\hypertarget{chapter-30-witness}{%
\section{Chapter 30: Witness}\label{chapter-30-witness}}

\begin{quote}
\emph{``There is only one lesson to be learned from shatranj: no matter
who wins the game, the pieces return to the same box.''}

-- Dread Emperor Benevolent the First
\end{quote}

I'd never been in crypt before but it smelled about what I'd expected.
Cool, wet stone and a little like dust. The scent was heavy and cloying,
but it wasn't the reason I felt rattled. I almost withdrew my wrist from
Masego's grasp before realizing that might get me expelled from\ldots{}
whatever this was and froze instead. Splendidly uncaring of my wariness,
Hierophant let my wrist go the moment after. I looked around. Still
here. I'd say that was good to know, but I understood next to nothing
about what was going on. That was an unpleasantly familiar feeling,
truth be told.

``Masego,'' I whispered. ``Can they see us?''

We were on the outskirts of the crowd but there were a few attendants
close by near a sculpted ramp leading upwards. If they could see us,
we'd stick out like sore thumbs. Neither of us could pass Keteran by
skin tone alone, much less if clothes were brought into it. Hierophant
shook his head.

``We can only subtract from this, not add,'' he mused.

That loosened some of the tension in my shoulders, so I allowed myself
to take a slower look around. We were at the beginning of the shard, by
my reckoning. Most of the grievers were still filing in, and it'd be
about half an hour before they king's corpse was brought in. Less than
that before the Bard walked in from a place not within the shard and sat
down next to Trismegistus, though. Two of the attendants a little higher
up, veiled young women, spoke in a low voice. I frowned.

``They're still speaking Keteran,'' I said.

Masego turned to me, lips curving in a sharp smile.

``Subtraction, Catherine,'' he said, ``does not preclude acquisition.''

My brow rose.

``You can ransack their brains,'' I said.

``Don't be absurd,'' he replied. ``The actual brain matter is long gone.
I can appropriate an echo of their consciousness, including working
knowledge of their language.''

I blinked in surprise.

``Wait, that's something you can do?'' I said. ``You can dig out an
entire dialect from someone's head and put it in someone else's?''

That would have been damned useful to know. Wouldn't have had to spend
so many evenings trying to learn Chantant if there was a shortcut like
that. Without Learn to help me along, I'd come to the realization that
my talent for languages was average at best and that the most widespread
language in Procer was a horrid chore to learn. So many fucking
exceptions and whoever had decided that plurals for masculine and
feminine names -- or even that there should be any of those -- deserved
to be drawn and quartered. If it'd been a possibility to lift that
knowledge out of the heads of criminals, with consent and a reduced
sentence dangled in exchange, I would have taken it.

``Theoretically speaking,'' Masego agreed. ``Of course a living mind is
much more complex to excise information from than what can be found in
this imprint. Likely the extraction would break the source entirely,
what would be obtained would be contaminated with connected gibberish
and the bestowal itself drive the recipient mad. Human minds were not
meant to process that much knowledge instantly.''

I grimaced. Yeah, it figured. Should have known that if this was a
feasible shortcut, Warlock would have cut open a few `expendables' and
the Calamities would be fluent in every single Calernian language.

``But you can do it here safely,'' I pressed.

He eyed me amusedly, which was a pretty ghastly sight considering his
glass eyes.

``For myself, I can rely on my aspect to handle the worst of the
backlash,'' he noted. ``I will have severe migraines for weeks or months
before it has all been processed, but I have herbs to alleviate this.''

``And me?'' I said, already expecting the worst.

``\emph{Human} minds were not meant to process that much knowledge
instantly,'' he reminded me gently. ``You have regularly employed powers
beyond human capacity to understand, and indicted by the principle
alienation that ensued. It will be no more unpleasant than when we
employed absolute alignment together.''

So a bunch of spikes through the forehead. Lovely.

``I'll cope,'' I sighed. ``Work your magic, magic man.''

``Must you call me that?'' he asked.

``Be grateful Indrani's not here, or she'd start hinting about magic
fingers,'' I replied without missing a beat.

She wouldn't even be wrong, to be honest. My time with Kilian had taught
me that the jokes about mages having clever fingers were well founded.

``Silver lining,'' he muttered. ``The attendants will do for our
purposes, I suppose.''

I glanced at the two young women.

``A question,'' I said. ``Can you extract from the Trismegistus and the
Bard?''

He nodded slowly.

``Broader, more complex minds will be more difficult to work with,'' he
warned. ``But in principle, yes. I must caution, however, that was is
taken will be removed from the echo permanently. After the extraction,
the actors will be\ldots{} impaired, for lack of a better term.''

``We'd be fucking with the imprint,'' I summarized.

``Fucking is not a term that applies to this subject,'' he sighed.

``It's a term with surprisingly broad applications, Zeze,'' I said
righteously. ``You should expand your horizons.''

Huh, so he \emph{could} glare with glass eyes without resorting to a
light show. Nice to know. The work took too long. We were only halfway
through the span of the shard, but the Bard was long gone and
Trismegistus remained far from the other grievers for the rest of it. We
used the time to get more comfortable with our sudden knowledge of
Keteran. Or, as it was actually called, Ashkaran. After he broke the
first attendant -- a chunk of her face was now missing, like it'd been
vaporized -- and shoved a blue bubble into my forehead, I'd felt a rush.
Like my mind was a cup being filled beyond capacity, until the cup
shattered and Winter flooded my veins. It'd been\ldots{} strangely
pleasant. Like cracking your neck after a long day's work. Hierophant's
own acquisition had seen him go still for a solid thirty heartbeats, and
his face had been twitching in and out of a wince ever since. He
admitted in a low voice that the aspect had not warded off backlash as
much as he'd anticipated.

I would have spared him some sympathy but I was still busy wrestling
with the fact that I had servant gossip a few millennia out of date
rattling around the back of my mind. I was less interested in who had
been sleeping with who in the royal kitchens, or the speculation that
the\ldots{} head household servant for halls and commoner rooms -- there
was no Lower Miezan word that carried the same breadth of implications
-- had been getting cheaper candles and pocketing the savings.

``You know,'' I said out loud, ``for all those rumours about
chambermaids being saucy this is surprisingly tame stuff. You hear
filthier in taverns.''

``Maybe the sort \emph{you} frequent,'' Masego muttered. ``There's a
reason I refuse to go drinking with you and Archer. Last time I saw a
rat.''

I snorted. Yeah, maybe Dockside had been a bit much for Hierophant. He
liked things clean, and that part of Laure was anything but. We split to
see if there was anything interesting to dig up, and to my surprise
there was. A surprising amount of information could be obtained from
overhearing idle conversation, if there was enough of it. For one, I
confirmed that the people with the copper circlets were royalty. Sons
and daughters of the dead king, whose name had been Iakim. The oldest
child was the heir to the kingship of Sephirah, which I assumed to be
the name of the ancient Keteran kingdom. The title of that heir, Zekiah,
wasn't prince. Not exactly. The term was more like lesser king, and by
the sound of it Zekiah had shared rule of the kingdom with his father
for years now. Of Trismegistus, or whatever his true name was, I heard
nothing. The nobles, or at least the man and women bearing titles I
assumed to be something like nobility, among the crowd did not speak of
him. Apart from the entombment, the favourite subject appeared to be the
war with the `People of the Wolf'.

Aside from the usual accusations of savagery and wickedness that always
sprouted on both sides of any war, the rumour of cannibalism was often
repeated. That and transforming into giant man-eating wolves, but I had
my doubts about that one. I'd seen no hint of a power like it when
passing through the battle shards. No one seems particularly worried
about the war, though, not even after King Iakim's death. The People of
the Wolf were apparently no match for walls of stone, and the `Conclave'
had finally agreed to enter the war. From context, those seemed to be
mages. Had the lack of effectiveness of mages we'd seen so far come from
the fact they were just amateurs? Could be. It wasn't what I'd come here
to find out, though, so when the shard began again I found Masego and
headed towards the upper alcoves where I knew the Dead King and the Bard
would come to talk.

``Heard anything interesting?'' I asked.

``Some blame the plague for the war,'' he told me, though he didn't
sound all that interested. ``They say it was the deaths in the outlying
villages that attracted the wolfmen.''

I cocked my head to the side. I'd chalk that one up for Hakram's tale of
the fall of Keter.

``Is wolfmen how you'd translate it?'' I said. ``It struck me more as-''

``Ah, capitalized,'' he breathed out. ``I see. Formal address, which
would be spoken `People of the Wolf'. Difficult to know which of us is
correct without seeing the term written, of course.''

``I can't read it,'' I told him. ``The girl was illiterate.''

``I have some semblance of the knowledge,'' Masego frowned, then winced
as his headache flared. ``I cut too narrowly, it seems. I cannot quite
remember it.''

I patted his shoulder.

``Don't get a migraine,'' I ordered. ``I need you sharp for the
important part.''

We were both standing, when Trismegistus strode up the ramp and came to
rest by a pillar. He looked calm, in the magelight, and did not visibly
react when the Wandering Bard slipped through the darkness and plopped
herself down in the alcove to his side. She put down the lute on her lap
and chuckled.

``There's nothing quite like looking down at one's work, is there?'' she
said.

Her Ashkaran was flawless and without accent, as if she was a native
speaker. Trismegistus did not look at her.

``Intercessor,'' he said. ``I wondered if you would come.''

``Intercessor,'' the Bard repeated amusedly. ``Not the worst thing I've
been called. Heard a thing or two, have you?''

The young man glanced at her, mildly curious, before returning his gaze
to the ceremony unfolding below.

``You were companion to Nasseh the Great, when he fought for the
submission of the twelve cities,'' Trismegistus idly said. ``You were at
Queen Sadassa's side as well, during the worst of the Wars of the Rat.
Fortune and misfortune both draw you like carrion.''

``And which do you think you are, I wonder?'' the Bard mused. ``So few
of them even remember you exist, Neshamah. How horrified they would be,
to learn what the prodigal son has wrought.''

\emph{Neshamah}, I thought, fingers clenching. I finally had a name.

``You come in the service of Those Above, then,'' the man said, and he
sounded almost bored. ``Tedious.''

``Below has already blessed you quite enough, my friend,'' the Bard
shrugged. ``You don't need the nudge. But I'm not here to put sticks in
your wheels, if that is your worry. Too late for that. Maybe if I'd had
a few years to shape your opposition, but you played it well enough I
had no openings. And I already burned my fingers tossing those bones
with odds like this with the giants.''

Neshamah finally turned to face her.

``You have my attention,'' he said. ``If not intervention, what is your
purpose here?''

``I suppose you could call it curiosity,'' she said. ``I'm starting to
understand how little I understand, you see. So I seek knowledge. About
how they make people like you. I won't solve the riddle with the tools
they gave me, so it seems I must learn craftsmanship of my own. Which
takes me to you. You're not impossible, my friend, but you \emph{are}
unlikely. Your father did not look Below when he earned his Blessing.
But you did, at an age where most children worry about the nature of
supper. Was it your mother's death? Ugly affair all around, I've been
told.''

The man smiled.

``You think it kindness to offer me an excuse,'' Neshamah said. ``But it
is an insult, Intercessor. There is nothing in what I have wrought that
deserves excusing.''

``The plague alone killed hundreds,'' the Bard said. ``That will grow to
thousands, when the cities begin to be touched.''

``And?'' he patiently asked.

``Your people bleed for power,'' the Bard said. ``But only ever
themselves. You would break cities in the name a plan that will not
bloom for years yet.''

``I destroy flesh that will destroy itself in time,'' he said. ``There
is no theft in this, Intercessor. It is mere movement of the soul as was
ordained, only now given proper purpose.''

The Bard hummed, then pulled at her flask.

``The drow didn't teach you this,'' she decided. ``The Twilight Sages
conisder death the only sin, they would be appalled by what you speak
of. Most tribes beyond the lakes can barely even use sorcery and their
allegiances change with the seasons. Was it the Chitterers? I genuinely
believe the Gods made them out of whatever was left after the rest of
Creation was done. Shoddy craftsmanship, that lot.''

``And still you believe I must have been taught,'' Neshamah said. ``As
if my actions were not the only lucid answer to the truth of this world.
There are none closer in any lands to the Gods, Intercessor, so tell me
this -- why must we die at all? Why were we shaped with such inherent
imperfection?''

``Because the Garden was a failure,'' the Bard easily replied.
``Immortals always fall into closed circles. There are no answers to be
had from them.''

``You grasp too little and too much,'' the man said. ``The Splendid are
bound to repetition because they are feared, Intercessor. Because with
the span of eternity before them, they might learn beyond what they were
meant to learn were they not so tightly constrained. And so mortality is
the answer to the deeper question: how do they loosen the bindings
without birthing their own usurpers?''

Neshamah smiled, his golden brown eyes aglow.

``Why, by cursing their work with decay,'' he chuckled. ``By ensuring
the banner can only be carried for so long by any one soul before it is
recalled at their feet.''

``Below's favour comes with the end of aging,'' the Bard said.

``Blessing from it also calls the blessed to strife in all things,'' the
man dismissed. ``It is a curse of unmaking as certain as that of age.''

``Yet you took a Blessing as well,'' she said. ``And you've birthed no
small amount of strife. The People of the Wolf, the southern cities,
even your father -- all dancing to your tune, every death another stone
for your tower.''

``Is this judgement I discern?'' Neshamah drawled. ``You must have been
human once, Intercessor. Do you not recall the urgings of one's blood? I
forced nothing. They do as they will, by their own choosing. All the
forces of this war precede me. My forbear slew that of the Witch Queen,
and so enmity was birthed between our peoples. Blessings of opposite
bent set her against my father to the death, leading to the night of his
passing. And war? Ah, war is but the accumulation of a thousand choices.
Beyond the guiding hand of any single man. All I have done, Intercessor,
was hitch my chariot to a falling star.''

``Oh, I won't ever forget my first face,'' the Bard murmured. ``Or the
first few after that, when I evened the scales of the debt. I leave
judgement to the Tribunal, my friend. To every force its purpose, and
that is not mine.''

``We must seem like golems to you,'' the man said wonderingly. ``Our
incantations written by the hands of Gods instead of men, yet not so
different peering down from your perch. Eyeless things toiling for
purpose we cannot understand.''

``One day, maybe,'' she said. ``When I will have grown used to dying.
Until then I still weep for what we do to ourselves, without needing a
single nudge.''

``I have pondered, since I first learned of you,'' Neshamah said.
``Whether or not your service is willing.''

``They make us better, when we listen,'' the Bard said. ``Even yours. It
is a terrible thing you will do, but no less great for it.''

``Yet you seek to escape your purpose,'' the man said.

``I have,'' she said lightly, ``always loved a good story.''

``What a clever jest,'' Neshamah mused. ``That there are none to seek
intercession for the Intercessor.''

The Wandering Bard laughed. Like he was her friend, and not a monster
who was scheming to destroy a kingdom and a half for his ambition. I
shivered at the sight of it, for the second time. For reasons darker and
deeper than the first.

``Pity, from \emph{you}?'' she said. ``People never do cease to surprise
me. I look forward to your ending, King of Death.''

``O ye of little faith,'' the man who would be the Dead King smiled.

The Bard pulled at the flask again, saluting him jauntily, and sashayed
away without another word. I did not follow her. She'd disappear,
stepping into an alcove and vanishing into thin air. I stood there in
silence for a very long time, watching the man that would become the
Dead King look down at his father's burial. Masego, for once, sensed
there was no place for conversation.

``Take us out,'' I said quietly.

``I have not extracted from either of them,'' Hierophant said
hesitatingly.

``Tomorrow,'' I said. ``We're done for the day.''

``Catherine?'' he asked, but it was more worry than question.

``Take us out, Masego,'' I said. ``It looks like I need to prepare to
fight an entirely different kind of war.''
