Darkness.
Sarmin floated, watching the thin, wasted prince convulse on the dais, and the pretty horsewoman kneel over him. Tuvaini was dead, the Knife still in his heart. The Carriers had fallen like Settu pieces after the Push, no motion left in them. He floated over the Cerani in their throne room: a useless empire for a useless people. The chatter rose in his mind like a river after the rains, and in the midst of it all, a single voice found him. “Sarmin.” His father’s voice. The Old Emperor, Tahal.
“Prince Sarmin is only within me. I am the Many.”
“You are Sarmin.”
That did not feel right, but he listened to the old man anyway.
“These lives are not yours. You must put them back.”
“I am the Many. These lives belong to Us. With them we can level this city, form an ocean, travel to the stars.”
“What for, Sarmin? What for? Below you lies the empire-my empire. You were saved for this moment. You must do the right thing.”
“The empire is naught but blood and cruelty, sacrifice and pain. An ocean is good. A mountain is good.”
“Think of all who will die.”
“They will join Us.”
“And the horsegirl?”
He looked down at the blonde woman and searched the Many for her name. He found the One who knew it and held that life in his mind as he spoke. “Mesema.” And then he saw that the mouth of the young prince moved, and the woman gave a cry of joy and kissed his brow.
“You have put yourself back. Now for the others.”
Put them back. A magic of many parts. A puzzle of many pieces.
He could feel her lips and arms, soft, nice. He remembered another woman, too. Her name was Grada. He reached out to where she trekked through the desert on camelback, the sun hot on her back, her mouth dry with thirst.
“Grada.”
“My Prince!”
“The Master is dead.”
Grada said nothing, only smiled in her mind and quickened her camel’s pace. The other voices began to stir. The lives, the disembodied souls that he held within him began to pull apart, distinguish themselves against the Whole. The Many began to disintegrate.
He touched against them, found their pattern-places. He matched mind to body and built them again. He could not replace them all; some had been too long apart and were too broken, but he mended hundreds-a child’s game of fitting shapes to holes. The men and women in the throne room stood and looked at one another in wonder. He reached out beyond that room, to the city, and then beyond to the desert, rivers and ocean. He mended thousands. Citizens returned to themselves throughout the empire. The joy rose from them and made his heart sing.
When he was finished, a piece of the Many remained in him: the ones Helmar had killed. Their lives’ power persisted, their memories and regrets confused and muddled together.
“I’m sorry,” he said to them. “I can’t do anything for you.” They did not hear him; they were dead. Helmar had stolen their lives, and now Sarmin held only an echo of what they had been. He kept their ghosts, the book of their lives written out beneath his skin, but he promised to use them wisely. They deserved no less.
“You have done well, my son.” His father sounded proud. Sarmin smiled in Mesema’s arms. “Now you must leave the Knife and join yourself.”
“I’m in the Knife?”
“You put yourself there today, as you put me there another day, when Eyul came into the sand-city. You don’t know your power, but you will, in the years ahead…” Tahal’s voice grew indistinct. Sarmin heard other voices and smelled incense and wine. He opened his eyes and looked up at Mesema’s face. He touched her cheek, and she smiled through her tears.
“I didn’t know if you would open your eyes again,” she said. Sarmin sat up and looked around the room. He’d erased the marks from his courtiers-perhaps he had erased all the marks? He would know soon enough. He stood, feeling the power of those extra lives running through his veins and in his mind. He looked at the man at the bottom of the dais, someone he hadn’t noticed before. “What is your name?”
“Azeem, Your Majesty.”
“Azeem, send for Govnan in the Tower. There is much to discuss. And bring my mother to attend me.”
Azeem bowed and withdrew.
And Sarmin settled into his throne.