Melody fortress, the dead plains,
Tlalotlan, Empire of Songs
204th day of the Great Star at morning
For the second time in a month, the song had swept out of control and cut through them all with clangouring hate and violence and need. And for the second time in a month, Pilos hadn’t been there to help his Singer.
Again, Enet had refused to communicate with him, and all Citla could tell him was that the song contained a power she had never felt before. Enough to shake her spirit almost out of her flesh and send her into a faint from which she’d been slow to recover. The hairs stood up on Pilos’s arms at the thought of what might have happened to him if he’d been communicating through the song at the time. He had none of Citla’s strength or skill; surely he would have been lost.
It was because of the changes to the song, clear even now, ten days later, that they were ready to march early. Eagles, macaws, dogs, and even the more experienced slave warriors had tripled their efforts in response to the unknown threat to the Singer’s safety.
The hawk Talon would accompany the Melody to the capital and take up residence in the large compound on the outskirts to continue their training there. If the war went badly – praise Setatmeh it will not – then they were already a week’s march closer to Yalotlan.
Though if I do have to throw barely competent hawks at the enemy, we’re truly fucked.
Feather Atu stood at Pilos’s side. ‘Feels strange to be heading out again so soon. In the Wet. Reminds me of Quitoban.’
Pilos snorted. ‘You were still sucking your mother’s tit when we brought the Quitob under the song,’ he teased, for Atu had been one of the youngest Pechaqueh ever to become an eagle and his youth and wide-eyed innocence had been a constant source of amusement among the older warriors.
His second laughed. ‘There was many a day I’d have gladly run back home for a cuddle during that campaign,’ he admitted.
‘Wouldn’t we all,’ Pilos muttered. The Quitob offensive had been bitter, drawn-out, and a fucking shambles, if he was honest, and though it was fifteen years in the past, the memory still bit at him. Forcing the final the battle in a flooded river delta, holy Setatmeh snatching the unwary on both sides, and warriors drowning in mud only strides from the fighting, sucked under before anyone could reach them. He’d lost an entire Talon of dogs and Coyotes and a full fifth of his eagles before the Quitob capitulated.
Now one in six of the dogs he was taking to war were Quitob, their tenacious, fierce determination put to work bringing peace to all Ixachipan. The glory of the song made manifest.
He didn’t doubt the Yaloh and Tokob would fight like the very lords of the Underworld in the moons to come, and he worried for the Melody as if each warrior, down to the lowliest slave, were his children. How many would they lose this time? How many offspring and partners would never see loved ones again? How many dog warriors, drunk on promises of freedom for themselves and their families – promises Pilos himself had made – would instead die screaming on Tokob and Yaloh spears?
Too many. The number, no matter how small, was always too many.
The eagles’ feathered banner was hoisted into the grey sky and the march began, first to the Singing City where Pilos would seek an audience with the holy lord, and then on, through Pechacan and Xentiban, out from under the song once more, and, with the Singer’s blessing, for the very last time.
Pilos’s feathered cloak fluttered behind him as they marched down the limestone roads, eight abreast, weapons and shields bright, war paint fresh on faces and arms. There was a long way to go yet, but the paint focused his warriors’ minds and reminded them that they didn’t march to sport or their families. They marched to war.
They made the Singing City in a week, but there were no messengers from the source waiting under the ceremonial arch to tell Pilos that the council or the Singer wished to see him. Despite the second incident with the song. Or because of it?
Pilos gritted his teeth and marched in impenetrable silence and his Feathers faded back behind him to avoid being a target if his temper snapped. He didn’t realise his mood had spread to the thousands of warriors marching behind him until Feather Atu coughed and then appeared at his shoulder.
‘Perhaps a song to lift the heart, High Feather?’
Pilos grunted, eyes fixed ahead, but then Atu’s words reached him and he consciously loosened his hands and shoulders. ‘Yes, of course,’ he said and then his gaze flicked sideways and he huffed a laugh. Elaq was marching off the edge of the road, unconsciously in step with the Melody and waiting for Pilos to glance over.
Atu touched belly and throat and vanished and, at a gesture, Elaq replaced him. Moments later the Feathers began the song of Chitenec, an old favourite. It rippled down the seemingly endless snake of warriors with its tail of cooks and builders and weapons-makers and offerings. Pilos and Elaq marched in silence for a while, listening to the voices settle into harmony. The song within the song.
‘Atu’s right; it does lift the heart,’ Pilos said and clapped Elaq on the shoulder. ‘Business or pleasure?’
‘The former,’ Elaq said, and Pilos sighed. Of course it was. ‘About the Great Octave; about the song,’ he added and Pilos was suddenly grateful for the singing of thousands of warriors behind him. He let it fill his consciousness, focusing on the rhythm and the story, so that as Elaq spoke, the words mingled in his mind and would be harder see. A poor imitation of the Listeners’ method to transmit confidential information.
‘Tell me about the song first,’ he said. Whatever Enet was up to could wait; the changes to the song could not.
‘Word from the source is that Pikte, son of the Great Octave and the Singer, is dead.’
‘The song first,’ Pilos repeated and Elaq held up a hand to still him. The eagle so rarely acted as Pilos’s equal that when he did, it meant something, so Pilos bit his tongue and waited.
‘Pikte was murdered. In the source, by Enet and the Singer. That’s what caused the change in the song—’
‘Stop,’ Pilos interrupted, his stride faltering. ‘This can’t be right. Why are you saying this?’
Elaq marched in silence, sympathy mingled with grim reality twisting his hard face into something harder. Pilos felt sick and the warriors’ singing suddenly seemed more like the wailing of spirits condemned to the Underworld. The afternoon was grey and windy – a typical end-of-Wet day – but it seemed more. Portents in everything.
‘The Singer was casting Enet out, stripping her of title and status, and so she offered him Pikte and the old ritual stone knife from back before. He took it, Pilos. He blooded the song, against all tradition, against the law. He blooded the song with his own son.’
There was such bewilderment in Elaq’s voice, usually so calm and capable, that it choked Pilos and he put his hand on the man’s shoulder again, giving and taking wordless comfort even as his mind rebelled at what he was being told. It couldn’t be true. It couldn’t.
‘Councillor Yana’s nephew is one of the Singer’s courtesans,’ Elaq continued after a pause, as if hearing his thoughts. Behind them, the ballad was coming to an end; they didn’t have much time. ‘He heard it from another courtesan, who heard it from an administrator, who got it from the Chorus warrior who was there when it happened.’
‘But—’ Pilos began, but Elaq interrupted again, and he let him.
‘The first time the song skewed, one of the peace-weavers, the woman Betsu, was brought into the source. The courtesan doesn’t think she ever left. We think that was the first, because Enet let it be known that one of the peace-weavers had returned home. The other followed a couple of weeks later – and he really did go; I had people watching. But not the Yalotl, as far as we can tell. Yana thinks the Singer killed her, too.’
‘Enet is blooding the song?’ the High Feather whispered, dread dragging icy claws down his spine. ‘Is she truly fucking insane? Does she know nothing of our history? She will destroy us all, destroy the Empire itself! Why would she do this?’
‘Yana and I are making enquiries, High Feather, but at this stage we don’t know whose idea it was. We don’t know if the Singer decided to blood the song, or if she encouraged him and provided him with … the means to do so.’
‘The Singer would not do that,’ Pilos said immediately. But was it loyalty or truth?
‘Her lust for power has no limits,’ Elaq said quietly.
It was rare for Pilos to be lost for words, but he could do nothing other than stare around him in bewildered disgust. Despite its size and strength, despite its military prowess and wealth in food and jade and slaves, the Empire of Songs forever trod a knife’s edge. The song lifted up the Pechaqueh and subdued and glorified the other tribes brought under its power, but if that song broke, if it became corrupted, even the most content slaves might become restless. The song was the resin that bound them together; Enet was wilfully, intentionally picking it apart. How would that bring them the stability needed to waken the world spirit?
‘I’m almost afraid to ask, but is there anything else?’ Pilos asked eventually, because Elaq had that shifty look he knew well.
‘The other information I have for you is from Councillor Yana. He is almost certain Enet controls a songstone quarry, at least one, owned through a number of subsidiaries so that it cannot be traced back to her. For the last four sun-years she has controlled all the provision of songstone to the Empire. He says that through clever manipulation of the council she has been earning enormous sums selling it to the architects capping pyramids and expanding the reach of the song. When you forwarded on Whisper Ilandeh’s report that Tokoban is rich in songstone and it was read out in council, Yana says Enet was furious. He thinks she fears the loss of her control over its supply.’
Pilos gaped again. The news, in its way, was just as shocking. ‘Songstone is divine,’ he spluttered. ‘It is not to be, to be fucking bartered for like a slave or an ear of corn. How has the council allowed this to happen? She cannot just sell it. No one sells songstone.’
Elaq’s mouth twisted with bitter humour. ‘The costs have been cleverly disguised – the use of artisans to quarry and shape the stone before removal; the prohibitive costs of transport, both of materials to move the stone and in offerings to any holy Setatmeh encountered along the route; the alleged difficulty in accessing the stone itself and the increased labour required to chip it free. Not one of the costs has ever actually been attributed to the stone itself. That remains, for all intents and purposes, free and sacred as it always has been. The Great Octave has merely been requesting compensation for the labour.’
‘That bitch-slut-snake,’ Pilos growled. It made sense though. For years Pilos had tried to discover the source of Enet’s influence and failed. The number of families who could afford the honour of commissioning a songstone cap for a pyramid – gifting the money directly to the source rather than to anyone who owned a songstone mine – was vanishingly small, and nearly all of them had a seat on the council. And … all of those councillors were loyal to Enet. ‘So Enet can deny her rivals access to songstone if she chooses, or she can barter for information from them. Payment in knowledge if not in jade.’
Pilos turned to walk backwards and caught Atu’s eye. He circled his finger in the air and his second nodded, and as the last notes of the marching song faded away, he began another.
‘That is the councillor’s thought also,’ Elaq said when their voices were covered by the Melody’s. ‘And the Great Octave sees you as her biggest rival. If she has as much power as Yana fears, it’s likely why the Singer didn’t meet you today. You need protecting, High Feather,’ Elaq added. ‘I’d like permission to come with you, to watch your back and front and every other fucking direction. I wouldn’t put it past Enet to have assassins among your Melody – even your eagles.’
Pilos smiled despite himself. ‘What an ignoble end for the mighty High Feather, to be gutted by one of his own, seduced from him by the snake in the council,’ he said with mock solemnity. ‘Peace, my friend. With fever in Quitoban, a conquest in the Wet, and the blooding of the song, my life means little in the grand scheme of things. Still, I promise to be careful,’ he added, seeing Elaq’s scowl. ‘But you know I need you in the city. You and Yana are the only two people there I can trust. I need you working – discreetly – to discover anything else you can. Definitive proof of the blooding, for a start. And look at my wealth, too, will you? Start drawing up papers to have me buy any mining rights in Tokoban. I’ll see it’s worked and gifted as it should be. For free. For the song. The more we can do to loosen Enet’s grasp, the better.’
‘As the High Feather commands,’ Elaq said with pointed courtesy.
Pilos gusted a sigh. ‘Setatmeh preserve me from overprotective eagles and the manipulations of beautiful women. I’ll be careful. And you be careful, too. You’re living in the viper’s den, remember. Under the song, my friend.’