Chunk 1
Hey, NaNo 2008, here we go. :D

I've been writing but haven't posted before now because I haven't felt like packing everything up at however much before midnight, lugging it down three decks to where I can get a signal (usually, sometimes, intermittently) and then fighting with the internet on the ship's end and the blown server on NaNo's end, to try to get a count in before midnight. Ick. So I'm just posting what I've got right now -- which is more than I need for Day Three, go me -- and I probably won't post here again until the night of the 5th, at which point I'll be home and once again using my desktop-sweet-desktop and our DSL connection. [hugs DSL connection]

For anyone who hasn't heard, I'm continuing with Swords and Shadows this year. This chunk below wraps up Chapter Seven and is about half of Chapter Eight, I think. The first six and a half chapters are still here if you want a refresher.

Please note that when I wrote about the first thousand words of this, I was horribly seasick. :P I take no responsibility for any glitches or stupidity in that chunk -- I'm just covering my eyes and promising to fix it in revision. [wry smile]

[This is my tenth cruise, by the way, and I've never been seasick before. :/ I already had a bit of the flu, though, and with my stomach already delicate, 65 mph winds (instant hurricane -- just add rain!) were enough to set me off. That's definitely an experience I never want to repeat. :( ]

Anyway, here we go -- enjoy!

Angie

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Chapter Seven, Cont.

They were at least a league on their way, past dawn-gilded fields and farmsteads, before either of them had recovered enough of their wits from where the touch of the god had scattered them to say a word.

"It's frustrating," said Roscha wryly, "how the gods seem to be willing to talk to us to tell us we're being idiots and shoo us along on or way, but are unwilling to tell us exactly what we're supposed to do, much less how."

"In that, they're much like other masters," Luka muttered.

Roscha shot him a pained look. "As to that, I've been thinking I've not handled this as well as I might have."

Luka restrained himself from commenting, and Roscha continued, "I understand that this is difficult for you, and I've tried to be as... as un-masterly as I could, to give you time to adjust. But now I think I've done you a disservice. We're home, or nearly, and you'll be expected to behave like a proper slave or be punished. You need to learn a lot, and quickly, and it's going to be more difficult than if I'd insisted earlier and gave you the time of the journey here to practice and make mistakes and take correction less harshly."

Luka felt his jaw clenching, but again bit back the words that wanted to escape. Apparently Roscha was regretting not being a harsher master, for Luka's own good? He could think of a few comments to make to that, but he was likely to regret voicing any of them, particularly if Roscha had decided it was time to turn into a disiplinarian.

He saw Roscha watch him for a moment, then sigh. "You need to understand that while I have a certain amount of latitude, there are laws and rules I can't break without consequences to both of us. Your being so obviously Ruvori just makes it more likely that the people around us will be watching, and looking forward to seeing how well I've 'tamed' you. You're a member of a conquered race and you'll be expected to act like it, which means more scrutiny and less tolerance than even other slaves get."

"So why don't you just kill me and be done with it?" Luka snarled. "If it's going to be so much trouble for you, why are we here?"

They stared at one another for a moment before Roscha looked away, and to Luka it felt as though they'd been trying to hear each other's thoughts

Although maybe it'd be just as helpful to be able to sift through his own thoughts, to make some sense out of the mess in his head. Luka had always thought, when he'd bothered thinking about it at all, that he'd rather die than be a slave. It hadn't been something he'd pondered over much, since whenever there was such a strong, decisive victory that slaves would be taken in the first place, it was usual for all the losing soldiers to be put to death anyway. No sense leaving an angry, resentful, conquered people with the skilled warriors it would need to strike back later. Killing all the soldiers meant a generation of peace at least, and when the next crop of angry boys grew into men, they'd have a hard time finding anyone among their own people to train them in the ways of war.

In previous wars, Luka had always fought with the army and had known that losing would most likely mean death, whether in battle or after.

And with the seige.... Well, Parakovac had never fallen and Luka'd had no reason to think it would this time. Treachery from inside had never occurred to him, much less that he'd have aided in it, however unknowing.

He pushed that thought away; there was no sense poking at it.

He should have died, though, whether in combat or as a soldier or on the order of the Molani god. Instead, there he was, riding down a road toward the Molani capital, alive and a slave. And although he knew he should prefer death, should be wishing he'd died with honor rather than having been left alive to scrape and fetch and grovel for a Molani prince -- and not just any one, but the one who'd brought down his city -- he found he couldn't, not truly.

He didn't want to be dead. Part of him knew that for a failing of honor, but he couldn't help wanting to live, wanting to survive. He might gain his freedom again and be able to take some measure of vengeance.

And he still had tasks to do. Even if his first instinct was to curse the gods and bid them run their own errands, there was still a chance of finding Tochi and winning him back from the Molani who'd taken him. That was worth living for.

He still hated Roscha, though.

"If you want to think of it as pretending, if that would make it easier, then you can do that," Roscha said finally. "I know you resent me, likely even hate me. I'd likely hate you if you'd brought down my city and caused the slaughter of every man I knew."

Roscha sounded stiff while making the allowance, and Luka wondered how it could be such a great admission. Surely any man would feel the same. He wasn't the one who'd been behaving strangely.

In some ways, it would've been much easier if Roscha had simply behaved like the sneering conqueror, jeering at Luka's earlier gullibility and current subservience. This Roscha, though, trying to be "understanding" was completely incomprehensible. Luka didn't know how to react to him. And it was maddening to have so little to fight against.

"If you concealed how much Pilen you understand," Roscha went on, "that would likely help. If people think you are ignorant and even somewhat stupid, they might make some allowances. Much moreso than if they perceive that you're disrespectful."

Oh, that would be a great help, Luka thought with a scowl. Play the clown, be jeered at for a simpleton. Yes, of course, much preferable.

"But however you manage it, you need to behave properly when there are others around. And once we get to Cara, we'll need to assume there are always others around, or that there might be at any moment," Roscha went on, completely oblivious to Luka's inner fuming, or perhaps merely ignoring it.

"There are passages and spy-holes, some merely concealed and some actually secret, all over the Palace. I know where many of them are, but I've never assumed I know them all. Most of the other older buildings have them as well, so you'll need to assume that we may be constantly watched.

"You'll need to walk two paces behind me and keep your head down. You're allowed to look around, of course, enough not to run into things and certainly to avoid running into people, and to be able to anticipate when I'm going to be starting and stopping and turning and such. But don't look a free man in the eye unless he gives you leave. You need only kneel before a free man if you're commanded, or if we're approaching a lord in state. Throne, carpet, flautists -- you'll recognize it. Although if you're ever in doubt about approaching someone, kneel; it's not always necessary but it's never wrong.

"Any man?" Luka asked, interrupting. "How about that farmer over there with the pigs -- should I hop off of my horse and go on my knees in the mud?"

Roscha gave him a wry smile. "Well, no. I was speaking generally of nobles and officials. And those of some station within the temples. A common farmer or crafter has the right to demand you kneel if you approach him, particularly if you're asking for something, but if you're just walking by you may ignore him."

"What if he steps in front of me and demands I kneel?" Luka knew he was acting surly, but he also wanted to know where the boundaries were if some lout who was feeling a bit too full of the fall of Parakovac decided to have some fun at the expense of an enemy slave.

"If he...?" Roscha frowned. "I've never seen that happen. But then, I'm not a slave so I suppose I might not have." He pondered for a moment, then said, "For now, if it happens just kneel for him then be on your way. If he persists in annoying you, then tell him your master is Prince Arden and he'll not be pleased to have you delayed about your tasks. If that doesn't deter him, just get away without hurting anyone and I'll handle the matter.

"When we get home, I'll ask one or two of the senior slaves if that sort of thing ever happens and what you can do about it. You've stirred my curiosity."

"I'm please to've been able to provide a few moments' amusement," Luka muttered.

Roscha sighed. "That's exactly the sort of comment you can not make once we're home," he said, sounding exasperated. "Or if you absolutely can not contain yourself, at least confine it to Ruvori, and hope that no one near understands it, and have something innocuous ready to say in Pilen if someone commands you to repeat your remark."

"That should be amusing at least," Luka said with a wicked smile.

"Be aware that if you're caught insulting someone who does happen to speak Ruvori, I'll be very happy to thrash you for it should they demand it, which they likely will. This is going to be difficult enough without you strewing about grease for the hornets."

"Yes, Master."

Roscha sighed once more. "We're both going to end up banished for this, aren't we?"

"I never wanted to come here in the first place," Luka muttered.



Despite their sniping back and forth, Roscha managed to get through quite a lot of Molani slave behavior by the time they approached the gates of Cara. Luka paid more attention than he let on; despite his jeering, he would rather not end up getting thrashed if he could help it. He'd decided to play his part and stay out of trouble, but that didn't stop him from jabbing Roscha while they went on, especially while they were on the road with no one in earshot.

Nearer to the city, however, they joined a throng of other travellers -- on horseback, in wagons and on foot -- all approaching the northeast gate through the suburb of Crescent Shore. Roscha said that it'd started out as a village around the fort which guarded the causeway entrance, and had built up over the centuries. There were such settlements around all the causeway gates on the mainland side, although Crescent Shore was the largest and busiest because of its position. The roads north and east both gave onto the Crescent Shore road, and for the last three leagues the road was in good repair and paved, wide enough for ten horses to pass abreast.

Despite that, it was still crowded. They approached at mid-morning and Roscha said the worst of the morning traffic had passed, but to Luka it was still more people than he'd seen on the move at one time short of a battlefield in full charge.

It took them until well after the noon hour to traverse those last leagues. Their best pace was a walk, but most of the time they simply stood, waiting for those ahead of them to move so they could guide their horses forward a few steps.

While they shuffled ahead a slow step at a time, vendors took advantage of the captive audience and hawked their wares from under the horses' very hooves. When the sun was directly over their heads, Roscha purchased eel sausages from one vendor, fried onion slices from another and beer in cheap, unfired mugs from a third, and that was their lunch.

"When you finish the beer, save the mug and drop it on the causeway as we pass over," Roscha said. "It's just clay. It'll add a bit to the roadway and save the repair crews some trouble next spring."

The raw clay gave the beer a dusty flavor, but Luka was thirsty enough not to care overmuch. And he had to admit the idea of the travellers paying an extra mite to buy their beer in mugs which would become part of the road -- essentially paying for the privilege of helping keep the imperial roadways maintained -- got him to smirking in reluctant admiration. Only the Molani would think of that.

And he couldn't even think of exactly which Molani had engineered the scheme. He couldn't quite imagine the Emperor making a proclamation about beer mugs sold on the street, nor whoever their engineer in charge of maintaining the imperial roads might be. Maybe the vendors thought it up themselves, as a way of selling beer to people who were moving and might be a block or two away by the time they finished drinking? (Although certainly not at noon-time.)

"Were there ever bins to collect the empty mugs?" he called over to Roscha.

He got a grin and a nod in return. "For a while, yes. But then the Brewers' Guild just had to send slaves to empty the bins and take the shards to a yard where the Imperial Road Works collected them, then sent their own slaves to strew the crushed shards along the road. An engineering journeyman in my grandfather's day suggested removing the bins and letting folk drop the mugs wherever they happened to be when they were empty so feet, hooves and wheels could trod them down into the road's surface. They still have to add gravel periodically, but it's a great savings. The journeyman was promoted to master for the suggestion, and his master got a noble title.

"Isn't that always the way of it?"

"Since the dawn of all things" Roscha agreed, "When Doro and Boro made the world, of earth and water, and it was given to the gods to rule. The one who does the work never gets but a single coin."

It had the sound of a proverb. Luka had never heard it, but it rang true anyway. Certainly King Misac hadn't offered to divide Tevaric among the heroes of the battle which had conquered it. And for that matter, no one had offered Parakovac to Roscha, despite his having brought about its fall through his own efforts. Those who stood back and commanded "Do thus," were the ones who were rewarded when "thus" was done.

Well, Luka had a "thus" to do, and he didn't care a smashed shard who was rewarded when it was done. He only wanted it to be done, so he could be about his own "thus," finding Tochi and winning him free from the man who held him. For all Luka cared, Roscha as his "master" could take whatever reward came to one who saved the world from a power-mad god. To Luka, it was just a distraction.



Chapter Eight

In the hours it took to get through Crescent Shore, Arden had time to go over quite a lot of slave protocol with Luka, both things he'd said before and new things he thought the man should know. He could never be sure how much Luka had absorbed, though, or -- just as important -- how much of it he'd obey when the time came. Luka wasn't a stupid man, Arden had seen plenty of proof of that in the weeks he'd known him, so he should be able to see where necessity lay. But he was also a proud, angry man and Arden wasn't sure the pride and anger wouldn't overwhelm his wisdom at exactly the wrong time and get them both into trouble.

All he could do was hope the wisdom prevailed, and that Luka would save the snapping and teasing for himself, and for times when they were alone, more or less.

At the gatehouse leading from the gate plaza into the fortified tunnel and onto the causeway, the road narrowed from ten horses wide to only five. Traffic was directed by a senior slave of Imperial Commerce, who had two squads of cavalry and two of spearmen under his direction, as well as dozens of lesser slaves who served as his eyes and hands, dashing about through the crowds issuing priority tags to those who wished to travel through, clearing the way for overly large wagons or parties, or particularly urgent travellers, and making sure nothing piled up on either end of the causeway for too long.

Of course, what was "too long" was subject solely to the judgement of the senior traffic slave, who commanded his small but vital fief with an iron will and was intimidated by no one short of Arden's imperial father, and at times Arden wouldn't even swear to that.

Arden's status as both a royal prince and a courier got him a high priority tag. He and Luka queued up to the north side of the plaza behind a blue-painted rope held by half a dozen Commerce slaves, while two regiments of cavalry galloped out the causeway gate like a shining silver river, taking up the entire width of the road by themselves. Arden recognized Duke Sedano's troops and raised a hand to a couple of officers he knew, although none of them noticed him in the crowd to salute back.

A blue flag was flying from the top of the gatehouse to signal the slaves on the other end to send blue-priority traffic from the city side immediately after the cavalry. When the cavalry had passed, the slaves on their side holding the blue ropes trotted forward to make an open path for Arden and other important (or at least long-awaiting) travellers in the blue group from the mainland side, and they passed by other blue priority travellers going the other way on their own side of the road.

Luka gave Arden a bemused look when they finally took their turn in the tunnel. "How long until the people revolt and hang the traffic slaves from the city walls?"

"They did it already," Arden said. "It was... thirty-some years ago now. A drover with a load of bricks or some such thing had been waiting for two and a half days and snapped. He pulled out a bow and killed the senior traffic slave. Others rose up and started killing the others. They were executed, of course, but they'd killed or badly wounded everyone who had any skill at managing the traffic here; nothing went in or out over this causeway at faster than a very slow crawl for the better part of a week, which was how long it took the twenty slaves they dragged over from the other causeway gates to straighten everything out and work out the best routine. I'm told it's a bit different for every gate, but don't ask me why. Before it was all over with, the people who'd been cheering on the murderers were shitting on their graves."

Luka laughed and shook his head. "Molani are crazy."

"Keep that in mind next time you think you can get away with something," Arden jabbed back.

He got back a silent glower, but the "silent" part gave him some hope.

They passed through the gate tunnel on the island side and then out into the hot noon sun once more. Arden tossed his blue clay tag into a bin and headed down the inward traffic lane to the edge of the gateway plaza, past lines and clusters of travellers with business on the mainland. One out of the plaza, he turned southwest for Palace Street. After having two different gods nagging at him, and a third trying to stop him, he wanted to get Luka into his father's presence as soon as possible.
====================
"So, do you have a plan?" asked Luka. "Something beyond introducing me to your father and having the shining force of my cheerful personality drive away all evil influences."

The "subdued" state didn't last long with him apparently, although Arden had had plenty of opportunity to note it during their journey.

"That's essentially it for a first step," he admitted. "I want to report what happened so he'll be aware of the danger. I imagine he'll want to consult with some of the senior priests, and even if he doesn't, I certainly do. If I'm going to have random gods popping up and nagging at me, I want to have some idea of what's going on and what it all means."

"I suppose that'll do for a start," Luka admitted. "I don't have any better plan, at any rate. The gods seem to be sure I'll know what to do when the time comes, so we can only hope they're correct."

"I usually prefer to let fate unwind in its own way and not give it too much thought," Arden agreed. "Having to try to figure out what you're bound to do is enough to give anyone a headache."

After some zigging about to line things up properly around buildings which had been too grand and important to knock down during the last remaking of the city, Palace Street ran directly south, in the direction the sun passed, toward the imperial Palace. It was straight and broad, except for two places where more grand, important buildings stuck out into it. It rather spoiled the look of it all, but luckily there was enough space for traffic to pass so the fault was only aesthetic.

It'd be a gauge of how power had shifted, though, if the mansion of Baron Chepano, or the Temple of Orlana Dawning, were ever cleared away to straighten the street.

Come to think of it, Arden realized as they rode past the temple, if Baruno has his way, the sun goddess's temple will see the wreckers sooner rather than later.



The Imperial Palace on its rise was an impressive sight to anyone first-come to the city, with its boundary walls of gold-colored granite and the walls of the building itself faced in white and green marble, both kept clean and polished. The windows were framed in gold and the balconies above railed in silver, at least on the front. The Palace had been rebuilt more often than any other building on the island; whether after having sunk into the swampy soil earlier on, or having been knocked down when some emperor or another had a whim to change it, and the funds and leisure to indulge himself.

The multiple sinkings and dismantlings, both complete and partial, had built up a sturdy mound of rock and packed earth around the Palace, with the result that it was the most solid place in Cara. The boundary wall was impressive to look at, yes, but would also be hell to beseige, assuming an enemy could get catapults and such over the causeways in the first place.

And as he'd mentioned to Luka, there were many secret ways within the building, and beneath it too. Some had been built for purpose, while others were simply there, left over from rebuilding and reworking and previous incarnations of the building. It was almost as though there were a ghost-building existing in the same space as the living one.

On that day, though, Arden took Luka in through the main gate, then around to leave their horses at the stable. Varit, one of the senior stable slaves, bid Arden welcome home and shooed him and Luka off, assuring him that his animals would be cared for and his things taken to his suite before he arrived there himself. It was likely true, since the possibility of their moving quickly through the Palace without being stopped was laughable.

Sure enough, at the east door, a small gang of slaves bowed and called greetings and blessings upon them while hustling them into one of the small bathing chambers to one side. They were stripped and settled onto wooden stools in the humid, tiled room and scrubbed with warm, scented water. Arden had been feeling dirty enough for long enough not to begrudge the time spent too badly. He had a short whispered conference with the head greeting slave, letting him know their plans so arrangements would be made for them.

Luka was smart enough to keep his mouth shut and go along, for which Arden was grateful. But when the slaves had removed his leather vest and his shirt, they fluttered around and made much of his scar. Luka scowled at their chatter, which was doubtless too fast and too prettily accented for him to understand.

"They're saying that you've been honored in the old way," Arden explained in low-voiced Ruvori. "The salted mark is hardly ever given these days, so they're speculating about what great deed you could have performed to have merited it."

Luka snorted and said, "Such honor I could have gone my whole life without. Are you going to tell them how I earned it, bound and bloody on my back?"

Arden looked away from Luka for a few moments, wishing he could lift the man's bitterness. He understood it, but it brought neither of them anything good or useful. The world was as it was, and neither of them could change the past.

Finally he said, "Yes, I'll tell them how you earned it," and he changed to Pilen and told the greeting slaves about how he'd been taken by an enemy mob who'd been determined to hang him, and how Luka had confronted them and driven them off, with only a boy-apprentice to help him. He made the mob sound much larger and more fierce than it was, but that was the way of tales after all.

He deliberately used some simple words Luka would understand, so he'd know which take Arden was telling.

The slaves were suitably impressed and did nearly as much bowing and obeisance to Luka as they did to Arden.

"There," Arden murmured. "The slaves all gossip like a tree full of redbirds. Before the evening meal, every slave in the palace will know who you are and what service you rendered me. And by midnight all their masters will know as well."

"Do you expect me to thank you for that?" Luka grated. "It never occurred to you that I don't want to be known as a man who aided the spy who brought down my city?"

"I know you far to well to expect anything close to thanks from you," Arden said, letting some of his exasperation show. "But unless you've lived in a palace, you've no idea what sort of pecking order and hierarchy thousands of slaves can come up with among themselves. As a new slave, and a Ruvori at that, you'd have been near the bottom of the personal slaves, and whenever you were away from me you'd have been bowing and scraping to them to be allowed to take a single step. Now you're a hero -- remember that they're Molani slaves -- and they know you've a salt mark. That gives you status among them, and your life will be much easier.

"And no," he added before Luka could say a word, "I don't expect you to thank me for that either."

They were dried with soft cloths and their hair combed, then appropriate clothing brought. Arden recognized some of his own clothes, fetched with haste from his rooms by some running slave through the narrow servants' passages, but for Luka, one of the bath slaves sized him up by eye and brought some plainer clothing, pants and a shirt and vest, with light indoor sandals, from the stores kept in the next room for appropriately clothing visitors who had nothing fit to be seen in. It wouldn't do for the Emperor or his courtiers to have to gaze upon poorly dressed folk. Only the most dire emergency would justify anyone going directly into the imperial presence in sweat and stains.

When they were dressed, they were given buns filled with spiced meat -- steamed buns rather than baked or fried, so there'd be fewer crumbs to sweep up after them. -- and sent on their way, with a slave before them to clear the path. Arden managed to persuade the young man not to call out his name every six steps as they went along the main corridors.

"Have they planned how many bites we'll take and how many times we'll chew before swallowing?" Luka asked in a low voice. He was trying to sound sarcastic but Arden recognized some of the shock common to visitors thrust into the Palace mechanisms head-first.

"It wouldn't surprise me," Arden said with a quick grin.

In the ante-chamber outside the Emperor's rooms, another pair of slaves wiped their hands with a moistened cloth -- doubtless having been told through some magical form of slave communication that they'd been eating on the way -- and brushed their clothing for invisible crumbs.

While they were getting their final going-over, Arden murmured, "Father will have just finished a meal and will be relaxing in the bath. This will be casual, which I'm just as happy about. I'd have hated to have to explain about a conspiracy of gods in front of the full court."

Luka just nodded, and then a chamber slave threw open the carved and painted double doors to the imperial bathing chamber and announced, "His Royal Highness, Prince Arden Solanus Molano," then slipped to one side.

Arden straightened his spine and strode through the door, praying the Luka would follow the correct two paces behind and to the left.

He stopped halfway between the door and the edge of the mosaicked bath, then went down on one knee and bowed. He didn't breathe until he saw Luka out of the corner of one eye, copying him.

"Arden," his father said, "come in here and let me have a look at you."

"Yes, Father." Arden bowed his head once more, then stood and held out his hands so two slaves could remove the clothing two others had put on him only a few minutes earlier. When he was naked, he stepped into the hot pool and waded over in toward the Emperor, who was seated on a sponge-padded bench on the far side. He held his arms up once more and turned slowly, giving his father a good look, while stealing a look or two of his own.

His Imperial Majesty was a short man in his late sixties. He was still sturdy, with muscles like iron beneath his sagging, age-spotted skin. The top of his head was bald, and the curly fringe around it was a mixture of silver and white. His face was square like Arden's, with heavy features and sharp eyes. No one ever took this man for a fool, at least not more than once.

"No new scars," commented the Emperor. "I hear I've this new slave of yours to thank for that." He jabbed a blunt finger at Luka, who had thankfully remained on his knees on the uncomfortable tile near the door.

"Yes, Father." Arden wasn't at all surprised that his father had already heard what there was to hear from the slaves' grapevine; that'd been another reason he'd told the greeting slaves -- to save some time once he was in his father's presence. Also, the old man liked to be on top of things and tended to be in a better mood if he'd heard at least some of one's news through his spies.