Around the Holy Matriarch were gathered those of her inner circle. Her old friend Sool was there, sitting by her side on a cushioned stool, turned half around so she could stare out through the windows at the ragged sea and clouds beyond. Klint the physician was as ruddy faced as always as he pulled absently on one of his piercings. Alarum, vaguely known to Ché as a spymaster in the Élash, offered a congenial nod of the head, eyes keenly observing him. Lastly, Archgeneral Sparus, the Little Eagle, stood in the centre of the room as though he had just stopped pacing, one eye covered with an eyepatch, the other pinning Ché in its glare.
Ché ignored him and glanced around the room itself. His quick search took in the jar of Royal Milk bracketed on a table behind Sasheen, then stopped at the two bodyguards standing outside on the balcony, huddling beneath their hoods.
‘Diplomat,’ Sasheen declared with a rueful twist of her lips. She was intoxicated, he could see, though it was only obvious by her reddened cheeks and nose, for the Matriarch spoke with focus. ‘I have a task for you, Diplomat.’
Ché bowed his head. ‘Matriarch,’ he said with false calm.
‘I need you to send a message to General Romano. As swiftly as you can manage it.’
Ché stifled the beginnings of a smile. And so it begins.
‘And what is the tone of this message, Matriarch?’
‘A warning only,’ rumbled the Archgeneral Sparus with a glance to Sasheen. ‘His catamite lover should suffice.’
‘Make an example of him,’ drawled Sasheen. ‘A fitting one. Do you hear me?’
Another bow of his head. ‘Is that all?’
Sasheen pinched the bridge of her nose, not responding.
‘You may go,’ replied Sool.
The twin priests accompanied him back outside. Ché hesitated in the shelter of the porch. He looked to the brother and was about to address him when he changed his mind, spoke to the sister instead.
‘Any notion as to what this is about?’
She looked amused by his directness. The brother shifted by her side, glanced to the two guards standing behind them.
‘Romano has been slandering the Holy Matriarch,’ Guan replied before she could speak. ‘In his chambers, intoxicated with his entourage.’
‘In what way?’
Swan leaned towards him, her piercings dripping water. ‘Her son,’ she said quietly. ‘He’s been slandering her son.’
Ché blew an exasperated breath of air from his lips, understanding at last.
That afternoon they caught their first sight of Lagos, ill-fated island of the dead.
The bad weather finally settled down, as though it wished to strike a more solemn chord for the occasion; really it was only that they had sailed into the lee of the island. South they headed towards the harbourage of Chir, with the rest of the fleet tightening up around them. White cliffs rose along the coastline, and green slopes covered by grey flecks that were the famous Lagosian long-haired goats.
It seemed that every one of the thousand souls onboard the flagship now crowded along the rails. Ché watched the Matriarch where she stood on the foredeck, flanked by her two generals and their entourages.
He studied the trio closely, curious as to how they must feel gazing upon green Lagos, that island of insurrection, its entire population so famously put to the torch. The Sixth Army, still stationed there, now due to become part of the Expeditionary Force, had been led by Archgeneral Sparus when they’d finally put down the rebellion. And it had been Sasheen herself who had given the order to kill the majority of the citizenry in retribution for their support of the rebels, even against the protests of many within the order itself, horrified by the loss of so much potential revenue in slaves.
In doing so, the Matriarch had stamped her authority on the pages of history. She would never be forgotten for this act of genocide.
Yet now, facing Lagos for the first time, Sasheen offered nothing but stiff-necked formality as she stood by the rail, while around her, the gathered priests of her entourage seemed more proud than anything else at having reacquired this most prized of possessions.
Back in Q’os, the news-sheets were filled with stories of the island’s pacification, and how the land was now open to immigrants from across the Empire. They played down the true extent of the slaughter wrought upon the Lagosians, and blamed them when they did mention the burnings and the clearances by pointing out how the rebellion had first begun: as a protest by the surviving Lagosian