A Sword for Kregen [Dray Prescot #20] Read online

  “By Black Chunguj!” swore Pompino. “I never did like to see a man flogged jikaider."

  For the Rapa and the Brokelsh between them were dicing the man's back up into a checkerboard of blood.

  A Deldar, a heavy and thick-set man with the weight of years in the grade with no hope of ever making zan-Deldar and then Hikdar about him, spat and swore. “Hangi should have left the wine alone. It's doing him no good, no, nor us, neither."

  The noble's guards standing and looking on glumly as their comrade was flogged jikaider—a cruel and inhuman punishment, even to me who had seen men flogged round the Fleet—wore harness much studded with bronze bosses, and with pale blue and black favors. They looked a hard-bitten lot.

  Pompino made some remark, and the Deldar hawked up again.

  “The notor is strict—aye, may Havandua the Green Wonder mete him his just desserts—strict. You can say that again about the notor, Erclan the Critchoith. Keep at it!” He swung away to bellow at the Rapa and Brokelsh who had desisted in their efforts to flay Hangi's back. “You know the score! Ten times six and six more! Stylor!” to the shaking Relt who stood with slate and chalk marking the strokes. “Keep a strict account!"

  “Quidang, quidang,” stammered the Relt, his weak beaked face betraying by its frizzle of feathers the state he was in.

  The lashes thwunked down again, and Hangi jerked, and was still. There is no real mystery why such a beastly practice should be given a name that associates it, however remotely, with the supreme board of Kregen. The contrast, it is said, explains the paradox.

  “Stole Risslaca Ichor, did Hangi,” the Deldar told us, his face with the veins breaking around the nose sweating and empurpled. “A whole amphora. The notor's favorite, is Risslaca Ichor, always keeps a special supply, and Hangi found it, and Hangi drank it, and there's Hangi now, for all to see."

  “Risslaca Ichor.” Pompino sniffed. “A mere common rosé adulterated with dopa—"

  “Fortified, dom, fortified!"

  “So they say."

  Then a profound change overcame the Deldar. He grew, if it were possible, even bulkier and more purple. The sweat sprang out in great pearly drops. “Keep at it, you hulus! Hit hard!"

  So we looked up to the flower-banked balcony, and there stood the notor, this Kov Erclan Rodiflor. Square and hard and ablaze with gems, he stood braced on wide-planted feet, his hands clamped on his hips, his chin with his strip of black beard upthrust, and his square lowering face brooded on the scene below. Returning to Jikaida City, was Kov Erclan. A man who exuded authority and power, he possessed a dark inner core that gave him the yrium he would have taken had he been a gang leader and not a kov.

  Like his men, he wore the pale blue and black favors, arranged in checkerboard fashion. Well, he looked down and we looked up and he saw neither Pompino nor myself in the shadows; his dark eyes were all for the flogging. I thought merely that I had met many men like that, and so we walked on, stony-faced past the guards, and when I next met Kov Erclan—well, that you will hear, all in due time.

  Pompino and I thus became, for each of us once more, paktuns, hired mercenaries, bodyguards, men who rented out their skill with arms and laid their lives at risk to earn their daily crust.

  Events moved with speed after that. The life of a paktun is mostly boring, and shot through with sudden and brief flashes of scarlet action. Often they are the last things that happen to him. We were outfitted, for it was all found, and donned bronze-studded leather jerkins, with gray trousers and calf-high boots. The weapons were thraxter, the straight cut and thrust sword of Hamal, stuxes, oval shields and a dagger apiece. The green tunic I was handed bore a rusty stain low on the left side, and a rip neatly sewn together, a rip about the size to admit a spear-blade. The trousers had been laundered clean, however, for which I was grateful.

  Pompino made a face. “Dead men's clothes."

  The helmets were of iron, and not bronze, iron pots thonged under the chin and with ear and back flaps. Holders at the crown bore tufts of green, black and blue feathers.

  So equipped and astride totrixes Pompino and I rode out the next morning as part of the escort to Yasuri Lucrina, the Vadni of Cremorra, en route for LionardDen, Jikaida City.

  From the rich lands around Gertinlad the way led us across rivers and through forests into country that grew impressively wild and menacingly forbidding. We were in the Dawn Lands of Havilfar. Here, in the ancient countries around The Shrouded Sea were situated those parts of the great southern continent that had been first settled when men arrived here in the beginning of history—so went the old stories. Both Pompino and I were firmly convinced that the Star Lords had sent us to ensure the safety of Yasuri. The whole operation, at least for me, was so markedly different from what had happened before that I deemed it prudent to follow events and to do my best to avoid the wrath of the Star Lords.

  Of one thing I was profoundly grateful. Because of the differences this time, and the warning, there was no extra bitterness in me at the parting from Delia. Of course I grieved for the sundering, and vowed to return as soon as I could, echoing in the old way and the old days, I will return to my Delia, my Delia of Delphond, my Delia of the Blue Mountains. But, this time, she was apprised of my disappearance, and she knew, now, what that fate was that dogged me. No moist-mouthed slimy minions of Quergey the Murgey could affront her now; she would send that lot packing with a zorca hoof up their rumps. Sorrow touched me that I had not welcomed Drak and clasped hands with him. As with Melow the Supple and Kardo. But I felt the warm glow of satisfaction at the thought that Drak, Prince of Vallia, Krzy, was now there, in Vondium, and, Opaz willing, ready to take up the reins. Suppose he refused? Suppose he contumed the task of standing in for the Emperor of Vallia? He had told us that he would not become emperor while we lived, Delia and I, and I had brushed that aside as sentiment. I felt that Drak, who of all my sons was the strong, sober, industrious one, with that wild Prescot streak in him, too, was best fitted to run Vallia. Had I thought Zeg, who was now King in Zandikar, or Jaidur, who was swashbuckling about in connivance with the Sisters of the Rose, could handle the job better, then primogeniture, too, would have been kicked out with a zorca hoof up its rump. Primogeniture obtains on Kregen; but it is not an unbreakable rule. A man must fight for what he wants there, and it is what a man is and the spirit and heart of him that counts, not what his father is.

  Or his mother, either ... For the ladies of Kregen are people in their own right, and fully aware of that, with minds that are their own. The ladies of Kregen count, as this Yasuri, Vadni of Cremorra, so sharply reminded us. Some of the women of Kregen there are who hate all men because they are men, as foolish a stance as to hate all calsanys because they are calsanys, or all roses because they are roses. But, then, some women do not deserve to be ladies of Kregen, anyway...

  There was little satisfaction to be gained in the situation where I was a puppet of the Star Lords; but it is useless to kick against the pricks when there is nothing one can do about that particular situation. I had slowly and cautiously been attempting to build a kind of structure of deceit against the Star Lords, and had intemperately gone against my own plans and been banished to Earth for twenty-one cruel years. Now I was trying a new tack. But, in the end, obedience to the Everoinye must dominate my actions. They were superhuman. Their powers were far beyond those of mortals, beyond those of the Wizards of Loh, beyond the Savanti. I trembled to dare to think that perhaps Zena Iztar might possess powers to match them.

  As we rode, I studied, to learn what I could from what Pompino could tell me. He was of South Pandahem, a land of which I then knew little. He was married with two sets of twins and from what he did not say I gathered that he rubbed along with his wife, in a kind of habit-formed pattern, rather than taking any active joy from the marriage state. Well, two worlds are full of marriages like that. He was not at all displeased to be called out to serve the Everoinye. He talked well as we jogged along through the land that increasi
ngly grew more ominous, with rocky defiles and overhanging crags leading on to wide plains where the sere grass blew. The country was pock-marked with tracts of badlands, and we were due to spend the night at a fortified posting house at the ford of Gilma. Gilma is a water sprite found in the legends of Prince Larghos and the Demons. Pompino told me that he did not like the Hamalese, a sentiment I could well understand from Hamal's ruthless conquest of Pandahem. But he could tell me little of the Star Lords.

  He received his orders from the Gdoinye. When I introduced a casual remark about scorpions, he dismissed them as unpleasant but rarely seen creatures of Havil.

  I told him I was from Huringa in Hyrklana. This city I knew well from my days as a kaidur in the Jikhorkdun there, and so could fabricate substantial accounts to bolster my story. He eyed me at that.

  “Queen Fahia grows too fat, so men say—and I mean you no disrespect, Jak. But men say she cannot live long."

  I nodded. “So it is said."

  Pompino clicked his tongue at his totrix. We were passing a stand of withered trees and the branches reached out like gray wraiths.

  “Men say that the tragedy of Princess Lilah cast a shadow over the kingdom."

  Princess Lilah of Hyrklana! I had sent spies to seek news of her whereabouts and all had reported failure.

  “It is indeed a tragedy. I would dearly love to know where she is now, By Kru—by Havil."

  The slip passed unnoticed.

  Much of what we said I will report when the time is due; suffice it that Pompino, for all he was one of those Khibils who consider themselves a cut above ordinary mortals, proved a stalwart companion, and in the manner of Khibils, brave and resourceful and loyal. A task had been set to his hands and he would fulfill that task with his dying breath.

  He did grumble: “What the confounded woman wants to go all this dolorous way to play Jikaida for is a conundrum I would not burden Hoko the Amusingly Malicious with."

  There were so many burning questions I had to ask that mention of Jikaida passed me by then ... But Pompino knew only that he took his orders from a great scarlet and gold bird, that he was paid handsomely for his trouble in real gold, and that should he disobey he would be punished with exceedingly unpleasant penalties. We did not go into their nature.

  “Why, Pompino? Why?"

  He looked puzzled. “The gods are passing strange in their ways, Jak. Passing strange. But to serve the gods, to serve the Everoinye, is not that a great pride and does it not confer stature upon a man? Is it not, Jak, a High Jikai?"

  I had never looked on rushing about pulling the Star Lords’ chestnuts out of the fire as a High Jikai. That great word, that supreme notion of high chivalry and courage and self-sacrifice, seemed to me sacred to deeds writ in gold. As I did not answer he scowled. “Well?"

  “Yes,” I said. “Assuredly."

  Because he had been the first to pelt down all naked into action and drive the Ochs away he had quite naturally assumed the leadership of our twin mission. I did not bother my head over that. Let him imagine he carried the burden. Truth to tell, I was happy to allow it—and, equally, I liked him.

  The posting house at the ford of Gilma was merely a single story house and surrounding wall all built of the gray stones carried down from the frowning hills. We did not change the totrixes or the krahniks, for we had not been pushing them and they were beasts of price. We set off early the next day and so came down the long valley into Songaslad, a town of thieves.

  Over the border some sixty dwaburs off lay the country of Aidrin in which lay the capital, the city called Jikaida City. The journey was fraught with peril. It lay over badlands of an exceedingly bad badness. In Songaslad, the town of thieves, caravans were formed for mutual protection on the journey. The lady Yasuri sent her Rapa Jiktar to haggle for the price of a caravan's protection. Perforce, we waited, and set a doubled guard over our possessions.

  We lost only a good saddle, richly inlaid, a carpet of high price, and a set of golden candlesticks whose theft almost gave the lady a fainting fit. Her companions, her handmaids in the coach with her, used burned twigs of Sweet Ibroi to revive her. We concluded a deal with hawk-faced Ineldar the Kaktu, the caravan master, forthwith.

  So, a long straggling procession of carriages and wagons and riders and people trudging afoot, we wended out of Songaslad, the town of thieves, to cross the Desolate Wastes, and so win our way to Aidrin, and the rich country around LionardDen, Jikaida City.

  * * *

  Chapter Ten

  Into the Desolate Waste

  Many times have I journeyed in caravans across country inhospitable by reason of nature or man, and on each occasion I vow never again, and know even as I vow that the lure of the adventure will always drag me on. Each occasion is different. Kregen is a world of so many startling contrasts that the beauty and terror mingle and fill the spirit with wild eagerness or desolation, with burning ambition to win against all or a calm and joyous acceptance of the stupendous.

  Nights under the stars! Ah—they are never to be forgotten.

  The Caravan labored along, crossing rivers and winding down long defiles, gaining the far slopes and so rising to emerge onto the vasty plains where the mist lifted blue and eerie, like lantern smoke against snow.

  The totrix of the lady Yasuri's given into my charge and whom I rode across the Desolate Wastes was a skewbald called Munky. I was careful of him. Accustomed I may be to walking barefoot across the awful places of Kregen, I was now far more of a mind to ride rather than walk.

  Oh, yes, despite all my deeper concerns, I enjoyed that caravan across the Desolate Wastes to Jikaida City. And, if the truth be told, the land was not all desolate. Grass grew and the animals fed. There was water in swift silver streams. Every now and then we crossed stony deserts, or sandy deserts; but we prepared for them. The various places along the way were infested with drikingers and these bandits attacked us, as was their custom. We fought them off.

  Here we saw why the Star Lords had provided two men—two kregoinye, I must now call them—to escort the person they had chosen to save for posterity. The Rapa escort fought well and earned their hire along with all the other caravan guards. But, one by one, they went down, by arrow or spear, sword or javelin. Soon my companion Pompino was given the escort command, with the rank of Jiktar, whereat he smiled at me, and I warmed to him, realizing how much and how little he valued these titles. But we saved the skin of the lady Yasuri.

  It is not my intention to give a blow-by-blow account of that journey, much though the prospect tempts me, for this was a kind of holiday. It is with some of the people of the caravan that my interest lies, and therefore yours.

  The lady Yasuri herself was going to Jikaida City to play Jikaida, and most of the other folk in the caravan were doing likewise, to play, to participate, to gamble or merely to make a profit on the game.

  As is the way with such caravans, people tend to fall into clumps, who jog along together, for company, good fellowship and mutual protection. A deal of this can be put down to the speed of progress. The lady Yasuri's coach matched the speed of an ornate, top-heavy creation of the carriage-builder's art, in blue and yellow, that swayed along next in line. This conveyance was drawn by six krahniks. In the caravan were so many of the various marvelous animals of Kregen it were vain to name them all; but there were Quoffas, calsanys, plain asses, hirvels, totrixes, and the like. There were few zorcas. Of course, being Havilfar, there were no voves. This blue and yellow coach with the black and white checkerboard along the sides contained Master Scatulo. In Master Scatulo's terms, to speak his name was enough.

  Master Scatulo—he trumpeted a host of names all attesting to his enormous prowess as a Jikaidast—permitted the lady Yasuri the graciousness of his company when we halted for meals. Yasuri hung on this young fellow's words—for Scatulo was young, brash, supremely self-confident and, by the reckoning of anyone you cared to ask, a remarkable player of Jikaida, a true Jikaidast.

  His face was o
f a sallow cast, sharp and edgy, with deep furrows between his eyebrows, and eyes of a piercing quality that Sishi, the lady Yasuri's least important hand maiden told me with a laugh, he painted with blue-kohl to enhance their impression of brooding intelligence. I believed this. It is known. Pompino guffawed and passed a most demeaning remark.

  “He's real clever, is Master Scatulo!” protested Sishi. She, herself, was apim and a little beauty with dark hair and a rosy glowing face and ways that were still artless, despite the way of the world. I waggled a finger at her.

  “Now then, mistress Sishi. Beware of clever men like this Scatulo. Just because he says he is Havil's gift to the world, that he is a genius, doesn't mean he can—"

  “I know what you're saying, Jak!"

  “Just as well you do, Sishi,” said Pompino. “For Jak speaks sooth. This Scatulo will get you—"

  Her face was scarlet. Sishi burst out, “You're horrible!"

  That, by Vox, was true enough; but had little to do with the subject in question.

  There were other Jikaidasts in the caravan; not many. I gathered from sly remarks that a Jikaidast must be in the very topmost flight of his profession to be preferred in Jikaida City. Trouble was, Pompino and I could not flaunt our ignorance; everyone understood so well the significance of Jikaida City that significant details were taken for granted. We agreed to keep our ears open and learn.

  The other person who jogged along with us and shared our fire and engaged in conversation was a Wizard of Loh.

  Yes. Oh, yes, I well realize the surprise anyone must feel in so cavalier a treatment of a representative of one of the most powerful groups of wizards on Kregen. But Deb-Lu-Quienyin was a pleasant old buffer whose red Lohvian hair was much thinned by perplexed rubbing and whose lined face expressed a perennial surprise at the state of the world. But, for all that, he was a Wizard of Loh. He wore plain robes, with their dark blue only moderately embellished with silver and he wore a stout shortsword, which made me look in wonder.