Two of those dry eyes belonged to a very obese man clad in incongruously soiled finery. His eyes were not merely dry, they were stretched wide with horror and terror.
Lurking well back in the crowd around the collapsed Temple of Love, Lord Umpily had come upon the Imperial inspection by mere chance. He had been working his way home on foot to the palace after attending the sumptuous birthday party of Senator Ishipole the previous night. He had been abducted from that glittering function to experience a harrowing interview with the long-lost Warlock Olybino. At dawn he had been released tb his own devices. Within minutes he had been relieved at knifepoint of all his valuables—some money, a few rings, even his boots, the golden tracery ripped off his doublet. He had been more than content to part with all of those in return for being allowed to retain a whole skin. Since then he had wandered in his socks, in agonies of indecision.
Better than most, he knew that the wholesale destruction could be blamed on the wardens, or at least on one warden, the deposed Warlock Olybino. Even Umpily did not know the details, though—much as he would like to. The former East had certainly been planning some challenge to the Almighty. One or the other had caused the devastation, or they both had. One or the other must have died in it, and Olybino was the most likely loser. What he had achieved or even hoped to achieve was beyond Umpily’s utmost imagining.
He had too many problems of his own to worry very much about the former warlock. The city swarmed with starving peasantry. Even after he had been looted, other thugs had accosted him without success. Sooner or later some such band would take out their disappointment in random violence and kill him from spite. He was penniless and friendless. The only refuge open to him was the palace itself, yet even worse danger lurked there.
He was no longer bewitched by the Covin. Olybino and his companions had removed his occult delusions. They had laid some sort of protection spell on him instead, but had warned him that it would not bear close. inspection. How long could he hope to survive in the palace before being closely inspected?
Typically, he had wandered to and fro until growing hunger stiffened his resolve. At least in the palace he could eat, and anything was easier to face on a full stomach. Thus he was heading homeward almost resolutely when he came upon the smoking ruins of the Temple of Love. It had been one of the largest and richest shrines in the city, easily the most popular. Even by day it had usually been crowded. Legionaries were overseeing gangs of workmen removing bodies, laying out rows of mangled corpses that almost blocked the roadway, many of them women. The death toll must have been enormous.
For some time Umpily stared in horrified fascination at this gruesome spectacle, making mental notes that he could later transcribe to his journal. He was still there when shouts and cheering alerted him to the arrival of the Imperial visitors.
It was then, cowering back in a doorway, that he had his worst experience of that whole dreadful day. Even through the cordon of guards, he could see the royal couple in their carriage. He also saw the officers and officials standing stiffly alongside, answering the royal queries with solemn respect. He watched as the parade moved on, but he heard the cheering through thick walls of solid fear.
Shandie and his wife. Emshandar V and Impress Eshiala. Umpily had seen them quite clearly—royal and gracious, somber and concerned.
At the same time and in the same places, he had seen her sister and his cousin, Ashia and Emthoro. They had been wearing totally different clothes, and he had seen both sets of garments, just as he had seen both sets of people.
He had known for months that those two were impersonating the imperor and his wife. Then, for other months, he had been deluded into not knowing it. Last night he had been forcibly disillusioned.
He had wondered—in his periods of sanity just how the deception was being worked. Did Emthoro really believe that he was Shandie and Ashia that she was her own sister? Or were the two of them merely puppets, willing or unwilling?
Now he had the answer: They were puppets. They knew what was happening and could not prevent it, could not stop their lips and limbs from obeying orders that came from outside themselves. Their treason was not of their own choosing, but they were aware of it. They were to be pitied, not despised! They had looked sick, disgusted, terrified. Their mouths had spoken the words he had heard, but their expressions had been conveying totally different messages. The wildness in their faces suggested they might both be close to madness now, and that could hardly be surprising.
Moreover, one of the coachmen had been a dwarf and another a jotunn. They had been imps at the same time. Two of the mounted guards closest to the carriage, although genuine imps, had displayed twin personas also. All four, in fact, must have been sorcerers, members of the Covin. That dwarf might even have been the Almighty himself.
Umpily staggered away, trembling. Now he could see through the deceptions. That was Olybino’s doing! The warlock had given him defenses against delusion and told him to go away and record events as they truly were.
Fine! From now on Umpily would see events as they really were. But when the fake imperor summoned him to a dinner party or a reception—as he still did sometimes and would probably do much more often in future, with the official mourning almost over-then Umpily was going to see both the Shandie illusion and the Emthoro reality inside it. How could he possibly conceal his own knowledge? There would always be sorcerers nearby, and he would not stand close inspection.
He might even run into the Almighty himself in a corridor when the dwarf was being invisible. His reactions would give him away at once, wouldn’t they?
Lord Umpily had spent most of his life at court. He had learned very well how to conceal his true feelings.
But he wasn’t that good an actor! Was he?
If he wasn’t, then he wasn’t going to last very long. Was he?
The ever-restless ocean had fallen strangely still; a sad wind sighed gently. Seaspawn lay hove to, hardly rolling, and even the inevitable creakings of a wooden ship were barely audible. The waning moon hung low in the night, painting a silver ladder on the Summer Seas. A single small lantern cast an orange glow over the priest’s breviary as he read the service. The hushed crew listened without a sound. Captain Ko-nu let his tears flow unashamed, knowing they would not be noticed in the darkness.
Then the priest closed the book and doused the lamp. His black-draped form disappeared. After a moment’s silence, his voice continued.
“Now we usually call for the eulogy.” He was speaking slowly and distinctly, so that his audience could follow his unfamiliar accent. “But you do not need anyone to tell you of your lost mate. Even I can testify to his quality, who only knew him for a few hours. I saw him bear his pain with courage beyond his years. I heard him freely forgive the hand that struck him, conceding that there was no sin to forgive.”
Someone began to sob.
“I tell you all,” the priest said, “that the Good has been increased because he lived, and that the Gods will scarce need to use Their balance to judge Wo-pu-Al. He goes to the last weighing as we shall all go there in our time; we shall do well indeed if our souls increase the Evil no more than his does, or prosper the Good as much.”
Waves slapped gently at the hull. Ropes creaked.
The priest spoke a soft cue. Gi-al’s sitar sounded a chord, and the crew began the final dirge. Ko-nu wiped his eyes to watch the muffled shapes of his two surviving sons lift the locker door on which their brother’s shrouded body lay, bearing it between them to the rail.
“Farewell, brother,” Father Acopulo said loudly, in the last words of the Burial at Sea. “Go to the Gods; we shall follow in our time.”
Mu-pu and Po-pu tilted the plank. The chant surged louder, hiding the splash as Wo-pu-Al departed on his last journey, one more victim of the merfolk’s ancient curse. The two pallbearers stood with heads bowed for a moment, then Mu-pu took the shutter and laid it on the deck.
The priest moved over to them and laid his hands on their shoulders. Whatever he said was inaudible through the singing, but Ko-nu was confident that the words would be appropriate, and reassuring.
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