Secret Sacrament (21 page)

The musicians stopped playing, and the Empress's steward announced that the feast was prepared. Everyone moved into the dining room. There were three long, low tables with cushions on either side. Bowls of exotic fruits stood on the purple cloths, and each place was set with an
elegant Amaranian glass, a silver-handled knife and spoon, and a golden plate. Over the head table hung a rich canopy. Slaves waited to serve, wearing white flowers in their hair and in garlands about their waists. Guests milled about the tables, vying politely for the honored places closest to the canopied area. With Cosimo and Izben, Gabriel stood behind sumptuous cushions at the table farthest away and waited for the Empress to enter.

“Have you been at a feast like this before?” Gabriel whispered to Cosimo.

“Several times. I always leave with a craving for a walk in fresh air, preferably in the places where the working people live.”

“When can we leave?”

“When the Empress says we can. In the morning, probably.”

Gabriel groaned, thinking of Ferron.

A hush fell and the Empress came in, accompanied by her high lords. She took her place at her table, the chief steward standing behind her. The cushion next to hers was vacant. She sat, and there was a rustle of silk and a ripple of color across the room, as all her guests sat as well. They were silent while the High Priest, Kanyiida, stood and said a blessing over the occasion. Afterward the guests waited, no one moving.

“Before the first course is brought in, the Empress makes a speech,” whispered Izben to Gabriel. “Never long, fortunately.”

But this time the Empress did not speak immediately. She beckoned her steward to her and whispered something to him. He nodded, then walked down the full length of her table and along the strip of crimson carpet toward the back of the room, his footsteps soft in the silence. He came all the way to the last table, and walked along behind the guests until he came to Gabriel.

“Gabriel, son of Jager?” he asked, bowing low.

Gabriel's palms sweated, and he could not speak. He nodded.

“Her Majesty would like you to sit with her, sir.”

Shaking and feeling sick again, Gabriel got up and prepared to follow the steward. But the man bowed again and indicated that Gabriel should go first. Gabriel took a deep breath and faced the long lamp-lit carpet to the canopied grand table. Never had a walk seemed so long, nor had he felt this conspicuous, this naked under so many curious eyes. At the end of the walk was the Empress, flushed and smiling graciously, and looking amused. Gravely, he bowed and took his place beside her.

“My dearest friends,” the Empress said, still
sitting, “this dinner is a celebration for me. I celebrate dreams, and the wisdom and warnings they give. I celebrate true friendship, honesty, and the gift of knowing what dreams mean. I honor bravery and trustworthiness.” She had a little trouble getting her tongue around the last word, and some of the guests smirked behind their hands. She went on, her voice raised: “In this feast we honor my new interpreter of dreams. One I trust above all others. One who has never lied to me, never tried to exploit me, never let me down. We honor Gabriel Eshban Vala.”

With a fond and triumphant smile, she picked up Gabriel's limp hand, and kissed his fingers. “You could look pleased, my dear,” she whispered, leaning her head close to his. “This is your honor-feast, not your funeral.”

Dimly he heard applause. He realized he should get up and bow, make some kind of speech himself, but his limbs felt paralyzed.

“We'll forgive him for his beautiful bewilderment,” said the Empress, so all could hear. “And we'll excuse him from making a speech. Until later.”

There was courteous laughter and applause, and the Empress nodded to her steward. People began to talk, and slaves came in bearing large trays of steaming fish and bowls of tangy sauces.

The smell of the rich food made Gabriel's stomach churn. He glanced across the table, and saw Jaganath sitting directly opposite. The Oracle's lips were frozen into a smile, bloodless and deadly.

Somehow Gabriel got through the first four courses. He noticed that all the food served to the Empress came in separate dishes with sealed covers, doubtless already tasted for poison by a slave. Sometimes, as a special favor, she offered him morsels from her plate. The food was rich and spicy, and he thirsted for cold water. But the slaves kept on filling his glass with wine, full-flavored and heady, and he tried not to drink much. Music and laughter mingled in his ears with the Empress's murmuring, and often he missed what she was saying. At one stage she told him to call her Petra. He did, though her name felt alien on his lips, the intimacy dangerous.

Kamos, the army commander, sat with Jaganath on the other side of the table, and Sanigar was beside him. Nagay, commander of the navy, was absent, and Gabriel assumed he was somewhere on the ocean. Mostly they ignored Gabriel, but during the fourth course Kamos said to him, in a voice so loud he was heard through the entire room, “We heard that you visited the Shinali, Gabriel. Friendly with the barbarians, are we?
Or is there a kind of wild challenge in defying our treaty?”

Gabriel reddened, and the Empress asked, “Are you friendly with them, my dear?”

“I was invited onto their land, Lady,” he said. “When I was home for my brother's funeral, I went running on the edge of the grasslands, and the Shinali saw me and invited me to their house.”

Slowly the Empress smiled. “I can imagine you wearing nothing but paint, and dancing around a primitive fire,” she said. “Or were you doing something more serious, like studying their medicines?”

“Our worthy Elected One wasn't studying their medicines, Your Majesty,” said Jaganath, softly. “He was being extremely sociable, canoe racing down the rapids.”

“Very brave of you, Gabriel!” said Petra. “Did your canoe win?”

“I was with the chieftain's son,” replied Gabriel. “Together we won.”

“And what else did you do, to impress the natives with our Navoran excellence?”

“Nothing, Lady.”

“Nothing? None of your wonderful healing? None of the famous skills Salverion has been teaching you?”

“I wasn't there to impress them, Lady. I talked
with one of their healers. They use many of the skills I learn at the Citadel. Our Navoran knowledge isn't so superior.”

There was an uncomfortable silence, then Sanigar said, “These little strips of meat really are delicious, Your Majesty. Are they pork?”

“They're strips of defiant slave, my dear Sanigar,” the Empress replied, straight-faced, but with her eyes twinkling at Gabriel. She offered him some, and he shook his head, his cheeks colorless. Across the table, Jaganath and his friends laughed.

Desserts were brought in, and the Empress placed tiny fruit pies and choice glazed fruits on Gabriel's plate. Suddenly most of the lamps were extinguished, and the dancers arrived. The music became high and passionate, and the performers began a spectacular rendering of the Navoran fire-dance, dancing in the dark with burning torches, their seminaked bodies licked by the flames.

Petra leaned close to Gabriel, her arm about his neck, whispering something he did not hear. Her skin felt warm, and her other hand was on his knee. He shifted his position so her hands were no longer on him.

“I brought the dancers in just for you, my dear,” she said.

The music changed, becoming a stirring throb of
drums. The dancers were in pairs, moving close, their motions ecstatic and wild, and very erotic. It was the fire-dance as Gabriel had never seen it danced before. It was too much for some of the guests, and they grabbed slaves and pulled them down onto the cushions with them, and the fervid dark filled with the fragrance of the crushed white flowers.

Gabriel looked down at the table and toyed with his wineglass. He felt overwarm, and his hand shook. Ashila filled his mind, his blood.

“Well, do you like them?” Petra whispered. “They'll dance again for us later, if you like. Just for you and me.” Her hand was on his thigh again, moving not so subtly.

He could hardly breathe, and his head ached. “I can't stay, Lady,” he said. “I have to go now. Salverion and I have surgery in the morning. It'll be a long day; we haven't been to the Infirmary since the epidemic started. I must sleep.”

“But my dear, you're sleeping here,” she said.

“Thank you, Lady, but no.” He stood up and bowed to her. The drums still pulsed, and the guests, apart from the High Judge, had their eyes riveted on the dancers or were occupied with the slaves. No one noticed what was happening under the silken canopy. “Thank you for the dinner, Your Majesty.” Gabriel bowed again and began to walk
out. He had not passed the first row of curtains, when the Empress called him back.

“Gabriel!” Her voice was shrill and furious, and he stopped. Everything stopped—the music, the dancers, the rapt murmuring of the guests. All eyes turned in his direction, and there was absolute quiet. Very slowly Gabriel stopped walking. He seemed to hear his mother's voice, from a time way back in his childhood:
There are times to run, and times to stand firm. You'll learn the difference. . . .

But he did not know the difference, not this time. The Empress made the decision for him. “One more step,” she said, “and you're exiled.”

He turned around and bowed again. “I have to leave, Lady. I'm sorry. I have work in the morning.”

“Gabriel, you are walking on the very edge of propriety,” she said, her voice shaking and low. “I forgive you, allowing for your youth and inexperience. But your behavior is unacceptable. Anyone else walking out against my will, I'd have whipped. I order you to come and sit down. I have a dream I want you to interpret. I want all these present to hear it.”

“I cannot interpret dreams as a public entertainment, Your Majesty. I'm sorry.”

“Come and sit down!”

He obeyed, his face hard and furious.

“Don't ever defy me again,” Petra murmured, as she smiled and waved at the musicians. They began playing again. Amused, and making quiet comments to one another, the other guests returned their attention to the dancers. Gabriel picked up his wine and finished it in a few gulps. A slave filled the glass again. As if nothing had happened, the dance went on.

Suddenly the music stopped, and the dancers bowed and waved their torches and left. The guests hooted and howled for more. When they were quieter, the Empress clapped her hands and there was silence. Slaves lit the lamps again.

“A short time ago,” Petra continued, “I called you all my friends. My dearest friends, I said. But this was not quite correct. Not all of you are my friends. One of you is my enemy.”

The silence was profound. Gabriel held his breath, overpowered with a sense of catastrophe. He glanced at Jaganath; the man was looking directly at him, his black eyes glittering.

“Ten nights ago I had a dream,” Petra continued. “It was a special dream, vivid and unforgettable. I have my thoughts on what the dream means, but I crave an accurate and honest interpretation. I'm going to tell you all my dream, and Gabriel will give us the true meaning of it.”

“Your Majesty,” began Gabriel, but she held up
her hand to silence him.

“In my dream,” she said, her voice clear and strong, “I saw a great field of golden wheat. The sky above it was blue, serene. There was a feeling in my dream that everything was fine and good. But then I saw, growing among the stalks of wheat, a poisonous weed. Larger and larger that weed grew, putting out long tendrils that reached to all the golden stalks. Soon it overran the whole field, affecting all the wheat. Its roots spread, and new weeds sprang up, sometimes within the very wheat itself; there was no separating the wheat from the weeds, they were so entwined. Then the skies darkened, and a great storm came. An eagle flew across the field, with claws long and sharp like sickles; and it cut down the wheat and the poisonous plants with it. Fire flew from the eagle's claws, and all the field was burned clean. But some grains fell into the ashen soil, and they grew. The eagle watched over them, and spread its wings over them, and guarded them. Out of its feathers new seeds dropped. These seeds grew up with the grains from the old field, and a new harvest came into being. The new crop was strong, better than before, and there were no weeds.

“And after that dream was another one. In the second I was lying in the field of wheat, while the skies were still blue, just at the time the first
weed sprang up. Its very first tendril wrapped itself about me, entangling me, choking me. At last I struggled free, and when I stood I saw how the whole field was ruined by the weed. I grieved, and as I grieved I heard a great cry. At the sound of it the skies darkened, and the eagle came. I saw no more.

“And now Gabriel will tell us the meanings of these dreams. Won't you, my dear?”

Gabriel was sitting staring at the plate in front of him. The gold dissolved, re-formed in the shape of fallen stalks of wheat. As clearly as if they were before him in reality, he saw the images of the dream. And with the images came the meaning, clear and unmistakable and devastating.

“Well?” Petra cried, when he was silent for too long. “Tell us, Gabriel! Tell us what the dreams mean.”

“I'm not the one to interpret these dreams, Lady,” he said. “Please call Sheel Chandra.”

“You are the one,” she said. “And as your Empress, I command you to tell us the meanings of these dreams.”

“It will disturb you, Lady,” he said.

“I'm fully aware of that. Tell us.”

So he told them, his voice low and unfaltering, and audible to every person in the room. “The field of wheat is the Navoran Empire,” he
explained. “The beginning of the dream, when the field is pure and the skies are blue, signifies the early greatness of Navora, the laws and the creeds and the integrity and truth of the people. But in time, as the Empire grows, the golden wheat becomes contaminated. The weed is the corruption, the poison that begins secretly at the roots and grows up to choke and destroy the wheat, plant by plant. In the end the whole field is ruined.” His voice broke, and he wiped his eyes and tried to control himself. He was no longer conscious of the guests, or even of the Empress. He saw only the dream and knew an awful grief. For the first time, sitting here in the supreme splendor of the Empire he belonged to, he realized the shocking devastation the prophecy foretold.