Here in Sanctuary she was the only one who knew the whole dance but had not yet performed it for the god. Seylalha guessed that this year would be her year the one fateful night in her constricted life. They thought she didn't know what the dance was. They thought she performed it out of fear for the bitter-faced women with their leather-bound clatter-sticks. But in her tribe nine-year-olds were considered of marriageable age, and a seduction was a seduction regardless of the language.
Seylalha had reasoned, as well, that if she did not want to become one of those mutilated women who had trained and taught her she'd best get a child from her bedding with the god. Legend said Vashanka's unfulfilled desire was to have a child by his sister; Seylalha would oblige the god in exchange for her freedom. The Ten-Slaying was a new-moon feast; she bled at the full-moon. If the god were man-like after the fashion of her clan-brothers, she would conceive.
She knelt on the soft bed-cushions they provided her, rocking back and forth until tears flowed down her face; silent tears lest her guardians hear and force a drugged potion down her throat. Calling on the sungod, the moongod, the god who tended the herds in the night and every other shadowy demon she could remember from the days before the slave-pens, Seylalha repeated her prayers: 'Let me conceive. Let me bear the god's child. Let me live! K-eep me from becoming one of themF
In the distance, beyond walls and locked door, she could hear her less fortunate sisters speaking to each other on their tambours, lyres, pipes and clatter sticks. They'd danced their dance and lost their tongues; their wombs were filled with bile. Their music was a mournful, bitter dirge - it told her fate if she did not bear a child.
As the tears dried she arched her back until her forehead rested on the soft mass of her hair beneath her. Then, in rhythm to the distant conversation, she began her dance again.
3
Molin paced around the marble-topped table he had brought with him from the capital. The mute who always attended him hid in the far corners of the room. Molin's wrath had touched him three times and it was not yet high-noon.
The injustice, the indignity of being the supreme priest of Vashanka in a sink hole like Sanctuary. Construction lagged on the temple: inept crews, unforeseen accidents, horrendous omens. The old Ilsig hierarchy gloated and collected the citizenry's irregular tithes. The Imperial entourage was cramped into inadequate quarters that shoved his household together. He was actually sharing rooms with his wife - a situation neither of them had ever desired and could no longer tolerate. The Prince was an idealist, an unmarried idealist, whose belief in the bliss of that inconvenient state was exceeded only by his nai'vety with regard to statecraft. It was difficult not to enjoy the Prince's company, however, despite his manifold shortcomings. He had the proper breeding for a useless younger son, and only the worst of fates had brought him so perilously close to the throne that he must be sent so depressingly far from it.
In Ranke, Molin had a fine house - as well as rooms within the temple. Rare flowers bloomed in his heated gardens; a waterfall coursed down one interior wall of the temple drowning out the street-noises and casting rainbows across this very table when it had resided in his audience chambers. Where had he gone wrong? Now he had a tiny room with one window looking out to an air shaft that must have sunk in the cesspools of hell itself and another one, the larger of the two, overlooking the gallows. Moreover, the Hounds were elsewhere this morning and yesterday's corpses still creaked in the breeze.
Injustice! Indignity! And so, of course, he must clothe himself in the majesty of his position as Vashanka's loyal and duly initiated priest. Kadakithis must find his way to these forsaken quarters and endure them as the priests did if Molin was to acquire better lodgings. The Prince was late - no doubt he'd got lost.
'My Lord Molin?' a cheerful voice called from the antechamber. 'My Lord Molin? Are you here?'
'I am, my Prince.'
Molin gestured to the mute who poured two goblets of fruit tea as the Prince entered the room.
'My Lord Molin, your messenger said you wished to see me urgently on matters concerning Vashanka? This must be true, isn't it, or you wouldn't have called me all the way out here. Where are we? No matter. Are there problems with the temple again? I've told Zaibar to see to it that the conscripts perform their duties...'
'No, my Prince, there are no new problems with the temple, and I have turned all those matters over to the Hounds, as you suggested. We are, by the way, in the outer wall of your palace -just upwind of the gallows. You can see them through the window - if you'd like.'
The Prince preferred to sip his tea.
'My purpose in summoning you, my Prince, has to do with the upcoming commemoration of the Ten-Slaying to take place at the new-moon. I wished certain privacy and discretion which, frankly, is not available in your own quarters.'
If the Prince was offended by Molin's insinuations he did not reveal it. 'Do I have special duties then?' he asked eagerly.
Molin, sensing the lad's excitement, pressed his case all the harder. 'Extremely special ones, my Prince; ones not even your distinguished late Father, the Emperor, was honoured to perform. As you are no doubt aware, Vashanka mayHisnamebe-praised - has concerned Himself rather personally in the affairs of this city of late. My augurists report that on no less than three separate occasions since your arrival in this accursed place His power has been successfully invoked by one not of the temple hierarchy.'
The Prince set down his goblet. 'You know of these things?' he asked with open -faced incredulity. 'You can tell when the god's used His power?'
'Yes, my Prince,' Molin answered calmly. 'That is the general purpose of our hierarchy. Working through the mandated rituals and in partnership with our God we incline Vashanka's blessings towards the loyal, righteous upholders of tradition, and direct His wrath towards those who would deny or harm the Empire.'
'I know of no traitors ...'
'... And neither do I, my Prince,' Molin said, though he had his suspicions, 'but I do know that our God, Vashanka - may-Hisnamebepraised - is showing His face with increasing fre-• quency and devastating effect in this town.'
'Isn't that what he's supposed to do?'
It was difficult to believe that the vigorous Imperial household had produced so dense an heir; at such times as this Molin almost believed the rumours that circulated around the Prince. Some said that he was at least as clever and ambitious as his brother's advisers feared; Kadakithis was deliberately botching this gubernatorial appointment so he would have to be returned to the capital before the Empire faced rebellion. Unfortunately, Sanctuary was more than equal to the most artfully contrived incompetence.
'My Prince,' Molin began again, snapping his fingers to the mute who immediately pushed a great-chair forward for the Prince to sit in. This was going to take longer than anticipated. 'My Prince - a god, shall we say any god but most especially our own god Vashanka - mayHisnamebepraised - is an awesomely powerful being who, even though He may beget mortal children on willing or unwilling women, is quite unlike a mortal man.
'A mere man who runs rampant in the streets with his sword drawn and shouting sedition would be an easy matter for the Hounds to control - assuming, of course, they even noticed him in this town ...'