Masks of Scorpio Read online

  “So I see.” I managed to speak the words in the kind of grating hiss a pile of pebbles gives when it slides off a truck, in my old gravel-shifting voice.

  She said, breathlessly: “We must—”

  “Aye. We must. Now keep quiet and pay them no attention.”

  As we were prodded along she flung her head up, glaring at me. She spoke softly; but it was a struggle.

  “Is that it, then? I see! You will do nothing because no one must know who you are! And there are friends over there — good friends — there’s Sosie ti Vendleheim, and—”

  “Ros! Shastum! Keep quiet!”

  She flinched at my tone, and I blundered on: “If we start anything now we’ll all be killed. If we fight now, all our friends will fight — all of them! — and we’ll all die!”

  “What was that, Jak!” called Pompino, shuffling along. “Something about fighting?”

  “When the time comes, Pompino. When the time comes.”

  “By Horato the Potent! My insides are more hollow than the nine empty bladders of Pantora Hemfi of Promondor! Just let us have a bite to eat and drink before we come to handstrokes.”

  Murkizon guffawed at that, and a guard hit him with the butt of his spear, and Cap’n Murkizon took the blow and rolled with it — and laughed the louder.

  I began to feel sorry for these guards of Pettarsmot.

  The two bunches of prisoners trudged side by side only for the time it took to cross the next yard. Here we were shepherded under an archway and so into the building; the last we saw of the aerial sailors of Vol Defender they were being bludgeoned through the opposite archway.

  Dayra would not look at me.

  She walked along, her head high, nostrils flaring, her face wild. I managed to crab alongside Lisa the Empoin, for whom I had a high regard.

  “Lisa — would you speak to Ros? Tell her how a prisoner and a potential slave behaves. She’ll stir up—”

  “At once, Jak. You’re right. She’s acting as though she’s a princess!” And Lisa the Empoin wormed her way swiftly to the Princess Dayra’s side, and said: “Ros Delphor, listen!”

  Quendur the Ripper looked after Lisa. “I think,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. “I really think when I make Lisa a princess, as, of course, I shall one day, she will remember Ros Delphor. If ever a girl should have been born a princess as well as my Lisa, it is Ros.”

  Do not think I enjoyed suffering under my daughter’s haughty contumely. She was in the right, if you took into account only the high Jikai kind of headlong glory-hunter who got himself killed half a dozen times.

  She probably did not fully grasp that the comrades with us now were of Pandahem; they’d fight for themselves, they wouldn’t get stuck into a fight with little chance just to rescue some damned rascally Vallians. Ros knew that well enough when she thought about it; at the moment she wasn’t thinking but letting all her Prescot and Valhan blood surge passionately into her actions.

  The guards bustled us into a chamber where a fellow halted us and formed us into ranks. We stared about owlishly. The walls were draped in deep blue. A railing fenced off a podium whereon stood four chairs, richly decorated. Guards watched us alertly. A woman hurried in from a side door, hitching up her blue robes, climbed onto the podium and sat down in a middle chair. She peered at us with great displeasure.

  A small woman, with a smooth yet knowing face, dark hair and eyes, and a mouth that would take off the leg of a granite statue, she used her power without thought.

  A flunkey bellowed: “The great and puissant lady Moincy, Under-pallan of Justice, in session.” He banged his staff. Murkizon laughed, and Pompino hushed him.

  I leaned a little toward my Khibil comrade.

  “I trust you have a good, a very good, story ready?”

  He swelled. He brushed his whiskers. “Trust me!”

  Nobody in this hick town was going to overawe or catch out a foxy fellow like a Khibil, no, by Horato the Potent!

  The woman, this lady Moincy, looked down on us.

  “You are fortunate that today there are bigger fish to fry. I cannot waste time on you. What have you to say for yourself before you are fined?”

  Pompino yelped: “Fined! What are we fined for?”

  “You do not have to know why you are fined, only that you are fined. Is that all you have to say? Very well — Each fined two gold Deldys.”

  Pompino’s mouth was opening and closing like — well, like a clever foxy fellow called the Iarvin who had had his breath temporarily snatched from him. Temporarily only, mind...!

  “They’ve had a good look at our belongings,” pointed out Quendur. “They know how much gold we have—”

  “And she’s pitched it just right! The slag heap!” said Murkizon, bristling.

  Murkizon, unfortunately, was wrong. The lady Moincy had barely started. She wasn’t in so much of a hurry as not to be able to spare a few more moments fining us.

  Pompino at last got out: “We are honest paktuns seeking employment—”

  “Thieving masichieri, more likely!”

  “Never! We—”

  “Silence.” She motioned down and a guard hoicked out our possessions from the chest into which they had been thrown. You may imagine with what hunger we gazed upon our weapons tumbled there. The guard produced a canvas and leather bag. From this he took out and held aloft the shining, ugly, cunning Claw.

  “To whom,” said the lady Moincy in a voice on a sudden silk soft, “does this belong?”

  Chapter five

  Of fines, songs and fliers

  My left arm flew out, as it were on its own, and palm back pressed Dayra away. I held that arm rigid so that she could not step forward, and Murkizon’s barrel body concealed my action. I stepped out before my comrades. I looked up.

  With my back to them I could put on an imbecilic face, a vacuous grin, a semi-leering simpleton look that I can do so well — as I have all the natural advantages for it, according to my comrades. I stared up happily at the woman and said: “Why, lady, that is mine.” Before she could answer I rambled on in a loud bucolic voice: “My comrade, poor Nath the Kaktu, brought it back from some outlandish place, don’t ask me where, somewhere beyond the Pillars of Rhine where men have eyes in their stomachs; leastways, that’s what poor Nath said, and he won it in a game of Jikalla, he said, although I wonder, for you know how these brave paktuns are, and Nath, he said—”

  “Shastum! Silence!”

  “Why, yes, lady,” I said, and wheezed, and looked up at her grinning like a puppydog.

  “And do you know what it is?”

  “Why — in course, lady.”

  I heard the low gasp from Dayra at my back.

  “Well, onker? What?”

  “Why, it be a back scratcher, o’ course, and right handy at bath nights, although it’s a mite sharp if you’re—”

  “You fool!”

  “Why, yes my lady.”

  She glared at me. “You are fined a gold Deldy for being a fool, fool!”

  “Why, thank you, lady—”

  “And now,” she went on, hunching herself up and taking on an altogether different appearance, as though she had sprouted wings, horns and a tail. “And this!”

  From the chest the guard lifted aloft a glittering star-sparkling silver mask, a snarling mask of a devotee of Lem the Silver Leem.

  “Why, my lady,” I spoke up before anyone else had a chance to speak. “Poor Nath did say as he valued that there mask above a flagon o’ best Jholaix, which as I told him is plain silly for an honest paktun to talk, seeing that it is never and nowise ever was real silver, leastways, that’s what poor Nath said, he said, ’t’ain’t silver, he said—”

  “Shastum!”

  “Why, yes, my lady.”

  As I subsided I wondered if I was verily the fool the lady dubbed me, or clever. I had the strongest feeling that the cult of Lem had either bypassed Pettarsmot or not been well-received here. To claim allegiance to Lem, as woul
d have been easy, would not, I judged, have been our best course.

  The guard hoisted up the golden zhantil mask worn by the people who slew the worshippers who wore the silver masks. We thought, although we did not know, that Pando had started the idea of having his fighting men wear the golden zhantil mask in opposition to the leem mask. I glared up with my lopsided grin, the simpleton to the life, ready to brazen it out, or to leap — very quickly! — seize a sword and so go red-roaring headlong into action...

  “And, fool, this?” The woman’s voice purred now just as a big cat purrs — sometimes — before he has your head in his jaws.

  “Nath said that was not real gold, lady, and you can see it is not real gold by reason of the bit of brass off behind the left eyehole which I saw at once and told poor Nath and he said, he said—”

  She sighed. She looked down.

  “Fined three gold Deldys for being a fool of fools.”

  “Why, thank you, lady.”

  Somebody at my back was having the devil of a job, spluttering and wheezing and fairly bursting to stop themselves from laughing out loud, long and uproariously.

  Grimacing away to the woman on the podium I got a quick glance back. Trust Pompino! He was in no case to step forward and take charge of the situation.

  But I misjudged my Khibil comrade. He shut his eyes, squeezed, opened them, took a whooshing breath, and then stepped out beside me.

  “My lady,” he roared out, very brisk, very correct, your upright paktun to the life. “We seek honest employment. Do you have any openings for guards here in Pettarsmot, for, my lady, we are all experienced mercenaries, and take our full pay as prescribed—”

  “The land crawls with mercenaries since the wars, fellow. Go along to that pest-hole in Bormark, Port Marsilus. They recruit an army there. They will welcome riff-raff like you.”

  “Thank you, my lady—”

  “Fined one gold Deldy—”

  “What for?” Pompino was outraged once again.

  “Fined two gold Deldys for speaking importunately to a lady, and two more for speaking improperly.

  Guards!”

  I tensed, but the guards merely ran us out of the chamber and into a narrow hall where they told us to wait.

  Presently slaves appeared carrying our gear. We checked it over, grumbling, and found the gold vanished. The lady Moincy had pitched it exactly — proving Murkizon right, after all — and there was not a single gold coin left to us.

  We belted up our armor and weaponry, and were all of us in a fine foul mood, I can tell you!

  “This place is worse than the Diproo-Blessed Tavern on pay night,” said Pompino. “The quicker we are out of here the better.”

  “Absolutely right,” I said.

  Dayra looked at me, her face rosy with repressed passion, and then she turned away. Her shoulder lifted against me.

  Surrounded by guards with arrows nocked and ready, we were escorted to the town gate.

  The town of Pettarsmot was just a town. The houses were neat and tidy, and no doubt the hovels were well out of the way, the folk were well-dressed and walked about with a brisk air of business. At the gate the towers were manned by guards. Flags flew. The Suns shone. Dust lifted. The hikdar in command waved us through.

  “On your way! If you come by here again you will no doubt be more circumspect.”

  “Oh,” said Cap’n Murkizon before anyone could let rip some noise, any noise, to drown him. “We’ll be back.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “Why, horter,” I said, pushing forward and grinning that silly sly grin. “We did enjoy your night’s lodging

  — and your supper and breakfast.”

  His pudgy face blanked with rage, blood rushed under the skin, then Pompino shoved me aside and roared out: “One has to suffer loons these days, hikdar! Never fear. We shall bid you all remberee, and depart!”

  Poor Dayra was so wrought up I saw her press her hands together. Her fingers writhed and coiled one within another. I felt for her. But her life was precious, far, far more precious than anything else.

  All the same, if these idiots of Pettarsmot thought they had done with me, they were vastly mistaken.

  Now it chanced that I’d been wearing a plain blue tunic with short trousers cut to the knee. I strode off along the road, with the irrigation ditch alongside, until we’d passed beyond the first stand of trees where we were out of observation of the guards on the gate towers. Here I halted.

  Advancing along the road toward us came the first of the incoming produce from the country, heavy wagons drawn by shaggy old quoffas like perambulating hearth rugs, carts hauled by low-slung mytzers with their multitude of legs. Country folk walked along, children clinging to their mothers’ skirts, the men in simple country clothes of smocks and tunics, some with shaggy jerkins, smaller editions of the quoffas they guided.

  Pompino at the head of our people passed.

  I said: “Do you go on, Pompino. I’ll join you later.”

  “Oh?”

  “Aye.”

  He looked at me. He’d experienced my desires to go off by myself before. He brushed up those reddish whiskers and started to say something, thought better of it, and yelled at the crew: “Step lively, there!

  We’ve a ways to travel before we reach breakfast!”

  As Naghan the Pellendur reached me I said to him: “Naghan. Would you have one of your lads carry my bundle, please? I’ll claim it later, and intact, I trust.”

  “Of course, horter Jak. But—?”

  I was stripping off the blue tunic and cut-off trousers. In their place I wrapped a length of green cloth about myself, unblinking of the color. An old brown blanket went over my shoulder in a roll. I handed Naghan the rapier and main gauche. He took them, mightily puzzled. I handed him the sword, the straight cut and thruster, and he took that, too. Over my right hip was sheathed a sailor knife. That would suffice.

  Perhaps I’d find a stout stick from a hedge.

  The Fristle guard Deldar said: “Horter Jak. Do you know what you are doing?”

  “Yes, Naghan, strange as that may seem. Now go along with your people. I’ll catch you in time for dinner.”

  He shook his catlike head, and tugged his whiskers, but he yelled at his men and off they went along the road.

  In the shadow of the stand of trees I watched them, searching for the form of Dayra. I did not see her. I frowned. A quoffa-cart creaked along toward me, loaded with what looked like cabbages. The man leading the animal chewed a straw and wore his hat pulled down. I simply fell in at the tailgate of the cart, and Dayra said, “And about time, too!”

  I refused to be discomposed.

  “Look, Ros, this is no place for you—”

  “They’re Vallians — and there are others who are friends besides Sosie—”

  “Yes, but—”

  “It is no use arguing.”

  So, in a kind of armed truce, we walked back to Pettarsmot where we had been imprisoned, fined —

  and not fed.

  She wore her own blanket in a kind of poncho, and had changed her russet tunic for a blue skirt and bodice. I saw I was going to have trouble with this smart daughter of mine if I wanted to sneak off in the future...

  She’d retained her swords, also, under the poncho.

  Going along quietly at the tail of the wagon we reentered Pettarsmot. The place looked no different, as indeed, why should it? We went along to the prison block and stopped outside to have a scout around.

  For all our casual attitude, this was not going to be easy.

  “Bash somebody over the head and ask,” counseled Dayra.

  With a little devil prodding me, I said: “Now if we had a carpet handy...”

  She stared at me. “I haven’t forgotten!”

  “Well, this is how we do it, then.”

  We found the fellow standing guard at a small side door. As we rounded the corner we both stopped.

  Dayra gasped.

 
; Out in the center of the parade ground lay the imposing if wrecked shape of a flying sailing ship of the air. Val Defender, masts trailing over the side, a raffle of cordage cumbering her decks, squatted like a child’s toy trodden underfoot by a careless adult.

  I brightened up when I saw her.

  “That’s more like it!”

  “What—?”

  “Grab this fellow and let’s get inside.”

  The guard went to sleep standing up and as I eased him to the ground Dayra slid the door open. Light from an open roof spilled down, revealing an empty corridor. We stuffed the guard into a corner, tied and gagged, and padded off looking for trouble. How odd, and yet how exhilarating, to be out adventuring with my daughter Dayra! I thought of the times I’d gone off on adventures like this with Lela, my eldest daughter, known as Jaezila, and I vowed certain vows and if I thought of my daughter, Velia, well, then, I did, and the whole world might stop and still make no difference...

  By a side wall in a patio where a well covered by a sharply pitched blue slate roof lorded it, we found a flunkey who was only too pleased to put down his water bucket and take us along to where the Vallian prisoners were confined. Usually, when you are on a rescue mission of this nature, it is not as easy as this... I watched the fellow in his gray slave breechclout. Dayra paced ahead eagerly.

  We heard them before we reached them.

  They were singing.

  It seems to me entirely unnecessary to say that I’d borrowed the sword from the guard who’d gone to sleep. Now I lifted the weapon, as it were, for all the silliness of it, for all the stupidity of it that it may reveal, I lifted the sword in involuntary salute.

  The men and women of Vallia, prisoners, sang.

  They were not singing one of the great songs of Vallia, a patriotic paean of glory and valor and nobility.

  Oh, no. They were not singing one of the rollicking Vallian songs that poke fun at the various enemies Vallia has had to contend with from time to time. Oh, no.

  Oh, no. They were singing “The Song of Logan Lop-Ears and His Faithful Calsany.” This, in its enumeration of the terrible problems poor Logan Lop-Ears faced taking his father’s calsany to market to sell the poor beast, adumbrates stanza by stanza the vicissitudes of folk’s lives and mishaps. It provokes, needless to say, considerable mirth.