“Perhaps another time,” I interjected. “That would be wonderful, really, but it will have to wait.”
I raised my fist and slammed it onto the tabletop. Not a hard slam; not one like Mayor Otis might have done, but forceful enough to make a strong impression. There was pause. All eyes looked my way. I raised my voice as well, and sharpened my tone.
“I am here because you have wrongfully incarcerated two citizens of the Trilands: a Pip by the name of Bobbin Numbit and a Stout by the name of Gariff Ram. Further, I have been made aware of evidence to suggest that you are holding political prisoners.”
“Do you represent the Trilands?” said Taradin, contention in his voice.
“I represent their views.”
“Legally?” he enquired.
“No,” I admitted, “Legally, just Webfoot.” And even that was shaky.
“May I see your colors?”
Reluctantly, I reached down and pulled the bone tube from my pack, extracted the leather document, and handed it over. While he thoroughly read through it all, I began to make my demands.
“Webfoot respectfully requests that the two forenamed individuals and any political prisoners you might have in custody be released immediately, and that all charges and allegations against them be dropped. Secondly, we know about your plans to mine the bog, and we recognize that there is some legitimacy to your claim of mineral rights. I am also here to discuss possible alternatives to that course of action.”
“You are well informed, aren’t you?” The question was rhetorical. With a kind bow of his head again, he handed back the leather and continued to speak. “I am at your mercy then, and at your service.”
The negotiations were going well. He could be a bit short at times, but all in all the First King seemed polite and cooperative enough, and, more importantly, legal-minded to the letter of the law. He had to be different from Taeglin; he came off as… honorable, although in a kind of twisted way. And how could he not be somehow twisted, being what he is?
“I hope to be at your service as well,” I said, returning the bow, “but first, we must find resolution. Webfoot, the Bearded Hills and the whole of the Trilands will not stand for injustice – the Pip and the Stout must be released.”
Taradin gestured to the scroll. “Remember, you speak only for Webfoot.”
“Indeed,” I said, and tucked the leather away. “But the Trilands will concur. Send a raven if you doubt it. Furthermore, the Stout is residing in Webfoot, currently. That puts him under my charge.”
Taradin nodded in acknowledgement.
“With regard to the bog,” I continued, “The entire Triland region has a vested interest in it. And I know my people – no amount of riches can replace our way of life or detach us from our forefathers. The bog waters course through our veins the same way seawater does through the blood of your people. Mining the bog will destroy our livelihood, our life-blood.”
“And yet we survive, separated from that which we long for,” he said. “In many ways, it has made us stronger.”
Taradin grinned a secret thought. “Do not fret, little one, Harrow will restore the land back to its original condition after the extraction – as per the Treaty. And Webfoot promptly shall receive the agreed upon tax – a full tenth of the value after expenses. You will never know the operation was even there. It is only temporary.”
“What do we do in the mean time?” I said. “You might be there for ten years… twenty even. During that time, the bog ecosystem will collapse. There will be open pits, drainage, tailings, destruction of habitat…”
Holly interjected, “There are other solutions. We can section off one area at a time to excavate and build a solid road to it without ruining the town or the greater habitat.”
She was out of place. Diplomatic aides were to remain quiet until spoken to, even when they thought that they had a good suggestion to offer. The only acceptable communication is a whisper into the ear of the one served.
Taradin gave her an annoyed look. I acted annoyed for show, before extending Holly’s line of thinking.
“I apologize,” I said, then looked to Holly. “It is not your place to interrupt.” I turned back to Taradin. “She’s new.”
Taradin nodded with a forced smile, and repeated a phrase he had said earlier. “I gathered that,” he said. “Indeed, good help is hard to find these days.”
“She’s quite good, actually,” I said, “and what she says is true. Harrow could simply guarantee a higher duty for use of the land while excavating, sort of like the deal we have going with Stoutville. Webfoot would handle inspections, approvals and would also provide advice.”
“Taeglin already has a plan in place, and your suggestions would just complicate it unnecessarily.”
“Taeglin’s plan dismisses Webfoot entirely. What I am suggesting is honest and forthright – and everyone benefits. You must convince him.” My argument was passionate and sound. The only thing lacking was the fact that I was talking to a walking corpse.
“Must I now?” remarked Taradin snyly. If he had eyebrows, I’m sure one of them would have risen while he spoke. “Humph.” A grim smile crept across his face. “To ease your strife, Taeglin is proposing to relocate your little bog people to more fertile grounds south of Harrow’s Gate, between the two rivers. And at his own expense, for the entire duration of the operation.”
I shook my head. And what of Bobbin and Gariff? He was avoiding the issue of my imprisoned friends, not to mention the political prisoners… my parents.
There was more to his proposal. “If you, Nud, act as our emissary and convince the Council to relocate without a fuss, lobbying the promise of a great reward for everyone personally involved in the decision, I am prepared to negotiate bonuses to make you all wealthy Pips, even beyond the dreams of your Everdeep clan, whom I have dealt with in the past.”
Mrello. Internally, I cursed his name. I knew it.
“As a gesture of goodwill,” he went on, “I will personally arrange to send you home in a chariot loaded with precious artwork, jewelry, metal bars and other gifts to distribute as you see fit, along with your little friends who are currently… shall we say, enjoying our hospitality.”
“What of the political prisoners,” I said.
“Simple,” he said. “There aren’t any. Harrow put an end to that sort of thing years ago.”
I did not fully believe him. It seemed to me that the words spoken were more Taeglin’s than his own. From everything I had heard of the man, Taeglin was the type to take the easiest route to get what he wanted, and would tell us anything we wanted to hear. I imagined he would follow through only long enough to suit his purposes: fickle, capricious and plainly unreliable.
However, the thought of rolling into town in a chariot laden with expensive gifts gave me pause. And Bobbin and Gariff would be free. Holly gave me such a sharp look that I shook off the notion immediately. But there was more.
The First King had lapsed into an internal state, swaying back and forth ever so slightly – a pendulum corpse, it seemed, heavy with the weight of indecision. Taradin’s jaw dropped slightly and his eyes looked up in thought. He stopped swaying, and then his gaze met mine. “There is one other thing I can offer you, Nud Leatherleaf; a great thing. In return for your loyal service, I am willing to put you on the path of rejuvenation. And your aide as well, if you fancy her.” Taradin looked Holly up and down.
These words, too, were quite enticing. As I pondered how I should respond, the repetitive motion of his lichen-covered hand kept me distracted. I came to realize it was his habit. Repeatedly, he stroked the amulet around his neck and the chain holding it, as one might comfort a loved one or a favored pet. At first, I thought the worst part to be the weak yet nagging scraping sound he made while doing so, until I saw that the chain disappeared into the flesh where his fingers ran across it – a groove down to the very bone.
“What about Webfooters?” said Holly, speaking out of turn again. “They will have not
hing.”
“You must learn to control your aide,” said Taradin. “She lacks the proper respect.” He looked to me for action.
I had to nod to express my agreement. I sent Holly a scolding glance.
“Enough,” I told her, “or it’s back to the Red Rooms for you!”
Holly lowered her eyes and made a good show of being shamed into obedience.
“Without me, Harrow would be naught but a simple fishing village with a powerless fool at the ship’s wheel,” said Taradin. “But under my careful guidance, this humble country is on a most glorious path, and soon Harrow will become the hub of civilization as we know it, and the envy of all.”
Evidently, “His Excellency” liked the sound of his own voice. What about my proposal? What about Holly’s idea? Had he even heard them? Maybe not: I took notice that his ears presented little more than shredded scraps of flesh.
The lichen-covered king turned to face me. “Nud, you look a little pale. Are you well?”
By then, I realized that the fiend was only toying with me. My impulse was to bolt, and leave his empty promises behind. The fire in his eyes seemed to flicker and swirl, and there was a kind of inquisitiveness in his voice that made me believe he might be searching for something; something in between the words I might say, or written in the expression on my face, or hidden in my eyes. Behind him, on the wall, a foul weather scene materialized. It began to churn, grey and foreboding.
“I’m just fine,” I said, “but thank you for asking. You look a little gaunt yourself.”
There was just enough flesh on Taradin’s lips to form a broken smile. Then a change came over him. He took on a more serious composure, cold and purposeful. The room darkened.
“As you said, you are here to get down to business. You are in a position to ease Harrow’s exercising of agreed-upon rights under the Treaty to obtain something desperately needed by its good people, but you choose to put up barriers instead.” Taradin leaned back in his chair. Elbows on the armrests, he folded his hands together upon his sunken chest.
“I fear we are at an impasse, for I agree with my son of sons. It is much easier to simply move the Pips out, bribes or otherwise, and drain the bog. And prisoners are wonderful for exchanges. I can tell you this much: those who would aid Harrow to achieve its goals will be richly rewarded.” Taradin gripped one hand into a boney fist. “Any and all who stand in the way of the Iron Tower will be crushed.”
The Vicegerent cleared his throat, coughed and sputtered. Raw muscles in his chest contracted as he heaved. He had worked himself up, it seemed, beyond what his bodily facilities could withstand. After a long moment, he regained his composure.
I looked to Holly. She raised her eyebrows and shrugged.
“I wish for you to be the one that helps us, Councillor Leatherleaf, I really do,” he continued. “I am rather fond of your bluntness and adventurous spirit. The earth holds many secrets, young Pip, and each secret tells part of the story of a larger design, and each design is part of one higher, and derives from one lower, and joins many others across, and influences more that we haven’t even dreamed of, and is driven by others we cannot even perceive or know to perceive…” He trailed off, introspectively.
“I will aid you in the negotiations and help find a viable solution,” I responded. “Just send us on our way with the Pip and the Stout that you—” I was interrupted.
“You have to be my ‘Man on Council,’” he said.
“Don’t you have one?” I responded.
“He is a fool,” said Taradin. “I want another.”
“I’ll do it.”
“And inform me who my opponents are?”
I hesitated. “Agreed,” I said.
Taradin sat back and stroked the chain around his neck yet again.
“Too late,” he said. “I retract the offer.”
I felt like pelting him. The boasting about his great people and great kingdom continued, until the words grew faint to my ears. Instead, they penetrated my chest and gripped my beating heart. Then it hit me. This man was terribly cursed and terribly mad, with little more than curses and madness to offer. Fyorn had been right: he should have died a hero long ago.
“What is it you want?” I said. “What are you looking for?”
“I admire that you have come here to save your friends and preserve your village,” he replied. “Noble causes, indeed they are… very noble causes and I commend you for taking them on. I did much the same once, long ago. But I made a decision to make good for my own line above all others. Family comes first. You plan to have a family one day, don’t you?”
The lichen-covered king was rambling, and he wasn’t answering my question.
“What is it that Harrow needs so much from the bog lands?” I said.
“Well, you will find out when the bog is drained,” he continued. “There is new knowledge hidden beneath your mud flats – perhaps even directly beneath your village – and the way to begin excavating a bog is to drain it. Your precious wetland sits high compared to the lands south. All that needs be done is to dig a few channels and dam or divert the inflows.”
I was desperate. “I know what you really seek,” I said at last. “I have seen IT. I’m sure I can tell you exactly where IT lies. Release my… the persons you have wrongfully detained and I will prove it.”
What exactly is IT? I was bluffing… sort of. My best guess was that the Iron Tower was searching for the Jhinyari battleground, of course, but perhaps there was something more: the “mother load” of sparkling stones similar to the one I found, or the “Spears of the Gods” cave for all I knew, or the Hanging City, or Dromeron Odoon, or Isotopia, or perhaps something special within the Hanging City – devices. Whatever it might be, I was treading into dangerous territory.
“You have professional informers then, don’t you? Very well then. Prove what you say. Where is that which I seek most?”
“If I tell you, I have nothing to bargain with.”
“Just tell me ‘what’ then.”
I blurted it out. “The location of the Jhinyari battle—” He cut me off.
“Scoundrels, I say. Let them rot! You are getting warmer. So what of it?”
He had me cornered, for I could only speculate on the specifics of the Iron Tower’s interest and intentions.
I fumbled my words. “I don’t know… I mean, I can’t explain because we were lost underground for so long,” I said.
“Lost?”
Not knowing what else to do and fearing for my safety if the First King became more irate, I looked to Holly. She appeared tense. When she met my gaze, I shifted mine to where she kept her sparkling stone. She looked down, then her eyes met mine, and at that moment, Holly reached into her shirt pocket and pulled out her light-bearing crystal, gained from the hags. She unveiled the stone from its leather sheath and dangled it in front of her on the black iron chain.
Taradin stared at the piece without saying so much as a word. The light danced about and sparked in rapid bursts. Discreetly, I checked to make sure my own stone was still tucked well away, under my shirt. There was no doubting the vicegerent’s sense of intrigue; he could not look away.
“Jhinyari… yes,” he said, as though recalling a distant memory. “I remember now… this dancing light… the sword-stones… all of it.” He closed his eyes and winced in pain, then shivered. “I will never forget the ‘strikers’ that cut us down from afar.”
Good, I thought. He’s taken the bait. I have that lichen-covered corpse right where I want him.
I continued with my plea. “And in my travels, I have beheld the Hanging City, and nearby, mammoth crystals I call the Spears of the Gods, and a Dancing Pool. I can lead you to all of these wondrous places. There are secret ways underground that can bring a crew to the bog without disturbing it or even revealing they are there. What you seek is underground, yes, but you don’t need to dig out the bog to get to it. You can start somewhere below this very room… the entrance is literally
beneath your feet!”
Taradin stroked his jeweled amulet and the chain holding it. The scraping of raw bone on metal sent a shiver through my spine. I tried not to flinch at the sound, nor at the sight of his fibrous neck muscles, exposed and contracting as he tensed.
“Compelling… and quite ironic, to say the least,” he said finally. “I call for a game of Pirates’ Dice to settle the matter. As you well know, it is within my rights to name the deciding game of chance. As I said already, we are at an impasse. Your trinket changes nothing.”
There was no such “right” and I could tell he was bluffing. I could see it in his preoccupation with the stone, and I could see it written all over his rotting face.
Chapter XXI
Gambler’s ruin
When the Lich King grinned, I wondered if his face might split in half. He rose from his chair and sailed across the floor to a narrow desk, set along the wall. There, amidst the ornate paintings and statues, he gathered two sets of dice and two shakers, one white set and one red set, then carried them back to the table. Then he retrieved an ink well and a white feather quill, and set them at my end of the table. He took his seat and moved the game pieces in front of him, picked up the white set of dice, and rattled them in their cup.
“The dice will reveal your integrity,” he explained. “They always do. If you roll true and wager well, you will be vindicated by the will of Karna, as I once was. I have six rings to wager and a coin, all quite valuable. You have your stone. The coin represents the bog, so I own the bog for starters.”
That hardly seems decent, I thought.
Taradin locked eyes with me: “My child, on top of your stone you have your life and the lives of your sweet companions. That only sums to three though – I’m counting all three friends as one. Trust me; it’s better for you that way. There are no political prisoners to add.”
SPARX Incarnation: Order of the Undying (SPARX Series I Book 2) Page 18
