IF there was anything worse than a fool of a husband, Lycian reflected, it was a royal fool. Having stormed away from yet another fruitless attempt to make Jaxar see sense, she found refuge in her private balcony, with its perfumed curtains and satin-cushioned divan. Her white lap-terrier, Precious Snow, licked her ankles and curled up at her feet.
Lycian gazed over the hills of Aidon, searching for a diversion. None of the wonders of the city cheered her. Below an unblemished azure sky, the sun poured over the rooftops of mansions—few as rich as her own, true—and temples to the myriad gods, marketplaces, fountains, and jewel-toned gardens. Farther away, blocks of dingy workshops, piers, and warehouses lined the river. The city teemed with color and riches and music, everything for which she had once yearned. All now lay at her fingertips. All had now turned to ashes.
Where had her life gone wrong? Everything ought to have been perfect. Even as a girl, men had found her beautiful. She had worked hard to keep herself so, applying milk lotion to maintain her flawless complexion, brightening the gold of her hair with chamomile and lemon, and always dressing herself in luxuriant fabrics. At first, her marriage to the brother of the Ar-King, may-his-glory-endure-forever, had seemed a fitting triumph to her conquests. If Jaxar’s deformities prevented him from ascending the throne, that mattered little. If she were clever and only a little lucky, her sons would be kings.
But no babe had swelled her belly, not from Jaxar’s seed nor from that of the lovers she had taken with suitable discretion. Jaxar was not sterile, she thought bitterly, not with a son from his first wife already grown to young manhood.
How could the fault lie with her? With this perfect body? It was not possible! She had visited every temple in the district and quite a few in the coarser parts of Aidon, consulted oracles, and offered sacrifices, all to no avail. Only the priests of the Scorpion god Qr, newly come to fashionable prominence, offered her any hope.
Look to where your husband scatters his seed, thus leaving none for you, they told her.
Tsorreh, that black-eyed witch, that spawn of Meklavar, placed in this very house four years ago by the order of the Ar-King himself, had stolen Jaxar’s virility. It could not have been by any natural means, for how could any man prefer such a thin, shriveled thing to Lycian’s voluptuous curves? The cause must be sorcery, magic black and forbidden.
Lycian’s manicured fingers tightened on the peacock-hued silk of her gown. Sensing her mood, Precious Snow whimpered.
The situation was intolerable, yet she could not openly oppose her husband’s wishes. On the other hand, she was not without resources. She had money of her own, access to the household accounts, and the blessings of the priests of Qr, the Scorpion god. They had warned her of the danger. Surely they would know how to rid her of this pestilence and kindle her womb.
In a somewhat calmer state of mind, Lycian went down to the garden atrium, where Jaxar usually took his breakfast. Morning sun slanted into the open space, but dew still dotted the leaves of the flowering plants. The mosaic-topped table had been set with a basket of breads, goblets, and a pitcher. Jaxar was not present, only his son Danar and Zevaron, Tsorreh’s infuriatingly arrogant son. Tsorreh didn’t look old enough to have a son Danar’s age. She must have been little more than a child herself when she’d birthed him.
Zevaron had barged in on them all a short time ago after supposedly rescuing Danar from a bunch of thieves. How he’d found his mother here, four years after the fall of their city, was incomprehensible. But everyone knew the ancient race of Meklavar bred sorcerers. The Ar-King had arrested many of them and—she dwelt upon the thought with a delicious shiver—extracted their confessions under torture.
Lycian’s eyes narrowed as she spotted a trickle of blood on Zevaron’s chest. The boy was a troublemaker, that much was certain, with his outlandish Denariyan clothing and those watchful, dark-lashed eyes. Yet he was undeniably beautiful and most likely ardent between the sheets . . .
Danar’s face paled beneath the tumble of his red-gold hair. “Stepmother—”
“Mother,” she corrected him.
He did not seem to hear her. “The Ar-King, may-his-wisdom-never-fail, has seen fit to arrest Father and Tsorreh. Only a few moments ago, Lord Mortan and his men took them away.”
Tsorreh, taken away? The Meklavaran witch was under arrest? Until now, Jaxar had used his position to protect the hag. But at last Qr had answered Lycian’s prayers!
Lycian’s flare of triumph quickly turned to consternation. She had not wanted Jaxar himself to be caught in the same net. “They arrested my husband? That cannot be possible! Not the Ar-King’s own brother! On what charge?”
Danar lowered himself into one of the chairs around the table. He seemed to be a different person, no longer a gangling boy but a man, slender still, yet with the promise of power in his shoulders. Zevaron remained standing, watchful, like a darker, more intense twin. He reminded Lycian of a panther, sleek and deadly.
“The charge is treason.” Danar gestured to a partially unrolled scroll lying amid the crumbs and plates. “Father is accused of plotting to overthrow Cinath.”
This must be Tsorreh’s doing! Jaxar, that credulous fool, might well forfeit his life as well as his riches. If he were executed, Lycian thought desperately, what then would become of her? Who would befriend a traitor’s wife? She would lose everything!
The enormity of the looming catastrophe engulfed Lycian. She struggled to speak, but all that issued from her mouth was a shriek. The harder she tried to control herself, the louder were the sounds that burst from her lungs. Her body contorted with the effort of screaming. The room swayed in her fading sight.
From afar, she heard Danar’s voice. “Look to my stepmother!”
Her body went numb, her muscles loose. She found herself on the floor, surrounded by servants. Hands lifted her up. The room blurred—a corridor swept past—then a colonnade–finally she came to rest on her brocaded divan. Gently, her maid bathed her temples and hands with lavender-scented water. A second maidservant fanned her with ostrich plumes.
Lycian felt more like herself once she began to make plans. Jaxar would probably make some ridiculous gesture of loyalty to the witch, but it would not do to cast him aside precipitously. Detaching herself from her husband’s misfortune would cost her the many advantages of his rank. He might still be redeemed if only Tsorreh were eliminated. Surely then Jaxar would come to his senses and the Ar-King would embrace his only brother once more. But how to ensure that end? She dared not leave matters to chance. Her enemy was both cunning and resourceful. Now more than ever, she needed powerful allies that even the Ar-King respected.
Relaxing back on the divan, her face cooled by the perfumed breeze, Lycian smiled. Never had the priests of Qr failed her. In fact, it often seemed they were preparing her for a greater destiny, a destiny she so richly deserved.
Zevaron knocked on the door, breaking Lycian’s reverie. He explained that Danar had instructed him to escort her wherever she wished to go.
“Very well,” she said, resigned to the boy’s company. “If Danar has ordered you to accompany me, then I suppose you must. I will be going out shortly.” Eyes like onyx regarded her from a face the color of molten amber, but the youth did not withdraw. “Don’t stand there gaping! Have my mount made ready immediately.”
Energized with new determination, she swept through her inner chambers, Precious Snow yapping at her heels. Her maidservant followed, as humble and attentive as if she had been a slave. Jaxar would not permit slaves in his household, so Lycian had developed her own quite effective methods of managing the staff.
In a satisfyingly short time, Lycian’s white onager was carrying her down the hill with Zevaron trotting alongside. The beast had followed this route many times and needed little guidance. As Lycian cradled the lap-terrier in one arm, she reflected that although Danar clearly intended Zevaron to spy upon her, the boy was at least competent. He kept pace with the onager without difficulty, and he looked as if he knew how to use the sword at his belt.
Cinath’s palace came into view at the intersection of two broad avenues. Set between silver-white columns, its forecourt statues glinted with gold leaf, lapis, and jade. The sight reminded Lycian of her disappointment when her new husband ignored her wish to live there, insisting on his own residence.
Lycian’s onager slowed to an amble. People, most of them on foot, moved through the streets. Some paused to leave offerings of fruit or flowers before the many shrines. From time to time, when one of the pedestrians drew too close, Precious Snow yipped out a warning.
First she was not to live in the palace, she with her beauty and aristocratic breeding, not to mention her royal destiny, and then she was forced to harbor a penniless exile in her own home! Tsorreh—her very name sounded like a curse—claimed to be of the royal house of Meklavar. What nonsense! One look at the woman, with her iron-black hair and work-roughened hands—and those eyes!—showed her to be fit only for scrubbing pots. True, the woman could read and write, which was more than Lycian herself could do. And she spoke proper Gelone as well as her own savage tongue and half a dozen others. But what could Jaxar want with such an unfeminine creature? Everyone knew that women were to be treasured for their beauty, not their wits.
Turning away from the direct route to the palace, Lycian halted in the spacious courtyard leading to the temple of Qr. “Wait here,” she told Zevaron, and for the first time she could remember, he nodded in assent. A lesser priest rushed forward to take the reins of the onager. The painted image of a scorpion marked the band tied around the priest’s smooth-shaven head.
A second priest bowed to Lycian at the door. Although this particular priest had greeted her many times on former visits, she did not know his name. None of the servants of Qr seemed to have names. Perhaps they surrendered them upon taking their vows.
“How may I serve the noble lady?”
“I must see the head priest at once!”
“But of course, Gracious One. He has been expecting you.”
From the walled courtyard and through the massive doors, they passed through a dimly lit hallway. With each step, Lycian felt less oppressed by her situation. She left her cares in the street outside: her fool of a husband, that Meklavaran harlot, the witch’s entirely too handsome son, even the nuisance Danar so frequently presented. The stone walls seemed to whisper that all her desires and hopes would soon be fulfilled.
Lycian was safe within the jointed arms of the Scorpion. Indeed, there was no place in Aidon where she would be safer. As she continued down the corridor toward the head priest’s chamber, she caught the fleeting impression of an immense, brooding entity, filled with frozen light and flames bright past bearing.
As if echoing across a vast distance, she heard voices:
“Come speedily into the world
Across flame, across ice,
Come to us! Come to us!”
Lycian hid a reflexive shudder. The temperature of the air did not change and yet cold-bumps pocked her skin. She rubbed her upper arms. If Qr would give her what she craved—the royal son and the power that would come to her from him, an end to the witch’s miserable existence—then she must do its bidding. What other choice did she have?
Lycian passed into the torch-lit vestibule that gave rise to corridors leading to the workrooms and other chambers whose purpose she could not guess. At the far end, a gate of copper and silver, the two metals intertwined like frozen flames, guarded the sanctuary. She had rarely been inside that holy place, performing her usual devotions in a small private chapel.
The head priest remained in his chair so that Lycian was forced to stand before him, as awkward as a peasant. In a moment of pique, she thought of sitting in the visitor’s chair without his leave. That would show him who was important!
As Lycian met the priest’s gaze, however, her eyes went to the scorpion figure on his headband. The many-legged form wavered in her sight. A shadow that was more than mere lack of light passed over the chamber. Surely it was an illusion, an aftereffect of her shock at the news of her husband’s arrest.
The priest sat, his gaze steady, his features utterly calm, and smiled.
The smile unnerved Lycian more than words could have done. Any hope of seizing control of the situation vanished. She fell to her knees and hung her head. A tear, scalding and unexpected, rolled down one cheek. She had no right to demand anything of such a vast, incomprehensible power. She could only petition. Plead. Beg.
“My child.” The priest spoke at last. “I know why you have come.”
Lycian dared not look up. “You . . . do?”
“Qr the Inexorable has revealed everything to me.”
“Can nothing be done for my husband?” burst from her like the entreaty of a desperate child. “He is enslaved by vile sorcery, obsessed . . .”
“Do not fear, noble lady, for together we will free your husband. We will restore him to favor, and your fortunes as well. You will shine in the eyes of the Ar-King and share in his glory.”
Lycian’s heart rose. All would indeed be well, she was certain of it now. A thought coiled through her mind, subtle and intoxicating. Perhaps she would not need her fool of a husband for long. The Ar-King’s wife had died some years ago and he had not remarried. Or she might raise her sights even higher. Cinath was failing. Even a blind person could see that he was not the powerful, decisive ruler he had been in years past, but a man increasingly erratic, even paranoid. Look at how he’d turned against his own brother! Suspicious men were difficult to control. His son Chion, on the other hand, was ambitious but young, and receptive to the flattery of women. She’d seen the way he looked at her.
A voice murmured, “Do you serve Qr and the greater Power behind Qr?”
She nodded, rapt with visions of glory and power.
“With all your heart and soul? And all your worldly might?”
Again, a nod.
“And will you do the bidding of Qr without question, without hesitation, without thought to yourself?”
What a silly question! Was it not the intention of Qr to place her son upon the Lion Throne?
“Only one person stands between you and all you seek. Between Qr and the glory to come. She has been your enemy since she was foisted upon you, has she not?”
Tsorreh.
Unbidden, Lycian’s lips pulled back from her teeth. She imagined the witch, with her eyes full of secret magic and her voice like honey. As long as Tsorreh lived, Jaxar would never be free. Never!
“She bears a thing that impedes the coming of Qr. Will you rid Gelon of this menace? Will you serve the Scorpion God?”
Lycian whispered, “Tell me how.”
“Listen carefully . . .”
Lycian stepped into the brightness of the day, the vial the priest had given her safely hidden in the folds of her gown. Her heart pounded with excitement, and her cheeks felt flushed. Zevaron, waiting beside her tethered onager, gave her a curious look. She glared at him to forestall any questions. She must let no hint of her intentions show. In due time, perhaps later this very day, she would have her chance.