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was attending Jagun, solicitously filling the Tatar’s cup. I gave thanks to Blessed Elua that the Kereyit warlord’s attention was fixed on the offering-ceremony. Joscelin, unobtrusive, hovered a few paces away, a thing none of the Tatars had noticed. It was a small thing in which to discern that the hand of Elua was guiding us, but it was all I had.
    How long would it take, before the effects of the opium became evident? An hour, mayhap longer. No one knew for sure. Drucilla had calculated it to the best of her ability, but there was no telling. The drug was diluted, and some drank more than others.
    And some less. The glowering Tahmuras, for one.
    I wondered when the vahmyâcam would begin.
    Anywhere else, this would be a sacred rite, with all the attendant solemnities. It did not mean in Daršanga what it meant elsewhere. This profane revelry, held in a desecrated temple-in Angra Mainyu’s worship, it was ritual. Not all who were there knew, or cared. It didn’t matter. The Âka-Magi knew, and their acolytes. The Mahrkagir knew. And I knew it.
    And the god ... Blessed Elua, the god himself knew it. Living under that dark, ravening presence , I had grown half-used to it. I felt it anew that night. Spring had come to Daršanga, and the offering approached the altar. Angra Mainyu was roused, the bottomless maw of hunger yawning open, eager to devour the world. When I blinked, I saw the walls of Daršanga running red with blood. It was in the faces of the men, keen and wolf-like. It was in the mad, beautiful eyes of the Mahrkagir, in the loving smile he bent upon me. It was in the air we breathed, heavy as thunder.
    Kill ... die ... destroy .
    Blessed Elua, I prayed in the silence of my heart, hold us safe in your hand.
    “Shahryar Mahrkagir,” murmured Gashtaham, bending his head in obeisance. “Angra Mainyu’s will is manifest. May we begin the vahmyâcam?”
    “Yes!” The Mahrkagir laughed, happy and excited as a boy at his natal festivities. “Go on, Gashtaham, get on with it! I am eager for my gift.”
    “So be it.” The priest glanced at me, his smile hidden in shadows. “You look very beautiful tonight, my lady.”
    “You are kind.” I forced the words through frozen lips. Let him know I was afraid; it didn’t matter. Everyone was afraid, in the zenana . I had lived in fear since Nineveh. I couldn’t remember what it was like to be without it, except in the Mahrkagir’s bed. And that was worse.
    Bowing to his lord, Gashtaham walked the aisle and mounted the dais, the other Âka-Magi falling in beside him, bearing shrouded burdens in their arms. There were a dozen, all told. The sullen torchlight flickered on their polished boar’s-skull helms, the black robes, the finger-bone girdles. Daeva Gashtaham raised his arms, the ebony staff in his left hand.
    In the festal hall, silence fell like a hammer.
    “Angra Mainyu,” he said, and his voice whispered in every corner of the hall, “we stand before you to profess our faith. Of this world we are created, and in death we are reborn in your name. The works of Ahura Mazda, we abjure! His livestock, we starve and slaughter; his earth, we salt and render barren. We embrace darkness and the lie, abhorring all truths. Your three-fold path, we walk in faith: Ill thoughts, ill words, ill deeds. Let your presence among us be made manifest, and your will spread, until the hearts of all mankind seek only destruction, and brother turns upon brother, and all is laid waste.”
    There was power in his words, terrible power. And I, who sat next to the smiling source of it, shivered until the bangles on my wrist tinkled sweetly and I had to grip my hands together in my lap to halt it.
    “Come.” Gashtaham beckoned. “Let those who have made the vahmyâcam and served their apprenticeship come forth to receive their reward.”
    Nine men came forward, some clad in armor, some in common garb, each with a girdle of finger-bones about his waist. One by one, they knelt before the dais and unknotted their girdles, laying them before them. I saw Arshaka, the old Head Magus, weeping with horror at the side of the dais. As each man approached, the Âka-Magi tended him. Two sheared his hair, letting it fall in careless handfuls. One eased a black robe over his shoulders, and another tied the finger-bone girdle about it. A fifth placed a hollowed boar’s-skull helm over his shorn head, and one last bowed, handing the new Âka-Magus an ebony rod, topped with a gleaming