Intrigue of Antares Read online

  The four riders did not appear. If they were following us, and given the usual desperate nature of these ventures of mine upon Kregen, they probably were, they could have cut down a parallel alleyway to reach the river.

  “A boat, then,” said Fweygo.

  I said: “Four riders. They may be following.”

  Fweygo instantly switched around to look back. He shook his head. We went on through the rain towards the river.

  The tangle of huts ended untidily against a shining expanse of mud where the town wall reared black by the river bank. Nets were hanging up on wooden racks. Small skiff-like boats lay pulled up onto the mud. Their exit onto the river lay through a small gate of iron bars beneath an arch under the wall. The whole set up would not be tolerated in Vallia. All the same, that was our way out.

  The man who shambled across to meet us was a Gon with a cloak pulled up over his bald head. His eyes were red, his nose was red, and from time to time he sneezed like one of Congreve’s rockets going off.

  He indicated the boat we were to use. We never used it.

  Even as Ranaj had one foot on the mud, the other still in the stirrup, a most ferocious bellowing uproar spouted up. Dark figures appeared over the wall directly to our front. In the glinting pink spears of the rain other and far more lethal spears glittered. A single glance, a simple deduction, were all that were required to assess the situation.

  The Gon shrieked out: “Pirates!” and dashed madly back into the shadows past the nets.

  Ranaj yelled: “Numi Hyrjiv! Back, back, now!”

  He regained his saddle still cradling the infant. The princess stuttered out some incoherent cry. Ranaj seized her bridle and in an instant whisked the animal about, fairly dragging freymul and rider by main force.

  Fweygo snatched at the other animal, leading Serinka as her husband led Nandisha. The whole party spurred back towards the huts.

  The raiders swarmed over the wall, dropping down like ripe black flies. They made huge squelching sounds. Maybe they did not expect to find this expanse of mud within the walls; no doubt I would not have, it was not usual. Whatever — the obstacle gave us time to start off. The freymul is a willing animal if not as powerful as one might wish, and these five responded. We dashed back past the nets towards the low huts.

  A few arrows went flick flick past; but the rain would interfere with serious shooting this night.

  The raiders must have pulled up the river after dark and were now intent on butchery and pillage. Pirates were the reason Amintin was situated ten miles up river from the coast and why no windows were pierced in the lower floors of larger buildings. No doubt the watch on the walls had been sheltering from the wet. What mattered now was that the pirates were in the town and we had not found a way out.

  From squelchy sloshings to staccato raps the freymuls’ hooves traversed mud and cobbles. Uproar surrounded us as the good folk of Amintin awoke to the ghastly realization of what was about to befall them.

  Of one thing I felt sure as we racketed along towards the main street: this unholy lot ravening at our heels would not be the only pack of reivers to climb the walls this dark and stormy night.

  As though Pixirr the god of mischief listened to my thoughts a mob of terrified Amintins stumbled up from the next side street and pursuing them with zest and venom a whole horde of reivers barred our way ahead.

  Ranaj roared: “This way!”

  He yanked his animal around and dragging Nandisha’s freymul hurtled straight across the muddy street. Fweygo followed with Serinka. Knowing my place in their scheme of things I, as usual, brought up the rear.

  Where the arrow came from that pierced Nandisha’s freymul not even the most senior and devoted follower of Erthanfydd could have told. Quite possibly the shaft had been let fly by a frenzied townsman or woman. The result was Nandisha and the child toppling into the mud and Fweygo having the dickens of a job avoiding a catastrophic collision.

  The poor freymul lay kicking his legs in spasm. Ranaj was rumbling incoherently and Serinka started to climb down to attend her mistress. I was there before her. The princess started up, still clutching the child.

  “You are unharmed?”

  “I — I think so—”

  The bedlam at our backs increased. There was no time. I lifted her, and in Zair’s good truth there was not much to her, and hoisted her onto my animal. Through it all she did not relinquish her grasp on the child.

  Fweygo snarled something and I hurled back at him: “Ride, Fweygo!”

  I gave the freymul a thumping great thwack over his rump and he started off with Nandisha holding on like a drunk holding onto a bar stool.

  “Drajak!” yelled Fweygo.

  Ranaj dropped the wounded freymul’s reins and sent his animal after Nandisha. Serinka said nothing. “Drajak!” shouted Fweygo again.

  “Ride!” I roared up at him. “You know why!”

  Even then I saw his Kildoi face twisted in indecision. Maybe he had never been disciplined by the Star Lords as I had; he certainly would not be banished four hundred light years across empty space in punishment. Running from a fight and abandoning a friend, of however recent an acquaintance, was not in his nature. But, as a good kregoinye, he understood what must be done when the Everoinye ordered.

  “I’ll see you later.” As I spoke I dragged out the sword furnished me by the Star Lords.

  “Yes, Drajak,” he said, turning his animal and hauling Serinka along. “Yes. Make sure you do, make very sure.” Then he galloped off.

  So I turned to see what the devil I could make of this perilous situation.

  Pirates were, it seemed in the erratic pink moonlight, running everywhere. Townsfolk screamed and fled and were cut down. One or two houses were already alight despite the rain and there would soon be illumination enough to see how to get oneself killed with no trouble.

  The reivers had to be stopped from following Fweygo. That was my job. That task was down to me.

  Objects became easier to see as the fires gained and the rain eased. The smell of wetness and of burning hung over the town. Directly opposite me the mouth of the alley down which Ranaj had led the rest of our party was where I had to make my stand. I had no bow, unfortunately. Well, if this was the way of it on Kregen, and this my doom and fate, then so be it. I’d do what I could before they cut me down.

  Pulling back my shoulders I started off. I, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor and Krozair of Zy, strode off to make a valiant last stand.

  My foot slipped on a patch of evilly glistening mud and over I went, twisting to regain my balance, to land smack on my back like an upended turtle.

  So much for gallant exhibitionism!

  Chapter two

  I stood up. I said nothing — absolutely nothing.

  The tunic and breechclout given me by the Star Lords were soaking wet and clogged with mud. Glutinous mud squelched in the shoes. The scabbard, a cheap affair of thin leather, wood and green brass, was bent, shrunken and distorted. The sword, a reasonable weapon of the straight cut and thrust variety, had a wire-wrapped wooden handle, flimsy quillons, and a point that made it primarily a cutting weapon. I hefted it and looked around through a hedge of drenched and mud entangled hair.

  With a gesture as much of resignation as irritation I shoved my hair back from my forehead, wiped a paw over my face, and glared about for anybody who wanted to pass by.

  The situation was familiar and ugly enough. Pirates infested the coast and now the menace of the Shanks had been removed, even if only temporarily, the sea rovers ranged far and wide. People ran about crazily. The noise lifted and sank almost, it seemed, in rhythm to the drifts of smoke wafting over the roofs. Amintin was a poor enough place, Zair knew; it still had attractions for those damned renders. I knew about renders, having served with Viridia the Render, that most charming lady pirate, and my feelings were that this unhealthy lot were both the dregs and the scum of society.

  Given my situation, standing like a loon in the mouth of an al
ley was a fine way of being chopped. Swiftly crossing into the shadows of the nearest house I checked the alley, which was now empty, and then faced the street again.

  If any pirates had seen our party ride off none of them for the moment strutted along to investigate. I began to think I might pull back and scuttle along the alley and see about transport to catch up.

  By this time during my life on Kregen I fought only when I had to and then reluctantly. But, like any seasoned warrior, once a fight was inevitable and joined then I’d go in with the ferocious determination to finish it as quickly as possible.

  Most of the noise racketed from further back in the town. My guess was the renders had put in their surprise attack and had closed in past this spot. They’d be making for the fat and juicy targets. The people in the Net and Stikling, for instance, would be well barricaded in and ready to put up a stout resistance.

  The decision made, I wasted no more time.

  Padding along the alley with the sword in my fist I kept both eyes wide open, very wide open, by Krun.

  The rain had appreciably lessened and the Maiden with the Many Smiles shone down her fuzzy pink light through gaps in the clouds. There were even one of two of Kregen’s stars visible, twinkling away up there and vastly indifferent to what went on below.

  Even then, sharply though I was keeping a lookout, they nearly had me. But I am an old leem hunter and am not easily ambushed.

  Four of them leaped at me from a black-beamed doorway. They tried to degut me with spears and tridents and for a moment there was a swift and deadly series of passages, of cuts and slashes, of twists and evasions, before they all went down. The sword was a damned unhandy affair. I shook it in disgust.

  From the next house along the sounds of combat spurted into the night. Your normal plunderer likes to help himself to loot with as little trouble as possible. No doubt these reivers had blood in their eye. It happens. Cautiously I padded along towards the fight.

  The moon washed pink light across the house wall. Seven or eight renders were prancing about in the street trying to cut down the four men backed up against that rosy-glowing wall.

  A number of bodies lay sprawled on the muddy cobbles.

  There was no question of indecision here. I leaped forward.

  Of course, they had their backs to me so I had no compunction in laying into the first of them to come to hand. One, two, three went down screeching before the others realized a new element had entered the equation.

  A long spear with a bearded pirate at the other end of it thrust hard for my midriff. With a left hand that had hauled me up the rigging in hurricanes to daze the senses, I took the spear away. Economically I used it to clout its late owner over the head. He fell down.

  Somewhere in the fracas over by the wall I heard a laugh. A light, peculiar, distinctly amused laugh, clear as a crystal chime through the hullabaloo, was not altogether unexpected. It told me someone was not taking this little scrap over seriously. Without a moment’s conscious reflection, engaged as I immediately was by a fresh customer, I formed an estimate of the laugher’s character and personality and — well, that you must judge for yourself.

  The renders mostly wore leather armor of sorts, bits and pieces. The fellow who challenged me now, a damned Chulik as ever was, wore metal. His yellow tusks were banded in silver. His chunky body strained against metal breast and back as we clashed weapons and then drew back so that I judged the armor he’d looted from somewhere was not a perfect fit.

  Someone yelled: “Watch your back!”

  The advice was not meant for me, so I reasoned; but you do not stay alive for very long if you ignore the slightest warnings. I leaped sideways and swung about, instantly reversing to slide the Chulik’s venomous thrust. I sidestepped and he blundered past so that I gave him a thwack and the confounded sword broke in two.

  He reared up, massively competent with weapons as all Chuliks are.

  They do possess humanity, do the Yellow Tuskers, a modicum. This one showed obvious delight at my predicament. His round black eyes and oily yellow skin did not differentiate him from a thousand of his fellows. But he sneered at me and said: “Come sneaking up at my back, would you! By Likshu the Treacherous, you have been rewarded!” He bored in with the sole intention of transfixing me upon his blade.

  A movement to the right and a swaying reverse allowed me to use my forearm to force his sword arm away to the side. I put a fist into his snub nose and followed that by a crafty kick as taught very early on in the unarmed disciplines of the Krozairs of Zy. He yelled.

  He yelled blue bloody murder.

  He didn’t have any metal armor there — he didn’t have any armor there at all, just a dingy brown breechclout.

  He doubled up so that my fist making contact with his chin received extra momentum from his own movement.

  Then, as usual in these affairs, it was vitally necessary to keep low and spring away without thought.

  The single-bladed axe swished down where my head had been and clanged into the cobbles. So fierce had the blow been the axe was twisted clean out of the grip of the Rapa who’d tried to cleave my skull in two.

  In a matter of less than a second the Chulik’s sword was in my grip and in the rest of the second was buried in the Rapa’s side.

  The sword possessed a strong curve to the blade, almost as much as a fancy sabre, and it slid in snugly enough doing the Rapa’s business for him.

  A swift glance around showed me the rest of the pirates sprawled in the mud. The Chulik lay doubled up and moaning. I confess I had kicked rather hard.

  “My thanks, friend. Llahal.” The voice was light and amused.

  So I stared at him as he came forward from the wall, the bloodied rapier in his fist, the left-hand dagger its match. Dandified, oh yes, in the way a predatory bird’s bright coat of feathers gives it a handsome appearance, he was all that and more. He was like the cold steel of his rapier with the charming colored jewels adorning the hilt.

  “Llahal,” I said.

  His three friends were visibly relieved still to be alive.

  He saw the Chulik groaning on the ground. One elegant dark eyebrow lifted. His lips although red were thin and firm. He stepped across and with delicate precision drove the blade through the Chulik’s heart. As the Yellow Tusker was doubled up this fine amusing fellow thrust through from the back. I knew well enough the point of his rapier had struck straight past backbone and ribs and with unerring aim burst the heart asunder. That, I knew.

  “Better to clean up any mess. I like to be neat and tidy.”

  His face was barely flushed after the combat. Over that thin mouth he affected a thin black moustache. Once he had cleaned his weapons the first thing he would do was run a forefinger along that elegant moustache.

  Other sounds began to percolate into our attention as the immediate fury of the fight subsided. A devil of a lot of noise was erupting from the town. Orange glare reflected from the low clouds. The Maiden with the Many Smiles shone down to add her pink luster to the scene.

  “What are we to do now, notor?” The fellow who spoke, short and wiry and with a shock of straw-colored hair dangling from under a round leather cap, clutched a hefty short sword with a smidgeon of blood upon the blade. His face showed all the marks of dependence on another, coupled with an animal cunning in twist of lip and slant of eye.

  “Do, fambly, do? Why, we shake hands with this gentleman and thank him for his help.”

  The other two men who were already cleaning their weapons were clad in tough leather armor and their function in life as guards was patently apparent. They’d earned their hire, for they had killed well.

  The lord eyed me calculatingly.

  “Your name, my friend?”

  “Drajak.” I spoke pleasantly. “And yours?”

  His servant sucked in his cheeks.

  Notor is how one addresses a lord in many parts of Paz upon Kregen. I’d had my fill of kowtowing to lords of late and I had no intention of begi
nning again right now. I had urgent things to do — like following Fweygo and the rest and trusting to all the Beneficent Spirits of Uttar Soblime they had not been slaughtered.

  His eyebrows drew down for an instant and then that light amused laugh eased the situation — at least, it eased the situation for him and his servant. I didn’t give a damn who he was. I wanted to get on.

  “I am Amak Dagert — Dagert of Paylen. Lahal.”

  “Lahal. Now, if you will excuse me I must—” He’d drawn a yellow cloth from under the short cape he wore over metal armor and was about to clean his sword. He wrapped the cloth again and stuffed it away with a gesture as elegant as a court dandy’s. His voice chirred like oiled steel clearing scabbard.

  “I think, Drajak, you must do something other than you intended.”

  Philosophically I turned around and followed his gaze. A whole bunch of renders crowded down the alley towards us. Now the rain had stopped they’d lit torches and the lurid lights glanced and danced off wet walls and cobbles, glinted redly from the black blood at our feet.

  The two guards stood very still, staring at Dagert of Paylen. Their eyes looked like pebbles. The amak’s servant trembled. He licked his lips and kept flexing his grip on the short sword.

  I looked around for another and possibly better weapon.

  That amused low laugh, almost a self-satisfied chuckle, broke from Dagert. He looked back. The alley led off into a darkness relatively deeper than that in the opposite direction. It seemed to me as I picked up a sword of somewhat better construction than those I’d already used, that this Dagert of Paylen was deliberately tantalizing his servant. He was making the poor devil suffer. Well, that was between them.

  “Notor—” The fellow’s wet lips shone as he licked them again.

  “Oh, you know me by now, Palfrey. When the odds are right — not otherwise. It has been pleasant meeting you, Drajak, and once more I offer you my thanks. Now it’s time to depart.”