Kushiel's Avatar - Jacqueline Carey [182]
FIFTY-THREE
THE DAYS that followed were among the most terrifying of my life. As hard as it had been to bear my secret alone, it was worse to have it shared, rendering so many of us vulnerable. The whispering was constant as the conspiracy grew. I was sure, at any instant, someone would speak carelessly in front of Nariman, and all would be lost.
None of it would have been possible without Kaneka. Bullying, cajoling, threatening—it was she who converted the others to our cause, convincing them to surrender their precious allotments of opium. Not all, but many; enough. Drucilla assumed charge of it, carrying the growing ball of resin in her physician's basket. When it was the size of a man's doubled fists, she gauged, it would be sufficient to affect the entire garrison.
Rushad too proved an invaluable ally. Although the prospect of it rendered him pale and stuttering with fear, he nonetheless provided a steady flow of information regarding the dedication ceremony, and the feasting that would accompany it. It was Rushad himself who would bring the opium tincture to the festal hall, late in the proceedings, and see it dispersed among the myriad pitchers of beer and kumis.
I do not think he would have found the courage, if not for Erich. The Skaldi's reemergence into the world of the living filled him with joy, and he held me personally responsible for it. They were an unlikely pair of friends, the young Skaldi warrior and the slender Persian eunuch. Still, Rushad doted on him, and for his part, Erich bore it with a certain fond tolerance.
As for the Akkadians, I told Uru-Azag myself, and not without a good deal of trepidation. He heard me out silently and, for a long moment, only stood and stared, fingering the hilt of his curved dagger.
"Opium alone is not enough," he said shortly. "There will be fighting. And men in the grip of delusion are dangerous."
"But unskilled," I said.
He nodded, thinking. "If we could get to the fishing boats, it might be enough. Drujan has no fleet to give chase. Still. Daggers are of little use against swords. And there will be two guards posted at the upper entrance to the zenana. Even that night."
"The guards will be dead," I said. "You can take their swords, their armor."
Uru-Azag frowned, brows meeting over his hawklike nose. "Who will kill the guards?" he asked. "You?"
"No." I shook my head. "The Mahrkagír calls him the Bringer of Omens."
The Akkadian laughed with harsh delight. "Him! Ah, then, I see."
"You will do it?"
He stared into the distance over my head, weighing the matter. "You are mad, you know. It is likely that we will all die."
"It is possible," I said. I thought of Erich's words. Like the Skaldi, the Akkadians had been warriors, once. "It would be a warrior's death, Uru-Azag. Not a slave's."
"It would." He looked at me. "Nariman will be a problem. I will kill him myself. It will be a pleasure to slit his fat throat."
I repressed my surge of relief and only nodded. "And the others?"
"They will fight." He smiled grimly. "It would shame them not to. Your god, lady, must be a mighty warrior, to inspire such courage."
A hysterical laugh caught in my throat. "No," I said, half-choking on it. "But he is a prodigious lover. Believe me, Uru-Azag, in this place, it is the more dangerous of the two."
The Akkadian only looked at me askance, and went about his business. It didn't matter. They thought me mad, god-touched. It had made me a pariah, before. Now it made me an icon, a catalyst. The signs had spoken . . . Kaneka's dice, the ringing tone's of Kushiel's presence, the Skaldi's return to life. It was enough. He would fight; they would all fight.
It left Imriel to be told. I had not done it yet.
On the first day, I had gone to see him after Kaneka and I had finished. Drucilla had examined him — this time, he had allowed it. He had been beaten with a lash, and there were marks of branding on the