The Unholy Consult (Aspect-Emperor #4)

The far-flung assembly roared in outrage, and exultation, a veritable sea of howling mouths and wild gesticulations. Pillarians had been toiling behind the back of the Zeumi youth even as Kellhus spoke. Now the Holy Aspect-Emperor raised a sandalled foot to Zsoronga’s forehead, and the booming trilled with illicit anticipation, as much for those in the throes of the Lament as for those yet in the thrall of the Meat. Men caught their breath for the suddenness of the fall. The Successor-Prince bounced from the limit of the rope, dangled insensate from his elbows, his head down, turning on a slow rotation, first one way, then the other. A stone struck his thigh, and he kicked as if from a dream. Almost immediately a shower of missiles rose from the crowds roiling below. A moment of confusion and consternation followed, as the Pillarians struggled to raise and tie him off higher.

But the Holy Aspect-Emperor gestured, and another nude figure—this one pale and olive—was brought forward. He was carried then violently thrust upon the gravel and stone where the Zeumi prince had grovelled but moments before. The hail of stones trailed, and a hush clipped the Great Ordeal’s indignant roar. Men bid one another to be silent, to the point of cuffing fools if need be, and they gazed in wonder at their Lord and Prophet, who stood erect and glorious before the cringing figure.

“Accursed—!” he began only to stumble upon the crack in his sacred voice …

“Accursed be Nersei Proyas!” he boomed with a savagery none had ever heard, a bark that seemed to pluck hairs from arms, the injury and incredulity belonging to fathers betrayed by beloved sons. An avalanche of cries rose from the Great Ordeal, roars that were at once snarls, building into a crescendo that nearly matched the hellish clamour of the Horde. But the din in no way diminished or hindered the Aspect-Emperor’s thunderous voice.

“Accursed be my brother! My companion in faith and arms! For his treachery has thrown the pall of damnation upon you all!”

The countless thousands seethed, stamped feet and brandished fists, scratched at skin, scalp, and beards.

“Accursed be he …” the Holy Aspect-Emperor cried upon a failing breath, “who has broken my heart!”

And what had been tumult and uproar surged into riot, the violence of Men so maddened they must punish what was near to exact vengeance upon what lay far.

The Pillarians once again laid hands upon the disgraced Exalt-General. He slumped against their brutal ministrations, his head lolling like a murdered maiden’s. They trussed him the way they had Zsoronga, then cast him from the Accusatory ledge. The hemp jerked him short, swung him hard into the chapped stone faces. He hung swaying by his elbows above the howling masses.

Occupying the point between the two criminals, the Holy Aspect-Emperor stood upon the thumbnail precipice, his gold-shining hands outstretched. The Great Ordeal answered in what seemed a vast, collective paroxysm, the rabid fury of those who had fallen upon the Scalded, and the wild lust of those who yet starved in the clutches of the Meat. Men wept and raged, screamed flecks of spittle at either of the two hanging figures, or howled adoration at the God who had condemned them.

The very World screamed, a sound so loud that the sky itself smelled of teeth. And the miraculous voice—His voice—somehow passed through all clamour and struck their ears to the quick …

“Accursed be the Great Ordeal!”

A voice so mighty as to transcend sound, to make a cavern ceiling of void, a croak that made a throat of Creation, and a tongue of each and every listener. The Host’s roar faltered, trailed into the whisk of dust-devils. The Men of the Ordeal stood dumbstruck, stupefied, as if the sheer loudness of their Lord and Prophet’s declaration had cracked the words and made mud of their meaning.

“For the commission of acts obscene and unspeakable—transgressions that beggar the heart, the intellect!”

And in their tens of thousands, they stood naked and hanging. Wails began poking the astonished silence …

Not a soul spared any thought of Golgotterath behind them.

“For the iniquity of brother raping brother! Of kin slaying kin!”

Others cried out in shame and grief, rocking, tearing hair and scratching skin, gnashing teeth.

“Aye, accursed! Damned! Damned to the eternal furnaces of Hell!”

And what was a broken chorus of lamentation swelled into a thunderous furor, whole nations, peoples, races, beseeching …

“Cannibal treachery! Unholy congress!”

“What outrage!”

“What abomination!”

To a man they convulsed or wept or shrieked or cast out warding hands. Admission, denial, it did not matter. Like inconsolable children they threw themselves against their neighbours, thrashed as if against the grip of the very World.

How? How had such a thing happened? How had these hands …

How could …

High upon the rock, the Holy Aspect-Emperor gazed down upon them, white and golden, a shining aperture. The chalk scarps of the Occlusion soared about him, flecked with black. And though he was little more than a mote to endless outer thousands, it seemed they could see the scowl of incredulity and indignation, feel the cudgel of divine judgment, the knife of fraternal disappointment …

How? How had his children wandered so far?

High upon the Rock of Accusation, their Lord-and-Prophet watched, waited, becoming as inscrutable as the overcast heavens. And one by one the Men of the Ordeal exhausted not so much their grief or loathing as the absolute license they had yielded to it. Soon they stood silent save for the mewling of those too far broken to be retrieved. They stood dead of heart, thought and limb, begrudging even the bare need to breathe. They stood awaiting the judgment of the beacon shining before them.

Yes. Let it end.

Even damnation, it seemed, could be blessed, if the past were blotted.

Though none could say from whence they came, cups appeared among them, small cones cut from papyrus and vellum sheets of scripture. And with the mass compliance peculiar to crowds, each repeated the actions of their fellows, taking one cup and passing the stack along. And it calmed them, this simple, communal act, as much as expectation made them wonder. Many craned their heads to peer across the masses, while others peered at the fragments of text scrawled upon their ad hoc cups. Still others gazed to the promontory, awaiting some sign from their Holy Aspect-Emperor …

Not a soul looked to Golgotterath rising in malignant glory behind them.

Thousands continued to weep, inconsolable. A few called out, while others simply wondered aloud. A conversational rumble swelled across the near tracts. Those who had been injured in the heaving madness were raised up and passed outward upon thickets of upraised hands.

“Many still weep among you …”

His voice fell upon them as rain, windless and warm.

“The souls most guilty.”

And something in his voice—a resonance or an inflection—pricked the ears of each and every one of them. Many of the weepers caught their hitching sobs, arranged their shoulders and stood erect, squeezed away tears with the balls of their thumbs, peered blinking in feigned weariness. But the vigilance of their neighbours was such that it did not matter. They had been branded by their lamentation.

“They lay as shadows across failing light …”

Screeching was rekindled within the rumble. Many of those marked by their wanton displays cast about, either bewildered or seeking lines of flight.

“They pollute … They foul …”

But some even welcomed their degradation, called out sobbing and smiling, beckoned the mortal judgment about to crash upon them.

“Seize them!”

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