Emperor and Clown (51 page)

Rap
and the goblin bedded down the horses and then were seen no more. The servants
and the duke’s daughters greeted Kade with cries of joy and great relief that
the long suspense was over. The imperor could not possibly have found a
guardian more welcome, nor more efficient. She took charge easily, calming
fears and issuing polite requests that sent men and women running to obey.

Inos
wandered the damp and empty rooms like a ghost, the last of the great army of
unmarried ladies of quality who had come there over the years to find matches
suited to their station. Had her father taken Sagorn’s advice and consulted the
magic casement, she would never have been one of them. She had a heartstopping
vision of herself holding a brownish, widenosed baby with unruly hair ...

No,
that would not have happened, but with his daughter at his side, surely Holindarn
would have recognized his own failing health and taken proper steps to groom
her and ensure her succession? Perhaps not. She had been a wayward, ignorant
child in those days. Foronod and the other jotnar might still have balked at a
juvenile female ruler. They would certainly have vetoed Rap as consort.

“Might
have been” was a useless exercise.

What
would the people say now? Was Foronod still alive? The bishop? Mother Unonini?

On
the following morning, Inos summoned a carriage and went into Kinford to shop.
Hubban clothes would be useless in Krasnegar; none of them would be warm enough
and many would be thought indecent. She bought wools and furs, in simple,
practical styles.

That
afternoon she began to pack a trunk, but for the rest of the day, and for the
two following days, she had little to do except pace the echoing corridors in
an agony of apprehension.

How
dare he desert her like this? A few times she went into the steamy, pungent
stables and yelled, “Rapt Come here at once! I need you.” She tried it in some
others places, also, but it never worked.

The
servants began to look at her oddly.

On
the third day Kade emerged from her bookkeeping waving a guest list she had
prepared for spring. Six months of mourning were plenty, she said brightly, and
the duke might benefit from genteel company. Nonsense! Kade wanted company for
Kade, but Inos saw that Kinvale would soon be its cheerful self again, and her
heart fluttered with fears for its own strength of purpose.

Then
she wondered if Rap had planned this ordeal to test her nerve. That thought
stiffened her will as nothing else could have done-doubting her, was he? How
dare he!

The
third evening arrived with no sign that Rap still existed, or Little Chicken,
either. A full moon rose in the twilight, huge and orange and ominous in the
northeastern sky. Inos shut the drapes on it. She joined Kade in a private
supper made horrible by their nervous efforts to cheer each other up.

But
Inos did not doubt that he would come. Whatever else he was-and she had an
extensive list of his shortcomings on the tip of her tongue at the
moment-Master Rap was a man of his word.

She
retired to her room and dressed for Krasnegar, in a long wool gown of cypress
green. She could expect to find the town cool even indoors, but her thick dress
and thicker underwear felt unbearably hot in Kinvale. She rang for a footman to
rope up her baggage. Then she was ready.

Carrying
a fur coat and thick mitts, and sweltering even in the unheated dankness of the
deserted mansion, she went down to the library to wait. There was a cheerful
fire burning there, and he could find her when he was ready.

As
she opened the door, she heard voices.

The
library was a big room, gracious and comfortable-usually. Tonight it was filled
with shadow and a strange sense of something uncanny that prickled the back of
her neck. White-shrouded furniture made eerie humped shapes like ghosts of
bison. At the far end, by the light of the fire and a single jumping
candleflame, Rap lounged at his ease in a big armchair. Facing him in another
was the goblin.

Automatically
Inos turned to leave. Then she remembered her father saying that no one could
eavesdrop on a sorcerer. She decided she had been summoned, so she stood and
listened, her hand still on the handle.

“
. as queen,” Rap said. “That will be tonight. I’d like a couple of days to see
her settled.”

A
couple of days?

The
goblin grunted and mumbled something at his big fists, which were clenched
together on his knees. “No,” Rap answered. “You can stay here and wait, if you
like. Or come with us. It makes no difference. Just a couple of days, and then
I’ll be ready to keep my promise.”

Inos’s
hands began to shake.

Little
Chicken sat back and stared stonily at Rap. “You tell me now? Tell me what the
big secret is? What you wouldn’t say?”

“I’ll
tell you after we get to Raven Totem. We’ll have time, won’t we? You’ll need a
few days to invite the neighbors to the barbecue.” Rap chuckled at his own
black humor, and shivers ran all over Inos.

“No!”

“No
what, Death Bird?”

“Don’t
want to be Death Bird. Don’t want your promise anymore.”

Inos
thought a silent prayer to the Gods-all the Gods!

“You
must become Death Bird!”

“Don’t
want to kill you.”

“You
must!” Rap sighed. “I suppose I do have to tell you. Remember the witch and the
warlock used foresight on you? They saw your future. You have a destiny, and
now I can see it, too. It’s mind-boggling! There’s no escaping a destiny like
that one.”

“Tell!”

“The
imp with the fancy helmet? Yggingi. He did what no imp had ever done-he attacked
your people in force. He marched through the taiga, looting and burning. The
Impire has never done that before, Little Chicken, never! The legions go where
there’s loot to pay for their upkeep, and the north never had anything worth
looting.”

His
companion laughed, a heavy, brutal noise. “Goblins got mad?”

“Did
they ever!” Rap chuckled softly. “But it was a turning point. The Impire won’t
forget. This time they’ll settle for holding the pass at Pondague and be happy
with that. There will be peace, then-for a while. But the legions never forget
a slight. They will be back!”

“Goblins
don’t forget either. Be ready for them!” Rap rose and turned to stand with his
back to the fire. He did not look at Inos, but of course he must know she was
there. He was telling this to her, also. His face was shadowed, but it wouldn’t
show anything, anyway.

“Yes,
the goblins will be ready for them. The goblins may even move first-I haven’t
bothered to check exactly. But the goblins have got to start preparing soon,
Little Chicken, my friend!”

There
was a thoughtful silence, then the harsh goblin voice said, “Prepare how?”

“You’re
going to need all the men you can get. Warfare is a wasteful business.”

Grunt!
from Little Chicken.

“The
goblins will have to change their ways, and soon, so that those boys can live
and grow up to bear arms. They’ll have to practice archery, and discipline, and
marching. Above all, the tribes must be unified.”

There
was a longer silence, then, before Rap went on, his voice hypnotic in the
shadows. “The goblins need a leader, and that is the destiny that waits for
you, Death Bird. You are the first goblin in years, perhaps the first in all
history, to see the world beyond the taiga. No goblin has ever traveled as you
have. Imps and jotnar and fairies and anthropophagi-you know them, and their
ways. You’ve watched the legions training, you’ve seen their weapons.”

“Others
have been fighting.”

“Throwing
spears from behind trees. We’re talking invasion over the pass now. We’re
talking a goblin kingdom.”

“Won’t
work,” Little Chicken said flatly. “No tattoos! If paint tattoos on me,
Sorcerer, won’t work, either. Are like sailors, goblins ... don’t like sorcery.
Magic tattoos fake!”

“This
is what I’m trying to tell you! You must earn your tattoos. Any man who wants
to change old ways to new ways and make men follow him in new waysthat man has
first got to show that he’s mastered the old ways, so that people will listen.
Not just goblins. That’s true of all races, everywhere. So you must take me
back to Raven Totem as a prisoner. You must win back your honor and earn your
tattoos by putting me to death. You’ve got to make a good show-a fabulous show,
one people will talk about for years, a fabled torturing.”

Inos
fought down dizzying surges of nausea. She wanted to run, she wanted to scream,
and she dared not move at all. She forced herself to listen, rooted by the
sheer cold-blooded horror.

“I
promised you a good show,” Rap added quietly. “And I’ll keep my word. Days and
days. They’ll follow you then! You’ll be chief of Raven Totem in a year. After
that you can start preparing. You’ll have to go slowly, and it’ll take a long,
long time. But one day you’ll lead your nation over the pass and carry the war
to the Impire.”

“Wanting
that?” the goblin demanded, and Inos was wondering the same.

“No,
I don’t, but I have no say in the matter. It’s your destiny, and the way the
world works. It’s as unchangeable as past history. The Gods decide such things,
not me.”

The
goblin squirmed in his chair. “Won’t! Don’t want to kill you, Rap.”

“I
thought I was Flat Nose?”

“Use
any Evil-begotten name you want!” Little Chicken barked, unexpectedly switching
from goblin dialect to impish with a Nordland accent. “You’re my friend now! I
like you, Rap, admire you ... Love you, I suppose! I can see where our ways
were wrong. They’re bad-not just for the victim, but for the whole goblin
culture. I wish it could be stopped. I’ve given up torture, and there is
absolutely no way I’d do those things to a friend! Never!”

Inos
released an audible gasp of relief and wiped her forehead with her sleeve. Her
legs wobbled. The men had not heard her cry out.

“You
must do it!” Rap insisted. Who could resist a sorcerer? “It is your destiny!”

The
goblin snarled something Inos missed, which was probably a nautical obscenity.

“The
Gods have given you a destiny, and I gave you my promise!”

“God
of Pus! Rot my destiny! I give you back your promise ... don’t even talk about
it. You’re making me ill!”

Suddenly
Rap laughed, and Inos marveled that his laughter sounded so familiar to her.
She would have recognized it anywhere, but she could not remember the last time
she had heard Rap laugh.

“You
big dumb green monster!” he said. “For weeks and weeks I tore my heart out to
get one kind word out of you. Now you defy the Gods Themselves for my sake?”

“For
weeks and weeks,” the goblin responded, “I could barely keep my thumbs out of
your eyeballs! The only thing keeping me sane was the thought of all the lovely
things I was going to do with your tripes eventually ... but I’ve reconsidered,
and decided to leave them where they are. For a nongoblin, you’re quite likable
trash, Rap.”

“You
don’t want to be king of the goblins?” Pause . . . “Not on those terms.”

“This
is awful!” Rap said. “The innocent savage has been perverted by the vices of
civilization. But here ... if I’m Rap now, then this must be Flat Nose.”

The
newcomer merged silently from the shadows behind the goblin’s chair, although
Inos was certain there had been no one there a moment earlier. Even so, she had
more warning than Little Chicken, who sniffed suspiciously, looked over his
shoulder, and then hurtled from his chair in a leap that carried him to the far
side of the fireplace. He yelled, “Arrk!” as he went.

There
were two Raps present. The new one was a little shorter and slighter than the
old, garbed in soiled buckskins. His filthy face was marred by a patchy beard.
Inos could guess what he smelled like for she had met that Rap near Pondague in
the spring. He stopped at the edge of the fire rug and just stood, wearing the
same faint good-natured, vacant smile that she saw every day now on Angilki.

“Sorcery!”
the goblin hissed.

“Yes,”
Rap said, studying the apparition. “It’s not a real person-only the Gods can
make those. But it’s close enough for what you need. It will bleed, and writhe,
and near the end it will start to scream. The only words it knows are `Thank
you.’ “

“Evil
sorcery!” Little Chicken advanced a step or two and poked the simulacrum with a
stubby finger. He peered into its unworried eyes.

“Not
evil from my point of view,” Rap said. “Nor yours. There’s no person in there,
Death Bird. It will seem to suffer and die, but there’s no mind, no soul. It’ll
last a long time.”

“I
told you-I don’t approve of torture anymore. Beside, it would be cheating!” He
sounded tempted, though.

“This
is how you can put an end to the custom! You still remember all those wonderful
ideas you had?”

“Yes,”
Little Chicken admitted. .”And I learned some really innovative stuff from
Kalkor.” He sounded almost wistful.

“Then
use them! A historic torment! It’s necessary for your destiny. It’s this or me,
and I’d be grateful if you chose this one. And besides . . . it would probably
be safer. I might get angry.”

Rap
held out a hand. Little Chicken hesitated, then chuckled and took it. Inos was
not quick enough to make out exactly what happened next, but Rap flew over the
goblin’s shoulder and landed on his back with an impact that shook the house.
Little Chicken went down hard on top of him. Inos heard a few brief grunts and
thumps, a small table went over loudly, and then it was the goblin who went
spinning through the air, arching up from the floor like an arrow,, passing
completely over an armchair. He came down heavily, fortunately breaking his
fall on the surrogate Rap, which had been standing immobile through all this,
smiling emptily. Goblin and counterfeit crashed in a heap, and a muffled voice
from underneath said, “Thank you!”