happens to Chandur. Once, I thought you cared about me. Do you maintain that my slow, gasping death shouldn’t be my primary concern?”
“Death, no, I would advise against that. As an enchantress who specializes in regeneration and curing diseases, dying would ruin your reputation.”
Hiresha's face felt too hot, her heart beat too fast. She paced in front of the brass tower, her frustration mounting. The tower had no doors, its metal walls etched with hieroglyphs of men standing sideways, salt urns, snakes, a balance, and many other symbols.
She asked, “Then what would the lord advise?”
“For one, I know why your escape failed today.”
“So you have heard about that fiasco.” The pursuit of the camelry and ships had struck her as unreasonably fast. An idea flashed into her mind that petrified her with rage. “Did you tell the guards? Did you get Chandur thrown down a pit?”
“No, but I'll tell you who did.”
Hiresha eyed the Lord of the Feast. Scores of thin braids beaded with gold dangled from his wig. She wondered whom he would name, and if she could trust him.
“A Soultrapper,” he said, “wants to imprison you in this city.”
Hiresha did not much like the turn of this conversation. She had encountered a Soultrapper before and found him to be most ill-mannered. Magic users of that ilk had the bad habits of corrupting flesh and controlling minds. “Why suspect a Soultrapper? Have you seen abominations on the streets? The reek of urine hardly counts.”
He said, “I have not.”
“I am skeptical that I could tell if any minds were being controlled. What is the difference between mass stupidity and aberration?”
“Permit me to ask you this, Hiresha. Do you believe your fiancé is possessed by a god?”
One of the nearby guards frowned at this as if he had heard. Hiresha lowered her voice. “Not as such.”
“Then how do you explain a fox marching three circles around you then kneeling?”
“Animal training.”
“Mind control. How else would the fox know to pick you out of a crowd?”
Hiresha traced a finger between the precisely arranged garnets on her dress. “The mathematical laws of aesthetics transcend species.”
His gaze traveled up her, from legs to eyes. It felt like a caress of ice. She hoped this lord of murderers would not be the one to notice she wore garnets, not amethysts.
He said, “I fear the Soultrapper married you for the wrong reason. Revenge.”
“I doubt very much that I could have offended...ah.” Hiresha kneaded her forehead with three fingers. People across the Lands of Loam believed the city of her birth had recently been attacked by the Lord of the Feast. Hiresha trembled to think what would happen if they learned the truth: The Lord of the Feast had helped her save the city from a Soultrapper. “You think this hypothetical Soultrapper knows about the incident in Morimound?”
“He might've taken an interest in the enchantress who killed his apprentice.”
“I am not convinced.” She did not want to believe it. I have too much else to worry about.
“Soultrappers draw glyphs on the dying, to enslave the power of their spirits. This city is covered with glyphs.” His arms stayed limp at his side, but he nodded toward the brass tower and its panorama of etchings. “I can't scent him because he doesn't fear me or anyone. He's cleverly pretending to be dead, in a city with more mummies in residence than the living.”
Hiresha glanced up the hieroglyphs etched into the bronze tower. Three stories above street level, the rows of sarcophagi began. Stone faces gazed over the city, each built into the structure and enclosed by bronze. More such towers loomed nearby, and in the distance to the north and west, lines of them converged on the pyramid at center of the city. Hiresha understood that many people wished to be entombed close to the gods they worshiped.
“Oasis City,” the Lord of the Feast said, “centerpiece of the Oasis Empire, and the
“Death, no, I would advise against that. As an enchantress who specializes in regeneration and curing diseases, dying would ruin your reputation.”
Hiresha's face felt too hot, her heart beat too fast. She paced in front of the brass tower, her frustration mounting. The tower had no doors, its metal walls etched with hieroglyphs of men standing sideways, salt urns, snakes, a balance, and many other symbols.
She asked, “Then what would the lord advise?”
“For one, I know why your escape failed today.”
“So you have heard about that fiasco.” The pursuit of the camelry and ships had struck her as unreasonably fast. An idea flashed into her mind that petrified her with rage. “Did you tell the guards? Did you get Chandur thrown down a pit?”
“No, but I'll tell you who did.”
Hiresha eyed the Lord of the Feast. Scores of thin braids beaded with gold dangled from his wig. She wondered whom he would name, and if she could trust him.
“A Soultrapper,” he said, “wants to imprison you in this city.”
Hiresha did not much like the turn of this conversation. She had encountered a Soultrapper before and found him to be most ill-mannered. Magic users of that ilk had the bad habits of corrupting flesh and controlling minds. “Why suspect a Soultrapper? Have you seen abominations on the streets? The reek of urine hardly counts.”
He said, “I have not.”
“I am skeptical that I could tell if any minds were being controlled. What is the difference between mass stupidity and aberration?”
“Permit me to ask you this, Hiresha. Do you believe your fiancé is possessed by a god?”
One of the nearby guards frowned at this as if he had heard. Hiresha lowered her voice. “Not as such.”
“Then how do you explain a fox marching three circles around you then kneeling?”
“Animal training.”
“Mind control. How else would the fox know to pick you out of a crowd?”
Hiresha traced a finger between the precisely arranged garnets on her dress. “The mathematical laws of aesthetics transcend species.”
His gaze traveled up her, from legs to eyes. It felt like a caress of ice. She hoped this lord of murderers would not be the one to notice she wore garnets, not amethysts.
He said, “I fear the Soultrapper married you for the wrong reason. Revenge.”
“I doubt very much that I could have offended...ah.” Hiresha kneaded her forehead with three fingers. People across the Lands of Loam believed the city of her birth had recently been attacked by the Lord of the Feast. Hiresha trembled to think what would happen if they learned the truth: The Lord of the Feast had helped her save the city from a Soultrapper. “You think this hypothetical Soultrapper knows about the incident in Morimound?”
“He might've taken an interest in the enchantress who killed his apprentice.”
“I am not convinced.” She did not want to believe it. I have too much else to worry about.
“Soultrappers draw glyphs on the dying, to enslave the power of their spirits. This city is covered with glyphs.” His arms stayed limp at his side, but he nodded toward the brass tower and its panorama of etchings. “I can't scent him because he doesn't fear me or anyone. He's cleverly pretending to be dead, in a city with more mummies in residence than the living.”
Hiresha glanced up the hieroglyphs etched into the bronze tower. Three stories above street level, the rows of sarcophagi began. Stone faces gazed over the city, each built into the structure and enclosed by bronze. More such towers loomed nearby, and in the distance to the north and west, lines of them converged on the pyramid at center of the city. Hiresha understood that many people wished to be entombed close to the gods they worshiped.
“Oasis City,” the Lord of the Feast said, “centerpiece of the Oasis Empire, and the
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