’t chosen the other eight. Smallest finger of the left hand. The Unnamed Companion. No one royal, or important. Unusual to choose that member of the spirit court first. I am intrigued.’
Cado shrugged.
Idyon blinked and frowned. ‘Are you sure there was nothing important we were talking about?’
‘Nothing,’ said Cado.
‘Then I will wish my king goodnight and retire.’ Idyon gave a bow and made for the door.
‘Goodnight, my friend,’ Cado said, and watched Idyon until the door clicked shut after him. ‘Goodnight.’
He had sat on that throne alone afterwards. What could he do with fears and suspicions? In the days that followed he wondered if it had been a dream, or a jest, some dark conjuring from Idyon’s sense of humour to jolt him out of his depression. He had hinted and tried to cajole Idyon into owning up. His friend had frowned at him, but shrugged it off, and no release had come.
Days went by, then weeks and the shadows gathered. He felt as though he were moving through the world separated by a sheet of crystal. When he had become the crown-anointed prince, and then the king, he had felt something similar. People had talked to him differently, expected him to be different. He had become aware of new things; of smiles that did not reach the eyes, and the guarded words of old friends when they spoke to him. The past had become separate, and the patterns of the world had become unfamiliar. Now though, it was not just a feeling; the separation was a literal truth.
