Of course. Trust the Savanti to spread a little ghoulish rumor about the Swinging City. I would not press this young couple; but I felt sure they could retail grisly stories about the goings-on in Aphrasöe. So I was still on the island. Zena Iztar had managed to keep me here, at the least. I swallowed down, dry as a bone, for I could not spit.
“So you ride together. In that direction.” My arm sliced down toward the north.
“Only for a ways. Then we turn off down the Valley of the Twin Spires. I feel confident of the way,” he said, eagerly. “Even though I have ridden it but once before. Always, the way was through the River Feron's lowlands. This is a dangerous route."
“This city of which we do not speak. Where away lies that?"
“Down the other River,” he said. That made sense.
Now I had to find where the river began—or where I could join it. I didn't care if it was the Aph or the Zelph.
In answer to my query he looked around the featureless horizon, undecided. He squinted up at the suns. He frowned.
Then: “I think, dom, I think—that away."
He pointed due north.
* * *
Chapter Thirteen
How Fimi Obtained Her Wedding Portion
For a space then, our ways would lie together.
The six-legged saddle animal, a gnutrix, walked along with that awkward swaying gait of the six-legged, and I tramped on alongside. The two young people made nothing of my nakedness and, partly, I suppose, that was because I was apim and they diff.
Their story was soon told. Miscegenation is not the true word for this kind of marriage across diff-boundaries, where the people in question are closely related. All the same, their own people were not happy; a chance meeting at a fair, the growing realization that a genuine love existed between them, the hostility of their families and, finally, elopement, all added up to this flight across the barren land to the sanctuary of Great Aunt Melimni's house—a fine villa with fountains and arbors, Naghan confided with pride—situated in the best district of Lowerinsmot. This town, he said with just the hint of doubt, was situated perhaps a little too close to—and here he paused, and ran a hand around his collar. I asked more questions in a general way, and gathered that Naghan knew a fair amount of the geography of this part of Ba-Domek, being a traveling salesman of a sort. I gathered as much from what he did not say as the information he parted with that Aphrasöe did indeed lie at the center of the island surrounded by the ring of sheltering mountains. He confirmed that the island swarmed with animals and birds and diffs. There were few apims. No city of Homo sapiens like me was known. And, of course, of those within the Swinging City itself, nothing would induce Naghan to venture there. He knew what apims were, of course, and regarded me with a lively interest as the representative of a strange and exotic breed.
Always before when I had been summoned by the scorpion and been flung head over heels pell-mell to Kregen I had awakened stark naked, faced with the immediate problem of rescuing someone or other from pressing peril. So, this time, I kept an eye on these two elopers. I did not think I had been dragged from the voller for nothing; equally, I was aware that the circumstances this time were greatly different from anything that had gone before.
“As soon as you reach Lowerinsmot all our troubles will be over.” Fimi clung to Naghan, speaking with perfect confidence.
They wore simple tunics of a flaxen color, and Fimi's was trimmed and hemmed with bright embroidery. They had a satchel with dried meats and fruits. Their only weapon, apart from a bronze knife, was the stux, and he handled the spear smartly enough but not, I judged, as a warrior. Traveling salesmen, he said his family were, going from village and town around the countryside. Sometimes there were fights; but few people like to pick a quarrel with a numim.
But for the two suns in the sky—and a fellow gets used to those pretty quickly—and the cat-girl and lion-man riding a shambling six-legged mount at my side, this dusty plain with its willy-willies and its scraps of thorny bushes might have existed on Earth. I might be trudging along on the planet of my birth. But that was dangerous nonsense. I was on Kregen. At any moment deadly danger could spring at us, seeking to rend us into bloody shreds. The wild animals of Kregen would make an Earthly tiger, or elephant, or crocodile turn tail and flee. Those savage beasts of Kregen would look on us all as tasty morsels for dinner. Three appetizers and a couple of mouthfuls, with blood running and white bones splintering. So, as we walked, we kept a sharp lookout.
“I do not fear the strigicaws,” said Naghan stoutly. “And we can outrun the graints. As for leems—” He pursed up his lion-mouth, and gripped his stux.
Fimi shivered. “Leems are terrible,” she whispered. “But if we meet the Khirrs—"
Looking back as I surveyed our rear and observed the track of our march, I said: “Whatever these Khirrs may be—there are riders following—"
Both Naghan and Fimi let out cries of consternation. The riders behind spurred on fiercely. I could make out the ungainly forms of gnutrixes like the one ambling beside me. The wink of weapons told plainly what was in store.
“Your family, Fimi!” shouted Naghan. “They have tracked us—they will not let you go."
“Ride on.” I spoke calmly. So this was the reason I had been dumped down here. Useless to rage. Useless to question the value of these two young people against the value of the emperor of Vallia, The Star Lords kept to their own purposes and to them an emperor might weigh no more than a Fristle fifi. But, was not that a part of my philosophy, also?
Already I had seen the result of similar handiwork. Had not my rescue of two young people at the commands of the Star Lords produced a great genius king, a mad king, who sought to rule all the world he knew?
I gave the gnutrix a slap on its hairy hide and it bounded away. What future lay in store for the child of these two, this Naghan ti Sakersmot and his Fimi, what veiled destiny?
Scattered about on the brown plain at my feet lay stones. Rough, sharp-edged stones. There were four riders. Stooping, I took up four stones of suitable size and shape.
Always a show-off, I suppose, the old onker Dray Prescot.
The riders slackened speed a trifle as they came within range. That fancy showing off was like to cost me dear, for the fourth stone missed its mark. The last rider, seeing his three companions slipping senseless from their saddles, let out a great roar and lowered his head—whereat my rock missed him—and charged, his sword whirling.
Now, the racial weapon of the Fristles is the scimitar. I hopped and skipped and ducked the sweep of the blade. His booted foot slipped at first through my clutching fingers and I had to roll under his beast, taking an infernal banging from the middle pair of hooves, before I could rise wrathfully up on the far side and so grab his leg and hurl him from the saddle.
“You great onker!” I bellowed. “I don't want to hurt you."
He came up on a knee. Quick and vicious, Fristles, particularly in anything touching the honor and well-being of their women folk. Their family would be shamed by Fimi's elopement. He retained his scimitar. The long curved blade glistered finely in the streaming radiance.
“Nulsh!” he screamed. He jumped in, recovered from his fall, scything his blade wildly.
I was not deceived.
At the last second that savage swashing would abruptly turn into a smooth thrusting drive as the scimitar revolved around the center of its artful curve—and the blade would carve me neatly through.
Turko the Khamorro would have relished the situation.
Armed with the Disciplines of unarmed combat instilled by the Krozairs of Zy I was able to feint one way, go the other, and then—very nastily—rake back and so tweak the scimitar from his grip and, instead of running him through or bashing him over the head with his own blade, present the point smartly at his throat.
He lay on his back, hands gripped into the dust, glaring up in murderous fury.
The little exercise was not worth a “Hai Hikai
,” the unarmed man's equivalent to the swordsman's “Hai Jikai.” I had given Duhrra, who had then been called Duhrra the Mighty Mangier, the Hai Hikai after our first encounter, for I recognized in the gigantic wrestler a true man. I had given Duhrra the “Hai Hikai!” not the swordsman's “Hai Jikai."
This is important upon Kregen.
If this Fristle flat on his back wished to make of this little spat a Jikai, he was welcome to try. I told him so. I finished: “But although I do not wish to slay you, and will not do so unless provoked beyond reason, I must warn you that Naghan and Fimi will depart in peace."
Three heavily armed Fristles slumbered in the dust and a fourth glowered up at me, flat on his back. I own it must have made a pretty sight. But I was in a hurry.
“Choose, dom. Let them go—or your life answers for it!"
He believed me. I suppose, looking back, I must have appeared to him a dark malignant demon, broad-shouldered, naked, sweat and dust molding those muscles of mine, ridged, iron-hard, turning me into the semblance of a man of iron. I felt only the need for speed.
In the end, believing me, he took himself off with his three companions. The four rode off on two gnutrixes, and one of them had fewer clothes than when he'd started and all had damned fewer weapons.
So, mounted up, rejoined with the two elopers, accoutred with scimitars and stuxes, we rode on.
Also, we had a filled water bottle and that, you may be sure, I kept under my hand.
“I shall return all these things, the gnutrixes, the weapons, the clothes, to you, Fimi, when we part. After all, they can be regarded as a wedding portion from your family."
Naghan laughed at this. “You are a strange man, Dray Prescot."
“Aye."
When the wind got up and blew devilish stinging sand into our faces we were glad to pull up the sand-scarves, although when I referred to my sand-scarf, calling it a hlamek as we do in South Zairia, my companions tittered and said it was a flamil. The Fristle from whom I had taken this flamil had been violently upset when I removed it from him. But I did not argue. From all I had heard and seen I was beginning to believe I might have stumbled upon another example of the work of the Savanti. All these jumbled animals and people, all living cheek-by-jowl around the outer portions of this large island—surely they must all have been brought here by the Savanti? Brought here to serve the purposes of the superhumans of the Swinging City?
Another explanation did not occur to me. Had it done so I would have seen it only as a further example of the cynicism of the Star Lords.
This island was in a mirrorlike way a representation of the rest of Kregen—or at least of the continental and island grouping of Paz. Diffs lived and worked and raised families here, Katakis prowled on their evil slaving raids, Chuliks maintained their strict Spartan training as mercenaries, along with all the other races who carried out the tasks for which they were best suited. Kings there were, too, so I heard, and wars and harryings and all the old evil ugly patchwork of human ambition and greed, along with the finer things of humanity, like art and love and religion and good works and music.
“Songs?” I said as we jogged along, the sand-storm blown away, the suns shining refulgently from a copper sky and the green of watered land showing on the horizon. “Aye, let us sing."
We took a good swig of the water bottle, for the greenery ahead promised, and started in. We sang The Pachak with the Four Arms, which is highly scurrilous, abusing a fine people I greatly admire. Fimi possessed a sweet singing voice, and Naghan roared out lustily and I joined my own bullfrog bellowings. A pang rose up to torture me—aye! The hostile territories ... I remembered...
So I launched into The Bowmen of Loh, leaving out certain of the stanzas, and found they were not too familiar with that famous and notorious old song. Then we had King Naghan His Fall and Rise in honor of the Naghan who rode with us. We were just about halfway through Golden Fur, a famous and beautiful song of both Fristles and numims, when the chavonth leaped.
This chavonth was a fine large specimen of his family, a six-legged hunting cat of formidable destructive powers. His hide was all patterned in hexagons of blue, black and grey, and his whiskers bristled and his fangs glinted as he leaped.
Treacherous are chavonths. He had my poor gnutrix. The animal went down squealing, his hide ripped by razor claws.
I rolled and the scimitar came out and I took a wild swipe at the cat as it sprang. At the last minute I managed to get out of the way and the chavonth hit the grass beyond my head. Faster than the cat, so fast I almost overran it, I leaped in and brought the scimitar down in an angled slashing blow. The blade grated into the bones of the chavonth's neck as the bright blood welled. It let out a tremendous screech and wrenched around and the blade snapped clean across.
For a moment we hung together, the six paws with those slashing claws clashing beyond my back as I strained to keep its head away. Fimi had screamed and Naghan's gnutrix had bolted. But all the world was concentrated into that struggle as, locked together, muscle against muscle, the chavonth and I sought to wrest the mastery. The fangs dripped. The red tongue lolled. I thrust back, feeling my muscles strain, feeling the blood thump in my head, feeling all the savagery that had been contained and repressed within me over the past days surging up, bright red, bestial, deadly.
Clamped together, we thrashed across the trampled grass beneath the small bluff where the chavonth had lurked. With every sinew straining, holding him back, my fists gripped around his throat, I pushed his head back and with my leg hooked about his body, hauled him in to me so that his claws could not disembowel. As it was he took a long raking chunk of skin and flesh away, and my blood dripped.
Then, with a last final, bestial effort, a great surging thrusting of bursting muscles, I smashed his head back and the chavonth's neck snapped across where the stupid broken scimitar blade jagged out.
Flinging the corpse from me I stood back. I drew in huge draughts of Kregen's sweet air. I dashed the sweat from my ugly old face. I know I was wearing that frightful devil's mask plastered in blood and sweat across my features.
“By Vox!” I said. “That was close."
“Give thanks to Farilafristle,” said Fimi, shaking, her eyes large and horrified. She had stopped screaming and yet, for all her brave words, she turned with a sob of thankfulness from me and the chavonth corpse as Naghan came racing back, flogging his mount unmercifully.
“I give you the Jikai, Dray Prescot.” He spoke gravely, dismounting and helping Fimi down.
“As to that,” I said. “I must walk again, by Krun."
Gods and goddesses and spirits come in all shapes and sizes on Kregen. Few people bother over much which deity is sworn by or appealed to, so long as their own beliefs are not crudely touched. So, collecting the gear I thought necessary and leaving the two corpses, the gnutrix and the chavonth, we set off again through this new tangled wooded country. The rips in my hide would heal; but they smarted sharply.
“Sooner a chavonth than a Khirr,” said Naghan. He held his stux at the ready. His flamil rested under his chin. He looked down at me. “Also, apim, it is best to have your flamil handy. Be ready to draw it up over your face instantly if you see a Khirr."
“What? Do they freeze with a look?"
“No—they are no Gengulas of legend. They are real. They spit."
The way became easy after that and we spent five or six nights in comfort, with ample fresh meats and fruit. We were beset on a number of occasions; but fought through. In the process I acquired a knife, a miserable thing; but better than nothing. Gradually Naghan became more nervy. Fimi rubbed the fingers of her left hand over the atra she wore in the form of a bracelet on her right wrist. We were camping in a cave, and she looked about, wondering about a fire. “It is all—so dark and mysterious when the suns sleep and the moons are tardy."
About to make some hard common-sense reply, I hesitated, for Naghan, too, was rubbing his atra. He wore his amulet slung around his neck. I have s
poken little of the atras, the amulets and lucky charms, the mystic spell-holders, worn by many people of Kregen. Superstition is as rife there as on Earth, mingled with sorceries and religions, demonic possession and necromancy. The bazaars and souks of cities and towns contained stalls where the magic talismans might be bought, and more money spent brought more protection. Blessings from as many sources of psychic power as possible also helped, and people would go from temple to sorcerer, brazen, bare-faced, to pay for a protective spell and a blessing.
“We are well-protected.” Naghan pushed his atra back down inside his tunic. No doubt he believed that had saved him when the chavonth leaped on me, a man without an atra. And then, heartening me, he hefted his stux and added: “Let us rely on ourselves this night, my love. A fire...?"
Naghan, knowing fire would drive away wild animals, would not have asked the question if there were not more behind a mere fire than that.
“What enemy is there,” I said, “apart from men, who does not fear fire?"
And, as he opened his mouth, I knew. So, together, we said: “Khirrs!"
This explained Naghan's increasing nervousness. We had a way to go yet before our directions parted. “Humm,” I said, just like a frigate captain making time to think before giving his orders, a weak habit, it is true. “Fimi must have food and she will not eat raw meat—?"
Fimi shuddered eloquently, so that was that.
We set the fire as close to the overhang of the cave as we could, and letting the smoke take care of itself in the darkness of the groined stone arch, shielded the little flames by boulders. Soon the Twins would be up and there would be light.
The Twins sailed up as I sucked on the last bone. The space of woodland before us showed indistinctly at first, bathed in the fuzzy pink light, and the glade glimmered ghostly in the moons’ light.
A dark round object appeared at the edge of the trees. Another and then three or four more moved among the pink-tinged leaves. I watched, motionless.
Near man-height, rotund, dark, hairy—I could make out little more. They looked to have two thin twinkling legs apiece. They stood for some time, and then they melted back into the forest. I let out my breath.
Savage Scorpio [Dray Prescot #16] Page 14
