They passed through the merchants’ living district and into the flesh markets. A crop of fresh Yaloh had come in and Enet had the bearers pause to inspect them. Many were still wan from the wounds they’d sustained in their misguided resistance to the will of the Singer and the glory of the song. It would have taken them three weeks to reach the Singing City, heart of Empire, source of magic. Three weeks in which they would have discovered the song and become immersed in it, saturated in its harmony and community.
She climbed out of the litter and approached the nearest, a woman whose eyes were dulled with captivity and hopelessness, who had not yet understood that within the song lay her freedom. The Spear walked up to her, two of her guards flanking her. ‘Listen,’ Enet breathed to the woman. ‘Listen with your skin and your blood. Hear with your heart and your bones. Accept the song into your very spirit, proud woman of Yalotlan. Your freedom – spiritual and physical – lies within its ever-changing, never-changing melody. Listen, and understand how you will one day walk free among us, a proud and noble member of the Empire of Songs.’
The woman was silent, watching her, and for a moment Enet thought she might have got through to her, might have saved her from months or even years of fruitless disobedience or the protracted death of one who would not conform. But then the woman lunged, her bound hands reaching for Enet even though she was tied on a line to the captives on either side of her. There was a mass jerk and stumble and the Spear’s guards leapt between her and the Yalotl. The woman was screaming insults and threats, meaningless babble as grating as the monkey’s screeching.
Enet’s warriors hustled her out of range, one clubbing the Yalotl in the face as he retreated, breaking skin and chipping teeth, but not causing enough damage that the flesh-trader could demand payment for her. The trader flung himself onto his knees and put his head in the dirt, for the insult had been done by his stock and was therefore his responsibility.
‘The song is in you now, all of you,’ Enet said, her voice loud as Pikte ran to her side, concern twisting the delicacy of his features. ‘Its glory can be your glory; its fame your fame. Cast off the superstitions and traditions of your past, honour your ancestors one last time and then sever your link to them, for they cannot help and have only held you back all this time. Embrace the song, embrace the Empire, and be reborn in its image. I promise you will not only live, but you will thrive, if you but see our values for what they are: the future. Your future.’
‘Fuck you, Pecha whore!’ shouted the woman Enet had spoken to. Blood sprayed from her mouth along with the poison of her words. Her guards rushed back in to exact justice, the flesh-trader uttering a horrified little squeak, but Enet held up her hand and stopped them.
‘This one is destined for the Melody, I presume?’ she asked.
The flesh-trader grovelled even deeper. ‘She is, high one, yes. All this line are warriors and will fight for the Empire soon enough. Unless … I could offer her to you for a good price if—’
‘Holy Setatmeh, no,’ the Spear said, waving off his words with mock horror. ‘That one needs the discipline of the Melody and the kinship of warriors. The only thing she would do on my estate is destroy its harmony. Send them off at dawn; there’s too much fire in them. Another week on the road on half water rations should cool them down.’
‘As the Spear commands,’ the flesh-trader said. ‘And I beg your forgiveness for the insult done you.’ Enet said nothing, waiting. The flesh-trader squirmed some more. ‘May I offer you first pick of this stock or the next to make up for the insult?’ he said eventually, as he must. He raised his head just far enough to see her nod, and relief washed over his features.
‘I will take him.’ Enet pointed to the man’s scribe, a youth of perhaps twenty who had been writing the slaves’ names and details in the record that would accompany them to the Melody.
The trader gaped, but it was too late. He could not tell the Spear of the City that she was mistaken, that the boy was not a part of his stock. He could not shame her like that, or bear the risk that such words could provoke.
‘As, as the Spear commands,’ he mumbled. He stood and the youth rose with him, fear and bewilderment smeared across his face. ‘Serve with honour and do everything you are asked. Do not shame me, understand? Do not shame yourself.’
‘High one?’ the scribe whispered, and the flesh-trader’s face twisted.
‘Go.’
‘Un-under the song, high one.’ The youth walked in a daze to the rear of the litter, next to the tongueless body slave. Wordlessly, he took the cage and its tiny, stinking occupant from the old woman. Enet pursed her lips; the boy had initiative, kindness. Perhaps she should … but no. She climbed back into the litter with Pikte and the bearers lifted her smoothly and broke into a trot. The sky was a riot of pink and orange and gold, the sunset wearing its finest plumage, it seemed, just for her. She watched it as they exited the flesh market and approached the wide, lazy loop of the Blessed River and the wooden bridge spanning it. Her estate lay only a stick away on the other side.
‘Here,’ she said and the bearers halted again. She nodded to her guards and they surrounded the youth and began to drag him forward. Enet let Pikte lead the way to the gap in the stone wall bounding the river. The scribe began to struggle and then to scream.
‘It is not time, it is not the appointed day!’ he shouted. ‘It is not new moon; you mustn’t. Please!’
Enet raised her arms and Pikte copied her. ‘Holy Setatmeh, you gods who bring life and plenty to our world, accept this offering from your humble servants.’
A single holy Setat raised its head above the water, watching them out of those wide, black eyes. A claw-tipped hand broke the surface and it flicked its fingers in a way so very human, a simple beckoning. A thrill of fear fluttered through Enet’s stomach as it opened its mouth. Would it sing for her, for all of them? Would it call them to their glorious deaths?
‘Wise Setatmeh, gods of water and of life, take this one in thanks for the bounty and the glory you bring us. Know that we revere you eternally, and pray that one day we will be joined with you forever in the awakened world spirit.’
She gestured and her warriors braced themselves; then they flung the youth into the river. He spluttered and surfaced, striking out for shore with flailing arms, choking and shrieking in an ecstasy of terror. The water god glided forward and snagged his ankle, dragging him back. The holy Setatmeh mouth opened again and this time it did sing, a liquid stream of notes that spoke directly to Enet’s legs and heart. Everyone on the bank stepped forward into the shallows, her son included, all of them yearning towards the perfection of the Setatmeh voice, song within the greater song.
Hearing it, its promise, the scribe turned in the Setatmeh arms and embraced it and it wrapped him up and buried its face in his throat, its song falling silent and releasing those who listened. Blood arced across the sunset, crimson against gold, the very essence of life ending against the ending of the light, and Enet stood in the shallows and watched her god feed, her spirit yearning to hear again its perfect voice.
‘For the glory of the Empire of Songs. For the world spirit. For the Singer,’ she breathed, and under the words – which she meant with every bone and muscle in her – other words drifted, unsaid and unthought. Glory. Influence. The right person to wield the song-magic as it is meant to be wielded.
When it was done, Enet and her attendants returned to the road and the litter. The body slave picked up the cage holding the monkey, the bearers picked up the litter, and, in awestruck, contemplative silence, the party crossed the bridge and made their way past the wide, walled palaces of nobles under a bloody sky and within a triumphant song.
Whatever had happened up to this point, the day had ended in song-given glory, and Enet would not forget it. The Empire was all. And all would live within its bounds.
THE SINGER
The source, Singing City, Pechacan, Empire of Songs
The song and the Empire that lives within its embrace are mine. It is my will that shapes the song and so it is my will that shapes the Empire. And my will cannot be denied.
The song is brought into being by my flesh and mind, my spirit and intentions. It is my duty to the people of the Empire, my greatest gift, my deepest honour. And the honouring of the song and its Singer is the Empire’s own duty. It is my right and the Empire’s truth. Inviolable.
Reverence is my due.
The song sings in their blood and bones as it does in mine, drawing us together into one nation. The song binds us in joy and harmony, restoring the balance when it falters, bringing peace where there is strife. The song is the question and the answer, the bringer of life and the bringer of death – of balance. Harmony.
The song guides and supports all who hear it. It can never be undone, unsung, unheard. My will cannot be denied. Will not be denied.
The song beats in the blood of a million people, lulling them to sleep and rousing them to the defence of their homes, succouring the fearful and strengthening the weak. When all the world is brought beneath its harmony, there will be peace.
When all the world shows the Singer and the song the reverence we are due, there will be glory.
The song is all. The song is good.
And I am its Singer.
XESSA
The Swift Water, below Sky City, Malel, Tokoban
125th day of the Great Star at morning
She was scared, but she was ready and the other ejab needed her. The city needed her. They’d let her leave the healing caves for home four days after her injury, and she’d walked painfully out into a day grey as an eagle’s back and thick with rain. The Wet had come harder and faster than in previous years. It would put an end to the skirmishing in southern Yalotlan – unless the councils decided to fight on through the season, a path they were still debating – but the rain gave the Drowned an advantage, and so despite the lingering burn in her joints and the pull of stitches in her lower leg, she had a duty to perform, and so she would.
And Tayan leaves tomorrow.
The thought brought an almost physical pain. Her lifelong friend, so bright and curious and interested in everything, a skilled shaman and healer, was not suited to long travel along dangerous trails. His eyes couldn’t see far into the distance and while he could bring down small, nearby game with a sling or blowpipe, he was no warrior. And they were walking, not just out of Tokoban, but into the Empire of Songs, into its very heart. Tayan’s ancestor had told him that it would be a Pecha who ended the Pechaqueh thirst for conquest, and so the shaman and the councils were convinced that this weaving would work. Xessa prayed that he was right, but it didn’t help the cold, hard ball of anxiety that grew in her stomach whenever she thought of her friend walking into that Empire and placing himself in its power.
Focus, Xessa reminded herself. The thoughts were a distraction from the fear tickling the edges of her mind as she stared at the river, but distractions were deadly. She frowned, skin tugging with the familiar and yet strange tightness where the paint had dried in swirls and loops that brought her strength and protection. Eja Elder Tika herself had painted the red and blue symbols on Xessa’s brow at dawn, arriving at her house unannounced to do her this honour, to welcome her back onto the snake path.
Ossa was off to her right, a streak of black fur as he raced parallel to the twisting of the Swift Water, his paws kicking up stones and mud and sprays of water. She whistled and he gave her the head-down-rump-up all-clear. Xessa shook out her shoulders and wiped sweat from her eyes. The river was flowing fast, full of the previous day’s rain, brown with silt from the thin soil on the uplands above the Sky City. The murk made it harder than ever to see the skin or shape of a Drowned, and the wounds in her leg throbbed in urgent reminder of the last time she’d been down here.
She glanced left and right along the length of the river. Three other ejab were approaching the water below their own water temples. Four targets. A one-in-four chance of attack – usually.
The hairs on her arms stood up and Xessa raised her spear, trusting the warning of danger at her back. She leapt sideways, parallel to the water – not getting any closer – and spun to face the Drowned bearing down on her, poised to stab.
It wasn’t a Drowned.
Ossa hadn’t given the danger signal because there was no danger. It was Ilandeh. The Xenti wasn’t blank-faced and answering the call of the Drowned; she was standing there with an anxious smile, halfway through an apology Xessa was far too enraged to read. She wasted a second, just gaping at the other woman, and then seized Ilandeh’s wrist and began dragging her back up towards the fields and orchards and city, her heart thudding in her chest.
They got all of three steps before Ilandeh twisted out of her grip and faced the river. Xessa whirled again, bringing her spear up to her jaw, but again there was no danger, again Ilandeh didn’t run for the water. The Xenti tapped her on the arm. ‘I just want to see,’ she said slowly. ‘I’m perfectly safe with you here – I just want to see one.’
Xessa shook her head so hard the rings and charms in her ears and hair slapped against her cheeks, refusing to rest her spear long enough to sign a response – not that Ilandeh would understand anyway. Instead she pointed it uphill and jerked her chin in the same direction.
Ilandeh’s face fell. ‘But I want—’
Xessa click-whistled the guard command and Ossa leapt at the woman, snapping and snarling. Ilandeh stumbled back, face slack with sudden fear as the dog harried her, driving her up the slope. Eja Toxte was in the water temple: why hadn’t he stopped her? The woman never should have got this close.
Xessa made sure Ossa and Ilandeh were well on their way before facing the Swift Water again; best just get it over with now that her stealthy approach had been ruined. She ran forward, scanning the water, scooped up the pipe and pivoted it, dropped to one knee and let it fall into the river with a splash. No time for subtleties. She thumbed open the cap and made it to her feet just as a Drowned struck, launching itself out of the water in a spray of foam.
Xessa leapt away from its slashing claws, twisted and struck back, but it had moved, its powerful froglike legs and wide, webbed feet propelling it further upriver and then out onto the bank. It was another Greater Drowned, taller than she was if it stood upright, its arms and legs sinewy with muscle and its chest, belly and lower back protected by overlapping plates of toughened skin. Its throat sac bulged with air, its mouth of needle teeth opening wide as it began to sing.
Ilandeh!
Xessa went for it again, vaulting the pipe, right hand throwing the net she’d pulled from the back of her belt. The Drowned skittered to its right, plunging into the shallows so that the net flared and fell wide, the edge sliding off a mottled green shoulder. And then it leapt.
Xessa planted both feet and set her spear, watching it come; it was in flight, unable to change its direction, would impale itself through the belly, armour or not. All she had to do was to brace and duck the claws as it died.
Ilandeh slammed into her, sending them both stumbling ankle-deep into the river, and then the Drowned hit them, mouth wide, hands and feet extended like a cat dropping from a tree. The three of them went down in a tangle of thrashing limbs and great sheets of water crystal-bright against the cloud. Xessa’s senses were filled with the stink of it, the cool wet skin of it, the scrabbling, wiry strength as it struggled for purchase. She was fighting two monsters – one on top of her trying to rip her open, and Ilandeh beneath her, desperate to give the Drowned her throat.
By now, Toxte would be on his way, sprinting from the water temple with a net and spear of his own. She hoped he was on his way. She prayed he was.
Xessa got her right hand around the Drowned’s neck and squeezed, shoving it away, but its claws were caught in the snake-scale bamboo sewn into her salt-cotton, anchoring it to her torso. It tightened its grip and pulled, yanking her up off Ilandeh while the claws on its feet dug into the padding stitched into the front of her leggings. Padding that wasn’t going to be enough.
The grip she had on the Drowned’s throat must be preventing it from singing, because Ilandeh was thrashing to get away now, not to give herself to it, but her movements threw off Xessa’s aim and every jab of her spear missed, awkward at such close range. She dropped it and snatched the obsidian knife from her belt instead, rammed into the creature’s side and sawed. Its hide was like wood.
She had a terrifying view of all its teeth as its mouth opened and it strained towards her; its breath, cold as the river, blew across her cheek. Xessa stabbed again, missed. And then Ossa, her brave, brave Ossa, sank his teeth into the Drowned’s leg and began to pull, ripping the claws out of her padding and savaging its limb. The Drowned twisted to face the dog and Xessa tore its face open with her knife.
It turned back and swiped at her, green blood spraying, and she jerked her head away hard, fast, cracking the back of her skull into Ilandeh’s face. The claws cut through the air just above Xessa’s cheek and then the Drowned twisted again and lunged for Ossa. The dog released his grip on its leg and bounded out of reach; the eja kicked it off her, snatched up her spear and scrambled to her feet to stab it through the lung.
Ilandeh, panicked beyond reason, lurched up and yanked on Xessa’s arm, spoiling her aim and dragging her away before she could kill it. By the time Xessa had broken her nose to free herself, it was too late. With a slither and a splash, the Drowned was gone.
Xessa pivoted side-on so she could see both uphill and towards the Swift Water from her periphery. Toxte was pounding down the trail, Ekka streaking ahead. The fight had lasted seconds, though it had felt like hours in that peculiar, stretched way common to moments of terror. To left and right, the other ejab had already placed their pipes. Water would flow uphill to the city and no one was dead. This time, no one was hurt. Except her. Xessa stared at Ilandeh with vicious, all-consuming satisfaction.
The Xenti stood with both hands pressed to her face and blood leaking between her fingers. Her shoulders shook as she cried and Xessa whirled her spear around and smacked it hard into the woman’s flank. Ilandeh stumbled sideways, mouth a rictus of pain as she dropped a bloody hand to her side. Xessa pointed uphill; the woman fled. This time she neither slowed nor looked back.
About fucking time too.
Xessa turned back to the Swift Water and sucked in air as she stilled Ossa, smoothing his hackles with a shaking hand. She tried to contain her anger and failed; she roared at the water in defiance and rage and fear, sparking Ossa into a frenzy of motion. Ekka appeared in her vision and she sent both dogs out on a run to calm their jitters.
She opened the pipe joint and connected the mechanism, and then Toxte was there, his usual calm competence fled. His eyes when he reached her were spirit-haunted and wild; the magic was strong in him and a shock like this could send him into a spirit-daze – or even a rage. Xessa calmed herself – outwardly at least – and checked for the tell-tale hints of a spirit-borne fury building within him.
‘Are you hurt?’ he signed, propping his spear against his chest.
‘No. Take some deep breaths, Toxte. No one’s dead; the pipe is ready. Be calm.’ She squeezed his hand until it unclenched and he laced their fingers together. A little haunting left his face, a little colour returned to his cheeks. He nodded that he had the magic and the spirits under control and she breathed more easily.
Together they backed up the hill as Ossa and Ekka stood guard near the pipe. ‘Stupid bitch said she wanted to see the river,’ Xessa told Toxte when she was sure he was in control – and she was herself. ‘Drowned came up and sang and she nearly got us both killed. She slip past you somehow?’
The colour in his face changed rapidly again, this time flushing with embarrassment. ‘I didn’t see her pass the temple,’ he signed. ‘I’d never have let her distract you, I swear. She must’ve come the long way round.’
‘But why?’ Xessa demanded, her anger heating her again. ‘The fuck did she think she was doing?’
‘Xentib are all moon-mad,’ Toxte signed. ‘No wonder the Empire conquered them.’
Spite surged in Xessa’s heart – she understood now why the Yaloh held their former neighbours in such low esteem. Even so, it didn’t explain how the woman had got to the river’s edge undetected. She watched Toxte watching Ekka. He’d never let anyone approach an eja on duty, but maybe the magic was beginning to slow him. It took some ejab that way, even young ones, furring their decisions, slowing their reactions and capacity for clear thought. Perhaps Toxte’s time on the snake path was coming to an end.
‘Any news from Tika on when the Yaloh ejab will be ready?’ she asked. Toxte chewed the inside of his cheek and it was Xessa’s turn to blush – he could clearly see the path of her thoughts. His mouth thinned and she put her hand on his arm and squeezed an apology. ‘I didn’t mean it like—’ she began but he was already replying.
‘They’ve begun learning to control the spirit-magic,’ he signed, the gestures cold and precise. ‘Some have said they’ll do it only until the crisis is passed, but the others seem to be embracing the life. They won’t be ready before the start of the next Wet, so we’ll just have to manage this one as best we can.’
Toxte gestured and they walked back up towards the water temple, the dogs following. He didn’t look at her as they ducked inside, just loosened his armour and then began to turn the massive handle. Xessa felt the vibration through her soles and moved to the end of the pipe and the stone trough beneath. Twelve revolutions of the handle and the first splash of water spurted from the mouth and she caught a palmful and lifted it to her lips to drink. Thank you, Malel.
She touched the tears in her armour and the places where the bamboo was missing, but she wasn’t even scratched, not this time. Still alive, despite how close it had been. That was one way to come back to the duty after an absence, she supposed.
Xessa watched the muscles in Toxte’s arms flex as he turned the handle, a smooth, tireless motion. He’d braided half his hair back and she watched the pulse in his throat, steady and slow despite the effort. She tapped his arm. ‘Beer later?’ she signed, though ejab weren’t supposed to drink when the spirit-magic was in them. Most of them did anyway – the magic lasted a day and usually by the time night fell, they were starting to get the shakes and beer or honeypot was the only thing that could stop it.
‘You buy it, I’ll drink it,’ Toxte paused long enough to sign, recognising her offer for the apology it was. They were all worried about the increase in their duties, after all; Xessa just wished she hadn’t been so thoughtless. But Toxte was fine; what had happened was bad luck, nothing more. The spirit-magic wasn’t harming him. ‘And lots of it,’ he added with a grin. They were still alive and so was the Sky City and Xessa planned on celebrating that by getting disgustingly drunk. Then he gestured over her shoulder and she turned to see the first Tokob with their gourds and pitchers and buckets, waiting patiently for their day’s ration.
