The Garden of Stones

chapter THIRTY





“There is no moral choice between right and wrong. The only moral choice is when we must decide between two wrongs and trust our decision proves to be right.”—Femensetri, Sēq Master, 3,487th Year of the Petal Empire


Day 325 of the 495th Year of the Shrīanese Federation


Belamandris guided the damaged wind-skiff low over the shattered-glass surface of the wetlands. It was difficult for Corajidin to take his eyes from the place Brede had stood, the Angothic Spirit Casque strapped to her back. He had managed to wash Brede’s brains and blood from his face and hands, but the wood of the deck still bore testimony to her violent end.

More than half of the Anlūki who had come with them had been burned when Indris had attacked them. Two had run along the deck, maddened with the pain of the flames that consumed them, until Corajidin had used a docking hook to push them overboard. Their screams had not changed appreciably much between the burning and the falling.

Wolfram had also suffered horrendous wounds in his efforts to save them. He had stood on the prow amid the flames, his staff clutched in his large knuckled hands, and gathered the flames into a compressed ball, balanced upon the blistered skin of his palm. The burning orb reminded Corajidin of Indris’s eye, which he felt had seared him to his core. Yet Wolfram had been unafraid. He had merely clenched the ball into his fist, extinguishing it so there was nothing left save ash and smoke.

Though the skiff was ruined, Corajidin had urged his son to turn the vessel around, to retrieve the Spirit Casque at all costs. Wolfram had snarled something incomprehensible. Belamandris’s face had gone pale with horror, and he had maintained his course away from the ruins.

The witch’s face, matted hair, and beard had been burned, as had his hands. The smell was grotesque. Wolfram, his face a peeled red mask, had reached out with one black-and-red, cracked hand to seize a wounded Anlūki nearby. Corajidin had watched in morbid fascination as Wolfram chanted in his guttural tongue. The Anlūki had shrieked, and his skin began to bubble, then crack, blood welling in great torrents from his flesh. In turn Wolfram’s wounds had healed, skin oozing across exposed muscle and bone until it had become a red sheath, where it was not covered by his filthy hair. With casual disregard, the witch had hurled his victim’s corpse overboard, as if the mangled ruin of the man was nothing more than litter.

“What now, Wolfram?” Corajidin snarled. He scratched at the reddened skin on the back of his hands until the skin split. “Where are your oracles now? Without Ariskander’s knowledge I am a dead man!”

Wolfram glared at Corajidin from between the knotted ropes of his fringe. “There is hope yet from my allies. Their potion has helped you, hasn’t it? Though you were the one who placed your faith in the destiny they spoke of, thus far the oracles’ words have been true. You were proclaimed the monarch of Amnon, its riches are yours to do with as you will. The other rahns bowed before you—”

“Semantics!”

“Petty man!” Wolfram thundered. Corajidin bared his fangs. The witch is weak, he thought to himself. He had been overused today. It would be easy to…Yet when he met Wolfram’s yellow-hazel glare, he saw there the eyes of a beast. Of a murderer in the dark, where his Humanity was simply a convenient skin, a shape to be discarded at need. “The Asrahn is the keeper of his people.”

“I am not Asrahn!” Corajidin gripped the hilt of his krysesqa. This was a blade that had killed the monarchs of nations! How could it fail to murder one witch?

“Have you considered that this is all part of your journey to that august role?” Wolfram asked. “That perhaps all which has come to pass has done so for a reason? These roads aren’t always clear.”

Corajidin’s fingers curled into claws as his breath hissed through his clenched teeth. He wanted to strangle the witch. Blood rushed to his head, making his face feel heavy, and sound became distant. Frustration rose in him like a bubble that exploded in an infuriated scream. He dragged himself to his feet, every profanity he knew spewing from his lips as he stalked to the stern of the vessel, there to be with his entourage of doubts.

For the remainder of the journey, he remained silent as he brooded on what to do next. Daniush had tried to kill himself rather than face what Corajidin had planned for him. Corajidin bitterly congratulated the boy on his resolve. Doubtless Daniush’s Ancestors applauded the lad. He needed to face the fact that Vahineh was now more than likely Awakened. If Corajidin was lucky, she was far from Amnon, far away from anybody who could help her. Better yet, the Awakening had actually killed her. It had been known to happen, if the person had not been trained for the burden. But it was safer to assume she lived, had the memories of both her father and brother, and would approach the Teshri to take action.

As for Ariskander? Corajidin slammed his palm against the rail. Curse Indris! How had the man managed to find them? There must be a spy in their midst. Or one of Thufan’s party had been careless. Perhaps all was not lost, though. Corajidin had felt the healing power of the potion Wolfram’s allies had given him. Even a taste of Majadis’s and Devandai’s alchemy had given him more strength than he’d had in months. There was also Kasraman’s belief that he could find an answer to Corajidin’s problems without the knowledge in Ariskander’s Ancestor memories. If Wolfram was correct and the oracles’ words were true, Corajidin needed to make his way back to Erebesq to see what his son had to offer. First, however, he needed to collect the treasures he had unearthed from the Rōmarq, stored in the cellars under the villa in Amnon. While Wolfram had not found the missing works of Sedefke as promised, there was much there of great value. Corajidin’s war to pillage the Rōmarq could wait a little longer.

The skiff banked. Corajidin narrowed his eyes against the wind of their passage to see the looming shapes of moored wind-ships in the distance. He ordered Belamandris to dock at their villa. The courtyard was large enough to accommodate the skiff.

His eye was drawn to the two grisly lumps of flesh that had come to rest on thick coils of rope. The severed heads of Ariskander and Daniush had almost been forgotten in the turmoil. Daniush’s eyes had the sun-seared whiteness of a person who had opened themselves to the majesty of their Awakened Ancestors in the moment of their death, the pupils shrunk to the size of pinheads and the dark-brown irises flared with streaks like star beams. By contrast, Ariskander’s expression was one of abject terror. Corajidin shuddered involuntarily when he looked upon his enemy’s death rictus. Ariskander’s eyes were wide with pain, his irises scorched to near black, the whites of his eyes streaked with burst blood vessels. His teeth were blooded from where he had bitten his own lips in death.

“He’ll come for them.” Wolfram leaned into the wind, his robe and hair swirling behind him. Wolfram’s staff was blackened in places, the coffin nails melted. The witch did not need to nod or gesture to the skulls for Corajidin to know what he meant. Nor did he need to elaborate on whom. Indris. “I fear we’ve roused something that was best left slumbering.”





Belamandris had barely settled the skiff before Corajidin stumbled into the courtyard. He stumbled as the muscles in his thighs spasmed, unable to support his weight. The pain of the bolt wound in his leg was like a hot nail had been dragged deep across his shin. The Anlūki swarmed after to help their troubled master. There were those who tried to approach, faces stricken, yet the Anlūki kept them at bay.

The guards at the door threw the doors to Corajidin’s chambers open as he approached. They refused to look at him, faces still and pale. From the corner of his eye, he saw one of Thufan’s intelligencers race to Belamandris’s side. His son fell behind as the man whispered urgently in his ear. The rooms were striped bright and dark where beams of sunlight streamed in through the open windows, plunging the nooks and crannies into gloom. There was no sound other than the faint rustle of the breeze through the long curtains. The antiseptic bite of vinegar was barely smothered by the cloying scent of water orchid from the oil burners.

He called for Yashamin, though there was no response. Not surprising. She was more than likely in his office. He glanced about the chamber. The linen on the bed had been changed, the entire room meticulously cleaned. Muttering to himself, he stripped his soiled clothes off as he limped to their private bathroom. His shin was scabbed with dried blood around a long, ragged gouge in his skin. It was not the first wound he had received. Wolfram could fix it easily. Corajidin washed the wound, then wrapped strips of linen around his shin. Red blossoms opened on the bandages, though not dangerously large. He quickly changed into new clothes, then laced himself into a light hauberk, the gold-washed mail hidden beneath an embroidered formal tunic and robe. He slipped his amenesqa and krysesqa through the sash at his waist. His hand spasmed around the hilt of the long-knife, a fixed claw. Eventually the muscles relaxed, the stiffness replaced by shooting pains through his forearms and calves.

He shuffled back into the sitting room to see the stricken face of Belamandris, flanked by one of the Anlūki commanders and the Knight-Lieutenant of Yashamin’s personal guard. The woman’s gaze was fixed firmly on the floor. Her hands quivered; her face was washed of color, a waxen thing, immobile and somehow unreal.

“What is it?” Corajidin asked as his hearts skipped a beat. The kohl around his son’s eyes blurred with tears. “Belamandris?”

“It’s Yashamin,” Belamandris said in a flat voice. “There’s been…an incident.”

Corajidin frowned, head canted to one side. The signs were everywhere. The antiseptic scent and the furious activity in the corridors of the villa. The quiet and the darkness of the room, where Yashamin loved noise and light.

Belamandris gestured for his father to follow.





They had laid Yashamin out on a silk-covered bier in the villa’s small private shrine. She had been washed, her skin anointed with sacred oils: the air was redolent with the scents of myrrh, cardamom, lotus, and henna. They had garbed her in the reds and blacks of a rahn of the Great House of Erebus, rather than in the layers of gray-and-white silk of a nemhoureh of the House of Pearl. Her hair was brushed to a flow of gleaming jet, then dressed with pearls, rubies, and pins of black-and-red gold. Her fingers and toes were bright with gold rings. Her ears and ankles with pearls. Her high-collared tunic covered her throat.

Corajidin rested his hand against her brow. Were it not for the coldness of her skin, she might be sleeping.

Death was supposed to be a thing of neither sadness nor fear. If such was the case, why could he not breathe? Why did tears blur his vision, no matter how often he wiped them away? Where had the sense of nausea come from? Why did his head ache and why did he want to do nothing except curl up in a ball, to inhale the scent of her from her clothes, and to remember the warmth of her body, the sound of her laugh, or the silk of her kiss? He wanted to see the way she frowned when she read.

This was not how it was supposed to be. This was not how he remembered his farewells to those he had professed to love before.

“Observe the rites,” he whispered. Belamandris and ten of the Anlūki stood at attention. Wolfram also remained. Corajidin could feel his speculative gaze. It was to the witch he spoke. “Speak to the Master of the Dead. Have him melt the amber for her Reliquary Mask. Then have her remains laid in alabaster, for her journey home to Erebesq for her cremation.”

“We—”

“Please, do not test me now of all times,” Corajidin warned. Wolfram hesitated a moment, then he must have sensed Corajidin’s mood. He creaked away, reeking of smoke, blood, and marshes. “And bring me more of your ally’s alchemy. My need is dire. Belamandris?”

“Father?” Belamandris bowed his head low.

“The guards who were on duty?”

“Veterans of the Jen Femidhe Sisterhood.”

“Where are they?”

“They took their own lives in recompense,” Belamandris murmured. He gestured to the Anlūki, who followed him from the room to leave Corajidin alone with Yashamin’s remains.

Corajidin touched Yashamin’s face, so beautiful in repose. He leaned down, then grazed her lips with his. Alone he could pretend, for a little while, the salt on her lips had not come from his tears.





Back in his office, Corajidin summoned his scribes. He was afraid that if he stopped, if he allowed himself to pause, he might never move again. He could not go back to his rooms. Could not give himself the time he wanted to sink into a pit of blackest despair until the sun itself burned out and the world was as dark for everybody else as it was for him.

Part of him wondered whether it might be simpler to give up. To rest and let his mourning take its course. Perhaps to test fate to see whether it would, actually, allow him to die even if he did nothing to preserve himself. Maybe he had fought too hard to make his possible future come true? If he had fought less, wanted less, then perhaps Yashamin would not be…But to stop now, midway through the great work she had been such a part of, would be an insult to the dreams she had for them both.

He dictated a letter, to be sent by the fastest couriers at his command to his allies within Amnon. A reminder for them to remember where their loyalties lay, or had been purchased. Now was not the time for resolve to weaken. There were unpatriotic forces at work in Shrīan who sought to destroy all they stood for. They must all follow his example. Remain steadfast in their resolve. They were to meet at the Tyr-Jahavān at the Hour of the Crow, four hours past noon. There they would convene an emergency vote under the Federation Act. In the absence of the Secretariat and the Arbiter’s Tribunal to debate the niceties of the law, Corajidin would demand a quorum of the Teshri convene an early assembly. There they would declare him Asrahn without delay.

To the Knight-Marshal Rahn-Kadarin fe Narseh, Corajidin penned a letter requesting her presence at an emergency military council. He ordered Knight-Colonel Nadir, his second in command of the armies, to begin plans for provisioning the Erebus army for a prolonged campaign in the Rōmarq. They were to move out within the week.

He would have Belamandris take control of the city, to ensure there were no unexpected impediments to his plans. Most importantly, his son needed to secure the Tyr-Jahavān. Without it, there was no way of communicating easily with his allies across the nation. Once Corajidin was Asrahn and a Speaker more sympathetic to his views was appointed, he would order his armies into the Rōmarq to claim all that should be his. He would find the legendary artifacts of fallen empires, make himself stronger than those who had come before.

Corajidin sat at his desk, chin resting upon his thumbs. There was little else to do now, other than wait for the appointed hour and for Wolfram to return with the potion and to mend Corajidin’s wounded leg. Now he had experienced ease from his pains, Corajidin was loath to suffer them again. Wolfram’s witch allies could ask what they wanted if their potions could keep him alive and active.

His thoughts turned to his daughter. Mari had clearly been unsettled by their conversation yesterday. Perhaps he needed to explain himself better. He was not certain she understood how important it was for the Avān to return to a time before the Sēq had hampered them with their restrictions and adherence to barely understood, elitist dogma. With Yashamin gone, he felt the need for family more than ever.

In the quiet he ached for his lost Yashamin. He could not erase the sight of her from his memory. She had been so young, of an age with his daughter. Their marriage had been for neither political nor social advancement. Had been arranged neither to form an alliance nor to strengthen ancient bloodlines as the Sēq had once conspired to do with selected Great Houses and families. He had married her because he had wanted to. He felt the heat of tears behind his eyes.

No! Desperate for the company of somebody he loved, Corajidin rose from his desk in search of Mariam.

He had gotten no farther than the corridor when he was informed Thufan was on his way.





The left side of Thufan’s face was a mass of angry red scar. The damage had been extensive and had required Wolfram to improvise. Parts of Thufan’s left cheek and jaw had been shredded. Wolfram had replaced absent bone with pieces of ivory, which had been screwed into place. Where possible the skin had been stretched to cover what was missing, though there was not enough. Bone shone through missing flesh. Ruined lips had been removed, which gave the kherife a rictus grin. His new eye, beneath a mangled lid, was a faceted silver orb that reflected light in harsh shards.

On Thufan’s less damaged right side, the cheek had been stitched closed and almost perfectly healed. The skin there was the pink of a newborn babe. For all Corajidin knew, after what he had seen Wolfram do to heal himself, the witch may well have actually used an infant to repair what he could of Thufan. Corajidin tried very hard to ignore the nausea that threatened to overcome him.

Corajidin tried to smile, suspected it came out more as a grimace. “I am glad to see you up and about, old friend. We did all that we could to keep you…to show our thanks…” His voice faded away, unsure what it was supposed to do next.

“Armal?” The hook rose, the darkened iron as sharp and ugly as the lies they had told each other over the years. Corajidin was not certain what the gravel-in-a-barrel voice was trying to inflect. “My son?”

“I do not know how they knew how to find you in the Rōmarq.” Corajidin could not look Thufan in the face. He rested his gaze on the scratched skin of his hands. Already the lesions had come back, swollen and tight with pus. “I am so sorry this happened. When you have recovered, I promise we will do all we can to find a way to, to fix what has happened to you. But now you must rest, Thufan.”

“My son. Tell me.” The hook swept down to take a chip from Corajidin’s desk. Thufan turned his head. The faceted orb of his eye gleamed in the light streaming through the window. Exposed bone shone against bruised skin.

“He is taking care of some business for me.” The falsehood came easily to Corajidin’s lips. For now, Thufan was entitled to gentler truth than Farouk’s betrayal. “You were right, Thufan, and I was wrong. Armal is not suited to lives such as ours. I asked Farouk to find him a posting far from Shrīan. Somewhere safe. Once you are well, I will send you home to new estates in Qalhad. You always told me how much you enjoyed winters overlooking the Southron Sea.”

Thufan coughed, though it came out as part bark and part wheeze. It took Corajidin a moment to realize it was supposed to be laughter. Both the kherife’s eyes gleamed coldly. Corajidin cringed in his chair even as Thufan turned, then slow-stepped out of the room.





Corajidin made slow time down the corridor to Mari’s chambers. On his way he saw a tall white porcelain vase painted with gray herons standing on a small hallway table, clustered with an arrangement of yellow-and-purple lotus flowers and a white spray of baby’s breath. Corajidin paused, tears in his eyes. Yashamin had loved the vase. Every day she had ensured fresh lotus blossoms were placed there. They reminded her of her home of Qom Rijadh on the shores of the Sûn Isles. He paused for a moment. The Anlūki who guarded him fanned out, hands on the hilts of their weapons as if in anticipation of some threat. Yet nothing came. Corajidin simply stood there for a long moment, gently caressing the lush petals, soft and full as his wife’s lips…

He continued to the end of the corridor. The guards outside Mari’s chambers snapped to attention at his approach.

In their red cuirasses and black-scaled hauberks, they looked more like golems than creatures of flesh and blood. Their ranking officer, a young woman with the fair complexion of Erebus Prefecture, bowed low to him.

“Pah-Mariamejeh is not currently in, my rahn,” she reported.

“Oh? Where has she gone?” Corajidin felt the disappointment of Mari’s absence. He took a deep breath to steady himself.

“She didn’t see fit to inform me of her destination.”

“No, I suppose she would not,” he murmured. The thought of going back to his office, of being surrounded by those who expected him to lead them, was too much. “I will wait within. The rest of you will remain outside until I call for you.”

The Anlūki officer opened the door to allow Corajidin entry, then closed the door behind him.

It took a few moments for Corajidin to realize something was amiss. The room was tidy. Meticulously so, which was unlike Mariam. There were usually clothes on the floor. Sheets of paper with half-finished drawings scattered on the tables. Even the small camp table she used for cleaning her weapons was gone.

He hobbled from room to room, the pain in his limbs growing ever more furious and the blood roaring in his ears. Jaw clenched against a growing fury, he finally saw the sealed letter propped on the table. It was addressed to Corajidin, sealed with Mari’s personal seal of the seahorse.

Corajidin sat on the edge of the couch, then cracked the wax seal. The paper was warm in his hand, its texture rough against his fingertips. He recognized Mari’s handwriting, her familiar unadorned broad strokes.

“Dear Father, I’m sorry we’ve come to be where we are, but after our talk last night, I’ve come to realize you’ll never set aside your plans, though they’ll no doubt kill you and make you cursed by history. It seems our moral compasses point in very different directions.

“Virtue. Endurance. Wisdom. These are the traits every warrior-poet is trained to honor. We live our lives according to a Measure, our duty toward our people and our country. To stand fearless before the storm, yet have the generosity of spirit to shield those in need. Most importantly, we’re taught to master ourselves, rather than seek the mastery of others. Those three small words dictate what I must be and what you should be as one who seeks to lead others.

“Above all, the warrior-poet gives themselves to a sacred calling. We sacrifice of ourselves, on behalf of the many. Yet you, who should be protecting your people, would return us to the days of madness, of the times when dark powers were whispered on the lips of black-hearted witches and monsters roared in the night. Those days ended for a reason. I choose to fight on behalf of those who should never have to live through such times.

“Know I love you. The last thing I want is to see either you or Belam hurt. So I say to you, run! Leave Amnon, leave Shrīan, and live a life free from what’s driven you to madness. At the moment, you’re the last thing Shrīan needs. Go. Heal yourself and come back to us the man I know you can be. There’s nothing more I can do to save you than this.”

It was with a cold rage Corajidin took the scroll in his hands and shredded it. First in long ripping motions, then with short, spittle-flecked bursts of invective as the paper was reduced to smaller and smaller pieces, which he then ground beneath his boot.