“Ah. To capture Faraataa and his followers! And what will be done to them if they are captured, which I very much doubt they will be, considering my own experiences when I wandered in that jungle?”
“They will be confined.”
“Nothing more? No execution of ringleaders?”
“My lord, we are not savages!”
“Of course. Of course. And the aim of this invasion will be strictly to take Faraataa?”
“No more than that, my lord.”
“No attempt to overthrow the Danipiur? No campaign of general extermination of the Metamorphs?”
“Those ideas were never suggested.”
“I see.” His voice was curiously controlled, almost mocking: much unlike any tone Hissune had ever heard him use before. “And what other plans does the Council propose?”
“An army of pacification to occupy Piliplok—without bloodshed, if bloodshed can be avoided—and to take control of any other cities or provinces that may have seceded from the government. Also, neutralization of the various private armies established by the false Coronals now infesting many areas, and, if possible, the turning of those armies toward the service of the government. Finally, military occupation of any provinces that refuse to take part in a newly instituted program for sharing food supplies with afflicted zones.”
“Quite a comprehensive scheme,” Lord Valentine said, in that same odd detached tone. “And who will lead all these armies?”
“The Council has suggested dividing the command between my lord Divvis, my lord Tunigorn, and myself,” replied Hissune.
“And I?”
“You will of course have supreme command over all our forces, my lord.”
“Of course. Of course.” Lord Valentine’s gaze turned within, and for a long span of silence he appeared to be contemplating all that Hissune had said. Hissune watched him closely. There was something deeply troublesome about the Coronal’s austere, restrained manner of questioning him: it seemed clear that Lord Valentine knew as well as Hissune himself where the conversation was heading, and Hissune found himself dreading the moment when it must get there. But that moment, Hissune realized, was already at hand. The Coronal’s eyes brightened strangely as his attention turned once again toward Hissune, and he said, “Was anything else proposed by the Council of Regency, Prince Hissune?”
“One thing more, my lord.”
“Which is?”
“That the commander of the army that will occupy Piliplok and other rebellious cities should be one who bears the title of Coronal.”
“The Coronal, you have just told me, will be the supreme commander.”
“No, my lord. The Pontifex must be the supreme commander.”
The silence that followed seemed to endure for a thousand years. Lord Valentine stood almost motionless: he might have been a statue, but for the slight flickering of his eyelids and the occasional quiver of a muscle in his cheek. Hissune waited tensely, not daring to speak. Now that he had done it, he felt amazed at his own temerity in delivering such an ultimatum to the Coronal. But it was done. It could not be withdrawn. If Lord Valentine in his wrath were to strip him of his rank and send him back to beg in the streets of the Labyrinth, so be it: it was done, it could not be withdrawn.
The Coronal began to laugh.
It was a laughter that began somewhere deep within him and rose like a geyser through his chest to his lips: a great bellowing booming laugh, more the sort of sound that some giant like Lisamon Hultin or Zalzan Kavol might make than anything one would expect the gentle Lord Valentine to let loose. It went on and on, until Hissune began to fear that the Coronal had taken leave of his senses; but just then it ceased, swiftly and suddenly, and nothing remained of Lord Valentine’s bizarre mirth but a strange glittering smile.
“Well done!” he cried. “Ah, well done, Hissune, well done!”
“My lord?”
“And tell me, who is the new Coronal to be?”
“My lord, you must understand that these are only proposals—for the sake of the greater efficiency of the government in this time of crisis—”
“Yes, of course. And who, I ask you again, is to be brought forward in the name of greater efficiency?”
“My lord, the choice of a successor remains always with the former Coronal.”
“So it does. But the candidates—are they not proposed by the high counsellors and princes? Elidath was the heir presumptive—but Elidath, as I think you must know, is dead. So, then—who is it to be, Hissune?”
“Several names were discussed,” said Hissune softly. He could scarcely bear to look directly at Lord Valentine now. “If this is offensive to you, my lord—”
“Several names, yes. Whose?”
“My lord Stasilaine, for one. But he at once declared that he had no wish to be Coronal. My lord Divvis, for another—”
“Divvis must never be Coronal!” said Lord Valentine sharply, with a glance toward the Lady. “He has all the faults of my brother Voriax, and none of his merits. Except valor, I suppose, and a certain forcefulness. Which are insufficient.”
“There was one other name, my lord.”
“Yours, Hissune?”
“Yes, my lord,” said Hissune, but he could get the words out only in a choking whisper. “Mine.”
Lord Valentine smiled. “And would you serve?”
“If I were asked, my lord, yes. Yes.”
The Coronal’s eyes bore down intensely on Hissune’s, who withstood that fierce inquiry without flinching.
“Well, then, there is no problem, eh? My mother would have me ascend. The Council of Regency would have me ascend. Old Tyeveras surely would have me ascend.”
“Valentine—” said the Lady, frowning.
“No, all is well, mother. I understand what must be done. I can hesitate no longer, can I? Therefore I accept my destiny. We will send word to Hornkast that Tyeveras is to be permitted at last to cross the Bridge of Farewells. You, mother, you finally may put down your burden, as I know you wish to do, and retire to the ease of the life of a former Lady. You, Elsinome: your task is only beginning. And yours, Hissune. See, the thing is done. It is as I intended, only sooner, perhaps, than I had expected.” Hissune, watching the Coronal in astonishment and perplexity, saw the expression on his face shift: the harshness, the uncharacteristic ferocity, left his features, and into his eyes came the ease and warmth and gentleness of the Valentine he had once been, and that eerie rigid glittering smile, so close almost to a madman’s, was replaced by the old Valentine-smile, kind, tender, loving. “It is done,” said Valentine quietly. He raised his hands and held them forth in the starburst sign, and cried, “Long life to the Coronal! Long life to Lord Hissune!”
7
Three of the five great ministers of the Pontificate were already in the council-chamber when Hornkast entered. In the center, as usual, sat the Ghayrog Shinaam, minister of external affairs, his forked tongue flickering nervously, as though he believed that a death sentence was about to be passed not on the ancient creature he had served so long, but on himself. Beside him was the empty seat of the physician Sepulthrove, and to the right of that was Dilifon, that shriveled and palsied little man, sitting huddled in his thronelike chair, gripping its armrests for support; but his eyes were alive with a fire Hornkast had not seen in them for years. On the other side of the room was the dream-speaker Narrameer, radiating dark morbidity and terror from behind the absurdly voluptuous sorcery-induced beauty with which she cloaked her century-old body. How long, Hornkast wondered, had each of these three been awaiting this day? And what provision had they made in their souls for the time of its coming?