Masks of Scorpio Read online

  They apostrophize Corg from time to time; but he and they rub along.

  Had we been in a galleon of Vallia now, I would not have been so concerned. As it was, I owned to a lively feeling of imminent disaster. And this, as you will perceive, was because I sailed with my daughter as shipmate.

  So it was that when the blue-glimmering apparition appeared on the forecastle of the ship I was among the first to leap eagerly for the help promised.

  “Mindi the Mad!” yelled those who knew her. She had helped us before and now she was going to help us again...

  We crowded up. She stood on the castle which, in an argenter was a real castle-like construction containing varters and not the low lean fo’c’sle of a galleon.

  “Mindi! Mindi the Mad!”

  She stood there in her usual pose, head downbent and her auburn hair shining from a light that never came from the suns above us. Her pale blue gown reached in its straight folds to a circle about her feet.

  Her arms were folded in the gown.

  Yet her figure wavered. She shimmered. We all knew the witch was not really standing on our forecastle; but her apparition presented far less of the solid reality it had shown before. A dark blur of the bowsprit showed through her, until her blueness coalesced and she was fully fleshed before us; then the image flickered and wavered erratically.

  Naghan the Pellendur who ran our guards with admirable correctness in the absence of the cadade, said:

  “She is having great difficulty. And there is no wonder at that!” He spoke with a crisp disdain which embraced the sea and all things to do with the ocean.

  The blue-gowned apparition lifted an arm. A pale hand pointed landward.

  We all craned over the bulwarks to look.

  A shadow raced across the sea. Clouds massed above and the radiance of jade and crimson lay low across the water beyond the shadow. Rimming the horizon the coast of Bormark lifted jagged peaks.

  Captain Linson said: “If we sail inshore I will not answer for the shoals—”

  “Yet she clearly intends us to do just that.” Pompino tugged at his whiskers.

  “She must know a way of safety.” Naghan the Pellendur looked decidedly unhappy. He was a Fristle, and it is notorious that that race of catlike diffs are not enamored of the sea. They make atrocious sailors, and are generally not employed aboard ship. Naghan, for one, would dearly love to set foot safely on dry land once more.

  Cap’n Murkizon let rip a bellow.

  “Put good men in the chains, Captain Linson! Go craftily. If this witch leads us, we can find a safe passage. By the unwholesome armpit of the Divine Lady of Belschutz! For an expert captain such as yourself the risk is not so great!”

  The mockery with which Linson habitually treated Murkizon was now being turned back on his own head. It was amusing. The situation itself, also, held amusing overtones. I simply stood back and didn’t even bother to take a mental wager on the outcome.

  An abrupt blast of wind that stretched our canvas and heeled Tuscurs Maiden settled the issue.

  We were convinced that Mindi the Mad knew the coast and that she would not send us hurtling down onto rocks driven helplessly by the wind. There was a secure cove there sheltered from the gale. That had to be so...

  In the refreshing way of your rapscallion Kregan they would have fallen into a sprightly argument, well-spattered with flowery oaths, before deciding to do what was obvious.

  For some unfathomable reason — no doubt connected with my thoughts of Dayra — I was jolted into a memory of the time I’d spent as a kaidur in the Jikhorkdun of Huringa in Hyrklana. The arena’s silver sands had wallowed in spilled blood and I’d fought as a sworder against horrific beasts and wilder men.

  In those days I’d dreamed of my baby twins, Drak and Lela, for the rest of the children had not yet visited Kregen. I’d thought, even then, that babies grow up and face their own problems. Well, by Zair!

  My children had grown up and they did, indeed, face their own horrific problems. The amusing kicker here was that Dayra’s twin brother, Jaidur, had grown up to become the king of Hyrklana. I could never have expected that when I’d fought in the arena in Huringa’s Jikhorkdun!

  So, impelled by these old thoughts, and perhaps with more of that old, lowering, black, devil’s mask that was the real Dray Prescot, I stepped forward.

  “Let us follow Mindi’s direction and seek a safe cove and to Sicce’s Gates with these rasts who follow us! Then we can divide up the treasure and see each one of us obtains his just share and reward.”

  Pompino glanced at me with a perplexed look. Then, at once, he shouted: “Captain Linson! Kindly steer the ship where the witch directs. As soon as we find a safe anchorage we can—” here he brushed up his whiskers in a way which said that, by Horato the Potent, he might not know much about ships; but he was the Owner, and he knew a bit of sea-going jargon or two “—where we can drop the hook.”

  Some of the old sea salts down in the waist laughed at this; but the situation eased dramatically.

  As for me — I felt the relief that Dayra was going to be kept out of another fight. She was a trained fighting girl, a mistress of the Whip and Claw. She had sheathed her Talons for a space. Those wicked razor-sharp talons affixed to her Claw that could rip a fellow’s face off as soon as look at him, they would remain sheathed if I had my way.

  And that, as any onker could tell you, was as unlikely a happenstance on Kregen as anything else. The future would not hold that Sweetness and Light I craved, and yet the darkness would be illuminated by flashes of that lightning that comes only from good companionship and stout hearts and a brave striding on against fortune.

  Running before the wind we sped rapidly toward the coastline. Any skipper in his right mind would have nothing whatsoever to do with this madness — running freely down onto a lee shore! Insanity! But we trusted the pale-blue glimmering apparition of the witch-woman, Mindi the Mad.

  The moment an upflung headland of gaunt striated rock passed away to starboard the wind moderated spectacularly. Our canvas flapped. We moved on sluggishly in the wayward eddying currents of air spilling over into this wide expanse of sheltered water.

  We had way enough to continue and to enter the mouth of a funnel-shaped bay. The land swept away and upward into mountain crests, and all clothed with strongly green vegetation. A river no doubt spilled down between those hills. The thought occurred to me, idly, that in all probability the water we now sailed was perfectly drinkable.

  Islands scattered reflections of themselves, many islands, and flocks of birds, driven to seek shelter by the oncoming gale, wheeled and squawked in the preliminaries of settling down. The shafting light of the Suns lay low and bewilderingly, glittering up refulgently from the water.

  Selecting one of the islands we rounded to in a good depth of water off a yellow beach. Here we did as Pompino in his newly won nautical expertise had prescribed and dropped the hook.

  “A goodly shelter, this, far from prying eyes,” said Captain Linson. He was well pleased. He, it was clear, saw no sense in risking his ship in a combat against twice his number. And also, he like us could foresee the time when we’d come by charts of these waters, honestly or otherwise.

  When a ruffianly crew of us went ashore for fresh water and firewood, Pompino roundly declared that, by Horato the Potent, he would spend the night on honest solid ground. A tent-like shelter was rigged, the fires were started, and the ship’s cook, the superb culinary artist Limki the Lame, with his assistants, prepared our evening meal. An anchor watch was left aboard Tuscurs Maiden, and we had to promise them their partners would oversee their share in the gold.

  Sharing out the treasure!

  Ah! That was now the single most important fact in all the universe to this bunch of rapscallions.

  The apparition of Mindi the Mad vanished to our shouted remberees. We could not hear her speak when she was in this trance state that allowed her spirit to visit us, and we doubted if she could hear us, bu
t being good Kregans we shouted the remberees in good heart. The two pursuing ships might snuffle about these scattered islands all night; we had no doubt that they’d never spot our fires, and if their captains had any sense, they, too, would anchor up for the rise of the Suns.

  The general opinion, heartily shared by Pompino and the Fristles, was that we ought to make camp here and spend some time reorganizing ourselves. Fresh water tinkled in the brook, game abounded, we were well-provisioned. This little paradise would mightily suit us for a spell.

  The chests were dragged across the sand and ranged in neat rows. The men clustered in the firelight.

  Their faces — well on the faces of the apims, members of Homo sapiens like me, the avaricious gloating could be plainly read. On the faces of those folk who were diffs, races of those splendid people of Kregen who are not fashioned like people of Earth, the expressions might differ. There was no doubt that everyone here looked forward with the keenest anticipation to dipping their hands into the gold and silver...

  Treasure!

  Well, I in my dour sour cynical old way anticipated trouble. I was right; but not as I’d anticipated...

  “We will do this thing according to immemorial custom.”

  “Aye!”

  The proportions to be taken by each and every person were regulated by rank, position and prowess.

  We had upward of two hundred thousand gold deldys to distribute, made up of various gold and silver coins. There was no rush. This could take all night and still the rascals would be on their feet with a flagon in their fists, gloating. Pompino stood on a chest with the list prepared by Rasnoli, his gentle Relt stylor, and read out the distributions.

  Each name was met with a cheer or a groan, a chorus of good-natured banter. The firelight glistened on flushed faces and whiskered cheeks, glittered in eyesockets, caught the rows of jagged teeth. Dayra and I stood together, a little in the background. She had brought the treasure to us, taken from the enemy led by Zankov; she would come into a handsome share.

  “Gold,” she said. “Ha — the Little Sisters should be pleased.”

  I did not inquire which particular set of Little Sisters she referred to.

  I did say: “In your own time, Dayra, you would do well to return to the Sisters of the Rose. They would welcome you—”

  “What do you know of them! You cannot tell me that!”

  “I do not seek to uncover the sorority’s secrets, my girl. But you could do worse than seek their blessing once more.”

  “I will think on it.”

  Now the treasure was being divided. It had all been counted, every last silver piece. The men formed up, and the women took their places. Each one held out a sack, or a cap, a stout wooden box, and the coins were counted out by Rasnoli as Pompino, Captain Linson, Cap’n Murkizon and other of the more trustworthy members of the crew stood by. The process took time. No one minded that.

  Gambling began at once, of course.

  The slaves we had freed and who had fought with us were entitled to their share. Also we had agreed that the multitude of girl sacrifices we had rescued should also receive each one her share. There was a certain amount of self-serving in this, for as soon as we reached civilization we could unload the girls with a small fortune each. That was the general consensus of opinion. Dayra, I had told, and she had agreed, that I wanted to look out for these waifs more particularly. If they were simply cast adrift with a pocketful of gold they’d be dead or slave again in a twinkling.

  The share-out went on. The principals, in which number Dayra and I were included, would receive their portions later. The amounts were known. This was not a scheme to defraud our shipmates, merely an example of the protocol in which Kregen abounds.

  This amused me. Limki the Lame stomped past, his nose in a flour bag. The bag bulged with the shape of coins.

  “By Llunyush the Juice!” he said, coming up for air, his face whitened in splotches. “As fine a sight as any honest man can hope to see!” We agreed. Cooks are important folk.

  A vast amount of jollity broke out around the campfires. Wine passed freely. Every man felt himself a king and every woman a queen. There were quarrels. Inevitably so. One or two knives flashed; but it was noticeable that these were mainly gripped in the fists of the newcomers to our band, and the old stagers moved in swiftly to break up the disturbances.

  Pockets bulging with gold coins, men and women strutted from the pay-out table to join in the celebrations. If trouble was to come, I was thinking, a few of us retained clear heads — I was thinking that when the lambent blue glow spread across the level sands by the water’s edge.

  For two heartbeats, and two heartbeats only, I thought the Star Lords were sending their enormous blue Scorpion to snatch me away from this island beach and hurl me down all naked and defenseless on some other part of Kregen where I would sort out a problem for them. For two heartbeats only...

  Other folk yelled. Some screamed. A panic movement away from the beach began and Rondas the Bold fell all sprawling on those yellow sands that were stained with the indigo fires spurting from the apparition.

  This was not Mindi the Mad.

  A face stared out at us from the center of the deep blue fire. A walnut-crevassed face surrounded by whiteness, a face sharp and piercing, a face of illuminated sorcery. Dayra took my arm. We stood, scarcely breathing, watching. And the hooded eyes in that grotesquerie of a face looked out in a gleam like summer lightning. Those eyes saw the beach and the campfires, the carousing people, the heaps of gold and silver, the broken open chests.

  “D’you recognize her?”

  “No,” Dayra answered, on a breath.

  The spectral image of the witch remained hard and fiery edged, studying us. The outline of blue flames expanded. The woman’s body rose into view. She wore a white form-fitting gown after the fashion of the Ancient Egyptian women of our Earth, banded under her breasts, which were small and hard and cone-like. The gown emphasized the shape of her figure, the swell of her hips, the slight protuberance of her stomach. Around her neck a massive circlet of interlocked gold lozenges, studded with gems, stood out vividly against the mahogany-colored skin. Her hair was remarkable. Frizzed and fluffed in the Afro fashion, it surrounded her head in a sheen of chalk-whiteness — startling and yet in no way incongruous.

  A tiara of blinding light crowned her forehead against that chalk-white mass of hair. The sound of a multitude of tiny tinkling bells shivered in the night air.

  In the fashion of many ladies of Kregen she wore a glittery linked chain from a bracelet on her left wrist.

  But the other end of the chain did not attach to a necklet on some friendly furry little creature, a doted-on pet, a warm cuddly bundle — oh, no. That necklet fastened up a winged, fanged, scaled reptile of hideous appearance, who yawned widely, revealing a scarlet mouth and serrated teeth and a forked tongue that licked wickedly this way and that.

  The witch gazed upon us on the beach and we stood, petrified after the first frantic moments of panic.

  Not a sound disturbed the night except the tinny tintinnabulations of the silver bells.

  As though an artist wiped a chalk mark clean with a single swipe of a wet cloth — the sorceress vanished.

  No one had the strength to speak.

  We trembled in the night air as the sounds of the crackling fires, night insects, the gentle susurration of the sea, returned to the normal world. An after-scent of musk hung in the air. I felt Dayra’s fingers gripping my arm.

  I’d made no move to put my hand on hers, to give her that physical comfort, for I felt sure she would not welcome that, regarding it rather as a patronizing gesture. But I did look at her, and as I turned my head a man yelled down by the beach, and then another shrieked in agony, and a chorus of agonized howls burst out.

  Dayra jumped.

  “The devil! Vomer the Vile take it!”

  She clawed frantically at her tunic, tearing at her pocket. I smelled burning. She had to rip the tun
ic off and hurl it down and jump on it to extinguish the blaze.

  All over the beach men and women were leaping about, yelling blue bloody murder, ripping off burning clothes. I saw Limki the Lame’s flour bag burst into flames and a lava stream of blazing gold run swiftly across the sand, molten, to hiss in eruptions of steam into the sea.

  So, of course, we understood what had happened.

  All the treasure had turned molten.

  Gold and silver alike, it melted into puddles and then wisped and shrank and vanished. We were left, dazed, smelling the stinks of scorched flesh and burned clothing, left with not a single coin of all that marvelous treasure.

  Dayra said it.

  “By Chusto!” she said, her eyes bright. “That gold soon burnt a hole in our pockets!”

  Chapter two

  Pompino simplifies the future

  “She may have been a Gonell, for they have white hair they do not cut off.”

  “She suffered from chivrel—”

  “Powdered with flour—”

  “The witch! I’d like to powder her with hot coals!”

  “With red honey and let the ants—”

  Oh, yes, as you can see, the company of Tuscurs Maiden was not at all enamored of the witch who had so summarily reduced our worldly wealth, whoever or whatever she might be.

  We sat moodily around the decaying fires as the Suns rose. Someone would have to stand guard and the rest would try to sleep. No one felt like doing anything. We were in all truth a most depressed bunch of desperadoes...

  “Well,” declared Dayra. “I never expected to be rich in this life.”

  “But that is always an objective, a dream, something one can yearn for,” protested Pompino. “Although, mind you, I own my disappointment is in not seeing my dear lady wife’s face when I emptied the gold chest before her.”