At those words, Vindeliar’s hands flew to his cheeks and then covered his mouth.
‘No. I wish to see Symphe. Alone or with Fellowdy. Only those two. At once, Deneis.’ Dwalia gave Vindeliar a glare. He dropped his hands and then hunched his shoulders as if expecting a blow.
The woman in yellow folded her lips, leaving her face all but featureless for her eyes were grey and as I stared at her I realized that she had no eyebrows.
‘It can’t be done today. Perhaps the day after tomorrow, I can—’
‘If you make my news wait two days, I think the Four will slowly remove your skin. Or perhaps allow me to perform that task myself.’
I had thought Deneis was as pale as she could get, but her face turned as white as my father’s good paper. ‘I will convey your request to their attendants—’
‘See that you do,’ Dwalia interrupted her. ‘We will await their summons in the Joy Chamber. See that refreshments are brought to us promptly. We have come a long way.’
‘You do not command me,’ the woman said, but Dwalia only snorted.
‘Follow,’ she ordered Vindeliar and me and led us from the circular entry hall down one of the corridors branching off it like the spokes of a wheel. We walked on spotless white stone past disapproving portraits. Behind us, I heard the outer doors open and looked back to see Deneis greeting a procession of finely dressed folk.
Dwalia moved down the hall with great familiarity and when we came to a door adorned with brass insets of multiple suns, she pushed it open and we followed her in. I trailed curious fingers on the door as I passed it. It looked as if it had been made of large panels of bone or ivory, but what creature would have bones or tusks that large?
‘Shut the door!’ Dwalia snapped and I snatched my hand back from the panel. Vindeliar was behind me and he pushed it closed. How long had it been since I’d stood still inside a room that didn’t shift with the waves? I took a deep breath and looked around me. It was a room designed for waiting and discomfort. Two milky-white windows admitted filtered light but no view. Chairs of hardwood with straight backs lined the walls. A bare table of white wood sat in the centre of the room. There was no cloth on it, no vessel of flowers such as my mother would have placed. The floor was hard white stone, and the walls were featureless white wood panels. Massive white beams crossed the ceiling overhead. With the door closed, no sound came from outside. Dwalia saw me looking around. ‘Go and sit down!’ she instructed me.
I was extremely thirsty and I needed to pee but I knew there would be no opportunity to appease either need. I went to one of the chairs and sat. It was too tall and my feet dangled. Uncomfortable. I tucked my small pack of bundled clothes behind me. It didn’t help.
Dwalia did not sit. She walked slowly around the room like a rat travelling the walls. Vindeliar shuffled along behind her until she abruptly spun about and slapped him. ‘Stop that!’ He caught his breath on a sob, glared at me, and then took the chair farthest away. He sat on the edge of it, his toes on the floor and his heels jiggling soundlessly. She pointed her finger at him. ‘Nothing left? You have no power left at all?’
His lower lip trembled. ‘You well know it has seldom worked against those with a strong measure of White blood. I could not sway Deneis. Besides, I had used so much for you on the captain and crew. It was a lot of work—’
‘Be quiet.’ She opened the top buttons of her blouse and fished in her bosom. She pulled out the leather pouch and Vindeliar’s eyes lit as she took the glass tube from it. ‘It is fortunate I saved some. You must convince the Four to listen to me and believe me.’
His face crumpled. ‘All Four? It will be hard. It would be hard even if I had a full dose! Coultrie. I might be able to sway Coultrie, but …’
‘Be quiet!’ She had unstoppered the tube, but when she tipped it, the coagulated mess in the bottom didn’t shift. She pushed the stopper back in and shook the tube. The clog in the bottom didn’t move. ‘We are damned!’ she said. She opened the tube and thrust her finger in. It was too short to reach the clot in the bottom. She could not touch the residue. She shoved it at Vindeliar. ‘Spit in it! Then mix it and drink it.’
I watched as he drooled saliva down the tube and then tipped the tube to try to mix it. I felt my gorge rise and looked away. ‘It’s not working!’ he wailed.
‘Break the tube!’ she ordered him.
He tried. He tapped it on the floor. Nothing happened. He tried again, harder and harder until suddenly it shattered. The serpent slime was a dried-up wad. Vindeliar picked it up and heedless of the glass splinters that clung to it, put it in his mouth. Dwalia waited, staring at him.
He breathed out hard through his nose. When he spoke, blood flecked his lips. ‘Nothing,’ he wailed. ‘Nothing at all.’
The blow Dwalia dealt him snapped his head on his neck and he fell to the floor. He sprawled there, his breath faltering in and out. She walked away from him and sat down in one of the chairs. She did not utter a word.
Eventually, Vindeliar got to his knees and crawled to a chair not far from mine. He pulled himself up and sat in it like a pile of soiled laundry. No one spoke.
We waited. No one brought the refreshments Dwalia had demanded.
We waited. And waited.
The late afternoon sun struck our obscured windows, making a rectangle of soupy light on the featureless floor. The door opened. Deneis, the same woman who had admitted us, appeared. ‘You will be seen in the Judgment Chamber. Now.’
‘The Judgment Chamber? That is not what I told you I wanted!’
Deneis turned and walked away without waiting for us to follow. Dwalia motioned me sharply to her side and seized my shoulder in a hard grip. ‘Say nothing,’ she reminded me. She pushed me along in front of her. The pace she set did not allow me to glance back. We followed Deneis back to the entry chamber and then down a different corridor. This one was broader and more elegant and we walked a much longer distance, my bladder aching at every step.
At the very end of the corridor stood two doors with four shining symbols embedded in them. Even in the muted light of the hall, the symbols gleamed. Perhaps they meant something, but to me they were just shapes in blue, green, yellow and red. Deneis pushed a brass handle and the doors swung wide.