The Tides of Kregen [Dray Prescot #12] Page 20

  One of the young Todalpheme novices shaded his eyes, looking out to sea. “I believe...” he said, pointing. I looked.

  This young Todalpheme was used to poring over papers indoors. My old sailor's eye picked out the familiar shapes. Argenters, their sails board-stiff, riding the brushing skirts of the gale, rushed headlong through the tumbling whitecaps. I studied them, the wind in my face, wondering how many of them would smash to pieces before they negotiated the gates of the dam.

  I saw the flags fluttering.

  Four green diagonals and four blue diagonals slanting from right to left, the blue and green divided by thin borders of white.

  Menaham.

  That made perfect sense.

  When mad Queen Thyllis, as she was then, had invaded the island of Pandahem she had overrun country after country until her victorious armies and air service had been stopped in the Battle of Jholaix. Of all the nations of Pandahem she had made allies of the Menahem. I had remorseful memories of my treatment of young Pando, the Kov of Bormark, and his mother, Tilda the Fair. They lived side by side with the people of Menaham, and they called them the Bloody Menahem. Even when Thyllis of Hamal had been forced back, made to conclude a peace with Vallia and those nations of Pandahem she had overrun, still she continued the alliance with the Bloody Menahem. Hamal possessed few ships. Pandahem was an island center of commerce, as was Vallia. So what was more natural than that Hamal should use ships from Menaham?

  If you ask why bother to use large, slow argenters to transport vollers when they might fly, you forget the ways of Hamal, the cunning of those cramphs of Hamal and their treacherous vollers. I knew well enough that the fliers in those ships would work well for a while and then break down. Oh, yes, I knew that! Would the Hamalians risk a flight from Hamal to the inner sea in suspect vollers?

  And, of course, Genod Gannius, like us in Vallia, would be so anxious to lay his hands on fliers he would accept the probable defects as part of the price he must pay. This was what Vallia had done, what Zenicce and all the others who bought vollers from Hamal had done. Otherwise, no fliers.

  So I stood no longer lolling on the high parapet-walk watching those ships standing in. They were handled smartly enough and they negotiated the wide openings superbly. They rode the waves like great preening swans. All their flags fluttering, the sails cracking and billowing as the hands braced the yards around, the ships aimed for the gaps, the white water spuming away from their forefeet. They breasted the waves and sailed through the Dam of Days into the bay leading to the Grand Canal.

  I walked across to the other side of the dam and watched them, their motion much easier in the enclosed water. They made straight for the canal. They would probably lie up in the harbor halfway through, or in the harbor at the eastern end, depending on circumstances. Then the vollers would be brought up from those capacious holds. The air service men from Hamal would give them a final check and hand them over. No doubt Genod Gannius had made arrangements for his men to be trained in their use. And then...

  I had an apocalyptic vision of hordes of Grodnims descending from the skies, first to smash all resistance in Shazmoz, then other cities along the red southern shore, then on and on, razing Zy, on and on, finally taking Holy Sanurkazz.

  Well, the vision was apocalyptic, but it was no further business of mine.

  And Mayfwy and Felteraz?

  I bashed my fist against the stone of that high walk. I cursed. Why must I remember Mayfwy and Felteraz now?

  Of what value were they, set against my Delia?

  But they were not set against her.

  One value could not destroy another if there was no conflict of interest. Wouldn't my Delia tell me—demand of me—that as a simple man, let alone a one-time proud, high and mighty Krozair of Zy, a man who professed Opaz—when it suited him, to be sure—my obligation was to protect Mayfwy, who was our friend?

  But I wanted none of the inner sea. I wanted to go home. Sight of those argenters of Menaham had kindled the spark of deviltry. I would sneak down there by the light of the moons, steal a voller and so fly back to Valka. I might set one argenter alight; that would be reasonable, though I did not think I would care to attempt to destroy them all. Genod Gannius struck me as the kind of general who would take care of such possibilities in his planning.

  A brisker gust of wind blew against the back of my head. I turned. The sea was getting up and the whitecaps were now rolling in thickly, with here and there a spume lifting and billowing away downwind. The air was noticeably colder.

  Men in the brown of the workers were crowding past, down on the main road across the dam. I saw an Oblifanter directing them, a tough commanding figure in brown with a good deal of gold lace and gold buttons, with the balass stick in his fist.

  “We must return, Tyr Dak,” said the novice. He shivered. “The tide is making. They will close the gates now that the ships have passed. We must go back."

  “And about time, too,” said Duhrra. He had no idea what those ships carried, that they spelled doom to him and his kind. “We have seen this marvel, Dak my master. Now, for the sweet sake of Mother Zinzu the Blessed, I would like to see about my hook."

  Slowly I climbed down off the high parapet and trailed on after the others. The novice called me Tyr Dak—sir. And Duhrra called on Sweet Mother Zinzu the Blessed, the patron saint of the drinking classes of Sanurkazz. Wouldn't my two favorite rogues, my two rascals, my two oar comrades, Nath and Zolta, also be caught up in the catastrophe if these vollers fell into the hands of Genod Gannius, the Grodnim?

  The coils of unkind fate lapped around me then. Uppermost in my mind, the tantalizing thought of Delia drove out all other thoughts—almost. Nath and Zolta, Duhrra ... and Mayfwy. It was not fair. But then nothing in this life, either on Earth or on Kregen, is fair. Only a garblish onker would imagine otherwise.

  When we had escaped from King Wazur's test, there on the island of Ogra-gemush, Delia had had to instruct me. I had been all for leaving the Wizard of Loh, Khe-Hi-Bjanching, and Merle, Jefan Werden's daughter, in the pit. Delia had made me, all wounded and half dead as I was, climb down there and drag them out—twice. If Delia were here at my side now, wouldn't she demand the same chivalry, the same conduct, damned stupid though it might appear to one unversed in the mysteries of the Sisters of the Rose and the Krozairs of Zy?

  That I was no longer a Krozair of Zy had nothing to do with it.

  Cursing, in the foulest of foul moods, I stamped along after the others.

  The tide was making rapidly.

  The Oblifanter, a bluff, weather-beaten man twirling his balass stick, was most polite to the Todalpheme, novices though they were. To Duhrra and me he extended a distant politeness that reflected his opinion of Grodnims who sought to take his functions into their hands. We walked on. The wind blustered past above the parapet. Flags were snapping and then standing out stiff as boards. The sea must be covered in white now. Inland the bay remained calm. The argenters were sailing into the cut, the wind on their quarter, under reduced canvas.

  A giant creaking, groaning filled the air, like the ice blocks of the Floes of Sicce grinding against each other.

  The Oblifanter cursed and ran to one of the tall chain-towers. He was yelling, “Put some grease on the ropes, you nurdling onkers!"

  I wondered, if he kept up that tone to a Hikdar of the Grodnims, how long it would take for him to lose his teeth and have his nose broken. The Grodnims are a barbarous lot.

  When we reached the spot the noise had sensibly reduced. We could look over and see the brown-clad workers perched on a spider-walk tipping buckets of grease onto the thick steel cables as they passed over the pulley train. Close by, the monstrous bulk of a caisson lowered slowly into the sea, while on the other side the equally monstrous bulk of a counterbalancing tank lifted up in its guides. The whole spectacle would have delighted the very hearts and souls of all Victorian engineers, who doted on gigantism within the context of wrought and cast iron. I walked on.
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  It was no business of mine.

  The image of Delia floated before me. Now that image looked scornful. Her glorious face filled me with the kind of feelings a rope's end might have after a manhound puppy has finished with it.

  A rope's end does not have feelings, although it can impart them smartly enough in the fist of a boatswain's mate, and it would be in shreds after a manhound had finished with it, puppy or not. In much the same kind of shreds as my emotions...

  The valves controlling the pipes to the caissons lay grouped together under a stone shelter, built as an integral part of the dam. I stopped there, watching the brown-clad workers turning the handles. The Todalpheme ahead swung around and motioned me to follow. The Oblifanter whisked his balass stick over the rump of a worker who was clearly not putting his heart into the work.

  I said, “Oblifanter, you would oblige me by opening the valves to the tanks and closing the valves to the caissons."

  He gaped at me.

  I said, “Be quick about it, dom, for my temper is short."

  He started waving his arms about. His face assumed that red sometimes seen in a malsidge trodden on in a dopa den.

  “You cannot do that! The gates will open—the tide will flood through!"

  “Nevertheless, that is what you must do."

  “But the tide! The tide!"

  “You will let enough through to do as I desire. When that has been accomplished you may lower the caissons again, so it will not be enough to sweep on through the Eye of the World. It will expend itself before it reaches Shazmoz.” I thought about that, of the Grodnim ships hovering like sea-leems off Shazmoz, preventing communication. “We had best leave the caissons up until the tide reaches Shazmoz. Yes.” I felt remarkably cheerful. I did not smile, but I felt amazingly active and energetic. “Yes, that will serve admirably."

  “You are mad!"

  “Do not doubt it."

  “Here!” yelled the Oblifanter, his eyes fairly popping from his head. He shouted to a group of Grodnims sauntering off with the workpeople not laboring at the valves. “Here! You! Earn your keep, for what good you do here! Stop this madman—"

  He said no more for I put him to sleep gently and lowered him to the stone-flagged roadway. I stared at the group of workpeople at the valves. Their faces looked back blankly, like calsanys'.

  “Shut the caisson valves and open the tanks. Jump!"

  They saw my face and they shivered and began to do as I said.

  The Grodnims walked back, puzzled by the shouting, and saw what the workmen were doing. The Todalpheme stood to one side, quite unable to grasp what was going on. Duhrra looked at me hard and then sauntered across.

  The day was darkening over, the clouds massing. The wind blew keenly. The gale would strike very soon now. And all the time the tide rose, one of those enormous Tides of Kregen that could wash away all before it like a tsunami, leveling and destroying, save where the hand of man placed obstacles in its path to protect his property and life.

  “What's going on here?"

  It so happened that there was a Jiktar among the Grodnims. A Jiktar has come a long way in the chain of command, for he commands a regiment, a swifter or a galleon; when he has worked his way through to zan-Jiktar, he may reach the highest military rank of all, that of Chuktar, above whom there exist only generals of the highest rank, princes, kings and emperors.

  “Stand aside, rast!” He spoke quite matter-of-factly. He shouted at the frightened workpeople. “Shut the tank valves at once."

  I said, “Open the tank valves."

  The Jiktar did not hesitate. That was one reason why he was a Jiktar.

  “Seize him!” he said, again quite normally. “If you have to slay him, you have to. But I would like to put the madman to the question."

  He'd really like that, enjoying himself.

  The Grodnims came for me with their longswords swinging. I was not overly fussy about how many got themselves killed.

  There remained one item to be finalized, no, two, for I saw Duhrra start fumbling about under his blanket-cloak.

  “Stand away, Duhrra!” I yelled. “Don't get yourself killed."

  He did not reply.

  What I must do was position myself in front of the workers so as to cow them and assure them of unpleasantness if they did not continue to fill the tanks, and I must prevent the Grodnims from getting past me at them. The fight looked promising. The immediate future appeared somewhat scarlet, lurid and highly diverting.

  The impressions of the moment burn bright still: the wind beginning to build up into a howling torrent rushing across the high loft of the Dam of Days; the frightened workers in their brown smocks frantically turning the valve wheels as I glared at them; the clatter of the soldiers’ studded war-boots as they ran on the stone flags of the walkway; the glitter of their mail and the bright sheen of their green as they advanced, ample excuse for swordplay; the sight of Duhrra hopping about beyond them, his face a maelstrom of emotions that in another place and another time would have proved comical in the extreme; the feel of the longsword hilt in my fist. This was a cheap weapon, not a Krozair longsword, with a cross-guard and grip of iron, the grip covered in sturm-wood, the blade true enough but the whole brand lacking the superb balance of the genuine article. The grip spanned only two hands’ breadths so there was no chance of spreading fists in that cunning Krozair fashion. This sword was designed for the bludgeoning, hacking of men-at-arms in the melee. Well, it would serve.

  The Grodnims at first thought simply to overawe me, so they rushed up swinging their swords, yelling, ferocious. It seemed unchivalrous, unsporting, not Jikai, to slay the first of them, so I parried his blow and cracked him across his mail coif. He went down like a log. The second pair came in together, abruptly shocked, ready now, in the swift way of the men of green, to slay me and have done.

  Their blows hissed past and I cut once, backhanded once and leaped clear of a third who sought to drive his point beneath my breastbone.

  My sword took off the side of his face. I whirled blood-drops at the workers who had stopped turning.

  “Turn, doms, turn! Fill the tanks!"

  The blood spattered brightly across them and yet, in the instant I swung back and engaged the next pair, that bright red darkened and dulled as clouds drove beneath the suns.

  More men ran up, shouting, as the Jiktar, fairly foaming with not so much rage as the outrage he felt, bellowed them on. I cut down the two before me, finding the clumsy sweep of the longsword some impediment. I had used a longsword like this many times. Perhaps employing the magnificent Krozair longsword weakened a fighting man when he was forced to use lesser weapons. So I leaped and ducked and fought, hacking and thrusting when the opportunity offered, for these men wore mail. I had noticed on this second period in the Eye of the World that the Grodnims affected a second sword scabbarded at their waists, a shortsword. Perhaps this was the handiwork of Genod Gannius. If it was, he would have turned purple with rage that his men stubbornly stuck to their familiar longswords now. I was unarmored. A shortsword man might have been able to drive in under my longsword and finish me. The shortsword has, as I have said, advantages in some combats.

  A Grodnim Deldar, raving to get at me through the press of his own men, abruptly stiffened, rearing upright, his eyes popping. I saw a sword smash down on that juncture between neck and shoulder where the mail spreads, battering its way through. The Deldar fell. Duhrra, the sword in his left hand whirring up for another blow, appeared bright-eyed, furious of face, yelling.

  “Hai Jikai!” bellowed Duhrra, laying about him. “Hai Jikai!"

  The wind blustered past above us. Mailed men screamed and fell as our longswords bit. Duhrra took a glancing slice on his right arm—only a slicing glance. In combat of this kind there are seldom wounded men, not for very long anyway. A blow from a longsword, which is really a sharpened length of tempered iron, will do a man's business for him with certitude. The longsword possesses awful smashing power. I
took a man's arm off and whirled to deface his comrade, leaped and ducked and so roared in to get at the Jiktar.

  He saw me coming and jerked his sword up. Two more men went down before we could meet. Duhrra took out another and then the stone-flagged walkway contained only the brown-clad workpeople, the three Todalpheme, the Grodnim Jiktar—and a quantity of dead Grodnims scattered about.

  The Jiktar said, “You are assuredly mad and will die for this."

  I would not have replied anyway, but as I closed I saw a wide-winged shadow on the stones. The sun had shafted through for an instant, the green sun, for the red remained swathed in cloud. If this was an omen I would have none of it. In that ephemeral shaft of green sunlight the shadow of a hunting bird lay at my feet. Before I looked up I leaped out of reach of the Jiktar's sword.

  Yes. Yes, up there, the damned scarlet and gold raptor, the spying Gdoinye of the Star Lords!

  The sight enraged me more than the fight had been able to do.

  And then ... and then!

  A blue radiance began to seep in, to encompass me. The vague outlines of that giant Scorpion appeared before my eyes. I tried to scream out violently and managed a whisper, feeling myself falling. The blue radiance hovered. Someone—a long time ago and a long way away—had said that by willpower I might avert the call of the Everoinye. I tried. I struggled. I do not think that I could have succeeded alone.

  The harsh bite of the stone flags against my knees told me I still remained on the high Dam of Days. There was still a fight to be fought and won, a Jikai to create. The blue radiance changed, swirling, coiling. I sensed an unease. A tinge of yellow crept into the blue. I did not ever remember seeing yellow when I was transmitted to and from Kregen.

  “I will stay here, Star Lords!” I roared. I struggled to rise. I could hear a strange tinkering sound, as of water hitting a tin cup. “Leave me be, you kleeshes! I stay here!"

  The blue wavered; the yellow prospered.

  The enormous form of the phantom blue Scorpion assumed vast, grotesque proportions—and then it burst. A blaze of pure yellow exploded about me, with the sound as of cymbals clanging in the High Pantheon of Opaz in Vallia.