#kulani

Her lips parted and she opened her eyes, sending her gaze out over the heathland of white blossom trees and heather that extended from the The Red House to the narrow pass between the Ai’ture mountain range. It was not quite enough. She reached out in a gesture of bargaining with the universe, out toward the great landmasses. The arid breeze lifted her white hair slightly from her shoulders.

A sigh of relief pressed itself out of her chest. Yes, there he was. He, among others that had been sent to ascertain the nature of the uprising in the north. Kulani stood that way for several minutes, letting the thread of his essence coil gradually like a spool of delicate thread back into her chest. Her eyelids fluttered. His was only a short reconnaissance mission, no military action was yet to be taken. But she would do this every morning for the next ten days, or until he returned.

A synthetic chime sounding through her chambers broke her concentration, she sighed and withdrew her hand, pacing barefoot into the solar.

“Enter.” She uttered.

A door hissed open hydraulically and Evun, her advisor on affairs of state stepped into the room. He bowed low at the waist.

“Peace to the Great Seer.”

Her fingers fluttered to signal him to stand straight.

“There’s news from Dagilach your Highness. The Empress Orlain has been detained. They say she is to be sentenced to death.”

Kulani drifted to the small natural spring that trickled down the side of the rock and parted the solar like a miniature stream. She placed her hands in the sweet water and swept them over her face. Drops fell from her nose and chin and soaked into the white robe that tied at her waist.

“The Dagal Empire will not be finished until it has killed every woman on its world, I fear. I appreciate being informed, but there’s little we can do. What of the reconnaissance?” There was a tinge of impatience in her voice.

Evun nodded. “The drones are picking up a large military force massing in the Drey City. We don’t know the identity of the leader as yet, he does not seem to show himself. But rumours are he is of mixed S’ruthan and Dagal extraction. He tells the people the old ways are dead.”

A mirthless exhalation left Kulani. “Perhaps those two pieces of news nest into one another more than I expected.” She placed her hand on the wall of the spring and let the water flow over it, absorbing its song. “For now we continue to watch. But we need to find this man, this would-be emperor.” She paused.

“And the men sent ahead? Before the drones?”

“They were undetected, and will be back two days earlier than expected your highness.”

Kulani felt her old heart lift in her chest. The water ran over the back of her hand, rivulets tracing her arm and wetting her sleeve.

I miss you. She spoke with her fingertips into the water.

“That’s some good news at least.” She replied, more lightly. “Please inform me of their movements, kindly, leave me be for now.”

Evun bowed low again and turned to leave. The door hissing shut behind him once again. The quiet of the wind at the balcony and the soft trickle of water suffused the room once more. The Empress pulled her hand from the water and parting her robe at the collar drew a circular rune on the skin of her breastbone, pressed her hand to it; a silent prayer for the Lady of Dagilach. She had never actually visited her sister world. Her mother, the previous Great Seer had warned her away before her death.

‘Don’t ever set foot on that land. Not while the palaces stand. Malice flows through the earth like water through ours. Maybe one day, when the ruins are reclaimed by the vines.’

Kulani stepped softly over the stream and walked through the solar to her bedchamber. A platform of soft green silk and pillows, these recent days she had found herself falling asleep on the stone floor by the water. Her knees and shoulder had the yellow bruises to show it. The earth was starting to speak, even if in only a faltering whisper, she was trying to hear the words.

The silk felt altogether too soft beneath her skin. She sprawled face down on the bed, one knee hitching up, her fingers sliding over her head to brush against the exquisitely carved wall at the head of the bed. She could recall the smell of him standing close to her in the briefing rooms, in the hearing chamber. He was always close by and yet just too far away. She had taken to reaching out for him, letting that intangible coil of thread flow from herself into him. He could feel it, but so far he had said nothing.

She was without a consort or heirs. This had not always been the way in her family, but she had taken the decision even before her coronation; under her rule there would be no kings on S’ruthan Liar, and the next ruler would be chosen, not born. But that could be a hundred years from now, perhaps more. Her people were known for their longevity, and traditionally her mother’s line had seen their four hundredth year.

It was going to be a very long life. Or, if this ‘Dagal Emperor’ had anything to do with it, a short life. Either way she was running out of time.

Her ribs felt heavy as she breathed into the silk, turning her cheek to rest against it. Her hands opened out and slid down over the silk like a breast stroke through water and hitched her gown up around her hips.

Shortly before he’d left she’d seen him and two of his lieutenants in the briefing room. She’d unravelled herself toward him as the other men laid out the maps and discussed the method of approach. But this time he’d looked to her, his gaze pinioning her. It froze her in place. His own reach pressed into the small of her back. There was a heat in it. When he blinked the other men were talking about squadrons and she was back in the room again.

Her hand flexed around to press into the small of her back, the other moving beneath her to the heat between her legs. When her mouth gaped, fishlike, as though starving for air his face flared in her mind. A brilliant star, it engulfed her and she forgot the boundaries of her body.