The Chosen - Stone Dance of the Chameleon 01 Read online

  Suth frowned. 'You flatter him, Lord Aurum.' Their eyes locked together. Though their lips did not move, nor their hands, Carnelian was convinced they were speaking to each other. He saw the other two Masters were also watching them.

  Flames spluttered, hissed. Sparks seeded the air.

  'Perhaps I do,' the old Master said finally, breaking off from the contest. He smiled but only with his lips. Suth turned back to his son. Carnelian could see he was controlling anger.

  'My son, let me make known to you our blood-pure visitors.' His father opened a fist and lifted the hand to indicate the old Master. 'Aurum, the Ruling Lord of that House. Your uncle.' The old Master gave a slow nod but his glassy eyes never left Carnelian's face.

  Carnelian stared back. He came back to the sound of his father's voice.'.. . Ruling Lord of House Vennel.' The Master who bowed was more slender than the others, younger, paler-eyed. His hand unsheathed from a sleeve like a sword and melted into the sign, Charmed.

  Suth turned to the last Master, who wore the serene smile of an idol. This is your second cousin, Jaspar of House Imago, who one day, if the Two will it, shall be its Ruling Lord.'

  'As you say, cousin, if They will it,' said the smiling Master and inclined his head elegantly.

  Carnelian tried to return the smile.

  'Now that the introductions have been made, my Lords, I might suggest that we retire,' said Vennel. He had a woman's voice and his Quya was like singing. 'One must confess to a certain weariness.'

  'What resources we have here are at your disposal, my Lords,' Suth said. 'Apartments have been made ready. I hope my Lords will forgive the little comfort we can provide. If we had been advised that you were coming...'

  'We have come in haste, my Lord,' said Aurum. There was neither the time nor the opportunity to herald our arrival.'

  Jaspar smiled again. 'A little comfort will be rendered great by comparison with our recent accommodation.'

  'Shall we then tomorrow meet in formal conclave?' asked Vennel with his woman's voice.

  The others lifted their hands in assent.

  Till the morrow then.'

  Vennel began to move towards the door. Aurum did not move. Vennel turned. 'You are not accompanying us, my Lord?'

  'Not immediately. I shall remain here and reminisce with the Lord Suth. Nostalgic nothings can resurrect the past.'

  Jaspar raised an eyebrow then dropped it again. Vennel's expression froze for a moment.

  Carnelian saw the sag in his father's face. He went up to him. 'You are weary, my Lord.'

  His father smiled a bleak smile. 'Perhaps I will find refreshment in reliving the past with the Lord Aurum. Go now, my Lord, and see that our guests are well looked after.'

  Carnelian bowed. Aurum was looking at him with gleaming eyes. Carnelian blushed. As he led Jaspar and Vennel to the sea-ivory doors, blinded slaves appeared. Carnelian stared at their puckered eyelids then, copying the others, he held his mask up before his face and a blindman bound it on. As the doors opened, he looked back. His new uncle, Lord Aurum, had stretched a long arm across his father's shoulders like a yoke and was moving him off into the shadows.

  The CONCLAVE

  A child can oft more fates decide

  Than can a meeting of kings.

  (proverb - origin unknown)

  He came up from a murky dream, the mist of memory thinning into vague uneasy recollection then fading to nothing. Cold. Cold darkness. Carnelian sensed it was not long till sunrise. The shutters were rattling. Sleet volleyed against them like arrows. Perhaps he had dreamed the visitors with their long black ship. His heart beat hard. He did not know which was worse: that they had come or that they might not have come at all. He put his feet onto the floor, fumbled a blanket round him and walked over to the shutters. When he swung them back, the wind ran iced fingers through his hair. Its kissing snow set him trembling. In the morning twilight the waves swayed their sickening surge. The ship was there in the anchorage, black as a hole.

  He did not bother to wake Tain. His brother's breathing was fitful. Carnelian had returned to find him sleeping there on a makeshift bed and had not had the heart to send him back to his own room. In truth, he drew some comfort from having him there. He would just have to do without paint.

  He hunted around in the half-light. He found an under-robe and slipped into its icy grip. He threw on more layers until he began to feel warm. His gull-feather cloak went over everything. He walked towards the outer door and stopped. 'Gods' blood,' he hissed. He returned for his mask. He had no intention of running into the visitors but it was safer to be cautious. He hitched the cold thing by its straps to his belt and returned to the door.

  He should have expected the guardsmen outside. They eyed his cloak. One of them stepped forward. 'You know you're not supposed to leave your room, Carnie, not till the Master sends for you.'

  'If there's anything you want we'll go and fetch it,' piped up another.

  'Who told you this?'

  'Grane,' said the first.

  Carnelian glared at the man, who flinched. For a moment he considered putting on his mask and commanding them to let him pass. Grane's granite face appeared in his mind. It was one thing to play the Master in front of the visitors, quite another to do so in front of his people. He nodded and bit his lip. One of the guardsmen sighed the general relief as Carnelian retreated back through the door.

  His hand kneaded the door handle. With the arrival of the visitors his life had changed, and not for the better. His father had warned him of the restrictions of life in Osrakum but Carnelian had never expected these to come to the island. All his life he had heard his father say that life in the Hold was very lax. Still, he burned with questions and would have them answered before the conclave.

  He considered his options and made up his mind. He strode back to the window and let in the grey sky.

  'What are you doing?' a voice said behind him.

  Carnelian turned to look at Tain. He was propped up on one elbow squinting past a hand. 'I'm going to find out what's happening. If you could bear it, Tain, I'd appreciate it if you'd hold the fort till I come back. You know, pretend I'm still here.'

  'What... ?'

  Carnelian was not in the mood for long explanations. He climbed into the window space, braced himself against the wind and looked down at the swelling anger of the sea as it foamed and mouthed the rock below. He mastered his fear and peered just below the sill. The ledge was there, slushy, slick with spume.

  There was a tugging at his cloak. 'By the horns,' he heard Tain spluttering, 'are you trying to get yourself killed?'

  Carnelian craned round. There're guardsmen at the door and this is the only other way.' 'But you'll kill yourself!'

  'Rubbish. We've both done this a hundred times.' 'When we were little, Carnie, and even then, never in winter.'

  'Let go, Tain,' Carnelian cried and pulled away.

  Tain let go, afraid Carnelian might pull so hard he would lose his balance. Tain knew well enough how obstinate his brother could be. 'Yesterday, when he wasn't going out, he needed to be painted,' Tain grumbled. Today, he's prepared to go out on ledges with naked skin.'

  Carnelian ignored his brother, stooped down to remove his shoes and tied them to his belt beside the mask. It was better to feel the ledge. He lowered a foot down to it, ground his heel into the slush and bore the stab of cold that went up his leg. The other foot joined the first. He turned to face into the room and walked his fingers over the stone of the wall outside looking for the once familiar handholds. He had to search a bit. The last time he had done this he had needed to stretch for them, now he actually had to bend his arms. Below him the sea was a beast ravening at the cliff. He edged along. His foot slipped, thumping his heart up through his throat. He made a shuffle to the side, another, one more and he had reached the next window. It would not open. Shoving it, he almost pushed himself out into space. He did it again, with more care. The catch gave way and the shutters snapped into the roo
m. He looked back to his own window. Tain's face was there, sick with fear. Carnelian winked at him then disappeared.

  Carnelian slipped into the barracks. He had no wish to run into the Masters or any of their guardsmen. He found a balcony that looked down into the Sword Court. A path had been cleared across it through the snow. The training posts with their wooden arms and heads were buried up to then-waists in drifts and looked like miserable old men. Carnelian smiled. There was nobody about.

  He skirted the court, avoiding the main corridors. When he reached the final stairway he could hear voices. He listened for a while. When he was sure they were men of his own tyadra, he went down to the alleyway. Its cobbles had recently been scraped clear but were already smearing with new snow. Two of his men were there. One had a brush and a cake of paint that oozed its indigo over his palm and was dribbling it down his arm. The men looked up and saw him.

  'What're you doing?' asked Carnelian.

  'Making wards, Master.'

  'Don't you "Master" me, Poal.'

  The man showed gaps in his teeth as he grinned.

  Carnelian looked north towards the Holdgate, then south into the Sword Court. The eaves' icicle jaws clamped a leaden sky. There was no sound, no movement save for fluttering snow flecks. He turned to inspect their work. An eye was already painted on the archway. The run of the paint was making it cry. Below this they were daubing a crude chameleon. The first sign warned against any uninvited intrusion: the second removed the restriction for those belonging to the House Suth.

  'Where's this being done, Poal?'

  'Everywhere, Carnie.'

  'Are the strangers wandering around?'

  The man shook his head. 'I've not seen any today.'

  'Where's Grane?'

  They both shrugged.

  'Keal?'

  'In the kitchens, I think,' said the other man.

  Carnelian thanked them, crossed to a door, opened it and slipped into the warm gloom beyond. Somewhere a door slammed. He felt his way down narrow corridors, met no-one and managed to reach the kitchens unseen.

  Pungent smells. A steam of air. Enough smoke to sting his eyes. Fires hissed and danced their gleam across walls panelled with platters of precious brass. Endless clatter, clanging and the scolding of the cooks. Stone slab tables stood on either side of the firepit. The centre of each was jammed with condiment boxes and bottles of sauces. Round them people were chopping with flint cleavers, slicing with obsidian knives. Along one wall were the cisterns with their chipped-lipped spouts where dishes were being scrubbed. Cracked flagged floor, tiled walls.

  The whole huge room funnelled up blackening into a chimney.

  Carnelian wandered into this world with his customary delight. He almost forgot his reason for being there when he saw they were cooking feast dishes. The storerooms had yielded up their treasures. Dried fish wallowed in pools of marinade. Air-mummified birds were being soaked in red, honeyed oil. A boy was binding their feathers into fans for garnish. There were flint-grey shrimp just drawn from their tanks, still trembling their combs of legs. Fruits like wizened jewels were being sorted into their kinds. The seeds and bark of rare spices were being pounded into pastes with garlic and rounds sliced from the segmented giriju roots, whose gnarled golden fingers had to be handled with leather gloves because their juice burned skin. Carnelian insisted on sniffing everything and the cooks indulged him. One of the older women slapped his hand away when he stole an apple. He made a face at her and she waggled her cleaver at him. Everyone laughed. He bit into the fruit, grimaced at its bitterness, and she told him that it served him right.

  He came to the firepit and peered into the pots. Some had green sauces, others yellow. In one a pair of carp swam round in the warming water. He stirred another, fishing for morsels with a ladle, curious to see what might be wandering in the depths.

  He reached the pool into which the Hold's spring was pouring its liquid ice. Girls were ranged around its edge, drawing water out with pitchers. He asked for Keal and one of them pointed. He did not see her shy adoration or the way the other girls exchanged meaningful looks. He made for his brother's broad back and slapped it.

  Keal spun round cursing. The anger slipped from his face. 'What're you doing here? Grane'll be furious—'

  'Grane's always furious. Besides, his bird'll be back in the cage before ever he finds that it's flown.'

  The order to keep you there came from the Master himself. You do know that, don't you?'

  Keal's eyes were storm-grey. His skin was a pale honey-brown. He was tall enough to reach Carnelian's chest. Of all the children his father had sired upon the household women, Keal was the one who looked most like him. Those eyes, that severe look, were the Master's. Carnelian felt a familiar pang because Keal would never see this for himself. In the household none but the eldest had ever seen his father's face.

  'Come on, you'd better get back there anyway,' said Keal.

  'Before I do I'd like to know a few things,' said Carnelian. 'First, tell me what happened last night. The warlike preparations—'

  'Hush!' Keal grabbed his arm and dragged him off into the intoxicating stink of one of the storerooms, whose walls rustled with dried squid.

  Keal looked so serious Carnelian almost laughed.

  'I'll tell you what I know but you must keep it to yourself, OK?'

  Carnelian nodded.

  'I don't know why I'm doing this.'

  'Because we're brothers, of course.'

  'As well as that. I'm just hoping that you'll make less trouble if your damned curiosity's satisfied.'

  'And because you know you're no good at hiding things from me.' Carnelian grinned.

  'Do you want to know or not?'

  Carnelian made his face serious, then nodded.

  'Well listen then. The Master armed us and made us man the Holdgate. I was with him as we watched the Masters coming up the road. I think he was as shocked as the rest of us that they were here.'

  'How do you know that?'

  Keal shrugged. 'I just do.'

  Carnelian let it pass.

  'He put me in charge of the Holdgate. He told me that when the Masters demanded entry I was to delay them, tell them that we were waiting for word to come back from him in his hall before we could let them in. He told me that I mustn't on any account open the Holdgate till he sent word. Then he left with Grane and—'

  They left you there to face the Masters by yourself... to openly disobey them?'

  'Well, it wasn't quite like that. It was their tyadra that actually demanded entry. Mind you, even then it wasn't easy.'

  'Go on.'

  Keal's eyes blanked. Though the Masters said nothing I could feel their anger rising like the storm. They just loomed in the background. It was terrifying. It was like contradicting the Master himself.'

  Carnelian shuddered. 'I can imagine.'

  'At last one of the Master's blindmen came. I can't remember all he said, you know how weirdly they speak when they're carrying one of his commands, but the gist of it was .. .' He stopped and walked to the doorway to make sure there was no-one nearby, then came back. The gist of it was that we were to let them in with all proper respect and to escort them to him, leaving none at the Holdgate. They were to be treated as the Masters they were but ... we should think of them as being pirates come to plunder the Hold.'

  Carnelian stared at his brother. 'He said that?'

  Keal nodded, his eyes big and round. 'Or something very close.' 'Was that it?'

  Keal chewed his lip. 'Not quite.' He had lowered his voice. The blindman also said that, at the Master's word, I was to be ready to destroy them.'

  'What?' Carnelian was stunned. Even the suggestion of harming a Master seemed blasphemy.

  That's what the man said, and he brought the Master's ring to prove it.'

  Their eyes locked.

  'Is there more?' Carnelian said at last.

  'I was to stay at the Holdgate and expect an attack from the ship. If any of th
em came back through the Hold without their escort they were to be destroyed.'

  'And later?'

  Things changed. When you came out of his hall with the two Masters, you remember, I took them to the west rooms? That's where they are now ... I hope. When I came back Grane was there and the other Master was still inside. The Master came out—'

  'Which Master?'

  'Our father.' Keal blushed from the use of the word. 'He came out and told us that we could relax our alert a little. He made most of us stand down. He said he wanted us rested and fresh for this morning.'

  'And today?'

  Today he's told us to paint wards everywhere. Grane was told to protect you and stop you wandering about.' He gave Carnelian the severe look again.

  Carnelian patted his shoulder. 'It'll be all right. Tell me about our people. How are they feeling about all this?'

  'What do you think, Carnie? They're all dancing for joy.'

  'What're they afraid of?'

  The Masters, of course, and do you blame them? They're a scary bunch. People know something's up but they don't know what.'

  Carnelian nodded grimly. 'I suppose I feel a bit like that myself.' He saw his brother tauten and reached out to touch him. 'We'll be OK. My .. . our father won't let them harm us.'

  'But, Carnie, they're taking so much, so much of everything.'

  Carnelian remembered the kitchen. 'You mean food?'

  That and other things. Their demands just don't stop. We've already started digging into our reserves. If they stay even a few days they'll eat into our stores, and you know as well as I do that there's nowhere to get more before the ships come.'

  Carnelian nodded. He knew how carefully they had always had to husband their resources, especially in winter. He was still brooding as they walked back into the kitchen.

  There you are,' a voice cried.

  Carnelian's heart sank. His Aunt Brin was sweeping towards them across the kitchen.

  'You do know it was the Master himself who ordered you to stay in your room?' said Brin as she reached him. She turned on Keal. 'And I would've thought you at least would show more sense.'

  Keal flushed. Brin was not only the Master's sister but she also had control of all the household except for the men of the tyadra. That did not stop them fearing her tongue. The kitchen clatter faded away as people turned to stare.