The Flame Iris Temple Page 11

“When Kagne went away with my stone cutter, I found I missed it, or rather, I missed not having made any use of it.” Basil said this with regret, a rare emotion from the hunter. “My days as a hunter have to end sometime. When Olef and Niksol and I return to Kelten, I think I’ll do something else with my life.”

  Sir Ako noticed that Sandun hardly ate any of his food; he brought it up after dinner when they were talking privately, the two of them, in the embassy library, as they had done often for the last year.

  “Are you well, Sandun? We stopped last night at Semnihali, and the teahouse owner recounted a story about you. Something about the Fire Sword wandering the streets of Tokolas all night and soothing spirits of the dead. Ridiculous, I thought, but are you well?”

  Sandun was disappointed that Sir Ako had seen through his pretend eating act. Miri had accepted that he hardly ate and slept very little, but now Ako was back, with his keen eye and questions.

  “I told you before, an angel saved me—changed me. I’m fine, Ako. I just don’t feel like eating.”

  Sir Ako’s face said it all: the knight didn’t believe Sandun’s story, but he wasn’t going to challenge him.

  “Well, you don’t look like you are wasting away,” Ako admitted. “I’ve seen men when they stop eating: the look on their faces, their sunken cheeks, lank hair, and yellowed eyes. You don’t look like them. In fact, you look strong. And happy. Your wife is a different woman—it’s as plain as day she’s pleased you are home.”

  “Isn’t Russu pleased you are back also?” Sandun said this in part to change the conversation but also because the princess had rarely joined them at meals and seemed to spend most of her time reading and making entries into a ledger book of expenses. She looked happy for an hour when Ako had returned, but when Valo Peli and Frostel bid them farewell, she had retired to her room with a curiously neutral expression.

  Ako sighed. “The princess doesn’t think my knights and I should be off gallivanting around Kunhalvar. She thinks we should stay here in Tokolas doing Sho’Ash knows what. I told her that she married a knight, and this is what knights do. We ride to danger, looking for troublemakers, and we kill those that oppose us. I don’t know what she thinks opmi do when the ruler isn’t out on a campaign. Write poetry? Sit beside the fire sharpening our swords? At least Lord Vaina understands us,” Ako concluded with finality. “He will make a good king.”

  “I think you should spend more time with the girl,” Sandun told his friend. “She is a newlywed, you know. As you were, once upon a time. The bandits and evildoers will still be around next spring.”

  “That’s fair enough,” Ako replied. He drained his glass and rose to his feet. “I’ll see you in the morning. It’s good to be back.”

  As Lord Vaina had predicted, the next abbot who arrived in Tokolas came prepared as though for battle. One hundred and fifty monks paraded into Tokolas from the South Gate, blowing long brass horns and carrying the abbot, seated, on a platform covered in white silk with an elaborately carved structure that arched more than ten feet over his head.

  Sandun, Lord Vaina, Chancellor Udek, and Valo Peli stood together above the rarely opened Main Gate of the palace and watched as the monks made their way up the central road of Tokolas. Lord Vaina passed around his farseer so they could all view the abbot, who proved to be a massive figure dressed in billowing orange robes.

  “Brother Oakheart comes to Tokolas,” Lord Vaina said with apparent good humor. “I’ve never laid eyes on the man, though he runs Water Moon Temple, the second largest monastery in all of Serica. He is aggressive, I’ll grant him that much. He seeks to nip this scheme of mine in the bud. A more prudent man might have waited to see if his monastery was on the list to be closed before trying overawe me, the apostate boatman.”

  “Was his monastery on the list to be closed?” Sandun asked.

  “I haven’t decided,” Lord Vaina answered. “There were good arguments both for and against. I want you to talk to him, Sandun. Tell him what you told me. See who he really is.”

  By chance, a brief opening in the clouds filled the street with sunlight. It made for a grand spectacle. Sandun was reminded of the time the archbishop of Seopolis had come out of the high temple, surrounded by the other major bishops of Kelten, and proclaimed Pandion the Third the newly crowned king of Kelten. Pandion came forward with the crown of state on his head, and the crowd went wild. That was how it should be: the king, not the temple, ruled the land.

  They didn’t open the great gate for the abbot, and for a time it was unclear if they would meet with Brother Oakheart at all. Oakheart’s go-between, a tall man who spoke exactly like a scholar, insisted that all of the monks should accompany their abbot inside the palace. This demand Chancellor Udek rejected curtly as “unacceptable.” Eventually, a meeting was agreed upon: the west market would be cleared the following afternoon, and the two men, with one aide each, would meet on a platform in the middle. Udek didn’t like this plan; he felt it gave the abbot too much status. But Lord Vaina told him, “This is my city, my province, I have seven thousand soldiers defending the city alone. I will meet with Oakheart in the middle of the market.”

  In the evening, Jay and Ven Kirdar came for dinner, and there was a discussion about the news, now common throughout Tokolas, that many of the monasteries and nunneries would be closed by Lord Vaina’s government.

  The Keltens didn’t care. None of them had visited a monastery of Eston, and they had only heard Lord Vaina’s unflattering stories about his years in the Yellow Dragon Monastery. Miri didn’t offer any opinion, but she looked troubled. Jay and Ven said that such a move would be impossible in Shila.

  “But it would not be necessary either,” Jay concluded, “because the monks do exactly as the king commands. They always have. Any abbot who refused the king’s orders would be replaced forthwith.”

  “From the accounts of Shila’s travelers, the monasteries of Serica are not well run,” Ven said with barely concealed disgust. “Truly appalling tales are told in our land about misbehavior, lack of piety, and other unnatural acts by Serice monks. What Lord Vaina described of his experiences in the Yellow Dragon Monastery is but a tenth of what we have heard. To us, most of the temples in Serica do not follow the true path, so it is not a surprise that the monasteries are filled with the unrighteous.”

  At this, Russu spoke out. “Well, I think what Lord Vaina is doing is very dangerous! I have accepted my husband’s faith, as is proper for a wife. But in Rakeved, the monks of Eston are powerful. One of my distant ancestors was put on the throne by warrior monks from the five monasteries that surround Velochaken. Years later, they nearly succeeded in deposing his grandson. I can tell you that in the court, we whisper stories to each other about the irreligious behavior of many monks and nuns, but we would never repeat such stories to the common folk. The monks are dangerous: they have spies and use black magic to sicken or slay their enemies.”

  “We have heard of the warrior monks of Rakeved,” Jay told her. “In fact, the Rutal-lil of Shila are based on a group of monks who substituted their daily meditation with the practice of martial arts. The long tradition of the Rutal-lil not marrying is certainly derived from our monastic origins. But in Serica, only the monks of Telihold ever copied our warrior ways; at least so far as I know.”

  At this, Filpa and Sandun smiled at each other. They’d had a brief run-in with monks from Telihold Tanul, the southern branch of the Telihold monks.

  “Some of the priests of Eston here are good men,” Sandun said. “I imagine some of the monks are good as well. The question is how many, and where? Lord Vaina thinks most of the monks should be doing something other than sitting and praying all day. He is the ruler of this land, and if they don’t like his rules, they can go elsewhere.”

  The meeting with Brother Oakheart took place in the afternoon. The clouds were broken and sailing south and east like great ships in the sky, and the w
ind blew in gusts, whipping bits of grit into the air. The smell of cooking oil and roasted garlic came up from the stones of the market square where, hours before, the food stalls had stood. The monks from Water Moon Temple sat in rows on the south side of the plaza, while Lord Vaina’s elite guards stood at attention on the north. A rank of civilian officials marked the east, and to the west was a line of priests from the temples of Tokolas. Not all were priests of Eston; several priests of the Mavana were clustered together, as were some Kulkasen temple leaders.

  In the middle, on a raised wooden platform, Lord Vaina sat with Sandun beside him. Facing them were Brother Oakheart and his chief aide, his go-between from the previous day.

  Sandun told Oakheart a simplified version of what he had told Lord Vaina; all the while, he examined the man with his second sight. There was nothing special about Oakheart’s soul. It was quite ordinary, very much as Sandun had expected. In his experience, nearly all religious leaders attained their positions of power not by piety but through politics.

  Oakheart responded dismissively, rejecting Sandun’s words with a few empty platitudes about how there were many false paths and spirits who tried to deceive humans and keep them from seeking Eston’s truth.

  Lord Vaina then spoke, very softly, so that Oakheart had to bend forward to hear him. As Sandun had recounted his tale, Lord Vaina’s chair had risen almost a hand’s span in height through a mechanical trick built into the platform, so he now was higher than the big abbot.

  “Oakheart, listen to me carefully. I own both Kunhalvar and Zelkat. I defeated the Kitran Empire’s army and caused Nilin Ulim’s death. I am stronger than the Iron King of Dombovar and King Tuno of Vasvar. As Advisor Sandun says, I will become the king of all of Serica. Right now, I am going to close seven out of every ten monasteries in Kunhalvar, and there is nothing you or anyone else can do to stop me. But I won’t close your monastery, nor will I replace you as the abbot. Water Moon Temple will have just as many monks after I am done as it does now.

  “Here are the new rules I will impose. First, no man younger than forty years will be allowed to remain in any monastery, including yours. Second, no monastery will be allowed to own more than a mu of land for every man who resides in the monastery. These rules will be strictly enforced by annual inspections.”

  The abbot opened his mouth to speak, but Lord Vaina drilled right through his objections, raising his voice so that all around could hear his words.

  “These are my terms. Accept them, and your monastery will remain open with you in charge. Reject them at your peril. This is not a negotiation. Heaven watches over me and approves. I will be the king, and as my subject, you will obey me!”

  Oakheart sat in silence for a long minute as he worked out the implications of Lord Vaina’s powerful speech. Sandun watched as the abbot’s mind twisted and whirled. Sandun had not seen this side of Lord Vaina before: the naked appeal to raw power, the plain implication that rejection would be met with violence. Gradually Oakheart’s mind settled, and Sandun felt sure that Lord Vaina had won.

  “Suppose I defy you and call upon ancient law to oppose your new rule?” Oakheart asked, pitching his voice so low that only the men sitting on the platform could hear.

  “Then you and all your followers will be arrested and punished as men disloyal to the government of Kunhalvar. I will make sure that the Water Moon Temple is destroyed with enough barrels of lopor so that no trace of it remains, as an example to all other abbots who might consider opposing me.” Lord Vaina said this conversationally, as though he were talking about grass growing.

  “And what if I say nothing, neither opposing your law nor supporting it?” Oakheart smiled a bit, as though this was a difficult question.

  Lord Vaina was unimpressed. “By long tradition of law in Serica, silence means consent. I will proceed as though you had agreed. Later opposition, should it arise, will naturally be dealt with firmly.”

  Brother Oakheart sighed. “I had hoped to convince you of the great good we do at the Water Moon Temple, but I see there is no possibility of understanding between us. You were brought into the Yellow Dragon Monastery, clothed, fed, and taught to read and write. And this is how you repay us? There is no gratitude in this world.”

  “And I thank you for reminding me of my own life history, which I had quite forgotten despite it being carved upon my soul with knives of iron. I know the life inside a monastery. Four years, Oakheart! Four years I spent watching and observing. I don’t fear you, Abbot, because I know your authority is built on shifting sand. I wager there are ten senior priors at the Water Moon who would stop at nothing to see you removed so they could wear the abbot’s robe themselves. You are a clever man, Oakheart, and you can see there is no benefit in opposing me. After all, why should you lift your sandals to help the other abbots whose monasteries are slated for closure? Let them find understanding in their own lives, or in their next ones, yes?”

  “I will not oppose you, Governor,” the large abbot said heavily. “I will pray for your compassion and your soul, but I recognize you have the authority to do these things. It is said, The water flows around the moon.”

  “Then it is settled,” Lord Vaina said decisively. “The law starts with immediate effect. All men younger than forty are no longer monks of the Water Moon Temple, including—from the look of things—most of the men you brought here to Tokolas.”

  “But these are my supporters. How can I return without them?” Abbot Oakheart said, looking back at his entourage.

  “You would prefer to wait here and argue that the law should not be enforced immediately? All while your enemies gain strength inside Water Moon Temple?” Lord Vaina said sardonically.

  “No…no, things will become more difficult with the passage of time. I will return immediately. Governor, you can tell the monks about your new law. I hope we meet again, in a future life.”

  “I think you will attend my investiture ceremony when I become king of Serica. You can look forward to it,” Lord Vaina said this with a cheerful smile that belied his unyielding will.

  The third abbot to talk to Lord Vaina was a man Sandun had met before: Master River Reed from the Temple of Noon. He came alone to the Kelten embassy, wearing a plain, dark-gray robe. When he was announced, Miri set aside her timbal, which she was practicing on, and accompanied Sandun downstairs to see Master Reed. Miri greeted him reverently, as did Sandun. Looking carefully at River Reed’s spirit, Sandun saw the abbot had an unusually radiant soul. It was quite pleasant to stand near him. In fact, it felt a little bit like being near Ajh. After some pleasantries, Sandun and Miri sat with the priest in the dining room, and they shared carrot soup together. Watery soup was about as much as Sandun could stand, and even so, he sipped sparingly.

  Sandun offered his thanks to River Reed. “I learned from my wife how you were a great comfort to her in the weeks when I was missing.”

  “She was in sorrow, and I tried in my limited way to help her. Eston does not wish suffering for anyone,” the priest replied. “Your return, great one, has been a blessing to this entire city. However, I have a favor to ask: I wish a private audience with Governor Vaina.”

  Sandun sighed. “This is related to his decision to close many of the monasteries, yes? He is not closing the temples in the city, at least not yet.”

  “It is related, but not in the way you might think. It is a matter of some urgency. Or rather, delay will bring no advantage to anyone.”

  Sandun nodded. “Since you helped me and my wife, I will take you to see Lord Vaina immediately.”

  As they walked to the palace, Sandun asked the priest, “Are you worried the governor will close your own place, the Temple of Noon?”

  “Yes, I suppose. But the situation is more complex than it may first appear, especially to a stranger,” River Reed said carefully. “While we use different words, temple and monastery, they are not always applied accurate
ly. Or the passage of time may have made once-accurate terms less so. For example, the other day you spoke with the abbot of the Water Moon Temple, yet everyone knows he runs a great monastery. Here in Tokolas, there is a building called Heavenly Peace Monastery in the southeast corner of the city. Yet few monks live there; instead, most people would agree, it has become a temple, serving the needs of the people who live close by. Centuries ago, Heavenly Peace was a monastery, but that was before the city expanded around it. As a final example, there is a building in Tokolas called House of the Perfect Diamond of Wisdom where many monks live. Yet I think of it as a temple, not a monastery.”

  “I see,” Sandun said thoughtfully. As usual, the world was more complex than it first appeared. In fact, he thought the same confusion would be found in Fiodroch and many other nations in the Archipelago. But not in his homeland of Kelten, where long tradition required monks be strictly separated from the temples. He couldn’t remember which king had imposed that rule; Lelex the Pious? Or was it the other Lelex, called Ironaxe?

  Inside the palace, Sandun and River Reed were brought to the garden where they found Lord Vaina resting in a pavilion beside the stream. He had a bandage wrapped around his head, and his primary wife, Lady Osmo, was tending to him.

  “Lord Vaina, what happened to you?” Sandun asked with concern. He had seen Lord Vaina just a few hours earlier, and he had been fine then.

  “It’s nothing, just a scratch,” Lord Vaina said with a somewhat unfocused expression on his face. “I stood too close to the new building, and a stone fell from the top. It hit the scaffolding and shattered. A shard cut me, that’s all.”

  “My lord husband is making light of a great danger.” Worry suffused Lady Osmo’s voice. “The block that fell was heavy, nearly half my weight. The workers were careless.”

  “It was my fault,” Lord Vaina replied, patting her hand affectionately. “The foreman suggested I stay back. Rain this morning made the unsecured stones slippery. Accidents happen when you are building. I know, I have the scars.”