If he thought that freeing it from its prison was a dangerous idea, then might he not blame Siemhouk for pursuing the undead mercenary’s story with such fervor? Better, perhaps, to wait until the city was found, and they knew if the demon yet lived, before taking steps either way.
“Why would you tell him?” she asked, the very picture of naive innocence.
“Because it’s something he should know. But I don’t have to. I know you have a reason for sending Kadya on the expedition. I even understand it. All I want is for you to share the rewards, be they gold or good feelings.”
“And if I don’t, you’ll tell Father about this Tallik?”
“That’s correct,” Dhojakt said.
“Go ahead. Let me know what he says.” She had made the calculation that, with permission granted, Dhojakt would never tell their father. He would think that she wasn’t concerned about Nibenay finding out, so there was a better angle for him in keeping it quiet.
Dhojakt rubbed his shaved head with one of those oddly human hands. “I think I’ll wait,” he said. “Perhaps there’s no need for Father to know just yet.”
“I could tell him …” Siemhouk offered.
“That surely will not be necessary,” her brother said. “When the time is right, I’ll let him know. Until then … well, why trouble him? We don’t even know if this Tallik is alive or dead. And if alive, if he yet possesses any power whatsoever. No, let’s hold off, for now.”
“As you wish, brother.”
Dhojakt started to turn around, a process that took his ungainly body a considerable amount of space and time. “As always, dear sister, visiting with you has been a pleasure and an enlightenment.”
“And the same to you, Dhojakt,” Siemhouk said, inordinately pleased to see the last of him. “Do come back whenever you’ve a mind to.”
Djena paced about the Council Chambers at the Temple of the King’s Law, running her hands through her gray hair, aggravated beyond belief at some of her templar wives. Wives loyal to her sat in thronelike chairs similar to the ones high consorts used at Council meetings.
“Of course we have spies in the caravan!” she said, at a level barely below a scream. “I’m positive every high consort has spies in the caravan. What I haven’t seen is any useful information.”
“What is it you need to know?” Lijana asked. She was one of Djena’s oldest allies, a woman who had become a wife just a couple of years after Djena and understood early on that Djena’s route to power in the king’s court could not be denied. She had been right—Djena had walked over the bodies of dozens of other wives to get where she was. Some of those bodies had been figurative, others quite literal. The High Consort of the King’s Law was the most powerful person in the city-state, second only to their husband himself, and so that position became Djena’s goal.
At the time, Siemhouk had not yet been born. No one could have known the king’s daughter would overturn his rigidly organized hierarchy.
“I need to know what Kadya has in mind. I’m certain she’s talking with Siemhouk. But Siemhouk is already more powerful than me, so what does she stand to gain? And what has she promised Kadya? My position?”
“She couldn’t possibly,” Pasumi said. Pasumi was young, beautiful, and Djena knew that to underestimate her ruthlessness would be a disastrous error. She had drawn Pasumi into her confidence because she recognized in the stunning new wife a kindred spirit, someone she wanted to keep a close eye on. Of all the templar wives brought into the family in the past five years, this was the one she most expected to make a play for her spot.
She never would have expected such a move from Kadya. From Siemhouk, though, anything was possible. If Siemhouk could replace her with Kadya, that would cement her control over the two most important temples, and therefore over most of the city-state. Her power would be almost on a level with Nibenay’s.
That was what she feared, and why she wanted a better conduit into the communication between Siemhouk and Kadya.
“She might, Pasumi,” Djena said. She stopped pacing, and shook out her hair. She must have looked a sight, like someone on the verge of a mental breakdown. She blew out a breath. “Don’t put anything past Siemhouk. She is my sister, my husband’s daughter, and I love her as I love life itself. But she is as ambitious a templar as has ever lived. I have achieved my goal, and attained a position from which I can help our land and its inhabitants. Someday I’ll be asked to stand down in favor of someone with new ideas. But that time is not now, and that person should not be Kadya. If we can’t find out what those two are saying to each other, though, then Kadya it may be. We need to know what Kadya reports to Siemhouk, and without waiting for Siemhouk herself to give us what are certainly very unfaithful adaptations of those reports.”
“What would you have us do, sister?” Lijana asked.
“Each of you knows someone on that expedition, I’d wager,” Djena said. “Make sure they’re sparing no effort at intercepting any communication between our beloved sisters Siemhouk and Kadya. And make sure that your allies here in Nibenay with experience in the Way are trying to glean the contents of those conversations on this end. We must know the truth about what they find, what they would do with it, and when it will return to Nibenay, and we must know it as soon as Siemhouk herself does. If we can’t, then I fear that all is lost.”
Djena plopped down into her usual seat, satisfied for the moment with her diatribe. She had overstated the case. There would still be time to react to whatever the expedition brought back, even after its arrival. But it would be more difficult then, the results of that reaction less certain. Forewarning was the best defense she could hope for. She had needed to throw a scare into her allies, to make sure they and their loyalists weren’t being lazy or duplicitous.
If Djena went down, they all did. That was the most important fact they had to bear in mind. Those who had tied themselves to Djena were all in trouble, if Siemhouk and Kadya were successful.
That couldn’t be allowed to happen.
IX
City Under the Sand
Aric and Ruhm rode inside an argosy, not because it was comfortable—the sun pounded on the armored roof and walls, and even with the open windows, Aric felt like they were riding inside his forge—but because Kadya had insisted, after the halfling attack, that he be kept as safe as possible. She pointed out that had he been inside an argosy in the first place, he would have been in little danger.
Aric tried to argue that he, in fact, killed some of the attackers. She countered that she’d had to drive off the halflings using magic, for which many no doubt resented her, and if it hadn’t been for that magic then Aric—and everyone else—would quite possibly be dead already.
So he was stuck.
The caravan cut across open desert, and since leaving the road the jouncing, jostling ride had been more pronounced than ever. He had to hold onto the bench or put a hand against the argosy’s wall to steady himself each time the wheels rolled over a rock or uneven patch of ground, or let his spine be painfully jarred. He and Ruhm and the others in the argosy, mostly slaves who chose to ride in order to save their strength for the difficult tasks ahead, weren’t talking much. The constant chatter and joking that had marked the earlier part of the trip was gone, and a new mood had taken over. People were tense, mourning the dead but even more concerned that they not follow their comrades into the grave.