The messenger continued to speak with the high templar for several moments. Tithian’s expression grew concerned, but Agis resisted the urge to expand his presence in his old friend’s mind. It was simply too risky.
When Tithian returned, he said, “My thanks for your offer, Agis, but my farm manager has been with me since I inherited the Mericles estate. He’s not as good as you, of course, but I have no need to boost my land income. I’m sure you understand. It would be a shame to put out a loyal retainer.”
Inside Tithian’s mind, Agis found his memory screen isolated by a vast plain of silent, white emptiness. Whatever the woman’s message, it had put the high templar on the alert, and he was now carefully suppressing his memories. For a moment, the noble worried that Tithian had somehow detected his presence, but realized this could not be. If that had happened, dozens of templars would be rushing to arrest him.
“I didn’t mean to imply that I would take your man’s place,” Agis said. “I intend to show him better ways-”
Tithian raised a silencing hand. “He’s quite touchy about his expertise,” the templar said, taking Agis’s arm and walking him toward the ziggurat. “I’ll have a young gladiator sent to your estate as a gift. He should keep the scavengers off your land.”
Agis locked eyes with the high templar. “This has nothing to do with your farm manager,” he said, changing approaches. “You just don’t trust me.”
As he spoke, he sent a black snake of guilt slithering across the empty plain around his probe. Soon, the noble saw a mountainous form looming on the horizon. It was a flat-topped pyramid with sides as black as night and as smooth as ice. With a start, Agis realized that the pyramid was something Tithian had seen recently, something that weighed heavily on his mind.
Glassy black balls began rolling off the pyramid, threatening to crush the snake-probe. Grimacing at the energy it required, Agis attached wings to his serpent, and it lifted off the white plain. For a moment he wondered if the avalanche had been a counterattack from Tithian. When the balls reached the bottom of the pyramid, however, they kept going without regard for the fact that they had missed him. A black shaft appeared in the plain, and the balls rolled into it. Agis dropped his winged snake closer and saw that the hole was lined by obsidian bricks.
A boiling mass of memory came shooting out of the shaft. Agis found himself staring into the sunken black eyes of a small, haggard man wearing a golden diadem-Kalak. Fearing Tithian had lured him into a trap, Agis turned his probe away and flapped its wings with all of his flagging strength.
The snake started to carry him out of Tithian’s mind, but the noble paused when Kalak’s voice spoke in a conversational tone. “You saw the shaft in my tunnel?”
Agis turned his probe in the pyramid’s direction. He saw the king’s shriveled form standing next to the obsidian structure. Kalak ran his gnarled fingers over the glassy surface, his eyes fixed on Tithian, who now stood before him. It was not a trap, but another memory.
Tithian nodded. “Yes, my king.”
“Good. During the games commemorating the completion of the ziggurat, you must place the obsidian pyramid over the shaft you passed, but only when the last match of the day begins,” Kalak said. “Make it look like part of the contest.”
“What about the throne and the balls?” Tithian asked. “Should I place them in the arena as well, Mighty One.”
“No!” Kalak hissed, scowling as though he would kill the high templar. “Don’t touch anything else. The globes and the throne stay with me!”
“As you command,” Tithian replied. “Forgive me for asking. Is there anything else?”
Kalak nodded. “When the last game begins, I want you to lock all the gates to my stadium.”
“Until when?”
“Don’t worry about opening them-”
In the memory, Kalak’s form stopped speaking in midsentence and faded away. Tithian faced Agis’s flying snake, then the black pyramid rose off the white plain and sailed toward him. Now completely certain that the high templar had discovered his presence, Agis changed his snake to an arrow and shot across Tithian’s mind like a bolt of lightning.
An instant later, he broke contact with the high templar.
“A man in my position can trust no one, not even his friends,” Tithian said, continuing the conversation where it had left off only a moment earlier.
Agis was in no condition to follow Tithian’s words, for he had all but exhausted himself inside the high templar’s mind. He stumbled and nearly fell, then felt his friend gripping his arm to prevent him from tumbling into the seats below.
“Easy,” Tithian said. “I wouldn’t want you to fall.”
Agis blinked several times. “Thanks for your concern,” he said, only a little sarcastically. When he glanced to both his right and left, he saw no sign of the guards he had expected the high templar to summon.
“Why aren’t you arresting me?” Agis demanded, still leaning against the wall ringing the terrace.
“Why should I?” Tithian asked, giving Agis a forbearing smile. The templar pulled the noble away from the wall, then gently turned him so that he faced the immense ziggurat. “Tell me, Agis, why do you suppose Kalak is having that thing constructed?”
“You’re the one who’s building it,” Agis said bitterly, recalling all his slaves whom the high templar had confiscated. “You tell me.”
Tithian shrugged. “If I knew, I would,” he said warmly. “The king hasn’t even told me what it’s for. I’ve shown you all that I know, and frankly, it scares me.”
Agis rolled his weary eyes. “Save your pathos for someone else,” he said. “I know you better than that. The only life you’re concerned with is your own.”
“Even to me, the possibilities of what Kalak’s plan might mean are horrifying. What does he need forty-thousand people locked in a stadium for?” Tithian countered. “Of course, if I wasn’t going to be one of the forty-thousand, it might be less horrifying, but that’s hardly relevant. I’m in this along with everyone else.”
Agis frowned. “What are you saying?”
Tithian raised his brow in a satiric look. “I think you’re intelligent enough to figure it out-and if not you, then certainly your friends who do not like to show their true faces in public.”
Though he was shocked to discover that Tithian knew of his tentative association with Veiled Alliance, he tried not to show his surprise. “Assuming I do know someone who might be interested in Kalak’s plans, why did you show me the pyramid, and why do you want the king’s enemies to find out about it?”
Tithian took Agis’s arm. “I want to survive,” the high templar said, guiding the noble toward an exit. “To do that, two things must happen. First, Those Who Wear the Veil must tell me where they hid their amulets. If I don’t find the last one soon, Kalak will kill me. Second, they must stop whatever the king has planned for the games. I’m going to be there, too. I’ve seen no reason to think he intends to spare his high templars.”
“And what will you do in return?”
“Anything I can without getting myself killed,” Tithian answered. “To start with, I’ll allow Sadira to speak with my slave, Rikus-but only after I’ve recovered the amulets.”
Agis stumbled. Though it was difficult, he refrained from asking how Tithian knew of Sadira. Obviously the high templar had a spy-either close to him or high in the ranks of the Alliance.
“Apparently you’re still fatigued from the exercise of your powers,” the high templar said, chuckling at Agis’s clumsiness. He paused at the gate through which the noble had entered the stadium. “Would you like to use my litter for the trip home?”
“No offense,” Agis said, “but I’d rather crawl on my hands and knees.”
As the noble stepped into the tunnel, Tithian caught him by the arm. “By the way, there’s one thing you should know about my proposal.”
“What?”
“It isn’t a truce,” Tithian said, releasing the noble. “Watch yourself.”