“Sajur Panggang and his little friend Rudyard Planck…”
(A few snickers: Âziz’s dislike of the puppeteer was well known.)
“Kasim Havid, the ambassador from the Medaïn Desert…”
Kasim tried his best to smile; like the other ambassadors he had been hostage in Araboth for a dozen years or more.
“… even several guests who are strangers to my sister and myself.” Âziz’s voice rose sharply. Ceryl cowered, pulling Rudyard Planck’s cape up to her chest.
Nike beamed groggily around the circle as Âziz explained, “My sister’s trusted augur Echion has informed us that we have a new mantic here tonight, a visitor from the lower levels.”
Murmurings from the guests. An untried hermaphrodite was always a minor occasion. Ceryl shut her eyes. This was it, then. She thought of her dead lover Giton, of her failed effort at timoring. She should have been kinder to the morphodite; she should have killed her immediately.
But maybe this would be one of those inquisitions you heard about, where everything was wonderful, and Nike and Âziz would be so taken with Reive they would take her into their private cabal of mantics, and Ceryl could disappear on Dominations among the vivariums, this time forever. It was such a pleasant thought that she never wanted to open her eyes again, but of course she did. Rudyard Planck was staring at her, his blue eyes wide with concern. He cocked a thumb to where Reive crouched beside Echion, looking as though she wanted to bolt.
“She’s never been here before, has she?”
Ceryl nodded miserably at his hoarse whisper. The dwarf swore. “They’ll eat her alive. Who’s the fat toad with her?”
“Echion,” Ceryl whispered. The dwarf nodded.
“That’s right—damn her, one of Nike’s panderers—”
From across the circle came several indignant ssshhes. Âziz raised her head and frowned slightly. The dwarf fell silent.
Nike began speaking, her husky voice slurred.
“Delightful… see all these familiar faces… most important… dreams during this time…” Her head fell forward. At her side, the serving girl anxiously snapped a candicaine pipette in two and waved the pieces beneath the margravine’s nose. Nike started, let out a long whoosh of breath, and turned to her sister.
“Âziz?” Nike furrowed her brows. “Um—is there something…?”
Âziz sighed and let the Aviator’s heavy coat drop back from her shoulders. “As my sister was saying,” she began in a ritual fashion, “our dreams are especially important during Æstival Tide, when the world Outside encroaches so closely upon our own. We are blessed here in Araboth to have dream-mantics of great subtlety and perception, to help us chart those dangerous territories we sometimes plumb in our sleep.”
Nike nodded happily at her sister’s words. Âziz glanced at her and said, “Nike? Would you care to go first?”
“Me?” Nike tittered, then shook her head. “I am afraid—dreams—can’t recall—”
“Of course not, you sotty cow,” hissed Rudyard Planck. Ceryl stared fixedly at the margravines, ignoring angry stares and whispers of “Shame!” and “Heed the margravine!”
Âziz’s expression seemed to align her with the dwarf in this matter. She turned from Nike, just as Sajur Panggang suggested, “Perhaps the margravine Âziz would share with us her dreams?”
Âziz shook her head. Her face looked drawn as she said coldly, “I prefer to keep my dreams to myself for the moment.”
There was silence all around the circle.
Ceryl’s heart began to pound. This was the part of the inquisitions that she most hated. Either some eager volunteer would call out her dream—actors and artists in particular were prone to such reckless folly—or else the margravines would choose someone at random. Ceryl tried to compose her face into a disinterested mask, as if to show that her dreams were reassuringly commonplace. She let her eyes focus on Âziz’s left shoulder, to indicate she had nothing to hide from the margravines; but then, horrors! Âziz seemed to find this interesting. The margravine’s eyes narrowed, she leaned forward, staring directly at Ceryl, and said, “Now, you there—Shiyung’s healer—”
But then another voice sounded, softer than the margravine’s but no less commanding. “I would have my dream read.”
The voice was so low that for a moment the terrified Ceryl thought she had willed it into being; but then she saw Âziz turn slowly to the dark figure at her side.
“Of course, Margalis.”
The soft voice went on, “I’m not sure of the protocol, I’ve been away so long….”
He stood and walked to the center of the circle, which was not the Way it was done at all. But not even Âziz motioned for him to sit again; others in the circle bowed their heads or looked nervously at the margravines. Across the room Reive glanced around cautiously, unsure of what was happening.
Ceryl could not look away from the Aviator. Within his seamless face his eyes gaped black and ragged, the pale irises swallowed by the dim light. Ceryl swallowed, feeling faint. Rudyard Planck murmured something reassuring and squeezed her knee. More than anything, she wished not to hear this thing’s dream. But already the rasa was speaking.
“I dreamed I stood in a great pit…” he began. His voice was so low that everyone in the circle moved forward to hear him, as though huddling around a fire in the darkness. “It was night, and there were scorched clouds running through the sky. All around me were flames. At my feet were the bodies of children, contorted into horrible shapes—they were children I had slain—and the ruins of machinery. There was a wind blowing, a very cold wind. I could feel it picking through my clothes, it was the kind of wind that gets into your bones, and I felt it inside me, as though my ribs might crack from the cold.
“Then I looked up, and for a moment the clouds broke, and I could see the stars. Who knows?—perhaps I might have seen the pallid lights of HORUS, or the ruins of my own command station, if only I had known where to look. But it had been a very long time since I had seen the sky, and I no longer recalled the configurations of the stars. I gazed up there for a very long time.
“When I looked down again the bodies of the children seemed so small to me, so—fragile. And suddenly the horror of where and what I was overwhelmed me and I began to weep, knowing I had murdered them. And then I woke. And when I woke I wanted to weep still, but I could not. And that was when I knew it was only a dream. Because you see, I had dreamed that I was a man.
“And, of course, I am no longer a man. But when will I be rid of this dream?”
His voice rose when he began to speak of the stars, and when he said But when will I be rid of this dream? the words came in a sort of brazen shriek, like the clamor of some great engine grinding against stone. Ceryl shivered, while beside her Rudyard Planck covered his ears. Tatsun Frizer whispered the names of Blessed Narouz. Reive sat bolt upright, her eyes wide as though bewitched. Âziz stared resolutely at the floor.
Only Nike seemed unperturbed. Without a word she held out a hand to her white-faced serving girl, who gave her a candicaine pipette. The margravine snapped it and inhaled. She shook her head, as though snow still clung to her hair.
“Well, isn’t that interesting,” she began, when another voice cut her off.
“This is not a true dream,” the voice said, clear as a child’s.
Oh, god, no, thought Ceryl.
You never accused someone of lying at an inquisition.
Tatsun Frizer pawed at Ceryl’s knee. “Isn’t that your little friend? ” she whispered in disbelief. Ceryl pushed her away and watched, horrified, as the gynander walked into the circle.
“No?” The Aviator’s terrible eyes fixed on her.