The Great Ordeal (Aspect-Emperor #3)(75)
How? How could he know souls—inhuman souls—he had never seen before?
He turned to peer at the Nonman King, who now stood before the Seal-and-Seat, doused and gold-gleaming before all … and found that he knew him as well.
Nin’ciljiras, Son of Ninar, Son of Nin’janjin.
How could he know this Nonman at all?
Let alone hate him.
“We are the dwindling light …” the Nonman King called in ritual invocation. “The darkling soul …”
Unnerved by the passions Nin’ciljiras provoked, Sorweel cast his look to the text and imagery hewn from the Concavity’s walls … and was stunned. He could read the text … recognize the images …
“Walkers of the Ways Beneath.”
Nin’ciljiras turned to a black basin set upon a pedestal just to the right of the Black Iron Seat. He raised a bowl that trailed threads too viscous to be water. Facing the crouched assembly, he doused himself in shining oil. The liquid pulsed in a sheet across his face, cracking into rivulets about the seams of his golden hauberk.
“Beseechers of Wisdom.”
For the first time Sorweel noticed the naked little Emwama child at the foot of the lunatic throne, gazing out with the same too-wide eyes that had repulsed the youth at the Gates of Ishterebinth, cringing beneath the wicked profusion of iron spines.
“Haters of Heaven …”
His voice hung but for a heartbeat, then the congregated Ishroi spake,
“SONS OF FIRST MORNING …”
in reverberating unison.
“ORPHANS OF LAST LIGHT.”
The Nonman King made an absent gesture, then, trailing a skirt of droplets, returned to the Black Iron Seat, where he became surreal for the contrast. The ghouls who had born Sorweel through the Mountain now hoisted him upright, dragged him beneath the gold-glistening aspect. The Emwama child retreated like an oft-struck cat, crouched shivering no more than a length away.
The Nonman King gazed upon him with what seemed bewildered contempt. A ghoul dressed in a welter of black silks knelt to the right of the Seat, began whispering into his ear. It was Harapior, the youth realized in dismay, his necklace of human scalps bunched as feathers about his cheeks. Listening to him, Nin’ciljiras raised his gaze to the similarly dressed ghoul standing on Sorweel’s immediate right: the Asker, his interrogator from the Thresholds …
Oinaral Lastborn.
“The Assay has been completed?” Nin’ciljiras asked Oinaral in a brass voice.
The Nonman lowered his face. “The Niom has been honoured, Tsonos. The manling has sworn to murder the Aspect-Emperor.”
The King’s gleaming brow furrowed.
“Harapior says he is more. More than an Enemy.”
A pause that seemed to lean against all hearts.
“Yes … One of the Hundred acts through him.”
This loosed a susurrus of exclamation among the gathered Ishroi.
The Nonman King affected indifference, turned to ladle more oil upon his scalp. “The Fertility Principle,” he said tilting his profile to strings of pulsing translucence.
“Yes, ” Oinaral replied. “The one the Tusk names Yatwer.”
The shining face turned.
“Do you know what this means, Oinaral Oir?narig?”
A pause.
“Yes.”
The Nonman King now stared at Sorweel frankly, though without directly meeting his return gaze. “Do you think this is why the Anas?rimbor sent him to us? He knows that Fertility moves against him, does he not? Perhaps he suspects Her interest in this one.”
An apprehension struck the Horse King, one both spear-sharp and inchoate. Was that what he was? Something wielded like axe or hoe? A dumb instrument?
Narindar, Zsoronga had called him. Holy assassin.
“The youth has been under the Aspect-Emperor’s thrall for months,” Oinaral explained, his tone rigid in a way that revealed the extent of his animosity for not mellowing. “Why exile a threat that is more easily killed?”
The Nonman King gazed upon the Lastborn with alarm and scowling indecision. How strange it was to witness human passion on the face of a Sranc. How natural and obscene.
“So Her track runs through us …” Nin’ciljiras said.
Sorweel heard the legendary assembly stir behind him, the murmuring clamour of souls too ancient to be astonished, yet astonished all the same.
“We are now bound to this one,” Oinaral called through the clamour. “Irrevocably.”
The Nonman King turned to the basin once again, doused himself while the uproar of the Ishroi waxed and faded across the Iron Oratorium. “Lord Cilc?liccas!” he finally called over Sorweel’s head. “What say the Quya?”
The Lord of Swans stepped from his fellows. The bolt of Injori silk he wore affixed to his shoulder and wrapped crosswise about his torso was so fine as to become crimson paint where it flattened against his nimil gown.
“Oinaral Oir?narig speaks true, Tsonos,” he said.
The Nonman King pondered the legendary Quya with open distaste, then returned his gaze to Sorweel’s keeper. “And what of the brother and sister?”
Sorweel suffered another swell of apprehension, like pins pricking just deeper than ice-numbed skin.
“The son knows nothing,” Oinaral said. “Tsonos.”