Chapter Eight The Minister and the Murder
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Minister and the Murder
When she of snow and flame dances through dreams
When the White Knight’s heart strays to lost queens
He is coming. He is coming.
When the abyss opens, when the dead bow down
The curse is come upon us, he will claim his crown
The ravine calls its master up above
He goes to tell lost souls he died for love
He is coming. He is coming.
The words run wild, escape if you can
The pearl will be his or belong to no man
His sword is ruin, his eyes are fire
All the worlds are his empire.
The child of gods is dead and grown
He is coming, he is coming for his throne.
The Emperor yawned. “I came. I conquered. I’ve heard this all before.”
The Oracle advanced. “Centuries ago, I foretold you would come. Because of my prophecy, Eyam waited for you. Eyam welcomed you, in spite of all that you are and all you have done. Did you think your coming was as far into the future as I could see? I knew your beginning, God-Child. And I know your end.”
The Once and Forever Emperor series, now revised, ANONYMOUS
“Somehow, the Emperor has returned.”
Pio threw down the statement like a document they could roll out upon the table and discuss. The Room of Wisdom and Whispers was half empty, the drawn faces of the ministers still left alive forming a broken ring around the grand oak table.
Pio should frame things to himself in a more cheerful light. The council room wasn’t half empty, the council room was half full. There were still many survivors.
He called the assembly at dawn. Pio found meetings soothing. If you held a meeting, you could come to a decision. Often the wrong decision, but you could blame everyone else at the meeting for that.
General Nemeth blinked hard several times, as though dismay had got in his eyes. “‘Somehow, the Emperor has returned’? You can’t just say that.”
“Yet I did,” Pio returned irritably. “Do you imagine I know how the Emperor’s return worked? The prophecy was never clear on the finer details. It only said he would rise once more, and lo. He is risen—” he is truly terrifying “—and we must bow down.”
Usually the council discussed how to address various plagues and taxes, how to make laws and take bribes in a dignified and statesmanlike fashion, how to keep undesirable elements such as the undead and poor people outside their walls, and – if the wicked Marquis of Popenjoy insisted – charity and support for the arts.
Governing bodies rarely needed to address a living myth.
“I don’t follow the Imperatorial faith,” objected Lord Claudius Cenimagnus. “I belong to ice crystals and constellations. I follow a thousand gods in the wind.”
Pio snapped, “I would keep that quiet if I were you. Since the Emperor has come for his throne and the raiders are at our gates.”
Legend said the earth of Eyam had been drenched in divine blood when the Great God sacrificed the God-Child.
That was why their land was fertile in a way no other land could be, producing enchanted metal and jewels, magic stones and trees.
Even the dead didn’t rest easy in their earth.
Theirs was an insular land. Many were eager to buy the magic of Eyam, but few wished to linger where the dead walked.
Given Eyam’s unique circumstances, the majority of their people followed the three-fold faith of the Great God, the god’s enemy the Great Goddess, and their child the Once and Forever Emperor.
But Lord Claudius hailed from Shroud Valley, distant from the capital and rich in mines, which often traded and intermarried with east Tagar.
Worshippers of the constellations were burned after death, their ashes sent to the wind, so those who followed the stars didn’t need to worry about rising as ghouls.
Pio had never cared about any man’s faith, but that was before they were at war.
Lord Claudius and anyone else who followed the stars must be watched closely to see where their loyalties lay.
“If indeed the royal line has been extinguished…” whispered a very young minister, who must have been standing at the back of the crowd last night and unable to clearly see the head.
“Extremely extinguished.” Pio tried to rub away the migraine knocking on his temples. “Cut off. In his prime, I mean. Very sad.”
“If that is so, rather than an individual of doubtful descent, might I suggest the dukedom of Valerius has a proud and ancient lineage? Lord Marius was the late king’s dearest friend from childhood. Octavianus would want Marius Valerius to succeed him as king.”
Octavian and Marius had been friends since they were squires. Those two, and one other, were the bright young hopes of the kingdom. Now only the Last Hope was left.
Pio hadn’t actually liked his king, but he felt they should have a moment’s silence after speaking his name.
The moment’s solemn silence was broken by Lord Blasius Balass. “Pardon my plain speaking, but if Lord Marius were king, we might wait a long time for a happy announcement. Can the Golden Cobra bear Lord Marius an heir to the realm?”
This extreme plain speaking caused instant commotion around the table. Some eyed the door, as though Lord Marius Valerius might break through the oak in a whirl of icy eyes and white cloak, an avalanche outraged by discussion of his personal life.
General Nemeth spluttered, “Lord Marius would never! He is a most pure and perfect knight. He took vows!”
Pio sighed. “Nemeth, he can’t hear you.”
Pio knew Nemeth felt uneasy after more than five minutes in Lord Marius’s presence.
Lord Marius had that effect on people. Beautiful and cold as an image carved in marble, many loved him from afar, and from up close said, “You know what, never mind”.
Pio had excellent spies, and he paid the Cobra’s even better spies to share information.
Romantic rumours about Lord Marius regularly flew around the court. Nobody had ever been able to confirm a single one. At this point, Pio would be stunned if Lord Marius got caught in bed with a piece of dry toast.
Recently a spy had reported overhearing Lord Marius accuse the Cobra of blackmailing him, and another claimed to have seen the Cobra hold a knife to Lord Marius’s throat. Both reports were ludicrous and unbelievable, since the Cobra yet lived. Pio had docked the spies’ pay for drinking on the job.
“At least the Emperor appears to be interested in women,” came a mutter from down the table.
Lord Olybrius raised an eyebrow. “Does Lady Rahela Domitia count as a woman? That harlot’s a she-devil with a shape to tempt men and a tongue to taunt them.”
Lord Eneth contributed, “Didn’t Lord Marius have a raving affair with Lady Rahela’s mother as a youth? We cannot escape Domitian women.”
Three ministers spoke at once.
“Whenever you say the words ‘Lord Marius’ and ‘affair’, no matter with whom, I feel I’m going to have a bilious attack—”
“If a Domitian she-devil had me in her clutches, I wouldn’t struggle that hard to escape—”
“I don’t care who’s on the throne, raiders are outside the walls!”
Pio pointed at the third minister. “Well said! Not you,” he added to the admirer of scandalous women.
“I am certain the council noticed that the Emperor’s—” ghastly army of ghouls—“emergency forces have repelled the raiders and rebuilt our walls overnight. All glory to his Imperial Highness. Yet outside our walls, the enemy awaits. The threat from Tagar is far from over. Our best course of action is to follow our Emperor’s lead. ”
Lord Cyrillus spoke up in a clear voice. A pious and kindly old gentleman with a face like a sweet withered apple, he had been part of the Divine Order in his youth, and spread the word of the Great God.
“I waited my whole life, certain one day the prophecy would be fulfilled. In the time of Eyam’s greatest need, I knew the Emperor would come.” His face puckered from withered to rotten apple. “I just didn’t think he would be common.”
Down the table a gloomy voice predicted, “This will give the lower classes ideas.”
“Why are you all drivelling?” demanded Lord Talabor, wild about the eyes. “Ghouls tore my wife to ribbons last night. This Emperor is a false god and a mad dog. We must put him down like the beast he is or die in the attempt.”
There was an embarrassed pause.
Nobody wanted to die in the attempt. Nobody wanted to think too much about people being torn to ribbons, either. Best to brush atrocities under the rug and pretend the pile of corpses was as easily forgotten as an unfortunate joke at a party.
Pio slammed his hand down on the smooth oak table.
“Ministers! I hear your wisdom. I understand your concerns. The Emperor has a rough and sinister aspect, his accent is vile, and he has murdered hundreds through evil magic. The sight of him makes me sick with terror, but that does not change the facts. The facts are these: we cannot stand against the raiders without him! We must hope our mad god-Emperor works in mysterious ways.”
He expected a storm of argument, but received only silence. In fact, now Pio came to think about it, his last few words had fallen into a deadly hush. All around the table ministers averted their faces, as though they didn’t wish to see what would happen next.
The edges of the world blurred in Pio’s vision as he realized he had his back to the door.
“Thank you, Prime Minister,” drawled a voice that painted the daylight dark, “for that marvellous introduction.”
Very slowly, Pio turned in his chair. The Emperor stood behind him, framed on the threshold of the Room of Wisdom and Whispers.
The Emperor wore the dead king’s regalia, but the enchanted armour seemed different somehow.
Iron stars winked cold as winter in the bronze of his breastplate as the Emperor prowled around the table, surveying his ministers one by one.
The minister who rejected the Emperor as his god, the minister who called him common, the minister who wanted him put down like a mad dog.