The Ambiguous Puzuma

The boys who watched had not been his friends, but he had jumped anyway, in the hope it might earn him a share of their respect, or inclusion, entry into a shared community of men. But that was one frost he had never learnt to break. They had not cheered, only watched him fall, as they always had. Then, by the time he climbed back up to where they'd been, his fingers numb from cold and shaking as they scrabbled on the stone, they were gone, having taken his dry clothes with them.

That age had been a precipice, of sorts. A time when boys became men, and had to decide what type of man to become, or have it decided for them. Those with gifts for violence were sent to the garrison, to keep them out of trouble elsewhere. Those who worked well with sheep went to the fields. Those with a way with ink were trained as scribes. So it went. But Laxon couldn't fight, or herd, or write. He hadn't been able to work wood, or metal, or dough, at least not to a master's satisfaction. He didn't take to anything. He only took: food, water, space, all needed for working men. For those who contributed. The other boys had taken it out on him, of course. That was only to be expected. After the pattern was established, they began to laugh at every failure. After enough failures, they began laughing at the attempt. Laxon was mocked for his slowness. He was beaten soundly, without the reaction time to fight back. In a way, his perch here suited him well. He had never had anything in front of him; nothing to look forward to. The future had always beckoned him with empty hands. The laughter had always happened behind his back.

As the runt of his cohort, it was not long before the adults had come to resent him too. Laxon was often found skulking about, lurking in corners; trying to keep out of the way, but always somehow underfoot. He even took it out on himself, having learnt the lesson of his failed existence. It was neater if he dealt with the punishment, so that they didn't have to. The masters found the cuts, but they only added to the mockery of his peers, and the disgust and mistrust of everybody else. The scars were taken as proof that there was something wrong with him - if there had ever been any doubt. A broken, malformed boy, with a twisted mind to suit.

In the present, he thought he saw something; a shadow flickering in the night. Far away, across the lake. There were never much movement on his watch, but that had been a shifting of grey across the black. Probably an owl. Or perhaps a bear, further back on the shore. That was probably his excitement for the night. Maybe the bats would visit later, after the taverns had emptied for the evening, and the music of other people's lives made way for the silence of his own. They could be long hours, but Laxon had grown used to the stillness. It gave him plenty of time to think.

In a way, the wall had been the solution to his problems. For the first time, he had found true solitude here, away from the jabs and the taunts, not in anybody's way. He had also found a purer source of pain. Laxon felt the wind cut sharp as any knife, and knew that he never needed to cut himself again. He could simply roll up his shirtsleeves, and watch the purpling of his skin, the pimples and the trembling hairs, and feel the burn on the surface and the aching in his joints. Exposure had the teeth to kill, but didn't leave a mark. Nobody had to know but him.

Last of all, he'd found his gift. His vocation. Laxon was good at being alone, a talent honed across many years as an outcast. He had passed through loneliness to the other side: so mistreated by the noise around him that he now craved silence, emptiness, boredom. He was good at enduring the cold, having already sought it out of his own volition, to deliver the hurt he knew he deserved, and built a tolerance to that as well. He was good at suffering. As good as anyone the city had.

When the Averun war had failed, and its men had returned broken or not at all, the city had found a developed a need for watchmen. There, at last, Laxon had found his fit. He could stand for twice, thrice the shift of any other man, who came hurrying to the hearthfire wringing life into their hands. They had to go in pairs, so as to not be driven mad by the solitude, but refused to partner him, for much the same reason. That suited him just fine. The whole thing did. It was the only part of his life that had.

So Laxon had watched diligently, stolid through the winter nights, as he now watched the bear investigating the other side of the lake, and imagined that he heard a distant splash as it searched for fish. He did his duty. But nothing else changed. He was still not accepted, and came into the watchhouse to smothered laughter, like ash thrown across a fire. The others still viewed him with suspicion, repulsion, like there was something twisted inside of him. Something broken. Something wrong. In his youth, his weakness had been the evidence of that. As man, they were suspicious of his strength. It was not natural for a man to bear the cold and quiet as he did. It might serve the city's interests, but it was wrong.

A light flared in the distance. It died quickly, but Laxon was sure of what he'd seen. He was not one of the men who grew distracted on their watch, talking with their partner or playing dice games. He knew many of them drank on the night shifts, to take the edge off the boredom and the cold. He was more focused than that. He knew this dark like the back of his hand, and had noticed the subtle shifting of the grey against the black. He certainly knew a flame when he saw one. Without taking his eyes off the horizon, not wanting to ruin his night vision, he leant down and lit a fire of his own.

Each watchman had a signal they could light, in the case of emergency. It burnt blue, to be more noticeable against the night. In practice, the other watches were taken in pairs, and one partner could run for aid whilst the other watched on; the beacons were less for sightings of danger, and more for cases where one partner fell ill, and the other couldn't abandon their post to seek help. Laxon didn't have that luxury. If he saw something, as he had now, the others would need to come to him. If he collapsed, they would find him at the changing of the shift. He suspected they would treat it as an inconvenience either way.

Somehow, that was overly optimistic. After all of the pain of his youth, Laxon had thought the scales had fallen from his eyes. He considered himself a cynic where the city was concerned, and knew well the failings of the watch in particular. But he had thought someone would come. He had believed them when they told him about the signals. He did not know if they had abandoned him in particular, or if they watchmen responsible had grown too lax to look. He only knew that an hour passed, and nobody arrived. More pressingly, he thought he sensed an approach across the lake. There was no sound of oars, no shout of sailors, but he could image the water had changed its texture slightly. As if it had been filled with rafts, silently sculling along.

He was left with no choice. If the others wouldn't come to him, he would need to go to them. Even if it meant abandoning his post. Laxon dithered on that for a short while, but in the end there was no argument to stay. There was no use in him remaining here, politely watching an approach without warning anyone. He extinguished his signal, and raced to the watchhouse to give them one they couldn't miss. It started with a pounding knock.

"Who is it?" a voice called from within.

"Me," he said. "Laxon."

There was no response. He imagined rolled eyes.

"Did you see my signal?"

There was another pause, although this time with a rattle. "I don't see anything."

"I put it out."

"Ri-ight." The voice through the door was slurred. "So... why are you here?"

"It might be easier if I show you."

"Easier for you, you mean. You want me to come out into the cold. Well, some of us have blood in our veins. I'm not coming to keep you company. If you want something, just spit it out."

"Can you open the door?"

He heard more clattering, and then it cracked open. The watchman on duty, Vermond, looked him up and down. "Hey, shouldn't you be on shift? What's the matter, finally couldn't hack it?"

"No." The fire was lit inside, and the warmth spilled out into the night. That had nothing to do with the heat he was suddenly feeling. Laxon had come here looking for Vermond's help, but it was hard to ask for it with his hackles raised.

"Why did you light your signal?"

Laxon took a moment to reflect. "No reason. I made a mistake."

"Typical Laxon," Vermond muttered, slamming the door shut. He heard some laughter inside, as he turned to leave. Which made it easier, later on, when he heard the screams.

Laxon didn't go back to his perch. It would be an unusual place for Averun to attack, but that might be precisely why they chose it. Outsiders wouldn't know that the sheer wall could be climbed from the water, but every man who'd grown up here did, and plenty of men had been lost in Averun this year. If they had asked the right questions, the right way, it would have been an easy thing to learn. The city's open secret. A known weakness, ready for an invader to exploit.

He used it to make his own escape. It was easier to climb down the stone, and lower himself into the water. The guards at the gates would ask him to many questions, but the lake accepted him with open arms. Laxon shivered in the cold, but bore it as he always had, and swam with careful strokes to the nearest shore. Once there, he stripped off his clothes, and waited for them to dry. A breeze was drifting in his direction, and it stung bitterly where it touched his skin, but that was nothing new. If he'd ever deserved a punishment, it was now.

He bore not the waking thirst of the man who sleeps with mouth agape, and rises to the sense of spiral sawdust shavings on his tongue, nor the thirst of a drunkard as the sun begins to set, as his thoughts begin to turn, and as his hands begin to tremble from the dreadful dryness of existence, but instead a thirst well-earned: curated by our boy over the days of walking at his back, and by the promise of a long and dusty road ahead. He had long since drained his water pouch, and it now slapped uselessly against his chest, become a part of his burden rather than providing its relief.

After a time he came across a crossroads, and there beside it lay an inn, its sign hanging listless in the still and stifled air, but words and illustration giving it its name. The Moon Under Water. The boy pushed his own underwatered legs to stagger in through heavy oaken doors, and blew upon the tinder of his voice until it crackled back to life. Well-water, to fill his skin, if they would be so kind. He could pay for it, good money, though he would rather not. He was a traveller, not a vagabond, a boy who had a place to live, only stranded on the road between his home and destination, and would not cause them any trouble. He was not a beggar, although he left a note of pleading in his dusty, rusty voice, and could not hide the weariness and desperation in his eyes.

The innkeep took some pity on him then, and offered up not only water but a glass from which to drink it, as well as a bench where he might rest his feet awhile. So there the boy sat, and he savoured the drink, and he savoured the sitting, and he savoured the setting of the empty inn around him; a bastion of relief amidst the harshness of the woods, a place where dark trees had been tamed into tables and benches, barrels and bars and banquettes from which banquets might be held, the shelter of a roof and walls to keep the wildness out. He savoured the scents of fermented fruit and roasted game, the forest housebroken and honed to human tastes, the moon captured within its pool, the world beyond the door made safe and better suited to his sensibilities.

But most of all, the boy was taken by a painting hanging on the wall across from him. It was a scene out of a faerie kingdom, a ramshackle mound of toadstools and bracket fungus, seemingly grown atop a broken tree but become there something more; the construction teemed with hidden life, woodlice and lacewings, bark beetles and millipedes, all intertwined and crawling atop one another, as if they were the people and buildings which comprise a town, or the guts and organs which make up a man. The picture was an oval, and seemed no thicker than canvas, although the image held impossible depth. He was not sure how it adhered to the wall, as there was no place for a nail. He was not sure it was supposed to show. The boy knew only that he had fallen in love.

How much, he asked the innkeep, who appraised both picture and boy in one look. Ten silver favours, she told him, and three pewter songs. The boy wondered if that was a true cost, or pitched to exclude him without insult. If so, she had judged them both fair. He only wished that he had such means. He returned to his seat, feeling doubly heavy from the weight of his walk, and there heard a clinking as he sat. He rose again, and checked the seat, and his clothes, and found them spread across a dozen of his pockets. Ten silver favours and three pewter songs. A painting, if he wanted it. And though it was more money than he'd ever held at once, the doorway to so many other things, he found that he still did. The coincidence of it, the miracle of finding the coins when he had wanted them, was too perfect to refuse. A small fortune counted nothing to fortune itself.

So the painting became his. It was heavy, despite being canvas-thin, seemingly drawn directly onto a wooden back, and did not easily roll. The boy found it impractical to carry apart from with both hands, the image gleaming in front of him. He held it there as he left the inn and returned to his dusty road, gazing into the imagined world as if it were his destination ahead, and drew from it the motivation to continue on. From time to time he passed travellers coming the other way, and wondered whether he should hide his newfound treasure, but considered they could only see the reverse of the painting: to them it was a blank oval of wood, unaware of the wonders on the other side.

"What do you have there, boy?" After some time had passed, one group at last asked the question. They were a small caravan of travelling performers, as far as the boy could judge, and it had been a large man with a lyre who had asked.

He fought his first instinct to flee, which would have been difficult given the painting in his arms, as well as the exhaustion seeping deep into his bones, and answered them. "A picture."

He slowly turned it around, with a hesitation that might have only raised their interest, but they sat back disappointed.

"A looking glass, you mean." The man frowned, as if he had somehow been cheated. "Though I suppose you might think it a picture if you had not seen one before. A picture of yourself, yes? Your reflection? As in a pool of water?"

"No," the boy protested. "It's something else. Something magical."

"Yes, I suppose you might think that as well." The man was not listening. The boy wondered if the painting did perhaps bear a touch of faerie magic, such that only some could see it. He still loved what it showed to him, but what good was a painting only he could see? When he returned home, would others think he had spent ten silver favours on a looking glass? "How far have you been carrying that?"

"There is an inn a short way along, at the crossroads. You may wish to stop there as well."

"Not us," the man said. "We do not linger in such places. There is danger where paths cross."

"Our paths have crossed," the boy replied, not knowing any better.

"Our paths have met, lad. Not crossed."

"What is the difference?"

"The difference between meeting a man and crossing a man. One is mostly a good thing, one always bad. With time, you will learn the difference. I wager you will learn the difference between other things as well. Fare well."

The party carried on, leaving the boy standing still in the road, staring at the painting only he could see. The man had looked at it again, with his final comment, as if pitying him as a fool. Was this what he had bought? A lifetime of frustration, and embarrassment, as he tried to share this beauty with others, and had them question his sense in turn? How long before he began to doubt his own mind?

He kept walking, but the heat and his pack weighed heavy on his shoulders, and he found his arms slumping with the weight of the painting too. It sank from chest height to his midriff, so that even he could no longer see the image, and then he had to catch himself from knocking it with his knees. With many miles more to go, he realised that this would not see him home. He tried tucking the picture under his arm, no longer as worried about protecting it from the dust kicked up from the road, but it was an uncomfortable fit, and he felt his arm grow numb with time. He shifted it to the other side, but to the same inevitable result.

After another difficult mile, he gave up. The painting was not what he had hoped, and it would always have been impractical to carry it back. He had clearly not been thinking in the inn, his mind still recovering from thirst, lack of drink as addling as its excess. That had been his folly. The boy tried not to think of what else he might have spent that fortune on. He did not want to set the picture down by the road, where it would soon be repainted with a thick coat of dust, and followed a gap between the trees to one side, setting it down in a clearing in the woods. The glade seemed a pleasant enough place to be laid to rest, much sheltered and shaded in comparison to the road. From askance, he saw what the man had said. The painting only mirrored the blue beyond the canopy, like nothing more than a reflecting pool. A sort of crossroads, where the water met the sky.

He continued on, his heart as heavy as the rest of him, but tried to remember where it had been, in case he ever came back this way with a horse or cart and had the chance to recover it. His arms now slumped by his sides, but the road did not get any easier to walk. The same thirst returned, and he finally dwelt on his regret. Ten favours and two songs. He might have spent that fortune on more to drink, provisions for the rest of his journey. He might have stayed and begged another glass of water, had he not been so entranced. He began to lose track of his progress, stumbling one foot after the last, the trees not seeming to move to either side. He saw shadows at the corners of his vision. One of them spoke.

"What do you need, boy?"

"Water." It was difficult even to speak.

The shadow nodded, and the boy felt the pouch grow heavy around his neck. He drank, and the world resumed its shape around him. Trees to the left and right. Road ahead and behind. He looked for the one who had addressed him, but only saw a small creature on the ground: a polecat, the boy supposed, like a stoat but caught aflame, his coat the russet red of rust and rot and old dried blood.

"You may call me Fauvel," the creature said. "Will you give me your name?"

The boy opened his mouth, his mind still dry and addled, but paused and closed it again. He shook his head.

"No matter. You accepted my water, and therefore owe me a favour in exchange. It is your turn to grant me a wish."

"What do you need?" the boy asked.

"There is an inn, at a crossroads, not far from him. Do you know it?"

The boy allowed that he did.

"It must be burnt down," the creature said, his fur the colour of fir, or fungus, or falling autumn leaves, or all things that old trees fear. "It is the source of many a broken bargain; the home of too much that was taken. In a sense, they are in my debt. As you now are."

"Why can you not do it?" the boy asked, thinking of the kindly innkeep, who had offered him water without demands. "You seem afire already."

"Of all the places that I cannot go, that is the place where I can go the least."

The boy wanted to protest. He did not wish to destroy the inn, which had been such a source of sanctuary to him. He did not want to harm the people who worked and drank there, even just in costing them their refuge or their livelihood. But he was too weak to fight. He felt a sip of water away from collapse himself. He supposed that the creature preyed on that. That would explain why it had appeared to him here, so far from its target. Only now was he weak enough, or dry enough, like a stack of kindling ready for a spark. It would explain why it could not visit the inn, where men were quenched and well greased for a fight.

"It is far," he managed. "I will struggle to make the journey."

"I will accompany you most of the way. Your pouch will never be empty."

The boy could not think of anything else to say, and so turned on his heels and headed back the way he had come. The creature, Fauvel, kept to its end of the bargain, and there was also water in his pouch, although it never seemed to satisfy the way the glassful had. He drank it gratefully, but it always tasted somehow empty, as if it was only the illusion of water: enough for him to forget the thirst for another few steps, but still to leave it lurking underneath. He wondered if that was also by design. He was reliant on Fauvel, now, to keep walking in any direction. Each sip, each step, was purchased with what he would soon have to do.

There was no use thinking. It was too tiring. The boy could not see a way out, other than death, and that scared him more than anything else. Defying Fauvel scared him. He could not run. Could not fight. He could only drag one foot after another, and hope that something happened when they reached the inn. If he could play along with this bargain, and make his way inside to burn it down, he could then tell all to the innkeep, and receive another glass of cool, refreshing water, and she would make everything right. There had been other people in the inn. They would know what to do. They would have the strength to see it done. Until then, he could only walk, and try to convince himself that that was true.

"I need to pause," he said, when he saw another the gap in the trees. He remembered the clearing, with its shade and its cool. He could rest there a while. "I had been walking all day afore I met you. My legs need a rest."

Fauvel bristled at that, but allowed him to trudge to the side of the road, and then further into the trees. The boy wondered if he was also more comfortable in the woods; if that was where he had come from, and only ventured into the road in the hope of snaring men.

"We can walk under the boughs, if you prefer. I know well the way. But we cannot wait for long."

The boy sat heavily on a fallen tree, ignoring him for a moment. That was the only rebellion he could muster; one of inaction. He wondered how long he could wait here, but Fauvel tried to force him to move, and what would happen then. But he was not brave enough to find out. When he can recovered enough strength to stand, they continued on, this time remaining under the canopy. It was easier going in terms of the heat, although he had to pick up his feet to avoid roots and branches fallen in the undergrowth, and he suffered a number of trips and stumbles as they went.

It was a relief when they came across a clearing, and doubly so when he saw what it contained. A pool of water, clear and bright, reflecting the blue sky above. The boy could not help himself. He ambled over as swiftly as he could and bent to fill his pouch from his surface, avoiding the clouds, which seemed to bob like apples in its depths. Then he drank deeply - and, for the first time since the inn, he his thirst dissipate in its entirely. He saw the world clearly: Fauvel was behind him, red fur on its end, but hesitant to approach the water, and his painting was in front. This was the pool that he had made, just earlier that day. His own oasis. His own sanctuary.

"What are you doing?" Fauvel asked, its voice irritated, but also fainter. Perhaps it knew that, with fresh water on hand, its hold on the boy would cease. Perhaps it would do something to destroy the painting.

The boy had to act first. He moved to take another sip, but then, moving as quickly as he could, grasped Fauvel by the fur on its back and plunged it bodily into the pool. The water rippled, a small but powerful body writhing in his hand, and he quickly withdrew it before a bite or worse could come. Instead, he placed his own face over the pool. At once, the troubled water disappeared, and the painting smoothed out into the image he had loved.

"Sort of that, too." There was a crash, then the unmistakeable clunk of his head hitting the underside of the desk, followed by a number of decidedly untechnical terms. Jussi emerged rubbing the point of collision, but Oona's eyes went straight to the key in his right hand. It was glass, like the broken one in his left, but much more intricate in its design, its shaft wreathed with a leaf motif and ivy wrapped around its bow. Where her key had always been clear, this one swirled with golden light. It was significantly more beautiful.

"They really exist?"

Jussi smiled. "It certainly seems to have cast a spell on you. One flash of the key, and your eyes and mouth have fallen wide open."

"I'm serious."

"It's sort of a trade secret."

"I can keep a secret," Oona said. She was well-known for it. But not to people outside of her world. That was sort of the point. "I've also given you plenty of trade, as you know. There are any number of locksmiths I could go to, if I just want to be treated like a customer. I come here because of our wonderful rapport."

"Yes, and I'm very grateful, of course." Jussi was still rubbing his head, but she wondered if at some point it just meant he was thinking. "I don't suppose it hurts to tell you it exists."

"The skeleton key?"

"The Library of Keys. It's like a legal deposit, if you know what that means."

Oona smiled at him sweetly. "Let's imagine for a moment that I don't."

"There are some libraries - libraries of the written word, mind - which have a copy of every book ever published. They have to be sent a copy, by law, so that they always have it preserved there. Imagine that, but for a keys. A vast repository of glass and metal. A museum of bits and blades. It's beautiful."

"It sounds it." Oona thought on that a while. "So every time somebody breaks or loses a key, you can just go and pick up the spare?"

"If it's lost I'd change the lock. Security first, right? But broken, like this, I'll have to head to the library. Your lock's a Solomon, right? It's not like I can just prize it off and replace it. I can't even pick it. Nobody can."

"That's what I paid for." Solomon locks were famously impregnable. Oona didn't have the first idea how they worked, but there had to be an element of magic worked into the glass. All of her lock-ups had them. She'd set some of her people to try breaking in themselves, but they hadn't been able to leave a scratch. "So when can you get me the spare?"

"It'll be the spare of the spare. The original stays in the library, but the scribes there will create a new copy. You won't be able to get into your lock-up in the meantime, I'm afraid."

"That's okay. There's nothing living in there." Not now, anyway. "So you'll go there twice? Once to request the copy, and once to collect it?"

"That's right. I can go there to commission them tonight, but it might be weeks until they call me back."

Oona didn't ask if she could go with him. The answer would almost certainly be no, and then he'd be suspicious, and therefore harder to tail. She didn't need his permission to have him followed. Besides, it wasn't as if she needed to get inside the library yet. That could wait until she had the key, and could steal back under the cover of night. She only needed to know where it was - and it was better if none of the locksmiths knew that she knew.

"And that key lets you in?" She hadn't really stopped looking at it. She'd tried keeping eye-contact, but it was always hard with Jussi, and the gold kept drawing at the corners of her eyes.

"Of course," he said. "What else would it do?"

"It looks like it could do plenty," she said. "But I'm guessing it's just for a particularly sophisticated Solomon."

"That would seem a sensible guess."

"So does the library have its own key?" she asked, her mind still spinning with questions.

"What?"

"Is there a copy of that one in the repository? You know, in case your one breaks, and you can't get in."

"That would be redundant, wouldn't it?"

"Oh. Right." Oona hid her smile. Sometimes it paid to play the fool. People were more happy to share secrets with an idiot. It could be good fun, too. "So what would happen if you lost that?"

"I'd go to a colleague. Every locksmith has a copy."

"Every locksmith?"

"Everyone in the guild. They swear an oath to send a copy of their work to the library, and gain access in return. So any other locksmith could have replaced your key, as you were so kind to remind me. Otherwise you would have been bound to me forever."

"I can think of worse fates." She smiled up at him. The comment on her going elsewhere had clearly stung, and she needed to keep him sweet. "Does your shop have a Solomon lock?"

"That's an interesting question." Jussi raised an eyebrow, as if any part of him needed to be raised more than it already was. "Why do you want to know about my security? I thought our relationship worked the other way around."

"I'm just interested in my own," Oona said quickly. Perhaps her reputation had spread more widely than she thought. She'd never let Jussi see inside the lock-ups, but even a professional like him had to wonder where all of these newfound valuables were coming from. "I've always thought that even the best lock is only as secure as the location of its key."

"What do you mean by that?" he asked, the eyebrow lowering a touch.

"Say you did keep a copy of my key here. If you only had a standard, pickable lock, my Solomons would be basically worthless, because any thief could just break in here and pinch the key. In that case, my lock is only as good as your lock."

"But I don't keep a copy of your key here," Jussi said. "So it's none of your business."

"Oh, but you keep a copy of my key in your library. And you keep the key to the library here. So, ipso facto, this store could be a vulnerability. A thief could break in here, slip into your library, grab the spare, scribes or no, and all of my lock-ups would be their oysters. In fact, from the sounds of it, they could have keys to any lock in the world. Forgive me if I'd like to know you've patched that massive gap in our defences."

"I keep the store key on my person at all times." He patted his inside pocket. "And yes, it's a Solomon seal on the door. Outside of opening times, nobody's getting in this shop but me."

"Fair enough." Oona said. That suited her fine. She had no skill at lock-picking anyway, even with ordinary locks, and Solomons were unbreakable. She'd had a hard enough time busting up the key. She'd never seen the point in forcing a lock, when somewhere there existed a key. It was usually much easier to find it.

She couldn't pick locks, but she was good at picking people. She could find out their secrets, their vulnerabilities, and use that leverage to force them to loan her the key, or even run her an errand themselves. Or, if they refused, she knew all their vulnerabilities. She had never broken a lock, but she'd broken a lot of other things until they opened. In general, she found that people were much easier to crack.

It was a meritocracy, of sorts. The would-be viziers of Quat worked hard to undermine the man who currently held the sceptre, whilst he fought desperately to implement his own philosophy, wading against the shifting tides of the Sah's apathy and rage. When he inevitably lost his head, his saboteurs jostled to replace him, only to later face the same fate themselves. It was all part of the game.

But it didn't have to be.

"I come to you with a proposition." Waseem rose with his voice, and took the steps down to the stage, gesturing for a late entrant to take his seat at the back. He intended to hold the floor for a while. "Regarding not imports, nor commerce, but something of just as much import to us. What happens inside this room."

The room they used was a disused theatre, reimagined by Quat's brightest minds into an auditorium, debating chamber, and occasional brawling pit. They met regularly, every month, to discuss new theories and consider the problems of the day. The attendees were all well-read, and intelligent in their way, but they each seemed to have arrived at their own unique perspective, and agreement could be very hard to win. Most no longer sought it, and instead came to hone their own skills in rhetoric, or learn how to shore up and defend their pet beliefs against their detractors.

A consensus was extremely rate, but that was what Waseem hoped to find today.

He scanned the crowd as he strode onto the stage, and was pleased to see Dosi perched in the second row. The sitting Grand Vizier was not always in attendance, but it wasn't unusual, when their duties didn't require them elsewhere. They came to listen to alternative views, and anticipate criticism, but also for the thrill of the debate, of hearing new ideas, of having to figure out their weaknesses. Most viziers had passed through this room in the first place, and Dosi was no exception.

He spoke directly to him, even though his words addressed the crowd.

"Each of us dreams of becoming Grand Vizier. That is no secret. We all believe that we could make decisions better than poor Dosi here. But if one of us should rise, as he has, the others are sure to tear him down. To sabotage his reputation; accused of negligence, if not outright conspiracy, and executed either way. But it hurts us all in the long run."

He didn't say: the Sah was never the most level-headed man. He has always been mercurial, to put it kindly. Fickle. But now, thanks to the actions of those in this room, he has been conditioned to believe that viziers have a tendency for plots and schemes and betrayal. He had taken some convincing, the first time, but each successive charge of treachery seems easier for him to believe. Once that trust has been broken, it's much harder to put it back together. We have made the ground unstable for us all.

"So what is your proposal?" Dosi asked, raising to the bait. "If you believe that you could make the best decisions?"

"It's simple. We depose the Sah as ruler."

"Are you mad?" He twisted around, checking for guards in the crowd, like an animal in a trap. Even being part of this discussion would be dangerous for him, if rumours fed back to the Sah. He had to be seen to oppose it. "The Sahs have always ruled Quat. This is their city."

"Really? When did you last see the Sah out of the palace?"

"If you had ever been permitted inside the palace, perhaps you would understand why." Dosi held his chin up. "The Sah fears nothing, but I would also not counsel him to venture here, if madmen might speak treason with such confidence."

"Oh, his eminence can still have his palace, and everything he really cares for. I am happy to keep him as a figurehead, with all the glory he deserves. But he's too capricious for the practicalities of rule. You know this to be true. He has no interest in the Quatli people, and is constantly trading his Grand Vizier for their fiercest critics, and therefore changing the entire direction of his policy. Laws shift back and forth, until nobody can remember what they are. We start to build a new dock, then demolish it in spite. For us to plan for the future, we need a steady hand at the tiller."

"And that would be you, would it?"

Waseem smiled. "Not just. It would be you as well. All of you. I propose that this chamber makes our decisions going forward. We will decide by majority vote. We will still have disagreement, but it should bring more consistency to decisions, if the bulk of our number has to be swayed."

That silenced Dosi, but whispers rose from the seats all around him. The idea made a lot of sense, not least to the men who would be receiving the reins of power. They had all dreamt of being Grand Vizier, as Waseem had said, and now they had the chance, with none of the risk attached to the role.

"Shall we take the first vote?" he asked. "Who is in favour of this proposal? To abolish the role of Grand Vizier, and instead take decisions by consensus, without the Sah plucking one of us at random to make them until we get one wrong?"

The hands went up. Cautiously, at first, but then gaining boldness with their numbers. Some were too nervous to join the first wave, but then looked around at their neighbours, and joined their shoots to the forest. Waseem kept looking directly at Dosi, who had the most to lose, until others turned to do the same, and even he caved to the arms all around him. If this was going to happen, it made sense for him to be a part of it, not cast out as the man who fought to keep the power for himself.

When the last domino had fallen, Waseem at last looked away, and sought out the man who had taken his seat. He had been one of the first to raise his hand, but otherwise nobody would have paid him any heed, tucked away at the back, dressed in a homespun cloak and with a young man's face that none would know. A newcomer, they would have guessed, come to join the debate on this most auspicious of days. If they had even thought of him at all.