Dinner passed almost too quickly. Soon the servants were collecting up empty plates and clearing the table of a dessert hash made of marsh berries and a sweet wine.
"Please, Isao," Juben said loudly from the top of the table. He motioned for the servants to refill all their wine glasses. "Tell us the of the goings-on in the imperial palace."
Isao recounted all the events he could, recalling what he could from his disjointed experience and unclear information. He still didn't really know what happened, who did it, or why. But he pieced together what he could for the group, laying the information before them all at once.
The telling took several minutes. By the end, he was exhausted.
"Now we're here," he said. "Among friends, and safe at last."
"A toast," Damla suggested with a hand on her husband's arm. "Let's toast to Hiwan and Ular. May we form a strong alliance against these traitors and restore the Empire to its former glory."
"Yes," Juben agreed, grabbing his goblet. "To Hiwan and Ular!"
Isao and Khalem reached for the goblets of fresh wine the servants set in front of them. Then Isao noticed Kamon had dropped his gaze and was fingering the stem of his goblet. Even Juben’s daughters seemed preoccupied suddenly. Why were they being so quiet?
"May we defeat our enemies and be stronger for it," Juben said, holding his glass aloft. "To us."
"To us," Isao and Khalem murmured. They touched glasses, and drank. The wine trickled down the back of Isao's throat, warming him. It tasted sweet, almost saccharine.
Maru began to explain her new duties as an official warrior, and Isao listened to the conversation with interest.
After a few minutes, a prickling sensation crawled up the back of his head, over his scalp, and into his face. It tingled. Isao pressed his lips together as they turned slightly numb.
He blinked. Why was the table blurring? Why were his thoughts moving so slowly?
Khalem seemed to be starting at the same spot on the table, as if attempting to memorize it. Were they so tired from their journey that it now caught up to them? Isao wondered. Perhaps the wine had relaxed them too much.
"Isao, are you all right?" Juben asked.
"Fine," he said.
"Your head isn't spinning, is it?"
With a bit of horror, Isao realized that was the best way to categorize the next sensation that overcame him. He gripped the edge of the table in a poor attempt to right his spinning world.
"What . . . what is . . ." he gasped out.
"There is a very powerful poison known throughout the Ular Clan. Anyone that's ever visited will have heard of it. The rest of us know how to obtain it and purify it from the time we're five. And now, my friend, you know it yourself," Juben said.
Isao struggled to under Juben’s words. Poison? Ular Clan?
His chest tightened. The air seemed to thicken, and time passed more slowly.
Something in his gut twitched. This wasn't right. He shouldn't feel this way.
His body slumped down farther in his chair. He tried to push his body back up, but his legs wouldn't respond. His arm fell off the table, plopping onto his lap.
"It's a progressive paralysis. Renders our enemies almost totally unable to move. A real delight when you have betrayers in your midst and want to get rid of them. Such as is the case tonight."
"Betrayers?"
The word came off Isao's tongue thick and garbled. His gaze darted around the table; all except Khalem were staring at him now.
As the strange feeling moved through every inch of his body, a figured moved into the room from the doorway. The dark masked figure from outside. The bulbous nose and fine cloak seemed more pronounced at the moment.
"The poison will not kill, just paralyze. We have taken it too, but we are masters of our own poisons and it has no effect on us." Juben gestured to Maru and Saya. "Tonight, they have finalized their warrior training by proving their deep tolerance to the serum."
Both Maru and Saya held their glasses high with accompanying smiles.
Juben's voice sounded far away. Isao attempted to speak, but the words wouldn't come. His lips wouldn't move. He closed his eyes, his neck pitching his head forward.
Juben continued to speak.
"The Hiwan clan will never understand the real meaning of religion, Isao, not with a man like Saemon at the head. He was too traditionalist. The Empire needed . . . more than he could provide. So I took action into my own hands. Thanks to that cunning Nari woman, we have planned every last detail of this takeover. For the good of the Empire, of course."
Isao's sluggish thoughts took in every word one by one. Although the words moved slowly through his brain, the truth wasn't lost upon Isao.
The Ular clan had done something horrible to the Empire because they had felt Saemon wasn't a good enough ruler.
If Isao’s mind hadn't been overtaken by a pervasive numbing sensation, he would have screamed aloud in rage.
"Do you remember, Isao, the ancient underground passage in the old armory where the two of us played?" Kamon asked. "We told the Nari woman about it. The Ameyas also were ecstatic to know about a hidden passage into the Jade Cradle. Beautifully simple, isn't it?"
Isao lost consciousness and plunged into the darkness awaiting him. The bitter taste of betrayal filled his mouth.
Isao ached all over. Every movement sent a shiver of pain through his body. His head pounded. His mouth was as dry as a bag of sand. His shoulders and muscles protested as he slowly swam up through layers of unconsciousness.
He had nightmares in this drugged, hazy state. Of mountains. Masked people. Tribal chanting.
Isao tried to reach out, but his arm felt so heavy. Then he realized that his hands were bound together at the wrists in front of him.
The realization of the betrayal of the Ular clan came racing back through his mind, and he felt torrents of rage anew. "Khalem?" he whispered, hearing the fear in his own voice. "Are you there?"
"Here, my Sheng," croaked a voice.
"How are you feeling?"
"Pain."
"Your arm?"
Khalem hesitated. "I think the fever is coming on. No doubt it will be fully infected soon, even with the healers’ work of yesterday."
"If they didn't start an infection purposefully," Isao spat, livid. His body began to tremble from the rage.
"You must calm yourself, Sheng, if we are to escape this."
Isao's nostrils flared. "They have deceived us, Khalem. I should have listened to you."
"Neither of us knew. We are not at fault. We did the best that we could."
"I'm so angry."
"Me too, Sheng. But let us believe in your father, eh? Perhaps he won. Perhaps things are not as bleak as we believe them to be. We left without all the information. I believe your father and the Karus are strong enough to overcome on their own. If they did, the Ular would not know this yet."
"Yes," Isao murmured, enjoying the brief spark of hope Khalem had given him. "Yes, Father is strong."
The sound of clanking came from down the hall. Heavy footsteps followed. Moments later, a door near Isao's head rattled open. Two men stepped in, grabbing them by the arms and yanking them to their feet.
The strange feeling of not being able to control his body rippled back through Isao. No matter how hard he tried to lift a hand or a toe, nothing would move. Isao pressed his lips together to keep from yelling in fury and pain.
The guards dragged them down a series of wet corridors, up staircases, and finally down staircases, taking them down into the deepest, darkest corridors of the Sarpa Palace. As was the case everywhere before, images of snakes lined the halls.
The guards spoke to each other in low tones, hissing as they did so.
"Where . . . where are you taking us?" Isao finally wrenched out in between grimaces of pain.
The guards said nothing in response.
Eventually the dank halls opened up into an expansive underground room illuminated by torchlights. Murals of snakes destroying cats dotted the walls here as well.
A gigantic head of a snake with a golden snout protruded from the far wall. Juben and Kamon flanked this massive head on opposite sides.