Freed for a moment from the exposition, Carnelian regarded the Grand Sapient. Even through the conduit of the homunculus, Carnelian could clearly sense how deep had been the incomprehension of the Wise. He remembered the ancients they had lost in the Iron House. He had glimpsed the trauma of their loss.
Tribute’s fingers came back to life around the neck of the homunculus. ‘When you survived, we realized that, in spite of what our calculations insisted, you must be, somehow, the key disturbing factor. It was at that juncture we panicked and made the clumsy attempt on your life.’
Carnelian sensed how much this Grand Sapient recoiled from that action, but only because it was such an inelegant, unconsidered impulse.
‘Having recast our calculations, taking into account your true birth, everything at last makes sense. High-blood birth on the chaotic cusp incident on a God Emperor’s death is a powerful enough input, but when combined with that of twins spanning a fault line, the consequences are catastrophic. Even then, had we known, had we had time to prepare, we could have avoided the abyss. We could have arranged it so that you would have succeeded your father and, with the sacrifice of the twins at your Apotheosis, we should have certainly healed the rift with minimal perturbation to the Balance.’
Carnelian floundered in this glimpse of timelines and how the past might have been rewoven to so profoundly change the present.
‘But we believe, child, it is not too late. Though he whom the Gods protect none can harm, he has the power to harm himself if he wills it.’
Carnelian pondered this, his mind warring with his heart. He flinched when Tribute’s homunculus came towards him and put out his hand, upon which sat an orb. Reaching out, Carnelian took it. Felt its leathery skin, gazed at its crown of spikes. He brought the pomegranate up to his nose. With inhalation came memories of being a boy in a fabulous, forbidden garden. For a moment he was lost in that miraculous vision. When he looked up, the Grand Sapient and his homunculus had gone.
‘What’s happened?’ said Fern, alarmed. ‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’
‘Is everything all right outside?’ said Carnelian.
‘Shouldn’t it be?’
Carnelian could hardly believe that Tribute could have made it through his camp unseen. Though he remembered how easily the Wise could find their way through the perfect darkness of their Library and this place was as familiar to them.
The pomegranate was heavy in his hand. If it were not for that he could well imagine he had dreamed the visitation. Why had Tribute brought it? Perhaps, with its red juice, it was a symbol of sacrifice.
Morose, he stood between two commentary stones, his cowl pulled down as much against the rain as to hide his face, as he watched the barbarian tributaries pass. Earlier, it had been huimur caravans, their domed backs rising above leather panniers, each larger than a man, which Carnelian had known must be stuffed with the bronze coins that were the taxes from the cities of the Commonwealth. Among the plodding beasts had walked deputations from the cities, their skins painted in imitation of the Masters, wearing elaborate, garishly dyed weaves, bearing upon their heads hats of outlandish design. This finery aped the pomp of the Masters, but was, in comparison, pathetic pantomime.
He had spent another night disturbed by dreams. Whatever they had to tell him, he was no longer prepared to listen. He had woken enraged at the notion that he might be the plaything of some god. Which god?
A hand clasping his shoulder made him jerk round with shock at being touched; at being caught unmasked. He heaved a sigh of relief when he saw it was only Fern.
‘I’ve done everything as you asked.’
Carnelian had delegated to him the task of bringing in the tributaries. Not only had he been in no mood to do it himself, but also he had thought it a good opportunity to let Fern sit in a command chair. In the outer world, Fern was going to be his lieutenant.
‘Everyone’s in.’ Fern waved his hand in the direction of the Forbidden Door, though it and the Black Field were hidden behind the standing stones. ‘The dragons are arranged down both sides. I left them with clear instructions that under no circumstances whatsoever are they to light their pipes, nor move their dragons out of position.’
Carnelian thanked him, then both turned to watch the people filing past. Sodden, dragging their feet, women and old men, faces set against suffering, leading by the hands or carrying countless numbers of miserable, scared flesh-tithe children.
They stood watching the children until night fell, then they returned to their camp. Carnelian’s voice sounded very loud when he ordered his people to stow everything for the journey into the Labyrinth. They set to it as if at a funeral. Through the darkness came the endless scuffling of the marching tributaries.
As Carnelian led them south-west, out of the Dance, he lifted his hand to touch the lefthand stone. Cold under his fingers, he stroked a worn pomegranate as if for luck. He frowned, remembering the fruit Tribute had brought him, his thoughts tinged by the dread in his dreams.
When they reached the outer ring, he gazed out. The terraces and windows of the Halls of Rebirth formed gashes and spots of jewelled light making the wall of the Plain there seem a window into a starry sky. Below lay the Black Field, its front edge twinkling with fires like a stopping place, its rear two-thirds in dense darkness. Shuffling towards this was a flood of shadowy heads.
With his back to the Forbidden Door, Carnelian gazed over the Black Field. Its nearest portion, lit by thousands of campfires, was made to appear a vast pebbled beach by the backs of the huimur. Beyond, squatting in the darkness, were the barbarians and their children spending one last night together without even the cheer of a fire. How long had he and Fern and his people had to wait for them to scuffle past? Long enough for hearts to grow heavy as stones, and legs to grow unsteady. Carnelian had made an attempt to have his people sit and wait it out but when he and Fern stayed standing so did they. When, at last, that miserable procession had ceased, they had followed the stragglers round, walking on the carpet of blue flames ammonites laid before them. They had skirted the Black Field with its sea of heads walled in by dragons, had endured the murmurous fear, the cries of the children, the weeping, the moaning bleak comfort of their mothers. Down the whole long side of that crowd they had walked, between the dragons and the Cages of the Tithe until, at last, beneath the malevolent gaze of the colossi, they had reached the Forbidden Door.
Carnelian turned from the outer darkness to regard the black maw of the Labyrinth tunnel with loathing, then, taking Fern’s hand, he led his people into its throat.
APOTHEOSIS
Fire from heaven
Shatters even the sky.
In the centre of the vast bed, Carnelian and Fern clung to each other like survivors of a shipwreck. They might as well have been upon a raft afloat on a dark, forbidding ocean. Having passed through gates and antechambers they had been glad finally to be able to close themselves away in this echoing chamber.
Carnelian stared blindly past Fern’s shoulder into the darkness. He was remembering their long journey from the Forbidden Door, carrying in their hearts the misery they had left behind. Then that blinking emergence into a world of light. A miraculous field of stars spread away into the remote glooms of the Labyrinth by myriad lamps. Glowing pavilions hung from the columns like morning-dewed webs. He had recognized this as another Encampment of the Seraphim, though grander than the one he had witnessed in the Halls of Thunder. Indeed it resembled a stopping place, seen from afar, but if so, one made by angels descending from a midnight sky. Carnelian had seen how awestruck Fern was, how his people gaped who had never beheld such a spectacle before. When the Quenthas elected to lead them instead of the Ichorian guides, they had followed the sisters as if in a dream.