A Sword for Kregen (12 page)

Soon the whole company were gliding and swaying and the music rose and a great sense of well-being filled me that was tinged with the sadness of coming parting.

We danced out from the lantern-lit areas and lightly followed the avenues of rose bushes, dancing under the Moons of Kregen. The feel of Delia in my arms, the scents of the flowers, the intoxicating strains of the music, the sense of a whole city enjoying itself, released the pressures and tensions of the times. And then Delia looked up and gasped.

“Dray — an airboat!”

Instantly my right hand darted to the rapier, for, dance or no dance, no Kregan goes abroad at night unarmed unless he has to.

The airboat landed on a wide terrace before the palace where the dancers and carousers scattered away for her. We heard the startled exclamations and then the laughter and the cheering. We stood, together, close. We saw.

From the voller leaped a tall, powerful, dominating man. He landed lightly and instantly turned to assist a woman to step down, a woman who wore a tiered headdress of intertwined silver flowers that caught the lights and glittered. A monstrous shape rose up from the voller. The watching crowds stopped their laughter and cheering, and they fell back. The monstrous shape leaped to the ground with the liquid lethal grace of a giant hunting beast. Instantly a second appeared and leaped to stand, ferocious, beside the first.

Delia gasped. I held her and then she broke free.

She ran.

She ran along the rose-bowered walk, shouting.

“Drak! Drak! Melow! Kardo!”

She ran to greet her son and I smiled and felt the enormous weight lift from my shoulders.

Those two savage Manhounds of Antares, Melow the Supple and her son, Kardo, had been saved and brought back to Vondium by Drak, Prince Drak of Vallia, Krzy, and I felt the proper pride of a father.

And then I smiled a little smile. For Delia had not called the name of the woman who stood so close to Drak. She had not cried out in welcome to Queen Lushfymi of Lome.

But she would do that, I knew; for in Delia there is no room for pettiness. So I slapped the rapier back into the scabbard and hitched up my belt and started off between the roses to greet my son.

Now affairs in Vondium could take a different turn. Farris would be overjoyed to hand over the burden to Drak so that he could get on with his Air Service. I could take the army and see about winning a few battles secure in the knowledge that Drak was here. The moment we had Vallia in good shape he was going to take over as emperor. My heart was set on that. To hand over now, with all the problems still with us, would not be seemly. But, soon now, soon.

The blueness was at first merely a drifting mist that brushed irritatingly in my eyes.

In a summoning flutter of scarlet and gold, wings beating against the blueness, the Gdoinye flew down. The spy and messenger of the Star Lords cocked his head on one side, his beak insolently agape.

“It is time, Dray Prescot. The Star Lords summon you.”

I felt my body would burst.

“Fool—” I managed to say.

“It is you who is the fool. You have been warned. See how considerate are the Everoinye, how tender of you — we have spoken aforetime—”

“Aye! And I have bidden you begone, bird of ill omen.”

The blueness closed in, thick and choking. The Gdoinye uttered a last mocking squawk. The shape of the phantom Scorpion coalesced, huge and menacing. I caught a last parting fragrance of the Moon Blooms. The ground whirled away. I was falling. The coldness lashed in. The blueness, the swirling movement, the cold — and then the blackness.

Chapter Nine

Pompino

A hard abrasive surface scratched at my stomach and legs. The blueness and the Scorpion of the Star Lords had hurled me somewhere. My arms dangled. I opened my eyes. Light — a familiar opaline wash of radiance — reassured me instantly; the idea that I might have been transported back to Earth had tortured me, held me in a stasis that this simple opening of the eyes dissipated.

I was lying full length on the knobbly branch of a tree, my arms dangling into space, and bright green fronds tumbled about me as I moved. Swinging my legs over I sat up. The tree was not overlarge, and the leaves were very pleasant; but the bark was like emery paper.

How far the woods went on I could not see for trees.

About to jump down to the ground a glint of light off metal caught my eye and I waited, still, scarce breathing. In the direction which, by reason of the moss on the tree trunks, I took to be north, that wink of metal blinked twice more and then vanished. I was wrong about the direction being north, as I subsequently discovered. I waited for five heartbeats and, again, prepared to jump down.

A man walked out from under the trees opposite.

Like me, he was stark naked. Unlike me, apim, he was a diff, a Khibil. His shrewd fierce foxy face turned this way and that. His body was compactly muscled and he bore the white glistening traceries of old scars. A bronzed, fit, tough man, this Khibil, with reddish hair and whiskers, and alert contemptuous eyes. He bent and picked up a stout length of wood, a branch as thick as his arm, which he tested for strength before he would accept it into his armory.

At this I frowned.

He looked all about him and then padded off between the trees, going silently and swiftly like a stalking chavonth.

My business, I thought, could not concern him. He was in no immediate danger and, anyway, apart from being naked and weaponless, looked as though he could defend himself.

A cry spurted up from the trees to my rear and I swiveled about. Just beyond the end of the branch on which I sat bowered in leaves, and running to fall on the grass, a young Fristle fifi yelled and blubbered. The Fristle who was hitting her with a slender length of switch wore a brown overall-like garment, and his whiskers jutted stiffly. His gray-furred arm lifted and fell and the switch bit into the fifi’s gray fur.

The branch bore my weight almost to the end. Then it broke with a loud crack. I jumped. I fell full on the Fristle. We both collapsed onto the grass.

He came at me raging, slicing his switch. I took it away and clipped him beside the ear and he fell down. He lay sprawled, and his whiskers drooped most forlornly.

Instantly the little Fristle fifi was on her knees at his side, wailing and crying.

“Father! Father! Speak to me!” She shook him, and pulled him to her. Then she sprang to her feet. Like a flying tarantula she was on me, striking and scratching, shrieking.

“You beast! You rast! My poor father — a great naked hairy apim — monster! Beast!”

I held her off. I felt foolish.

“Your father?”

She was sobbing in my grasp.

“We are poor wood cutters. I broke the jar with poor father’s tea.” She tried to bite my finger. “It was ron
[3]
sengjin tea. He beat me for it.”

“Tea,” I said. I shook my head. “Ron sengjin. A broken jar and a father’s chastisement.”

She broke free, for I could not bear to hold her, and she dropped to her knees and took her father’s head into her hands, crooning over him. Presently he opened his eyes and stared vacantly upward. I put down my hand and hauled him to his feet. He stood, groggily, shaking his head. I feel sure the Bells of Beng Kishi were clanging in there well enough.

“You fell on me from the sky, apim.”

“I owe you an apology — but the switch was too severe a punishment for the crime.”

“You fell on me.” His eyes rolled. “From the sky.”

A blaze of scarlet and gold flew down between us. The Gdoinye passed right before the staring eyes of the Fristle and his daughter. The cat-faced man and girl saw nothing of that impudent bird. He perched on a tree and he squawked at me.

“From the sky,” said the Fristle. He swallowed. “A great naked hairy apim. Fell on me.”

The Gdoinye squawked again and ruffled a wing.

Knowing when to make myself scarce I left the Fristles to it. The father might have lost his tea; I fancied he had learned a little lesson, also.

“Remberee,” I shouted back. And I plunged into the blue shadows of the trees.

With that curious little incident, over which many a man would have grown rosy red in the remembrance, to point me on to my duty for the Star Lords, I ran out from under the far trees and so looked down on my real work here.

And yet, even as I plunged on down the slope, I could not feel fully convinced. The horizon lifted mellowly from a patchwork of fields and woods, threaded by watercourses, and the glittering roofs and spires of a town showed less than a dwabur off. The air held that fragrant freshness of Kregen. I breathed deeply as I skipped down the slope into action. The length of wood I had snatched up would serve to crack a few skulls.

And yet, as I say, I was not fully convinced.

* * * *

An ornate blue and gold carriage drawn by six krahniks was being besieged by a band of Ochs. The offside front wheel of the carriage jutted awkwardly from under the swingle tree, indication that the axle had broken. The krahniks stood, russet red and placid in their harness, chewing at the grass. Half a dozen Ochs were busily attempting to cut the traces and make off with the animals.

Half a dozen more were banging spears on the wooden panels of the carriage and yelling. A big Rapa was running about, his beaked vulturine face desperate, trying to fend the Ochs off. Another Rapa lay in the grass. He was not dead, for his crest kept quivering as he tried to haul himself up, only for an Och to give him a sly thwack and so stretch him out again. Now Ochs are small folk little above four feet tall with lemon-shaped heads with puffy jaws and lolling chops. They have six limbs and use the central pair indiscriminately as arms or legs. Usually, they prefer to work in as large a body as they can, numbers giving them strength.

The rest of the group, about ten or so, were all yelling and jumping about and trying to attack the naked Khibil. He was laying about with his length of wood, knocking Ochs over, sending them flying, whirling them away. It was all a crazy little pandemonium. I ran down, debating.

Often I have had to make up my mind just who the Star Lords wanted rescued. Was this Khibil in need of assistance? Or was he the aggressor and the Ochs required for the mysterious purposes of the Everoinye?

The Gdoinye, who had acted in so strange a manner, left me in no doubt.

He flew on before me and swooped at the Ochs banging on the coach. They could not see him. So I ran on down and stretched that group of Ochs out and turned to give the Khibil a hand.

There were only three left by then and they ran off as I turned on them. The rest left the krahniks and ran off, also, squeaking, their spindly legs flashing.

The Khibil swelled his massive chest and regarded me.

He held his length of wood cocked over his right shoulder. Deliberately, I allowed my length of wood to drop.

“Llahal, dom,” I said cheerfully.

For a moment he hesitated, and I fancied he was fighting the inherent feelings of superiority some Khibils never master. Then: “Llahal, apim. You were just in time to assist me in seeing this rabble of Ochs off — they are not worth pursuit.”

“Probably.”

A noise echoed inside the carriage and I heard a whisper, quick and fervent. I moved slowly sideways so as to get a view of Khibil and coach together. The Khibil lowered his length of wood. Whatever the obi might be hereabouts it evidently did not include the immediate giving and receiving of a challenge it held in other parts of Kregen. I, of course, had no idea where I was. That I was on Kregen was the extent of my knowledge. The two suns were in the sky, and they were high in the meridian, and they did not jibe with my moss-and-tree deduction of the direction of north.

The Khibil shared my curiosity.

He said, “Tell me, dom, where are we?”

Before I could answer, a sharp female voice from the coach window spat out: “Why, you knave, in Kov Pastic’s province, of course, and if you don’t put your clothes on at once I will have the kov’s guard arrest you the moment we reach Gertinlad.”

The Khibil and I stared at each other for a space. His reddish whiskers twitched. I thought of the Fristle on whom I had dropped from the sky. I thought of the occasion when I had given a helping hand to Marta Renberg, the Kovneva of Aduimbrev, with her luxurious coach that fell by the way. And, too, I thought of an earlier occasion when I had been transmitted to Kregen by the Star Lords to assist Djang girls against Och slavers. The two instances were strangely mingled here. Again that sense of machination troubled me, and by machination I mean wheels within wheels and not the ordinary interference in my life by the Everoinye. So the Khibil’s whiskers twitched. The woman in the coach was still screaming about our nakedness and her friend the kov. The Khibil was the first to laugh.

And I, Dray Prescot, who had learned to laugh muchly of late in odd ways, I, too, laughed. The Khibil recovered first.

With the length of wood held just so, he approached the carriage. He spoke up; but the note in his voice was of a fine free scorn tempered by social observance.

“Llahal, lady. We have no clothes. They were stolen by these rascally Ochs. But we have saved your life.”

The woman was hidden from me by the jut of window; I could see her hand, thin and white, on which at least five rings glittered. Her voice continued in its shrill shriek.

“Onron! Give these two paktuns clothes! Bratch!”

The Rapa who had been running about, the one with the red feathers in whirlicues about his eyes and beak, went to the trunk fastened to the back of the coach and, presently, the Khibil and I were arrayed in gray trousers and blue shirts. I was beginning to have an idea of where I was, and not caring for it over much.

“See to the wheel,” said the lady, and the window shutter went up with a clatter. A mumble of conversation began within the coach.

I looked at the Khibil, prepared to get on with fixing the axle, for I conceived that the Everoinye wished this hoity-toity madam in the coach preserved for posterity. If she was anything like the couple I had saved in the inner sea she might pup a son who would topple empires.