Renegade of Kregen (17 page)

I took my hand away.

He dragged in a harsh breath. His eyes were bloodshot.

"Aye, Gadak of the Green! You argue well and shrewdly. Yet you do nothing to escape. I begin to think you really love these zigging Grodnims. You wish to stay with them forever. I do not think—"

"No, Duhrra, you do not think."

"Duh — I do, so!"

I shook my head. I know I wore that old evil expression on my face in the moons-glow, for he flinched back.

"I do not intend to escape, meekly run away, like a cur with its tail between its legs. When I go, I go in style, in a way all men may see, and say — ’That was a Zairian!’"

"Fine words."

"Aye."

He still did not know what to make of me. Of late I had been your true dyed-in-the-wool Grodnim. The religious observances that amused me had been dealt with faithfully. I think that Duhrra did doubt me then. And he had every right so to doubt, for I doubted myself.

All my life I have been a loner. With the exception of my Delia I have never revealed myself. And yet I have good friends, as you know. Seg Segutorio and Inch — great men, fine blade comrades, true friends. And there were others you have heard me speak of — Hap Loder, Gloag, Prince Varden Wanek, Kytun Kholin Dom, and Ortyg Fellin Coper. And there were my friends who lived in Esser Rarioch: Turko the Shield, Balass the Hawk, Naghan the Gnat. And I included here Tilly and Oby. There were others of whom you know. There was most particularly here in the Eye of the World Mayfwy of Felteraz. How could I face them with the knowledge I bore? I do not make friends easily. When I do make a friend I tremble lest I destroy that friendship through one of my typical, stupid tearaway actions.

Not for me the easy assumption that friends remain friends no matter what atrocities I commit.

How would Rees and Chido regard me? They were of Hamal, the empire ruled by mad Queen Thyllis, and were deadly foemen to Vallia. Yet during my days as a spy in Ruathytu, capital of Hamal, I had found true friendship with Rees, Trylon of the Golden Wind, and with chuckling, chinless, pop-eyed Chido, a courtesy amak. I had been tortured by the decisions forced on me, the honest attempt to rationalize the friendship I felt for Rees and Chido and the numbing knowledge that our countries fought and hated each other.

Duhrra punctured my problems with a new brashness owing much to dopa.

"So, Gadak the Great Planner. When is this to be?"

"As soon as the right opportunity offers." I did not smile at his words. But this was much more like it — much more a cheerful companion, this Duhrra who chided me for my lapses from grace, my omission of good works. That to him these good works could exist only in labor for the Red of Zair meant only his vision was scaled to the Eye of the World. Maybe I had been slack of late. But, despite all, for me, still, it was Red and not Green. The conflict in the Eye of the World might be of tiny dimensions when compared with the dramas of the Outer Oceans. When a fellow was caught up in them they tended to reduce visibility to the immediate horizon.

Duhrra possessed the appearance of that kind of superbly built idiot calculated at first glance to deceive. I have met your true moron from time to time, and usually give him a wide berth. They do not amuse me, as they appear to amuse so many people, these slack-faced giants with muscles of gods and brains of calsanys. Duhrra was basically right in his desires to go and
do
something for Zair.

My problem was that what I did must rank as a High Jikai, a world-shaking feat of arms that men would talk about and nod their heads over sagely and consider to be worthy to stand in the legends of Kregen along with the other high feats of achievement. That it would be damned difficult to do I knew. Maybe I overmatched myself against fate.

"We will strike for honor, Duhrra, but I do not believe I shock you when I say that honor is a poor substitute for life."

"Duh — you threw away my bottle!"

"Aye — now get some sleep. I must think."

But my thoughts coiled around my friends and my shortcomings.

These feelings of dissatisfaction with myself prompted me to the reflection — which I try always to keep somewhere near the forefront of my mind — that a man must work hard at keeping friends. At least, I know this was so for me. I did not feel that no matter what I did my comrades would remain loyal to me forever and ever. I know this is the counsel of perfection, the David and Jonathan summit; and I knew, too, I would never lose my affections for Seg and Inch and the others just because they were foolish at some time or other, or played me false out of a lapse from the counsels of morality we all accepted in our own ways; but I felt always that I was under trial. If this proves me lacking in understanding, as I suppose it does, it also proves that I am a true loner.

I would not have understood had someone at this time pointed out to me that — in my assumptions that no matter what my friends did I would forgive them but if I erred they would not forgive — I did my friends a grave injustice and imputed a higher value to my friendship than I was prepared to extend to theirs. I knew, then, I was not worthy of my Delia, and, also, not worthy of the friendship extended to me by Seg and Inch and the others. This is what I believed.

So, with Duhrra as with Melow the Supple, with Vomanus of Vindelka, with all my comrades, I chose to hew to the line of rectitude — and as always the savage barbarian that is the true me, I often think to my shame, would break out and I’d go raving off doing all the things that should, if my philosophy was correct, have resulted in the cloak of Notor Zan falling on me from a great height.

Kytun Kholin Dom — that magnificent four-armed warrior Djang, a kov — and Ortyg Fellin Coper — a wise and learned Obdjang statesman, a Pallan — ran my kingdom of Djanduin in the southwest of Havilfar for me when I was away. I had been away on Earth, banished by the Star Lords, for twenty-one Terrestrial years, and since my return and all this imbroglio in the inner sea I had not been back to Djanduin. I had no doubts whatsoever, no doubts at all, that Kytun and Ortyg ran the country with all the efficiency and honesty we had built up between us. I was still the king of Djanduin, and when I returned I would be greeted as such. Provided, of course, they were both still in power and no further revolutions had taken place. Against a warrior of the caliber of K. Kholin Dom and the statecraft of O. Fellin Coper, I did not fancy the chances of new revolutionaries, for we carried the people with us. I give this example to illuminate my tangled feelings about friends.

Twenty-one years’ absence and then a cheerful "Lahal, Ortyg. Lahal, Kytun," and I would resume the throne as though I had not been away. Blind I was in those days, for although I gave thanks to Zair — or, in this case, to Djan — for my friends, I did not fully understand the quality of their friendship, and how blessed I was in the receiving of it.

All of which led to a very subdued Duhrra, with a hand to his bald head, crawling out of the tent on the following morning and moaning for a handful of palines.

"Dopa," I said.

"Aye, master. Dopa. Duh — a fearsome drink."

"And suitable only for those who wish to become as calsanys."

"There are many bottles in the infantry lines. I was led astray."

Dopa if drunk in sufficient quantity is guaranteed to make a man fighting mad. Did Gafard, then, need dopa to whip his splendid army to fighting pitch? I was surprised.

When I was summoned to the usual morning briefing ready to begin a day astride my hebra, Boy, carrying messages, Gafard appeared to be wrought to a high pitch himself, as though he, that hard, practical, seasoned warrior, had been drinking dopa.

"Gernus," he said to the assembled officers and the aides standing respectfully in the rear. "Great news! We are highly honored. The king himself, the All-Highest, sends news he will pay us a visit — we must expect him today."

Later I saw the arrival of King Genod. He flew in by voller.

The moment I saw the petal-shape of the airboat flitting in over the camp from the shining sea, I knew the instrument had been placed into my hands.

This, then, would be the means of creating a High Jikai.

Chapter Thirteen

King Genod reviews his army

A considerable bulk of the army drew up on parade to greet the arrival of their king, this Genod Gannius, genius at war.

In my capacity as aide to the general in command here I rode my sectrix, Blue Cloud, and clad in mail and green, waited respectfully among the ranks of the aides, well to the rear of Gafard and his high officers.

The trumpets pealed, the flags flew, the twin suns cast down their mingled opaz radiance, sectrixes snorted, and the mailed ranks stood immobile, splendid, imposing, their pikes all slanted as one, the suns-light glittering from their helmets.

There were two vollers.

One was the small two-place flier I had seen over the Grand Canal, before I’d released the tide and so swept away the vessels carrying the consignment of vollers from Hamal.

The other voller was larger, higher, with three decks and varter positions, with room for a crew of eighty men — a pastang. As she flew in I was forcibly reminded of the power an aircraft must possess over the earthbound fighting-man marching on his own feet.

Rumors had floated about sufficiently for me to know that these were the only two vollers Genod possessed. I took no pride that I had deprived him of the squadron supplied by Hamal; the relief I felt was tempered by the knowledge that with these two alone, against totally unprepared Zairians, he could do a great mischief.

The reception went off smoothly enough — I was sorry to see — and with the bands playing and the flags fluttering and the swods marching in perfect alignment, King Genod made his way into the camp of one of his armies upon the southern shore.

There was no doubt as to the polished drill of these swods. There is a great difference between your wild warrior and your disciplined soldier, for all they are both fighting-men. The mercenaries Genod had hired were not on parade. He was being welcomed by the army he had helped create, the killing instrument with which he had won his victories and carried the Green triumphantly to the Red southern shore. This was a family reunion, as the long ranks of pikemen marched past, with the halberdiers and swordsmen leading, and the wedges of crossbowmen, closed up to march, followed, their crossbows held all in strict alignment across their chests. Each man in the ranks with his green plumes and insignia, I felt sure, owed a special and personal allegiance to King Genod. Genod had forged his army and it was his, in his hand, to do with as he willed.

He trusted this army, out of the greater army he had created, to Gafard, the King’s Striker.

There was a deal of affectionate greeting, and much bowing and saluting, the pealing of trumpets, the curveting of sectrixes, the green flags proud against the sky.

A little breeze had ghosted up, and this added a fine free atmosphere to the occasion, a zephyr breeze foretelling the great wind of destruction that would sweep the Green to victory over the Reds all along the coast.

The king and Gafard and a sizable body of their immediate officers and retinues disappeared into the tall pavilion erected against the king’s coming. Treasure was being spilled here. Yet for this genius king, this superman with the yrium, such attendances were not only expected and demanded — they were essential to his life-style.

A powerful Pachak guard surrounded the two fliers, and the gaping swods were kept well away. I stood in the crowd with that fold of white silk across the lower half of my face. Many soldiers affected the style, for here the wind carried stinging sand. I stared at the two vollers.

For my money they would both be first-class specimens. Hamal habitually built and sold inferior specimens to foreign countries. That had been one cause of a war that, while it lay in abeyance for the moment, was by no means over. The Hamalese had supplied these two vollers as examples, and on their performance the balance of the order might rest, although I knew well enough that any nation which did not manufacture fliers was only too pleased to buy examples from Hamal even if they were less than perfect.

"Real boats! That fly through the air!" observed a swod, his full-dress uniform now changed for his fatigues. The other pikemen and arbalesters were likewise changed. Full dress was costly and reserved for occasions like this grand parade and, ironically, for battle.

"I’d never have believed it, if I hadn’t seen it with me own eyes!" declared a dwa-Deldar, wiping his nose with his fist.

"Gar!" said a wizened little engineersman, spitting. "They be just ordinary boats, fitted with the power o’ Grodno, if you ask me."

"Nobody’s asking you, Naghan the Pulley."

They would have wrangled on, in the press, amicable in this off-duty period as swods usually are. I moved away with Duhrra. I would see all I wanted of the positions of the vollers. I did not like the guards being Pachaks. That complicated matters.

In less than a bur I would be on duty again, and just before Duhrra and I went to dress into our mail and greens, a fresh interest cropped up in the army. Two swifters came in bringing with them a captured Zairian swifter.

We all trooped down to the beach to look and jeer and shout mocking obscene threats as the Zairian prisoners were marched ashore in chains.

The two swifters were from Gansk, a powerful Grodnim fortress city of the northern coast opposite Zy itself. The Zairian was from Zandikar, a fortress city up the coast to the northwest from Zamu. So, of course, the Ganskian sailors and marines were cock-a-hoop over their victory and very mouthy about it to the men of Magdag.

Duhrra spat. "Zandikar," he said. "I’ve been there myself! I fought a bout there and won two zo pieces. I think they fought well before they were beaten."

The sight of those chained men displeased me. Zandikar, the city of Ten Dikars, was nowhere near as powerful or wealthy a city-state as her next-door neighbor, Zamu; but her small fleet was considered smart and effective and she had a reputation for her archers and her gregarian groves. There was no order of Krozairs associated with Zandikar, not even a Red Brotherhood, but she was of the Red and of Zair, and an ally.