Karl could not keep the bitterness from his voice. “That gives me great solace.”
If ca’Rudka heard the sarcasm in Karl’s voice, he didn’t respond to it. “You Numetodo don’t understand what it is to obey,” he answered.
Ca’Rudka said it without heat, without any apparent passion at all.
“You believe what you each please. You’re like wild horses. Despite any power you might have, you’re useless because you don’t understand the bridle and the bit.” The commandant moved to the window of the cell, looking out toward the city. “It’s obedience to a higher authority that created everything you see out there, Envoy. All of it. All of Nessantico, all of the greater Holdings. Without obedience-to Cenzi, to the Divolonte, to the laws of the Kralji, to the rules of society-there’s nothing but chaos.”
“Were you born here, Commandant? In the city, I mean?”
The man glanced back over his shoulder at Karl. “I was,” he said.
“You’ve never been elsewhere?”
“I served in the Garde Civile when I was young. I saw war along the frontier of East Magyaria, when the Cabasan of Daritria crossed the Gereshki with his army in violation of the Treaty of Otavi.” He touched his silver nose. “I lost my real one there, in a stupid quarrel with one of our own men. Afterward, I came back here a chevaritt, with a recommendation from my superiors, and joined the Garde Kralji.”
“You’ve never been to the western borders? Never crossed the Strettosei to Hellin or the Isle of Paeti?” Ca’Rudka shook his head. “If you had,” Karl continued, “you might understand. Ah, the Isle. . There’s not a greener, more lush and more varied country in the world. And there, Commandant, where a dozen cultures have come and gone, we
understand that ‘different’ isn’t a synonym for ‘wrong.’ There are many ways to learning the truth of how the world works, Commandant. The Concenzia Faith is just one. It’s just not the one, not the only way. I have seen things. .” He stopped, shaking his head. The motion rattled the chains around his hands and caused the guards to glance into the cell again. “You would probably have me flayed for telling you,” he said.
Ca’Rudka had turned back into the room, leaning against the wall by the balcony. “If I wanted to flay you, Vajiki, I would have already done it, and for less provocation. Tell me.”
Karl licked his lips. “My parents lived on the eastern coast of the Isle. They were of the Faith, and they brought me up to believe in Cenzi. They read the Toustour to me; they followed the precepts of the Divolonte. When I became a young man, though, I had the wanderlust and I traveled with a company of traders beyond the Isle to what you call the Westlands, past the green mountains on the borders of Hellin. That trip opened my eyes and my mind. There, out in a flat plain of grasses that stretched like a waving ocean from horizon to horizon, I saw a city that could have easily held three Nessanticos, grand and glorious, with enormous buildings like stepped mountains on top of which their priests held their ceremonies, with buildings of cut stone that gleamed in the sun, while canals glittered with sweet water alongside avenues wider than the Avi. The people there wore clothing of a fabric I’d never seen before, bright and smooth to the touch, a cloth that let the breezes flow through to keep you cool in the heat. And at night-Commandant, the city glowed with mage-fire brighter than the Avi. They used your Ilmodo, too, though they didn’t call it either ‘Ilmodo’ or ‘Scath Cumhacht,’ nor did they worship Cenzi, who they considered just another god among many. But they could shape the
Second World as well as any of the teni. That, Commandant, is when my own faith began to waver.”
“Perhaps it was a test,” ca’Rudka answered without emotion. “One that you failed.”
“That’s what the teni on the Isle told me later.” Karl shrugged.
“The traders I traveled with said that there were even greater cities, farther west and south, all the way to the shore of the Western Sea two hundred days’ or more march from where we were. They said
that they were part of an empire larger, richer, and more powerful than the Holdings. I don’t necessarily believe those stories-I know as well as you that travelers’ tales grow with each telling, and that it’s our nature to make ourselves sound more like great adventurers than simple tourists. But this city. . I saw it with these eyes, and I’ve never seen its like anywhere else. I know this, Commandant: there are more mysteries in this world than the Concenzia Faith will allow you to believe.”
Ca’Rudka smiled indulgently at the long speech. “Sometimes, to young eyes, the small looks larger than it is. I would think that if such a great empire exists beyond the Hellin Mountains, we would have met its armies or at least its envoys when we came to the Hellins. I may not have been there myself, but I met the Governor of the Hellins when he was last in Nessantico, and he said that the natives there were little more than savages.”
“He sees them with the wrong eyes, then,” Karl answered. “Like looking through the stained glass of the temple, he doesn’t see the true colors beyond.”
“And you do? I find that rather arrogant, Envoy ci’Vliomani. It surprises me to find that quality in you.”
“We all have colored glass through which we view the world, Commandant,” Karl answered. “Our society and our upbringing and our
experiences place the glass before us, with the Numetodo no less than the Concenzia Faith. I don’t deny that. But I think we Numetodo have more shades of color from which to choose and that, as a result, we are closer to the truth.”
Ca’Rudka laughed again, though this time the guards remained quiet. “You are a fascinating creature, Envoy ci’Vliomani.” He took a long breath. “I enjoy listening to you, and no doubt we’ll have ample opportunity to continue our conversation. But for now. .” He picked up the silencer from the table, its metal buckles jangling. The taste of foul leather filled Karl’s mouth, just seeing it.
“Commandant, I will give you my word. .”
“And I would accept it,” ca’Rudka answered before Karl finished.
The silencer swayed in his hand. “The Kraljiki will want a confession from the Kraljica’s assassin. Are you prepared to give that to him, Envoy?”
“I can’t confess to what I didn’t do,” Karl answered, and ca’Rudka smiled at that, with the indulgent expression of an adult listening to a young child.
“Can’t?” he said. “I’m afraid that happens all the time here in the Bastida, Envoy. I think you might be surprised what a person would be willing to admit under the right encouragement. Why, give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, and I could find something in them to have him hanged.”
Karl’s breath vanished. He felt suddenly cold. “Open your mouth, Envoy,” ca’Rudka said. “I promise you that I’ll be back tomorrow, and each day until the Kraljiki tells me what I must do with you, and as long as you give me your word, I’ll take the silencer from you so we can talk more. I will cherish those times, truly. Now. . I need you to open your mouth, or I will have the gardai come in and put on the silencer in their own fashion. Which would you prefer?”
There was nothing but despair in Karl’s heart now. He knew he would die here, and he knew that there was nothing he could do except make that death as painless as possible. Karl opened his mouth and allowed ca’Rudka to buckle the device to his head. He felt tears forming as ca’Rudka stepped behind him to tighten the straps, and he forced them back, blinking hard.
Sergei ca’Rudka
“Commandant, I wish to see Karl ci’Vliomani.”
Sergei straightened the inkwell on his desk, arranging the quills in their holder. Then he looked again at the young woman in front of him, wearing the green robes of the teni. “I find that I’m surprised you would make such a request, O’Teni cu’Seranta, especially given that you were with the Numetodo when I arrested him.” He raised his eyebrows. “I doubt that the Archigos would be pleased to find you here after that coincidence.”