If Reki could dispose of the threat of Adderach, then they would no longer be beleaguered on two fronts, and they could turn all their attention to Igarach in the south. If the Sisters' intelligence was accurate, then they needed only to hold the Weavers off till next winter; and with Adderach out of the picture, it could be done.

And then there was Cailin's a.s.sertion that maybe, just maybe, getting the Sisters to that witchstone might be enough to end this war. That was a prize worth trying for.

He picked his way between campfires, returning the greetings of the soldiers as he neared his tent. He was discomfited tonight, a subtle notion that something was amiss. Posting extra guards and sentries had not eased his fears. He tried to shake it off, to return his mind to matters at hand, but instead he found himself drifting, as he so often did, towards thoughts of Asara.

Trust is an overrated commodity. One of Asara's favourite sayings. And she should know. For he was beginning to suspect that trusting her had been something of a mistake.

He had not known peace since she left him all that time ago, heading to Araka Jo on some secret purpose of her own. At first, he had been tormented by not knowing, mocked by possibilities; and then, when that had become too much to bear and he had sent his spymaster Jikiel to find answers, he had been racked with guilt at betraying her. But now things were even worse. He had thought his love could withstand anything that Jikiel might discover about his wife's past, but when the spymaster returned it was with news that was entirely unexpected.

Asara had no past.

His initial reaction was to dismiss this as evidence of the spymaster's limits. After all, he had to fail sometimes. But Reki had had experience of Jikiel's abilities, and he could not convince himself of it in the end. The spymaster was far too good to come up blank like that. If he could not dig out the truth of any matter, then Reki was convinced that there was no truth to be had.

But of Asara, he had found nothing. Her family name, which she had said was Arreyia, yielded no answers. It was a common enough name, for it was very old and had spread widely. Saramyr names ranged from those derived from archaic Quraal, like Asara and Lucia, Adderach and Anais, to more modern ones which arose after Saramyrrhic had evolved, like Kaiku and Mishani and Reki. There were other Asaras, of course, but none matching her description, her talents and her circ.u.mstances. Jikiel had heard of a spy called Asara tu Amarecha who had worked for the Libera Dramach in recent years, but he discounted her eventually. She was not desert-born, and Reki's Asara certainly was, unless a person could fake their bone structure, their skin colour, the shape of their eyes.

Jikiel had probed the limits of his spy network as the puzzle became more intriguing. Whispers and hints were followed up and came to nothing. He sought information from those who had met her in the Imperial Keep during the time she had first seduced Reki, but they had no answers to give. He asked in places of learning, for she had been incredibly knowledgeable and well-travelled for one so young and it hinted at a childhood of study or adventure or both, but no clues were found. He worked on the a.s.sumption that she had changed her name, maybe even that she had disguised herself with a different manner, different hairstyles and clothes. He was adept at seeing through such basic deceptions. And still, nothing.

Eventually, he had exhausted all possibilities and was forced, shamefully, to admit defeat. In the end, he could report only this: that the woman who was to become Reki's wife had not appeared to exist prior to that day she turned up at the Imperial Keep.

Reki was still thinking about the implications of that when he walked past the guards outside his tent not noticing the wry grin that one gave to the other and found Asara waiting there.

The tent was tall and wide enough to stand up in, but inside it was bare and spartan except for a thick bed of blankets and a lamp placed on the groundsheet. The lamp threw light up and onto the curves of his wife's face and body, capturing her as she half-turned at his entrance. The surprise at her presence and the breathtaking beauty of her robbed him of speech for a moment.

'I promised I would be back, Reki,' she said. 'Even though it meant I had to track you through the mountains.'

He opened his mouth, but she stepped towards him and put a finger to his lips. The scent of her and the touch of her skin was intoxicating.

'There will be time for questions later,' she said.

'We have to talk,' he murmured, some remnant memory of his previous sour thoughts inspiring the need to protest, however feebly.

'Afterward,' she said. She kissed him, and he gave up any more attempt to resist. He had yearned for her every instant she had been gone, and now that she was here he could not restrain himself. Their kisses turned to caresses and took them onto the bed, where they sated their pa.s.sions with one another long into the night and past the dawn.

When Avun arrived at the room where he and Muraki shared their meals, he barely recognised it.

The table of black and red lacquer was surrounded by four standing lanterns, the flames burning inside metal globes with patterns cut into them to allow the light through. Exquisite drapes had been hung over the alcoves, hiding the statues there. A brazier of scented wood smoked gently in the far corner of the room, providing heat and a subtle fragrance of jasmine. No longer did the room seem cold and empty, but warm and intimate. The meal was already served, bowls and baskets steaming on the table, and Muraki knelt at her place, dappled by the light from the lanterns.

'This is wonderful,' he said, unexpectedly touched.

Muraki smiled, her eyes averted downward, her face half-hidden by her hair. Beyond the three tall window-arches at the back of the room, it was utterly dark: no stars or moons could penetrate the canopy now.

He settled himself, kneeling at the mat across the table from her. 'Wonderful,' he murmured again.

'I am glad you approve,' she said quietly.

'Will you eat?' he asked. It had become one of their rituals. At first, because she was always reluctant to dine with him, and later, as a wry joke between them at the way she had been. He began to take the lids from the baskets and serve her.

'It is done, then?' he asked. 'The book?'

'It is done,' she replied. 'As we speak it is being taken to the publisher.'

'You must be relieved,' he guessed. He really had no idea how she felt at any stage of her writing, for she had never discussed it with him.

'No,' she said. 'Saddened, perhaps.'

He paused in the act of spooning saltrice onto her plate, puzzled.

'I thought you were celebrating?'

'I am,' she said. 'But it is a bittersweet day. That was my last Nida-jan book.'

Avun was confounded by this. It was as if she had told him she was giving up breathing. 'Your last?'

Muraki nodded.

He pa.s.sed the plate to her and started taking food for himself. 'But why?'

She was sliding on her finger-cutlery. 'His journey has run its course,' she said. 'It is time, I think, to begin anew.'

'Muraki, are you sure about this?'

She made a noise to the affirmative.

'Then what will you do? Will you create a new hero to write about?'

'I do not know,' she replied. 'Maybe I will stop writing altogether. Today, Nida-jan is ended, and all things are possible.'

Avun did not quite know how to gauge his wife's mood, and was careful in his words. Though he had always found Muraki's constant writing a source of irritation, he found himself unable to imagine her any other way, and now that it came to it he was not sure he wanted her to stop.

'Are you doing this for my sake?' he asked. 'I would not have you change yourself for me.' The hypocrisy of this pa.s.sed him by entirely.

She met his eyes for a moment with something like amus.e.m.e.nt. 'It is not for you I do this, Avun,' she replied. 'Too long I have lived in the safety of my own world and ignored the one that surrounds me.

Today I have closed my world away, and I am ready to face what is real.'

He set down his plate, hiding his wariness. He was unsure whether to be glad or worried about her decision. Writing had been such a big part of her life for so long that he was afraid she might not cope without it. And he would not be there to watch over her; there was no way he could delay the movement of the Aberrant forces now, even if he wanted to. After all the effort he had spent to make himself indispensible to the Weavers, he could not back out. Kakre would shred him.

'You must tell me,' he said, to cover his thoughts. 'How does it end?' He poured each of them a gla.s.s of amber wine.

'It ends well for him,' she said. 'He finds his son at last, in the Golden Realm where Omecha has taken him. There he wins him back after facing Omecha and beating him in a game of wits. They return to their home, and the son acknowledges Nida-jan as his father, for only a father's love could drive him to seek his son even beyond the realms of death. And so the curse laid upon him by the demon with a hundred eyes is lifted.'

'It is a good ending indeed,' Avun said. And yet privately, he wondered. For it was no secret to him that she had been mourning the loss of their daughter in her books, mirroring her grief in the actions of Nida-jan, and this sudden turn to happiness made him suspect that something had happened which he was unaware of.

'Come to the window, Avun,' she said, picking up her gla.s.s of wine and holding out her hand to him across the table. Surprised by her uncharacteristic impetuousness, he took up his own gla.s.s and rose with her. Together, they walked across the room to the window-arches that faced out over Axekami.

In the night, the miasma overhead could not be seen, and Axekami seemed peaceful. Lights were lit, tumbling down in profusion towards the Kerryn and the River District. Not as many as there had been in days gone by, but enough. It was almost possible to believe the city was beautiful again.

Muraki turned to him. 'While I was dreaming, you have become the most powerful man in Saramyr, my husband,' she said. She kissed him deeply, and there was a hunger in it that made him dizzy. He wanted to have her then and there, but he did not yet dare to do so, did not trust that he would not embarra.s.s himself by overstepping the mark. Presently, she drew away from him, her eyes searching his, and she took a sip of wine, regarding him over the rim of her gla.s.s. He slid his arm around her tiny waist. His wife's words made him burn with pride. It was true: he had done all this, he had made this of himself.

He sipped his own gla.s.s as he surveyed his conquest, the great capital of Axekami, and he was content.

It took him only seconds to realise that the wine was deadly poison, but by then it was far too late.

The first he knew of it was the awful tightening of his throat and chest, as if he was choking on a bone.

His hand came free of Muraki and went to his collar; his other, absurdly, still held the gla.s.s out of instinctive reluctance to drop it. He could not draw breath. Gaping, he staggered backwards and tripped on his heel, falling to the floor. The gla.s.s shattered in his hand, cutting it badly. His chest was a blaze of pain as if he had swallowed the sun. His lungs would not respond to the urging of his brain, would not expand to fill with oxygen.

Wildly, in blind animal panic, he reached for his wife, but Muraki was standing by the window, her face shadowed by her hair, and she was not moving to help him. His eyes widened in horror and disbelief.

That appalled gaze still rested on his wife when his body went slack and his life left him.

Muraki regarded him for a long time. She had expected tears to come, but there were none. She had expected, at least, to be consumed by remorse or guilt, but she felt none of that either. If she were writing this scene, she thought, she would not do so with such a dearth of emotion. Real life was infinitely stranger and unpredictable than the one she lived in her imagination.

She turned away from her husband and looked out over the city once again. She could smell the oily tang of the miasma, overpowering the jasmine from the brazier. She had never quite become accustomed to it. Her lips tingled where the poison wine had touched them, but she had not let it past into her mouth. Simple enough to procure poison from Ukida: she had only to order him, and he obeyed. He was loyal enough to keep her secret and not to ask what it was for.

She glanced at the corpse of Avun again, trying for some last time to stir something in her breast. The newly awakened pa.s.sion for him had not been faked by her. She had wanted to enjoy what she could while she could, and she wanted to make him happy too. After all, she thought he deserved that much before she killed him.

She realised what would follow now. The Weavers would take their revenge, would scour her mind agonisingly until they knew all about her code, and about Ukida, and Mishani's visit. They would know their plans had been compromised, and would alter them.

That could not be allowed to happen. From the time she had decided to murder her husband, she knew she would have to die too. She had found that knowledge an immensely liberating sensation.

Thoughts of her daughter brought back words she had spoken during those precious minutes when they were together, a few short minutes in ten terrible years ten years for which Avun had been responsible.

We are on two sides of a war now. Mother, and one side or the other must win eventually. Whichever of us is on the losing side will not survive, I think. We are both of us too involved.

She was right. She always had the gift of cutting to the point. So let it be Muraki on the losing side, then, for she could not bear the thought of her daughter suffering such a fate.

Avun had indeed been clever in arranging the Weavers' power base so that so much relied on him. He had carefully guarded his battle tactics, kept them close to his chest, and ensured that there was n.o.body else in a position to easily succeed him. His death would be a major blow to the Weavers, at the time when they could least afford it. And from what she knew of Kakre, she did not think he would turn back from his a.s.sault now, no matter what speculation might arise as to what happened in this room tonight.

The Aberrants would move according to plan, and their enemies would be waiting for them.

Would it be worth it, in the end? Only the G.o.ds could say. There were no certainties in the real world.

She gave a long sigh, and her eyes turned to the night, the impenetrable blackness with no moons and no stars. What a cold and dreary prison her husband had made for her. She much preferred her dreams.

She drained her gla.s.s, and soon she was dreaming once more.

TWENTY-SIX.

Nuki's eye was sinking in the west, igniting cottony bands of cloud. The surface of the River Ko glittered in fitful red and yellow. It had been unseasonably hot today, but the folk of Saramyr were glad of it, for winter was drawing to an end and it was their first hint of a spring to come.

Now the temperature dropped as Nuki retreated towards the far side of the world, afraid of the tumult that the moon-sisters would bring when they took the sky. For tonight the moons' orbits would cross at shallow angles, and they would drag screeching fingers across the darkness. There would be a moonstorm, and a particularly long and vicious one.

It would be a suitably apocalyptic backdrop, Yugi thought, to the battle that was to come. He stood holding the reins of his horse on a rise a little way south of the river, and looked to the north. Waiting for the Aberrants.

The lands to the north and south of the Ko were rolling downs, a gentle sway of hills that ran from the Forest of Xu twenty miles to their west to peter out on the sh.o.r.es of Lake Azlea, a similar distance to their east. In between was the Sakurika Bridge, a st.u.r.dy arch of wood and stone that spanned the river.

It was a plain construction, not as grand as many in Saramyr, and little used. Its abutments, spandrels and parapets were painted in faded terracotta to blend with the honey-coloured varnish on the wood, but beyond that there was no decoration. It had been built during a campaign in the far past to facilitate troop movement along the west side of the Azlea, but no road had ever been laid to it. The thin strip of land sandwiched between Xu, Azlea and the Xarana Fault was considered too perilous back then to merit a tradeway. Still, it had been maintained all this time, for it was the only crossing-place for this river east of the forest, and wide enough for twenty men abreast.

And it was here that the forces of the Empire hoped to halt the advance of the Weavers.

Yugi felt sick. He wished he could smoke a little amaxa root to take the edge off his fear. Instead he surveyed the scene below him, the sea of armour and blades and rifles. Several artillery positions were dug in on the hilltops to either side of the bridge, densely packed with mortars and fire-cannons and even old trebuchets and ballistae that they had managed to acquire. The flat ground in between was thick with soldiers, representing almost all of the remaining high families and the Libera Dramach. Their banners hung limp in the failing breeze.

A barricade of spikes had been built along the centre point of the bridge, and behind it soldiers waited.

Beneath their feet, well hidden inside the arch, were enough explosives to blow the bridge to matchwood.

'G.o.ds, I can't stand this waiting,' Yugi murmured to those nearby: a few generals, a black-haired Sister that might have been a twin to Cailin in her make-up, Barak Zahn, Nomoru, Mishani and Lucia. Horses shifted and whinnyed restlessly; there was the creak of leather armour and subdued coughing.

'Are we certain that they are coming this way at all?' Mishani asked. It was a measure of how tense she was that she asked such a redundant question; she already knew the reports of the scouts.

'They are coming,' said the Sister, whose irises were red.

Yugi glanced down at Lucia. Her expression was bland. The enemy had to be on time. There were better places in which they could have met the Aberrants, places further south where they could mount ambushes and which were far more defensible than this. But they would not win without Lucia, and it was at her insistence that they chose to meet the threat here. This, their scholars promised, was the night of the moonstorm; and it was on this night that the Aberrants whose steady and unwavering advance had been marked by scouts all along their route would reach the river. This night, in this place, Lucia would draw the spirits to the defence of their land.

They could only pray that Lucia knew exactly what she was doing, for without the intervention she had promised their stand would not last for long. Thousands upon thousands of lives were staked on the word of a girl barely into adulthood. Yugi thought they could be forgiven a little nervousness at this point.

Mishani, not for the first time, was asking herself why she was here at all. For someone who prided herself on her self-control and level-headedness, she seemed to have been remarkably rash of late. First her visit to Muraki and now this.

But if not for my rashness, we would not have even this chance, she thought. Oh, Mother.

She took a steadying breath to keep down the tears. No, she would not cry again. The thought of that last meeting still burned her with grief, but she was glad, at least, that she had made amends to Muraki.

If she died today, she would have done that much.

Had she known then that her mother and father had already been dead for weeks, her grief would have been keener still. But the Weavers had been careful to keep that matter secret.

In the end, Mishani thought, it came down to Lucia. Mishani and Kaiku had been her guardians throughout her childhood in the Fold, and they had acted as elder sisters to her. Though time and circ.u.mstances had made them distant, they still had that bond. But Kaiku was needed elsewhere, and Mishani could not bear the notion of leaving Lucia to face this alone. She knew how easily manipulated Lucia was, and there was n.o.body here who truly cared for her except her father Zahn, but he would be down in the battle. Mishani could not contribute much to war, but she could stand alongside Lucia. She felt that it would be dishonourable to abandon her.

Once, she had almost killed the young Heir-Empress, when she brought her a nightdress which she thought was infected with bone fever. When it came to it she had backed out; but she still felt responsible for harbouring the intention, and she had come terrifyingly close to executing it. She owed Lucia this, at least. And if Lucia fell, there would soon be little left to live for anyway. As with her visit to her mother, this was something Mishani had to do, no matter what the risks. A moral need that would not be overmatched by sense or logic.

You are getting impulsive in your old age, Mishani, she told herself wryly.

There was a cry from somewhere to their left, echoed by another voice closer by. The lookouts with their spygla.s.ses had seen something on the horizon. A few moments pa.s.sed, during which Mishani felt her blood slowly chill, before the Sister spoke.

'Our enemy has arrived,' she said.

Zahn exchanged glances with Yugi and the generals, a grim understanding in their eyes. Zahn was overall commander of this force, by consent of the council of high families. The generals mounted up and began to disperse to their positions. Yugi looked at Lucia, who did not acknowledge him, then he swung on to his horse, and pulled Nomoru up behind. Zahn put his hand on his daughter's shoulder, and her gaze shifted to him.

'We will do a great thing this night,' he murmured. 'Be strong. I will return to you; I promise you that.'

She nodded, her face set.