Working God's Mischief

39. Shamramdi: The Godstalkers

Young Az came to the house where the Mountain and his men were enjoying the siege of Shamramdi. He was pale and grim. He had lost weight. He had been wounded twice during sorties against an enemy who was always ready.

Nassim Alizarin said, “I hope you feel better than you look, Nephew.”

“I doubt that, Uncle.”

“Then why are you out of bed?”

“Indala couldn’t come. His own health remains poor.”

Rumor suggested that the Great Shake was dying, or was suffering from slow poisoning. Or Unbeliever sorcery was sucking his life and soul.

Nassim had not seen Indala for weeks. He suspected that age alone would explain the Great Shake’s indisposition.

“Not heartening news, Nephew. But you have darker matters on your mind.”

“Complications, certainly. My great-uncle wishes to offer his apologies for not having been more supportive of your effort to crush the Dreangerean sorcerer.”

This was odd. “Has a serpent turned in his hand?”

“A courier bringing dispatches from the coast, across the mountains, was held up by the Ansa while they found a tribesman able to read and write Lucidian. They wanted to send you a message.”

“And then someone here had to make sure I wasn’t getting secret instructions from the crusaders.”

“Not entirely. Some people just can’t not stick their noses in.”

Nassim snorted. The longer he lived the less well he thought of his own kind. “So tell me what it says.”

“How? The letter was meant for you.”

“You aren’t familiar with its contents? Do come on, Nephew.”

“As you will.” Young Az read, but slowly. Nassim had thought him more literate.

He took the letter. The text was not in the florid style he usually saw. It made no effort to proclaim the author’s command of language. The sentences were simple declarative grunts, the words mud bricks only, not an artist’s paint. Nor was the calligraphy artful. That alone might explain young Az’s trouble reading. Too, the writer did not know his Lucidian as well as he might pretend.

“Damn! This is rough. But I think I get it.” Nassim Alizarin certainly had his own difficulties with Lucidian.

“Then explain. If you will be so generous. Because no one who has seen that message understands what it actually means. Most think it’s code. If he says camel, you know he means something particular happened…”

“He is hard to decipher and harder to follow but he is as literal as a poisoned dagger. When he says camel he means camel. This is a desperate warning. The Dreangerean will resurrect Asher soon. The process may be under way already, after the natural delays suffered in getting this out of the Idiam.”

“So. Only my great-uncle truly thought…”

“How long, Azim?” The scribe had not dated his missive-which would not have helped had he done so. The Ansa did not date according to Praman custom.

“It’s been knocking around court for a week. I only heard about it yesterday, when they wanted to know what I thought it meant. If it is a literal warning … Indala will be livid. Several men who think they’re smarter than him are about to find themselves reassigned to obscure towns on a border where they can expect to have to face Tsistimed the Golden.”

“Indala had sense enough to take it for what it is?”

“The smart men shouted him down.”

The Mountain chuckled. “No. The Great Shake might refuse a contest with fools but he wouldn’t abandon a conviction. He might have a favorite nephew stand in for him.”

“Assisted by the man who knows the evil best.”

Nassim smiled. A gap showed in his smile. Another sign of time catching up. Two more teeth had begun to trouble him.

“And what did the Great Shake suggest? Our freedom of action is restricted. Or does he want anything done? If the great evil returns it might fall more heavily on the crusaders than on us.”

“Not so, Uncle. Definitely not so.” Young Az then revealed the fact that Indala had excellent information sources inside the Episcopal Chaldarean world. “Lord Arnmigal, the Commander of the Righteous, was the Brothen Church’s Captain-General before he moved on to the Grail Empire.”

“I know that. I saw him close up on Artecipea, when we were employed by Peter of Navaya. He seemed driven, too. But he understood my need to destroy Rudenes Schneidel personally.”

Though this had not come up before, young Az betrayed no surprise. He did know the story. “You recall his stated purpose for being there?”

“The siege of Arn Bedu. The destruction of Rudenes Schneidel. Of course. We all had personal motives. The strategic reason, though, was to keep Schneidel from resurrecting Seska, the Endless.”

“You destroyed the sorcerer. The Captain-General destroyed the Endless. He exterminated a gaggle of Schneidel’s revenants in the End of Connec, too. Some think that he killed another revenant earlier, at al-Khazen, during the Calziran Crusade. You were there, too.”

“I was there. I didn’t see that. I do recall an explosion and an earthquake said to have been the result.”

“There are many frightening questions around Lord Arnmigal-including a suggestion that he is a revenant himself. He has lived a mysteriously charmed life. There is little evidence that he even existed before the Church’s first incursion into the End of Connec.”

Nassim did not mention the Sha-lug captain, Else Tage. He tried to look alert and interested, a man learning new and interesting things.

“There is a woman named Heris. Rumor suggests that she was once a household slave in Shartelle. She could be Lord Arnmigal’s natural sister. How that could be possible is beyond me, given their respective backstories. She has, they say, destroyed five revenant prehistoric gods of incredible power and evil. Gods who were originally put to sleep by later devils like Asher and Ashtoreth, who had to have human worship in order to survive.”

This was mostly news to Nassim.

Young Az continued, “Lord Arnmigal and this Heris are known to the Night as the Godslayers. So my great-uncle has been informed by some who supposedly know.” Sort of a wink, then, because good Pramans were forbidden congress with the Night. They should not know the thinking of the demonic Instrumentalities. “Both are closely associated with members of the Episcopal Collegium, one being the natural grandson of another. Those two have acknowledged the Heris woman as their true descendant through a man whose name you will recall: Grade Drocker.”

Startled, Nassim said, “My old enemy!” Then, “I’m confused.” And the more so because he had known Lord Arnmigal as a promising student in the Vibrant Spring School.

“The whole thing is confusing and goes on getting more so. The most powerful man in the west is supposedly a refugee from one of those countries that is now covered by ice. But.”

“Does it matter? We have to deal with the man who is here, whatever his background was.”

“True enough. But. We should keep in mind the fact that not only has he killed gods, he has begun to show godlike characteristics himself.”

“What?” Alizarin fought for breath. His heart pounded.

“He isn’t rattling mountains. It isn’t an omnipotence thing, it’s an all-knowing thing. We can’t trick him. We can’t mislead him. We can’t outwit him. Whatever we try, he’s there first, waiting, with dozens of those cursed falcons. He doesn’t even have to be in the theater himself … Sorry. Self-pity leaking through, there. Because of my wounds. I shouldn’t get upset. He isn’t why I’m here. My great-uncle believes this message is more important than it looks. He is more worried about er-Rashal.”

Azim pointed out that the Faith had been under crushing pressure in Direcia since the disaster at Los Naves de los Fantas. Praman principalities in the Antal and Holy Lands were falling like dominos. The Faithful in the east were being exterminated by Tsistimed the Golden, who was determined to expunge al-Prama from history. The Hu’n-tai At showed Believers no mercy whatsoever, anywhere, at any time. Hu’n-tai At warriors amused themselves in camp by roasting imams alive, then feeding them to their dogs. Their souls would never enter Paradise.

It could have been worse only if the martyrs’ corpses were fed to hogs.

“You knew the sorcerer, Uncle. What does he want?”

The Mountain had considered that for years. “He wants to ascend. He wants to become an Instrumentality himself. He wants to turn back time to the age of Dreanger’s greatness, before al-Prama, before the golden age of the Chaldareans, before the Old Empire and the Agean Empire. He wants to waken Dreanger from a two-thousand-year slumber. Then he will become Dreanger’s god-emperor, the Son of the Sun.”

“Ambitious.”

“He used to brag about his direct descent from the last native dynasty. He made jokes about being the rightful emperor-and about how harsh he would be once he came into his kingdom. We all played along. But, obviously, he wasn’t just having us on.”

“If the message is correct, then, he may be about to achieve his dream.”

“He’d be settling for third choice, actually. He lost out when Seska went down. He lost out when the Great Shake’s campaign forced him to flee Dreanger. Now, again, he has to try to resurrect and manage a god from outside his own pantheon, and for his life, not as a diversion. Still, I’m pleased that Indala finally sees the threat.”

Azim simply nodded.

The Mountain’s longtime comrades had gathered round, with respect, neither interrupting nor offering comment. Even Old Az, Master of Ghosts, kept his thoughts to himself.

Nassim asked, “So, given this, what does Indala want?”

“Ideas. We no longer have much influence in the rest of the world. Our crusaders are content to keep us closed up while their brethren have their way elsewhere, with Believers who no longer have Indala to inspire them.”

“So it would seem. I have an idea. No one will like it.”

* * *

The lines round Shamramdi were loose everywhere and especially sketchy where defenders ought not to be able to offer any serious challenge. The crusaders were content with that. They awaited relief columns that they could exterminate piecemeal. However, even armed with those devastating falcons and intelligence so precise that they had to be wedded to the Adversary, the crusaders could not prevent daring individuals from coming and going. Smugglers smuggled. Couriers mostly managed. City militia patrols stayed informed about enemy dispositions so exfiltration routes could be designed.

The crusaders seldom bothered with individual travelers.

Nassim Alizarin’s strategy depended on that.

Unseasonable warmth in a region known for its heat had been melting snow off the peaks of the Anti-Neret. Though there was no flooding, the Bareh-da was running high. That river, flowing through Shamramdi, made it possible for the city to exist and prosper in arid country. Floating out on one-man rafts was how most emigrants departed. Dozens abandoned the city every night.

Getting in was a little more problematic, and much less attractive.

The Mountain, Azim al-Adil ed-Din, al-Azer er-Selim, and Alizarin’s oldest companions took the river route, one man at a time over several hours in order to avoid special notice by the Eyes of the Night. Excepting Nassim himself and Indala’s great-nephew, all had visited Andesqueluz in the once-upon-a-time. The Mountain had had to reveal that before he could sell the Great Shake on his plan. Too, he had confessed that he knew the Commander of the Righteous better than he had admitted before, though he reserved the heart of the truth. He related only interactions during the campaign on Artecipea.

Wonder of wonders, the Great Shake did grasp how vast a threat er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen would become, ascended, with an Old God in his arsenal. Indala had the vision to think beyond dogma hammered in since infancy.

Alizarin feared the peril might be beyond his imagining. Asher had not been benign. Should er-Rashal be unable to control it … Asher would engineer the resurrection of his spouse, Ashtoreth. The couple would chastise the world … which might be an ambition the Rascal shared, but according to his own lights.

Nassim quelled his dread. Pointless, dwelling. He had obsessed too long already, in an endless quarrel with his conscience. Now he was wet and cold and alone on a raft that had begun to come apart. There was no moon. The Bareh-da was not yet entirely free of crocodiles. Lions rumbled beyond both shores. Though nearly hunted out, the survivors were afoot tonight. Then he heard the cough of a leopard. What else might be about, less mundane than fang and claw, he did not care to speculate.

“Entirely imagination,” he told himself. “Just imagination. Fear pounded into my ancestors by the Night.”

The Night was the true danger. The Night was wickedly clever. The Night was boundlessly cruel-though Instrumentalities seldom showed up in person anymore. Mostly they lurked in scary stories from back before the Revelation.

Nassim Alizarin had seen crocodiles, leopards, and lions, in all their fearsome tooth and claw, and what they could do to people who annoyed Gordimer. He preferred a less grisly fate for himself.

He spotted the wan signal finally, used a rotted board to paddle to the western bank, eventually landing two hundred yards long. Mohkam joined him, armed with a small lantern shuttered so tight it released almost no light at all.

“The others?” the Mountain asked.

“All here. Waiting at the signal, except for the Master of Ghosts.”

Al-Azer had left first, on the best raft, his job to pick the landing site and set the signal. “Where did he go?” Then, “My raft came apart. I lost most of my gear.”

Mohkam shrugged. “He wanted to check something. You didn’t lose your weapons, did you? We can find food and clothes.”

They walked while talking. At the assembly point young Az asked, “How long should we wait for the Master of Ghosts, Uncle? We should be under cover before first light.”

Nassim said, “Patrols won’t be a worry if we don’t clump up. They don’t bother individuals who aren’t obviously smuggling food or weapons.”

Young Az remarked, “They are more restrained than they could be.”

“Restrained?” Nassim blurted, startled.

“It being a war and all. Of religions. Just saying. Despite the atrocities we hear about, the Righteous have been generous-if the defeated surrender when offered the chance.” Azim added, “Compared to the Hu’n-tai At, or Rogert du Tancret, or crusaders and Gisela Frakier who aren’t with the Righteous.”

It took the Mountain a moment to grasp the implication.

Had Captain Tage survived after all? The Righteous were not systematically exterminating the Believers, unlike the Hu’n-tai At. The Righteous simply disarmed those who served the God Who Is God, with massive destruction and bloodshed occasionally but never to the limits of their capacity.

That deserved reflection, someday when he had leisure time, when the sun was high and no big, hungry things were snuffling about.

Old Az caught up. He did not explain himself, but did report, “We are going to walk a lot. That could be good. On foot and at our ages we won’t look so dangerous.”

Nassim said, “I begin to entertain doubts about this.”

Young Az countered, “It was your idea.”

“Time has made me wise enough to admit that I can mess up.”

“And have you?”

Nassim grunted a provisional negative. He had grown passionate selling this mission to the Great Shake. Indala had had his doubts but once he made his decision he did not consult advisors or family other than Azim.

Nassim had shielded him from the totality of the scheme.

It would entail a certain level of what might be considered treason.

Treason? Easy for Nassim Alizarin, the professional turncoat. But what of Indala? What of the Great Shake’s most favored nephew? Would they be branded forever?

Success or failure would tell.

Old Az asked, “How did Bone take having to stay behind?”

“It wasn’t pleasant.” Nassim hoped the old warrior was secretly pleased. “He claimed he would rather die out here with his brothers than molder a dozen more years among strangers. I hope that was just for show.” The old man had been sure that he would see none of the band again.

Somebody feeling negative muttered, “And ain’t there a grand good chance the old goat was right?”

The Mountain felt like his companions were with him mostly because he was doing something, however foredoomed, as opposed to doing nothing in Shamramdi while awaiting the inevitable end.

The reception from the Ansa was mixed. Some blamed Nassim for their troubles since his departure. Others understood that their tribulations were less than a sideshow to the grandees of Qasr al-Zed. Nassim should be honored for having argued his way back into the conflict with the monster of the Dead City. Without him the Ansa had no hope at all.

The Rascal was his weakest yet but he won every skirmish. He had negated the Ansa firepowder weaponry. They could now do him no serious harm. They could not get close enough.

And now the Dreangerean had begun taking outsider victims.

The crusaders had closed the traditional communications routes between the coast and the Lucidian heartland. Today’s routes passed through the Neret Mountains. The road that debouched at al-Pinea was most heavily traveled.

Couriers did not always get through, though losses were never so heavy that the route might be abandoned. It had been dangerous in peacetime, the Ansa taking the blame. Usually, they were guilty.

The Rascal was harvesting messengers for raw material. Soon he would resume reanimating his grandfather of devils. He was very close to success.

Neither the Ansa who visited Shamramdi, nor any of the tribe’s appeals, mentioned that the Rascal had made himself some helpers by using his ugliest necromancy to resurrect some of Andesqueluz’s former residents.

They numbered fewer than a dozen. They were slow. They were vulnerable. They were not much good at carrying out orders but they did ease er-Rashal’s life. The terror they caused exceeded that generated by the sorcerer himself.

The terrified Ansa were on the brink of panicky flight despite having nowhere to run.

The Ansa found the situation hard to discuss. It struck to the core of their cultural obsessions. When a few did try to explain, language problems and cultural quirks left the Sha-lug baffled.

Old Az thought about it a lot. Eventually, at the communal fire, he told Nassim, “The Rascal did learn something awful from those mummies he had us steal.”

Er-Rashal failed with many more mummy reanimations than he succeeded. Most of the mummies were too damaged. The successes had enslaved the imaginations of the Ansa, though. They would not fight back.

Young Az argued, “It’s simple and obvious. You throw flammable liquid and light them up.”

“Light them up!” Mohkam barked, laughing.

The Master of Ghosts was more restrained but agreed. “That should work. You’d think they’d try it. They don’t because that would amount to outrageous disrespect for their ancestors-who were sorcerers themselves in their time.”

Nassim hoped that, as in some old horror stories, er-Rashal would bumble his way into some trap set by the ancients. “Why would they worry about disrespect? They have no ancestors among the dead of Andesqueluz.”

True. The Ansa had not occupied the Idiam nearly long enough. They descended from a stiff-necked cult that had fled thither in Brothen imperial times. Nevertheless, they had adopted the older history.

Even the most cooperative Ansa refused to dishonor their presumptive ancestors by defending the living against them.

“We have cultural blind spots, too,” Nassim told young Az. “And we’re just as unaware. Everybody. Let’s don’t have any bad talk about Ansa thinking. We want them blind to what we’re doing.” He stared into the fire. “We’ll act. We’ll buy time. I have a new plan.”

The company moved in around him. He would not want to be overheard. He did not give them much, though, because no truly new idea had occurred. “We won’t stand toe-to-toe with er-Rashal. That path can lead only to failure and despair.”

The new plan came as a flash of inspiration that was, in fact, not really all that sudden. He decided instantly not to share it till he had no choice.

He began with a diversion. His renegades clumsy-sneakily started building a crude firepower manufactory, claiming to have distilled saltpeter from the waters at al-Pinea. He told the Ansa that he had found a means whereby he could produce weak firepowder impossible to be set afire from a distance. Nassim counted on at least one Ansa having voided his conscience to keep er-Rashal posted.

The process had barely begun, with Ansa youngsters collecting scrub wood to burn into charcoal, when Old Az announced, “Something cold and empty is watching.”

“A revenant?”

“Almost certainly.”

“The Rascal is being careful.”

“We’ve stung him before.”

Nassim chuckled. “He shouldn’t attack tonight but be ready anyway, in case he suffers a stroke of bold. Keep the youngsters near the fire. I want the revenants getting hungry.”

Events conformed to Nassim’s scheme. Er-Rashal took the bait, dreading untouchable firepowder. His revenants moved in next night, intent on destroying renegade Sha-lug and feasting on tender young Ansa. They came in a swarm, anticipating no ready resistance, counting on Nassim to be considerate of Ansa culture and so delay his response too long.

Everyone felt the coldness and emptiness of the revenants waxing. Nassim did not share his intentions with the Ansa.

The revenants attacked. The Sha-lug doused them with oil and chucked them into the fire. The action lasted only seconds. The revenants burned vigorously. Er-Rashal got a dose of oil and fire himself while distracted by rage. Screaming, smoldering, he bounded off toward the Dead City, still remarkably spry.

Old Az opined, “He’ll be out of sorts for a while.”

Young Az said, “Let’s go after him. He’ll never be weaker.”

Nassim said, “Tactically, we should. But we’d need to have friendly Ansa behind us.”

The others were dismembering revenant mummies, making sure no piece of any old sorcerer escaped the flames. The Ansa present, all youngsters, were appalled.

Young Az said, “I see. We should get out of here. They might decide to do something that we’ll regret.”

Nassim told a son of the tribe’s second chief, “We bought you time. It will take the sorcerer months to recover. Keep the living away and he won’t recover at all. His evil survives only because of his ability to steal life. Let the elders hate us if they like but tell them not to waste the time we’ve won. It is a dark gift but the best I can manage. We Sha-lug must now go play another sad role.”

The Ansa did nothing till Nassim and his band were long gone.

“The place is uglier than ever,” Old Az said. Gherig was illuminated strangely by a rising sun piercing a massive dust storm to the east.

Young Az said, “The weird light definitely makes it look creepy.”

Gherig still wore a skirt of scaffolding. Gaps and cracks still marred its walls. It looked more grimly inhospitable than ever, though hospitality had never been its forte. Hostility, though … The boy added, “This would be a good time to attack, had we the numbers.” Ignoring his own past failure.

Mohkam muttered continuously, trying to keep his courage elevated, lacking all faith in a white banner’s ability to shield those who had irked the crusaders so stubbornly for so long.

Nassim himself had no trouble trusting Madouc of Hoeles. However, the Master of the Commandery was not alone there. Resenting his reduced status, Rogert du Tancret might imagine a chance to aggrandize himself by aborting any agreement between the Brotherhood and the renegades from the east.

A needless concern. The Master quietly demonstrated his complete control over Gherig. Black Rogert’s men had come over to him almost universally. Du Tancret had subsided to a whining nuisance raging against the unfairness.

Madouc of Hoeles listened closely while the old general stated his case. He asked perceptive questions. He had paid attention while serving the Captain-General. He grasped the threat shaping in the Idiam. He knew what er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen could do. He knew more about the Ansa and the Idiam than Nassim expected.

Nassim Alizarin hoped his own people would not hate him for, apparently, having turned his coat again.

Young Az was deeply unhappy, certainly, though he insisted that he understood.

One thing could not be denied: The Believers totally lacked the knowledge, the power, and the ability to cope if er-Rashal did awaken his devils. The Crusaders, Lord Arnmigal, and the Godslayer, however, had shown extreme skill in dealing with powerful and wicked resurrected demons.