The Hidden City

‘Good God, Vanion!’ Emban exclaimed when he saw the Pandion Preceptor. ‘What’s happened to you?’

‘I got married, your Grace,’ Vanion replied. He smoothed back his mahogany-colored hair. ‘This was one of the wedding presents. Do you like it?’

‘You look ridiculous!’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that,’ Sephrenia disagreed. ‘I rather like it.’

‘I gather that congratulations are in order,’ Sarabian said urbanely. There was a marked difference in the Tamul Emperor. He had a self-confidence and a commanding presence that had not been there before. ‘Considering the enormous religious barriers, who performed the ceremony?’

‘Xanetia did, your Majesty,’ Vanion replied. ‘Delphaeic doctrine didn’t have any objections.’

Sarabian looked around. ‘Where is Xanetia?’ he asked.

Sephrenia pointed upward with one finger. ‘Out there,’ she replied rather sadly, ‘with the rest of the Delphae.’

‘What?’ The Emperor’s expression was baffled.

‘Edaemus took them, Sarabian,’ Flute explained. ‘Evidently he and Bhelliom made some sort of arrangement.’ She looked around. ‘Where’s Danae?’

‘She’s in her room, Divine One,’ Baroness Melidere said. ‘She was a little tired, so she went to bed early.’

‘I’d better go tell her that her mother’s home,’ the Child Goddess said, going toward the door leading back into the rest of the apartment.

‘We’ve received any number of reports,’ Foreign Minister Oscagne said, ‘but they were all couched in generalities – “the war’s over, and we won” – that sort of thing. No offense intended, Queen Betuana. Your Atans are excellent messengers, but it’s hard to get details out of them.’

She shrugged. ‘Perhaps it’s a racial flaw, Oscagne-Excellency.’ As she always did now, Betuana stood very close to the silent Engessa. She seemed reluctant to let him get very far away from her side.

‘The thing that puzzles me the most is the rather garbled message I got from my brother,’ Oscagne confessed.

‘Itagne-Ambassador has a great deal on his mind just now,’ Betuana said blandly.

‘Oh?’

‘He and Atana Maris became quite friendly when he was posted to Cynestra last fall. He didn’t take it too seriously, but she did. She came looking for him. She found him in Cyrga and took him back with her to Cynestra.’

‘Really?’ Oscagne said, his face betraying no hint of a smile. Then he shrugged. ‘Oh, well,’ he added, ‘it’s time that Itagne settled down anyway. As I recall, Atana Maris is a very vigorous young woman.’

‘Yes, Oscagne-Excellency, and very determined. I think your clever brother’s days as a bachelor are numbered.’

‘What a shame,’ Oscagne sighed. ‘Pardon me a moment.’ He went rather quickly into the next room, and they all heard the sounds of muffled laughter coming from there.

And then Danae, her black hair flying, came running into the room to hurl herself into her mother’s arms.

Sarabian’s face went bleak. ‘Who finally killed Zalasta?’ he asked. ‘He was at the bottom of all this, when you get right down to it.’

‘Zalasta isn’t dead,’ Sephrenia said sorrowfully, lifting Flute into her lap.

‘He isn’t? How did he manage to get away?’

‘We let him go, your Majesty,’ Ulath replied.

‘Are you mad? You know the kind of trouble he can stir up.’

‘He won’t be causing any more trouble, your Majesty,’ Vanion said. ‘Unless he happens to start a few grass-fires.’

‘He won’t do that, Vanion,’ Flute said. ‘It’s a spiritual fire, not a real one.’

‘Will somebody please tell me what happened?’ Sarabian said.

‘Zalasta shewed up at Sephrenia’s wedding, your Majesty,’ Ulath told him. ‘He tried to kill Vanion, but Sparhawk stopped him. Then our friend here was just about to do something fairly permanent about Zalasta, but Khwaj asserted a prior claim. Sparhawk considered the politics of the situation and agreed. Then Khwaj set Zalasta on fire.’

‘What a gruesome idea,’ Sarabian shuddered. Then he looked at Sephrenia. ‘I thought you said that he isn’t dead. Yet Sir Ulath just told me that he’d been burned to death.’

‘No, your Majesty,’ Ulath corrected, ‘I just said that Khwaj set fire to him. The same thing happened to Baron Parok.’

‘The Trollish notion of justice sort of appeals to me,’ Sarabian said with a bleak smile. ‘How long will they burn?’

‘Forever, your Majesty,’ Tynian replied somberly. ‘The fire is eternal.’

‘Good God!’

‘It’s further than I’d have gone,’ Sparhawk conceded, but as Ulath said, there were political considerations involved.’

They talked until quite late, providing details of the campaign, the rescue of Ehlana and Alean, the freeing of Bhelliom, and the final confrontation between Sparhawk and Cyrgon. Sparhawk rather carefully stressed his surrogacy in that particular event and made some issue of the fact that he was no longer Anakha. He wanted that particular book permanently closed with no doubts remaining in anyone’s mind that there was absolutely no way to reopen it.

Also during the course of that long conversation, Sarabian told them of the attempt on his life by Chacole and Torellia. ‘They might have actually pulled it off if it hadn’t been for Elysoun,’ he concluded, looking fondly at his now-demure Valesian wife.

Mirtai looked at Elysoun with one questioningly-raised eyebrow. ‘Why the change of costume?’ she asked bluntly.

Elysoun shrugged. ‘I’m with child,’ she replied. ‘I guess my days of adventuring are over.’ She looked at Mirtai’s puzzled expression. ‘It’s a Valesian custom,’ she explained. ‘We’re allowed a certain amount of freedom until our first pregnancy. After that, we’re supposed to behave ourselves.’ She smiled. ‘I’d more or less exhausted the potentials of the imperial compound anyway,’ she added. ‘Now it’s time to settle down – and catch up on my sleep.’

‘Has anybody heard from Stragen and Caalador?’ Talen asked.

‘Viscount Stragen and Duke Caalador came back to Matherion a week ago,’ Sarabian replied.