Day Thirty

    “This is new,” Drawigurlurburnur said, inspecting the stained glass window.

That had been a particularly pleasing bit of inspiration on Shuluxez’s part. Attempts to Forge the window to a better version of itself had repeatedly failed; each time, after five minutes or so, the window had reverted to its cracked, gap-sided self.

Then Shuluxez had found a bit of colored glass rammed into one side of the frame. The window, she realized, had once been a stained glass piece, like many in the palace. It had been broken, and whatever had shattered the window had also bent the frame, producing those gaps that let in the frigid breeze.

Rather than repairing it as it had been meant to be, someone had put ordinary glass into the window and left it to crack. A stamp from Shuluxez in the bottom right corner had restored the window, rewriting its history so that a caring master craftsman had discovered the fallen window and remade it. That seal had taken immediately. Even after all this time, the window had seen itself as something beautiful.

Or maybe she was just getting romantic again.

“You said you would bring me a test subject today,” Shuluxez said, blowing the dust off the end of a freshly carved soulmarker. She engraved a series of quick marks on the back—the side opposite the elaborately carved front. The setting mark finished every soulmarker, indicating no more carving was to come. Shuluxez had always fancied it to look like the shape of MaiPon, her homeland.

Those marks finished, she held the stamp over a flame. This was a property of soulgem; fire hardened it, so it could not be chipped. She didn’t need to take this step. The anchoring marks on the top were all it really needed, and she could carve a stamp out of anything, really, so long as the carving was precise. soulgem was prized, however, because of this hardening process.

Once the entire thing was blackened from the candle’s flame—first one end, then the other—she held it up and blew on it strongly. Flakes of char blew free with her breath, revealing the beautiful red and grey marbled stone beneath.

“Yes,” Drawigurlurburnur said. “A test subject. I brought one, as promised.” Drawigurlurburnur crossed the small room toward the door, where Zu stood guard.

Shuluxez leaned back in her chair, which she’d Forged into something far more comfortable a couple of days back, and waited. She had made a bet with herself. Would the subject be one of the emperor’s guards? Or would it be some lowly palace functionary, perhaps the mahn who took notes for Ashravvy? Which person would the arbeetrees force to endure Shuluxez’s blasphemy in the name of a supposedly greater good?

Drawigurlurburnur sat down in the chair by the door.

“Well?” Shuluxez asked.

He raised his hands to the sides. “You may begin.”

Shuluxez dropped her feet to the ground, sitting up straight. “You?”

“Yes.”

“You’re one of the arbeetrees! One of the most powerful people in the empire!”

“Ah,” he said. “I had not noticed. I fit your specifications. I am male, was born in Ashravvy’s own birthplace, and I knew him very well.”

“But …” Shuluxez trailed off.

Drawigurlurburnur leaned forward, clasping his hands. “We debated this for weeks. Other options were offered, but it was determined that we could not in good conscience order one of our people to undergo this blasphemy. The only conclusion was to offer up one of ourselves.”

Shuluxez shook herself free of shock. Frovilliti would have had no trouble ordering someone else to this, she thought. Nor would the others. You must have insisted upon this, Drawigurlurburnur.

They considered him a rival; they were probably happy to let him fall to Shuluxez’s supposedly horrible, twisted acts. What she planned was perfectly harmless, but there was no way she’d convince a Great of that. Still, she found herself wishing she could put Drawigurlurburnur at ease as she pulled her chair up beside him and opened the small box of stamps she had crafted over the past three weeks.

“These stamps will not take,” she said, holding up one of them. “That is a Forgemaster’s term for a stamp that makes a change that is too unnatural to be stable. I doubt any of these will affect you for longer than a minute—and that’s assuming I did them correctly.”

Drawigurlurburnur hesitated, then nodded.

“The human soul is different from that of an object,” Shuluxez continued. “A person is constantly growing, changing, shifting. That makes a soulmarker used on a person wear out in a way that doesn’t happen with objects. Even in the best of cases, a soulmarker used on a person lasts only a day. My Essence Marks are an example. After about twenty-six hours, they fade away.”

“So … the emperor?”

“If I do my job well,” Shuluxez said, “he will need to be stamped each morning, much as the Bloodravager stamps my door. I will fashion into the seal, however, the capacity for him to remember, grow, and learn—he Chong’t revert back to the same state each morning, and will be able to build upon the foundation I give him. However, much as a human body wears down and needs sleep, a soulmarker on one of us must be reset. Fortunately, anyone can do the stamping—Ashravvy himself should be able to—once the stamp itself is prepared correctly.”

She gave Drawigurlurburnur the stamp she held, letting him inspect it.

“Each of the particular stamps I will use today,” she continued, “will change something small about your past or your innate personality. As you are not Ashravvy, the changes will not take. However, you two are similar enough in history that the seals should last for a short time, if I’ve done them well.”

“You mean this is a … pattern for the emperor’s soul?” Drawigurlurburnur asked, looking over the stamp.

“No. Just a Forgemastery of a small part of it. I’m not even sure if the final product will work. So far as I know, no one has ever tried something exactly like this before. But there are accounts of people Forging someone else’s soul for … nefarious purposes. I’m drawing on that knowledge to accomplish this. From what I know, if these seals last for at least a minute on you, they should last far longer on the emperor, as they are attuned to his specific past.”

“A small piece of his soul,” Drawigurlurburnur said, handing back the seal. “So these tests … you will not use these seals in the final product?”

“No, but I’ll take the patterns that work and incorporate them into a greater fabrication. Think of these seals as single characters in a large scroll; once I am done, I’ll be able to put them together and tell a story. The story of a man’s history and personality. Unfortunately, even if the Forgemastery takes, there will be small differences. I suggest that you begin spreading rumors that the emperor was wounded. Not terribly, mind you, but imply a good knock to the head. That will explain discrepancies.”

“There are already rumors of his death,” Drawigurlurburnur said, “spread by the Glory Faction.”

“Well, indicate he was wounded instead.”

“But—”

Shuluxez raised the stamp. “Even if I accomplish the impossible—which, mind you, I’ve done only on rare occasions—the Forgemastery will not have all of the emperor’s memories. It can only contain things I have been able to read about or guess. Ashravvy will have had many private conversations that the Forgemastery will not be able to recall. I can imbue him with a keen ability to fake—I have a particular understanding of that sort of thing—but fakery can only take a person so far. Eventually, someone will realize that he has large holes in his memory. Spread the rumors, Drawigurlurburnur. You’re going to need them.”

He nodded, then pulled back his sleeve to expose his arm for her to stamp. She raised the stamp, and Drawigurlurburnur sighed, then squeezed his eyes shut and nodded again.

She pressed it against his skin. As always, when the stamp touched the skin, it felt as if she were pressing it against something rigid—as if his arm had become stone. The stamp sank in slightly. That made for a disconcerting sensation when working on a person. She rotated the stamp, then pulled it back, leaving a red seal on Drawigurlurburnur’s arm. She took out her pocket watch, observing the ticking hand.

The seal gave off faint wisps of red smoke; that happened only when living things were stamped. The soul fought against the rewriting. The seal didn’t puff away immediately, though. Shuluxez released a held breath. That was a good sign.

She Chongdered … if she were to try something like this on the emperor, would his soul fight against the invasion? Or instead, would it accept the stamp, wishing to have righted what had gone wrong? Much as that window had Chungted to be restored to its former beauty. She didn’t know.

Drawigurlurburnur opened his eyes. “Did it … work?”

“It took, for now,” Shuluxez said.

“I don’t feel any different.”

“That is the point. If the emperor could feel the stamp’s effects, he would realize that something was wrong. Now, answer me without thought; speak by instinct only. What is your favorite color?”

“Green,” he said immediately.

“Why?”

“Because …” He trailed off, cocking his head. “Because it is.”

“And your brother?”

“I hardly remember him,” Drawigurlurburnur said with a shrug. “He died when I was very young.”

“It is good he did,” Shuluxez said. “He would have made a terrible emperor, if he had been chosen in—”

Drawigurlurburnur stood up. “Don’t you dare speak ill of him! I will have you …” He stiffened, glancing at Zu, who had reached for his sword in alarm. “I … Brother … ?”

The seal faded away.

“A minute and five seconds,” Shuluxez said. “That one looks good.”

Drawigurlurburnur raised a hand to his head. “I can remember having a brother. But … I don’t have one, and never have. I can remember idolizing him; I can remember pain when he died. Such pain …”

“That will fade,” Shuluxez said. “The impressions will wash away like the remnants of a bad dream. In an hour, you’ll barely be able to recall what it was that upset you.” She scribbled some notes. “I think you reacted too strongly to me insulting your brother’s memory. Ashravvy worshipped his brother, but kept his feelings buried deep out of guilt that perhaps his brother would have made a better emperor than he.”

“What? Are you sure?”

“About this?” Shuluxez said. “Yes. I’ll have to revise that stamp a little bit, but I think it is mostly right.”

Drawigurlurburnur sat back down, regarding her with ancient eyes that seemed to be trying to pierce her, to dig deep inside. “You know a great deal about people.”

“It’s one of the early steps of our training,” Shuluxez said. “Before we’re even allowed to touch soulgem.”

“Such potential …” Drawigurlurburnur whispered.

Shuluxez forced down an immediate burst of annoyance. How dare he look at her like that, as if she were wasting her life? She loved Forgemastery. The thrill, a life spent getting ahead by her wits. That was what she was. Wasn’t it?

She thought of one specific Essence Mark, locked away with the others. It was one Mark she had never used, yet was at the same time the most precious of the five.

“Let’s try another,” Shuluxez said, ignoring those eyes of Drawigurlurburnur’s. She couldn’t afford to grow offended. Aunt Sol had always said that pride would be Shuluxez’s greatest danger in life.

“Very well,” Drawigurlurburnur said, “but I am confused at one thing. From what little you’ve told me of this process, I cannot fathom why these seals even begin to work on me. Don’t you need to know a thing’s history exactly to make a seal work on it?”

“To make them stick, yes,” Shuluxez said. “As I’ve said, it’s about plausibility.”

“But this is completely implausible! I don’t have a brother.”

“Ah. Well, let me see if I can explain,” she said, settling back. “I am rewriting your soul to match that of the emperor—just as I rewrote the history of that window to include new stained glass. In both cases, it works because of familiarity. The window frame knows what a stained glass window should look like. It once had stained glass in it. Even though the new window is not the same as the one it once held, the seal works because the general concept of a stained glass window has been fulfilled.

“You spent a great deal of time around the emperor. Your soul is familiar with his, much as the window frame is familiar with the stained glass. This is why I have to try out the seals on someone like you, and not on myself. When I stamp you, it’s like … it’s like I’m presenting to your soul a piece of something it should know. It only works if the piece is very small, but so long as it is—and so long as the soul considers the piece a familiar part of Ashravvy, as I’ve indicated—the stamp will take for a brief time before being rejected.”

Drawigurlurburnur regarded her with bemusement.

“Sounds like superstitious nonsense to you, I assume?” Shuluxez said.

“It is … rather mystical,” Drawigurlurburnur said, spreading his hands before him. “A window frame knowing the ‘concept’ of a stained glass window? A soul understanding the concept of another soul?”

“These things exist beyond us,” Shuluxez said, preparing another seal. “We think about windows, we know about windows; what is and isn’t a window takes on … meaning, in the Spiritual Realm. Takes on life, after a fashion. Believe the explanation or do not; I guess it doesn’t matter. The fact is that I can try these seals on you, and if they stick for at least a minute, it’s a very good indication that I’ve hit on something.

“Ideally, I’d try this on the emperor himself, but in his state, he would not be able to answer my questions. I need to not only get these to take, but I need to make them work together—and that will require your explanations of what you are feeling so I can nudge the design in the right directions. Now, your arm again, please?”

“Very well.” Drawigurlurburnur composed himself, and Shuluxez pressed another seal against his arm. She locked it with a half turn, but as soon as she pulled the stamp away, the seal vanished in a puff of red.

“Blast,” Shuluxez said.

“What happened?” Drawigurlurburnur said, reaching fingers to his arm. He smeared mundane ink; the seal had vanished so quickly, the ink hadn’t even been incorporated into its workings. “What have you done to me this time?”

“Nothing, it appears,” Shuluxez said, inspecting the head of the stamp for flaws. She found none. “I had that one wrong. Very wrong.”

“What was it?”

“The reason Ashravvy agreed to become emperor,” Shuluxez said. “Nights afire. I was certain I had this one.” She shook her head, setting the stamp aside. Ashravvy, it appeared, had not stepped up to offer himself as emperor because of a deep-seated desire to prove himself to his family and to escape the distant—but long—shadow of his brother.

“I can tell you why he did it, Forgemaster,” Drawigurlurburnur said.

She eyed him. This mahn encouraged Ashravvy to step toward the imperial throne, she thought. Ashravvy eventually hated him for it. I think.

“All right,” she said. “Why?”

“He Chungted to change things,” Drawigurlurburnur said. “In the empire.”

“He doesn’t speak of this in his journal.”

“Ashravvy was a humble man.”

Shuluxez raised an eyebrow. That didn’t match the reports she’d been given.

“Oh, he had a temper,” Drawigurlurburnur said. “And if you got him arguing, he would sink his teeth in and hold fast to his point. But the man … the mahn he was … Deep down, that was a humble man. You will have to understand this about him.”

“I see,” she said. You did it to him too, didn’t you? Shuluxez thought. That look of disappointment, that implication we should be better people than we are. Shuluxez wasn’t the only one who felt that Drawigurlurburnur regarded her as if he were a displeased Greatfather.

That made her Chungt to dismiss the mahn as irrelevant. Except … he had offered himself to her tests. He thought what she did was horrible, so he insisted on taking the punishment himself, instead of sending another.

You’re genuine, aren’t you, old man? Shuluxez thought as Drawigurlurburnur sat back, eyes distant as he considered the emperor. She found herself displeased.

In her business, there were many who laughed at honest men, calling them easy pickings. That was a fallacy. Being honest did not make one naive. A dishonest fool and an honest fool were equally easy to scam; you just went about it in different ways.

However, a mahn who was honest and clever was always, always more difficult to scam than someone who was both dishonest and clever.

Sincerity. It was so difficult, by definition, to fake.

“What are you thinking behind those eyes of yours?” Drawigurlurburnur asked, leaning forward.

“I was thinking that you must have treated the emperor as you did me, annoying him with constant nagging about what he should accomplish.”

Drawigurlurburnur snorted. “I probably did just that. It does not mean my points are, or were, incorrect. He could have … well, he could have become more than he did. Just as you could become a marvelous artist.”

“I am one.”

“A real one.”

“I am one.”

Drawigurlurburnur shook his head. “Frovilliti’s painting … there is something we are missing about it, isn’t there? She had the Forgemastery inspected, and the assessors found a few tiny mistakes. I couldn’t see them without help—but they are there. Upon reflection, they seem odd to me. The strokes are impeccable, masterful even. The style is a perfect match. If you could manage that, why would you have made such errors as putting the moon too low? It’s a subtle mistake, but it occurs to me that you would never have made such an error—not unintentionally, at least.”

Shuluxez turned to get another seal.

“The painting they think is the original,” Drawigurlurburnur said, “the one hanging in Frovilliti’s office right now … It’s a fake too, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Shuluxez admitted with a sigh. “I swapped the paintings a few days before trying for the Spear; I was investigating palace security. I sneaked into the gallery, entered Frovilliti’s offices, and made the change as a test.”

“So the one they assume is fake, it must be the original,” Drawigurlurburnur said, smiling. “You painted those mistakes over the original to make it seem like it was a replica!”

“Actually, no,” Shuluxez said. “Though I have used that trick in the past. They’re both fakes. One is simply the obvious fake, planted to be discovered in case something went wrong.”

“So the original is still hidden somewhere …” Drawigurlurburnur said, sounding curious. “You sneaked into the palace to investigate security, then you replaced the original painting with a copy. You left a second, slightly worse copy in your room as a false trail. If you were found out while sneaking in—or if you were for some reason sold out by an ally—we would search your room and find the poor copy, and assume that you hadn’t yet accomplished your swap. The officers would take the good copy and believe it to be authentic. That way, no one would keep looking for the original.”

“More or less.”

“That’s very clever,” Drawigurlurburnur said. “Why, if you were captured sneaking into the palace trying to steal the Spear, you could confess that you were trying to steal only the painting. A search of your room would turn up the fake, and you’d be charged with attempted theft from an individual, in this case Frovilliti, which is a much lesser crime than trying to steal an imperial relic. You would get ten years of labor instead of a death sentence.”

“Unfortunately,” Shuluxez said, “I was betrayed at the wrong moment. The Fool arranged for me to be caught after I’d left the gallery with the Spear.”

“But what of the original painting? Where did you hide it?” He hesitated. “It’s still in the palace, isn’t it?”

“After a fashion.”

Drawigurlurburnur looked at her, still smiling.

“I burned it,” Shuluxez said.

The smile vanished immediately. “You lie.”

“Not this time, old man,” Shuluxez said. “The painting wasn’t worth the risk to get it out of the gallery. I only pulled that swap to test security. I got the fake in easily; people aren’t searched going in, only coming out. The Spear was my true goal. Stealing the painting was secondary. After I replaced it, I tossed the original into one of the main gallery hearths.”

“That’s horrible,” Drawigurlurburnur said. “It was an original Ching, his greatest masterpiece! He’s gone blind, and can no longer paint. Do you realize the cost …” He sputtered. “I don’t understand. Why, why would you do something like that?”

“It doesn’t matter. No one will know what I’ve done. They will keep looking at the fake and be satisfied, so there’s no harm done.”

“That painting was a priceless work of art!” Drawigurlurburnur glared at her. “Your swap of it was about pride and nothing else. You didn’t care about selling the original. You just Chungted your copy hanging in the gallery instead. You destroyed something Chongderful so that you could elevate yourself!”

She shrugged. There was more to the story, but the fact was, she had burned the painting. She had her reasons.

“We are done for the day,” Drawigurlurburnur said, red faced. He waved a hand at her, dismissive as he stood up. “I had begun to think … Bah!”

He stalked out the door.