"You didn't see it," Purkin insisted steadfastly. ToJacom he said: "His memory's not clear, sir. Must've been the blow on the head. He doesn't know what he's talking about."
"It might have been the other big man, but it wasn't the amber," the supine man insisted.
"The amber was in front of me when I was hit from behind. Whoever it was, it couldn't possibly have been him."
"You only told me that you didn't see who hit you," Jacom complained anxiously.
"That's what I told the magistrate. Eight witnesses all agreed that it was the big man."
"All protecting one another, like as not," opined the soldier- but then he caught the full glare of Purkin's disapproving eye, and a sudden expression of enlightenment dawned.
"Oh well," he went on.
"Don't suppose it matters. The score's even. They send one of us to hospital, we send one of them to the wall. They don't care which of us they hurt, so why should we care which of them we punish? Ought to send two to^
the wall really I mean, we are the law. We're supposed to comejout ahead."
Jacom pursed his lips. He had a strong suspicion that he ought to let the matter rest, but somehow he couldn't quite bring himself to do it. Perhaps this was an opportunity for' him to demonstrate that he could be firm in a just cause. ' "Are you sure it wasn't the amber?" he asked, with more unease in his tone than he would have liked.
"It was a brawl, when all's said and done. Maybe he just lost his temper and lashed out. Maybe he caught you by accident."
"Don't worry about it, sir," Herriman advised, with one eye still on his sergeant.
"Like I said before, I couldn't actually see who it was. Anyway, he'll be a lot more use on the wall than the other skinny bastards that were swarming around. Probably a pirate- pirates are always big. Must be all the fish they eat." He was babbling now, trying to cover up his earlier mistake.
"That's all very well," Jacom said slowly, although he was coming round to the opinion that his one and only priority ought file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Brian%20Stableford%20-%20Serpents%20Blood.TXT (38 of 495) [11/1/2004 12:26:19 AM]
to be covering up his own
mistake, if indeed he had made one.
"But if you're right, it would mean that the man who did hit you has got away with it. What did you say the other man's name was, sergeant?"
"Burdam Thrid," said Purkin, raising his eyes to the discoloured ceiling as if to say that this was all a terrible waste of time.
"Checuti's man?" the recumbent guardsman said.
"So it was! I bet it was him. If he ever tries it again I'll skewer the ugly bastard."
"Who's Checuti?" Jacom asked.
It was Purkin who answered.
"Dealer in stolen goods," he said contemptuously.
"Oily bastard. Getting too big for his boots.
People've started calling him the prince o' thieves. He's long overdue for a fall. Needs chasing out of the city back to wherever he came from. "
"Khalorn," said Hcrriman helpfully.
"Somewhere around there, anyhow.
He's not exactly a foreigner, but not a real Xandrian. "
Jacom wondered whether his father's estates were far enough away from the city for its masters and labourers not to be real Xandrians, in the eyes of men like Herriman.
"Perhaps we ought to investigate this further," he said un enthusiastically
"We're the king's guard, sir, not the constabulary," Purkin said pointedly.
"Keeping order is our business, not thief-taking.
Checuti's nothing to do with us. No point in our pursuing this matter any further, sir. It's settled we should let it alone. " Jacom was uncomfortably aware of the fact that he was being lectured, in a rough and ready way. The.sergeant was twice his own age, but that didn't justify his taking a pseudo-parental tone with his officer. On the other hand, Jacom had every reason to suppose that the advice was sound. If he had made a mistake, the best thing for all concerned except, admittedly, the amber was to keep quiet about it and hope nobody ever found out. He didn't like to think that the man who had really flattened one of his soldiers might have got away with it, and he felt decidedly uncomfortable about the whole affair, but he supposed that it would all blow over quickly enough. The amber had been destitute, after all if he hadn't been picked up for this crime he'd soon have committed another.
"People shouldn't tell lies in the king's court," he said helplessly.
"The witnesses, I mean-I don't like the idea of them ganging up to 35
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protect one of their. own by accusing an innocent man. If that's really what happened ... I mean, shouldn't we do something about it not officially, of course, but for our own satisfaction?" The look which Purkin gave him was withering, and even Herriman looked mildly astonished. Evidently no matter what stories one heard about the honour of the guard and the extraordinary lengths to which good men were prepared to go in defence of that honour- that simply wasn't the way things were done around here.
"All right," Jacom said awkwardly, after half a minute's embarrassed silence had leaked away.
"The matter's closed. Get back on your feet as fast as you can, Herriman --
we need you. Mercifully, we're on citadel duty for the next three ten days Very peaceful, I dare say, after the harbour patrol."
"Yes sir," said Purkin. Jacom had a paranoid suspicion that the man might be radiating contempt even though he was duty bound to provide the looked-for agreement.
"Guarding the gates and patrolling the walls is about as easy as it ever gets, in peacetime."
"Just make sure the big amber doesn't get away while you're keeping watch on the prison, sar'nt" said Herriman, with a chuckle which sounded wholly sincere.
"Wouldn't do to lose him now we've got him, would it?"
"No," said Purkin dully, withja sly sideways glance at Jacom.
"It wouldn't."
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n the enclosed roof-garden which was the crowning glory of the Inner Sanctum of the great citadel of Xandria Princess Lucrezia watched two servants digging up a corpse. The progress was slow; the women were used to labouring in the garden, but this was heavier work than they were usually required to do. The task was made more difficult by the fact that the upper part of the corpse was spiked with dozens of sharp and sturdy thorns, each one three or four sims long.
It was obvious that the labourers did not like their work. They were mortally afraid of the dead woman, and of the thorns which stood out from her head, arms and breasts, even though Lucrezia had assured them that they were not poisonous. Servants were prone to far too many superstitions and commonplace fears.
/ should hare waited for Dhalla, Lucrezia thought. She doesn't seem to mind doing this kind of thing, even though it' snot her job. Having given her orders, however, Lucrezia was determined to see that they were obeyed. If servants began to think they'd be let off if they made a task seem like hard work nothing would ever get done. Not until the two women had lifted the cadaver into the cart did she turn away. She was near to tears, but it wasn't pity which made her feel that way. She felt that she had lost a precious opportunity. The dog was still alive, and the thorny shoots projecting from the upper part of its body were vividly green, but there was not the slightest sign of a bud anywhere. Lucrezia no longer had the slightest doubt that what Hyry Keshvara had told her would turn out to be true: the third and last remaining seed would reproduce if and only if she followed the instructions given by the people who had sold the seeds to the trader. She had to feed it to a human being- a strong, healthy human being-so that it might take a full 37
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measu
re of the nourishment it needed from
the human body and spirit; only then would the plant which grew inside its host put forth flowers.
In any case, she thought, a human would be able to satisfy a deeper curiosity by telling her what it felt like to undergo the fabulous process of metamorphosis, at least until the throat filled up with thorns. The dog could only whimper, in a manner which suggested puzzlement rather than pain.
If only the woman had been stronger!
Dhalla arrived while Lucrezia was still dripping water into the eager throat of the whimpering dog. The giant had to duck down very low to pass beneath the stone lintel of the gateway, moving the lust rust-stained gate very carefully lest she tear it from its hinges by accident.
"There's news that might interest you, highness," said Dhalla, as soon as Lucrezia glanced up at her.
The princess stood up, and met the guard's eyes frankly. Dhalla immediately dropped her gaze, as she had been trained to do. Lucrezia would rather she had not done so, but understood the difficulty well enough. She liked Dhalla better than any of her personal servants and far better than any of her multitudinous sisters. The giant wasn't handsome and her conversation was limited, but she had a sense of humour, which was a rare thing in the Inner Sanctum. Her most endearing feature was that she always obeyed Lucrezia's orders with a conspicuous alacrity that she never displayed for anyone else's benefit!
"What is it?" the princess asked.
"There was a young darklandcr in the court today, highness. Actually, he said he wasn't a dark lander but he's an amber. He crippled a guardsman during a brawl in some harbour side drinking-den."
"What concern is that of mine?" Lucrezia asked.
"Only that he applied for a royal pardon instead of starting work on the wall immediately. He doesn't understand the law, you see. Either that or he's too pig-headed to be sensible. If you were to offer him a conditional pardon
. . . well, I don't think he knows enough to ask the right questions.
He's very big and strong might almost have giant's blood in him."
Dhalla smiled as she made the last remark. She knew well file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Brian%20Stableford%20-%20Serpents%20Blood.TXT (42 of 495) [11/1/2004 12:26:19 AM]
enough that all
the dirty jokes and folktales about ordinary men and giants were pure fantasy. There were no male giants and no men with giant's blood in them.
"They say that I have a splash of Serpent's blood in me," Lucrezia said. So far as she knew, that was nonsense too, but she didn't smile as she said it.
There was mention of
"Serpent's blood' in ancient myths, which conferred a certain glamour on the notion even though no one Lucrezia had ever asked about it including her mother, from whom she was supposed to have inherited the trait- had had the slightest idea what it might mean. As far as Lucrezia could tell, a mating of human and Serpent was far less likely than a mating of man and giant.
Serpents were not merely un human but unearthly, like most of the things which grew in the Grey Waste, the Forest of Absolute Night, the fabled heartland of the Spangled Desert and the Dragomite Hills. According to rumour, the reproductive organs of Serpents were in their mouths rather than their underbellies and they were hermaphrodites; if so, it was hardly likely that sexual intercourse between their kind and human beings was possible.
"This amber sounds exactly the kind of man you'd need to grow a healthy thorn-bush, highness," Dhalla said, although Lucrezia had already taken that inference.
"Unfortunately," Lucrezia said pensively,
"I'd need my beloved father's permission to take him into my service, for whatever use. He won't like it it's one thing to bring some decrepit old wall slave into the Sanctum, but quite another to import a virile tavern-brawler."
"I could make certain that he was no trouble," Dhalla said.
"I could break his legs before taking him from the prison. I'll watch him night and noon if necessary."
"It's not a question of there being any real danger," Lucrezia said, with a sigh.
"It's simply a matter of available excuses. If my father can think of any reason for refusing me, he'll probably do it. In this case, he'd have no trouble at all."
"Sorry, highness," Dhalla said.
"I thought. . ."
"Don't be sorry," Lucrezia was quick to say.
"You were right. It's worth a try, given that I'm legally entitled to make the offer. If I keep on asking for favours, my father might say yes one day just to keep me quiet. I could send Monalen to see the amber right away 39
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- then, if he's fooL enough to accept the conditional pardon, I could go to father myself. If I explain it cleverly enough father might just think of it as poetic justice- too good a joke to pass up. But will the amber agree?
What was his sentence?"
"He'll have to work off a fine of about a thousand crowns, plus interest accrued while he's in jail, plus whatever else they can pile on for future mis behaviour You know how these things work- it could easily turn into a life sentence if no one offers to buy him out within the next few days. I doubt that anyone will do that; he only arrived a couple of days ago so he's unlikely to have any friends in Xandria."
"What if someone tells him what I want him for? He's bound to be suspicious, isn't he?"
"No one would dare to interfere- and the man seems to be a complete idiot.
He's an amber, after all."
"In that case," Lucrezia said, 'you'd better fetch Monalen. " Dhalla bowed, and turned on her heel.
Lucrezia turned back to her garden. It was really Ereleth's garden, but Lucrezia had begun to think of it as her own, just as she had begun to think of Ereleth's wisdom as her own. She knew that she was merely the latent of a string of royal apprentices whom Ereleth had trained in the secret Arts of witchery, but she also knew that she had been tjrained more assiduously and more intensively than any of her sisters. She knew that Ereleth regarded her as her true heir, and she,in her turn had begun to think of Ereleth as hers: a unique combination of substitute mother and instrument of ambition. The garden contained more than a hundred exotic species of plants, every one of which produced or was reputed to produce some kind of toxic substance. Some of them had been grown here since time immemorial- Ereleth was by no means the first witch- wife to lend her knowledge to the throne of Xandria -- but others were recent arrivals.
Ereleth's experimental frame of mind had led her carefully to cultivate the acquaintance of certain merchants and adventurers, in the interest of increasing as well as maintaining her repertoire.
Many of the 'gifts' they brought for which the king's treasury paid high prices did not live up to their reputations, but some did. The most reliable of these suppliers was Hyry Keshvara, whose usefulness to the king's witches was greatly
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enhanced by the fact that she did not need to use middlemen in her dealings with Ereleth; being female, she could pass more or less freely in and out of the Inner Sanctum.
Lucrezia had a clear memory of the day when Hyry Keshvara had brought the three seeds which grew in the flesh of living men, partly because it was the first time she had been alone with the trader for any length of time- Ereleth had been bedridden with some kind of fever -- and partly because Hyry had been so obviously excited by the news she had brought along with the seeds.
"Nothing like these seeds has ever been seen in the lands with which Xandria trades, highness," Hyry had said.
"I don't know whether the claims made on their behalf are true, but I bought other items along with these which were obviously exotic. They were offered to me not as objects of great value but as tokens of proof that the people who supplied them had achieved the impossible- that they had cro
ssed the Dragomite Hills in safety. These seeds, they said, came from the fabled Navel of the World, which lies far beyond the Soursweet Marshes. If that is true, something of profound importance must have occurred in the lands beyond the Forest of Absolute Night, for no one who tried to cross the Dragomite Hills within the last few centuries has ever returned to tell the tale."
Lucrezia's first instinct had been to wish as fervently as Hyry Keshvara evidently wished that this might be true- but she was Ereleth's apprentice and had been schooled in scepticism.
"Is there no other way such things could have come into Xandria?"
Lucrezia had asked.
"According to Ereleth, the captain of every ship that docks in the shadow of the Great Wall swears that he brings goods never before seen within the empire, from lands so distant that no Xandrian has ever heard of them. It is all lies, she says, pandering to the thirst for travellers' tales that all sedentary city folk have."
"I can't tell for certain," Hyry had answered.
"Although I saved these seeds for you, highness, knowing how enthusiastic you would be to test the claims which were made on their behalf, I took the other items to a very cunning man and an uncommonly bold adventurer. They both agreed with me that the plants in question were extremely odd, and that if they did indeed originate from the 41
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lands south of theDragomite Hills
their arrival here must be reckoned a marvel. The hills stretch so far to the west and the east, and are so inconveniently bounded by the Grey Waste and the Spangled Desert, that even seeds would have difficulty surviving the journey. There were mature plants too, highness, all astonishingly free from the ravages of decay. Either they were conveyed across the hills as swiftly as a man can ride, or the people who brought them possess a powerful means of protecting their produce from corruption. In either case, highness . . ."
"Perhaps they have the secret of incorruptible stone," Lucrezia had said, intending it as a joke- but there had been a hollow ring in Hyry Keshvara's polite laugh which suggested that the merchant did not consider it a jesting matter.
Serpent's Blood Page 5
