The Spider's War

  “The man is evil, Cithrin. We can put bows and bells on it and dance ribbons into maypoles—”

  “Stop that,” she said, annoyance in her voice.

  “Stop what?”

  “Making him into the story about him. He’s not Orcus the Demon King. He’s not war incarnate. He’s just a person, and my job is to judge people and risk and what losses are wise to hazard in return for what rewards.”

  “He’s a person with a history of hacking people to death if he feels betrayed by them,” Marcus said. “And not to make the knife too sharp, but he feels betrayed by you.”

  “Yes, I am putting my life at risk. And yours and Clara’s and Barriath’s. All of us will be killed if I’m wrong. But the return if I’m right will be everything, and…”

  She turned away, her lips pursed like she’d tasted something sour.

  “And?”

  “And I’m right,” she said.

  Marcus wove his fingers together over his knee. From the house, Charlit Soon laughed and Sandr’s grieved voice floated behind it, the words less clear than the tone of them. Everything in Marcus’s body was screaming to throw Cithrin over his shoulder and run. Find a way to get her away from the city and the little kings who threw children to their deaths as a kind of political punctuation mark. The urge was larger than oceans, vast and powerful, and he recognized it from a lifetime of nightmares. It was the same thing he felt when he wanted to draw Merian and Alys from the fire. The want to save her was as complete as for his own wife and daughter, and it was as impossible. It left him trembling.

  But then, he hadn’t understood her when she wanted to turn gold into paper either, and everyone had seemed to think that terribly clever. So maybe he just didn’t see what she did. Faith in her was as good a bet as anything.

  “What’s the job, then?” he asked.

  Her face took on a calm seriousness that was better than a smile. “In the short term, see to it that we aren’t interrupted. Especially not by any of the priests. I’ve arranged a bit of a theater piece. I believe that having his father with us gets us past the first barrier, but there will be some dangerous spots.”

  “Glad we agree on that, anyway,” Marcus said. “Care to tell me what you expect they are?”

  A bell sounded, dry and clanking, but with a long rolling finish that seemed to cut the night in two: all the moments that had come before it, and all the ones after.

  “We may have to learn those lines when we say them,” Cithrin said.

  “You mean?”

  Cithrin gestured toward the garden gate. “He’s here.”

  Geder

  Geder’s illness, whatever it was, seemed to be getting worse, or at least no better. He couldn’t sleep at night or wake fully in the day. The business of the empire was as vast as it had ever been, but he couldn’t even bring himself to address it. Letters and reports and requests came in each day, high nobles requested audiences on any number of concerns. Rates of taxation and disputes over land rights and slights of honor. Reports from the searchers he’d sent to Lyoneia and Hallskar, tracking the ancient wonders and threats of the world that he could no longer muster any enthusiasm for. Geder had a basket the size of a bed filled with invitations to one thing and another. The blessing of Maken Estellin’s newborn granddaughter, a garden fantasia by Lady Nestin Caot, a tasting of brandy captured from Nus the year before at a private room of the Great Bear. Everyone seemed to want something of him, and the weight of it bore him down until even the simplest thing felt too much because it was attached to all the rest of it.

  The death throes of the enemies of the goddess were growing stronger, which Basrahip told him was a good sign. Inentai and Nus and Suddapal were all in open revolt now, and a Timzinae army was pushing its way north with Jorey and Canl Daskellin doing all they could to hold it back. Written reports said the temple in Nus had been burned to the ground and the priests with it, but that was fine. It was good. Basrahip said it was good. And despite that one terrible haunting moment of confusion that Geder had seen in the huge priest’s eyes, Geder believed him. He heard the man’s voice, and he believed, but he was so tired. And the fog grew in his mind.

  His study was warm with the light of sunset. A bird sang outside the window, three rising notes and a pause and the same three again, like a musician practicing a flourish. Geder plucked at the cuff of an embroidered jacket sent from Asterilhold in celebration of his glorious victory over the apostate. It was hard to remember sometimes that he’d done that.

  A carafe of cool water sat on the edge of his desk, sweating. When the drops of water it called out of the air dried, a girl from the kitchens would come and replace it with another that Geder also wouldn’t drink from. This was the third of its kind that had come since he’d sat down. It was strange that he felt he’d been working so hard but nothing, so far, had been finished or done.

  The knock at the door startled him. A thin-faced Dartinae woman in a servant’s robe bent almost double with her bow. He caught a glimpse of the tops of her breasts as she stood, but they excited neither lust nor shame. Just a kind of weariness.

  “Lord Regent,” she said, holding out a silver plate. A slip of butter-pale paper stood folded on it. He almost turned away, but the script was familiar. His father’s. Geder felt a mix of pleasure and anxiety as he plucked it up and unfolded it, but at least he felt something.

  I’m at your mansion here in the city, and I need you to come over right away. There’s something we need to discuss. I love you very much.

  Geder blinked at the words, his heart beating a little less sluggishly than it had a moment before. It was the profession of love at the end that scared him. Something had happened. Something must have happened.

  “Call a carriage,” he told the Dartinae girl. “And tell the guard I need to go. Right away.”

  And still right away took the better part of an hour. The sun was gone below the roofs and city wall in the west by the time Geder’s carriage surrounded by his personal guard clattered across the cobblestones of the darkening city. A fog was rising from the depths of the Division and creeping out into the streets that surrounded it, the bridges across the great urban canyon shifting and undulating like the surface of a slow, grey lake. Geder drummed his fingers against his thigh, willing the driver to push the horses faster. Lehrer Palliako wasn’t a man given to appearing in court or sending mysterious messages. What if he’d fallen ill? What if something was wrong that Geder didn’t have the power to fix? He wondered as they arrived at the gate whether he should have brought a cunning man with him, just in case.

  As soon as his carriage stopped and before he’d even stepped out of it, the gate slave struck a bell. The clanking sound had a long, clear finish, and before it had faded to silence, Lehrer Palliako was walking out into the street to meet him. He was well enough to walk, then. Maybe it wasn’t his health.

  “My good boy,” his father said. “My good, good boy.” There were little tears in his eyes catching the torchlight. “I knew you’d come.”

  “Of course I would,” Geder said. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  They hugged awkwardly before Lehrer tugged him forward to the dark gate and the garden beyond. “Come along. And leave the guard here. There’s something we need to talk about in private.”

  “They can be trusted,” Geder said. “They’re my personal guard. Basrahip talks to them every morning. They’re the most loyal soldiers in the empire.”

  “Leave ’em here,” Lehrer said. His voice had taken on a rougher note. This was all very strange, but Geder motioned to the captain of his guard, and the swordsmen took up positions in the street and along the wall. If they weren’t to guard him, they’d guard the house he was in. And it wasn’t as if there were going to be anything dangerous. It was his house. His father.

  Once the gate had closed behind them, his father’s pace slowed. Geder walked at his side past a wide spray of moon lilies bobbing in the soft breeze.

  “I want you to know,?
?? Lehrer said, “that I’m proud of you. Whatever happens, I’m very, very proud of you.”

  “Of course,” Geder said with a tight, nervous laugh. “I mean I’m Lord Regent. Master of the Empire. We’ve almost doubled the size of Antea since I stepped in. Who’d ever have thought that we’d be this important?”

  “That’s not why I’m proud of you,” Lehrer said.

  “But it’s still quite a thing. You must admit, it’s quite a thing.”

  Lehrer didn’t respond. They passed into a little courtyard and through a screen to a drawing room with pale screens that kept the worst of the bugs away. Clara Kalliam sat there on a divan. Her face was so dark and thin, he almost didn’t recognize her at first, but when she rose to her feet, the movement was unmistakable. Are they here to tell me they’re getting married? Geder thought. And then, Would I be Jorey’s brother then?

  “Lord Regent,” Clara said, her voice warm and gentle.

  “Lady Kalliam?”

  Lehrer sat on a silk chair, bent forward, his hands clasped between his knees. “I love you, my good, good boy. I love you, and I need to you listen. Don’t… don’t be afraid.”

  “Of course I’m not afraid,” Geder said, though it wasn’t true. “And I’ll always listen to you.”

  “Not to me,” Lehrer said.

  “Then—” Geder began.

  “To us,” a voice said from behind him.

  Cithrin bel Sarcour. Cithrin, in a pale dress. Geder heard a low grunting sound like someone had been punched, and realized afterward that it had come from him. In the light of the lanterns, she glowed like the wick of a candle that had just been blown out. Her expression was soft, her hands clasped before her. He had a vague impression of people at her side, but he couldn’t care about them. His heart clattered in his chest like a kettle suddenly at the boil.

  He’d imagined some version of this moment so many times. Cithrin throwing herself at his feet, weeping and begging his forgiveness. Or else haughty and dismissive, reveling in his humiliation. Neither version of her made sense now that she was here.

  She was here. Why was she here? And she was so beautiful. And why couldn’t he catch his breath?

  “I didn’t know you were here,” he heard himself say, wincing even as he spoke the words. Of course he hadn’t known. God, he sounded like an idiot. But she didn’t laugh at him, only lifted her hand a degree. And yet here I am.

  “Geder!” another voice said. Cary, the actor. She stepped out from Cithrin’s side, her arms wide, and scooped him up in a vast hug. And then Hornet, grinning, and Mikel and Sandr. And a couple of new people Geder didn’t even know. They all hugged him and clapped him on the back, grinning and laughing and greeting him like he was an old friend they hadn’t seen in too long. And at the end of them, Clara Kalliam took him in her arms too, pressing her cheek to his.

  And then Cithrin was there, and she put her arms around him, embracing him gently. Don’t wake up from this, Geder thought. If this is a dream, die in it. Only don’t wake up.

  “I don’t understand,” Geder said. And then, without being sure quite what he meant, “I’m sorry.”

  “There’s someone else you need to talk to,” Lehrer said, his hand on Geder’s shoulder. “Before any of the rest of this.”

  The priest looked much like the others, only maybe thinner and more worn. Olive-toned skin and wiry hair, and an expression of gentleness and an indulgent fondness. “We haven’t met,” the man said, “but it seems we have a great number of friends in common. I am called Kitap rol Keshmet, or sometimes Master Kit.”

  He took Geder’s hand in both of his. Amid the shock and confusion and joy, Geder felt a thread of fear. “Are you with Basrahip?”

  “I knew him once, when he was a boy. But that was many years ago.”

  Geder felt a cool breath of fear. “Are you an apostate, then?”

  The priest sighed. “I’m afraid you’ll have to decide that for yourself.”

  Geder shook his head. His body felt weirdly separate, like he was watching himself from a distance. “For myself?”

  Lehrer took Geder’s elbow and guided him to a chair. Kit walked along with them and sat at Geder’s side. A beetle that had escaped the frames and mesh floated in the air, its wings beating so quickly he couldn’t tell they were there except for a soft buzzing.

  “I think you are aware of the curious gifts that the spiders allow men like myself, yes? I hope you will understand, then, the position I find myself in.”

  “I don’t think I do,” Geder said. His father sat beside him, leaning in toward the priest. Cithrin put her weight on the divan’s side, leaning casually against it. Her gown clung to her arm, draped from her shoulders and breasts. Geder couldn’t focus clearly on anything but her. At least not until Kit spoke again.

  “I believe you have been played for a fool, Lord Regent. I believe that, but you must make up your own mind on the matter. And because of my… condition, I find I must choose my words with you very carefully.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Everything you’ve heard about the goddess and her role in the world might be wrong,” Kit said. “You will have to consider it, and come to your own conclusion. Knowing what you do of me, and Basrahip, and all the men who are like the two of us, you can weigh what you know of us and of the world, and decide for yourself what is true. It’s possible that we will disagree.”

  Something in Geder’s mind shifted. “Disagree?” he echoed.

  “You can disagree,” Kit said, his voice low and powerful as a drum. “To look at the world and doubt the stories you’ve heard of it is your right. Your responsibility, even. If something can be harmed by a question, I think it should be. Must be, even. And especially when it’s said by someone like me.”

  “But Basrahip—”

  “The things the Basrahip says may be wrong,” Kit said. “You should look at the evidence yourself and see what sense you make of it. I understand you’re something of a scholar.”

  “I was,” Geder said. His hand was shaking. That was very strange. Why should his hands be shaking? “I am. I’ve translated text out of a dozen languages. Not always very well, but… I have… I have a collection of speculative essays.”

  “Then perhaps you understand already the importance of looking outside of a story for other bits of evidence that a thing is true.”

  “But written words are dead,” Geder said. “They’re just things. They can’t be true or false. The living voice can carry intention in a way that written words can’t.”

  “Possibly,” Kit said. “But only possibly. Are you certain of that?”

  “You’re doing it to me now, though,” Geder said. “You’re using the power of the goddess to… to…”

  “To open your mind to doubt,” Kit said, “and to ask that you reevaluate the conclusions you’ve drawn. Not mine. Your own. If they are true, then considering them can do no harm. For example, you have heard—I did too when I was at the temple—that nothing written can be judged and those things which are spoken can be. Is that your experience?”

  “Yes,” Geder said, and looked at his father. Lehrer’s expression mixed fear and pain and a fierceness Geder had rarely seen. “I mean, I think so…”

  “Listen to my voice, Lord Geder,” Kit said. “Some of the things the Basrahip has told you may be true. Others may not. You must judge them for yourself and decide whether the world he describes is the same as the one you know. You are permitted to disagree.”

  “But—”

  “Listen to my voice, friend. You can disagree.”

  Cary came to him, a cup of water in her hand. Geder sipped from it out of a kind of habit. He looked out past the pale screens to the moonlight on the roofs of Camnipol to the vast tower of the Kingspire. The banner of the goddess, red in the daylight, had faded almost to black. Lights glowed in the high windows where Basrahip and the other priests held their ceremonies. The great doors had been swung open to allow in the night’s cool air. Geder
felt like the tower himself. It felt as though the fog that had taken him for the past months was being stirred by a cold wind. The illness that no cunning man could identify, much less treat, began to resolve. The sensation of it was physical, and the words that it carried were I can disagree. He hadn’t been ill. He’d been confused. Caught between two things that he couldn’t reconcile until a kind of moral vertigo had consumed him. But he could disagree.

  “They came to help, Son,” Lehrer said.

  Everything that Basrahip said, everything about the war and the goddess and the nature of the apostate… He could disagree. As soon as it was said, he knew that he did, and the force of it pushed at his throat like too many people rushing through too small a door.

  “I don’t know,” Geder said, and the words were like a confession. “I don’t know. I’m not… sure.”

  “Is there some question that’s bothered you, my lord?” Kit asked.

  “The fire years,” Geder said, then stopped. His jaw felt almost stiff with the effort of saying it. He paused, tried to catch his breath. The words hurt in a way he couldn’t quite explain. It wasn’t physical, but if it had been, it would have been the bright, itching pain of tearing off a scab. “Basrahip said there were years after the dragons fell when the whole world was burned, but there’s nothing about that in any of the histories.”

  “I see,” Kit said, but Geder couldn’t stop now. The words had begun and they wouldn’t stop until he’d finished.

  “And there are buildings in Hallskar with wooden perches. Either the perches would have to be a wood that doesn’t burn or someone would have had to make them after there weren’t any dragons left to use them. And there’s not a layer of ashes under any of the ruins in the Division, and it just doesn’t make sense!”

  “Then perhaps there were no fire years,” Kit said.

  Geder’s blood felt bright in his veins. Somewhere in his gesturing, he’d spilled a bit of the water from his cup. It dripped down his knuckles. Clara Kalliam put a hand on his shoulder and smiled down at him. His father nodded. His breath felt clean and clear for the first time he could remember. Across the room, Cithrin stood like a statue of some ancient hero, her chin high but her eyes kind.