CHEJ AND Ruesp emerged in the western half of the fortress, in the administrative domain. It was like being in an anthill kicked open by a giant. People were scurrying about seemingly at random. All sorts of people. It wasn’t just the physical walls that had been broken by the Beast and Zu’s arrows, but the unseen barriers that kept people in their accustomed compounds, doing their usual work, following their routine paths through the day. Men and women from every xarim domain and ministry mingled in the halls, united by their panic. Many of these were guards and soldiers; Chej expected to be recognized and arrested at any moment, but he quickly realized not one of them was looking for him or even at him. He also began to see patterns in the apparent chaos. Great clumps of people huddled in chambers and doorways. Others moved cautiously, stopping to examine every junction before crossing. Most of these were moving toward the outer terrace and the gates. They were evacuating the fortress. Chej saw one of the exits; it looked so crowded as to be impassable. The din was incredible: hundreds talking, screaming, praying to the gods.
Ruesp grabbed hold of a fellow in the red and silver of the reserve guard. Chej looked around nervously while they shouted in each other’s ears. After a moment, Ruesp took Chej’s arm and began guiding him north and east from the administrative domain. This was near where the Beast had come through the roof, and much of it was rubble, with huge gaps open to the sky through which flames were sucked into vortexes whirling heavenward. There were a few squads of house minders fighting the fire with buckets of water and sand, but everyone else had cleared out. Ruesp directed him to winding routes around the damage until they were in mostly quiet, abandoned corridors with the fires behind them, although even those were full of smoke.
“Ruzuyer took your wife,” Ruesp said, when they could hear each other’s words without screaming.
Chej didn’t look at him. They continued in silence for a few steps.
“What?”
“She was seen fleeing the Earth Center Tower. Reports are that she was wounded. Yir’s bird picked her up and took her off to his tower.”
“Is she dead?” he finally asked.
“If it were anyone else, I would imagine so,” the xarim replied. “But after the bird got her to Yir’s tower, some sort of flash was seen. Like lightning.”
“Zu’s arrows,” Chej muttered. “It must be. Is that where we’re going? Yir’s tower?”
“Against any sort of sense, yes,” Ruesp replied.
As they neared the tower, it started getting crowded again, but, as before, no one was paying much attention to anyone else. That changed when they came to the entrance of the tower, where Yir’s black-and-brown-clad guard met them with spears in hand. The fortress shuddered, whether from the rolling thunder outside or some other cause Chej did not know.
For a moment, no one said anything. Then Ruesp nodded at the xi.
“You know me, Hsaj,” he said. “You served with me for a time. What is happening here?”
Hsaj was a lean, tall man with a scar above one eye.
“I wish I knew, xarim,” he said. “Something. All sorts of strange sounds. But we’ve been told to remain here and prevent anyone from coming up.”
“You won’t prevent me,” Ruesp said. “I’ve got business with Yir. The Emperor’s business.”
“Do you have orders you can show me, xarim?”
“Have you had a look around lately, Xi Hsaj? No, I don’t have orders to show you. But you will let me in to see Yir or you will personally go up to fetch him and bring him down here.” He cocked his head. “Do you remember me as a man who talks or brooks nonsense?”
“No, xarim. It’s just that Yir said—”
“Yir is not the Emperor,” Ruesp snapped. “And this is no time to delay me. I have given you options. Turning me away is not one of them. Choose one of the others.”
The xi took a few breaths, brows knitted.
“You can go up, xarim,” he finally said. “But I would beware if I were you. I do not think it is safe up there.”
“Where do you think it is safe, Xi Hsaj?”
“You may have a point there, xarim,” the guard said.
Ruesp motioned as if to push the guards aside.
“Lend us a lantern,” he said.
The xi obliged, taking one from a hook and handing it to Ruesp. Then the men cleared a path and, in a few moments, they were mounting the winding stair of the Standing Pinion Tower.
Chej had only been in Yir’s tower once, many years before, on an errand for Sha, but he remembered the trip well. Yir had not only Ruzuyer; he was a collector of birds of all sorts. Each room of his tower was closed with a double door of woven cane mesh; you would enter one, close it behind you, then proceed through the next, so that the winged inhabitants of the room could not escape. The rooms themselves were fancifully decorated with artificial trees and plants of wood and stone to provide his many pets perches and shelter. On his visit, Yir had been in good spirits and given him a tour of the hundreds of birds in the tower. There were birds of every color of the rainbow, and some were rainbows in and of themselves. There were birds bigger than a man, who could not fly but that stalked about on thick limbs. Yir had owls and hawks, jays and pelicans, ravens and hummingbirds, stranger birds from very far away.
And to feed and water them he had servants, quite a few of them. They lived in tiny rooms, much smaller than those of the birds. On the second florr he saw one he recognized standing between the two doorways holding a lantern. Behind her, a lamp in the room revealed birds with bright emerald plumage flitting about.
“Xol,” Chej said.
“Yes,” the small, hunched woman said. “That is me.”
“I met you years ago.”
She shrugged. “I don’t remember you.”
“That’s understandable. Do you know what’s going on upstairs?”
“Someone killed Ruzuyer,” she said. “Burned him with the lightning. Yir has the killer. He told us to stay down here and watch the birds, keep them calm. He’s going to do something.”
“Do what?”
“Some sort of sorcery,” she said. “Something bad, I can feel it. Everything is bad now, isn’t it?”
“Maybe,” Chej said.
She glanced behind Chej and her face softened. “You are Xarim Ruesp, yes?”
“I am.”
“The birds,” she said. “What should I do?”
“Maybe you should let them go,” Ruesp suggested.
“Some of them wouldn’t live,” she replied. “They won’t find the right food. The weather outside is wrong for them.”
“None of them will live if this place burns down,” Ruesp said. “Think about it. You may be in charge soon.”
“How can that be?” she whispered. “Yir is master here.”
“Just keep it in mind,” he said. “If you cut open the window mesh, they can leave. It’s what they want to do, isn’t it?”
“Most of them,” she said.
“We have to go,” Ruesp said. “Do as you see fit.”
They continued up the stairs.
“I smell something burning,” Chej said as they neared the top. “Something other than the fortress, I mean. Like flesh.”
“Yes,” Ruesp replied.
“Perhaps it is Ruzuyer?”
“No,” Ruesp said. “I’ve smelled this before. It isn’t burnt bird.”
They reached the next landing. Chej remembered that Yir’s workshop was windowless but usually illuminated by lamplight. Now it was completely dark, at least until the light of their lantern entered it. The burnt smell was strong here. A little smoke curled in the lamplight, drifting up from tables and stools that looked like they were made of charcoal.
In the center of the room four sets of four columns stood floor-to-ceiling. A stone chair faced them. When they drew closer, Chej saw there was someone—no, what was left of someone—in the chair. His clothes had been burned off and his flesh charred black. His eyes and hair were gone.
Chej backed against the wall and closed his eyes. He understood the smell now. It was suffocating him. The back of his throat burned.
Too much. He’d seen too much. Too many dead people. Too much blood and ash and horror.
“Master Pinion?” someone asked. “Pinion?”
He knew the voice. He forced his eyes open and darted his gaze around the room. Then he saw her, crouched against the wall. It looked like she had a film of ashes on her, but other than that she was naked.
“Yash!” he said. “You’re alive.”
“Ch-Chej?” she managed. He realized her teeth were chattering. She was shivering. And her eyes: they were looking in his direction, but not at him.
“It’s me,” he said, taking a few steps toward her. Her gaze shifted toward his feet. “Are you—you don’t seem well.”
“I…” she said. “I don’t know. Pinion! Chej, watch out for Pinion.”
“I… I can see him,” Chej stammered. “What’s left of him, anyway.” A sob escaped his lips. He was crying. Of course. What else was there to do?
“Chej?” she said. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt? I can’t see you.”
Of course. That’s why her eyes seemed so strange. They weren’t looking at anything.
“Yir is all burned up,” Chej said. “He’s—” He couldn’t finish.
Ruesp put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “Chej isn’t hurt,” he said. “He’ll be better in a moment. Because he has to be.”
Chej drew in a deep, quavering breath. He remembered his father’s hand on his shoulder like this, just after his mother died. How he’d felt better not because it fixed anything or lessened his grief, but because it reminded him that he wasn’t alone. But when his father also traveled off beyond the sunset, there hadn’t been anyone. There hadn’t been anyone since.
“Chej?” Yash asked. “Who is with you?”
He drew himself straight and wiped his eyes. “It’s Xarim Ruesp,” he said. “My friend. I’m fine.” He walked past the burnt corpse to where Yash was trying to stand.
“Why are you blind?” Chej asked. “I’m coming to you. Don’t kill me.”
He knelt before her and tentatively put a hand on her shoulder. She didn’t feel cold—in fact, she felt feverish—but she was nevertheless shivering. She grabbed him by the wrist.
“Chej,” she said. “I thought you might be dead. I shouldn’t have left you.”
“What happened to you?” he asked. “You’re cold?”
“Freezing.”
“A moment,” he said. He gently pulled her fingers from his wrist and then pulled his shirt over his head. Then he helped her put it on. On her, it was a gown, and he still had his skirt to cover him. Then, carefully, he wrapped his arms around her and helped her stand up.
“Yes,” she said. “Thank you, shegan’.”
He tried to let her go, but now she was holding him. It was a dozen heartbeats before she let him go.
She took a deep breath and nodded. “I think my sight is improving,” she said. “Ruesp has a lantern? I think I can see it. But I still can’t see you.”
“Let us hope it continues to improve,” Chej said. “But… what happened to you? What happened to Yir?”
“He was trying to change me,” she said. “To make me into a monster.”
“You’re already a monster,” Chej said.
She chuckled. “Into a tower monster,” she said. “A xual, as you call them. To replace his bird. But I tricked him. Sort of. Into casting me into the White Brilliant. I knew I would either die there or come back stronger and still myself. If he had thrown me into one of the other worlds, he might have gotten what he wanted. But change is my nature. I guess when I returned from the White Brilliant I was… hot.”
“Very hot, I should say,” Ruesp said.
“We cannot stay here, I think,” Yash said. “If Pinion was right, we cannot stay here.”
“Your eyes—”
“My sight is returning. It’s like I looked into the sun too long. It will clear.”
“If Yir was right about what?” Ruesp asked.
“I’ll tell you as we go, xarim,” she replied.
“Ruesp will do. Can you see well enough to walk?”
“Not yet, but the two of you could guide me,” she said.
“Yes, we can do that,” Chej said.
“I missed you, Husband,” she said. “I am glad you’re not dead.”
“He isn’t safe yet,” the old man said. “The Emperor has ordered his execution. He cannot stay in the fortress. He shouldn’t remain in the Empire. I tried to convince him to leave when it was possible, but he insisted on finding you first.” He sighed. “Things are in great disarray. But with all of this confusion, I think I can still get you out of the city.”
“Get Chej out of the city, by all means,” Yash said, taking a few tentative steps. “But I have more to do here.” She stopped. “Wait. Deng’jah.”
“What of him?” Chej asked.
“Pinion had him captive. In a glass jar on the table near his chair.”
“Wait,” Chej said. He took the lantern and searched around the corpse. He found the jar on the floor. Zu’s bow and arrows lay near it unscathed, although the quiver had been incinerated. The long demon-bone knife Yash has been so handy with earlier was there also, now lacking the leather wrapping its grip.
“It’s shattered,” he told her. “I don’t see the bug. But I have your weapons.”
Her eyebrows lifted, and Yash held out her hands. He handed them to her and watched as she examined them by touch. She felt the weight of them then nodded and reached the bow and arrows toward Chej.
“You should take these until I can see again,” she said. “You know how to shoot a bow, I imagine?”
“Yes,” Chej said, taking them. Yash kept the knife. “I’m sorry about your bug.”
“Deng’jah?” she asked. “I doubt he’s dead. I don’t know if he can die. He can take care of himself. But I feel…” She frowned and turned slowly in a circle. “I feel as if I missed something.” Her eyebrows lifted. “Oh, wait. Do you feel that?”
At first, Chej didn’t know what she was talking about. But then the stone of the tower trembled beneath his feet. It stopped. Then, after a short pause, it happened again, stronger this time.
“Yes,” he said. “What is that?”
“Run,” Yash said. “We must run.”
They made it to the stairwell and then to the next landing before the tower quaked so violently that Chej lost his footing and tumbled painfully. He let go of Yash’s hand to protect his head.
When he looked back up he saw Yash and Ruesp above him. They had fallen, too. He had dropped the lantern, and it was broken, spreading a puddle of fire on the stone that was dripping in blazing cataracts down the stairs. The fire struggled, though, as water spattered onto it from above. In the same moment Chej realized he was wet and getting wetter. And cold. Somehow, rain was pounding down on him.
Then he understood. The top of the tower—including the room they had just been in—was gone. Lightning lit the clouds above from within and, against that, a shadow moved, coming toward them. It was huge, like the sky falling.
But then lightning flashed, and a face appeared, filling most of what he could see of the sky: an inhuman visage of stone covered in flower-shaped jewels, its eyes lightless depths, its mouth yawned open to reveal bristling teeth of sharpened agate, quartz, obsidian, jade, coral, garnet. It loomed above the tower, and now a hand reached into the broken tower, the smallest finger as long as he was tall.
“Run, I said,” Yash yelled, taking his hand and grabbing Ruesp’s with the other.