Shadow Scale: A Companion to Seraphina(74)

As soon as we were all three crammed inside, the litter lurched into motion. Some thoughtful person had retrieved Ingar’s shirt. He pulled it over his head, whining, “My lady warned me about Paulos Pende. He’s dangerous.”

“Paulos Pende is the kindest being who ever lived,” said Camba lightly, straightening her skirts and smoothing her hair. “I am dangerous. I don’t like to do it, but I can break your arms like pastry. Recollect that before you trying anything unwise.”

Ingar, wide-eyed, nodded minutely. I wondered what kind of priest employed a ferocious woman who could break your arms. The same kind who mysteriously knew I was looking for him, apparently. It had been my plan to see him today, but I can’t pretend I felt no apprehension as our overloaded conveyance jostled and joggled downhill.

Camba, on the other hand, retrieved a little scroll from behind the seat cushion and read silently, not bothered about us in the least.





The swaying litter, too reminiscent of a ship for my tastes, stopped at last, and we emerged, blinking and stretching, in the bustling Zokalaa. At its west end stood the temple of Lakhis of Autumn, grim goddess of relentless necessity, and to the east was a much more popular temple, gauging by the worshipers climbing up and down the steps: the temple of Chakhon of the Spring, the merry god of chance in his fertility aspect.

Camba turned toward the temple of Chakhon, steering Ingar up the marble steps through a descending crowd of young women. We crossed a columned peristyle and passed through a doorway into darkness, where I was hit by a heavy fog of incense and by thick, scratchy cords that dangled all around us, like a forest of vines. As we brushed them, the cords rang bells high in the ceiling, producing a clanging cacophony. It alarmed me initially, but then I grinned at the unexpectedness of it. This god of chance and I had a similar sense of humor. I held out my arms as I passed through, causing more bells to ring. “That’s impious,” whispered Camba, elbowing me. “Go toward the light.”

Big braziers flamed somewhere ahead. We emerged from the thicket of ropes into an airy space like a cathedral nave. Before us towered a statue of a beautiful blindfolded man sitting cross-legged, his open hands upturned upon his knees; worshipers lingered back near the ropes, approaching the altar whenever the god moved them.

Camba didn’t wait for the prompting of the god, or else felt it at once. She knelt, fanned fragrant smoke from one of the braziers over her face, then rose and bowed.

“Listen, ridiculous foreigners,” she said, keeping her eyes fixed upon Great Chakhon, “we will enter the holy precinct. I thought it unwise to bring you inside, but Pende is old and does not like to travel. Follow my lead in all things. Touch nothing. Avoid eye contact with the priestesses. Can I rely on you?”

The prospect of offending everyone was a bit intimidating, but I nodded. Ingar perked up a bit and said, “I’ve read about your holy precincts. I know that—”

“Whatever you have read is insufficient and incomplete,” said Camba curtly.

She led us through a hidden door behind the statue of Chakhon, into an anteroom where we removed our shoes, then to a trickling fountain where we were to cleanse our hands, feet, and thoughts. I did not like to pull my sleeves up, but there was no way around it. Camba eyed my silver scales sidelong but made no comment. The purification of thoughts was achieved symbolically by taking water into the mouth and forcibly ejecting it through the nose. We inept Southlanders couldn’t do this without precipitating a fit of coughing. Camba rolled her eyes, but finally proclaimed us clean enough.

As we moved from the anteroom to the cloister, a white-robed initiate presented us with a basket containing the Loaf of Chance. Ingar tried to take a slice, since it was on offer, but Camba slapped his hand away. Apparently this was not for us. Camba herself took as little as possible and seemed to be picking stones out of her mouth surreptitiously. She stowed them in a little pouch at her waist.

The Sisters of Chance walked the cloister with their eyes closed, pausing as their god commanded and opening their eyes with slow portentousness. We looked away as Camba had instructed us; Ingar whispered to me that if you met a priestess’s eyes, you would sever her connection with her god. Camba overheard and muttered, “Incomplete.”

We arrived at Pende’s sparsely furnished cell, but he wasn’t there. Camba asked a passing novice, who directed us deeper into the precinct. We emerged from the cloister into a walled garden full of lumpy topiaries, overgrown from their original shapes into looming, bulbous things.

Or were they supposed to look like that? Maybe they were the topiaries of chance.

Upon a stone bench sat an extremely old man draped in priestly white. He squinted at us myopically, one hand upon a red sack-like wattle at his throat.

I recognized him immediately. In my mind’s garden, I called him Pelican Man, and he sat on a bench, gazing at the stars. He’d always struck me as gentle and wise.

Camba knelt before him on the mossy lawn and indicated that we should do the same. When we had properly humbled ourselves, Pende spoke. His voice was gravelly; he wore false teeth of ivory that clacked when he spoke and made him hard to understand.

Camba translated Pende’s words: “You shall not find the rest of our ityasaari, Seraphina Dombegh. I have told them to stay away from you. I warn you: I have mind gifts, too. I will defend my people. I am as formidable a foe as you have ever faced.”