In the Halls of the Sky-Palace: A Short Story Read online



  IN THE

  HALLS OF THE SKY-PALACE

  by N. Ellen Fulda

  Cover Art by Keliana Tayler

  Originally published in Jim Baen’s Universe

  Copyright 2009 by Nancy Fulda

 

  The clack of castanets tapped out a crisp, clear rhythm beneath the smoky torches of the dining hall. Jeweled fingers glinted in the firelight. Brightly colored silks swirled like ardent lovers around thighs and forearms.

  Aesva watched the dancers from a crack between free-hanging tapestries. She had to admit that they were very beautiful. They moved beautifully, too, even the dead ones. In the flickering brightness, their pallid skin looked no different than that of the living, but Aesva was not deceived. Even amidst the swirl of fabrics, it was easy to spot the ones with no heartfire.

  Across the dining hall, the Sky-King shifted on his chair, unaware that half of his performers no longer breathed. He hardly noticed them anymore, for all that he took great care to trot them out whenever he entertained guests. Such exquisite faces, he would exclaim. Such grandeur of hair and skin tone! They were his war trophies, each woman a tribute to a fallen empire. Aesva was old enough to remember the last time he had—

  Footsteps.

  Aesva ducked farther behind the tapestries. She should not be here. Children were forbidden in the Sky-King's dining hall. There were no exceptions, not even for Gifted daughters of dancers. She stepped backward, intending to flee down the narrow servants' tunnel that had brought her here, but her calves thudded against one of the silver-furred tamarins that crept along the corners of the Sky-King's palace. They were forbidden, too, it was said, but the Sky-King's guards had had no luck in ousting them.

  The tamarin howled. Aesva stumbled. A studded glove thrust the tapestries aside.

  A hush settled over the dining hall. Utensils paused midway to mouths. Even the dancers stilled, the warm rhythm of their castanets fading into tangible silence. Aesva quivered beneath the weight of a thousand stares.

  The tamarin circled her feet, then stretched its jaws and sank two rows of tiny teeth into her ankle. The pain jolted her into movement, and she ran.

  Sounds of uproar chased her down the servant's tunnel. Chairs thudded against the flagstones. Swords rang free of their scabbards. Boots thumped in the darkness. Above it all came the infuriated, insistent demand of the Sky-King: "Whose child is that?”

  Aesva, already scampering into a ventilation shaft shared by three tamarins, found the question peculiar. All of the children in the sky-palace were his.

  * * *

  "That was a foolish thing you did,” Denai told Aesva late that night. "If you wish to watch the dance, you should come to the courtyard where we practice.”

  "Did anyone recognize me?”

  "Only me. Your heartfire blazes like a beacon. Sleep now.”

  Aesva reclined against the cool smoothness of the pillows, but she did not sleep. Instead, she listened to the rustle of Denai's skirts as she moved about the room, removing jewelry, snuffing candles and eventually retiring to her own pillowed alcove. When Denai had lain motionless for two chimes of the watchman's bell, Aesva stood and padded across the room.

  She paused with her hand on the heavy oak of the door and glanced over her shoulder to stare, fascinated, at the little knot of darkness where Denai's heartfire should have lain. A hollow, yearning emptiness opened beneath Aesva's chest. Denai was Aesva's mother, and she had been one of the first dancers to die.

  It was nearly a fortnight now, since Aesva had first felt coldness creeping along the hallways of the Sky-King's palace, since the first of the dancers were murdered. Now, padding in silk slippers along the chill flagstones of the hallways, she opened her mind to the Gift and let the sensations of the second reality wash over her.

  Heartfires were easily spotted. Aesva observed the slumbering coals of sleeping dancers, the wakeful flickers of guards at the gate. The tamarins, too, were visible, bright streaks of motion in the shadows. They clustered near Aesva and followed her down the corridor.

  Two doors from the courtyard she spotted it: A pocket of emptiness sliding past the stonework. Her physical eyes could not see it. Even to her Gift it was apparent only by its absence — like a dent made in water by an invisible hand. It was shaped very much like a man. Aesva followed it.

  It entered the sleeping chamber of a living dancer, passing through the door like smoke through a sieve. Aesva pressed her hands against the latch. Locked. She pounded on the door, hard enough to disturb the guards at their posts, but if her cries woke the dancer, it was too late. A nonexistent hand brushed the darkness, and the dancer's heartfire vanished.

  Aesva wept. Beyond the door the dancer, now unbreathing, rolled in her sleep.

  When the man-shaped emptiness emerged through the door, Aesva trailed it, stepping through hallways that grew momentarily more silent each time its foot brushed the floor. They passed through a courtyard where naked branches clawed the sky, turned a corner, and entered the throne room.

  The Sky-King slept there, as he did many nights, too concerned with the matters of his throne to abandon it for his bed. Aesva kept to the corners, nearly stepping on the tail of a tamarin, and watched with stilled breath as the murderer approached her king. She was painfully aware of her own heartfire, brilliant and blazing and oh-so-easy to extinguish, but the emptiness paid her no heed. It ascended the steps to the dais — hardly more than a shimmer in the air — then entered the Sky-King much as it had passed through the sleeping dancer's door. Its shape relaxed, settling like water over weary limbs, vanishing like wisps of smoke. The Sky-King sighed in his sleep and smiled as though a long-absent piece of him had come home.

  * * *

  Aesva walked alone through the cold hallways back to her chambers. The candelabra had fallen dark, and arched windows outlined the paling void of the pre-dawn sky.

  She was not certain what she had just seen, but she was certain now who held the blame for the dancers' deaths. She did not understand why the empty places in the king's own soul would arise to slay his cherished war prizes. The dancers had been his companions for decades — in some cases, for centuries — magically bound to him and hence immune to the slow decay of age. Some said that the dancers were a reflection of his own soul, their bodies the vessels of his vitality; their castanets, his heartbeat. Perhaps there was truth in this, for no enemy's blade, however cleverly wielded, had yet brought him to submission so long as his dancers remained safe away from the battle.

  Was this, then, an uncanny form of suicide?

  Aesva could not sort the tangled threads of this dark puzzle. She felt far too young for this. But Denai had always taught her that the Gift brought with it a grave responsibility. All things uncanny were laid bare before it; all supernatural webs fell into the hands of the Gift's bearers, theirs to resolve.

  Denai herself could not unweave this tangle. Her Gift had frozen in the moment of her death, seeing no longer the present, but merely the memory of heartfires that had been. Were Aesva to fall dead on the stairs, Denai would believe Aesva slept. Were Aesva to proclaim the death of the other dancers — as she had already, twice — Denai would laugh and tell Aesva not to tease so. In the manner of all deceased yet lingering beings, she was blind to changes in the world of the living.

  This brought great pain to Aesva. She had loved her mother greatly, and could not muster matching feelings for the exquisite echo that bore her name and likeness. Nevertheless, all regrets notwithstanding, Aesva was now the only living bearer of the Gift within the palace. To her fell the burden of
untwining this geas.

  Claws of doubt still gnawed at her when she reached the doorway of her chamber and swung it open on silent hinges.

  "The Gift weighs heavily on you this fortnight,” Denai said as Aesva finished lowering the latch. Aesva started, for she had not known Denai was awake. "Will you tell me why?”

  Aesva shook her head. I have told you twice, dear Mother, and you would not believe me. Brilliant stars cast light past the window ledge, outlining surfaces like fine silver thread. Aesva stepped carefully across the rugs and knelt beside Denai in the dimness. "I... am troubled by a dream,” she temporized.

  Denai's head rose from the cushions. She sat up, straight-backed and utterly motionless. "Tell me.”

  "A man walks at night, stealing the heartfires of others without slaying their bodies. He is... lonely, I think. And weary of past glories. To my dreaming eyes, he appears as a great emptiness, like a crevasse in space and time.”

  Denai nodded in sage consideration. "You describe a Khondui, a spirit-that-is-not. We all have them, although most of ours sleep. It is most unusual for one to take form and act for itself in the way you describe.”

  "Mother... if the Khondui were stopped — confronted — might it be possible to regain the heartfires it had stolen?”

  Denai contemplated. "Possible, perhaps; but I doubt that it would be wise. A Khondui does not walk without reason. If your dreams have shown you one, then unusual events indeed are abroad in our country.”

  "What is a Khondui, exactly?”

  "It all those pieces of oneself that one has rejected. Everything you might have been, but chose not to become — that is your Khondui. To Gifted eyes, it appears as a rippling void that changes the shape of all which passes through it.”

  "What does it want?”

  "To reclaim a might-have-been, of course. Reality presses against a Khondui, restrains it. Were it not for reality, the Khondui would burst into a thousand possible futures, each more enticing to it than the last. A Khondui that walks seeks to release one of those possible futures.”

  "How can it be stopped?”

  Denai's gaze was piercing in the darkness. "First, you must determine whether it should be stopped. Rest now, child. It's nearly dawn.”

  Reluctantly, Aesva settled onto the pillows in her alcove. The silk was smooth and comforting beneath her fingers; the silence where Denai's soft breathing usually lingered, less so.

  She had a name, now, for the presence she had seen, but she felt no closer to untangling the puzzle or saving the lives of the remaining dancers. It struck her that the palace had become a place where people clung desperately to tiny tidbits of the past. Denai clung to a reality that had ceased along with her heartfire. The Khondui sought to retrieve a reality that had never been. Even the tamarins, ousted thirty times from the branches and crevasses that had once been their homes, nevertheless kept creeping back.

  As the darkness enclosed her, just before she slept, an unwelcome voice breezed like dry leaves across her thoughts.

  And you, Aesva? Which part of the past do you cling to?

  * * *

  The sky-palace did not really float among the clouds, although from certain windows set into the cliff face, it appeared to do so. Aesva sat in one such window the next morning, her bare foot dangling over the precipice. Below her, birds shrieked and jostled for position in the branches that stretched from the outcropping. Above her, tamarins scampered along clinging vines.

  To her right and a little ways down, the cliffs sloped around a stony courtyard that jutted like a fist from the mountain. In it, the dancers practiced. Swirls of silk gleamed like rivers in the sunlight. The faint clap of castanets rose on the air. The rhythms were no different than they had been on days previous. Nevertheless, on this morning, the sound made Aesva think of rattling bones.

  Footsteps echoed in the hallway behind her. Instinctively, Aesva curled up against the window's edge. Children were not forbidden in this portion of the palace, but they did not often come here, and the looks she received in these hallways made Aesva feel peculiar. Adults who chanced upon her tended to stare at length and with intensity. Some took a subconscious step towards her. Others recoiled as if from an undesired future. To Aesva, remaining comfortably hidden in the shadows of the window arch was preferable to either. Her prudence seemed doubly justified once the footsteps rounded the corner and Aesva sighted their source.

  The Sky-King traversed the hallway at a stately pace. At his side walked Denai, her arm linked in his with the ease of long association. Each step brought a faint tinkling from the jewels that dangled at her arms and forehead. They paused two windows away from Aesva and rested their forearms on the ledge. Below them, dancers whirled and clapped in unison. The Sky-King let out a long sigh.

  "We do not please you as we have in years past,” Denai said. There was no hint of a question in her tone.

  "Nothing pleases me as it did in years past,” the Sky-King answered. "I have grown too weary, I think, for pleasure.”

  "And yet you cling to us. Do not deny it,” Denai added when her king made no response. "We are dust. Were it not for the strength of your will, we would have aged and expired long ago. Yet we remain, and share your vitality.”

  "What would you have me do?” the king demanded irritably. "Toss aside my greatest achievements? Let you crumble and die as your cousins and grandfathers did before you? Hah! I might as well raise a banner proclaiming my weakness to my enemies.”

  "You have no more enemies. You have not ridden to war in five decades. There is no power strong enough to threaten your reign.” Denai's eyes, locked on the face of her master, bore a mixture of pity and pain. Her voice took on added intensity. "The world is yours, Mighty King. What will you do with it?”

  "I don't know,” the Sky-King answered after silence had stretched between them like honey. His voice was soft, almost like a child's. "I had so many plans once... but I've forgotten them.”

  "Say rather that you drove them away, for it is truth.”

  "There was no time for them.” The Sky-King was openly angry now. "One cannot build an empire while nurturing childish dreams.”

  "Indeed not,” Denai murmured. "Nor can one rule it without them.”

  "Do you seek to provoke me, woman? I — can someone not rid my house of these creatures?” While they had spoken, a half dozen tamarins had crept from the corners and niches of the ceiling and converged on the couple. Now, one of them had leapt from the curtain rod to land softly on the Sky-King's shoulder. He brushed it from his vest with an irritated motion. It leapt to the window sill and crouched as though uncertain whether to flee or to return and nuzzle his hand in affection.

  Denai scooped the creature into her arms and ran a hand over its silver-furred back. "They do no harm.”

  "They pester me. I have no time for such beasts, and yet they will not leave me alone.”

  "Perhaps they know something you have forgotten.”

  "Enough! We will speak no more of this.”

  "As you wish.” Denai turned, the tamarin still cradled in her arms, and padded towards the doorway. The other tamarins followed at an easy, graceful lope. Just before vanishing beneath the archway, Denai turned and spoke to the Sky-King's back. "Take thought for the future, Anakeil. The dancers aren't the only ones bound by your will.”

  She left.

  * * *

  The Khondui walked again among the shadows that night. Aesva met it as it seeped through the heavy stone of a chamber wall, leaving behind it another dancer who no longer breathed. She placed herself in its path, heedless of the rebel trembling of her own limbs. For a breathless moment she feared that it would pass through her, snuffing her heartfire like a careless breeze snuffs a flame. But it halted.

  In the empty corridor, it seemed to Aesva that its head cocked, examining — not Aesva — but the outline of the empty spaces within her. She took a breath th
at did little to steady her nerves.

  "Can you speak?” she asked it.

  Motion; like the shimmer of heat over a flame. Aesva could not tell whether it was a nod or a shake of the head.

  "I'm the only living bearer of the Gift in the palace. I'm supposed to untwine this tangle, but I don't know how. I don't even know why you're here.”

  Another shimmer.

  "Are you stealing heartfires for the Sky-King?” More shimmering. To Aesva's eyes, the empty space in the corridor seemed sad. "I don't think it's right for you to slay the dancers. If I help you somehow — if I say the right thing, do the right thing... will you bring their heartfires back?”

  The Khondui seemed to curl in upon itself, breaking apart like smoke disturbed by a wind. Aesva felt the tug of its departure; icy currents blown across her heart. Faint wisps of nothingness trailed away down the corridor toward the chamber where the Sky-King slept.

  Aesva stood, alone and frustrated, in the mundane emptiness of the hallway. What good was it to have the Gift of perception if you had no idea how to act upon what you perceived?

  A group of tamarins crept toward her from the corners. She sat on the stiff floor rugs and let them climb across her lap and shoulders. Their fur was like silk beneath her fingers, pleasant to the touch, enticing. They smelled like cinnamon.

  Holding them made her think of things she'd forgotten; the way she used to skip along sunlit flagstones and pretend she was a butterfly. The road that twined away from the Sky-Palace, and the plans she had once made to follow it. Dreams of a future husband, tall and gently smiling.

  "You have them, don't you?” Aesva murmured to the tiny creatures. "All our cast-off yearnings. You're keeping them safe for us.”

  One of the tamarins chattered and raised its head to stare at her with wide, black eyes. Then the tamarins scattered as if at some invisible signal.

  In their absence, the dim stones of the palace closed around her. This was the Sky-King's way of life. Solid, secure... built upon many victories. Aesva sat in the darkness and listened to the silence where no one lay breathing.