“What was that?” Amaltar wondered, along with every other soul in Daltigoth.
“An omen, Majesty,” Tol said, trying to sound cheerful. “A good omen for the start of your reign!”
The emperor did not look convinced. “Stay by me, Champion.” Tol vowed he would.
At the gate of the Inner City, Amaltar’s children divided, flanking the entrance on either side. Tol halted while the emperor continued on. Standing before the closed gate, clad in white-girded armor, was Draymon, commander of the Palace Guard.
“Stand off, invader! This is the sacred realm of His Majesty Pakin III!” Draymon intoned.
“Your ruler is lost and must yield,” Amaltar recited the ritual reply. “Death awaits any who resist!”
“Then fight, hated foreigner! The house of Ackal Ergot shall not fall!”
So saying, Draymon slipped inside the gate. Amaltar strode forward and struck the gate three times with his ceremonial sword. Each blow was punctuated by beats on the drums. On the third strike, a squad of palace guards hauled the gate open wide. Draymon and his men went to their knees. The mob in the plaza calmed.
“Spare us, O conqueror!” the commander exclaimed. “We did but serve our great lord!”
“Where is the noble Pakin III?”
“Yonder, on his bier.” Draymon pointed behind him. Through the forest of banners, the catafalque’s white curtains stirred in the breeze flowing through the open gate.
“I will pay homage to your defeated lord.”
Accompanied only by Tol and the golden case he bore, Amaltar entered the grounds of the place in which he’d grown up, no longer a prince, but as master. Pale and sweating inside the armor of his powerful ancestor, Amaltar did not resemble a conqueror but a worn and sickly man. More than once Tol had to pause as his imperial master faltered slightly, staggering under the weight of Ackal Ergot’s armor and the burden of his empire.
Oropash, Helbin, and the senior wizards stood waiting by the catafalque. Catching sight of Tol, Oropash paled and Helbin scowled. With Mistress Yoralyn gone, they were the only wizards who knew Tol possessed the nullstone, fatal to all their art. The two wizards mastered their emotions and lowered their eyes out of respect for their new emperor.
Amaltar and Tol climbed the steps to the veiled shrine. Within, Pakin III lay on a black basalt plinth. His loyal wizards had transformed him entirely to stone, even to his burial robes and single golden earring. Alive, he had been a sardonic, cynical man, brutally honest and strictly fair. Transmuted to alabaster, the old emperor looked wise enough to counsel the gods.
Amaltar laid his sword across his father’s chest. Instead of the ritual words, he said quietly, “Good-bye, Father. No man worked harder or understood me less.”
He knelt and a long silence ensued. Tol stood unmoving. He did not want to desecrate Amaltar’s silent prayers with any noise, no matter how slight.
At last, Amaltar rose and recovered his sword. “Come, Tolandruth.”
The banners had been cleared away, and the entire coronation procession had taken over the square. The monumental plaza could have easily accommodated even their number, but they were not alone. All the warlords of the empire had joined them, as had the wizards of the college and the servants, lackeys, cooks, and other lesser folk of the palace. The plaza was full of expectant faces and hushed voices. In the multitude Tol located Valaran, Nazramin, and Egrin. Far across the square, Mandes stood on the palace steps, surrounded by scribes and palace guards. The sorcerer was dressed in his best for the coronation, a blue-gray robe and spotless white gloves.
Tol descended two steps, turned to face Amaltar, and presented the heavy golden box. Amaltar unlocked it with his ring and raised the lid, letting it rest against Tol’s chest.
The ancient blade, bent into a circle, held within its tempered length the power and glory of an entire empire-the future of millions, contained in three spans of iron.
Amaltar lifted the iron crown from its resting place and seated it on his head. He turned to face the assembled throng.
In a loud voice slightly gruff with strain, he declared, “I am Ackal IV, Emperor of Ergoth! Who will bow down to me and serve me all my days?”
Noisily, with the clinking of armor and swish of silks, five thousand knelt as one.
“Hail, Ackal IV!” Tol shouted.
The crowd replied with a roar, “Hail Ackal IV! Long live the Emperor! Long Live Ackal IV!”
Chapter 14
By night the sky over Daltigoth was ablaze with light. The tremendous orange glow blotted out the gentle light of the stars. To an onlooker leagues away, the city might seem to be burning from end to end, but Daltigoth blazed only with revelry. From the Inner City to the scruffiest dive on the canal, everyone was honoring the memory of their past emperor or paying homage to the new one by feasting, drinking, and dancing.
So large was the throng of the elite-warlords, wizards, courtiers, and foreign dignitaries-the banquet in the Inner City was being held outdoors in the plaza. No hall in the palace was large enough to hold all the guests.
An army of trestle tables had been set up between the palace and the garden surrounding the Tower of High Sorcery. Torches stood at the ends of the tables, and masses of servants labored to keep the emperor’s favored guests well supplied with food and drink. An entire herd of imperial cattle had been slaughtered for the feast, along with no fewer than ten thousand fowl.
The palace kitchens were not sufficient for the great quantity of food to be prepared, so firepits were built in the alley between the palace’s north facade and the Inner City wall. There an army of cooks labored. Stripped to loincloths against the searing heat, they roasted whole steers, turned spits containing a hundred chickens, and stirred cauldrons of simmering vegetables. Wine tuns as tall as ogres were hauled up from the cellars and tapped on the palace steps, and hogsheads of beer were put at the end of each row of tables.
At the imperial table, Ackal IV dined with his wives, children, and royal siblings. Tol was favored with a seat at the table facing the imperial table. Miya and Kiya had joined him, as had Egrin and the other members of the morning’s honor guard.
The night air was cooler now, as summer waned into autumn, but the heavy coronation finery worn by the diners, the great quantities of wine and beer they consumed, and the leaping flames of the torches combined to overheat the scene.
The gathering was earnestly merry, with a few notable exceptions. Chief among the melancholy was the new emperor himself.
Ackal IV sat in his oversized chair, listlessly taking in the fantastic scene. Gray-faced and sweating, his earlier vigor had faded under the great weight of his new position. As regent, Amaltar had ruled the empire for twelve years, but no matter how much power he’d held, it had always been wielded in his father’s name. Now he was emperor in truth. There was no one above him, no other name to invoke to settle disputes. Everything rested on his own shoulders. The Ergoth Empire was a prodigious burden. Another man might have reveled in the glory, in the unbridled power that was now his to command. Ackal IV looked miserable.
The emperor’s apparent gloom infected Tol’s mood, or perhaps it was the quantity of beer he had drunk. Between toasts offered by the Dom-shu sisters on his left and salutes offered by the warlords on his right, Tol was imbibing much more than usual.
Valaran was seated only steps away from him, yet she might as well have been perched on the red moon. Cool and regal amid the raucous celebration, she seemed totally unruffled by the loud talk and the oppressive heat of torches, braziers, and open hearths. Tol itched to stalk across the narrow gap separating them and take her for his own, as he had Tarsis or the Blood Fleet.