And a figure uncoiling out of the darkness, a Shapeshifter, long and lean and grim-faced, taking one great step forward and in a swift unstoppable lunge driving a knife upward and inward beneath the heart of the man in the brocaded Pontifical robes—
“Majesty, I beg you!”
Magadone Sambisa’s voice, ripe with anguish.
“Yes,” said Valentine, in the distant tone of one who has been lost in a dream. “I’m coming.”
He had had enough visions, for the moment. He set the torch down on the floor, aiming it towards the opening in the wall to fight his way. Carefully he picked up the two dragon teeth—letting them rest easily on the palms of his hands, taking care not to touch them so tightly as to activate their powers, for he did not want now to open his mind to them—and made his way back out of the shrine.
Magadone Sambisa stared at him in horror. “I asked you, your majesty, not to touch the objects in the vault, not to cause any disturbance to—”
“Yes. I know that. You will pardon me for what I have done,”
It was not a request.
The archaeologists melted back out of his way as he strode through their midst, heading for the exit to the upper world. Every eye was turned to the things that rested on Valentine’s upturned hands.
“Bring the khivanivod to me here,” he said quietly to Aarisiim. The light of day was nearly gone now, and the ruins were taking on the greater mysteriousness that came over them by night, when moonlight’s cool gleam danced across the shattered city’s ancient stones.
The Shapeshifter went rushing away. Valentine had not wanted the khivanivod anywhere near the shrine while the opening of the wall was taking place; and so, over his violent objections, Torkkinuuminaad had been bundled off to the archaeologists’ headquarters in the custody of some of Valentine’s security people. The two immense woolly Skandars brought him forth now, holding him by the arms.
Anger and hatred were bubbling up from the shaman like black gas rising from a churning marsh. And, staring into that jagged green wedge of a face, Valentine had a powerful sense of the ancient magic of this world, of mysteries reaching towards him out of the timeless misty Majipoor dawn, when Shapeshifters had moved alone and unhindered through this great planet of marvels and splendours.
The Pontifex held the two sea-dragon teeth aloft.
“Do you know what these are, Torkkinuuminaad?”
The rubbery eye-folds drew back. The narrow eyes were yellow with rage. “You have committed the most terrible of all sacrileges, and you will die in the most terrible of agonies.”
“So you do know what they are, eh?”
They are the holiest of holies! You must return them to the shrine at once!”
“Why did you have Dr Huukaminaan killed, Torkkinuuminaad?”
The khivanivod’s only answer was an even more furiously defiant glare.
He would kill me with his magic, if he could, thought Valentine. And why not? I know what I represent to Torkkinuuminaad. For I am Majipoor’s emperor and therefore I am Majipoor itself, and if one thrust would send us all to our doom he would strike that thrust.
Yes. Valentine was in his own person the embodiment of the Enemy: of those who had come out of the sky and taken the world away from the Piurivars, who had built their own gigantic sprawling cities over virgin forests and glades, had intruded themselves by the billions into the fragile fabric of the Piurivars’ trembling web of life. And so Torkkinuuminaad would kill him, if he could, and by killing the Pontifex kill, by the symbolism of magic, all of human-dominated Majipoor.
But magic can be fought with magic, Valentine thought.
“Yes, look at me,” he told the shaman. “Look right into my eyes, Torkkinuuminaad.”
And let his fingers close tightly about the two talismans he had taken from the shrine.
The double force of the teeth struck into Valentine with a staggering impact as he closed the mental circuit. He felt the full range of the sensations all at once, not simply doubled, but multiplied many times over. He held himself upright nevertheless; he focused his concentration with the keenest intensity; he aimed his mind directly at that of the khivanivod.
Looked. Entered. Penetrated the khivanivod’s memories and quickly found what he was seeking.
Midnight darkness. A sliver of moonlight. The sky ablaze with stars. The billowing tent of the archaeologists. Someone coming out of it, a Piurivar, very thin, moving with the caution of age.
Dr Huukaminaam, surely.
A slender figure stands in the road, waiting: another Metamorph, also old, just as gaunt raggedly and strangely dressed.
The khivanivod, that one is. Viewing himself in his own mind’s eye.
Shadowy figures moving about behind him, five, six, seven of them. Shape-shifters all. Villagers, from the looks of them. The old archaeologist does not appear to see them. He speaks with the khivanivod; the shaman gestures, points. There is a discussion of some sort. Dr Huukaminaam shakes his head. More pointing. More discussion. Gestures of agreement. Everything seems to be resolved.
As Valentine watches, the khivanivod and Huukaminaan start off together down the road that leads to the heart of the ruins.
The villagers, now, emerging from the shadows that have concealed them. Surrounding the old man; seizing him; covering his mouth to keep him from crying out. The khivanivod approaches him.
The khivanivod has a knife.
Valentine did not need to see the rest of the scene. Did not want to see that monstrous ceremony of dismemberment at the stone platform, nor the weird ritual afterward in the excavation leading to the Shrine of the Downfall, the placing of the dead man’s head in that alcove.
He released his grasp on the two sea-dragon teeth and set them down with great care beside him on the ground.
“Now,” he said to the khivanivod, whose expression had changed from one of barely controllable wrath to one that might almost have been resignation. There’s no need for further pretending here, I think. Why did you kill Dr Huukaminaan?”
“Because he would have opened the shrine.” The khivanivod’s tone was completely flat, no emotion in it at all.
“Yes. Of course. But Magadone Sambisa also was in favour of opening it. Why not kill her instead?”
“He was one of us, and a traitor,” said Torkinuuminaad. “She did not matter. And he was more dangerous to our cause. We know that she might have been prevented from opening the shrine, if we objected strongly enough. But nothing would stop him.”
“The shrine was opened anyway, though,” Valentine said.
“Yes, but only because you came here. Otherwise the excavations would have been closed down. The outcry over Huukaminaan’s death would demonstrate to the whole world that the curse of this place still had power. You came, and you opened the shrine; but the curse will strike you just as it struck the Pontifex Ghorban long ago.”
“There is no curse,” Valentine said calmly. “This is a city that has seen much tragedy, but there is no curse, only misunderstanding piled on misunderstanding,”
“The Defilement—”
There was no Defilement either, only a sacrifice. The destruction of the city by the people of the provinces was a vast mistake.”
“So you understand our history better than we do, Pontifex?”
“Yes,” said Valentine. “Yes. I do,” He turned away from the shaman and said, glancing towards the village foreman, “Vathiimeraak, there are murderers living in your settlement. I know who they are. Go to the village now and announce to everyone that if the guilty ones will come forward and confess their crime, they’ll be pardoned after they undergo a full cleansing of their souls,”
Turning next to Lisamon Hultin, he said, “As for the khivanivod, I want him handed over to the Danipiur’s officials to be tried in her own courts. This falls within her area of responsibility. And then—”
“Majesty!” someone called. “Beware!”