The Great Ordeal (Aspect-Emperor #3)(69)

“They say one stalks these very halls, my Prince. Why not ask him?”

“He refused to tell me,” the boy lied glumly.

A squint of approval.

“Yes, that doesn’t surprise me.”

“He told me the ways of Gods do not answer the ways of Men …”

Lips like oiled mahogany, pursing into a smile pained for inversion. Disgust never looked so happy.

“Yes-yes …” Nikussis said with the sonorousness of wisdom correcting youth. “He spoke true.”

“And I said the ways of my Father are the ways of the God.”

Fright never looked so delicious.

“And … ah …” A half-concealed swallow. “What did he say?”

Terror, the boy had long since realized. Fear was his father’s true estate, not adoration or abjection or exaltation. Men did what he, little Anas?rimbor Kelmomas, bid them to do out of terror of his father. All the yammer about love and devotion was simply cotton to conceal the razor.

The Librarian hung pale on his response.

“The assassin said, Let your Father ask then.”

The eyes of skinny people bulged when they were frightened, he realized watching Nikussis. Would Thelli’s eyes bulge? Was she even capable of fear?

“So I cried out, ‘Sedition!’”

He screeched this last word, and was gratified by how the old Librarian started—the fool almost kicked the sandals from his feet!

“Wha-wha-what did he say then?” Nikussis stammered.

The young Prince-Imperial shook his head in false incredulity.

“He shrugged.”

“Shrugged?”

“Shrugged.”

“Well-well it is good then that you came to see me, young Prince.”

The famished idiot fairly babbled everything he knew of the Narindar after that. He spoke of great slums of envy and avarice, hatred and malice, how thieves and murderers marred every congregation of Men, souls as wicked as the soul of Anas?rimbor Kelmomas was noble, as polluted as his was pure. “The Tusk says the Gods answer to our every nature, manly or not. There is no Man saved for virtue, no Man damned for sin, save what dwelleth in the Eye of their God. And just as there are wicked healers, so too are there holy murderers …” He tittered in admiration of his eloquence—and Kelmomas understood instantly why Mother adored him.

“And none are so wicked or so holy as the Narindar.”

“And?” the Prince-Imperial asked.

“And?”

“I already know all this tripe!” the boy cried, openly wroth. What was wrong with the fool?

“Wha-wha-what would you hav—?”

“Their power, you fool! Their strength! How is it they can kill the way they kill?”

Every man was a coward—this had been his great lesson hiding in the bones of the Andiamine Heights. Just as every man was a hero. Every sane man conceded something to fear—the only question was one of how much. Some Men begrudged crumbs, rampaged as lions over the merest trifle. But most—souls like Nikussis—one had to cut to draw out the thrashing hero. Most came by their courage far too late, when only shrieking and raving remained.

“The-they say the Fo-Four-Horned Brother Himself picks them … orphans … alley urchins, younger than even you! They spend their lives traini—”

“Every boy trains! All kjineta are born to war! What makes these boys special?”

Men like Nikussis, bookish souls, had at best a shell of obstinate arrogance. All was pulp beneath. He could be bullied with impunity—so long as his skin remained intact.

“I-I fear I-I don’t und—”

“What lets a mere mortal …” He paused to swallow away the murderous quaver in his voice. “What lets a mere mortal walk into Xothei and stab Anas?rimbor Maithanet, the Holy Shriah of the Thousand Temples, in the breast? How could such … a thing … be … possible?”

The overstuffed scroll-racks blunted his voice, rendered it deeper and softer than it was. The Librarian gazed at him in false appreciation, nodding as if he at last understood … The Prince-Imperial was bereaved. The boy had loved his uncle—of course!

Nikussis did not truly believe this of course, but the man needed some tale to balm the fact of his capitulation to such a child. Kelmomas chortled, realizing that henceforth the Librarian would like him—or at least tell himself as much—simply to save his dignity from himself.

“You me-mean the Unerring Grace.”

“The what?”

The brown face blinked. “Th-the … uh … luck …”

A measure of fury darkened the Prince-Imperial’s scowl.

“You know the rumours …” Nikussis began, hesitating. “Fr-from before …” he nearly blurted. “The tales of the … of the-the … White-Luck Warrior hunting your father?”

“What of it?”

The Librarian’s eyelids bounced with his chin. “The greatest of the Narindar, those possessing the blackest hearts … those they say become their mission, indistinguishable from Death. They act not of will, but of necessity, never knowing, always doing that which must be done …”

At last! At last the buffoon spoke of something interesting.

“So you’re saying their luck is … is perfect?”