Scorpio Triumph [Dray Prescot #43] Read online

  The flying lizards did not stir.

  Beyond the door lay a squared-off corridor illuminated by the pallid light. A repetition of my antics showed a similar corridor beyond the right hand door.

  Which way I went had no meaning, for I was completely lost, so I went to the left. If going to the right would take me out of the labyrinth then I'd chosen badly, that was all.

  The inscription above the altar, this time, read:

  BEWARE THE PIT OF THE FIRE FOR THE DRUMS ENSLAVE

  “H'm,” I said under my breath. “They didn't heed that warning!”

  The situation now appeared clearer to me. I fancied this part of the labyrinth under the City of Eternal Twilight had been inhabited by a people before those who'd bathed in the radiance of the Fire as the Drums roared. Perhaps there had been a bloody war. At any rate, those black-garbed priests of the Realm of the Drums had taken over. We had dispersed them; I didn't doubt that some would rally and continue after we had left.

  That was, I corrected myself, if we ever did find a way out and did manage to leave this damned maze.

  The squared-off passage led on for some distance, turning various corners, and I went along with exquisite caution. By this time I was ravenously hungry. Well, by Krun, I've been ravenously hungry plenty of times before and, Kregen being Kregen, will no doubt be hungry again.

  All these various passageways were cut neatly and the floors lay smooth and clean. Almost every door was closed. One or two that were open showed neat living spaces of a simple yet comfortable kind, and all were empty. A larger door revealed a room very similar to the room of the shrine I'd left, and a glimpse of the corner of a sarcophagus through the far opening. On I went to come out to a lobby. Here the head of a staircase with wide steps leading down did not tempt me. I wanted to find the way up and out.

  Some distance on past more living rooms and two more shrines, a faint green glow ahead seeped into the pearly light.

  Approaching stealthily, for I had no idea what I might wake up from a five hundred year sleep, I halted at the edge of a jagged crack across the floor. This fault was the result of an earth tremor, and I was thankful to see that I could leap the gap without difficulty.

  Before I did that I stretched out on my stomach and looked down.

  The scene displayed below was touching, noble and yet, given what I had run across so far, not entirely unexpected.

  The crack in the floor gave me a view of an extremely extensive chamber below. No doubt originally it had been a natural cavern; these people had worked on it, beautifying it, turning it into a temple.

  Hundreds of worshippers knelt with bowed heads, frozen in time in the instant of prayer. The high altar blazed with flowers. Priests and priestesses in white vestments had been caught in the act of prayer and blessing. Around the walls and stationed at the many doors stood armed guards. They were of many races of diffs, and were armed and accoutred like the effigies on the sarcophagi. The worshippers carried no weapons. Clearly, these people were concerned lest they be attacked during their devotions. Absolute stillness and silence below created a sense of awe.

  These, then, were the folk who continued to live down here under constant threat from the black-garbed degenerates of the Realm of the Drums.

  No one stirred, so I was not near enough to arouse them.

  Standing up I consigned their fortune to Opaz, and walked on.

  After half a dozen paces I abruptly halted and stood stock still.

  Onker! Here was I, lord of this and that, Prince of Strombor, King of Djanduin, Strom of Valka, a fellow who had been the Emperor of Vallia and was now supposed to be—or become—the Emperor of Emperors, the Emperor of Paz. I'd had plenty of practice deciding issues, using what skill I had in imitation of the Wisdom of Solomon, acting as a judge. That I did not care overmuch for that side of being an emperor had nothing whatsoever to do with it. I should have seen the situation and its ugly outcome instantly. And here I was calmly walking on! Talk about Pontius Pilate and the washing of hands!

  Without any further hesitation I turned around and went back at a run.

  Reaching the lobby I went haring down the steps four at a time. The problem of traps and monsters here did not exist. The foot of the stairway led out into a cavern filled with agriculture and flowers. There were no syatras, no Spiny Ribcrushers, no Cabaret Plants, no crowpins and no slaptras in the many pleasant pools. Everywhere as I passed the gorgeous perfumes of the flowers scented the air.

  At the far end a series of constructions held gardener's tools. The corridor continued and if the directions I held in my head were right then just up ahead and to the left should lie the temple chamber.

  Around the expected corner I trotted and instantly broke into a rapid dash. The two Hytaks on guard at a door stood as they had stood for five hundred years, leaning on their strangdjas, the spiky-headed polearms glittering with edge and point. As each one woke up he had no time to wonder about the stiffness in his muscles, for a thumb pressed just so under his ear sent him back to sleep again.

  Now it was necessary to proceed with caution, for the door led onto the balcony around the temple about fifteen feet up from the floor. The balcony was not as crowded as the nave below. A deep breath whooped into my lungs ... I set myself ... Then I was off, sprinting as fast as I could around the balcony, leaping kneeling devotees, hurtling around clumps of people, rushing on and on until I returned to the door.

  The air filled with song. That hymn faltered, almost died, and then regained fullness and power. These people prayed in song. Their quality showed in their reactions. They might feel odd, stiff, with aches here and there; they went on singing their devotions.

  There was no need to look back. The temple was now filled with life, with a proud people making their covenants with whatever god they had chosen. And the guards were alert and ready for any sneaky attacks from the black-robed priests of the Realm of the Drums.

  Straight down the corridor and up the stairs four at a time and out onto the landing above I hurtled. Along the corridor—a quick look through the green glowing crack to confirm all was well—and then I was rushing on.

  Well, now! Perhaps these people might regain the Realm they had lost. So, on I went and gradually the habitations fell away until I was finding my way across rocky caverns and through jagged tunnels, always going up.

  A waterfall and a stream impeded me a trifle; but I found a way up drenched in spray to come out onto more tunnels. Still, I was going ever upward, thank Opaz.

  Around then I felt as though each leg was encased in lead, weights hung on my arms, and my poor old backbone was bent double under the millions of tons of rock pressing down above. A small cave with only one entrance which could be blocked up promised a decent rest. Ignoring the protests from my inward parts I shut my eyes, thinking as always my last thought before sleep, and opened them again to the same pearly light. I must have slept for I felt refreshed. I was still damned hungry, though, by Krun.

  Hungry and thirsty, and only a trifle stiff from sleeping on a rocky floor—something I have had to grow accustomed to as a slave on Kregen—I pushed on. When I saw the corpse on the trail ahead of me, at the time I was crossing a deserted cavern, I bucked up. The poor fellow had been stripped of his worldly possessions, which was a disappointment for me; but he indicated I was regaining touch with one of the parties wandering about down here. Just which bunch it would be lay in the lap of any of the many magnificent pantheons of Kregen.

  Again a stream crossed my path and a long cool drink refreshed but could not satisfy those grumbling inward parts. Grass grew here with pretty white daisy-like flowers. There were going to be syatras and plenty more of the ferocious carnivorous plants of Chem up ahead. Maybe, instead of the plant eating me, I'd eat the confounded thing, by Vox!

  So, in not a very happy frame of mind I came out to a clearing with the cavern roof lost in that pearly haze, to see a man sprawled between two trees. He wore a grey breechclout which was of no i
nterest to me. But, in his hand, he clutched a small leaf-wrapped parcel. If I knew my slaves, that would be a trifle of food he had saved for himself.

  Now there is no excuse for my conduct. None at all. I am supposed to be a mighty and puissant fellow, a mercenary, a warrior prince and all the rest of it. I just let rip a holler and leaped forward to grab the parcel of food. Food!

  The leaf-wrappings were in my hand. I was ripping away to get at the food when a great swishing and swashing brought me up too late, far too late, and the folds of a net descended about me.

  Instantly I was rolling over and over and trying to get the little curved sword out of my belt to hack at the strands. They were tough stuff. A sharp point prodded me. A boot kicked me. A hoarse voice said: “Lie still, dom, or I'll stick you through, as Havil is my witness!”

  Flopped over on my back I stared up balefully at the fellow prodding me with his spear. His companion kicked me again. They were both apims, wearing armor and weapons after the fashion of Hyrklana, so I knew whose party I'd fetched up with—Vad Gochert, him with the gem-encrusted eyepatch and the icy manner, a dedicated swordsman, a man who worked for Spikatur Hunting Sword in the fight against Hamal. Well, he'd come down here to be frozen some good time ago, and the matter of Spikatur Hunting Sword had been concluded and Hyrklana along with Vallia were allies of Hamal.

  He came striding up with his foxy-faced Khibil guards. So, as I say, there is still no excuse for my further conduct. Yes, I was starving hungry, I wanted to get out of this hell hole, and now I'd been trussed up like a chicken in a net and prodded and kicked. I was, I make no bones about it, in an evil mood.

  “Hey, Gochert!” I yelled. “Get these clowns of yours off me. Bratch!” Now, for a start, one does not usually address a vad, the second highest rank of nobility, in quite those terms, at least, not unless you are a kov or prince or king with little sense of propriety. Also, that word bratch, meaning get a move on, jump to it, can be offensive.

  His gemmed eyepatch glittered on me. As I glared up I saw a flicker of shadow on the jewels—no, rather, a flicker of movement behind the gems. His narrow ferret-like face, although he was an apim, and the spareness of his supple body, held all the suppressed energy of which I knew he was capable. He was all oiled-steel and ice.

  “Don't just stand there like a loon!” I bellowed. “Get this confounded net off!”

  In that oiled-steel voice, sharp and meticulous, he said: “I remember you now. I puzzled over you when we met here in the maze.”

  “Well, then, you hulu, get this confounded net off!”

  His expression did not change. I was still wrought up so that just what this situation was in reality escaped me. The truth was that a powerful noble was being grossly insulted by a common fighting man.

  He made a sharp gesture and the two apims started clumsily to pull the net off. I struggled out, boiling with exasperation. I rapped out: “Kick me, would you, you rast!” And: “Prod me, would you, you cramph!”

  One I hit on the nose and the other in the eye. They staggered back, yelping, and I swung about to see a Khibil's rapier point at my throat.

  “Stand still—” he started to say. He was that same Romano who was Gochert's captain of the guard, a Khibil cadade with a very high regard for himself. That he had a rapier at all told eloquently that he fancied himself, for rapier and main gauche work were—in his time—comparatively new in Hyrklana. He started to speak, and then the rapier was in my fist and the point at his throat.

  “You stand still, you yetch!” I roared. I was, as you can see, most wrought up, in a right old paddy.

  He stood rigidly, and his whiskery fox-like face tightened.

  Gochert's icy voice reached me.

  “Your insults offend me. By Sasco! Just who do you think you are?” I jumped away from the cadade and swung about to face Gochert. He drew his rapier and main gauche with the practisedease of your true Bladesman. “You have a sword, I see. Now it is time I taught you a lesson that you will not forget.” He advanced, rapier and dagger poised.

  Just then—and only then—I realized what an onker I'd been and what I'd let myself in for. Our blades met and crossed in a chingle of steel.

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  Chapter three

  Those first testing movements gave me time to step backwards, and backwards again as he pressed. I gave ground rapidly, flicking and flailing the rapier in a way that suggested I was more used to a heavier vertical sword rather than the lighter horizontal rapier. His men scattered away and then formed a ring. They started to shout, and even in those moments of tension, I recognized the quality in their encouragements to the lord their master. I'd known plenty of guards and retainers who'd have been overjoyed to see some stranger stick their lord, by Krun!

  The ring of shouting men and women meant I had to circle to keep away from Gochert. The blades clashed and I saw he was not trying to thrust home. He was, as he had said, going to teach me a lesson. That would entail, I guessed, a considerable number of weals and cuts and dints on my body. Enough of my evil mood persisted for me to know very well I wasn't going to let that happen.

  “You took that sword, and you hurled the insults.” He made a neat little passage which should have ended with his point just nicking my left side. I let my own blade flop over to ward off that stroke as though mere chance guided the weapon. His smile could only be described as thin. He went on: “Normally I am over-patient with fools. They take advantage of my good nature. But you, I think, have overstepped the mark.”

  He whipped in a quick double-beat and then slashed and I had only to step back to allow his blade to whistle past my stomach.

  His lips widened a trifle. “Yes, I remember you now. Jak, your name, wasn't it? You helped Vad Noran with the schrepims.”

  As I have mentioned, there are swordsmen who like to chatter when they fight. That is their privilege. Usually I allow the sword to take over and so let myself sink into that mystic rhythm that enables the true swordsman to fight blindfolded. And, yet, still, the sword does not take over entirely. Always, I hope and believe, there remains enough of Dray Prescot to keep the combat on human terms. So, now, I let him chatter on. I did say: “Drajak, known as the Sudden.”

  “Drajak. Well, Drajak the Sudden, when I have taught you your lesson your suddenness may be considerably lopped.”

  A fresh onslaught saw me back-pedaling and keeping his brand out. His smile remained, and I guessed that was a fixed rictus of his fighting habit, a piece of psychological warfare to intimidate his foe. Two little vertical lines appeared between his eyebrows. Again he pressed and again I slipped away, letting my blade drive his down and out to the side. At that point I could have thrust him clean through the bread basket.

  He saw that. He saw his error and he leaped back, rapier lifted. So far the left hand dagger had played no part in the combat. I thought I knew why. Gochert fancied himself as a Bladesman; I had the one sword, so he would use just the one.

  He said: “I bear you no personal ill will. This is a matter of honor as between a noble and a commoner.”

  He leaped. I slid away. This time he used both weapons, the rapier and main gauche, known as the jiktar and the hikdar.

  Hung on my belt and thumping away at me the crowbar was my only other weapon, the little curved sword having been flung off with the net.

  I said: “You are using two swords.”

  “The lesson must be done.”

  I hauled out the crowbar with my left hand and hefted it. I wondered what the Bravo Fighters of Zenicce or the Bladesmen of the Sacred Quarter of Ruathytu would say if they could see me now. Laugh? They'd rupture themselves laughing, by Krun!

  Still, armed with rapier and crowbar I fought Vad Gochert with rapier and left hand dagger. By this time I'd sussed out his quality. He was very good, that followed of necessity. He would have acquitted himself well in a Bravo brawl in Zenicce, which is high praise. As always when I go into a fight I am re
ady to meet an opponent who is better than I am, having already had that experience with Mefto the Kazzur. This Gochert was good but not good enough. So now I had to work out what to do about him and his people.

  As you can see, I was fighting objectively, and keeping a tight control on my reactions. The longer we went on the more he would see he was outclassed. Then what would he do?

  Round about then I came to the conclusion that I'd have to speak up. As we fought I beat down his attacks with techniques he'd never dreamed existed and gave myself time to chatter.

  “I did not think you believed poor old Noran. Did you honestly believe he had fought off those schrepims?”

  He lost that artificial fighting smile. His ferret-thin face drew even thinner and longer. “You dare to speak of the noble lord Noran in these terms—!” He came in with a swingeing attack that I had to flick away and let my point leap past his side and so draw back without hitting. I said: “Just listen to what I have to tell you, Gochert. No—” as he essayed another onslaught. “No, no. Just listen, confound you, you onker!”

  His icy manner and disdainful superiority were evaporating. I said: “I shall not kill you, Gochert, for I believe any man who stands for Spikatur must have some good in him. You would do well to order your people not to shaft me. There is much for you to learn.”

  His retainers and guards had stopped yelling some time ago. They were talking quietly among themselves, I guessed, their eyes riveted to what was happening to their lord and employer.

  Gochert did not cease in his attempts to get his point past my defense. The crowbar was acting as a splendid main gauche. Suddenly he drew back. “I found it hard to credit Noran with victory over the schrepims. I see. You are a great swordsman. So be it. I own I cannot lunge past your guard. But that is something else not touching your insults.”

  “Look here, Gochert. How would you feel if you'd been traipsing through this damned labyrinth all alone and starving hungry and thoroughly lost and you found a packet of food in the hand of a poor dead slave and then nurdling great idiots drop a net on you and kick you and prod you with a spear, hey? Answer me that.”