Stormcallers: Chapter 6
Now, beloved, we must leave Rukiya where she sleeps and travel across the cloud-sea, to the island of Norrholt, the land of mists and mountains, of plains and dark forests. Greatest Norrholt, the largest island in the cloud-sea, torn in half by the great Autumn Wall.
On one side of the Autumn Wall, the side known among those who live there as Greater Norrholt, lies the mighty Herathian Empire. Once a land of many tribes and houses, now all united under the Red Saqur, the banner of a brutal and violent Law handed down to the Herathi people from the great warlord Zouhbal centuries ago.
Past town and village we must go, over the fog-soaked lands of rice and wine, of wandering needle-deer and watchful redcats. Deeper into Greater Norrholt, up the hills and towards the longest mountain range in the cloud-sea, the Saber Mountains.
Here among the many dark and misty peaks lie many strongholds and fortresses, what they call Oratzi, of the Herathian empire. Like sentinels they stand, dark and ever ready, looking out over the mists of Norrholt.
Here too lies the great capital city of the Herathian Empire, Wlansaat Az, mighty city and blessed jewel of the empire. It is here the great Herathian Emperor sits on his silver throne, his holy guidance apportioned in accordance to the Law.
And high atop the tallest tower, flies the flag of the Red Saqur. On every banner, hung on every standard, there was no escaping the black shape of the majestic bird of prey, wings spread and claws grasping. In ages past, the saqur fed the Herathi people as they wandered the lowlands in search of the promised land. They were the guides of the Herathi, promising prosperity and peace when the journey was complete. Where the saqur soared, the wise Herathi followed.
Now, the same saqur guided nearly all of Greater Norrholt. On crimson cloth the saqur flew high where the Law held sway. It was a promise made flesh and blood every day that a Herathian lived and breathed under the iridescent gaze of the fatherland.
But it is not Wlansaat Az were we may stop, oh no. Now we continue ever higher, to the greatest and most mighty of fortresses, the first of its kind. Great Zouhbal Oratz, resolute and unyeilding. As the mountain rises high, they said, so shall the mightiest Oratz of the Empire last forever. Within its granite walls lived the High Varus, apex of the Herathian military; second to none and true defender of the Law.
Here too lived his advisors, his Commanders. Five were they, and each a different facet of the empire did they administer, each a king in their own domain.
It is here, in the lavish bedchamber of Teschemar Khuridan, Cloud Commander of Herathia, Enginemaster and Leader of the Imperial Armada, Keeper of the Furnace, and High Master of Industry, that the story many continue.
He sleeps, Cloud Commander Teschemar, and dark are his dreams. Disjointed visions of sweat and blood filled his slumber. Screams of rage and pain made an advancing bank of mist, drawing ever closer. In his sleep he both feared and craved the mist, for it was both his enemy and his strength. Such are the dreams of the warrior; every battle leaves a mark on your soul that can never be washed away.
But before the mists collided in glorious battle, a single light pierced Teschemar’s eye, and he pulled himself from the depths of sleep. The light, he saw, was not that of a slow-fuse held to a cannon, but a single candle being held by one of his many servants.
Sensation crept back into mind from the edges, soft and muted compared to the vivid sensations in his dream. A soft down cover replaced cold metal. A cool night breeze muted the hot smoke and flame. The thunder of musket and cannon faded once more to distant memory.
Teschemar pushed his aching body from the thin mattress, gradually becoming aware of his wife’s steady breathing, the nervous gasping of the servant, and his own labored inhalations as they echoed in his skull.
“What is it?” Teschemar demanded of his servant, though his throat was dry.
The servant bowed his head as all Herathian slaves must do, like this; “High Commander of the Maps, Lord Ghazan of the Right-wing Eye, Surveyor of the land and High Scout of the Herathian Legions has arrived. He requests your leave to speak with you.”
So dark was the sky that Teschemar knew the day was long in coming, and so Commander of the Maps Ghazan must have had something of paramount importance to discuss. He bid his servant to attend Lord Ghazan while he washed himself in shiny silver basin sprinkled with salts.
He washed in the Herathian way, which was to rub his fingers through the water like this, and brush his skin like this. As he did so, he watched the glint of his own candle-light jump and play like wapping-hares across the water’s surface.
He traced the lines of his face. His wife was quick to tell him that he was quite young for a Commander, but the stabbing pain in his leg and scars on his face had taught him well that there were measures of age other than time.
When he was finished, he pat his face dry with paper and walked out to meet with his friend. There in the front sitting room of his chambers sat Lord Ghazan, a drink cupped in his hands and bathed in the red glow of the lamps the old servant had seen fit to light.
They did not speak at first, but gripped each other’s elbow. This is the way of Herathians when they greet each other. Then Teschemar spoke: “I did not expect your messenger to return before tomorrow.”
He said this because while washing his face he had realized there was only one reason the Commander of Maps would wake him so early, and when he saw the look on his friend’s face, he knew he was correct.
“My messenger rode until his horse was exhausted,” he explained, “and with fortune crossed ways with a band of soldiers marching towards the edge. They had a broken cart-wheel and no need for a rested horse, to bring the news all the sooner to the High-Varus’s ear.”
At this, Teschemar felt his blood chill and his heart quicken. He had been waiting for months for the news, ever since the High Varus made his will known. He leaned closer to his old friend as the Commander of the Maps took a drink.
“The King of Wendsha has listened to his advisers, soldiers, and petty nobles. In their wisdom, they have counciled that it is a time of great change and upheaval. They requested I pass along their plea to the Emperor, that he might honor them by accepting their fealty in person, this week hence. It is at last a new era. the ancient houses finally united, the dream of every Herathian since King Heln.”
How wondrous was the news to Teschemar’s ears, and how bittersweet! They should have been laughing. He should have been calling to his servants to open his finest casque of wine. No, even more so he should have been surrounded fellow soldiers, all cheering and signing O’ Blessed Jewel of Norrholt, or Herathia on High.
He took a cup of wine from his servant’s offered hand, and let the sweet taste coat his bitter tongue. “To you is due the praise,” he said to his close friend. “Twas your words of peace and unity that carried the day.”
Ghazan returned the favor to his oldest companion. “Twas your navy and mighty industry that promised to seed their graveyards. Too could it have been the infantry or cavalry of our fellows.”
But as Teschemar heard his words, and knew them to be true, his head could not embrace the sugared words of his friend. Instead, his finger found an ancient scar that circled his neck and traced down to his collarbone. He opened his lips and spoke the words that would damn him, and set him on the path to ruin.
“It was no great victory.”
Such a bitter truth it was to speak aloud. Wendsha, the final piece of a great Empire, had been taken with little more than an exchange of pleasantries. With but the capitulation of a foreign king, the time of blood and war had passed. Ghazan said as much to his distraught companion: “Why strike iron upon bronze when words could rule instead?”
Teschemar knew the words were those of the new Emperor, who had been crowned not a year previous, and he did not like them, for they struck at the heart of the Law.
It was the Law that drove Teschemar’s actions, and had done since he was a child. The code of Zouhbal held within its pages the Way of Things, not only as they were, but as they ought to be. It was the Law that turned the islands of the cloud-sea, that saw the light above rise and set with such regularity. The Law was the Natural Order, and chief among its precepts was that the strong would survive.
For his whole life, strength had been Teschemar’s singular goal. Now, with the whim of a child, the new Emperor had proclaimed a new kind of strength. One of words, not deeds. One of charm, not steel. One of gentleness, not of will.
“The Emperor is a fool,” Teschemar said, his finger once more tracing the scar on his neck. “He does not understand what Herathia is. It is an ancient Empire, and must be treated with respect. He stands astride an iron horse, and uses it to plow the fields of foreigners. How long has it been since we last stood side by side over a battle-map and plotted strategy and tactics until the daylight?”
It had indeed been a long time, and his friend said as much. “I did not know you were so eager to go to war again.”
In truth, Teschemar did not yearn for war. He had seen his fair share of death and knew there was little honor in a field well salted, but when he attended the new Emperor in council, when he looked into the man’s eyes and heard him speak, he did not hear the words of a Herathian. He heard the words of his pet priest.
Pet Priest? Who was that?
Hush, beloved, and I shall tell you.
How grand was the ceremony at Zhoubal Oratz. Not one week later, the King of Wendsha, along with his many councilors and advisors, arrived at the mighty gates to join their kingdom to the great Herathian Empire.
The ceremony was held in a great hall, befitting the splendor of the occation. It was here that Cloud Commander Teschemar, along with his four fellow Commanders of the Herathian Miliary and their superior, the High-Varus himself, waited for the Emperor to arrive.
Here too waited the delegation from Wendsha; a thin king and his hunchbacked council, sniveling peasants to a man. No one spoke. No one moved. There was no need. It was the stillness that blanketed a battlefield full of dead.
At last the Emperor arrived. Know that the entrance of the Emperor was no small thing. First, the doors opened to a procession of horns and song. Then fair maidens crossed the threshold, flowers sprinkling from their fingertips. Then came bowls of fragrant oils, and holy candles were carried though the open doors. Then the dancers, whose feet trod gracefully on the painted silks that littered the floor. The Ascendancy was sung by the Emperor’s maiden-choir, who swept into the room like this, turning and waving their hands before kneeling with their heads bowed. Then came the Submissants, men and women whose prayers were accompanied with holy gestures and poses, like this.
Then, with the weight of history in his every step, the Proceedant entered the room with the Staff of Forthcoming raised above his head. He stood in the doorway, staring at the assemblage with fire in his eyes as he raised his mallet high, and struck the bronze gong that hung from the staff’s forked head.
At this, every head in the room bowed low, averting their gaze and prostrating themselves as the Emperor’s anointed personage finally crossed the threshold. Teschemar’s bowed as well, but even with his head low he could hear the Emperor’s footfalls, like this. To Teschemar, these steps were unmeasured, laden not with wisdom or strength, but disrespect.
The Emperor took his place at the front of the room, and silence filled the air, everyone waiting for the Emperor to give the order to rise. But the command did not come. Instead, the Emperor spoke of history, of the warlord Zouhbal, and the Principality of Cast’s great war which brought about the need for the Autumn Wall of Norrholt. He spoke of vile King Erzin and vision of the first Varus of Herathia.
With every word, Teschemar’s felt his ire grow, until at last the Emperor fell silent, and bid the King of Wendsha to approach and swear fealty.
There was a time, Teschemar remembered, when rulers had their pride and believed in their duties. They respected the traditions that brought them and their ancestors to the hear and now. Now, an old man who had never been more uncomfortable than having cold feet stared owlishly at simple ministers who gripped their quills and ink-bottles to sign away their heritage. It was disgusting. A defilement of everything it meant to be Herathian.
When the ceremony was at last complete and the delegates of Wendsha had been escorted back to their secure rooms, Teschemar found himself alone on the balcony with his thoughts, but he was not alone for long.
A foreign man with a foreign face stepped out onto the balcony with him. His long red robe brushed the stone with a soft whisper, his pale eyes glinting in the light. Teschemar knew this man, for he had seen him many times before, always at the Emperor’s elbow. He had heard the soft swish of his red robe, and the deep grumble of his voice; but even had he not, he would have known the man by the golden solmontix that hung from his belt.
That was what hung around the first mate’s neck, right?
Yes, beloved. It was the holy symbol of the Fellowship of Light; a circle atop a flat line, like this. This man’s name was Valokakis, Exarch of the Fellowship and spiritual advisor to the Emperor. He was from the distant island of Orghasa, where his church ruled over one of the Seven Spires that dotted the land, and their ways were secret and strange. His superior, his highest and holiest, the Ecclesiarch, had commanded him to proselytize to the leader of Herathia, to be a guiding light in times of spiritual danger, and so he had.
When he saw this man, Teschemar turned his back on him, and said; “I wish to be alone.”
But Valokakis was not only a priest, he was also a diplomat, and he had need of Teschemar’s ear, so he said; “We are never alone. We seek solitude and in the darkest corners we still find we are there with the shadows of those we thought left behind.”
Teschemar was angry at this. “I am in no mood for your religion, priest.”
But Valokakis remained, and said; “You seem troubled, Cloud Commander. Perhaps I can be of some assistance?”
“I need no help, nor your prattle. Leave me now, and I will not have you beheaded.”
But Teschemar would not dare to behead the Emperor’s priest, and Valokakis knew this. He also knew that Teschemar would not speak freely about what troubled him, so he spoke gently, as ivy gently creeps into the cracks in a wall. “Tell me, is it true that the Chet’ia cannot grow beards? It is a rumor I have heard, but my duties prevent me from leaving this palace to see for myself.”
Now, the Chet’ia were one of the many houses to become part of the Herathian Empire, and as their skin was dark and their eyes brown, they too rarely grow hair on their faces. To think of this now, Teschemar found it angering, though he did not know why. Valokakis knew, however, and so continued.
“It is a curious thing,” he said. “I have heard that generations ago, The Herathi were but a single house out of many; the Hakhi, the Dalain, Chet’ia, Nersane…And now, after generations of blood and conflict, the many houses of Greater Norrholt are all Herathian. I find that curious. I was born on the Isle of Orghasa, and there are few of my people who regularly wear caps. Here, everyone wears the distinct fur hats of Herathia. I asked one of the court sages, and he told me that it was the Nersane who first shaped and wore these caps. Should we not call them Nersane caps? Or did they become Herathian caps when house Nersane was gathered into Herathia’s open arms?”
“Enough.” Teschemar released the balcony railing and turned to face the insolent priest. “Were you not the Emperor’s Priest, I would have you executed. Leave me in peace or I will beg his forgiveness later.”
“You would not need to beg,” Valokakis said. “I am not a fool, Cloud Commander. This Oratz was named for Zouhbal. Not Ajidun, the first king of Herathia, not Shaldazik who ordered its building, but Zouhbal. He who fought to unite the houses of Norrholt. A High-Varus before there was such a thing. The Emperor may say what he will, command, demand, and proclaim…and at the end of the day, like a dog, he will look back at his master and wag his tail.”
Teschemar listened, in spite of himself. “His master?”
“I am no dog, and neither are you. I will go where I am asked, and leave when I am bidden. My purpose is not to subvert, nor corrupt. If I am not welcome in Herathia, I shall leave…but I shall stay as long as a single person desires my guidance.”
For as I said, the Ecclesiarch had commanded Valokakis to proselytize to the leader of the Herathian Empire, yet Valokakis knew that this was not the Emperor but the Commanders and High Varus of the Herathian military.
But Teschemar, though he was lost and in need of guidance, had learned the ways of his people too well, and would rather die than beg for help in keeping the ways of Herathia from slipping away. Nor was he easy to trust those who came from far off lands with strange and unfamiliar ideas. “I do not trust you. You have not lived in Herathia, you do not know its people, or its ways. You do not know how to be Herathian.”
Valokakis nodded, as this was true. He had lived his entire life in the marble halls of the Fellowship of the Light. But he did know one thing about being Herathian, as it was a lesson the Fellowship had taught to him as well. “The Steward of the Roads collects taxes as well as maintains the military warehouses. The Commander of Pikes upholds the Law in addition to his infantry soldiers. Your duties are not just the Herathian navy but the carpenters, masons, foundry workers, engineers and scholars of your great Empire. You called me the Emperor’s priest, but you would not accept the title ’the Emperor’s soldier.’ You serve the Varus, and he serves Herathia. You have a higher calling than this mere mortal man who thinks setting his posterior on gold and silk makes him powerful. You serve something far greater than he. So do I.”
His piece said, Valokakis bowed to Cloud Commander Teschemar and left the balcony, leaving the man to think about what he had said. For he was skilled as a priest and preacher, else he would not have risen to the rank of Exarch. He knew that if he left Teschemar now, he would be filled with a profound understanding of his place in the new Herathia that was to come.
Teschemar knew, as he stared out over the fog-covered lands of the Empire, that he was still a warrior. The forges and smiths of his military did more than create tools of industry and war, but new and better people. The fires of conflict educated even the most foolish into hardened and pure men. Let the ministers and Emperors play with their scraps of paper. They meant nothing to the strong hands that gripped true power. He and his were the gatekeepers of Herathia. As long as they were true to the Law, Herathia would endure.