A Fortune for Kregen Read online

  “Thank you, Jiktar,” I said, and shuffled off back into the amorphous mass of people.

  “Wait!”

  The word hit me like a leaden bullet slung by a slinger. “Yes.”

  “You, dom, will be the player.”

  The eyes of the people about me showed white. Some started to caterwaul their fears, others cried out, some shrieked.

  “But—”

  “Shastum!” The Jiktar roared out, instantly halting the growing noise. “Silence. Move out!”

  I did not move.

  Into that cowed silence I said, “And who acts as player when I am slain?”

  “The next in line. There is no interruption in play. Move out! Grak !”

  It all made sense. Any fumble-wit might make the moves. The poorer the player — the more the deaths.

  The double doors were thrown open. Mingled streaming light poured in, the glorious radiance of the Suns of Scorpio, illuminating a stairway of brilliance out to horror.

  Chapter Seven

  Execution Jikaida

  We played black.

  Each one of us wore a grimy black breechclout and a tattered favor marking the rank of the piece we represented — and that was all.

  Almost all the black breechclouts carried rusted stains — dark and dreadful mementoes of past games.

  The brilliance of the day outside smote in with pain. We walked out, for we hardly marched, and so were shepherded willy-nilly to our places on the yellow and blue sanded squares. The terraces were packed. The spectators craned forward. The rituals with their incantations and sacrifices and prayers were all passed. We marched out to a hush, a long hollow waiting silence.

  Up there against the brightness of the day the ranks of Bowmen of Loh brooded down, tall and spare; but they were there on this day to perform a slightly different function from their usual task of shafting any wight foolish enough to run. Now they were insurance, in case the men in black were too slow.

  One young lad — his face was so contorted with fear it took a moment to realize he was apim — when he was positioned by the marshals upon his square in the front rank, simply ran. He did not know where he was running. Head down, screaming, he fled from horror — and ran into the arms of the men in black, into the arms of horror upon horror.

  What the men in black and their instruments did to the young man rooted every other piece wearing the black to the square on which he stood. Rooted him there as though he had grown into the solid ground beneath.

  The trumpets blew. The banners waved. The crowd craned forward as the white pieces emerged.

  So we understood what kind of Execution Jikaida we played. I stood on my square, feeling — well, feeling that I had had some ups and downs in my life upon Kregen, sudden and dizzy swoops from greatness to disaster. And I had clawed my way back, only once more to be thrust down. The situation was no novelty in that respect; but this was like to be the last time I was so cast down. This time was the casting down and out.

  The white pieces were not men condemned to execution. They were soldiers, in garish fancy-dress uniforms, with white favors everywhere. They carried weapons. They were off duty, performing a part of their agreement entered into when they signed on, and earning themselves a tidy bonus apiece.

  When they took a piece from the black side they would kill him, chop him — or her — down without thought. When a black piece took one of them, he would simply walk quietly off the board, most probably to sit on the substitutes bench to watch the remainder of the game.

  As the Pallan I stood next to the Princess.

  She stood there, drooping, pale, and I saw she was the woman I had so uselessly attempted to rescue from the trampling hooves of the totrixes. She wore a black breechclout and, because she was the Princess, a forlorn black crown of drooping feathers.

  I looked again. In her arms she cradled the baby.

  The bastards had even wrapped a scrap of black cloth about the baby’s skeletal ribs. I felt sick.

  If I lost the game, then hyrkaida would not be a mere civilized checkmate — it would be the swift and lethal swordblow finishing this woman — and her child.

  “What is your name, doma?”

  She jerked as though I had assaulted her. Her eyes shifted sideways. She colored. She shook her head.

  “They don’t mind if we talk a little, quietly.”

  “Yes... I am Liana whom men once called the Sprite.”

  “Lahal, Liana the Sprite. I am Jak.”

  “Lahal, Jak — will it be very — very terrible?”

  “For some of the swods and Deldars, and some of the superior pieces, yes, it will be terrible. But you will be safe—”

  “Unless you lose!”

  “Yes.”

  Up there lolling on the terraces, ensconced on their comfortable seats, the audience stared down avidly.

  It seemed to me outrageous that anyone could take pleasure from all this. Although I detested Kazz-Jikaida, where the pieces fought for the squares on which they stood, at least then there was some chance. But here, just to stand and wait to be butchered! And it was useless running. The men in black and their ghastly instruments hovered.

  The throng murmured with excitement. They were sick, all of them, sick to their twisted minds.

  And perhaps the sickest of all was the white player.

  He — or she — would have paid an enormous sum for the privilege of playing Execution Jikaida. I looked at the white throne, at the far end, and the tiny glittering figure there.

  An immediate advantage was conferred by that position, the usual one that overlooked the board. From my level place it was going to be difficult to see all the board and appreciate what pieces stood on what squares.

  But, then, that was all a part of the fun of the game to these sickening blood-batteners watching.

  These wealthy people whose obsession with Jikaida led them to make the difficult journey here and play in Blood and Death Jikaida employed a Jikaidast to advise them in their games. A Jikaidast, a professional who played the game for a living as well as for the absorbed joy of it, would sit at their side and the moves would be seriously discussed. The massive clepsydra would drip its water, drop by drop, as the move was pondered, and a brazen gong would signal that time had run out. What normally happened then would happen here as a matter of course — just another poor devil would be chopped.

  The marshals were finishing pushing and prodding the black pieces. The whites were set and ready. The chief marshal, perspiring, rosy of face, a trifle flummoxed, came up to me.

  “You ready, lad?”

  “Tell me, who is the player yonder? Who the Jikaidast?”

  “Why bother your head over—”

  “Who?”

  He blinked and wiped the sweat away. He was in a hurry to get back to his quarters and a stoup of ale.

  “Kov Loriman the Hunter. The Jikaidast is Master Scatulo.”

  I smiled.

  The grimace must have had some effect on the marshal, for he took himself off very smartly.

  Master Scatulo! Well, Bevon the Brukaj, who had been Scatulo’s slave, had told me pertinent things of Scatulo’s play. Here was the first ray of sunshine through the clouds.

  “Jak...” Liana’s quavering voice brought my attention back to the immediate proceedings. “I think they begin...”

  “Trust in Havil the Green,” I said. How incongruous that remark would have been only a few seasons ago!

  “Rather in Havandua the Green Wonder.”

  “If you will.”

  Quite naturally white took first move. This was not from any similar tradition to that in the chess of our Earth; simply that we blacks were here to be chopped.

  Now — many a Pallan playing for black, I gathered, had desperately sought never to put himself in a position where he might be taken. After all, the object of the game from white’s point of view was to win and enhance his prestige in the league tables. Just because black’s pieces were slain did not affect t
he play. This was real Jikaida, not Death Jikaida.

  The proper rules were observed and play would have to be skilled. So a Pallan might seek to screen himself. I fancied, with a quick stab of gratitude to Bevon, that Master Scatulo might be in for a surprise.

  So the game began, the call of “Rank your Deldars” rang out, and we set to.

  It was very far from pretty.

  The lines began to form, cunning diagonals of swods propped by Deldars, reaching out to the far drins.

  [1]

  Scatulo chose the Princess’s Kapt’s swod’s opening. I replied cautiously, opening up just one line. I zeunted — that is, vaulted over a line of pieces — fairly early so as to retain a better grip on the center.

  The zeunt was to enable the board to be clearer in my mind, as well as to place me in a good position.

  The first swod was taken by the whites. I could not prevent that.

  The soldier with his white favors gleaming lifted his sword, the wretch with the scrap of black cloth around him threw up his arms and screamed, and the blade sliced down.

  The men in red ran onto the board and carted him away.

  The game proceeded.

  The orders for the moves were carried by beautiful girls wearing black or white favors, and with their red-velvet-covered wands of office. Their draperies swirled. We lost more men.

  Gradually I gleaned an understanding of just what Scatulo was up to. I do not pretend to be a master player; but I have some skill. And, by Zair, I needed it then!

  The disadvantage of standing on the board, with the disorienting perspectives reaching out and the pieces all on a level, was greatly offset by the ability to hold the positions in my head. Blindfold Jikaida and multi-game Jikaida are capital teaching methods.

  Pointless to go through the game move by move — or blow by blow. Every time white took a black piece, a man or woman died. It was necessary, it was vital, that I concentrate on the game and not allow the horror of the situation to unnerve me.

  Those words to Liana the Sprite had been hollow. I did not think I had much chance of winning, and when I lost she would die.

  The shaming thought drilled into my brain — suppose, just suppose, it was my Delia who stood there!

  Suppose it was Delia of Delphond, Delia of the Blue Mountains, who stood there, straight and supple, wearing that stained black breechclout? Or, just suppose it was my wayward daughter Dayra, who was called Ros the Claw? Or that other daughter of mine, Lela, whom I had not seen for long and long? Why should my reactions then be any different? Were they not all women, like Liana the Sprite? Was not my duty to them all?

  As the game progressed and I sniffed out Scatulo’s play I think some near sublime passion overcame me, so that Liana and Delia and all the beautiful and helpless women of two worlds were represented by that single shrinking form.

  But why only the beautiful? Why exclude those women who have not been favored of the gods with divine faces and forms? Were not they all women? Some women are very devils, as I know; but they are not the helpless of two worlds. And, would it be right to exclude them, just because of that?

  Scatulo essayed a clever move down the right-hand side and I countered with the correct answer, as I had played with Master Hork in Vondium. The tiered stands buzzed afresh with appreciation. To the Ice Floes of Sicce with you all, I felt like shouting up at them and their smug knowingness.

  Now Scatulo knew he was in a game. I think this Kov Loriman the Hunter, who had engaged Scatulo for the game, must have fancied himself and overridden the Jikaidast, for some odd moves were made from time to time. Trying to be quick I seized the opportunity of one such move and zeunted a Kapt over with a good chance of reaching the Princess in two moves.

  The Kapt could not, for the moment, be taken. Scatulo moved a piece across which, although blocking his nearest Kapt, threatened on the next move but one to take my Kapt.

  I looked at the situation in my head, for it was down at the far end of the board. The blue and yellows zigzagged their way across the board, the black pieces stood, apathetic, frenzied, shaking — but all standing faithfully on their ordered squares through fear of the instruments of the men in black. The white pieces were lounging there, earning a bonus. The stands were quiet, sensing a stroke.

  Master Hork had discussed many famous old games with me. I remembered one in particular. In my head I looked at the situation and made the necessary move. If Scatulo did not respond with the single correct move available to him — I had him.

  This, I may add, came as a surprise.

  As I stood, waiting for Scatulo — or his employer — to make his move, the strangest sensation swept over me. Scatulo had seen the danger, for it had raced in with speed, and his own developing attack was abandoned. I felt — I realized that I had become engrossed in the game. This was needful — by Zair!

  but it was needful. It had given me this chance. The strange sensation was like coming up out of a deep cave into the light, and remembering that an outside world existed, that daylight smiled over the land, that the whole world was not confined by walls and darkness.

  And this burgeoning feeling was not because we blacks might win. It was a realization that my first thought that I had been callous to become engrossed in a game where men died was not the truth. That absorption in the game, despite the blood and the screams, had been necessary. I had to believe that.

  Now, facing me, was the final enormity.

  Had I not realized my absorption, had I been still engrossed in the game as a contest of skills, divorced from the blood and death, there would have been no problem until the aftermath.

  For, you see, my move, the winning move, demanded that the Pallan vault the line of pieces and alight at the end on the one square that would place the white Princess in hyrkaida.

  That single crucial square was occupied by a black piece, who did not have the Pallan’s powers and could not attack the Princess and end the game.

  And a Pallan may capture a piece of his own color.

  As we waited and the water dripped in the clepsydra and the time passed I found I hoped, almost hoped, that Scatulo would see the danger, and make the only move that would save him.

  And then, angrily, I pushed the betraying thought away.

  If I did not do what had to be done, the game would go on and many more of the black pieces would die.

  Many more.

  For my attack had borne the hallmarks of frenzy, which was a part of the gambit which had already sacrificed a Hikdar — who was a man, shaking and trembling, cut down in blood — and to abandon it now would be worse, far worse.

  The clepsydra was nearly on its time, the lenken arm of the hammer lifted to crash down resoundingly on the gong — Scatulo made his move and the lissom girl dashed off. The moment I saw the direction in which she sped, I knew the game was in my hand. Scatulo’s move was good, exceeding good; but, then, so had been the move of Queen Hathshi of Murn-Chem in that long ago game against the Jikaidast Master Chuan-lui-Hong.

  Without hesitation, my moment of doubt passed, I started to walk up the long line of pieces. As I went I lifted up my voice in that old foretop hailing bellow.

  “Do you bare the throat?”

  That was pure panache, pure exhibitionism, pure self-indulgence.

  But, by the Black Chunkrah! Didn’t we condemned criminals wearing the black deserve a trifle of flamboyance now — now that we had won?

  And then — by Zair; but it hit me shrewdly. It rocked me back. There was I, strutting, marching up along the line of pieces, black and white mingled, simulating that vaulting move unique to Jikaida of Kregen, zeunting in to place the white Princess in hyrkaida. There I was, stupidly proud, scarcely crediting I had pulled it off, puffed up with self-pride — knowing what I had to do to win.

  So I halted at the end of the line and looked on the square containing the black piece, and it was Lop-eared Nath.

  He stared at me, quite clearly imagining I was zeunting over him to
a good attacking position beyond.

  His lop-ears, his broken nose, the hairs on his chest, the shadowed cage of his ribs, his thin arms and legs, the piece of black cloth hitched around him, his hair all wild and disarranged and jumping alive-oh, too — there he stood, this Lop-eared Nath.

  I could see the way his stomach sagged and tautened as he breathed under the jut of his ribs. He was sweating. But, then, so were we all.

  He cracked his lips open as I marched up. He was a stringy old bird, as tough as they come.

  “How’s it going then, dom? By the Green Entrails of Beng Teaubu! We’re up the sharp end here.”

  “Lop-eared Nath.”

  I was still staring in a stricken fashion at him and the black and white pieces leading up to him were all staring at me. The soldiers in their fancy white favors and stupidly garish holiday uniforms were interested.

  The black pieces looked sick with fear.

  “Go on, then, dom — get onto the square!”

  I shook my head. It was an effort.

  In only heartbeats the move must be declared, for I had started off without the usual declamation and I was fearful I would be penalized.

  “You being the Pallan and all, and up here right near the Princess — that has to be good, don’t it?” He shivered and looked around warily. “Are we going to win? I don’t care if we win or lose, so long’s I come out alive — course, I feel sorry for Liana and her baby and all. But a fellow’s got to live — and I have a quarter to run—”

  “D’you play Jikaida, Nath?”

  “Me? No — the Game of Moons. What’re you waiting for?”

  A buzzing and a murmuring began in the tiers and the marshals began to stir themselves.

  “A Pallan, Lop-eared Nath, may capture a piece of his own color — not the Princess, not the Aeilssa, of course.”

  “Yeah? You’d better get onto your square, dom, else those bastards in black’ll have your guts out with their pinchers.”

  “Lop-eared Nath — you are on my square.”

  He didn’t understand, not at first.