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I reflected that piss was supposed to stay in my body, but if that screaming went on for much longer, that might not stay the case.
perfected the art of shaping life, root and branch and flesh and bone. And just as the kirpis shroom in the corner had been altered to cool and clean air, I, as an Imperial engraver, had been altered to remember everything I experienced, always and forever.
“Yes,” she hissed through gritted teeth. “Titan’s taint! Of all the Sublimes who could have been my assistant, why did it have to be the one with a forty-span stick up his ass?” “Well, technically, you selected me from the list of applicants, ma’am.”
We watched them go in silence. Someone shouted something, some order, but I just stood there. How shattering it felt to realize that the order of all our lives could be dashed to pieces in a few frenzied moments by the rumblings in the east.
“So my friends won’t be in danger now,” I said, “but later?” “Correct, and incorrect,” said Ana. “A breach is a terrible thing, Din. We’re all in danger now, for the rest of the wet season.” “And what are we to do about that, ma’am?” She shrugged. “Wait. And see.”
Vashta stared at Ana, astonished. “That is so,” she said softly. “Yes, that is so.” “I see,” said Ana. She nodded, satisfied. Then she sat back in her chair, sniffed, and said, “Well. Fuck.”
“In that case,” said Ana, “how could I possibly say no? Right, Din?” I said nothing. For there is nothing worth saying when you are being forced into a pit of horrors.
“That’s the nature of Khanum, eh? Safety and security for strangeness. Many are willing to make the deal.”
The only permanent thing seemed to be the roads and foundations, wrought of stone and brick. All else was impermanent and haphazard. A sketch or a doodle of civilization, perhaps, hastily done on a canvas of soaking stone.
“Then we’ll have to add the Tala canton to them,” she said, sighing. “To protect against any wormrot, or neckworm, or wormbone, or fissure-worm you might encounter out there. As well as cheek-worm, of course.” I stared at her as I absorbed the expansive variety of worms waiting in the wilds to devour me.
That was it. Jilki’s scarf smelled just like Blas’s pot of oil. Exactly the same. Then Miljin’s voice over my shoulder: “Kol…are you smelling that dead woman’s clothes?” I dropped the scarf. “Coming, sir.”
We need plotters. Like your Ana. Even if she has pissed off a lot of powerful people.” “She has?” “Oh, yes. That’s the problem with figuring shit out—eventually you run into someone who’d prefer all their shit remained thoroughly unfigured.
I stared at the hill and saw something buried in its side. An appendage, perhaps, like a beetle’s leg—an enormous one, a quarter of a league long, covered in pale gray chitin and ending in a curious claw. I wondered what was buried in that hill. And then I realized. The green rock formations in the hill were not rock at all. They were bones. Ribs. The leviathan’s carcass was not buried in the hill. The leviathan’s carcass was the hill.
“Erupting from within due to a sudden vegetal growth is, I concede, pretty fucking unusual,” Ana said acidly.
How queer it suddenly felt: I’d been a model officer for almost all my career, but I had to join the Iudex to become a true criminal.
I continue to feel something is amiss here. I just don’t know what it is. Yet still—tonight, stay sharp. We must establish the death scene, and there is most certainly someone out there who wishes you not do that. Strovi seems a solid sort, but…keep your hand close to your sword.” I paused. “My sword is, ah…still made of wood, ma’am.” She frowned and cocked her head. “Oh. Well…in that case, make sure your boots are laced up proper, boy, so you can run like hell.”
“The Empire is the people next to you, and before you. Bodies in boots on the wall, taking up posts served by the ancients. We are the fulcrum on which the rest of the Empire pivots. And we are all made equal and common in that service, and before its long history.” He paused. “Though perhaps I’m being sentimental.”
“Who…who are these people?” I mumbled. “Who are they?” said Strovi. “Who are you?” “What?” “Where the hell did you learn to fight like that?” he demanded. “You killed, what, two men? And disabled another?” “I…I just recalled my training,” I said, taken aback. “You just…just recalled it? Your basic training?”
I stuck it in my sheath, yet it did not fit: the sheath was too short, leaving at least four smallspan of blade exposed. “Is…is that not your sword, Din?” he asked. “Had a wooden sword,” I said. “Lost it in the fight.” “You what?”
“Good. And there’s nothing else you haven’t told me yet, is there?” asked Vashta. “You don’t have some other magic reagents key that might open…hell, I don’t know, the emperor’s undergarment drawer?” There was an awkward silence. I glanced back at Miljin, who looked on, uncomprehending. “Well…” said Ana. “You don’t,” Vashta said flatly. “I’m afraid we do, ma’am,” said Ana. “We have found a second key.” “I was joking!” cried Vashta. “I’ll joke no more, if the gods shall hear them as wishes and make them true! Where did you find it?”
“Vashta is coming back. I can feel her stride in the very wood…And I think Miljin and Strovi are with her. Come. Let us pretend to be professional, you and I, for hell and the gentry await.”
The officers all bowed low and offered me thanks, and blessings, and wine, shaking my hand and claiming my victory was full of good portent. Their praise did not hang easily on me, and eventually I began bowing low so they couldn’t see the strained smile on my face.
“Din!” she said, incensed. “Is it not safe to say that you have just witnessed me formulating answers to some very complex problems? Ones far more complicated than the mystifying puzzle of ‘How did this young man who was so shit at his exams suddenly score so well?’ I mean, titan’s taint! The only reason they didn’t investigate further was that I selected you and told them to forget it!”
I and all the other minor officers were tasked with restoring the city to order. The panic and stampede had been almost as damaging as a leviathan’s wrath, which frustrated and flummoxed many; for after all, the Legion had been quite clear that the titan was approaching. “People are often damned fools about what’s before them,” a Legion princeps commented as we tried to figure out how to move a slain horse from the streets. “And not much smarter regarding what’s behind them, at that. It’s amazing we ever get anything done.”
