A Day of Fallen Night (The Roots of Chaos)

Mount Ipyeda watched over the ruins of Antuma. For the first time in three years, Kuposa pa Nikeya made her way up its stepway, eyes watering from the cold. She had waited until spring to climb, in the safe part of the year, but the snow had shown little sign of relenting.

It had been tempting to try sooner, but she would not goad the mountain. Dumai had warned her against that, as they lay together in the depths of Mayupora Forest. Nikeya still knew precious little of mountains, and had almost no tolerance for them. Her ascent had been slow and careful, much like the dance of politics – one step, a wait, another step.

Always slow, daughter, her father had taught her, in one of his gentler lessons. A flame that burns too quickly lives a short and senseless life.

Nikeya stopped to brace her ribs. Each breath threatened to splinter them. Inchmeal, she pressed on, drawing on her last reserves – lifting one boot, then the other, each step harder than the last. The first time she had done this, she had brought servants and a guide. This time she had refused all help. The villagers had warned her to reach the temple by dusk at the latest, or the cold would freeze her.

The sun had just disappeared when she got there. She slid to her knees, gazing at the High Temple of Kwiriki, the place where she had met the woman she would come to love.

How long had she waited for Dumai since then, watching the sky for the ghost of a dragon?

Nikeya hardly remembered. Those first days had rolled like smoke over fog, hard to distinguish from each other. She still wore grey, as everyone did, to mourn the thousands of dead. Seiiki had been found later than the mainland, but on an island, there had been nowhere to run.

Unora came to meet her at the entrance. ‘Nikeya.’ Her face was thinner, weary. ‘You’re alive.’

‘Maiden Officiant.’ Nikeya held her furs close. ‘May I come in?’

Silence lay on the temple, much as it did on the city below. Unora led her to the Inner Hall, where the Grand Empress of Seiiki sat beside a sunken hearth. Nikeya had never seen her, despite many attempts. She was small and pale in the grey folds of her mantle.

‘Your Majesty.’ Nikeya bowed, her stiff body protesting. ‘It is my honour to meet you in person.’

‘I am hardly a picture of majesty now,’ the Grand Empress said in a dry tone. ‘Only the rotten stump of a tree.’ Her hair was white. ‘I wondered when you would return here, Lady Nikeya. Did your father send you to finish the undoing of the Noziken?’

‘Kuposa pa Fotaja is dead.’

Unora stood in the corner, watching.

‘My father went to Muysima, the isle of exiles, where Taugran the Golden filled him with a strange form of the red sickness. The wyrm saw through his eyes.’ Nikeya forced the words past her trembling lips. ‘After Taugran fell, my father declined at once, and soon died.’

‘You were with him?’

‘Yes.’

She could have killed him when he started to howl. A blade would have been a kinder fate, but he had taught her to savour all poetry. He had been the one who sought to set his blood on fire.

‘A year has passed since then,’ the Grand Empress stated. ‘Where have you been?’

‘I have been searching for Dumai, as have many others.’

‘And did you find my granddaughter?’

Nikeya clenched her jaw.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Only the great Furtia.’

That first long walk along the coast still lingered in her dreams. A mist had swathed the island the day after the comet appeared, and she had entered it alone, carrying a lantern.

Seven dragons she had found along Muysima Bay, their scales curled away and scattered like leaves, the waves breaking against their hides. Furtia Stormcaller had been the last. When that giant body had emerged from the mist, she had run to it. She could still hear her own desperate screaming. Her calls of a name – all in vain, all unanswered.

‘I am told my other granddaughter was devoured,’ the Grand Empress said, ‘along with the rest of the House of Noziken.’ She looked at Nikeya. ‘Dumai rode against Taugran.’

‘Yes.’

‘Tell me how it was.’

‘Sit by the hearth first, Nikeya,’ Unora said quietly. ‘You should warm yourself.’

Nikeya knelt on one of the cushions. The exhaustion was catching up with her, making her thighs shake. Unora steeped a pinch of ginger as she told them everything.

She had locked it all into a box in her mind. There were fingerprints on its lid, from the nights when she had woken alone, and the days she had spent trying not to look back.

‘Furtia and the others surrounded Taugran,’ she said, once she had shared the rest. Her mouth moved without the thoughts fully joined to it, so she could speak the words, but not quite feel them. ‘A brilliance came. It was all of their light – a blinding glow, like thousands of lightning bolts. Then all that remained in the sky was the comet.’

It had stayed there for several days. Nikeya had barely looked up while she trudged along the coast, each day smothering hope. The sight of it had been too much to bear.

That final light was seared onto her eyelids for all time. The light that had consumed Dumai, and the utter silence that had followed, the dark made deeper by the glare before it.

‘The comet ended it all.’ Unora filled her cup again. ‘Dumai knew it was coming.’

‘Yes.’ Nikeya swallowed the knot in her throat. ‘One of my father’s soldiers loosed an arrow at her. Even if she survived the fall, she would have been too weak to swim.’

‘And yet you searched,’ the Grand Empress said.

‘She may have decided to leave me behind, but I was not so willing to give up on our dream.’

Nikeya lowered her head as soon as she said it. She had held down the bitterness for so long.

‘Dumai may not have been fully herself,’ the Grand Empress said. ‘I am sure she never meant to abandon any of us, but when that comet appeared, she had no choice. You see, the great Pajati gave Unora a gift – a drop of his light, which woke our old power in the child she conceived, a child of the rainbow. Dumai was called to be with the gods.’

‘They saved everyone on the beach. Everyone in the city,’ Nikeya said. ‘Including me.’

As she spoke, she tasted salt. Her father had always told her not to trouble him with tears; to use them only to further the cause – but her father was dead, and she had survived, and now she could weep for all of her losses.

‘Lady Osipa wrote to me, before her death,’ the Grand Empress said, watching as Nikeya brushed the tear away. ‘She told me of your blatant designs on my granddaughter. You must have thought it an amusing game.’

‘I will not deny that it started that way. My father asked me to govern her.’

‘At least you admit it.’

Nikeya reached into her coat and took out a case, for preserving woodfall.

‘Dumai entrusted this relic to me.’ She presented it to the Grand Empress. ‘Since I failed to find her, it belongs to you, Your Majesty. You are the last of the House of Noziken.’

The Grand Empress opened it. The glow from the stone was brighter than ever, bestranging her features.

‘I had thought this was lost to the sea,’ she murmured. ‘You came here to return it?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what do you plan to do next, Lady Nikeya?’

‘I don’t know. My future has always rested on others. Now those others are all gone – my father, Suzu, Dumai.’ Her voice tapered to a whisper. ‘What now for the shining court?’

‘Dumai told me you held a water marriage,’ Unora said.

Nikeya glanced between them, and nodded.

The memory warmed her like another pelt. Even now, she smiled at the rightness of it, the feeling of certainty when their lips met. She could see Dumai smiling at her, lifting the tiny freckle on her cheek.

‘Then you, Lady Nikeya, are Dowager Empress – or Dowager Queen, as you like – of Seiiki.’

The soft words like ink into paper, indelible. Nikeya stared at the Grand Empress.

‘No,’ she said hoarsely. ‘Your Majesty, I know how this must appear, but that was never my intention. All I wanted was Dumai, and for her to rise as queen, after all this.’

‘I hear they are calling all this the Great Sorrow – the loss of the fleeting world we once loved, a world that burned away like dew. How fortunate we were to touch it.’ The Grand Empress looked hard at her. ‘You are convincing, Lady Nikeya. I see your father in you, staring out of those bright eyes. Part of me wonders if even your grief is part of a long and elaborate performance, designed to win you a right to the Rainbow Throne.’

Nikeya shut her eyes. Even in death, her father possessed her, kept her locked inside his dollhouse.

‘I told you, Grand Empress,’ she said, with all the dignity she could muster. ‘I do not want it.’

‘And yet,’ came the mild reply, ‘someone must take it. Someone must step forth to rule Seiiki.’

As silence returned to the darkening room, the Grand Empress closed the case.

‘Dumai told us about your meeting with Master Kiprun,’ she said. ‘If he was correct, then what we just experienced was an Age of Fire. We ruled in that time – we, with the gods’ starlight in our blood. But even if any Noziken remained, I would desire change.’

Nikeya dared not speak.

‘Sooner or later, Dumai would have needed an heir. We all know she could not have borne that. She would have drained herself to dust, just to paint the rainbow farther. Even if your plan had worked, she would only have passed the expectation to Suzumai. Unora and I both wanted children, but what if neither of my granddaughters had?’

Dumai had been afraid of that outcome. Nikeya had embraced her, as if they could press the fear smaller between them.

We’ll find another way.

‘History may record the end of my line as a tragedy,’ the Grand Empress said, ‘but a house that crushes its own daughters beneath its foundations – that is no house at all. Better it burns with the rest. A different world must be drawn from the ashes. Who better than you to build it, heir of the secret flame?’

Nikeya furrowed her brow.

‘Yes,’ the Grand Empress said, her smile as tight as a seam. ‘I know the story your father believed. If we are to keep the balance of the Mulberry Queen, I believe it is your turn to rule. In a time of starlight, fire must rise.’

‘Me.’ Nikeya whispered it. ‘After all of this, you would relinquish it to me, of all people?’

‘I didn’t say it wouldn’t sting. But I have had enough.’ Faint shadows undercut her eyes. ‘I would still not want you enthroned, for fear you had manipulated Dumai. Except that Epabo – my son’s mysterious servant – came to see me, before he left for Mayupora Forest.

‘Prior to your departure, Epabo had been keeping an eye on you. He told me that the River Lord had visited his daughter one night, to give her a task. She was to help him destroy Princess Dumai, to turn back the great tide of love she had found in the provinces. She was to spread lies about the princess, sow the seeds of scandal, coax or coerce others to speak ill of her – to light whatever fires it took to burn her reputation to the ground.’

Nikeya tried to keep her mind from that room, even as she listened to her own story.

‘At first, Lady Nikeya tried to resist him discreetly. She proposed that, instead of trying to discredit an imperial heir, her father simply bolstered his own reputation, by helping the provinces himself,’ the Grand Empress said. ‘The River Lord accused her of caring for the exiled princess. He told her it made her useless to him – as useless as her dead mother.

‘Of course, once he had struck that blow, he tried to soothe the bruise. Epabo had seen him do that to his daughter before – a cruelty, then a kindness. After all, Lady Nikeya was his heir, his only child. His legacy. He needed her, of all people . . . but the next day, she was gone, and the bell in Belfry House had been brought down.’

Loathing had scorched her every vein that night. She had almost believed that was how it must be – that the flame of hatred could spark the sleeping magic in her blood, and she could burn him to the ground, as he had commanded her to burn Dumai.

‘I am not some carven thing that is incapable of love,’ Nikeya could hardly speak. ‘He tried to make me so, but he failed. Because of my mother. Because of Dumai.’

‘Then rule for her, exactly as you planned. I believe you did love her, and that she loved you,’ the Grand Empress said. ‘Let the House of Noziken fade, like the comet. Let now be your time.’

Nikeya could only look at her.

‘It is not a gift I give you, but a heavy burden,’ the Grand Empress said, her tone gentling. ‘Seiiki is devastated. Many of our people lie dead. The red sickness will linger for a long time yet, even as the gods find their strength again, and rains fall once more on our land. It will take a confident leader to light the way now. But someone like you could do it, I think – a woman with a flair and a liking for intrigue, but also a heart as soft as a song. A woman who has the support of a clan that I doubt will want to let go of their power.’

‘But the Tajorin and the Mithara—’

‘—are loyal to me. This is the best way to bring peace.’ The Grand Empress lifted an eyebrow. ‘Dumai said you were once called a flower grown for court. I do not see that as an insult, but an endorsement. A flower in a world of ash is proof that life endures.’

Nikeya could not stop the tears now, even if she made no sound.

Silence fell like night. At last, she pressed her forehead to the floor before the last Noziken.

‘If you believe me worthy, then I must obey,’ she said. ‘I will not rule as a queen or an empress, or even a Kuposa. I will not sit on the Rainbow Throne. That belonged to your house, not mine. I will rule as Nadama pa Nikeya – Dowager Queen, and Warlord of Seiiki.’

After a hesitation, Unora said, ‘Nikeya, surely war is the last thing the people can bear.’

‘Not war among ourselves, but against the wyrms. Should they ever return, I mean for us to be ready. Seiiki must be strong, so there will never be another Great Sorrow.’

The two older women exchanged a long look. One look to decide the future of an island.

‘I will come down the mountain and intercede with Tukupa the Silver,’ the Grand Empress concluded. ‘Should she accept you as my successor, then it will be so, Warlord of Seiiki. Unora and I will remain here, to support you as you establish your rule. Where is the Council of State?’

‘Ginura,’ Nikeya said. ‘Furtia and Dumai saved its castle. The nobles wait to hear from you.’

‘Hear from me they shall. But first,’ the Grand Empress said, ‘let us see to the Rainbow Throne.’

****

It stood in the ruins of Antuma Palace, the place Nikeya had called home for a decade. She watched as the godsingers broke it apart, using a blade forged in the old foundries of Muysima. When it splintered, it sounded exactly like ice. Most of the shards would be enshrined in Seiiki, but two would go to Queen Arkoro and Consort Jekhen, if they had survived.

Tukupa the Silver watched the breaking. She was the descendant of Kwiriki, and now she was stronger than ever, her eyes brightened and wildened by the comet. All the others had woken.

Beside her stood the Grand Empress, off the mountain for the first time in decades.

‘You will have to learn to sign, if you are to intercede with the gods for your people,’ she told Nikeya, leaning hard on Unora. ‘Dumai could speak to them in her mind, but that is not an art known to most of us. I will teach you a different way.’

Nikeya nodded.

‘There is something else I would like you to ask the great Tukupa,’ she said to the Grand Empress. ‘I have thought for some time, about how best to honour Dumai. She loved the people. I saw that every day in Mayupora Forest.’ Unora swallowed. ‘During my search for her, I saw many orphaned children, left alone by the Great Sorrow.’

‘What do you ask, Lady Nikeya?’

‘It should not be just one family – not mine, nor yours, nor any other – who truly know the gods. I would like to train some of these orphans as riders, to help defend Seiiki.’

Unora smiled. ‘Dumai would have liked that very much, I think.’

The Grand Empress glanced up at the dragon, who returned the look, blowing fog through her nostrils.

‘You should be patient, Lady Nikeya,’ the Grand Empress said, the corners of her mouth tweaking. ‘My granddaughter may yet guide you herself. The dead whisper through the crash of the waves. Sometimes, they may even choose to return to us – we, who are left on the shore.’

****

Thanks to Clan Kuposa, the House of Noziken had lived a long way from the coast. Nikeya would make no such mistake. Ginura was the last place Dumai had visited, apart from the city where she had fallen.

Once they had received the order in person from the Grand Empress, the few surviving members of the Council of State – most had been in the palace when it burned – had confirmed her as Warlord of Seiiki. Nikeya knew she would have to work hard to win over Lady Mithara and Lord Tajorin.

That is one of your gifts, a distant impression of Dumai reminded her.

The Nadama were flocking to her court at Ginura Castle. Nikeya meant to bring greater change to Seiiki, as the years went on – but she would still have to be slow, always slow. She would rule for a time as if she were queen, and see what other ways opened for her.

The remaining Kuposa had not been pleased with her choice of name. Still, without her father, they were already proving less of a force. Most of them wanted to distance themselves from the man who had betrayed Seiiki. She could work them to her will, now they were shaken from his web of intrigue. Soon she would spin a web of her own.

The wyrms and their creatures had gone into a deep sleep, as the gods once had. Every last one would need to be hunted, to ensure they could never rise again. The red sickness would not only have to be forced out, but kept out. As for the imbalance that had caused it all, that would need to be rightened, and soon.

Nikeya meant to righten it.

She was Dowager Queen and First Warlord. For her crest, she took the golden fish with the rainbow arching over it, and two swords to defend them, as if the bell had been reforged – silver, to balance the gold. She would not let anyone forget the House of Noziken.

She would not let them forget Queen Dumai.

Her throne overlooked the sea without end. By day, she was the iron leader, laughing and strong. At night, she wandered alone through her castle, listening to the waves, dreaming of what could have been. For the rest of her life, she would be wrapped around an emptiness.

I will see you in the Palace of Many Pearls, she thought. Wait for me, Mai. I will not be long.

****

Months into the Age of Starlight, the First Warlord of Seiiki pored over her latest edict. Outside, snow fell where thick ash once had. Eyes dry from reading in the gloom, she glanced up from her work.

A figure stood in the corner of her study, wearing the robes and veiled headdress of the Maiden Officiant.

‘Unora,’ Nikeya said in surprise.

‘No.’ The visitor inclined her head. ‘Please excuse my unannounced arrival. I know you have a duty of great import to perform tonight.’

‘Indeed, which is why I ordered my so-called guards to let no one into my private study. Yet here you are.’ Nikeya tapped the end of her brush on the table, too intrigued to mind the intrusion. ‘Still, plenty of time to admonish them later. Who are you?’

‘Unora of Afa has withdrawn from her duties as Maiden Officiant, to devote herself to caring for the Grand Empress. I am her successor.’

‘It is a long road to here from Antuma. Why come so far from the mountain, godsinger?’

‘To wish you a long and prosperous rule,’ came the soft answer. ‘And to give you a token of my regard.’

The visitor came forward. Her right hand remained beneath her sleeve as she laid something on the table.

A comb, adorned with a gold butterfly.

‘You will find me on Mount Ipyeda,’ she said, ‘should you ever require counsel. Or comfort.’

Nikeya slowly looked up, finding the pair of dark eyes behind the veil. Ripples had been moving through her marrow since she heard that voice.

‘Thank you,’ she said, hitching up a smile. ‘I look forward to seeing you soon, Maiden Officiant.’

She could have sworn the godsinger smiled back. ‘Not too long, Dowager Queen.’

As silently as she had come, she was gone.

Nikeya stared at the place she had stood, with the sudden and terrible sense that she had just met a water ghost. If not for the comb, it would not have seemed real. She was rising to follow, to ask for a name, when her Chief Minister appeared on the threshold.

‘Warlord,’ he said, ‘it’s time.’

She composed herself.

‘So it is,’ she said, fastening her armour. ‘Fear not. I am ready.’

The truth would have to wait, for Tukupa had brought the eggs to Ginura – eggs that had stayed underwater for centuries, biding their time while the fire rose. In the sight of her gods, the Warlord of Seiiki laid a hand on the smallest, listening for movement.

‘Come, now.’ Her whisper misted its surface. ‘Come, now, and let us make the world bright.’

Beneath her fingers, the egg cracked.