Centuries had added hollows to the shallow stairs, and stains of damp on the walls. She bent to touch the depressions in the cold, grey stone and marvelled at the number of feet which must have passed this way since Telsen took her on tour.
Gazing out over the sarcophagi of generations of Corminevars, Medair saw that the Hall had been extended. Through a wide new opening to the right of the second tier she could dimly make out stone railing and marble. Built to house five hundred years of Ibisians who had ruled from a stolen throne.
The Hall was not permanently lit, and she felt suddenly uneasy about venturing among the dead. Waiting for her eyes to adjust to the gloom, she hesitated at the foot of the entrance stair. Light reflected past her off the polished floor of the Hall of Ceremony, where several large mageglows provided a steady, clear illumination. It only served to make the shadows deeper.
Voices prompted her to edge to one side, where must and dust waited to assail her nostrils. The palace seemed overfull of guards today. They had watched her suspiciously as she’d made her way down from Cor-Ibis' rooms. She’d had half a mind to don her ring, but was tired of the vague sensation of illness. Besides, there was no ban of which she knew against visiting the Hall of Mourning. Skulking around invisibly would only make her seem guilty of something.
The source of the voices proved not to be guards, but a group of young nobles, walking in a tight cluster. She couldn’t make out what they were saying, and waited until they had passed through the Hall of Ceremony. Then a series of careful gestures served to conjure a bobbing mageglow bright enough to keep the shadows at bay without drawing the attention of passers-by.
Her footsteps echoed as she walked across the first tier, where the earliest kings and queens of Palladium lay in stone-wrapped state, their likenesses carved by hands long turned to dust. The second tier was larger, but held fewer sarcophagi. It had once been considered fitting for the coffins of monarchs to be more than a container for their bodies, for their lives to be reflected by some tribute. So there were friezes, columns, crypts within crypts. They ranged in complexity from the wrought iron fence around Iriane the Just, to the miniature palace which housed the remains of Varden the First.
She paused momentarily at the entrance of the new extension. A corner of pale stone was visible in the light of her glow, but the rest was little more than black shapes in darkness. Ibisian dead: she had no wish to look upon them. Gritting her teeth she went onward, to the third tier. This was where Grevain Corminevar’s mother had been laid to rest, where the last true Palladian Emperor would surely lie.
White, pure, unembellished. Her mageglow heated its milky depths. Medair stumbled to a halt, having discovered not the resting place of her Emperor, but the one who had destroyed him. There were no markings of any kind on the tomb, not even his name, but Medair knew it could be no other. Standing alone at the very end of the Hall, an achingly simple box of near-translucent marble which held the mortal remains of Ieskar Cael las Saral-Ibis.
Twenty-three and dead. She refused to think of it, of him. He had destroyed the Empire and deserved no thought at all.
With grim determination she dragged her eyes from the soft marble, sought and found the carved, grey face of the man to whom she had sworn her life. Grevain Corminevar’s sarcophagus lay in the shadow of two of Farak’s handmaidens. The statues towered some seven feet high, leaning out of the wall at the head of the sarcophagus, each holding a stone arm forward, hands resting on the shoulders of his image. Their heads were bowed in sorrow or contemplation.
A lump lodged itself in Medair’s throat and she went to one knee in the traditional obeisance. He had not been a handsome man. Stocky, bearded, dour. Whoever had been set the task of recreating his likeness had been skilled: the prominent Corminevar jaw was visible beneath the curling outline of beard. The stone face was at peace, despite the sword clasped to his chest to indicate he had died in battle. Medair could not remember ever seeing him wear such an expression. He had been a brisk, impatient man, used to dealing with problems quickly and efficiently, always thinking on to the next trouble brewing on the horizon.
"I’m sorry," Medair choked out, inadequately. She brushed at tears suddenly streaking her cheeks. The enormity of her failure overwhelmed her and she was barely able to hold her ground, wanting to collapse into wails, to crawl away in shame. "One stupid mistake," she told indifferent stone. "I – it could have been so different, if I hadn’t – Excellency…"
The futility of it all strangled further words. Grevain Corminevar was dead, the Empire had fallen, and nothing Medair could do could change that. She could not even ask his forgiveness.
Did death release the bonds of oath? Medair was running out of time in which to struggle with her own conscience. She did not want to stand by and watch the inhabitants of Athere slaughtered, for all they were Ibisian. But to give the Horn of Farak to those whom she had originally sought to use it against? No, that was beyond her. She would not betray her people to the benefit of another. She would rather…
Medair placed her satchel on top of the stone hands of her king, and slowly opened it. Reaching in, she found a heavy silk cord and pulled it gently, not enough to expose the Horn, not yet. It was so rich in power that every Ibisian in the palace would likely be able to feel it. Instead, she found the bone handle of a knife, a sliver of metal which would cut flesh cleanly. Fear and uncertainty washed over her, but she pushed second thoughts to one side. It was better this way.
Winding the cord about one wrist, she closed her eyes and sent a silent prayer to Farak. The Horn would be pulled from her satchel when she fell, and she would be free of choices she did not want to make.
"One last place to run, Keris an Rynstar."
Medair gasped, entire body jerking with shock. She stared around her at the shadows lurking at the edges of her mageglow, but could not see the source of that entirely too familiar voice. It couldn’t be him.
She cautiously unwound the cord from her arm and took a step forward, knife held at ready. Another step and she was able to see the stair, and the tall man watching her. His eyes were serious, his pointed face the same grave mask he’d worn for an entire war. Pale hair fell neatly over the shoulders of a shimmering robe of Kier’s white.
The knife fell to the ground with a clatter. Medair backed away until her ribs connected painfully with a corner of white marble and she stopped, trapped.
"A most convincing display of horror." Kier Ieskar descended the last few steps into the room and paused.
"How–?" Medair rasped, lifting one hand as if to fend him off. At the same time she began sidling sideways, to remove herself from the vicinity of the white marble which she had thought housed his body.
He inclined his head to one side, lids lowering as he followed her progress. White Snake. When he spoke again, it was in Parlance, a concession he had not made since their first meeting.
"Wild Magic," he said, and looked down at himself, as if to confirm his own existence. "The shield held off the reshaping of the Conflagration, but the world is still saturated with unfocused power. It collects in pools, sinks into the ground, is carried on the wind. It will be a long time before there ceases to be unpredictable changes."
"Changes!!? The dead coming back to life is not–"
"Not what has happened here. Calm yourself, Keris an Rynstar. You have summoned my shade from beyond the veil, not returned me fully to this world."
"I –?!"