Long Live the King

The personal diary of Sorashi, daughter of Deirdre, pt 14

After our conversation in the harem (thankfully empty apart from Mother staying as my guest) I am taught the Power Word ‘See me’. My first thought is decoy, Mother’s is a more social usage – we are very different in some respects.

But, the responsibilities of being the Lady of the Alhambra continue on, as Asfar announces Rama and Vamana of House Indra who have come to survey the House for repairs.

We start at the main gate – it seems as good a place as any, as it is where we are all standing, and whilst Vamana is making notes, I chat to Rama.

I previously mentioned that Chaos gossips more assiduously than a gaggle of kitchen maids, and this is borne out when Rama asks me about Melvin’s candidacy for High King. I am not surprised by his having heard of it, but I am interested in his opinion.

In essence, he has no antipathy to the idea – after all, Lord Mandor is his backer – but feels the position may be a poisoned chalice. I feel he may have a point, but the future is always changing so it may be the Wheel turns in Melvin’s favour. He is family, and I still have the sisterly impulse to look out for him.

Rama has his own news – due to his success in liaising with Alhambra, he has been offered the chance to assay the Logrus. It is a great honour, he tells me, a very great honour, though his manner betrays his apprehension – given the fate of those who have recently assayed it, there is ample reason for his misgivings.

I can only offer such reassurance as one can who is in no danger of having to chance one’s luck at the Logrus, and he rejoins Vamana who has finished the main gate and needs his opinion.

I leave them to it. Almost immediately, Asfar is at my side, wishing to engage my attention – for a faceless collection of floating robes, he looks nervous as though he fears my reaction to the news he brings.

The problem seems to be Surpanakha, though he seems hesitant on expanding on the nature of this problem. After a raised eyebrow has been in evidence for a few seconds (the tiara may have helped) he volunteers the information that she has the capacity for ‘original thought’ and even a ‘sense of humour’ and moves off with the obvious intent that I follow.

I am somewhat unsure of what I will find – but when I walk into the room, she is in the guise of Mother. Not a bad likeness, truth be told, but not a choice to be encouraged. It is important not to over-react, however so I just raise my eyebrows a little (it worked on Asfar) and calmly inform that said shape-shift is not to be worn – especially outside the House, or in the presence of myself or Mother.

She shrugs and reverts to her preferred shape, with no visible signs of rancour and asks for permission to patrol outside the walls. I give it gladly – a bored rakshasa would seem to be something of a liability, and the stories do not tell tales of stupid rakshasa. Every day is a lesson, as they say.

Talking of lessons, I leave Rama and Vamana at the Alhambra and travel to Cloud Nine to visit Tajal – feeling somewhat guilty at having neglected her for so long. She bears me no ill-will at this, however, chattering cheerfully about her lessons - sorcery and poison primarily. Her progress (as far I can tell) seems satisfactory, and she seems happy here – although I have to endure the inevitable grilling about when we are going to Amber. I have learnt that attempts to deflect or change the subject are worse than useless, so I tell her what I can, being careful not to seem to make promises I cannot keep.

As a distraction, I offer to teach her some folk dances from back home – she has been taught some of the more formal Temple dances by Mother, but the more free-flowing and improvised village dances make her laugh with joy. I stay as long as I can, and hide my disappointment at having to leave until I am back at the Alhambra.

Where Asfar awaits with more matters for my attention – merely offers of marriage, from lesser Houses. They are all politely and diplomatically declined, but the life of a noble would seem far less luxurious and idle pleasure-seeking than I had been led to believe. As I think this, almost as if Karma agrees, Asfar appears again to inform me that I have an Ixtramurini visitor – a Mr Saturday from Guede – who wishes to discuss our ‘arrangement’. Rama and Vamana look up from their discussions with a measure of disapproval at this, but I am not on the Thelbane so such social limitations do not apply to me. I tell myself this a couple of times, as I approach the door.

The gate definitely looks a lot better – the aura of decay seems to be gone and it looks cleaner and more solid. Mr Saturday stands outside, and he reminds me of his prophecy – Fiona’s arrival, the yellow dust we danced upon – I promise to mention his House as a potential applicant for Rim status, another bottle of spirit is handed over and he takes his leave.

I will mention it to Melvin when I see him, though I do not wish for a luomo (or whatever the spirit is called) – perhaps after the coronation, he will be busy enough before that.

As I am on my way to the courtyard to speak to Kirgiz, I receive a Trump call from Havelock in the Chapel Royal. Apparently, Oberon’s body has been stolen.

I am pulled through to a dark, cold but richly decorated place where Oberon had lain in state for so long. There is both blood and ichor on the floor, a central plinth but no coffin. Scrape marks on the floor attest to it being dragged out of the apartments, by 2 people being my guess.

Other members of the family, including Cymnea, are there already, or arrive as I investigate. There are angry discussions about the guards which should have been there, but the body of one of those lying by the door witnesses what happened to at least one of them.

I part change to track better, and we set off, following the trail to the Whispering Bridge

As we make our way there, Havelock claims to have contacted Oberon by Trump - it seems that, in Chaos, dead is not quite as uncommunicative as we (or even he) would expect.

At a convenient juncture, I hang back to strip and change completely, catching up with the rest of them. There is a strong smell of water-dweller, partly fish and partly frog, with a hint of the unclean I seem to remember from the attack at Mandor’s House.

The first smell is explained by the corpses lying around the bridge – 2 are frog-like, 2 serpentine and 1 humanoid but slate-grey.

There is one survivor, hiding under the bridge – she is called Ludmilla, apparently – human-looking but a skin-covered skeleton in appearance. With a little gentle threatening from Constance and William, it seems that she and her dead comrades were members of the Hoary Order of the Outrageous Affront (this would be Oberon’s stealing of the Serpent’s Eye, I assume) who had decided to steal the coffin and throw it over the bridge in order to have their revenge. Unfortunately, Nang-Dra of Amblerash ambushed them and took the coffin.

I am distracted by the resurgence of the unclean smell so I am unsure how Ludmilla got decapitated but I suspect that William got bored. Ludmilla herself merely looks resigned at this treatment.

A more pressing issue is the sudden appearance of a creature totally unlike any I had ever seen before, a sort of undulating, spiny, multi-legged strand of anger and hatred, dripping something bluish-green from what must be its mouth. It jumps immediately to attack William and Cymnea, fortunately William’s armour develops defensive spines of its own, and the combined attacks of several of the family see it destroyed. It fades into the ground, gouts of its glowing – saliva? – burning the grass.

Nobody seems hurt, and we move off in case another arrives. The thing was a Hound of Tindalos, according to Cymnea, relentless and aggressive, existing only to kill. Obviously it had been summoned to kill or delay whoever followed the second group of body-thieves.

A short distance away, I find a scrap of green cloth – not dissimilar to the banner draped over Oberon’s coffin. I track the scent-trail easily enough, once Darig moves to downwind of me – the smell of the Tindalos hound’s drool permeates him and covers all other scent. He checks carefully, but no trace of it is on him – it is tenacious, however it attached itself. Several more scraps of cloth lead the way – we are being left grains of corn by someone.

The trail leads to the Duomo, where more bodies await us – 4 bodies, and one frog-thing with its intestines in its lap. Constance leads the questioning with this one, who claims that they were merely interested in returning the coffin back to its rightful place. I am not the only one patently unconvinced by this, but the frog-thing continues that the group was betrayed by one of their number – Torquemada (person or House, I do not know) who took the coffin down the side of the Duomo where it was now gone ‘where [they] couldn’t follow’.

We leave the frog-thing to its inevitable death, and Havelock tries to Trump Oberon again. Oberon is apparently unimpressed by the recent run of events, but after a bit of a talk he apparently had stopped moving so we are told he will be passing us through once the lid was lifted. Cymnea is told to stay behind (I am glad Oberon could not see her face on the receipt of this) and then William is passed through the Trump.

After a pause, Darig follows, then Constance, then me.

I arrive standing in a coffin with Oberon in a sort of street, outside a house which is under attack by large beast-men of some kind, three humans are fighting back, one a female with blonde hair. Before I can take more in, I am lifted up and thrown into the melee, landing on the back of one of the attackers, knocking it onto the floor. Unfortunately, it is soon evident that my victim is a great deal stronger than me so I bite and rake frantically, trying to hit a vulnerable area, as it does its best to bludgeon me to death. The timely intervention of Havelock with a Pattern blade saves me, though I have to move swiftly when my attacker bursts into flames.

My whole body hurts, my ears ring and I can feel my left cheek start to swell. I am alive, however, which is something to be grateful for. The sounds of Cymnea yelling at Oberon distracts me from my discomfort – her diatribe is quite impressive, but Oberon just lets her get on with it, his face holding an expression of fond tolerance.

The fight seems pretty much over, and those inhabitants of the House involved in it come forward. One of them is familiar from the Ball – apparently, known to Constance but (as with most of Constance’s new acquaintances) not a friend. His name is Raffles, the female combatant was Penelope and one of the other, somewhat malformed creatures, was Jack.

Constance proceeds to question Raffles about why they stole the coffin. His attempt at jocular familiarity, however, earns him a backhanded blow from William, who draws his sword to finish the job – Havelock and Darig manage to talk him down from such a stupidly short-sighted move but I’m beginning to feel William may well become a liability unless Constance exerts herself enough to control him.

This does nothing to enhance relations between us and Raffles’ compatriots, but after tight-lipped and grudging negotiations, Raffles agrees that his House will carry the coffin back (once its occupant has finished catching up with his ex-wife).

This means that he needs to go into his House to gather more coffin-bearers and, voting myself the Amberite least likely to kill him for no pressing reason, I go with him to ensure that he actually does as he promises.

The place is absolutely bulging with all manner of decoration – statues occupy most of the floor, fighting spiritedly with vases, cabinets and plant-stands for space; pictures are hung up in rows on the walls (and ceilings) and everywhere there are… things. Jewellery, books, bolts of cloth are stuffed into or onto every available space, threatening to cascade at the merest touch. I have to walk very carefully to avoid knocking things over.

It would be absolutely beautiful if the rooms held a tenth of what they presently held, as it is it merely looks incredibly cluttered – no, to be fair, it looks impressive and incredibly cluttered.

The sound of arguing outside proves that William is reluctant to let go of the ‘kill everyone’ route but the clatter of his armour proves that rather more diplomatic heads have prevailed. The female, Penelope, offers me a room to change in and some clothing, which I am grateful for. I come down to the family being entertained by Raffles (the building is the Kabinett, apparently, I can’t remember the House name) and some really rather decent wine. I think he may come to regret that decision, given who he is entertaining, but I suppose being alive counts for more than a sorely depleted wine cellar.

In the course of the conversation, Havelock leans over and apologises for scorching me (I still smell faintly of singed fur but possibly only to me) – I accept his apology graciously, the burn was superficial and he did save my life. Whatever else, he has good manners.

The conversation is pleasant and interesting, but it seems that Oberon has been gone for a rather long time. Constance catches my eye and we seem to come to the same conclusion as we head out to find him.

There is a large full moon overhead, which I assume is set dressing rather than astronomical body but it provides enough light to see by. We cautiously climb a set of stairs up the side of the house, to find Oberon and Cymnea sitting on a bench, holding hands and looking at the moon.

I do not think they notice us, so without a word we turn and go and leave them in privacy.

Eventually, Oberon appears, has a drink and we leave. Raffles is as good as his word, and four of the misshapen lower members (known as ‘jacks’) carry the coffin to the border of the Thelbane – I think it is that, the border between the Ixtramurini and those not so designated, for the sake of clarity. Unfortunately, we have to carry it the rest of the way and Oberon was not a small man – I appreciate it would be contrary to the dignity of kingship for a king (a dead one at that) to be carrying his own coffin, but it would really have helped.

Our heroic efforts are met with a set of unhappy guards who inform us that the coronation is about to start and could we please hurry?

The (live) male members of the Family are ushered off to be Melvin’s honour-guard so, as Oberon seems to have reverted to being actually dead again, the females brush themselves down as best we can – Constance glamours my swollen cheek and split lip so I do not look like a street beggar, and off we go.

Melvin looks – I am not sure, resigned or melancholy, the unnerving black tendrils filling his eye-sockets make him seem unknowable, a locked door – but he looks sufficiently regal in posture and when he speaks, although not strident, he has authority behind his words.

He pronounces amnesty to all exiles and prisoners (someone behind me whispers ‘Spandrel’) and, more controversially, declares peace with Amber.

With these words, he is crowned, to the usual cheers of such occasions but my ears pick up mutterings of discontent about Barimen ‘now ruling both poles of existence’.

As the poem says, a crowned head does not sleep peacefully.