think I would like her, too. I cannot believe she could have a daughter like Ravenna. Who on
earth did she choose as the father?”
Garth gave a funny half smile. “I think Ravenna”s father is my father. We”re half-brother
and sister.”
Ishbel stared at him. She opened her mouth to say something, then shut it again.
“I cannot be sure,” said Garth, “but my father has always been awkward and secretive
about Venetia—and she about him. I think that when he was younger, he must have gone to
Venetia to talk with her about her herbal cures, and she seduced him, perhaps, much as Ravenna
seduced Maxel, but without the ulterior motive.”
“Ulterior motive?” Ishbel said.
“Ishbel…Ravenna said something to me this morning. She said that she had conceived
the child not to trap Maxel, but to save Elcho Falling.” Should Maximilian refuse to see Ishbel
for what she truly was, but this Garth did not say.
Ishbel sighed. “Garth, I do not wish to speak about Ravenna”s child.”
“I”m sorry, Ishbel.” Garth thought of the child Ishbel had lost, and both her and
Maximilian”s distress over it. Ravenna”s pregnancy could not be easy for Ishbel. “I feel I should
also apologize for Ravenna.”
“You have no need to apologize for her, Garth!”
“Nonetheless, someone has to, and it was I who involved her in Maximilian”s life in the
first instance. Oh gods, Ishbel, I can”t believe he slept with her!”
Ishbel laughed at the affront in his voice. “I had thought that you”d sympathize with her.”
Garth shook his head. “Ravenna has ever been her own person.” He glanced at Ishbel. “I
was quite desperately in love with her myself, you know, when we were young.”
“Then you had a lucky escape. Particularly if she is, as you think, your half-sister.”
He laughed, and they looked at each other.
“I think we might be friends, Ishbel,” Garth said.
“That would be a relief, Garth. You are too likeable for me to be bothered trying to
maintain a dislike of you.”
They shared a smile, then looked around at the sound of hoofbeats behind them.
Maximilian rode up, pulling his horse in on the other side of Ishbel”s.
“No knives?” he said.
“No knives,” Garth and Ishbel said as one, and they shared another smile.
They chatted about inconsequential things, before Ishbel finally asked Maximilian where
Lister and Vorstus were within the column.
“Far enough away that I cannot see them,” Maximilian said, somewhat shortly.
“Lister came to see me last night,” Ishbel said. “To make friends, I think. I don”t know.
Maybe to gauge my residual loyalty. Perhaps to tell me what he thought I ought to be doing.”
“More likely the latter,” Maximilian said. He glanced at the satchel tied to the back of
Ishbel”s saddle. “Have you touched the crown?”
“Yes,” said Ishbel. “It is a grim thing.” She shot him a look, and a brief smile. “It had a
talk with me.”
“I don”t want to know what it said,” said Maximilian. Then he, too, smiled. “Strange. I
didn”t hear you run screaming from your tent at the sound of its voice.”
“We all change, Maxel.”
“Aye, we all change.” Now Maximilian looked at Garth. “And what think you of Vorstus,
my friend? You were close, once.”
“A long time ago, Maxel,” Garth said. “As once Ravenna and I were. As you said, we all
change.” He paused, thinking. “I am almost not surprised to hear he has been so duplicitous and
so manipulative. Frankly, Maxel, I”d set the pair of them to digging out the latrine ditches each
night when we make camp.”
All three smiled, and the shared amusement gave Garth the encouragement to ask
something that had been feeding his curiosity ever since Maximilian had told him Ishbel was, in
fact, the Archpriestess of the Coil.
“Ishbel,” he said, “when first Maximilian received news of the Coil”s offer of a new
bride, no one truly knew what to think about you.”
“I am sure you are being very diplomatic, Garth,” said Ishbel.
“We all advised Maxel against you,” said Garth. “We thought you”d be nothing but
trouble. But Vorstus argued that Maxel would know if you were a priestess of the Coil, because
you were sure to be marked. But…Maxel has mentioned no mark…and he said he did not know
for certain that you were a member of the Coil—let alone its archpriestess—until he found you in
Sakkuth.”
He left the question unasked, but dangling in the air between them.
“I can assure you,” said Ishbel, “that Maxel looked for it. Very diligently.”
She paused, enjoying the moment, keeping her eyes ahead.
“He just didn”t look in quite the right place,” she said eventually, a smile taking any sting
out of her words. “And he”s lost his chance now.”
Further up the column, the soldier Rimmert rode his horse up to join Insharah”s.
“There is deep unhappiness, my lord,” Rimmert said to Insharah. “Every man among us
wonders why we continue on this road to Elcho Falling, when we”d be doing more good further
south.”
“Enough, Rimmert.”
Rimmert studied Insharah. The man”s voice had lacked conviction, and Rimmert noted
that there were deep lines of worry and sleeplessness about his eyes.
“What are we doing here, Insharah?” Rimmert said, lapsing back into old familiarity.
“There is word that Armat has consolidated his forces to the east, and even now prepares to
march south to Isembaard.”
“Rimmert—”
“That word, Insharah, has spread like wildfire throughout the troops. Armat is acting,
while… here?” Rimmert spat to one side. “We are merely riding toward some vague glory. I
don”t know. I just don”t know, Insharah. Elcho Falling has nothing to do with us, while the fate of Isembaard and our families has everything to do with us. Everyone believes we would be
better south than—”
“Enough, Rimmert!”
Rimmert gave Insharah a long, hard look. “Tonight fully one hundred thousand men are
going to desert…if „desert” is the right term to abandon a man and cause to which we owe no
loyalty. I will be with them. It is your choice, Insharah, whether you allow us to go, whether you
alert Axis…
“Or whether you join us.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Isembaard
Isaiah stood, stretching out his muscles and looking around him. It had been two days
now since he”d discovered Hereward and the Book of the Soulenai.
Both had complicated everything.
He”d wanted to continue further south, surveying the damage that had been done to
Isembaard ( and to his river), and discovering what had happened to Kanubai and to the pyramid.
In the latter case, Isaiah now had a very clear idea of what had happened to Kanubai, and
had no need to travel south to investigate what had happened to the pyramid.
It was coming north with supernatural strides, coming to talk to him.
Isaiah could not have moved in any case. Shortly after he handed the Book of the
Soulenai back to Hereward, Skraelings had begun to congregate nearby.
Not close, perhaps fifty paces away, but within hours thousands upon thousands of the
wraiths had encircled them. Still, silent, hunched on the ground staring with their great silvered
orbs hanging from their dog faces.
They allowed Isaiah and Hereward to visit the riverboat on two occasions to retrieve
some supplies, but would not allow them to move any greater distance from their small camp by
the side of the glassed river.
Isaiah knew their purpose was to keep him there for the One”s visit.
The One. The physical manifestation of mathematical perfection, as once worshipped by
the Magi?
The wait was troublesome, not merely because Isaiah was highly wary of any
confrontation between himself and the One—did it want to negotiate with him or destroy
him?—but also because of Hereward.
Isaiah did not like her very much, and she, so far as he understood, loathed him. She also
perplexed him, for he did not know how to treat her. His life as a Tyrant had been spent dealing
with generals and soldiers, with nobles, with legends and heroes. The slaves and servants at his
palace of Aqhat had been all but invisible to him. Isaiah had dealt with his palace
chamberlain—he knew the man”s name, and he knew some of the man”s life beyond his role as
chamberlain—but as for the others who served him, and who slipped in and out of the shadows
of the palace…he had no idea.
He”d recognized Hereward”s face when first he”d seen her, so Isaiah knew he”d seen her
about the palace—she”d very likely served both him and Ishbel within his private chambers—but
she”d made no impression.
Kitchen steward?
He stretched the muscles in his back, then decided to sit down, and perhaps engage the
woman in some conversation.
Anything to relieve the tension of waiting for the One.
“You worked directly under the palace chamberlain?” Isaiah said, trying to keep his mild
dislike for the woman out of his voice.