House of the Rain King, page 8
“Oh, no,” said Emwort, “I shouldn’t…” His voice dried in his mouth. It was too hard to explain, and the old man was already dressing him with calm efficiency.
“Thank you,” said Emwort. The robe was warm and dry against his clammy skin.
The old servant’s eyes lit up a little. He hesitated, then said: “Young sir. Some of the young folk—the indentures, I mean—they’re talking. Saying the debts would be forgiven when the King came home. Is it true?”
“Of course,” said Emwort. He quoted the Rain Work: “The flood wipes all slates, dissolves all bonds, submerges lands and titles.”
Again he felt the effort of translating a mythic future into an immanent present. He had studied the doctrine of the flood jubilee, but he had not really thought about what it would mean for the indentures. “Yes,” he said, thinking it through. “Your debt is erased, so you are no longer indentured to the Rain House. You are free to do as you please.”
He thanked the old man again and left to search for Brother Nonus.
There was no reason why it had to be Nonus he confessed to, except that he simply could not imagine explaining the error to anyone else. As he passed other monks in the corridor, he considered reaching out to clutch their sleeves: “Brother, I need to tell you something…” But they were strangers to him, and busy with their own tasks. Two augurs pored over a chart of flight patterns; an accountant spoke severely to a pair of indentured custodians; a junior monk went past carrying a cup of perfumed water.
At the far end of a corridor, Emwort saw Nonus walking away in the dim light. Emwort called out, but not loudly, for fear his voice would echo through the entire monastery. Nonus disappeared around a corner. Emwort followed and came out in the west wing, where the windows overlooked the Paupers’ Garden. There were several more quick turnings. Nonus was always just too far ahead for Emwort to catch his attention. At last Nonus came to a narrow door half-hidden behind a drape, unlocked it, and went inside.
Emwort dithered in the corridor for some time. He knew roughly where he was now: through the window he could see the wall of the seminary. The door behind the drape probably led to some part of the library, and he was unsure if he was supposed to use it. But his need was great. He strode forward, turned the handle and stepped inside.
The room beyond was small and nearly pitch-dark. Once Emwort closed the door, the only light came through a narrow slot in the wall to his left. He knew this slot very well. It opened onto the seminary classroom. Each day of his studies, Nonus or another monk had slid aside the partition, passed through a book, and issued directions for study. Only later in the day would Nonus emerge from the cloister to discuss what was being read.
While the other boys trudged like mules through their studies, Emwort had devoured each text and pleaded with the librarians for more. He had waited by the slot for a glimpse of the far side: the dark shelves heavy with codices, the faint smell of parchment wafting through the gap.
Now he was here. The bookshelves were on every side of him. A polished redwood desk sat against one wall, with a very old codex lying open on it.
There was no sign of Nonus, but the door on the far side of the room was left ajar. The library had seven rooms in total, all windowless to protect the books from sun damage. Emwort realised he must have come in through the library’s back entrance, and was now in the seventh chamber, where the most ancient texts were stored. As a novice, he was not meant to be here without permission. But this seemed a minor sin when he was deeply uncertain whether he was meant to be in the Rain House at all.
His eyes roamed nervously, gluttonously, along the shelves. He saw books he had read in the seminary; books he had dreamed of reading; books he had been forbidden. There were early recensions of the Hagiograph and the Supplications, the original manuscript of Tullweg’s first Commentary, and an illuminated copy of Harpath’s Long Litany. There were books of the Rain King’s cult in other lands—the Wet Pneuma of the northern isles, the Praises of the monsoon kingdoms. There were books of litanies to the Ancestors: Kelki, Ovroman and Gweir, along with genealogies that linked all the old bloodlines of the valley to those three ancient founders.
Then there was the book on the desk. As soon as Emwort saw what it was, he took a step forward. This was a text he had requested and been denied many times: the oldest known copy of the Flood Chronicle. Tullweg had called it the Gnomic Chronicle, for the many mysteries surrounding its origin and contents. Harpath had simply called it spurious.
Emwort couldn’t resist. He slid back the seminary partition as far as it would go, to let in more light. Then he bent over the book and began to read. The script would have been difficult even in good light; according to Tullweg it was eight or nine hundred years old, and the scribal style had drifted a long way in that time. The page before him seemed to be an esoteric discussion of the jubilee doctrine. He lifted the parchment carefully and—placing a ribbon to mark the page—turned to the last quire.
The final sixteen pages of the book were written in an undeciphered, otherwise unattested script. The squat, coiling letter-forms were like nothing else Emwort had ever seen. Tullweg had spent the last five years of his life trying to translate these pages. Nobody knew where they had come from or what they meant.
Emwort felt the parchment, soft between his thumb and forefinger. It was a sacred moment, shot through with guilt.
Footsteps echoed from deeper into the library, and candlelight flickered on the wall. Emwort quickly turned back to the marked page, removed the ribbon, and stepped back from the desk. He was waiting with his hands behind his back when Nonus came into the room.
“Emwort! My, you gave me a fright,” he said. “I know your enthusiasm is great, but you are not really supposed to be in here.”
“I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have, but—I have something important to tell you.”
Nonus set his lantern down on the desk, a look of concern on his face. “You are distressed.”
“It’s about what happened yesterday. During my initiation.”
“I see. But you must not speak about the Inner Mystery—not even between the two of us.”
“But…” A lump formed in Emwort’s throat. “I know I didn’t pass the test, and I think I failed, but perhaps,”—he had been determined to stop there, but the words kept spilling from his treacherous mouth—“perhaps I could retake the test, so I could know for sure if the Saints’ grace is—”
“Emwort, enough,” said Nonus gently. “Do you think it was an accident that the Rain King arrived at the very moment of your initiation? And that you knew exactly what to do, when the rest of the brothers—myself included—were in the grip of panic? What greater evidence could there be that you are suited to our order?”
Emwort shrugged unhappily.
“We have already lost one of our number. After much discussion with the fairy seneschal, I have managed to convince him that we may go forward with thirty-two monks. Whoever is appointed as the new Abbot will play a dual role in the rituals. But to lose another monk at this late juncture would be absolutely impossible. So you must put your doubts aside now, Emwort. You are a brother of the Rain House.”
Emwort nodded, but his heart was not convinced. Nonus smiled, patted his shoulder, and ushered him out through the door he came in by.
“Brother Ash has been appointed Master of Ritual. I am sure you will be of great use to him. Go and find him now, for the Rain King will soon be waking.”
He shut the door, leaving Emwort alone in the wan light of the corridor.
8
THE STORY OF THE SAINTS
Emwort really did mean to seek out Brother Ash as he had been told. But his feet carried him in a different direction. Through the empty corridors, ringing with shouts and footfalls just around each corner, he made his way back to the sacristy. There was no sign of the old servant this time. He went on through into the Chapel of the Sainted Brides.
The Chapel was deserted. The outer door had been locked and bolted, and nearly all the altar candles had gone out in the wind. The Brides’ statues were no more than gloomy silhouettes.
Emwort took a taper and carefully propagated fire to each of the seven altars. Then he knelt and tried to pray.
He begged the Bird Saints to guide him. He felt lost within a stone maze. He had gotten inside the Rain House at last, but nothing was as he had thought it would be. He had looked everywhere for the sacred heart of things, but it danced always out of reach or diffused into ordinary objects. He searched for it in his brothers and they disappeared behind closed doors. He searched for it underground and found only cellars. He searched for it in the Rain King, his god in flesh, but there found only suffocation and fear.
“O Sainted Brides,” he whispered, “please show me the way. If I am not meant to wear this robe, give me a sign, o, give me a sign.”
He waited.
A sound came from the shadowed back of the room: a muted ringing, like someone was polishing a chime.
Emwort opened his eyes. The chapel was not empty after all. Someone was sitting on the dais, behind the statues. The room had been so dark, and she so still, that he had had no inkling of her until now.
The candlelight flickered briefly across her. It shone in her green eyes, and in the steel of the rapier laid bare across her knees. It was the mercenary, Vivien, and the sound he had heard was her running an oiled rag along her blade.
“Oh,” he said. “I… thought you had all left already.”
She waited a moment before speaking.
“Brywna’s sticking around to finish up a few things.”
“Um. I see,” said Emwort. “You shouldn’t really be sitting up there. It’s a sacred place, you see…”
Vivien met his gaze. Her green eyes smothered his words into silence.
He thought about ignoring her and continuing his prayers. He thought about shouting for help. Instead he did nothing.
She rose slowly. The way she moved was more than poised; it was an elegance emphasised to the point of menace, the stalk of a predator that wanted its prey to know they were hunted. She took a candle from Iroque’s altar and carried it away.
“I have some questions,” she said, “about the wedding.”
She held the candle up to the wall, illuminating the ancient mural. She was standing before the mural’s final section, which depicted a nameless Bird Saint laid on a funeral bier, with the birds of all nations weeping around her. The artist had rendered the Saint in the realist rather than symbolist style, as a human woman with a cloak of feathers. There was enough detail on her open mouth to show it was full to the brim with water.
“What is this?” Vivien said.
Emwort attempted a smile, but gave it up immediately. “It’s the funeral of the Bride,” he said. His voice had a croak in it.
“What happens to her?”
“Well… surely you know. You’re in the Rain King’s entourage.” He looked at her. “You really don’t?”
Vivien turned toward the statues, with their brilliant eternal feather cloaks pinned at the collarbones. “He kills them, doesn’t he?”
Her voice was almost melancholy. It was also cold as iron. Emwort found he was standing very, very still.
“I think,” he said, “you may have missed some important context—”
Brywna was trying to leave, she really was. She had meant to go with the others at dawn. But then she had seen the monks lingering at the bottom of the tower stairs—all kitted out in their ceremonial robes, joss sticks in their hands and triangular caps on their heads. None of them had wanted to take the first step.
So she had stuck around, just long enough to teach them what she knew about handling the King. The warding incense, which Fanuwe kept in a watertight chest, was the best tool they had available. Shake it in the King’s face and nine times out of ten he would turn aside. It was just the tenth time you had to worry about.
Brywna had explained this to the monks, along with some basic rules the Sparrows had figured out over the past six weeks. Never wake the King if you can avoid it. Never get between him and a dead end. Avoid loud noises or crowds of strangers. The monks had nodded along, but only time would tell if they’d actually listened.
She felt responsible. That was always the trouble. Her mantle of care had spread out, without any conscious decision on her part, to cover these people whose names she didn’t know.
She thought: You brought this upon them.
And answered: No. Be honest. With or without you, he would have come.
Still she felt the old urge. The need to be of use to them. To convince herself, each time anew, that she was more than just a killer for hire.
In a minute she would go and find Vivien, who had promised to wait for her, and they would walk up to the Big Inn together. First a smoke. She had a need to be alone for a little while, in some place tucked away. The north side of the monastery would be no good: there were dozens of people out there now, milling around in the mud. Instead she snuck out through a postern door on the west side, which opened onto a somewhat decrepit ornamental garden. Nobody was gathering there because there was no shelter from the rain. But over the door there was a tiny slate awning, just the right size to stand under and enjoy a pipe.
She took a puff and admired the melancholy view spread before her. The garden was already flooding. Earthworms and millipedes swarmed out of the mud and climbed the trees and fenceposts, where ibises gathered to devour them by the hundreds. On her left hand was Lake Tilehat, huge and silvery and swollen with the rain.
The waterline was coming up slow, creeping in through the Rain House dock. Still, she judged it would be another day or two before the monastery was seriously threatened. Elsewhere in the valley was likely the same. For now there was little danger, only the portent of what was to come.
As she thought idly upon this, a voice whispered sharply: “Brywna!”
Brywna turned. A slight figure was standing nearby, under one of the garden’s few trees. The hood of her cloak was drawn up; all Brywna could see of her face was a small mouth, sharp nose, and a few wet curls of amber-coloured hair.
“Pelomeda?”
“It’s Ginger.”
“Right.”
“I didn’t expect to find you here. When I got back, they told me the outlanders had all left at dawn.”
Brywna frowned. “I had a little more to do. I won’t be around much longer.” She didn’t say anything about the second contract. Better to keep that under wraps until they’d voted on it.
Ginger drew closer, pulling back her hood so Brywna could see her eyes. There were deep bags under them; no doubt she hadn’t slept.
“I don’t know you,” said Ginger, “but I think you’re a decent person. And I’ve got a favour to ask of you.”
Brywna shrugged slightly to show she was listening.
“I won’t be able to explain everything, but this is the situation. There have been a few hard years in the valley. Droughts. And in hard years the Rain House gives out a lot of loans, because they can afford to. Now things are starting to look up, so the loans have to be paid back. Most of this year’s harvest, so far, has gone straight into the Rain House storerooms.” She nodded toward the high wall at Brywna’s back. “And now this—the flood. It will take a whole year before we can harvest again, maybe more. If those stores aren’t preserved, people are going to starve.”
Brywna nodded. She had seen inside the storerooms, briefly. There was enough there that even if every able hand were turned to carting it out of the valley, some would still be left behind for the floodwaters to swallow. “The flood turns everything on its head,” she said. “It doesn’t matter what you own, only what you can carry.”
“Yes,” said Ginger. “So why are the doors of the Rain House still locked?”
Brywna thought about this. It was Fanuwe who had ordered them to keep the rabble outside, to ensure his precious rituals went off without interruption. But the monks hadn’t exactly protested, either.
“I know you’ve finished your job and you’re leaving,” said Ginger. “All I’m asking is you leave that door unlocked when you go.”
“Hm.” Brywna rubbed her chin. She was not under contract, so there was nothing in the Sparrows’ Charter that would prevent her doing this. “It isn’t that simple, though.”
She related what had happened to the Abbot the day before. Also all the close calls they’d had on the journey south. And she said: “He’ll be waking up any minute now. The monks will do their best to corral him, but really it’s anybody’s guess where he’s going to go. If you’ve got people sneaking in here, pilfering food, they’re going to end up in his way. And that’ll get ugly.”
“I’ll make sure everyone knows. We can take care of ourselves.”
“Sorry,” she said. It was only in saying the word that she reached her decision. “If anyone else is going to die here, it won’t be on my head.” She tipped out the ash from her pipe and retreated through the doorway.
Ginger darted forward, looking to put her arm through the gap before the door closed. When she saw the look in Brywna’s eyes, she thought better of it. Brywna pulled the door to and bolted it behind her.
Shit, shit, shit, she thought as she went back through the winding corridors, past the doors to the storerooms filled with grain, cheese, cured meats and warm clothing. Had she made the right choice? They’d find another way in sooner or later. It was a monastery, not a bloody fortress. The situation did not turn entirely on her shoulders. That was hubris thinking. But damn it, the look in the girl’s eyes as the door closed: anger and disappointment and scorn.
She came around a corner and crashed into Vivien, her forehead clonking the younger woman’s chin.
“Ouch!” said Brywna, and started laughing. “There you are. I just had the strangest thing happen to—”
She stopped. Vivien wasn’t laughing. There was a deep, deep cold in her emerald eyes. A killing look.
