A Day of Fallen Night (The Roots of Chaos)

This world exists

as a sheen of dew on flowers.

– Izumi Shikibu

First, the waking in the dark. It had taken her years to become her own rooster, but now she was an instrument of gods. More than any change of light, it was their will that roused her.

Second, immersion in the ice pool. Fortified, she returned to her room and dressed in six layers of clothing, each made to withstand the cold. She tied back her hair and pressed down every strand with wax, to keep it from blinding her in the wind. That could be deadly on the mountain.

She had caught a chill from the pool the first time – shivered in her room for hours, runny-nosed and red of cheek. That was when she was a child, too fragile for the tests of worship.

Now Dumai could endure it, as she endured the elevation of the temple. Mountain sickness had never touched her, for she was born into these lofty halls, higher than most birds were hatched. Kanifa had once joked that if she ever went down to the city, she would keel over, breathless and faint, as climbers did when they ventured this high.

Earth sickness, her mother had agreed. Best stay up here, my kite, where you belong.

Third, writing down the dreams she remembered. Fourth, a meal to give her strength. Fifth, stepping into her boots on the porch, and from there to the courtyard, still mantled in night, where her mother waited to lead the procession.

Next, the lighting of the woodfall, sweet bark from logs that had lain on the seabed. It burned with smoke as clean as fog, and a scent like the world in the wake of a storm.

In the gloom, wide awake, the bridge that crossed the gap between the middle and third peaks. Then the long climb up the slopes, chanting in the ancient tongue.

Onward to the shrine that stood at the summit, and then, at the first glow of dawn, the ritual itself. Ringing the chimes before Kwiriki, dancing around his iron statue – calling out to the gods to return, as Snow Maiden once had. Salt and song and praise. Voices raised together, the song of welcome golden in their throats and on their tongues.

That was how her day began.

****

Snow glared under a clear sky. Dumai of Ipyeda narrowed her eyes against the dazzle as she picked her way down to the hot spring, taking a long drink from her flask. The other godsingers trailed far behind.

She rinsed herself before she slid into the steaming pool. Eyes closed, she sank up to her throat, savouring the heat and quiet.

Even for her, the climb was hard. Most visitors failed to summit Mount Ipyeda, and they paid for the privilege of trying. Sometimes they became headsick or blind and had to admit defeat; sometimes their hearts gave out. Few could breathe its thin air for long.

Dumai could. She had breathed nothing but this air since the evening she was born.

‘Mai.’

She glanced over her shoulder. Her closest friend had appeared, carrying her clothes from the shelter. ‘Kan,’ she said. It was not one of his climbing days. ‘Are you joining me?’

‘No. A message came from the village,’ Kanifa said. ‘We’ll have guests by nightfall.’

Strange news indeed. There was a window of opportunity in early autumn for climbers, but this late in the season, when deep snow filled the lower pass and the wind blew strong enough to kill, the High Temple of Kwiriki did not expect guests. ‘How many?’

‘One climber and four attendants.’ Kanifa laid her clothes beside the pool. ‘She is from Clan Kuposa.’

There was a name to banish exhaustion – the name of the most influential clan in Seiiki. Dumai rose from the water.

‘Remember, no special treatment,’ she said, drying herself with a length of cloth. ‘On this mountain, the Kuposa stand at the same height as others.’

‘A good thought,’ he said mildly, ‘for a different world. They hold the power to close temples.’

‘And why should they use it?’

‘Let’s not give them a reason.’

‘You’re growing as nervous of court as my mother.’ Dumai picked up the first of her layers. ‘All right. Let’s prepare.’

Kanifa waited for her to dress. She tied fur warmers over her sleeves and trousers, pulled on her heavy black coat, secured her hood under her chin, snugly wrapped her feet and covered them with her deerskin boots, fastening her ice spikes to the soles. Last came her gloves, sewn to fit her. On her right hand, only the forefinger and thumb were whole, the others shortened with hot steel. She slung on her pelt and followed Kanifa.

They walked down to the sky platform, Kanifa with a small frown. At thirty, he was only three years older than Dumai, but the deep lines carved around his eyes made him seem older.

The platform creaked underfoot. Ahead lay Antuma, capital of Seiiki, built at the fork of the River Tikara. It was not the first capital; likely it would not be the last. Sunlight daubed its rooftops and sparkled on the frosted trees that stood between it and the mountain.

The House of Noziken had once ruled from the harbour city of Ginura. Only when the gods had withdrawn into the Long Slumber – two hundred and sixty years ago – had the court had moved inland, to the Rayonti Basin. Now its home was Antuma Palace, an impressive complex at the eastern end of the Avenue of the Dawn. If Antuma was a fan, that avenue was its central rib, a clean line from the palace to the main gate of the city.

Often, Dumai would look out and imagine what Antuma had been like when dragons roamed. She wished she had been alive in that time, to see them watching over Seiiki.

‘Here they come.’ Kanifa eyed the slope. ‘Not yet frozen.’

Dumai followed his gaze. Far below, she made out a line of figures, specks of ash on the blinding white. ‘I’ll prepare the Inner Hall,’ she said. ‘Will you instruct the refectory?’

‘I will.’

‘And tell my mother. You know she hates to be surprised.’

‘Yes, Maiden Officiant,’ he said solemnly. Dumai grinned and gave him a push towards the temple.

He knew she had only two dreams. The first was to set eyes on a dragon; the second was to one day succeed her mother as Maiden Officiant.

Inside, she parted ways with Kanifa. He made for the refectory, she for the Inner Hall, where she built five screened enclosures for the climber and her servants, each with its own stove and bedding. By the time she was finished, hunger had rubbed her stomach raw.

She fetched a meal from the refectory: yolks steamed and beaten into a smooth yellow cream, poured over slices of skinned chicken and mushroom and speckled with dark salty oil. As she ate on one of the roofs, she watched for the sorrowers that nested in the crags above the temple. Soon their young would hatch and fill the evening air with song.

When she had cleaned her bowl, she joined the others for the midday prayer. After, she chopped firewood while Kanifa scraped ice from the eaves and gathered snow to melt for drinking.

It was dusk by the time the party appeared. They had survived the treacherous steps that led from the first peak to the second. First came their armed guards, hired to drive off the bears and bandits that stalked the wooded foothills of the mountain. They followed a guide from the nameless village on the lower slopes, the last waystop before the temple.

The climber came next, wrapped in so many layers that her head looked too small for her body. Her attendants huddled around her, heads bowed against the screaming wind.

On the porch, Dumai exchanged a look with Kanifa, who glanced over his shoulder. The Maiden Officiant was supposed to receive visitors, but Unora was nowhere to be seen.

‘I will greet them,’ Dumai finally said.

The snow was thick and swift, so heavy she could hardly see for the flakes on her lashes. Her hood kept most of her hair in place, but loose strands whipped free and caught on her lips.

She had barely reached the steps when a hand grasped her wrist. Expecting Kanifa, she turned – only to find her mother beside her, wearing her headdress of silver butterflies.

‘I’m here now, Dumai,’ she said. ‘Is everything ready?’

‘Yes, Mother.’

‘I knew I could rely on you.’ Unora touched her shoulder. ‘Rest. You’ve worked hard today.’

She retreated, knowing better than to stay. Her mother was different when courtiers visited, especially the Kuposa – tense and distant in a way she never was elsewhen.

Dumai had never fully understood it. Though Clan Kuposa had enormous influence at court, they had only ever supported the High Temple of Kwiriki. They had financed crucial renovations, sent beautiful gifts, even paid for a distinguished artist to paint the Inner Hall. Still, it might be wise to tread with care around a family with such power.

On her way to bed, she cracked open a door. In the highest quarters of the temple, Osipa of Antuma was peering at a scroll through a water stone, feet perched on a hot brick.

‘Osipa,’ Dumai said, ‘can I bring you anything?’

Osipa squinted at her. ‘Dumai.’ Her voice was clotted. ‘Thoughtful of you to offer, but no.’ She raised her grey eyebrows, still groomed in the old court style. ‘I saw you working cracks into your hands again. Have you tried the balm I gave you for Summerfall?’

‘I need them tough for climbing,’ Dumai reminded her. Osipa shook her head, then coughed into her sleeve. ‘Are you not well?’

‘A chill.’ Osipa dabbed her nose. ‘I envy you, child. You weather the cold as well as the mountain.’

‘Let me get you some ginger. It will help.’

‘I know by now that nothing will.’ She hunched over her scroll again. ‘May your dreams be clear, Dumai.’

‘And yours.’

Osipa had always hated the dark months. A loyal handmaiden to the Grand Empress, she alone had followed her mistress to Mount Ipyeda. Decades later, she had yet to settle.

Night plunged the temple into darkness. Dumai made her way to her room, finding a meal waiting on a tray, and the shutters locked against the wind. Once she had sanded her calluses, she undressed and slotted her legs under her blanketed table, where a box of coals smouldered.

As the wind moaned, she ate, warm as a nestling. Only when every dish was spotless did she open her prayer box, taking out a strip of paper, her brush, and a jar of cuttlefish ink. She wrote her wish – always the same – and dropped the paper into her dream bowl. It thinned as it floated, the water absorbing her words, drinking them into the gods’ realm.

Tiredness came rushing over her, like the sea she had never seen. She moved the coals next to her bedding, blew out the lamps, and laid her head on her pillow, falling asleep in a heartbeat.

****

First, the waking in the dark. Parched mouth, fingers slurred. They slid out from the bedding, finding the floor too soft, too cold.

Dumai swam up from the sea of dreaming. Shivering, her nose like ice, she tried to think why her face was damp, why there was snow under her fingers. Nearby, sounds fought to be heard over the wind. A squeak, a rattle – then a dreadful crack that jolted her upright.

One of her shutters had blown open. Left to clatter, it would wake the whole temple.

Her legs were slow to move. She groped her way to the window and reached out, fingertips hooking into the shutter.

Something gave her pause. She looked straight ahead, into the black roar of night, towards the lantern at the top of the stepway, protected from the wind. By its light, she could make out a shadow. Kanifa had always said she had sharper eyes than a bird of prey.

A bandit. Or a sleepless ghost. Something that did not belong. She remembered tales of teeth like arrowheads, of flesh rotting on bone, and suddenly she was a fearful child again.

She was also a godsinger, ordained before the great Kwiriki. Resolve hardened her spine.

The floor creaked as she carried a lamp from her room, down the stairs, past the softly lit doors of the Inner Hall. She had learned to walk in these corridors, knew them just as well in darkness as she did by day. On the porch, she put on the first boots she found.

The figure was still beside the lantern, so hunched against the wind it looked as if it had no head. Dumai walked towards it, grasping one of her ice sickles. She had never used it as a weapon, but she would try if necessary. When the figure turned, a face came into relief.

Not a bandit. This man wore the muddled garb of a saltwalker. He looked at Dumai with watering eyes, then coughed out a fine spray of blood and collapsed into the snow.