Chapter one

Near Kylakapec, Tlaxaca

 

They had dipped him in what looked like tar and then handed him a potion. He had no idea who they were – he’d never seen any northerners before and they spoke a language that he didn’t understand. He’d always been proud that he knew many words in the common tongue of humans but he couldn’t understand any of these. It was clear that they were witches, though, and his captain had happily let them do those things to him; possibly because he was terrified.

He had been trained to be a spy and an assassin; a sneak and murderer, but they all called him Thief. The Tlaxacans needed lots of spies, as they valued stealth and the tainted blade over ordinary combat. The thief had never doubted the need for any of this, as he had been born and raised within the warrior caste – he rejoiced in fighting for Yellowcloak, his god and his master – and some warriors must spy and steal so that the battle could be fought on their terms and not the enemy’s. He had learned that from the very beginning of his training, in the nursery, years before. 

After that, his captain took him to a priest who led him in great haste to a strange tall round building in the centre of Kylakapec, close to the god’s temple. The priest knelt in front of the tower and chanted words that the thief recognised as the magic language of the god. He was in awe – he’d never heard it spoken outside the temple before.

A high stone door swung open in the building and the priest prodded him to enter. Inside there were steps leading up to a first floor platform. On the platform stood another man, dressed in even more spectacular robes and wearing the yellow crown of the High Priest. At the top of the stairs the thief fell to his knees: weeping and praying. The High Priest stared down at him. 

‘Get up!’ he spat, ‘I don’t have time for that nonsense’

The thief forced himself to his feet.

‘Are you the one they call “The Master Thief”?’ the High Priest asked him.

The thief nodded, too terrified to speak.

‘And you can read?’

He nodded again.  

‘Can you interpret a map?’

He made a noise that started off life as a ‘yes’ but died at birth. The High Priest didn’t seem to care.

‘Good – I had heard that you showed some skills in the written word. That is excellent’

The yellow folds of the High Priest’s cloak wrapped round the priest’s body like petals on a human flower; the thief found the rustling of the fabric fascinating. It calmed him and made him listen particularly intently to what the holy man was saying. 

‘Take this map.’

He took the rolled piece of parchment that the holy man handed to him. He unrolled it and stared at it. It showed a path through a labyrinth, with the ways marked in yellow chalk. It reeked of the god, strong and rarefied; so like the sweet stink of tainted rotting flesh.

‘What is this?’ he forced himself to ask. The High Priest’s voice swelled in response. It was almost music  

‘It is one of the god’s maps; it is the map given to him to allow him to reach the centre of the temple at Tlaxapec and so visit the Wisest One’

‘Our Lord Greycloak?’ the thief whispered, reverently.

‘Indeed, he...’

‘I can’t...’ began the thief.

The holy one shook his head.

‘Yes, you can and you must’

‘But what must I do?’

The High Priest took a step to one side and revealed a yellow circle on the ground ,glowing with light. It was large enough for one human-sized figure to stand on it.

‘I want you to stand on this circle and it will take you, instantly, to the entrance of the Wise One’s pyramid. Then you must follow the instructions on the map and penetrate to the centre of the labyrinth’  

 ‘But... why? Is that not only fitting for the gods?’

The High Priest frowned.

‘Perhaps, but our lord requires you to do it; to manoeuver through the labyrinth and report what you find’

‘But I will be discovered...’

The holy one half-smiled. It was not an expression that suited him.

‘That is why we have had out northern friends dip you in the Dew of Anonymity; and why they have also given you a draught of invisibility. The combination of those two things will make you as insubstantial as a puff of wind’

‘Are you certain, my lord?’

‘Yes, but you must hurry. The enchantments will only last for five hours and you must return before they wear off. You will need to memorise the map, as after you become invisible you will not be able to read it again.’

‘My memory is said to be excellent, my lord’

The High Priest narrowed his eyes.

‘Unsurpassed, I am told. That is why you were chosen’

The thief was still baffled.    

‘But what is it you want me to find out?’

The High Priest sighed.

‘Just report what you see; that is all, do not think about it – and do not get caught. Return as soon as you start to become visible. Now... hurry!’

The thief stepped on to the yellow circle.

 

There was a brief pop in the air and then he was somewhere else – in a grey featureless room with four corridors running from it. The air was lit dimly from unseen sources – he didn’t have time to worry about that.

He studied the map intently for a few seconds and committed it to his memory.  Then he drank the magical draught, as instructed. A few seconds later he was invisible.

He ran down the left hand passageway. Now he was in the maze; corridors and rooms came at him as he ran. He chose first left, a corridor on the right, then second right; beyond that a chamber, with a frieze of dragons on it.  He stopped for a second to get his breath back.  He had seen dragons in the sky over his home city – high up in the heavens, symbols of scared power; but these seemed different. Here, someone had painted them golden and their eyes were grey.  He turned around. There was a sliding cover on a secret door beneath a recumbent dragon and then a long corridor that led into another chamber. This one had clearly once been adorned with red flames, but now, once again, they had been painted over so that the flames were pale as milk. Beyond this room there were multiple ways. He stopped to think: third of four, fifth of seven, first of three. The passageway opened out again. Here was a room with a high ceiling. It seemed to have originally been painted sky blue, but now it was covered with grey clouds, obscuring most of the original rendering. He thought that he heard a sound somewhere in front of him. He waited for a moment and then proceeded more slowly, stopping to listen every few steps. He was close to the end now – second right and then through a hallway that might once have depicted a naval battle but now just appeared, in his brief glances, to show a shipping fleet.  From then on there was a straight passageway leading, according to the memorised map, to the centre of the pyramid. There was one more chamber, to his left, which showed strange squat brown figures rising from a newly painted sea. He hurried on.

A grey cowled figure was sitting on a wooden chair at the end of this last corridor. He started, as if he had been asleep, and then jumped up. It was clear that, despite the enchantments laid upon him, this creature could see, or perhaps sense, him.  

‘He’s long gone, I’m afraid’ murmured the figure, standing up with a stiff bend of his limbs. He seemed misshapen – as if his limbs had outgrown his body.

‘Who are you’ asked the thief

‘I am a follower of the Grey Wanderer’

‘A priest?’ asked the thief

‘Perhaps... I’m not sure though that that is quite the right word’

‘Are there many of you?’

‘Priests? Well, I’m not sure. I think perhaps two – me and one other who lives elsewhere’

‘Only two?’ asked the thief, astonished, ‘to serve the Wise One who Leads Us All?’

The grey creature laughed.

‘It’s not much of a religion...and my lord no longer answers to that title. He has wandered far and learned many things. He has come to the fork in the road and he has taken the second way...’

‘But the many priests who were here before – the myriads that worshipped the Imperial Deity, what happened to them?’

‘A wanderer needs no priests – he sent them away. Only I remain... as caretaker, if you like...’

The thief had no idea what this could mean and so he concentrated on something that he could understand.

 ‘Why do you speak to me in the common tongue? Is Tlaxacan not your native language?’

The grey figure pushed back the hood of his cloak. The face and head beneath it were misshapen, with a long jaw and a huge blobby nose. His eyes were intensely grey.

‘You’re of the kinaam’ blurted out the human thief.

The grey priest shook his head.

‘No, I am not, but I am made of the same materials; but there is no bloodline leading from them to me...’

Once again the thief had no idea what this meant, so he waited, hoping that things would start to make sense.

‘We have agreed that we will speak the language of the north as it carries no stigma. We will not speak the language of the slavers’

‘Slavers?’

‘Yes – those who hold our cousins in bondage’

Dread leapt up at the thief – this was no ally, this was almost certainly an enemy. The labyrinth seemed cold and dank – it did not feel like a place where a god might live.

‘Are you going to kill me?’ he asked

The grey figure pulled up his hood so that it covered his face again.

‘No, of course not – we do not kill. It is not me you should fear’ he said, ‘it is your masters’

‘How can that be?’

The priest spoke more loudly and more slowly.

‘The dew will kill you; it is very toxic. It is only intended to be used once...’

‘What?’

‘Your priests have doomed you...’

‘No...’

‘Sadly, it is true. The dew dissolves away a soul in six hours; in order to make you seem as nothing they have to turn you into nothing. It is necromancy – perhaps even fouler than a taint’

The thief’s heart began to thump loudly in his chest, but no-one could hear it. His throat was dry but he could not cough. It was clearly true – he was fading away.

‘No...’ he cried out loudly, but he was not speaking either; the priest could read his mind somehow. He had been cruelly misled.

‘What can I do?’ he moaned, wondering how much time had passed, and  how much longer he had. The priest came forward and stood in front of him. His voice dropped to a hum.  

‘You can help me, poor pilgrim’

The thief was desperate. He imagined how long his few hours could be made to last; his very last hours. His voice became a savage mix of hatred and despair.

‘What are you talking about – you’re the last person I would help, dying or not... and I’m a thief not an ‘pilgrim’.

The strange angular face behind the grey cowl smiled sadly.

‘Well, none of that is true, my friend. We are all pilgrims and I am almost certain that you will help me ‘

All that the spy wanted to was to run, run perhaps to a river or a pond and try to wash the deadly tar off his body. He sobbed.

‘Why... why are you so certain?’

The grey creature slid his hand into his voluminous pockets. He pulled out a vial of brown liquid; it shimmered in the darkness with a reddish inner light. His voice was finely edged with laughter.

‘Why am I so certain?’ he answered, ‘Because I can heal you’