Carnelian looked over the edge of the stair to the floor with its retainers. They must all be of Aurum’s household. He spotted some distant doors. ‘Is that the way out of the sanctum?’
The quaestor’s mask came up. ‘It is, Seraph.’
Continuing his descent, Carnelian heard the quaestor creeping after him. When he reached the ground, he moved off along an avenue flanked by kneeling guardsmen. Beyond them he glimpsed small shapes in the shadows. He was halfway to the door when he realized they must all be children. He became uneasy, feeling as if half the flesh tithe was prostrate around him. Was it possible Aurum’s household consisted almost entirely of children?
As he reached the doors, they clanked apart. Through them he saw the structures of the fortress wavering in the haze. He could make out the high wall of the cothon and the city itself, looking as if it were made of sand, verminous with windows, spired, tottering-towered. A hot breeze bore upon it scents, none of which lingered long enough for him to identify. A smell of life, though, that he longed to breathe free of the prison of his mask.
A shrill cry made him turn. The quaestor came scurrying towards him. ‘The Seraph cannot mean to walk?’
‘Can I not?’
Carnelian followed a paved gully. Ribbed limestone rose up on either side, pierced with gates and slits. The echoes of his footsteps combined with those of the quaestor’s. No tyadra stood guard upon the gates. The rings on either side held no heraldic banner poles. The place felt desolate, abandoned, but he was certain that beyond those pale walls must lurk the households the Masters had left behind when they went on campaign with Aurum. He had the uncanny feeling that, through each slit, eyes were watching his progress.
The quaestor several times attempted to lecture him about the Law and its demands. Carnelian knew that, however much he resented these, it had too often been others who had had to pay for his defiance. Moreover, it would be foolish to ignore its edicts, however distasteful, where doing so might diminish his status and thus weaken what little power he had. So, by the time they reached the purgatory door, he was ready to submit to the full ritual protection. As ammonites disrobed him and began inscribing his skin, he told himself that whosoever the visitors might turn out to be, he was determined he would not return to Aurum’s tower with its household of children. If there were no alternative, he would quit the fortress and return to the dragons and Osidian.
He had agreed to be carried to the cothon in a palanquin. First the quaestor had told him that there were no aquar for him to ride, then he had pointed out that it was too far to go wearing ranga. He wished he had not given in. The palanquin was turning out to be no faster than walking. All he had done was trade the exhaustion of tottering along on his ranga for imprisonment in this box, where there was nothing to do but fret about who the visitors might be, and why they had come. From time to time he peered out through a grille in the hope of seeing that they had arrived but each time he was presented with what seemed an identical view of the crumbling city. Attempts to resolve its pale intricacies wearied his eyes. Depressingly, the only difference between one scene and the next was the shadows, which had lengthened so that he became anxious that it would be nightfall before he reached the cothon.
At last he began hearing a sound like distant sea. Straining, he managed to distinguish in the hubbub countless voices ghosted by echoes. As a hush descended he was able to hear the snuffling of aquar. His heart pounding, he put an eye to the grille. All there was to see was a wall of bronze that had to be one leaf of an open cothon gate. He could no longer bear to travel blind and tapped on the palanquin wall. As it settled to the ground he put on his mask and readied himself to confront whatever might lie outside.
Sliding open the door, he saw his bearers kneeling. Two ammonites placed his ranga on the cobbles, then, gathering his robe, he climbed out onto them. Cries shrilled around him as the ammonites gave commands. Rising to his full height, he turned. A shrouded crowd confronted him. Lepers. Though these were the visitors he had expected, he was still shocked. He had been so convinced he would never see them again. A forbidding bulk looming behind their tide turned his shock to alarm. A dragon, the bright, uneven cross of her horns turned on the Lepers. Earth-is-Strong, like a ship upon a grey sea. Almost he surged forward, shouting frantic commands to her crew that they must not open fire. The realization that her pipes were unlit brought a debilitating relief. The ammonites were still shrilling, motioning marumaga to advance on the Lepers. Tentatively, the legionaries approached the crowd who were, it seemed, determined to stand their ground.
‘They must abase themselves before the Master,’ one of the ammonites called out.
The legionaries menaced the Lepers, but their shrouded mass seemed uncowed. Fearing bloodshed Carnelian strode forward, commanding the legionaries to desist, making gestures towards the ammonites that silenced their haranguing. As the legionaries retreated, he saw it was only the first few ranks of the Lepers that had confronted them; the rest and major part of the crowd were mostly turned to face Earth-is-Strong – many of them still mounted. He glanced up to make sure the dragon’s pipes were still not lit. Then he noticed, with pleasure and relief, Sthax and the rest of his Marula to one side. He decided it was better not to get them involved, so located among the legionaries those whose stance emanated authority. ‘Attend me,’ he said, motioning them to approach. He scanned their collars and found the one he had hoped among them. ‘Quartermaster, send a command to that dragon that she is to withdraw to the other side of the cothon.’
‘As you command, Master.’ The Quartermaster bowed and sent one of his men hurrying away to do Carnelian’s bidding, then approached him, eyes cast down. Carnelian sensed he was about to be petitioned to make a decision as to what to do with this invasion. Uncertain, he turned away from the man and approached the Lepers, who recoiled from him. He put his hands up to stay them. ‘I would speak with your leaders.’
He could see no faces in their cowls, but sensed their fear. A few glanced back towards Earth-is-Strong. ‘I’ve given instructions that the dragon is to retreat. She’ll not harm you.’
The people before him stayed as they were, uneasy, afraid of the dragon, afraid of him. He wished he could remove his mask, climb down from his ranga, walk among them. There must be some there who would know him. Of course, such actions would be madness. Any who saw his naked face the Law would have destroyed.
It was only once Earth-is-Strong started moving away that the whole crowd began turning towards him. He noticed an eddying in their midst as someone came through them. The front ranks parted and two figures emerged. Carnelian’s heart leapt into his throat. Even shrouded as a Leper, he could tell by her size, by her gait, that one of them was Poppy. Both seemed very small as they came to stand before him. Carnelian gazed down at Poppy. When she looked up, her face appeared in the shadow of her cowl. He yearned for a smile of recognition, but her mouth was a line in a face tight with fear. It took a moment for him to realize it was not his face she was seeing, but an unhuman one wrought from gold. He felt trapped behind it. Everyone was waiting for him but, anxious about what effect his voice might have on Poppy, he was reluctant to speak. He turned his mask enough to see, on either side, ammonites, keepers of a merciless Law, as well as marumaga legionaries with cruelly hooked poles. The Lepers greatly outnumbered them, but they were, effectively, unarmed. Besides, if there were a riot, he might lose control of Earth-is-Strong. Still, he had to say something. ‘Why have you come?’
Poppy’s eyes widened as she stared up at him but, thankfully, she showed no other sign that she had recognized his voice.
It was the shrouded figure beside her who spoke. ‘We’ve come to honour the agreement we made with the Master Osidian.’ It was Lily.