“You make it sound, Highness, as if I give your words and wishes no regard.”

Cyron laughed. “I point out a single instance and you turn it into an indictment of your performance since you entered the bureaucracy. Your rhetorical trick may have other princes retreating and praising your efforts. They miss the truth your trickery confirms: there are instances where you utterly disregard my orders. It is those instances in which you presume to place your judgment above mine. In doing so, you fail to serve the nation and, instead, serve only the bureaucracy.”

Pelut let shock rise on his face.

Pyrust dropped a hand to his sword. “Empress, allow me to take his head now. I will take all their heads, and we will replace them.”

The Lady of Jet and Jade waved that suggestion away. “Their heads are not gourds to be harvested. Each of these men is a spider who has spun a web. Their webs run together, and that network has value.”

She looked straight at Pelut. “Unlike the Princes, Minister, I have ample evidence of how you work. I have my own network of agents, and what you deny, here, to Prince Cyron, you gloat about in the safety of a trysting bed. So let it be understood that if you deal with this as a game, it is a game you will lose.”

Pelut pressed his hands together. “I am judged harshly. I fear those who serve me are judged harshly as well. It has been our duty, since the Empire was first established, to preserve order and maintain stability. If this is a vice, then I shall gladly be a criminal. Perhaps it should be best, in that regard, if Prince Pyrust were to harvest my head.”

“No, that shall not be necessary.” She snapped the fan open again.

“What is necessary, then, is the following.” Prince Cyron began reciting his wants and needs in an even voice. Various junior ministers scribbled notes. The rustle of rice-paper sheets reminded Pelut of autumn leaves scuttling over cobblestoned streets.

He did not listen. He could not. The words were blasphemy. Everything Cyron wanted would have to be gathered in haste, and haste bred incomplete and unreliable information. Acting on bad information bred disaster.

Only a fool would deny that the situation in Erumvirine required urgent action; but so much remained unknown about the invaders that it would be impossible to field a force to oppose them. Some tales suggested they were inhuman monsters. Others suggested they were superior beings who would drive Men from their Empire as Men had driven the Viruk from theirs. No one knew if they could be negotiated with, or even if they intended to head north. And what good would racing troops to the south do when so much coastline remained vulnerable to attack?

Too little was known. Cyron and Pyrust could play their game, but it would destroy them and their nations. It would leave the people without leaders or a means to survive. It would be worse than the Time of Black Ice.

And I cannot permit that. Pelut kept his face frozen. He would comply with Cyron’s wishes and give him what he wanted. All of it. He would overwhelm the Prince with details too vast and trivial to be of use. Once Cyron had been overwhelmed, he would leave the working of the world to those trained for it.

Then the game would end and the losers would be very sorry indeed.

TheNewWorld

23rd day, Month of the Hawk, Year of the Rat

Last Year of Imperial Prince Cyron’s Court

163rd Year of the Komyr Dynasty

737th Year since the Cataclysm

Jaidanxan (The Ninth Heaven)

“You are perplexed, my brother.”

Jorim had sensed Tsiwen’s presence, but had chosen not to acknowledge it until she spoke. He turned from the edge of his palace’s courtyard and leaned back. A balustrade materialized, preventing him from tumbling to the earth. He was not sure which of them had manifested it, but he let it accept his weight.

“I am, sister.” He folded his arms over his chest. “I have stood here and watched since my brothers left. It seems as if no time at all has passed, but nights and days have blinked over the face of the world. It hardly seems enough time to consider all I have been told-and certainly not to reach a decision about Nirati and her death.”

The goddess laughed lightly, the sound coming as gently to his ears as a warm spring breeze. “Our brother believes death is the solution to everything because he is the Master of it. Because of the magic you gave Men, he cannot touch your mortal sister.

“I do not believe I can, either.”

Tsiwen raised an eyebrow. “Dire news if true.”

Jorim waved her to the courtyard’s edge and the balustrade obligingly evaporated. “See, down there: Anturasixan. My grandfather used magic to create it.”

“Yes, I can feel the power in it and him.”

“My brother and I used to debate about whether or not a cartographer could become a Mystic. What would magic enable us to do? Draw maps without brush and ink? Would we be able to make one master map, and all maps drawn from it would change as the master changed? These were the lines along which we were thinking, but Qiro seems to be able to create lands by whim. He used to say that no place existed until he put it on a map, and now places seem to exist because he places them on a map.”

“So it would appear.”

Jorim scratched his throat with a gold talon. “But now he has created his own world. And wittingly or not, he has defied the gods and denied them access to his creation.”

Tsiwen hugged her arms tightly around her middle. “So even if Grija’s solution were the key, you could not simply appear there and destroy Nirati.”

“No. Nothing lacking a blood tie with my grandfather can set foot there. Nirati is allowed. The things he makes-some of them creatures plucked from nightmares I confided to him-are free to leave. I think he had created those things before he even made his continent, and they had ventured out to attack the Amentzutl. The Mozoyan became more complex over time as he unconsciously redesigned them, making them better.”

“If what you say is true, then nothing can reach your sister.”

“No. She is there because she is his flesh through my father. Likewise my brother. He could get there.”

A cloud passed beneath the palace, momentarily eclipsing the world. Tsiwen turned and looked up into his golden eyes. “How does he prevent someone from going there?”

“He’s crafty. He always has been.” Jorim waved a hand toward the continent. “You are Wisdom incarnate, sister. Perhaps you can find a way to outwit my grandfather.”

Tsiwen smiled impishly, then stepped off the courtyard’s edge and streaked earthward. Her silken gown snapped as the wind plucked at it, then the flailing sleeves grew into bat’s wings as she dove, flittering out of his sight. She looked to be having so much fun that Jorim almost sprouted wings of his own to join her.

But he had already failed in the mission she was attempting. He had no desire to be frustrated again. It was less anger at being thwarted by a mortal than being unable to best his grandfather. He’d never been able to outfox Qiro when he was human, and divinity hadn’t made much of a difference.

But isn’t Qiro a god of sorts himself? Because Qiro had become a Mystic, he had access to the fabric of reality. He might not have as much power as a god, but he had enough. Unlike other Mystics, Qiro did not seem to release a lot of chaotic magic as a by-product of his talent-he appeared to use all of it.

I wonder if that is because he is creating something, not just performing a task. Could it be that Mystics tapped into far more magical energy than their task could accommodate, hence the release of the excess? The release of excess magic should have warned people against profligate use.

The flapping of Tsiwen’s wings revealed her irritation as she returned. She landed, then blossomed upward with a venomous expression on her face. “You could have warned me, brother.”