That was impossible. These ruins had been here for hundreds of years, since long before the Crown of the Moon was built in Hulan’s honor. Sairu took a moment to gaze around the ruins again. And she recalled the image of the great house she had glimpsed in the moonlight all those long nights ago. She wondered what could have burned it to the ground, leaving the rubble still suffering hundreds of years later.
But she had no time to consider such things now. Gathering her robes in both hands, she slipped out from behind the stone and hastened on to the central building, Hulan’s Throne, where the High Priest dwelt in holy opulence.
The Besur, unaware of that which slipped up on him in the shadows, stood in the window of his outer chamber, gazing out across the vast temple grounds but not seeing them. His mind was fixed upon the churning question of the emperor’s dream—the promised reward, the ugliness of the vision described, his own inability to locate it as he dream-walked.
A fellow priest—one who had accompanied him the night before to the emperor’s chamber—stood across the room, shifting awkwardly on his feet. He cleared his throat and said, “Honored Besur?”
“Yes?”
“Could we not, as it were—for the sake of Anwar’s Favored Son—possibly invent an interpretation?”
The Besur said nothing.
“I mean,” the priest continued, stuttering at the boldness of his suggestion, “the vision, however disturbing, is probably no more than a fancy conjured up in the Imperial Glory’s magnificent imagination and unlikely to be of any concern to him in another month. Would it not be in his favor to ease his mind now, let him forget it, and move on with our duties?”
There lingered, unspoken between them, the added thought, While one of us claims the princess, the province, and the place in the palace.
Slowly the Besur turned and fixed his fellow priest with the coldest of stares. “You would consider lying to the Imperial Glory of Noorhitam?”
The priest opened his mouth to answer, thought better of it, closed his mouth again with a click of his jaw, and bowed. He bowed his way right out of the room, murmuring retractions, blessings, and other things to which the Besur did not bother to listen as he turned back to his window. He heard the door slide shut, and his mouth turned up in one corner with a grim smile.
It was difficult to remember the time, back in his boyhood—scrubbed fresh by his mother, still damp with soapy water and her tears—when he had first entered his home village’s temple and the service of Hulan. That day had possibly marked the last of his belief in the sacred truth of his nation’s religion. Since then, being a bright, ambitious young man, he had learned different.
He had learned the subtle arts of avarice. He had grown in power, entered into the greater secrets of his order, until at last he stood here in the Besur’s shoes, boasting supremacy in Noorhitam only a little less than that of the emperor and a few of his greater lords.
“Lie to the emperor,” he whispered, considering. Was this not, perhaps, the final depth to which he could plunge? Would it make any difference, really, considering the rest of his life’s deeds? “Lie to the emperor . . . .”
He sighed heavily, his great body shaking with a sudden wave of something close to sorrow; sorrow for that boy he had been, bright-eyed with religious fervor that mirrored his dear mother’s and all her hopes for him. That boy whose vision was so swiftly clouded, never to be cleared again.
He turned from the window. And screamed.
The scream scarcely had a chance at life before it was stifled by the pillow thrust unceremoniously into his mouth by the deft hand of Sairu, who smiled at him. “None of that, Honored Besur,” she said. “I don’t want your lackeys swarming. I have a few questions I would put to you, and I think you will prefer the privacy as much as I.”
The Besur spat out the pillow and opened his mouth to roar like a lion. But a flash from Sairu’s eyes warned him, and he dropped the roar in exchange for a furious whisper. “Where is Lady Hariawan?”
“No,” said Sairu. “I’ll ask the questions.”
She was so small and he so huge that he cherished, momentarily, a vision of taking her in his arms and crushing the life out of that wretched smile. The muscles in his shoulders twitched, eager to fulfill that vision.
But the next moment he saw two knives in her hands, which had not been there the moment before.
“We can make this unpleasant,” said Sairu, “or you can comply, and I’ll be on my way much more swiftly. Understand?”
“You—you would dare threaten the Besur of—”
“Before you go on,” said the girl, “know this: My first loyalty is to my emperor. My second is to my lady. You are not high on the list of those to whom I feel any great devotion. What is more”—and she took a threatening step toward him, her eyes dark behind the smile—“your secrets have caused my mistress nothing but danger, and I, for one, am sick of them.”
The Besur took a step back for each step she took forward, and soon found himself pressed against the sill of his window. He felt the air of many levels behind him. He would not survive a jump.
“What are your questions?” he demanded in a growl, like a cornered cur.
“Why did you send my mistress to Daramuti?”
“To recover from—”
“Besur.” She spoke his title sharply, as a warning. He drew a long breath. Then he spoke, slowly but without falsehood. She could read the truth in his frightened eyes.
“She met something in the Dream. Something terrible. It hurt her.”
“The burn,” Sairu said promptly.
“Yes. You see, nothing should have been able to touch her in the Dream. She walked in spirit, not in body. And while the spirit may, it is true, be assaulted by nightmares, the body should be safe. Yet whatever she met while dream-walking hurt her in body as well as spirit.”
“In spirit?” said Sairu. “How did it wound her spirit?”
“She was changed,” said the Besur, his lip curling. “Before that night, Lady Hariawan was not the empty-eyed creature you met. She was strong. She was sharp as an arrow-tip. Quick to learn, quick to wrath.” He closed his eyes then, remembering. “She came to us from the Awan Clan along with three other tribute girls of various clan families. But within days she dominated her sisters, and the brothers were in awe of both her beauty and her force of will. Within a month she demanded audience with me and told me that she could dream-walk. Not like my brethren and I dream-walked, tentatively nosing about in the mists on the edge of the Dream. No. She could truly walk, like the Dream Walkers of old, plunging deep into the Realm of Dreams and bringing back tales of the visions she saw.”
“How did you know she spoke the truth about those visions?” Sairu asked.
“We have holy texts,” said the Besur, glaring at her. “Generations ago there were many Dream Walkers who could do as Lady Hariawan does, and they wrote down the things they saw. We have sought after those things for over a hundred years but never found them. Then Lady Hariawan came to us and told of what she saw in the Dream, and it was as though she had read the texts for herself.”
“Had she not?”
“No. Lady Hariawan can neither read nor write, nor can any man or woman of the Awan Clan. She did not recite to us or quote. She truly saw.”
Sairu nodded. “Very well, Besur. And what did you and your brethren decide to do with this talent of hers? What was your plan?”
His face went red, and every feature betrayed his unwillingness to answer. Sairu took another step toward him, and he pressed harder into the sill, feeling wind on the back of his head. Then, with great reluctance, he said, “We sent her to find Hulan’s Gate.”
“Why?”
“We are the priests of Hulan. Need you ask?”
“Besur,” said Sairu, her smile most patient, “do not try to convince me that either you or your brothers were concerned in the least with holy ascension. You value Lady Hariawan too much for that to be the truth. You hired a Golden Daug
hter to protect her, you sent her into hiding. She means more to you than access to your goddess, whom you do not worship in your heart. What is your true purpose for discovering Hulan’s Gate?”
A flash of shame crossed his face, and the Besur lowered his eyes, staring at the floor beneath Sairu’s feet. He whispered the truth like a confession. “The Dream Walkers of old wrote of fabulous treasures hidden in Hulan’s Garden. They wrote of gemstones and carbuncles beyond compare.”
Sairu recalled the stones Jovann had pressed into her hand. Flaming opals, but far more beautiful, far more valuable than any opals she had ever before seen, even those adorning the emperor’s crown. “So you hoped to use my Lady Hariawan to fill your own coffers,” she said, and added spitefully, “Holy Father.”
The Besur made neither move nor answer, and he would not meet her gaze.
“I want you to tell me,” Sairu continued, “about this thing which my mistress encountered and which caused her such hurt. What was it?”
“I do not know.”
“But you have a guess.”
Again he did not answer.
“Honored Besur,” said Sairu, “while keeping watch over my mistress’s sleep, I felt shadows moving in a realm just beyond my perception but as real and as near to me as you even now stand. What were they?”
The angry red drained from the Besur’s face, leaving him pale, almost grey. With an effort he spoke: “The Dream Walkers of old wrote of a cult. It was called the Order of the Greater Dark and said to be comprised of those who once worshipped Hulan. Those whom Hulan betrayed.”
Sairu thought about this for but a moment. Then she said, “The Chhayans.”
“Yes,” said the Besur. “Those who worshipped the sun and the moon before our people took over this land and this faith. Those who turned from their goddess when she turned from them. According to the Dream Walkers of old, they too seek Hulan’s Gate. But for a different purpose.”
“What purpose?”
“We do not know. We have only our guesses.”
“Destruction. Revenge,” said Sairu, easily reading those guesses in his eyes.
The Besur nodded.
“And you think it was they—this Order of the Greater Dark—who harmed my Lady Hariawan? Who struck her?”
But here the Besur shook his head. “I do not know. If they are Dream Walkers like unto us, they would not be able to cause her physical harm. Not one so powerful in the arts as she! They could pursue her, follow her, harry her. But they could not touch her, not in that world.”
Sairu studied the Besur’s face. “You think they want her, don’t you? You think they want to use her to find Hulan’s Gate.”
“There has not been a Dream Walker such as Lady Hariawan in over a century. If the Order of the Greater Dark wishes to pursue its vengeance, it might very well need her in order to succeed.”
“Do they know she’s a woman?”
“I doubt it. As we do not take our physical forms into the Dream, we appear as no more than phantoms to each other in that realm. They would see only a powerful Walker, not a woman.”
“So, in this world, they would not know how to find her. And after her assault, hoping to throw them off the trail, you sent her far from the Crown of the Moon and the other Dream Walkers.”
The Besur nodded.
“That explains a good deal,” said Sairu, turning the knife in her right hand reflectively. “But it does not tell me why a Crouching Shadow tried to kill her.”
“What?”
“Yes, Honored Besur,” said Sairu. “One of the very slaves you hand-picked to journey with us to Daramuti proved an assassin. A Crouching Shadow bent on my mistress’s destruction. Are they also part of this Order of the Greater Dark?”
“No,” said the Besur swiftly. “No, they are not. They are . . .”
“Yes?”
Grudgingly he admitted, “They are the self-styled protectors of Hulan and her children. They have plagued my fellow Dream-Walkers and me for as long as we have practiced our art. As they themselves cannot enter the Dream, neither do they believe other mortals should. They have killed more than a few of my order over the years. And if they knew that a Dream Walker of Lady Hariawan’s abilities had come to the Crown of the Moon, well—”
“They would stop at nothing to find and kill her as well, thus protecting Hulan’s Garden from mortal invasion.”
The Besur nodded shortly. Then he said, “They are all fools.”
“They are not the only fools,” Sairu replied, perhaps more sharply than she should have. Then, her voice once more sweet as poison, “Does Princess Safiya know this?”
“I have not told her, no. We do not divulge all our secrets to the Golden Mother.”
“And she considers you no more than a weak old blusterer,” Sairu said, “so she would not seek you out for information.” Once more the Besur’s cheeks flushed with rage. But Sairu continued, “There, at least, my dear Mother is at fault. For you are not merely a weak old blusterer. You are also cunning to a frightening extreme.”
Oddly mollified, the Besur nodded. “I have my moments.” Then, surprised when Sairu suddenly flicked both her knives out of sight into the sleeves of her priest’s robe and turned from him, he said, “Where are you going?”
“You have nothing more to tell me. I have business elsewhere.”
“What business?”
“The protection of my lady.”
“She is alive then? She is safe?”
“She is hidden,” said Sairu. “And you will not see her until I know for certain that she is, indeed, safe. Until then, Honored Besur, do not look for me.”
With that, she was gone. The Besur stood alone in his chamber with only his shame for company.
All cats possess an uncanny ability for melting into the shadows and vanishing, escaping detection by even the sharpest eye. But this cat was more than a cat. He did not merely melt into the shadows; he seemed to become a shadow himself, flitting along the floor and wall with such silent stealth that he fancied, if he wasn’t careful, he might even lose himself.
This thought made him grin.
His grin diminished as he penetrated deeper into the passages beneath the Crown of the Moon. Since death and despair are considered unseemly companions for celestial worshippers, the only entrance to the temple dungeons was found not in any of the main temple buildings, but in a lowly guardhouse in the far western corner of the temple grounds. The guardhouse itself was humble enough, belying the vastness of the dungeon passages below.
How many sad souls languished in these subterranean cells? What might be their crimes? The cat shivered as he proceeded, his grin long gone. He passed guards and prison-keepers at intervals, and they stank of the worst kind of mortality: cruelty, sprung from fear and masked in illusions of false justice.
He thought with sorrow, suddenly, of the Lady Moon herself. He knew that she, high in her vaulted heavens, sang of such evils as this, and her song was full of tears. And yet how many of these poor prisoners were incarcerated in her name?
The cat did not know exactly which scent he sought, for he had never met Lord Dok-Kasemsan. But he did not doubt his own cleverness and was quite certain he would find the lord eventually. He must simply center his energies and . . .
A memory flashed across his mind. The cat paused mid-step; his ears flattened and his eyes narrowed. He recalled a time, not so long ago, when he had plumbed the depths of another temple dungeon. Only then it was no stranger he sought.
“Now, now, old boy,” the cat muttered, shaking his whiskers. “Don’t think about her. Don’t think about any of that. Your little mortal charge has a point, you know. Can’t allow yourself to be distracted. Can’t allow yourself to be divided. Now focus!”
He closed his eyes entirely, for it was too dark for them to serve him well. His pink nose, however, sifted through a hundred and more different scents, searching for something likely. Searching for some clue.
“Dragon’s teeth!”
His eyes flew wide, and he stared into the passage before him, as though willing himself to see through total darkness. He sniffed again and knew he had not been mistaken. “Jovann!”
Indeed, Jovann had certainly come this way, probably dragged. Not long ago, not long at all. Perhaps only a few hours before, in fact! Which meant he might very well still be alive.
There was no way of knowing whether the scent he caught was from Jovann being dragged into prison or dragged out for execution. But the cat, his tail long and low behind him, trotted down the passage, determined to find where it led. Oh, of course, he’d locate Lord Dok-Kasemsan too, eventually. However, he did not believe Sairu would object to this detour.
As he neared the end of the passage, it opened up with light and a small workspace. A prison-keeper’s station, furnished with a bench, a table, a lamp, and little else, appeared before him. The prison-keeper himself, secure in his knowledge of the locks and bolts around him, sat on the bench, his back against the wall, his feet propped on the table, and snored loud and long. What a man he must be to sleep amid this dank despair! It was amazing, the cat mused, the things to which mortals accustomed themselves.
Jovann’s scent was still strong. The cat proceeded with his nose to the ground, following where that scent led and ending up at a narrow, heavy door. He put a paw to it and pressed. He did not consider his powers to be magic, because magic would imply spells and sorcery, which was not something the cat could bother himself to learn. His powers were deeper, an innate part of his being. He had, for as long as he could remember, been able to break through locks and barriers, particularly mortal ones.
Except for . . .
“Dragons blast it,” he muttered. “Iron.”
There was no use in fighting iron. Already he felt it going to his head, leaving him dizzy and sick to his stomach. All other metals and alloys would bend to his whim. But never iron.