“As difficult to say or spell, I wager,” said Hereward. “I commend the short form, it shows common sense. What of it?”
“It is on the list,” said Fitz.
Hereward bit the edge of pewter cup and put it down too hard, slopping wine upon the table.
“You’re certain? There can be no question?”
Fitz shook his head. “After I had doctored the young woman, I went down to the lake and took a slide of the god’s essence—it was quite concentrated in the water, easily enough to yield a sample. You may compare it with the record, if you wish.”
He proffered a finger-long inch-wide strip of glass that was striated in many different bands of colour. Hereward accepted it reluctantly, and with it a fat, square book that Fitz slid across the table. The book was open at a hand-tinted colour plate, the illustration showing a sequence of colour bands.
“It is the same,” agreed the knight, his voice heavy with regret. “I suppose it is fortunate we have not yet signed on, though I doubt they will see what we do as being purely a matter of defence.”
“They do not know what they harbor here,” said Fitz.
“It is a pleasant city.” said Hereward, taking up his cup again to take a large gulp of the slightly sweet wine. “In a pretty valley. I had thought I could grow more than accustomed to Shûme—and its people.”
“The bounty of Shûme, all its burgeoning crops, its healthy stock and people, is an unintended result of their godlet’s predation upon the surrounding lands,” said Fitz. “Pralqornrah is one of the class of cross-dimensional parasites that is most dangerous. Unchecked, in time it will suck the vital essence out of all the land beyond its immediate demesne. The deserts of Balkash are the work of a similar being, over six millennia. This one has only been embedded here for two hundred years—you have seen the results beyond this valley.”
“Six millennia is a long time,” said Hereward, taking yet another gulp. The wine was strong as well as sweet, and he felt the need of it. “A desert might arise in that time without the interference of the gods.”
“It is not just the fields and the river that Pralqornrah feeds upon,” said Fitz. “The people outside this valley suffer too. Babes unborn, strong men and women declining before their prime . . . this godlet slowly sucks the essence from all life.”
“They could leave,” said Hereward. The wine was making him feel both sleepy and mulish. “I expect many have already left to seek better lands. The rest could be resettled, the lands left uninhabited to feed the godlet. Shûme could continue as an oasis. What if another desert grows around it? They occur in nature, do they not?”
“I do not think you fully comprehend the matter,” said Fitz. “Pralqornrah is a most comprehensive feeder. Its energistic threads will spread farther and faster the longer it exists here, and it in turn will grow more powerful and much more difficult to remove. A few millennia hence, it might be too strong to combat.”
“I am only talking,” said Hereward, not without some bitterness. “You need not waste your words to bend my reason. I do not even need to understand anything beyond the salient fact: this godlet is on the list.”
“Yes,” said Mister Fitz. “It is on the list.”
Hereward bent his head for a long, silent moment. Then he pushed his chair back and reached across for his sabre. Drawing it, he placed the blade across his knees. Mister Fitz handed him a whetstone and a small flask of light, golden oil. The knight oiled the stone and began to hone the sabre’s blade. A repetitive rasp was the only sound in the room for many minutes, till he finally put the stone aside and wiped the blade clean with a soft piece of deerskin.
“When?”
“Fourteen minutes past the midnight hour is optimum,” replied Mister Fitz. “Presuming I have calculated its intrusion density correctly.”
“It is manifest in the temple?”
Fitz nodded.
“Where is the temple, for that matter? Only the citadel stands out above the roofs of the city.”
“It is largely underground,” said Mister Fitz. “I have found a side entrance, which should not prove difficult. At some point beyond that there is some form of arcane barrier—I have not been able to ascertain its exact nature, but I hope to unpick it without trouble.”
“Is the side entrance guarded? And the interior?”
“Both,” said Fitz. Something about his tone made Hereward fix the puppet with a inquiring look.
“The side door has two guards,” continued Fitz. “The interior watch is of ten or eleven . . . led by the Lieutenant Jessaye you met earlier.”
Hereward stood up, the sabre loose in his hand, and turned away from Fitz.
“Perhaps we shall not need to fight her . . . or her fellows.”
Fitz did not answer, which was answer enough.
The side door to the temple was unmarked and appeared no different than the other simple wooden doors that lined the empty street, most of them adorned with signs marking them as the shops of various tradesmen, with smoke-grimed night lamps burning dimly above the sign. The door Fitz indicated was painted a pale violet and had neither sign nor lamp.
“Time to don the brassards and make the declaration,” said the puppet. He looked up and down the street, making sure that all was quiet, before handing Hereward a broad silk armband five fingers wide. It was embroidered with sorcerous thread that shed only a little less light than the smoke-grimed lantern above the neighbouring shop door. The symbol the threads wove was one that had once been familiar the world over but was now unlikely to be recognized by anyone save an historian . . . or a god.
Hereward slipped the brassard over his left glove and up his thick coat sleeve, spreading it out above the elbow. The suit of white and yellow was once again packed, and for this expedition the knight had chosen to augment his helmet and buff coat with a dented but still eminently serviceable back- and breastplate, the steel blackened by tannic acid to a dark grey. He had already primed, loaded and spanned his two wheel-lock pistols, which were thrust through his belt; his sabre was sheathed at his side; and a lozenge-sectioned, armour-punching bodkin was in his left boot.
Mister Fitz wore his sewing desk upon his back, like a wooden backpack. He had already been through its numerous small drawers and containers and selected particular items that were now tucked into the inside pockets of his coat, ready for immediate use.
“I wonder why we bother with this mummery,” grumbled Hereward. But he stood at attention as Fitz put on his own brassard, and the knight carefully repeated the short phrase uttered by his companion. Though both had recited it many times, and it was clear as bright type in their minds, they spoke carefully and with great concentration, in sharp contrast to Hereward’s remark about mummery.
“In the name of the Council of the Treaty for the Safety of the World, acting under the authority granted by the Three Empires, the Seven Kingdoms, the Palatine Regency, the Jessar Republic and the Forty Lesser Realms, we declare ourselves agents of the Council. We identify the godlet manifested in this city of Shûme as Pralqornrah-Tanish-Kvaxixob, a listed entity under the Treaty. Consequently, the said godlet and all those who assist it are deemed to be enemies of the World and the Council authorizes us to pursue any and all actions necessary to banish, repel or exterminate the said godlet.”
Neither felt it necessary to change this ancient text to reflect the fact that only one of the three empires was still extant in any fashion; that the seven kingdoms were now twenty or more small states; the Palatine Regency was a political fiction, its once broad lands under two fathoms of water; the Jessar Republic was now neither Jessar in ethnicity nor a republic; and perhaps only a handful of the Forty Lesser Realms resembled their antecedent polities in any respect. But for all that the states that had made it were vanished or diminished, the Treaty for the Safety of the World was still held to be in operation, if only by the Council that administered and enforced it.
“Are you ready?” asked Fitz.
Hereward drew his sabre and moved into position to the left of the door. Mister Fitz reached into his coat and drew out an esoteric needle. Hereward knew better than to try to look at the needle directly, but in the reflection of his blade, he could see a four-inch line of something intensely violet writhe in Fitz’s hand. Even the reflection made him feel as if he might at any moment be unstitched from the world, so he angled the blade away.
At that moment, Fitz touched the door with the needle and made three short plucking motions. On the last motion, without any noise or fuss, the door wasn’t there anymore. There was only a wood-panelled corridor leading down into the ground and two very surprised temple guards, who were still leaning on their halberds.
Before Hereward could even begin to move, Fitz’s hand twitched across and up several times. The lanterns on their brass stands every six feet along the corridor flickered and flared violet for a fraction of a second. Hereward blinked, and the guards were gone, as were the closest three lanterns and their stands.
Only a single drop of molten brass, no bigger than a tear, remained. It sizzled on the floor for a second, then all was quiet.
The puppet stalked forward, cupping his left hand over the needle in his right, obscuring its troublesome sight behind his fingers. Hereward followed close behind, alert for any enemy that might be resistant to Fitz’s sorcery.
The corridor was a hundred yards long by Hereward’s estimation, and slanted sharply down, making him think about having to fight back up it, which would be no easy task, made more difficult as the floor and walls were damp, drops of water oozing out between the floorboards and dripping from the seams of the wall panelling. There was cold, wet stone behind the timber, Hereward knew. He could feel the cold air rippling off it, a chill that no amount of fine timber could cloak.
The corridor ended at what appeared from a distance to be a solid wall, but closer to was merely the dark back of a heavy tapestry. Fitz edged silently around it, had a look, and returned to beckon Hereward in.
There was a large antechamber or waiting room beyond, sparsely furnished with a slim desk and several well-upholstered armchairs. The desk and chairs each had six legs, the extra limbs arranged closely at the back, a fashion Hereward supposed was some homage to the godlet’s physical manifestation. The walls were hung with several tapestries depicting the city at various stages in its history.
Given the depth underground and the proximity of the lake, great efforts must have been made to waterproof and beautify the walls, floor and ceiling, but there was still an army of little dots of mould advancing from every corner, blackening the white plaster and tarnishing the gilded cornices and decorations.
Apart from the tapestry-covered exit, there were three doors. Two were of a usual size, though they were elaborately carved with obscure symbols and had brass, or perhaps even gold, handles. The one on the wall opposite the tapestry corridor was entirely different: it was a single ten-foot-by-six-foot slab of ancient marble veined with red lead, and it would have been better situated sitting on top of a significant memorial or some potentate’s coffin.
Mister Fitz went to each of the carved doors, his blue tongue flickering in and out, sampling the air.
“No one close,” he reported, before approaching the marble slab. He actually licked the gap between the stone and the floor, then sat for a few moments to think about what he had tasted.