Ishbel gave a small shrug. “Why should I know?”
Aziel sighed. Because everyone else in the damned world knows. “Sit down,” he said, “and I shall tell you of Maximilian Persimius.”
He waited until Ishbel had sat herself, her back rigid, her face expressionless, before he spoke.
“I shall be brief, as I am certain you shall have ample opportunity to hear this story from Maximilian himself.”
Ishbel’s face tightened, but Aziel ignored it.
“Eight years ago there was an uproar when the presumed long-dead heir to the Escatorian throne, Maximilian, suddenly reappeared. He told an astounding tale: stolen at the age of fourteen, thrown into the gloam mines—known as the Veins—to labor in darkness and pain for a full seventeen years until he was rescued by a youthful apprentice physician and a marsh witch. Yes, I know, stranger than myth, but sometimes it happens. It transpired that Maximilian’s ‘death’ had been staged by his older cousin Cavor, who wanted the throne. Once free of the Veins, Maximilian challenged Cavor for the throne, won, and…well, there you have it. Maximilian has since led a fairly blameless life running Escator and, as luck would have it, looking for a wife. I have never seen him, nor met him, but I have heard good of him. He is respected both as a man and as a king.”
“He was imprisoned in the gloam mines for seventeen years?”
“Yes.”
“Then I hope he has since managed to scrub the dirt of the grave from under his fingernails.”
“That was ungenerous, Ishbel.”
“Don’t lecture me,” she snapped. “Maximilian may be of the noblest character, and patently has endurance beyond most other men, but I have no wish to be his wife. I do not wish to leave Serpent’s Nest.”
“Ishbel…the Great Serpent has said that—”
“Perhaps the Great Serpent is mistaken,” Ishbel said, and with that she rose, snatched up her cloak, and left the chamber.
CHAPTER FOUR
Serpent’s Nest, the Outlands
Wrapping the cloak tightly about herself, Ishbel walked quickly through the corridors until she came to the stairwell leading up to a small balcony high in Serpent’s Nest. She was grateful she met no one, partly because she could not at the moment contemplate questions or small talk, but mostly because she felt deeply ashamed of her behavior and manner with Aziel.
Her shock and horror at the vision the Great Serpent had showed her—and then at the solution he had suggested—could not excuse her behavior toward Aziel. Ishbel owed the Great Serpent, the Coil, and even Serpent’s Nest itself a great deal, but she owed Aziel so much more. He had been the one to rescue her. His had been the hand extended to lift her from the horror that assailed her. His had been the gentle smile, the soft encouragement, the friendship, over all of these years, which had helped her to put that frightful time behind her.
He hadn’t deserved that face she had just shown him.
Ishbel sighed and began to climb the stairs. The eastern balcony was her favorite spot in Serpent’s Nest, and she often came here to think, or simply to stand and allow the salt breeze from the Infinity Sea to wash over her face and through her hair.
The climb was a long one, and, as it progressed, the stone stairs became ever rougher and a little steeper. The increasing difficulty of the way did not bother Ishbel; rather, it comforted her, because it meant she approached the older part of Serpent’s Nest.
The more mysterious part.
Serpent’s Nest was a mystery in itself. Ishbel had begun to explore the structure in the first months after she had arrived as a child, completely fascinated by her new home. Serpent’s Nest was not a town, nor even a building, but a series of interconnecting chambers and corridors hewn out of what Ional, the old archpriestess Ishbel had replaced, told her was the largest mountain in the world.
Inhabited once by giants among men, Ional had said, and a legendary warrior-king who wielded magic beyond comprehension, but now left with only us to keep its empty spaces company.
Ishbel could well believe that giants had once lived here. Well, many people, at the very least. The Coil only occupied a hundredth of the chambers that had been thus far explored, and there were yet more corridors and tunnels that led deep into the mountain through which no one had yet dared venture. No one knew who or what had once lived here. Ional had told Ishbel that the Coil had lived here for twenty-three generations, but that the mountain stronghold had been long empty when the Coil had first arrived.
The stairs suddenly broadened, and Ishbel felt the first breath of sea air wash over her face. She smiled, relaxing, and stepped onto the eastern balcony. Ishbel had found this place in her tenth year, and had come here regularly ever since. No one else ever used the balcony, and Ishbel was not sure that anyone else even knew how to reach it.
Perhaps, among the myriad stairwells and corridors and possibilities that Serpent’s Nest offered, no one else had ever found this particular stairwell.
Ishbel leaned back against the stone face of the mountain, the semicircular balustrade of the balcony wall two paces before her, and looked out over the Infinity Sea.
By the Great Serpent, was there ever a more beautiful view?
The mountain that Ishbel knew as Serpent’s Nest rose directly above the vast Infinity Sea, its eastern face, where Ishbel now relaxed on her balcony, plunging almost a thousand paces into the gray-blue waters of the sea. Ishbel loved the great vastness of the ocean stretching out before her, with its wildness, its unpredictability, its strangeness, and its unknowable secrets. Behind her rose the comforting solidity of the mountain, almost warm against her back.
Ishbel took a deep breath, forcing herself to think about what had happened today. The horror of the Great Serpent’s vision…she shuddered as she replayed in her mind the sight of the ice wraiths with their huge silvery orbs for eyes and their oversized teeth, swarming over the mountain.
And the solution…
Ishbel shuddered again. Leave Serpent’s Nest? Marriage? Marriage? Ishbel could almost not comprehend it. She struggled to remember household life in her parents’ home. Her mother had been bound to the house, supervising the servants, the mending of linens, deciding what food should be served to her father for his dinner, being pleasant and hospitable to visitors. Her parents had been wealthy and important people, but Ishbel could remember that faint touch of servitude in her mother’s manner to her husband—how the entire household revolved around his wants and needs—and even to those visitors that her husband needed to impress. She remembered how tired her mother had constantly appeared, worn down by the responsibilities of the house and her large family.
True, marriage to a king would be different, but not so greatly. Ishbel would still be his inferior, and would still need to subject herself to him, as would any wife.
Here she was Aziel’s equal, respected by all other members of the Coil, and feared by those who came to the Coil seeking their visionary aid.
Even worse, Ishbel would need to subject herself physically to the man. Ishbel had led an utterly chaste life since her arrival at Serpent’s Nest. She did not even think of any of the male members (or any of the female members, for that matter) in sexual terms. She could not imagine a man thinking he had the right to touch her, and to use her body in the most intimate sense. She could not imagine having to subject herself to such intrusion.
And to lose all the support she had at Serpent’s Nest in the doing. To lose everything she held dear, and which kept her safe, for such a life.
“The Great Serpent must be mistaken,” she said. “This can’t be the solution.”
Ishbel straightened, squaring her shoulders, determined in her decision. “I will tell Aziel that I was mistaken, that I misinterpreted the Great Serpent’s words, that—”
Ishbel, do as I have asked.
Ishbel froze in the act of moving toward the opening that led to the stairwell.
Very slowly, so slowly she thought she could hear the bones in her neck crea
k, Ishbel looked up toward the distant peak of the mountain.
An apparition of the Great Serpent writhed there: the setting sun glinted off his black scales and shimmered along the fangs of his slightly open mouth. His head wove back and forth, as if tasting the wind; then he slowly wound his way down the mountain toward Ishbel.
Do as I ask, Ishbel.
Ishbel could not move, let alone speak.
The Great Serpent wound closer, sliding between rocks and through cracks with ease until his head hung some ten paces above Ishbel.
Do as I ask.
Ishbel was recovered from her initial shock. The Great Serpent had occasionally appeared to her, but it had been when she was a young child and still wept for her mother. Then he had come to comfort her. Now, it seemed, he was here to ensure Ishbel did as he wished. Given that Ishbel had just spent some long minutes silently fuming at the idea she should have to subject herself to the wishes of a husband, the idea that the Great Serpent was here to force her to his will irritated her into a small rebellion.
“I cannot see how marriage to Maximilian would help, Great One. We need armies, warriors, magicians—”
I need you to marry Maximilian Persimius. Ishbel, do as I bid.
Ishbel’s mouth compressed. “One of the other priestesses, perhaps. I—”
The Great Serpent’s mouth flared wide in anger, and his tongue forked close to her hair. Ishbel—
Then, stunningly, another voice, a male voice, and one much gentler than that of the Great Serpent.
Ishbel, you need not fear.
Ishbel spun about, looking to the stone balustrading. An oversized frog balanced there, its body so insubstantial she could see right through it to the sea beyond.
A frog, but one such as she had never seen previously. He was very large, as big as a man’s head, and quite impossibly beautiful. This beauty was mostly due to his eyes, great black pools of kindness and comfort.
He shifted a little on the balustrade—
Almost as if he balanced on the rim of a goblet…
—unconcerned about the precipitous drop behind him.
Ishbel, he said, listen to my comrade, no matter how distasteful you think his directive. He is arrogant, sometimes, and uncaring of the fragility of those to whom he speaks.
“I am not fragile,” Ishbel said, almost automatically. This apparition was a god also: she could feel the power emanating from him, and she sensed that perhaps he was even more potent than the Great Serpent. It was a different power, though. Far more subtle, more gentle.
Compassionate.
For some reason Ishbel’s eyes filled with tears. It was almost as if the frog god could see into her innermost being, where she still wept for her mother, and where she still shook with terror from the whisperings of her mother’s corpse.
“Who are you?” she asked, her voice soft and deferential now, where she had been irritated with the Great Serpent.
Above her head the Great Serpent gave a theatrical sigh. A companion through a long journey, Ishbel. My aquatic friend here keeps watch on the ancient evil to the south whereas I, it seems, must spend my time seeing that my archpriestess does her duty as she is bound. There was a moment of silence. I can’t think what he does here.
Ishbel felt amusement radiating from the frog.
I feared that if you got too dramatic, my serpent friend, the frog said, Ishbel might be forced to throw herself from this balcony in sheer terror at your persuasive abilities.
Ishbel bit her lip to stop her smile. For a moment the frog god’s eyes met hers, and she felt such a connection with him that her eyes widened in surprise.
You are not alone, the frog said, into her mind alone. We may not meet for a long time, but you are not alone.
“Must I marry this man?” Ishbel said.
Yes, said the frog. It shall not be a terror for you, for he is a gentle man. Do not be afraid.
Your union with this man is vital, said the Great Serpent. Allow nothing to impede it. You will do whatever you must in order to become Maximilian Persimius’ wife. Whatever you must!
He paused, then added in a gentler tone, You will return to Serpent’s Nest, Ishbel. It shall be your home once again.
Then, as suddenly as both the frog god and the Great Serpent had appeared, they were gone, and Ishbel was left standing alone on the balcony high above the Infinity Sea.
She waited a moment, gathering her thoughts, still more than a little unsettled by the appearance of not one but two gods. Then she went down the stairwell to Aziel, to whom she said she had changed her mind, and that she would, after all, marry this man, Maximilian Persimius.
She did not tell Aziel of her meeting with the Great Serpent, nor of her encounter with the compassionate and hitherto unknown frog god.
In the morning Aziel met with Ishbel again. He would not have been surprised to learn she had changed her mind yet again, but to his relief, and his pride, she remained resolute.
“I will marry this Maximilian,” she said. “I will do what is needed. After all, has not the Great Serpent said that I will return to Serpent’s Nest eventually? This shall be a trial for me, yes, but marriage cannot be too high a price to pay for saving Serpent’s Nest and the Outlands from the ravages of both Skraelings and ancient evils.”
That was a pretty speech, Aziel thought, and well prepared, and he wondered if it was less for him than for Ishbel herself.
Perhaps Ishbel believed that if she repeated it enough times, over and over, the words would take on the power of prophecy.
“When the Great Serpent sent me to fetch you from Margalit,” Aziel said, “he told me that you would eventually need to leave—perhaps even then he foresaw this disaster. And it is true enough he said you would eventually return.” He smiled. “I hope you will not stay too long away, Ishbel.”
“I also hope I shall not stay away long,” she said, and Aziel laughed a little at the depth of emotion behind those words.
“Besides,” Ishbel continued, “perhaps Maximilian of Escator will not accept me.” She paused. “There would be few men willing to wed an archpriestess of the Coil, surely.”
“Ah,” said Aziel, “but I do not think we shall be offering him the archpriestess, eh? You are a rich noblewoman in your own right, and I think it is as the Lady Ishbel Brunelle that you should meet your new husband. We shall call you…let me see…ah yes, we shall call you a ward of the Coil. That should do nicely.”
CHAPTER FIVE
The Royal Palace, Ruen, Escator
Maximilian Persimius, King of Escator, Warden of Ruen, Lord of the Ports and Suzerain of the Plains, preferred to keep as many of his royal duties as informal as possible. He met with the full Council of Nobles thrice a year, and the smaller Privy Council of Preferred Nobles once a month. Maximilian respected, listened to, and acted upon the advice he received from both those learned councils, but the council he leaned on most was that which he referred to as his Council of Friends—a small group of men that, indeed, made up Maximilian’s closest circle of friends, but were also the men he trusted above any else, for all of them had been involved to some extent in his rescue from the gloam mines eight years earlier.
These men knew Maximilian’s past, knew where he came from, had seen him at his worst, and they still loved him despite his occasional darker moments.
Today the king was in a lighthearted mood, and none expected any of his dark introspections on this fine morning. Maximilian sat in his chair, one long leg casually draped over one of its arms, his fine face with its striking aquiline nose and deep blue eyes creased in a mischievous grin, his dark hair—always worn a little too long—flopping over his brow. He was laughing at Egalion, captain of the king’s Emerald Guard, who had hurried late into the chamber. Egalion was now making flustered excuses as he dragged a chair up to the semicircle seated about the fire that had been lit in the hearth.
“You must be getting old, my friend,” Maximilian said, “to so oversleep.”
“Out late, perhaps, with a lady friend?” said Vorstus, Abbot of the Order of Persimius. In his late middle age, Vorstus was a thin, dark man with sharp brown eyes and the distinctive tattoo of a faded quill on his right index finger. The Order of Persimius was a group of brothers devoted to the protection and furtherance of the Persimius family. Maximilian owed Vorstus a massive debt for aiding the effort to free him from the Veins, and sometimes, when Vorstus looked at Maximilian with his dark unreadable eyes, that debt sat heavily on Maximilian’s shoulders. When first Maximilian had emerged from the Veins he had trusted Vorstus completely. Now he was not so sure of him, for he felt Vorstus watched him a little too carefully.
Maximilian ignored Vorstus’ comment. “Perhaps you need the services of Garth, Egalion. A potion, perhaps, from the famous Baxtor recipes, to soothe you into an early sleep at night so that we may not be deprived of your company at morning council?”
That was as close to a reprimand as Maximilian was ever likely to deliver to any of these three men.
“I apologize, Maximilian,” Egalion said. He was a tall, strong, fair-haired man who had served the Persimius throne for over thirty years, but now he reddened like a youth. “I have no acceptable excuse save that I did, indeed, oversleep, and no excuse for that—no woman or wine”—he shot a sharp-eyed glance at Vorstus—“save a need to compensate for a late night spent at the bedside of one of the Emerald Guard.”
“And that late bedside vigil spent in my company,” said Garth Baxtor, court physician and the fourth member of the group sitting about the fire. “One of the men developed a fever late yesterday afternoon, Maximilian, and Egalion and I spent many hours in his company until we were satisfied he was not in any danger to his life.”
“Then I am the one to apologize,” said Maximilian, all humor fading from his face.
“You were not to know,” said Egalion. “The man, Thomas, asked that you not be disturbed.”