A Fortune for Kregen Read online

  “I’m not an assassin. Get your breath back.”

  “By Krun!” he said, which told me he was Hamalese. “I’d never believe it — not even if—”

  “Believe. And give me my belt back. Unlike you, I wish to retain my trousers.”

  And he laughed.

  The night breeze played along the roof. The man below yelled again, coming back out the door with a lantern. The men up on the roof answered him, shouting down. There was a deal of confused yelling.

  “Can you make your own way along the guttering? You’ll be safe when you reach the gable end — the ornamentation there is profuse, if in bad taste.”

  He stared at me. He was a young fellow, with dark hair cut long and curled, and with a nose rather shorter than longer, and with eyes — whose color was imponderable in that light — which, it seemed to me, stared out with forthright candor. He had a belt fashioned from silver links in the shape of leaping chavonths, and a small jeweled dagger; he had lost his sword. He regained control of his breathing.

  “I think so.” He screwed his face up. “And you?”

  “I—” I started to say.

  “Stay here. I shall make my way to that zany lot and tell them nothing of your presence. Then, when we have gone, you may get away.”

  “You would truly do this?”

  “Yes. And I give you my thanks. Lahal and Lahal — I am called Lobur the Dagger.” He laughed again, and I saw he had recovered himself and was much taken with this night’s adventure, now that it had, miraculously, turned out all right and not with his untimely death. “I do not expect you to make the pappattu—”

  “I think not. In the circumstances.”

  “By Havil, no!”

  The noise from his comrades had passed over and the three who had remained on the slate walkway above our heads had gone. The man and his lantern below were visible, just, at the far end of the building. The jut of a dormer window obscured him. We were alone under the Moons of Kregen, sitting on the gutter of a roof, talking as though we shared tea and miscils in some fashionable hostelry in the Sacred Quarter.

  “There were three of your friends on the roof above — they are gone now — but I think they saw you did not fall.”

  “Friends? Oh, yes, friends.”

  He was clearly getting his wind back and setting himself for the scramble along the gutter. I am sure the thought stood in his mind, as it stood in mine, that there was every chance another section of guttering would give way under his weight.

  There was no point in urging him to hurry. I fancied the hunt would bay along the next roof and courtyard. But, all the same, I had no desire to sit here all night.

  The opportunity to gather information ought not to be overlooked and he might well be in the frame of mind to say more than in other circumstances he would allow himself.

  “You are Hamalese. I hope you have enjoyed your Jikaida here. Do you return home soon?”

  We were sitting side by side on the edge now, dangling our feet over emptiness. He laughed again.

  “Jikaida! No — I have no head for the game. I wager on — on other things. As to going home, that rests on the decision of Prince Nedfar, and he is, with all due respect, besotted on Jikaida.”

  “Most people are, here in Jikaida City.”

  “And live well on it, too—” He cocked his head on one side, and added, “Gray Mask.” He laughed, delighted at the conceit. “That is what I shall call you, Gray Mask. And the people here know well how to take our money. The whole city is full of sharps and tricksters.”

  “So, Lobur the Dagger, you believe I am not of the city?”

  He looked surprised. “Of course not! Didn’t think it for a moment. Who, here, would know aught of the Sacred Quarter of Ruathytu?”

  So either he had heard my quick remark to the unseen girl at my back, or had been told. So, he must think I was Hamalese like himself, perhaps a wandering paktun, a mercenary. This could be awkward or could be useful.

  I spoke with more than a grain of truth as I said, “Ah, yes. What I would give to be able, at this very moment, to be sitting on the roof of that sweet tavern of Tempting Forgetfulness in Ruathytu instead of here, on The Montilla’s Head.” And then I thought to prove myself a very cunning, very clever fellow indeed. I added, most casually, “But the commands of the Empress Thyllis are not to be denied.”

  He drew a quick breath. He cocked an eye at me. “Prince Nedfar — who is the Empress’s second cousin — is here on state business. This is known. But a second embassy?” He sucked in his cheeks. “I do not think the prince knows — or would be pleased if he did know.”

  Well, that wouldn’t worry me. Any confusion I could sow in the minds of the nobles of Hamal I would do and glee in the doing. If this Prince Nedfar, who had come here to talk of alliance with Prince Mefto, grew angry at the thought he was being spied on at the commands of the empress then I would have struck a blow, a small and near-insignificant blow it is true, against mad Empress Thyllis.

  So, quickly, I said, “The Empress is to be obeyed in all things. That many of these things are such that an honorable man must recoil cannot affect their consummation. I have no grudge against the prince.”

  “But you sought to steal his airboat.” He shifted at this and looked hard at me. “And by Krun, Gray Mask! That would have stranded me here in this dolorous city!”

  “Mayhap, Lobur, you would have come to a delight in Jikaida.”

  “Hah!”

  The time had run out and I began to entertain a suspicion that he kept me here talking so as to detain me for his friends. They’d be back, soon, hunting over the back trail. Yet I fancied I might sow a little more discontent and, into the bargain, reap more information, for which I was starved. The risk was worth taking.

  So I said, again in that casual way, “Many men murmur at the empress. You must have heard of plots against her. And, anyway, things go badly for Hamal in Vallia, do they not?”

  He hitched around and as the guttering gave an ominous groan, stilled immediately. His pride would not allow him to take any notice of that menacing creak from the rivets and brackets.

  “Aye, I have heard of plots.” This was good news — by Vox! Excellent news! He went on, “And we do not prosper in Vallia. They are devils up there — I have heard stories that are scarcely credible. They have a new emperor now, the great devil Dray Prescot, who was once paraded through Ruathytu at the tail of a calsany—”

  “You saw that?”

  “Yes. By Krun — the man is evil all through and yet, and yet, I felt a little—” He paused and hawked up and spat. We did not hear the splat on the cobbles far below. “Enough of that maudlin nonsense. If I could get my dagger into him I would become the most famous man in all Hamal.”

  “Indubitably.”

  “But the chance is hardly likely to come my way.”

  “No. And I think it is time we moved off. Much as I am enjoying this conversation—”

  “Yes, Gray Mask, you are right. I owe you my life. I shall not forget.” He looked at me. “You will not give me your name?”

  “If you were to call me Drax, I would answer.”

  “Drax?”

  “Aye.”

  “Hardly a Hamalese name—”

  “What did you expect?”

  “No. No, of course, Drax, Gray Mask, you are right.”

  We had been sitting thus and talking companionably for a time, and he was sitting on the side nearest the broken guttering and farthest from the gable end that was our goal. He inched back and leaned against the tiles, making ready to pass behind me. I got myself two very secure grips. As he eased himself sideways he could easily give me a sudden and treacherous kick and so spin me out into the void.

  He saw that instinctive movement as I secured myself. When he reached the other side he stooped.

  “You thought, perhaps, I might push you over?”

  “The thought was in my mind.”

  In the pinkish glow of the moons
his face darkened. “You impugn my honor! D’you think I would—”

  “No.”

  “I owe you my life.” He suddenly trembled, and I saw the tremor pass through him as a rashoon shudders over the waters of the inner sea, the Eye of the World. “By Krun! When I was slipping down that damned gutter — sliding to the end to fall and squash — I tell you, Drax, Gray Mask, it was awful, awful. I thought — and then—”

  “If we ever meet again we will drink a stoup or three together.”

  “Aye! That we will.”

  We spoke a few more parting words, and then we gave the remberees, and he edged his way cautiously along the gutter, making each step a careful probe for weak spots, until he reached the gable end. He vanished in the shadows of sculpted gargoyles and zhyans and mythical beasts. A macabre, a weird, little meeting, this conversation on a roof. But I had learned a little and I hoped I had sown a few seeds of doubt.

  Damn the Hamalese! And double damn mad Empress Thyllis. But for her and her megalomaniacal schemes we’d have had Vallia back, smiling and happy, after the Time of Troubles by now.

  The moment Lobur the Dagger disappeared into the twisted shadows I started along after him. There was no point in waiting. If he intended to betray me then the quicker I got in among them the better.

  Hauling him in had taken its toll of my feeble strength. Yes, yes, I had been a stupid onker in thus chancing all when I was not physically ready; but I needed that airboat on the roof. The voller that belonged to Prince Nedfar.

  Looking down over the next courtyard from the concealment of that garish profusion of sculpture I could see no sign of Lobur or his cronies. The shadows lay thickly. The moons shafted ghostly pink light down and painted a pale rose patina across the lower roofs and walls. Around me LionardDen, the city of Jikaida, lay sleeping.

  Very well.

  Despite my physical weakness, despite all that had happened — was not this the moment to strike?

  On that I started to climb up the gable end, handing myself up from stone beast to stone beast, working my way back to the slate walkway along the ridge.

  Once up there I would retrace my steps to the roof where the airboat lay.

  Maybe I would again be unsuccessful. Maybe there would be so many guards, so many obstacles, that I just would not be able to overcome them all. But that made no matter. I do not subscribe to the more stupidly florid of these notions of honor, particularly of rampantly displayed honor. But, here and now, there was a deal of that juvenile and exhibitionistic emotion mingled with the shrewdly practical idea that they’d be off guard up there. This was a chance.

  Climbing along the roof back the way I had come, I knew the chance had to be taken.

  Chapter Two

  Gray Mask Vanishes

  The kennel containing the two stavrers I had passed in something of a hurry showed up ahead in the moonlight as I leaped — not too nimbly — up onto the coping. The stavrers had been aroused by the uproar. They stretched out to the full extent of the chains fixed to collars about their necks. Chunky, are stavrers, fierce and loyal watchdogs, with savage wolf-heads and eight legs, the rear six articulated the same way, and they can charge with throat-ripping speed. After a distance they flag; but that stavrer charge, bolting all fangs ready to rip and rend, is quite enough to protect an honest man’s house.

  Now these two set up a fearful howling.

  Two helmeted heads popped up over a nearby roof ridge among that jungle of roofs. Two arrows were loosed at me. They were not Bowmen of Loh shooting at me — chances are that I would not be here talking had they been — and I went flying down into a leaded gulley between tiled slopes and so scrabbled along like a fish in a stream trap.

  This was all beginning to get out of hand. A guard jumped down from a chimney pot and tried to take my head off with his axe, and I ducked and got a boot into his midriff, and he went yowling away, holding his guts. The axe clattered down over blue slates and vanished into emptiness.

  Other men were shouting, there was the shrilling sound of whistles, and more barking, from stavrers and other kinds of domestic animals nicely designed to rip the seat out of your pants, or to rip off other more important parts of your anatomy. Feeling incredibly like a fool, and beginning, also, to feel the humor of the situation breaking down all the silly anger, I went charging down a roof slope, came around a chimney corner and saw the uplifted coping of the roof whereon rested the airboat.

  Any hope of stealing the voller vanished instantly.

  She lay there bathed in the light of many lanterns. The men had turned out — some still without shirts or trousers, but all with swords. There was one young fellow there, with wide black moustaches, turned out as though for Chuktar’s Parade — fully accoutered in harness and with shield and thraxter at the ready.

  His helmet shone under the lights of the moons.

  So I debated. The debate was very short.

  The stavrers were baying at my heels, the guards were massed in front, the moons were casting down more and more light as they rose — the Twins, the two Moons of Kregen eternally orbiting each other

  — had been early this night, and The Maiden with the Many Smiles and She of the Veils were late. The light would strengthen in rose and gold until the first shards of light from the twin suns, Zim and Genodras, illuminated the horizon. Then this exotic world of Kregen would be revealed in radiance of jade and ruby and the light would increase and burn and any fellows foolish enough to be hopping around on the roofs of high-class hotels would get all they deserved.

  Home — rather, back to the tavern at which I was lodging for the moment — seemed to me the order of the day — or night, seeing that the day’s orders would be so uncomfortable.

  Mind you, if in retrospect I make it seem all light-hearted and if, truly, I did feel that light-headedness then, do not misunderstand me. I was raging with anger and frustration. Oh, yes, my island empire of Vallia, cruelly beset by predatory foemen, was in good and capable hands. I could go gallivanting about having adventures for as long as I wished; but I felt the deep tide drawing me back home. I had to get back to Vallia and make sure, make absolutely sure, that all was well. That I intended to hand it all over to my lad Drak as soon as possible was merely another reason for return. He was there, in Vallia, and I had not the slightest inkling what he was up to.

  And, too, my half-healed wounds must have contributed to that feeling of light-headedness, as though this was all one gigantic jest.

  So, bitterly angry, and stifling my laughter, I hopped off the roof down onto the next one and scuttled like an ancient crab along the ridge and slid down a drainpipe to the courtyard with its arbora trees. They are called this because their flowers look much like arbora feathers. If I thought I was on ground level I was seriously mistaken.

  I remember I was thinking that I’d just let all this fuss blow over, and rest up a bit and get my strength back, and then I’d be back here to The Montilla’s Head and this time I’d really lay my avaricious paws on Prince Nedfar’s airboat. But really.

  A door made from sturmwood and the bottoms of old bottles ahead looked promising, the roseate moonlight catching in the bottles and whirling hypnotically. I eased across with a quick glance aloft and then the door opened and disaster walked out — rather, disaster reeled out, shrieking and yelling.

  The girl — she was a kitchen maid — was not apim but one of those charming diffs with the faces of apim infants, all soft rounded curves and chuckles and dimples, permanent baby-faces, naive and simple and delightful. The men folk have harder faces, it is true, but they, too, carry that hint of undeveloped childishness about them. For all that, the men have tough, muscle-hard, brawny bodies. The womenfolk have been blessed with female bodies that are marvels of curve and symmetry, sensuous, fascinating, endlessly alluring, intoxicating to any man — whether apim or diff — who shares our common heritage.

  This race of diffs — I once used to miscall diffs beast-men or men-beasts, halflings, no
t understanding —

  are often given the name Syblians; although the name they give themselves, not wishing to be confused with Sylvies, is Ennschafften.

  The drunken lout chasing the girl was calling, in between hiccoughing and belching, yelling to her to stop.

  “Mindy, miundy,” he called, staggering out of the door, his shirt tangled around his waist, his face enflamed with drink and passion, his eyes fairly starting out of his head. “Miundy, Mindy — wait for me, you little — come back — or I’ll—” And he staggered against the doorjamb, and bounced up, reaching out after the shrieking girl.

  Now in these and similar situations a fellow had best keep out of the way until he knows exactly what is going on. Many an upright citizen stepping in to rescue a maiden in distress has been turned on by what seemed victim and attacker, both containing him with insults for coming between a family squabble of man and wife. So I waited quietly in the shade of the arbora tree. The scent was delicious, and I breathed in — thankful, I may add, for the rest.

  The Sybli caught her foot in a gray old root of the tree and she stumbled forward three or four paces, off balance, her arms spread out to try to save herself. She wore a tattered old blue and yellow checkered dress, badly torn as to bodice and skirt, and her feet were bare. She almost saved herself, and then she lost her balance and fell.

  The man laughed and staggered forward. He was apim, a big, husky, full-fleshed fellow who knew what he wanted — and took it.

  The girl Mindy tried to rise and gave a gasp as her ankle twisted under her. Her face showed babyish terror. The man leaped forward and she kicked out. I felt like giving a cheer as he yelped and reeled back, cursing.

  “Never, you beast, never!” she cried. Her body was shaking.

  “You will or I’ll—”

  She bit him as he came in again, sinking her sharp teeth into his hand. He let out a fearsome yell. It was quite clear that this secluded courtyard was soundproof and that with all the hullabaloo on the other side of the hotel this fellow was perfectly confident that the girl’s cries would not be heard.