A Life for Kregen Read online

  The offer was as we had expected. Alliance between our two forces, first against Layco Jhansi, and then against the Hamalese and the mercenaries and all the other vermin who had flooded into Vallia to pillage. He made no mention of the embassy from Jhansi. I forbore to bring up what was clearly a prickly subject. I kept a graven and serious look on my face — not a difficult task, by Krun! — and heard him out.

  The clothes these four Racters wore were the usual decent Vallian buff coats and breeches. Their wide Vallian hats with the black and white feathers lay on a side table. They bore no arms. My guards would have seen to that, and relieved them of their rapiers and main gauches long before they were conducted here. I studied the clothes and discreet insignia. Nothing out of the way there.

  Memory of the golden image of the grascent, that leaping scaled risslaca with the powerful hind legs and wedge-shaped head of destruction, worn by the Chulik who had attempted to slay us under the Gate of Voxyri, made me wonder if Phu-Si-Yantong had infiltrated the ranks of the Racters. It was most unlikely that he had not. But he would scarcely parade that kind of hidden exercise of power openly.

  When that particular Wizard of Loh struck, he struck from the shadows.

  Well, of course, they all do. But Yantong’s menace held a special brand of cunning and absolute conviction of superiority. I still fancied I could find something in him of admiration to ordinary folk; but I had to acknowledge that it would be damned hard to unearth.

  “What answer shall we carry back, majister?”

  I let them hang a space before I replied.

  “I must ponder on this,” I said, at last, keeping a straight face. “It is not a light matter.”

  “It touches the well-being of all Vallia.”

  ‘That is sooth. Tell me, from whom do you come?”

  “We represent the Racters.”

  “That I know. But who sent you? Who is still alive who commands your allegiance among the black and whites?”

  “Those whom you met in Natyzha Famphreon’s garden, and others. We are a strong and virile party, and—”

  “Spare me the boasting. Layco Jhansi will no doubt say the same of his powers.”

  “That cramph!” burst out Strom Luthien. His narrow face betrayed all the bile in him. “He should be strung up by the heels and left to rot.”

  ‘Tell me, Strom Luthien. What does Natyzha Famphreon say to the new emperor? Or did she not give you a private message?”

  Luthien allowed his thin dark moustache to lift at one corner. “Aye, she did. I give it to you under the code of heraldry.”

  I nodded. “Speak.”

  “When a leem leads a ponsho flock, the chavonths gather. But it is the Werstings who take the flesh.”

  I did not laugh. The brazen old hussy! At least, she recognized that I was in sober truth comparable to a leem, a powerful and elemental force of destruction imprisoned in human guise and apostrophized as a leem, an eight-legged hunting beast of superabundant energy and incredible ferocity. She knew I was not the fake, the pseudo Hyr-Jikai, the publicity-created Prince of Power without a shred of Jikai about him that so many people in Vallia and other parts still believed me to be.

  And, as you will readily perceive, that did not verge on megalomania, on overweening pride, or on puffed-up vanity. No, by Krun! It was all those horrendous things rolled into one and spread out, like a mirror of truth, for me to stare at my own dark reflection and recoil from — if I still had the morality.

  But, I sensed dimly that I must distinguish between the sins of evil self-importance and a too-crazed ego-mania, and a sober understanding that to do the things I had set my hand to would demand, must demand, a man prepared to accept the darker destinies of humanity as well as the lighter.

  These thoughts were not pleasant, and Strom Luthien moved back a pace, his hand falling to the empty scabbard. He no doubt thought my displeasure had been occasioned by the words of Natyzha he had relayed. Well, he was wrong. But I did not disillusion him.

  “Those are the words of San Blarnoi, I believe,” I said in that old nutmeg-grating voice. “Very well. Whatever I may decide about this offer of an alliance, there remains this. You may carry back to your masters this word: ‘A man pleads with his wife to do something and she refuses on the ground he is giving her orders.’” I glared hotly at the Racters. “You may tell all the Racters that the new emperor in Vondium is the emperor. There is no other. All their puppets have tangled strings. And there are regiments of fighting men with shears to untangle them — finally.”

  Strom Luthien knew me of old. I do not think he had heard me talk like this before. He had not witnessed the gradual emergence of Jak the Drang.

  And, I admit, and with perhaps not enough shame, that I welcomed the chance to let the Racters know the true position.

  Luthien swallowed down and got out a few words.

  “We will carry your message — majister.”

  There was no sarcasm in that last word.

  I nodded and left them. Before I could face the embassy from Layco Jhansi — and he deserved to swing high, as my men said — I went along to our private rooms. Delia was not there, for which I was thankful. I bathed my face and then found a cup of water and drank that, and spat, and so, pulling my tunic straight, marched off for the anteroom to the Samphron Hall.

  This Layco Jhansi... His province was Vennar, immediately to the east of the Black Mountains, a land that gave him an ample income, being lush and fertile in areas which afforded good husbandry and barren in others, where mining brought silver and alkwoin and other valuable minerals to swell his coffers. His colors were Ochre and Silver. He had been the old emperor’s chief pallan, his strong right hand, and he had betrayed that trust. He had set Ashti Melekhi to poison the emperor and when that plot had been foiled had seized his chance in the Time of Troubles and struck for the power himself. He had taken over Falinur. He was, without a doubt, still a most powerful foeman. I wondered whom he had sent to talk business with me.

  The ashy taste of smoke still clung about the anteroom as I nodded to the guards at the doors and went in.

  Jhansi had sent five people to attempt to persuade me to ally with him.

  I knew only one, Ralton Dwa-Erentor, the second son of a minor noble, who might style himself Tyr because his father’s rank and his own title did not come directly from the hands of the emperor. Had the emperor bestowed the title, Dwa-Erentor would have been Kyr Ralton. I nodded to him, as politeness dictated, for he had proved himself a keen racing man, riding sleeths, a dinosaur-like saddle animal I do not much care for, and I fancied he hewed to Jhansi’s party because of his father.

  The leader of the deputation rose from the chair to greet me. He rose slowly. I allowed this. I would be patient, understanding, and I would not lose my temper. So I, Dray Prescot, decided.

  Ha!

  This ambassador introduced himself as Malervo Norgoth, a man whose immediately striking feature was the thinness of his legs and the bulk of his body, which overlapped him on all sides like a loosely-tied haywain. His face bore traces of makeup. I eyed him as he spoke; but he piped up with a bold front, confident that what he had to say was of the utmost importance. Well, it was to him and his master, no doubt.

  He wore hard-wearing traveling clothes of buff and gray, and, like his companions, his weapons had been removed. He was a Tarek — a rank of the minor nobility — no doubt created by Kov Layco Jhansi. He was a man whose own importance expanded or receded with the company he kept. And, it was perfectly plain from his bumptious manner, he regarded me as a fake-emperor and someone in whose company he might expand wonderfully.

  As he made me the expected offer, I studied his companions. They seemed to me a bizarre lot. One of them, a very tall Rapa whose vulturine head was adorned with green and yellow feathers, and whose clothes hinted at armor beneath, grasped a long steel chain of polished links. The collar was empty, a round of bronze-studded steel. I wondered what manner of feral beast normally occupied th
at hoop of metal. The ring appeared large enough for a chavonth; probably it was a wersting, half-tamed and savage given half a chance. I doubted it would be a strigicaw.

  The fourth personage was a woman, and, to be frank, she was one of the ugliest women I have ever seen. I felt quite sorry for her, for her personal appearance was clean and decent, good clothes, freshly cleansed face, tidy hair and impeccable fingernails. But the cast of her features resembled so much the stern-end of a swordship that I fancied she bore a deep-seated wounded pride under her harsh exterior.

  And the last of this deputation — the first, given their respective powers — stood looking at me from under wild tangled brows. His eyes were Vallian brown. But his face was the face of an ascetic, marked by lines of self-inflicted punishment, grooved with masochistic fervor. He wore a hitched-up robe of skins, pelts out. His head was crowned by a rawly yellow skull, the skull of a leem, as I judged, and ornaments and bangles dangled and clanked as he moved. His left hand grasped a morntarch, the crook garnished with brilliants and the shaft embellished with wrapped skins and the legs of small animals and a couple of rast skulls. The smell wafting from this sorcerer, Rovard the Murvish, assured him a wide berth, and the woman kept herself at the far end of the line from him. I wrinkled up my nostrils at his stink; but I gave no sign of the affront I felt he gave me, here in the imperial palace of Vondium. By Vox! I’d been flung down here before the throne in a much worse condition and stinking far higher. He shook the clattering morntarch, softly, as though to remind me of his powers.

  Yet, despite those vaunted powers — and how real they were I did not fully know — which he shared as an initiate in the Brotherhood of the Sorcerers of Murcroinim, he wore a gaudy gold and emerald belt from which swung empty scabbards.

  Malervo Norgoth, the ambassador, was winding up the preliminary terms of his offer.

  Listening, I tried to understand why Jhansi would have sent these particular people and what they could bring to the deputation. Jhansi was a rogue, well enough, and had proved it; but he was shrewd. He liked to work through other people and, as in the case of Ashti Melekhi, when they failed him he would unhesitatingly destroy them.

  “Falinur,” I interrupted. “How stands Falinur in this?”

  Norgoth smirked, very supercilious. “The Falinurese stand with Kov Layco.”

  That seemed likely. The two provinces marched, the east of Vennar and the west of Falinur sharing a common boundary. The Falinurese had detested their new kov, my staunch comrade, Seg Segutorio, because he had tried to stamp out slavery. The people of Falinur would have been happy to throw in their lot with Jhansi. Well, that plot had failed and the attempt to seize power by force in the descent on the capital had gone awry when Phu-Si-Yantong’s puppets had appeared on the scene. But the current situation was new and I had to learn what I could. So we talked for a space and then I told them I would consider the matter, as I had told the embassy from the Racters.

  Norgoth shook his head.

  “That is not good enough! We must carry an answer back today — within the bur, for you have kept us waiting long enough as it is.”

  I stared at him.

  He stood his ground, whereat I was pleased, for that meant I was keeping my temper and my face must appear bland and indifferent.

  “There are people — nobles and pallans — with whom the matter must be discussed.”

  This was not true; but it sounded genuine enough and would be accepted as normal conduct.

  Again Norgoth shook his head.

  “Not so. You may be a nithing, as all men believe; but I do know you would take this matter into your own hands.”

  “Believe it. And reck that when I say I will think on this and tell you my answer, that is what I mean.”

  The woman opened her mouth to speak, and Ralton Dwa-Erentor, that canny sleeth racer, butted in swiftly. He clearly wished to pacify the rising passions here.

  “Surely, Tarek Malervo — two burs will not make all that difference?”

  Ralton glanced at me as he spoke, so that I understood his genuine desire to help. But his words were wholly wrong.

  “Two burs!” shouted Norgoth. ‘Two burs! We must have the answer, here and now.”

  And, of course, Ralton Dwa-Erentor should have seen that I, had I been your ordinary run of emperors, would never have stood still for any kind of time limit. Two burs or instantly. But he tried to help, and that forgave him much. A fleeting thought of Thelda, Seg’s wife, the lady kovneva, crossed my mind. She was always trying to help and making a mess of things. She’d been sorcerously flung back to her home in Evir, far in the north of Vallia, and what had happened to her since then Opaz alone knew. I fancied that Seg had gone looking for her. That would explain his absence even though he had been sent off to his home in Erthyrdrin at the northern tip of Loh.

  By Zair! What I wouldn’t give to have Seg and Inch and Balass and Turko and Oby and all the others with me, here and now, ready to face the perils that lay ahead!

  And my family, scattered every which way, each one busy about his or her pursuits — I would really have to talk seriously to Delia and see about rounding them up. Although that would not be the way I’d phrase it, by Vox.

  So I looked at Norgoth, this Tarek Malervo Norgoth, and I felt the old blood thumping and I gripped my fists together into the small of my back and ground my jaws down, tightly, so as to keep the proceedings on a halfway decent level of civilized transaction. But it was hard, by Zair, it was hard.

  At last I unclenched those old rat-traps of mine and managed to say in a quiet voice: “Here and now, Norgoth? Then you must expect the answer to be no, surely?”

  “Aye! That we do expect. I have said so all along.”

  “But I have not!” burst out Ralton Dwa-Erentor. His young face looked sullen, determined, as though he had built up a charge and now it was coming spilling out. The sullenness was very close to mutiny. “We must stand with honest Vallians against the Racters and the bastards from Hamal and their Opaz-forsaken cramphs of mercenaries.”

  They tell me that friends and friendship are becoming dirty words in this wonderful new civilization we are building here on Earth. That may be, and may be for the worse. But as I stood watching Ralton as he spoke so vehemently, I felt that in other circumstances we could have been friends. The determination in him to say out what he believed in, against the feelings of the ambassador, warmed me.

  I bent my brows on Malervo Norgoth.

  “Why does Layco Jhansi choose you to lead the deputation, if you seek only rejection as an answer?”

  Ralton fired up at this; but the woman turned her battleship-old-head and he simmered down. But he glowered most handsomely.

  “We knew the Racters were sending. That, alone, seemed good enough reason.” The contempt in Norgoth stung.

  Everyone spied on everyone else. Of course. That was just another of the pretty little ways of life an honest old sea dog had to understand. And, in all this, just how much was the devil’s work of Phu-Si-Yantong?

  “I still see no value in this mission from Jhansi.”

  “Will you or will you not stand with us against the Racters?”

  “I have said, I will ponder this and give you my answer presently.”

  A rattle from the sorcerer drew my attention away from Norgoth.

  A blank and horrifying whiteness shrouded his eyes so they looked like corpse-eyes, glaring sightlessly upon me. Foam speckled his lips and dripped in white-tinged green streamers upon the unkempt beard. He trembled. He shook as a tree shakes in the tempest. The hard bean-rattle of his morntarch clicked and clattered like the claws of rats. His right arm lifted and extended horizontally. The clenched fist uncurled and the long brown fingernails, rimmed in grime, spread and the forefinger pointed at my breast.

  His panting filled the anteroom with opaque beats of sound.

  “Now you will see why!” shouted Norgoth. His thin legs carried that gross body sideways, away from the sorcerer, and h
is face betrayed a glee made manifest in his delight at my coming destruction.

  I felt the blast of psychic power.

  I felt it. Like a wall of rushing air as one puts one’s head over the shield in a flier. Like the blow from an axe against the brim of the helmet. Like the nuzzling embrace of a graint as that great beast seeks to crush ribs and pelvis and skull. All of these sensations flared in the scything attack. I staggered. I took a step backwards.

  Norgoth yelled again, urging his sorcerer, this Rovard the Murvish, to greater effort, demanding that he render me incapable and in his power.

  So they did not wish to kill me. They had deeper designs. Their object was to place me in hypnosis, a saturated psychic state in which I would obey every command they chose to give me, in which I would be their puppet.

  Well, I have been the puppet of the Star Lords, aye, and of the Savanti, too. I have been used by Wizards of Loh in ways that are passing strange, and have fought. And I have been the recipient of favors from Zena Iztar, that superhuman woman who from time to time had appeared to me, exhorting me to courage and to perseverance, and who had enabled the genuine formation of a devoted Order of Brothers, the Kroveres of Iztar. She it was who had extended some measure of protection over me, spreading her aegis. And even the Star Lords had descended from their aloof mistiness to afford me a defense against Phu-Si-Yantong. So I staggered back and then recovered and glared at the sorcerer with a malice that rose fiery and lurid from the depths of my spirit.

  Well, poor fool, Dray Prescot. Instantly Rovard the Murvish spun his magical apparatus into wilder swings and sweeps and the reek of him puffed loathsomely into the anteroom. But I stood there, defying him. Poor fool indeed!

  For, of course, I should have appeared to succumb. I should have pretended to fall under the hypnotic sway. In a deceit like that I could have carried off easily enough, I fancy, lay the way to learn much.

  But I did not. I do not think it was pride, pride that showed itself in my unsought ability to withstand his sorcery. For I have little truck with pride. Rather, it was a sheerly warrior’s reaction, an instinct to fight back when attacked.