pencil marks, were scratched fleet sizes, travel times, other notations. Question marks abounded.
A third arrow ran from the capital of Q’os to trace a sea-course to the far eastern island of Lagos, with more numbers and queries scrawled alongside it. Then, from Lagos, a fourth arrow swept down to Khos – the First Expeditionary Force, the invasion of Khos itself.
He was near-lost in studying the details when Ché realized – with a sudden start – that he wasn’t alone in the room.
He glanced across to an armchair so hooded and deep that he’d failed to notice the creature that sat within it; Kira, mother to the Holy Matriarch of Mann. The ancient crone was asleep, it seemed, her ancient hands folded across the white cloth of her robe. Ché released his breath and peered closer. Glimmers could be seen from beneath her eyelids, two slivers of eyes.
Was she watching him? Had she seen his stifled laughter?
Ché felt the hairs rise on his arms. He was as shocked by his lack of perception as he was by her sly observation of him.
Kira dul Dubois: one of the participants in the Longest Night fifty years before. Rumoured to have been a lover of Nihilis himself; rumoured even to have been involved in his death six years into his reign as the first Holy Patriarch. It was like being in the sights of a silversnake.
Slowly, he stepped back from the map, hoping as well to move beyond her line of vision. He cleared his throat as he resumed his position in the centre of the floor, and refused to look at the old woman again.
At last the glass doors to the balcony slid open and the priests began to file through the room. A few cast furtive glances in his direction as they left; he recognized one of them as a priest from the sect of commerce, the Frelasé. Behind them came Bushrali himself. Ché had expected the man to be dead by now after failing to uncover the Rōshun hiding in the city. But no, after much political manoeuvring to save his skin, here he was, still alive, still even the head of the Regulators. Perhaps the rumours were true, then; that he held a blackmail dossier on every High Priest of Q’os.
Still, the man had not entirely escaped punishment, Ché saw. He’d been fitted with a Q’os Necklace, an iron collar sealed around his neck, fixed to a length of chain that ended with a small cannon-ball, which he cradled in his arm as he stepped past. He would be expected to wear the necklace for the rest of his life.
Only Sasheen and a single bodyguard remained outside, the woman lost, it seemed, in her thoughts. Ché felt a draught pressing against his cheek through the open doorway, though he could only faintly hear the city beyond, unusually silent in these recent weeks of enforced mourning. When Sasheen turned and stepped inside the Storm Chamber, she was holding the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger as though burdened with a headache. Her bodyguard remained outside, slowly patrolling around the balcony. She approached a stand of steaming bowls and bent to inhale from one. With a gasp she straightened, her face flushing.
Sasheen’s eyes flared for a moment when she saw her Diplomat waiting there for her. She moved past to the fire with her hands held out for warmth.
‘Is it done?’ she asked with her back to him.
‘Yes, Matriarch.’
‘Then sit. Warm yourself.’
He wasn’t cold but he did as instructed anyway, choosing a leather settle before the fire. He maintained an upright pose, his hands folded, breathing deeply, resisting the urge to scratch at his neck. After a moment, the Holy Matriarch left the burning coals and sat down beside him, close enough for their knees to touch.
He could smell the scent of mulled wine on her breath, and realized she was drunk.
The leather of the settle creaked as she folded one long leg across the other, her robe parting along a slit to show the soft cream of her thigh. Compared to her usual attire, the robe was a plain affair, but still it was smaller than it needed to be, so that the cotton stretched tightly over her curves. Below its hem, the nails of her bare feet were painted a vivid red.
‘Bushrali tells me they will not come for me, for killing their apprentice.’
‘The Rōshun?’ ventured Ché.
Her eyes narrowed in annoyance. Do not play coy with me.