The device made a steady ticking sound when properly adjusted. Faleri had brought a man with him who knew how to achieve that. He believed this man was also tasked with spying on him. There was always someone spying. There wasn’t much you could do about it. Information was the iron key to unlock the world.
Orso Faleri felt as if the moments of his life were passing swiftly, to that ticking sound. His mistress was beautiful, young, imaginative, not celebrated for her patience. There were many back home who openly desired her, including two council members. At least two.
His unhappiness was extreme—and would need to be concealed.
The two great doors swung open. Servants in white and gold appeared, more tall men, standing extremely straight. The court official (he needed to begin remembering names) smiled at Faleri again. Another man appeared at the doors and greeted him. This, he knew, was the chancellor. A name they’d discussed back home. Chancellor Savko nodded his head. Ambassador Faleri nodded his.
They entered a large, long room together. There was a throne on a carpet most of the way towards the far end. There were fires lit, but it was still cold.
The clock had been placed on a table beside the throne. It was ticking. Faleri heard it when he rose heavily after the second set of obeisances. He managed to stand without help, which was gratifying, but he was perspiring under his heavy clothing, even in a chilly autumn room. It would not be seemly to mop his forehead at this point. His silk shirt under his doublet clung damply to his body. He worked to control his breathing.
If he had to do this every time he was presented for a year—or two!—it would kill him, he thought. He might as well die now.
Rodolfo was looking at the clock. He lifted a vague hand, in what might be construed as a greeting to the newest ambassador to his court. Or it could be a cautionary gesture to keep quiet. No one spoke. Faleri had not been introduced by anyone. He couldn’t speak. He didn’t exist here yet. A good thing, in a way. He needed to regain composure, and his breath.
The clock ticked loudly in a silent room.
Rodolfo, Jad’s Holy Emperor, King of Karch, of Esperaña in the west, of the northern reaches of Sauradia, laying (disputed) claim to parts of Ferrieres, some of Trakesia, and diverse other territories and islands, Sword of the High Patriarch in Rhodias, scion of an illustrious (inbred) family, said thoughtfully, “We like this device. It divides eternity.”
No one replied, though there were forty or fifty men in the room. No women, Faleri realized. In Seressa there were always women at times such as this, adornments of life, often sublimely clever. He shifted his legs. His head was still swimming; the room wobbled and swayed like a child’s top. He felt hot, dry-mouthed. They would kill him with these obeisances. He would die kneeling in Obravic!
The emperor was taller than expected. Rodolfo had the beaked nose and receding chin of the Kohlberg dynasty. He was pale-skinned, fair-haired. His hands were large, his eyes narrow above that nose, which made it hard to read their expression.
The chancellor finally broke the ticking stillness. “Excellency, I have the honour to present the distinguished emissary from the Republic of Seressa, arrived to take up his position among us. This is Signore Orso Faleri, who carries ambassador’s papers attested by the seal of that republic, and who wishes the privilege of saluting you.”
He had already saluted, Faleri thought grimly. Six times, head to marble floor. Was he now to crawl forward and kiss a slippered imperial foot? They did that in Asharias, didn’t they? That great, triple-walled city wasn’t called Sarantium any more, it had been conquered. It was where the khalif ruled. They had renamed the City of Cities since the fall, the terrible disaster of the age.
Twenty-five years ago. It was still difficult to grasp that it had happened. They lived in a sad, harsh world, Orso Faleri often thought. There was still money to be made, mind you.
The emperor finally looked at him. He actually turned from the ticking gift-object and regarded the ambassador of a power wealthier than he was, which lent him money, which was less beleaguered, and more sophisticated in almost all ways.
Well, good, thought Orso Faleri.
Rodolfo said, quietly, “We thank the Republic of Seressa for its gifts, and for sending Signore Faleri to us. Signore, it is our pleasure to see you again and to welcome you to Obravic. We hope to enjoy your presence here.”
And with that he turned back to the clock. He did add, by way of explanation as he looked away, “We are waiting to see the man with the mace come out and strike the infidel.”
He was, thought Faleri, said by many—including their last ambassador—to perhaps be going mad. It was possible. Faleri might spend two years of his life destroying his back and knees, burdening his heart and other parts of his anatomy at the court of a lunatic. There was madness in the imperial bloodline. All that intermarriage. It might have arrived again.
For one thing, Orso Faleri had never met the emperor before.
Our pleasure to see you again . . . ?
Was this a damaged mind, lost to alchemy and philosophies, or was it the empty pleasantry of a ruler not paying attention to what he said? Faleri might consider that an insult. On behalf of Seressa, of course. On the other hand, their gift had elicited approval. That was good, wasn’t it?
There came a chiming sound.
Everyone regarded the clock.
A warrior of Jad, armoured in silver with a sun disk on his chest and bearing a golden mace, came forth on a curved track from doors on the left side of the apparatus. An Osmanli soldier, clad as one of the elite djanni infantry, bearded, wielding a curved sword, emerged similarly from the right. They met in the middle, in front of the clock face. Both stopped. The chiming continued. The Jaddite commenced to strike the Asharite upon his head with the mace. He did so three times. That was the hour. The chiming stopped. The warriors withdrew into the body of the clock, left side, right side. The doors closed, concealing them. There was ticking.
Jad’s Holy Emperor laughed aloud.
—
LATER THAT AFTERNOON, as a cold rain fell, the chancellor of the Holy Jaddite Empire, a man greatly burdened by the demands of his office, closeted himself with two of his advisers in a fire-lit room.
The emperor was, at this moment, on a higher level of the palace—in a tower, in fact—where the latest attempt to alter the state of being of lead was underway under the auspices of a small, belligerent, untidy person from Ferrieres. There had been rumours of dramatic progress.
In this room the discussion was more prosaic. It concerned the Seressini ambassador. There was a vigorous dispute taking place. Chancellor Savko’s tall secretary and the young man named Vitruvius, who held no significant official position but spent most nights in the chancellor’s bed, were both of the opinion that the newest envoy from Seressa was a fool.
The chancellor pointed out that the Seressinis had not become the power they were by employing fools in important offices. He differed with their assessment. Indeed, he went further and chastised both—causing the younger one to flush (appealingly)—for being so hasty in formulating any opinion at all.
“Nothing about this,” he said, lifting a necessary cup of warmed, spiced wine, “requires or is assisted by speed.”
He drank slowly, as if to make a point. He set his cup down and looked out the streaked, barred window. Rain and mist. Red-roofed houses barely visible below, towards the grey river. “We have no need to form views about him yet,” he said. “He can be observed at leisure.”
“He asked about women,” his secretary said. “Where the most desirable courtesans might be found. It could be a weakness?”
The chancellor made a note. “That is better,” he said. “Bring me information, not judgments.”
“What did you think of him?” his secretary asked.
“I think he is Seressini,” Savko replied. “I think Seressa is alwa
ys dangerous, always to be watched, and they sent this man to us. Did he say anything else?”
“Little,” the secretary said. His name was Hanns. “A remark about pirates, the shared need to deal with them.”
“Ah,” said the chancellor. He had expected this. He made another note. “That will be about Senjan. He won’t wait long before making a submission concerning them.”
“What will we say?” his lover asked. Vitruvius was from Karch. He was pale-blond, blue-eyed, broad-shouldered, as many were in the north, and intelligent enough for his tasks. He was utterly loyal to the chancellor, which was critical at any court, and he knew how to kill people.
The chancellor tugged at his moustache, a habit. “I don’t know yet. It depends on the Osmanlis, somewhat.”
“Most things do,” Secretary Hanns said.
He, as it happened, was too clever for his current position. There was a need to consider promoting him to a state office this winter. A useful man should not be allowed to become unhappy.
Savko favoured him with a rare smile. “You are right, of course,” he said. “Pour yourselves wine, both of you. It is a miserable afternoon.”
His mood, despite that, was benign. His foot wasn’t hurting, for one thing, and he enjoyed minor mysteries of the sort this new envoy posed. He’d held office for fifteen years, half the emperor’s reign. He knew he was good at what he did.
He’d kept a challenging emperor seated and secure, hadn’t he? Well, largely secure. Money remained a vast, intractable problem, and the Osmanlis had been pushing forward just about every spring the last few years.
He’d be receiving the report on the state of their fortifications soon, since the campaign season had now ended. He wasn’t looking forward to reading it. There was a probability the great fort of Woberg would be under siege again next spring, in which case repairs would be urgent, and expensive.
“I still think this new man is a fool,” Vitruvius said, pouring wine.
“Let’s set about finding out, shall we?” the chancellor said mildly.
He would think about the border forts when proper information arrived. A portion of his skill lay in not addressing matters until he had the facts he needed. He was endlessly aware of what he saw as a defining truth of the world: power almost always decided things.
Looking out the rain-blurred window as a wet evening descended, he gave quick, exact instructions concerning Orso Faleri, who appeared to like women, perhaps especially on cold autumn nights. This matter of a new ambassador he could begin to consider now. He’d done this before, many times.
—
IT WASN’T AS IF SERESSA was sunny and warm in late autumn. Indeed, if he was being honest he’d have to say his city on its lagoon could be colder than Obravic. Fog and damp that could find your chest and bones, even in a palace on the Great Canal. There weren’t enough fireplaces in the world, Orso Faleri was thinking, to entirely ease a wet autumn or winter night back home.
Even so, even so. You felt the cold more when you were away. Men were like that, the world was. An unfamiliar house among strangers, darkness having descended to the sound of rain. Poets wrote about such things.
When he was younger he had done his share of travelling for the family, journeying east on their ships (his father’s ships, then), enduring what came to a man at sea or in alien ports where, when bells rang, it was to summon Asharites to infidel prayers.
He had made a point of going once into the desert of Ammuz, an escorted journey inland from the port of Khatib, before sailing home with grain. He had looked up at the innumerable stars from outside a tent at night. He’d been bitten by a spider, he recalled.
If there was any pleasant aspect to growing older, it was that he’d reached a point where others made those journeys for him. He didn’t regret tasting the wider world. A man needed, he thought, to know the bitterness of far-away beds and tables, danger and hardship and strangeness away. Spider bites in a desert night.
It made you appreciate what you had at home.
He was appreciating for all he was worth tonight. The afternoon’s rain had not eased. He’d thought it might turn to snow, which would at least be delicate, white on the bare branches of trees, but it hadn’t yet. It was just wet and cold in Obravic. Windy. The wind was from the north, winter in it. It rattled the windows.
They might have prepared a banquet for him, he thought. His first formal evening as ambassador, documents presented and accepted. They might have welcomed him properly. Of course they’d have been watching and judging him at any such feast, but he’d have been doing the same with those he met. That was what all this was, after all. Power assessing power.
Instead, he was in the ambassadorial residence, below the palace but on the same side of the river, alone except for servants. The clock-winder had remained in the palace. It seemed the emperor wished to have him housed among his men of art and science. That was all right. Faleri didn’t trust the clock-winder. He wasn’t one of his own men. He had only his manservant, Gaurio, with him. The others came with the house. They lived here, attending to whoever the ambassador was in a given year. Or two—may Jad defend his life and soul from that.
He had, however, enjoyed another passable meal. The cook appeared to know what he was doing. An unexpected blessing. He had drunk very good wine—his own. He’d brought three barrels of red Candarian with him, would send for more. There had been dreadful reports they mostly served those pale, sour Karchite wines in Obravic, or beer—and no civilized man could be expected to drink those for an entire year. Or two. (He needed to stop thinking about that.)
He was in a room furnished as a study on the ground level. A sturdy desk, a writing chair, daybed, south-facing terrace with a view of the river, for use in a better season. A good-sized fireplace, two more heavy chairs either side of it, a large table, storage chests with locks, Seressini paintings on the walls. One of these, an early Villani, was of the lagoon at sunrise: boats on bright water, the two sanctuaries, their domes gleaming, the lion pillars, the Arsenale just visible on the right. That painting was going to make him wistful, he thought.
Viero Villani was dead. Earlier this same year. Coughing blood, it had been reported, but not the plague. A good artist, in Faleri’s view. Not one of the greatest, but skilled. He owned two of Villani’s works himself. And tonight, looking at a painting (his own palace would have been just to the left of this scene), he morosely lifted a glass to toast the image and the man.
Not everyone could be a master. You could shape an honourable life somewhere below that level of accomplishment. It felt like an important thought. He had no one, he realized, with whom to share it.
He missed Annalisa already. She’d have seated him by the fire, poured another cup for both of them, listened sympathetically as he told of those six obeisances and the weak-chinned emperor clapping his hands like a child when their clock chimed and the warrior smote the Osmanli.
Then she’d have come upstairs to bed and unpinned her splendid hair and warmed him with the miracle of her youth while the sun god drove his chariot under the world and defended mankind from all that would assail it in the night.
Faleri drained his wine. Poured another cup. He wondered where she was tonight. If she was alone. He hoped she was alone. He heard a knocking at the door from out in the rain and dark.
—
FALERI SENT THE WOMAN home afterwards. It was difficult, as she had been warm and accommodating in his bed, but this was a game of courts, not desire, and those here were not to assume they had his measure so soon.
It was too transparent a device, in truth. Almost an insult, insufficient subtlety. Or perhaps just northern clumsiness. He had mentioned women to a yellow-haired man (and learned his name: Vitruvius) and—oh, see, astonishment!—a girl appears with an escort at his door that very night, scented, in low-cut green silk, which emerged as she shed a wet, dark, heavy clo
ak and hood.
Her name was Veith, she said. Yes, it was a bad night. Yes, wine would be much appreciated. She had a low, appealing voice.
He’d given her the wine in his bedchamber (best to get into the habit of not letting girls into the ground-floor room where there would be papers). He had taken his pleasure with her, and it was pleasurable. She simulated desire and gratification with practised, amusing skill. No northern clumsiness here. They’d spoken a little, afterwards, about autumn weather and importing silks, then he’d summoned Gaurio to take her back down to the front door where her escort would be—one dared assume—waiting under cover from the rain. She’d looked slightly disconcerted at being asked to dress and leave so expeditiously. That was all right.
He told Gaurio to be generous, though she’d have been paid by the court. She’d earned his coin, he judged, if not theirs.
He went to bed.
In the middle of the night Orso Faleri woke suddenly, even urgently, with a thought out of nowhere, or, more properly, out of the depths of a dream-memory.
He’d been standing with his father by the lagoon near the Arsenale. The slap of water against the stones. A great imperial ship was docked, a royal visit from Obravic. A herald presenting the republic’s dignitaries to the previous emperor, including the well-regarded, prosperous merchant family of Faleri.
The previous emperor’s oldest son, Rodolfo, was with his father. Walking behind him, hands clasped behind his back, looking about with curiosity. Faleri had been a boy, Prince Rodolfo a young man.
But they had seen each other that day. Almost forty years ago. It is our pleasure to see you again.
Faleri felt chilled, and not from the cold.
He adjusted his nightcap over his ears. It would be a grave mistake, he decided, wide awake in a black night, to decide that this emperor, however distracted he might appear, was any sort of fool. He would write that, encoded, in his first dispatch, he thought.