169 - Bow Yourself Out

Nadian was only on his knees for a moment.  The shock was almost more a quick and rapidly passing weakness than anything important.  Yes.  Now is my moment.  Now is my time. The blood on his hand was already drying, already clotting. He didn’t even bother to brush it off, leaving red smears on everything he touched, as he opened his doors with a great deal more decorum than he’d slammed them shut a moment before.

He strolled up to the throne room, the highest room in the Loggia.  The highest room in the whole city, save for the Great Hive up above.  That would be fixed shortly.  He nodded at the guard at the door, who looked a bit stunned, and walked across the floor.  The Hive was... nearly empty it sounded like.  The room was strangely quiet.  He slowed as he crossed the marble and looked up, but didn’t stop his progress.

There were no bees visible at all on the ceiling, or in the comb that lined the delicate pattern of holes up to the hive itself.  Nothing moved.  It was as still as if the entire hive had died.  That would hardly be a problem to me, he thought, as he ascended the steps of the throne and sat down.  The flakes of blood from the edges of his hand fluttered in the air and he left a smear upon the hilt of one of the swords in the throne.

The stone under the bloodspot pulsed, lighting up, spreading out in waves of light in time to his heartbeat until the whole room was reflecting him in waves of golden light.  “I am the Emperor!” He announced to the empty room.  “I am the Reflection of the Radiant Light of Lainz!”

**

Kyrus stood next to his nervous bird, covered entirely with what looked like every bee out of the Hive. Ilax stood next to him, partly covered and the cloud around them was thick enough to hide the Rasheem guard all around.

Above, visible even in daylight, pulses of light burst from the top of the city, drawing almost every eye.  “Amir!” The Emir-al snapped.  “I will guard the Kraganzh and his husband.  Take the boy up there!”

“As you command Naser!”  Good boy!  He caught Kyrus and spun him around.  “There’s a challenger to the throne, siwion.  You need to go up there!”

The women, a sea of brightly coloured veils, closed around them.  “Milady Basserus,” the Amir panted.  “You are here to attend the new siwion?”

“Yes, Amir.  The zardukar are here.” The older man dropped back, wheezing. 

The woman took hold of his elbow.  “Let me help you, siwion.” The steps they were on were, every fingerlength of its surface, carved with flowers, symbols, fantastic creatures he'd never seen before, but he couldn't stop and look.

“But... what?  Where are we going? My great-grandfather is dead, what’s going on?”

“There’s someone challenging you and your father for the throne.” He tried to stop and get them to explain but she... and the other women around him... the sheer press of them all, wouldn't let him slow down.

They were up the steps and up a spiralling open work staircase that arced over the whole city.  He’d never in his life ever thought he’d set foot on that precipice.  It had just been a fantasy of carved and painted rock crystal over everyone’s head every day.  Normal, unchanging, and unnoticed as people went about their lives.  People just didn't notice the bulk of the city over their heads ususally.

The staircase came out into a series of galleries continuing the spiral upwards each round a different colour of pale stone, soaring arched bridges leading off to what seemed to be either single or multiple rooms.  “I never realized...” he said, hustled past a whole group of them.  “Challenging him?  What? That’s crazy!  Great Grandfather wanted father to be the Heir...”

“Yes, yes, we know that.  We zardukar are the Emperor’s support but there’s a system in the Great Hive that allows challenges... based on the old earth bees.  There can only be one queen.  The bees won’t choose.  You have to win this fight.  Your father... is being taken up by the bees.  Were you?”

“I... um...” He caught a reflection of himself, surrounded by pale columns of silk, with ghostly faces barely showing.  The Amir was still coming but had fallen behind.

“Mind the step...”

“I don’t swat bees, even since they’ve been finding us and stinging us all day!”

“Good.  You can win this for yourself and your father – this way...”

“Mother?  Are you zardukar?”  He craned his neck around to look at the veiled women all around but couldn’t see her.

“I’m a linner, son... we’ll greet properly once you get that man off your father’s throne,” she said from out of the crowd.  “Fix this crisis first... then we’ll be ready to do all the family things, we don't have time for... Here... listen to Shashi... Nasera Basserus.  Mother Thriti and High Teacher Amardad are here too.  I’ll introduce you –“

“--Here we are,” Nasera Basserus interrupted, turned him toward a massive set of gold and mirror doors that stood open, with only one Rasheem at the door.  “This is the Highest room.” Kyrus wasn’t sure how this was happening it was so fast but... but... the Nasera let him go as if he were a falcon she was launching and everyone drew back.

When they cleared away in front of him he stood under the strangest hive he’d ever seen. There were honeycombs on the ceiling, growing in fanciful patterns of wax, glowing with all colours of honey.  Embedded in the wax were lights, precious stones moving in whirling and repetitive patterns, cogs and wheels of brass, gleaming like gold.  Stone levers that clicked and moved. Normal hives just didn’t look like that, for all that it was built around hexagonal wax cells.  The patterns were repeated, unmoving down the columns of walls that had both mist and silk curtains moving slowly in the breeze seemingly generated by the humming pulse of light.

The women who had brought him up here were all around.  His mother was here, standing straight and sensible, beside a woman who had silver-painted eyelids and a woman who seemed to command a great many of the others.  Some of them carried children, though none were even whimpering, just watching quietly. The Amir stepped in as he turned away from the door and the round of windows.

His eyes moved over to the source of the light, the throne, where a man sat like a darkened blot in the middle of the shining display.  “Who are you?” He blurted out.

“I’m a relative.  Nadian Basserus.  You did your best, boy, you and your swordbuck father to get here before the old one died. You didn’t succeed.  What was Diryish thinking?  A half-mad sword mander bastard of his and his basin rat also bastard?  I’m of a line as old as the founding of the city, raised and trained to it. I’m the Emperor now.  If you are smart, you’ll bow nicely and turn around and go somewhere else.  Perhaps to that lovely little bolthole your father found to hide in for all those years.  Why doesn’t he go home there and continue being a nice sheep to your new stepfather, hmmm?  Bow yourself out while you can.”