Arkanith

Arkanith is the Grand Moerend, supreme prelate of the Moerend death cult, and the last holder of that office in Usmai. In Days of Shattered Faith he functions as the series' principal religious antagonist: a man whose public manner is that of a weary civil servant and whose private conviction is that of a mad fanatic, devoted to the resurrection of the old Imperial necromantic order through the body of a single child. He enters the story as a fixture of the Alkhand's household, a figure of bureaucratic nuisance demanding sinecures for his followers, and exits as a dying man on a crypt floor, his life's work shattered by a Palleseen soldier with a modified baton. Between those poles he crowns a usurper, grooms a prince toward a ritual suicide, performs a centuries-spanning necromantic working beneath the House of Hard Angles, and proclaims before his death that the first new Necromancer-Emperor in a thousand years is about to reclaim his rights.

His significance to the book's architecture is twofold. He is the mechanism by which Premath, the forgotten third son of Alkhand Oparan, is shaped into a sacramental corpse-the engine of the novel's central necromantic plot-and he is the institutional face of the Moru faith's entanglement with Usmani kingship, a entanglement that gives him leverage over every Alkhand from the moment of coronation. His death and the killing of his remaining monks extinguish the old Imperial death cult in Usmai outright, closing a thread that the book has traced back to the fall of the Empire itself.

Character

Appearance

Arkanith is bald and cadaverous, described by the narrator in one passage as "the cadaverous bald man" who arrives at a coronation wearing "a lot of skull-looking regalia" - Days of Shattered Faith, ch 17. His expression is characterized as a grin that never reaches warmth: he grins, but mirthlessly - ch 5. He is old enough that his branch of the cult is described in its final chapter as "a whole withering branch of the cult, at its very last ebb" - ch 44.

Personality

Arkanith presents "the public disposition of a civil servant and the hidden heart of a mad fanatic" - ch 5. In the formal machinery of court he is a supplicant who comes to press demands for money, sinecures, and public positions, who bows and retreats before a Palleseen broker, and who delivers addresses in an ancient ceremonial tongue with a younger man translating - ch 18, ch 39. Strip away that decorum and what remains is a man who addresses the corpse of a beloved student as a successful transaction-"His ledger in the next world shall be credited appropriately"-and who mocks the very idea that his enterprise requires public support - ch 25, ch 44. He shows no deference to the sovereign who holds the power of life and death over him, reframing a prince's starvation-and-poisoning as a pious election rather than a failure of guardianship - ch 25. He is, in the narrator's final summation, a man who took a "kid nobody had a use for" and loved him enough to murder him for a god - ch 44.

Beliefs & Motivations

Arkanith's theology is Moeribandi: a death-cult discipline in which the faithful "walk the path to death at their own pace" and progress through "stages of existence" judged by gods who keep ledgers - ch 25. Premath's ingestion of toxic sacramental face-paint, daubing his own face into a Moerend skull before a mirror, is not tragedy to Arkanith but a completed rite - ch 25.

His "greater kingdom" is the restoration of the old Imperial necromantic order: the raising of a new Necromancer-Emperor, carried to the doors of the Necropolis, where "the Imperial Family shall adopt him" and he shall "reclaim his rights" - ch 44. He does not seek political power in the Usmani court for its own sake; his demands of Gorbudan are the mundane maintenance of a cult whose true object lies beneath the House of Hard Angles, in a sarcophagus surrounded by a thousand trapped ghosts he has been feeding for years - ch 18, ch 29. He speaks Old Morib, the ancient Imperial tongue, which by the book's present survives only in religious rite - ch 39.

Affiliations

- Moerends - grand moerend

History

Days of Shattered Faith

The Duel with Tarcomir (ch 1-5)

Arkanith is the Grand Moerend, head of the death cult, and appears in the chapter's survey of the Alkhand's household and the political situation in Alkhalend. He is described as grinning and mirthless, possessing "the public disposition of a civil servant and the hidden heart of a mad fanatic" - ch 5. He is the mentor and favourite preceptor of Premath, the third son of Oparan, whom Arkanith has renamed from Premaran and immersed in Moeribandi death-cult theology. Arkanith's ambitions for Premath are explicitly not dynastic: his plans "have nothing to do with inheriting the throne and everything to do with a greater kingdom" - ch 5. What that greater kingdom entails is not stated in this passage, though the narrator frames Arkanith's instruction as grooming Premath for something other than kingship - ch 5. - implied: Arkanith's "greater kingdom" is later revealed in this same book to be the raising of a new Necromancer-Emperor - ch 44.

Gorbudan on the Mirror Throne (ch 17-19)

Seven days before the chapter's present, Arkanith officiated the coronation of Gorbudan as Alkhand at the pools halfway up the waterfall cliffs outside Alkhalend, a ceremony attended by Kakrops and the Usrani. Arkanith is recalled as "the cadaverous bald man" who "turned up with a lot of skull-looking regalia and rushed through the formalities"; the narrator adds that "Nobody had really got into the festive spirit" - ch 17.

Four days later, at the Mirror Throne in the House of Tranquillity, Arkanith follows Follo to press demands for money, sinecures, and public positions for his Moerend followers of the Moru faith. Gorbudan capitulates, aware he is distributing offices already promised to others, and resolves internally that his only long-term solution is to expand Usmai's wealth by force - ch 18. The crowning rite itself gives Arkanith leverage: the Moru faith traditions of kingship require a Moerend priest at every high ceremony, and Arkanith holds that rite exclusively - ch 18.

When Gorbudan visits Premath's chambers and considers letting the third son join the priesthood to win Arkanith's credit, he rejects the idea, fearing a living brother backed by the cult could be seized by enemies - ch 18. Whether Arkanith is scheming to place a Moerend-backed candidate on the Mirror Throne using Premath as a figurehead is not resolved here - ch 18.

Following the Alkhand's departure from the palace, Arkanith and his Moerends occupy a small wing; Enshili steals paint pots - antimony, lead, white, black, marked with the dead Moeribandi alphabet - from that wing and passes them through a ventilation shaft to Premath before fleeing Alkhalend - ch 19.

Dekamran's Escape to Peor (ch 20-21)

During his seven-day imprisonment in the House of Hard Angles, Dekamran names Arkanith and the Moerends in a bitter fantasy of revenge, listing them among those who struck the deal with Gorbudan and profited from the usurpation - ch 20.

The Killing of Kakrops (ch 24-26)

At dawn the morning of the night assault, Gorbudan discovers Premath's corpse in a room of morbid curiosities: the third son has starved himself, then ingested toxic sacramental face-paint - lead, antimony, and other toxic ingredients - daubing his face into a Moerend skull before a mirror. The body has been dead since dusk the previous evening. Enraged and guilty, Gorbudan demands Arkanith be brought before him: "Get me the Grand Moerend, he spat. Get me Arkanith. Haul him from his bed. From his tomb if you have to" - ch 25.

Before the corpse, Gorbudan accuses Arkanith of filling Premath's head with a "necrotic creed" and causing his death. Arkanith denies responsibility and reframes the suicide as a faithful act: "It is the right of the faithful to walk the path to death at their own pace. Your brother has elected to progress to the next stage of his existence according to prescribed means approved of by the judging gods, for one who is a scion of a royal house. His ledger in the next world shall be credited appropriately" - ch 25. He adds: "Your brother chose his end and went about it the proper way. It is to be celebrated" - ch 25. Gorbudan nearly draws his sword on Arkanith for sacrilege but is interrupted by messengers reporting Dekamran's night assault. Gorbudan orders Arkanith confined under guard, hoping the old man will also face "a final judgment" - ch 25. - implied: Gorbudan's hope that Arkanith will face "a final judgment" is not realised by the assault itself; Arkanith's fate is settled elsewhere in the book - ch 44.

Drathel's Operations in Alkhalend (ch 29-31)

Months after the death of Kakrops and the installation of Dekamran on the Mirror Throne, Drathel inspects the House of Hard Angles and is shown its crypt by the Under-warden: a single sarcophagus at the building's heart, surrounded by a thousand trapped ghosts that have been passively charging the structure over centuries. Arkanith has been entering the crypt, lighting candles, and performing prayers over the trapped host as part of an ongoing necromantic working - ch 29. Drathel assesses the ritual as unlikely to succeed but notes that something of "utterly surpassing dodginess" is occurring under the Alkhand's nose, and that the original Imperial occupant of the tomb never arrived, leaving the necromantic architecture unfulfilled but still functional - ch 29. - implied: Arkanith's working here is the same ritual that culminates in ch 44; whether it can actually succeed is the question Drathel poses but does not answer at this point - ch 29.

Wattery's Contracts and the Occupation of the Palace (ch 38-40)

Arkanith appears briefly before the Palleseen audience with Alkhand Dekamran. He comes to the House of Tranquillity to pay respects to Sage-Broker Berkely and delivers a formal address in Old Morib, "the ancient Imperial tongue," now used only in religious rite. A younger Moerend translates the speech into Pel. Drathel supplies Berkely a three-layer intelligence assessment of the Moerends: civic religion, useful bureaucracy, and a hidden necromantic inner cult. Arkanith bows and retreats - ch 39.

Gil's Arrest and the Destruction of the House of Hard Angles (ch 41-45)

Arkanith's final appearance is in the crypt of the House of Hard Angles, where his long-running ritual has reached its culmination. Three unnamed old monks, "a whole withering branch of the cult, at its very last ebb," chant alongside him over Premath's preserved corpse, which lies in a death-imagery coffin at the crypt's heart, accumulating the power Arkanith channels. Arkanith has been a "second father" to Premath, "the kid nobody had a use for," and has groomed him toward a sacred necromantic death - ch 44.

Drathel, entering the House for what she suspects is her final visit, descends past the chanting monks to observe the working. Arkanith detects her; she steps out and confronts him, mocking his plan. Arkanith declares: "I do not need their rallying. Do you think Death cares for popular acclaim? Premath was chosen. A child born to death. I will take him to the doors of the Necropolis. I shall knock, and they shall open. The Imperial Family shall adopt him. The first new Necromancer-Emperor in a thousand years, ready to reclaim his rights" - ch 44.

He lunges at her. Drathel shoots him with a modified baton, insulated to function inside the House where standard batons fail, hitting him under the collarbone. The three monks rush her; she kills two with one rod's tablethi charge and the third with a second. Arkanith is left dying on the crypt floor - ch 44.

As he dies, Drathel shows him the bandoliers of uncharged tablethi she intends to use to harvest the accumulated power from Premath's corpse: "You had to show people the error of their ways. It was practically Pal doctrine" - ch 44. She tells him: "I'm sorry to be the one that breaks this to you, but nobody wants an empire of necromancers back. Probably not even actual necromancers, honestly. Not the ones I've met. I've read up on it. It sounds like a terrible idea" - ch 44. Arkanith is the last Grand Moerend of the old Imperial death cult in Usmai; with his death and the killing of his monks, the cult is extinguished in Usmai - ch 44. - implied: Arkanith's plan for Premath - raising him as a new Necromancer-Emperor to open the Necropolis - is answered in full here: to carry the corpse to the Necropolis's doors and claim the throne of the old Empire - ch 44. - implied: The "lesser Moerends" who know the House's secret are now leaderless; the book does not specify their subsequent fate - ch 44.

Relationships

- Premath - Arkanith is Premath's mentor, guardian, and "second father," the man who took the forgotten third son of Alkhand Oparan, renamed him from Premaran, and immersed him in Moeribandi theology - ch 5, ch 44. His ambition for the boy is explicitly non-dynastic: "a greater kingdom" that is the Necropolis and the Imperial adoption it promises - ch 5, ch 44. After Premath's ritual suicide, Arkanith tends the preserved corpse in the crypt of the House of Hard Angles for months, accumulating necromantic power over it until Drathel ends him - ch 29, ch 44.

- Gorbudan - Arkanith crowns Gorbudan as Alkhand at the waterfall pools, then uses the Moru faith's requirement of a Moerend priest at every high ceremony as permanent leverage, extracting sinecures and positions for his followers - ch 17, ch 18. When Gorbudan confronts him over Premath's death, Arkanith refuses to show deference, and Gorbudan orders him confined under guard with the hope of "a final judgment" - ch 25.

- Drathel - Their sole interaction is adversarial and fatal. Drathel descends into the House of Hard Angles' crypt, Arkanith detects her, they exchange words in which she mocks his plan and he lunges at her, and she shoots him under the collarbone with a modified baton, leaving him to die on the crypt floor while she prepares to harvest the power his working has stored in Premath's corpse - ch 44.

- Sage-Broker Berkely - Arkanith comes to the House of Tranquillity to pay respects to the new Palleseen authority, delivering a formal address in Old Morib and bowing out-a brief act of institutional self-preservation that Drathel reads as evidence of the cult's hidden necromantic layer beneath its bureaucratic surface - ch 39.

Notable Quotes

"It is the right of the faithful to walk the path to death at their own pace. Your brother has elected to progress to the next stage of his existence according to prescribed means approved of by the judging gods, for one who is a scion of a royal house. His ledger in the next world shall be credited appropriately." - Arkanith, Days of Shattered Faith, ch 25

"I do not need their rallying. Do you think Death cares for popular acclaim? Premath was chosen. A child born to death. I will take him to the doors of the Necropolis. I shall knock, and they shall open. The Imperial Family shall adopt him. The first new Necromancer-Emperor in a thousand years, ready to reclaim his rights." - Arkanith, Days of Shattered Faith, ch 44

Tags

1. grand-moerend · #death-cult · #necromantic · #priest