Intrigue of Antares [Dray Prescot #44]

by Alan Burt Akers

  The lord eyed me calculatingly.

  “Your name, my friend?”

  “Drajak.” I spoke pleasantly. “And yours?”

  His servant sucked in his cheeks.

  Notor is how one addresses a lord in many parts of Paz upon Kregen. I'd had my fill of kowtowing to lords of late and I had no intention of beginning again right now. I had urgent things to do—like following Fweygo and the rest and trusting to all the Beneficent Spirits of Uttar Soblime they had not been slaughtered.

  His eyebrows drew down for an instant and then that light amused laugh eased the situation—at least, it eased the situation for him and his servant. I didn't give a damn who he was. I wanted to get on.

  “I am Amak Dagert—Dagert of Paylen. Lahal.”

  “Lahal. Now, if you will excuse me I must—” He'd drawn a yellow cloth from under the short cape he wore over metal armor and was about to clean his sword. He wrapped the cloth again and stuffed it away with a gesture as elegant as a court dandy's. His voice chirred like oiled steel clearing scabbard.

  “I think, Drajak, you must do something other than you intended.”

  Philosophically I turned around and followed his gaze. A whole bunch of renders crowded down the alley towards us. Now the rain had stopped they'd lit torches and the lurid lights glanced and danced off wet walls and cobbles, glinted redly from the black blood at our feet.

  The two guards stood very still, staring at Dagert of Paylen. Their eyes looked like pebbles. The amak's servant trembled. He licked his lips and kept flexing his grip on the short sword.

  I looked around for another and possibly better weapon.

  That amused low laugh, almost a self-satisfied chuckle, broke from Dagert. He looked back. The alley led off into a darkness relatively deeper than that in the opposite direction. It seemed to me as I picked up a sword of somewhat better construction than those I'd already used, that this Dagert of Paylen was deliberately tantalizing his servant. He was making the poor devil suffer. Well, that was between them.

  “Notor—” The fellow's wet lips shone as he licked them again.

  “Oh, you know me by now, Palfrey. When the odds are right—not otherwise. It has been pleasant meeting you, Drajak, and once more I offer you my thanks. Now it's time to depart.”

  With that and without more ado he turned abruptly and darted lithely away down the alley.

  Mind you, he was right, assuredly, he was right, by Krun!

  One thing you noticed about Dagert of Paylen that lingered in the mind was his eyes. Liquid and dark, they hid unfathomable depths. What he said was one thing, what he thought quite another.

  There was no point my hanging about here any longer. My duty lay with the charges the Star Lords had placed in my care. Swiftly I followed Amak Dagert into the shadows of the alley.

  The problem now was to get out of Amintin and that meant scaling the wall somewhere where that was practicable and preferably out of sight of townspeople and renders alike. The clouds were drifting away across the stars and if the sky cleared much more many of the comforting shadows would disappear.

  The pirates had entered the town across more than the one wall over which we had seen them clambering and now they infested the whole place. The unholy noise racketed on. Flames twisted against the thinning clouds. There were people running about aimlessly, desperately seeking shelter. What the Amintin Watch might be doing, what the local lord in command might be ordering, appeared to me to be completely unimportant. This dreadful night the renders owned Amintin and did as they pleased.

  The nearest wall now would be the one over to the east. More than once I had to skip smartly down an alleyway to avoid roistering mobs of pirates. Their domination had been swift and sudden and was now total.

  Soon I entered an area of warehouses where no doubt the goods coming in and out along the caravan trails were stored. Other, more interesting odors competed with the stink of fish and mud.

  Naturally, a quarter of the town holding goodies like this was not going to be overlooked by your conscientious looter. Oh, dear me, no!

  Carefully sliding along by a painted wooden wall and looking everywhere about, I spotted parties already at work hauling out Amintin's wealth. Just past the end of this warehouse and past the opened double doors from which streamed yellow lantern light an open space fronted an inland gate. Undoubtedly the gate had a name. What it might be I neither knew nor cared. I did know that it did not represent my way out of the raped town. Further along would be the place, where steps led up to the ramparts.

  I did not proceed without a plan. The chances of success rested firmly on the very speed with which the renders had entered and conquered.

  Moving swiftly yet cautiously I skirted the open space where during a normal working day the pack animals and the carts would muster and cut across between the two end warehouses. The wall lay only a scant fifteen paces off.

  The route I had followed, dictated both by my desire to avoid pirates and to reach the east wall, channeled other fugitives to the same point. Pink moonlight momentarily illuminated agile figures clambering up the steps onto the ramparts with the oddly-cut openings of the battlements beyond. I halted. There was no doubt I expected a shower of arrows or crossbow bolts to sleet into those refugees.

  Nothing happened and they ran excitedly along the top of the wall and vanished into one of the small towers erected at intervals. I frowned. That did not look promising.

  “Sink me!” I snarled to myself. “In for a ponsho in for a leem!”

  I gathered myself up and started at a dead run for the dappled shadows at the foot of the steps. Before I reached the wall a group of people appeared from the side, racing along with bent heads. For all their apparent blind panic, weapons snouted in their fists.

  We reached the wall together.

  Dagert of Paylen called: “Up, up, you hulus. Bratch!”

  In a bunch we panted up the steps. Moonlight filtered down and dimmed and shone. Dagert's lean handsome face with that trimmed moustache and dark eyes looked perfectly composed. He said: “We must be swift, Drajak.” And, instantly: “Get on, get on, Palfrey, confound you!”

  They started to run along in the shadow of the battlements towards the nearest small tower. I stopped and looked over the outside of the wall.

  Praise be to Zair! My plan had come right! Dangling from the walls hung the rope ladders up which the pirates had swarmed to despoil Amintin. Dagert and his three followers were helter-skeltering along towards the tower. I called: “Dagert! This way is surer!”

  He halted and swung about, a lithe, tense figure in that moon-dappled confusion.

  I swung up into the gap and took the ropes into my fists. I wasn't prepared to hang about to be feathered waiting for anybody around here. Starting down, I called up: “Ladders, Dagert.”

  His voice cracked out like two flat boards striking together in one of those Shensi plays, all puppets and buffoonery. “This way!”

  Before I'd reached halfway down I felt his weight above me on the ladder. Glancing up I saw the nimbleness with which he negotiated the rungs. By the time I'd dropped into the dry moat—which was sticky with odiferous mud—he was halfway down and the rest of his party tumbled down after him.

  Even then I had time to reflect on the illuminating fact that his followers had chosen the same ladder he had, the same one I'd chosen. There were other ladders dangling down. That told me a great deal.

  He sprinted up to me as I hauled myself out on the other side of the moat.

  “We'll have to reach the cover of those trees quickly.”

  A couple of hundred or so paces off the dark mass of trees did promise shelter.

  “Aye,” I said and started running over the muddy grass.

  “My flier is parked to the north—” he was saying, and then stopped and saved his breath for running.

  At that moment the first crossbow bolts began to whicker past our heads.

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  Chapter three

  Almost instantly Palfrey let out a scream—really the yelp he let out was more like a mouse squeak. The two guards ran on, heads high, chests outthrust, pacing Dagert of Paylen stride for stride. Well, that was their duty, what they were paid for. I glanced back.

  Palfrey's shock of tow hair swung wildly as he danced and hobbled along, trying to clutch at his ankle and at the same time run after us.

  Dagert did not turn his head.

  “Come along, Palfrey, you hulu! Bratch!”

  “I'm wounded, I'm wounded!” The words tumbled out all mixed up with squeakings and panting. “I'm skewered through!”

  “No you're not!” Dagert hadn't even glanced back. “A scratch.”

  “Mama Thehico the Healer aid me! Help!”

  Not sure to be amused or annoyed I swung back and seized the servant up under the armpits and carried him along like a bundle of cordwood. He did have a long graze down his left shin and blood shone greasily black. He was babbling something to himself under his breath; but he had the sense not to struggle. The need to run as fast as possible coupled with the equally important need of dodging about randomly caused me to carry poor old Palfrey with less gentleness than was seemly for a wounded fellow creature. He yelped a bit but remained still and limp.

  Thankfully the shooting became highly erratic as we opened the range and by the time the leaves of the first trees closed over our heads we were in no danger from either arrow or quarrel.

  Putting Palfrey down I carefully did not look at Dagert. Palfrey lay on his back with his leg in the air and he clutched his ankle as though it was about to fall off. “Oh, oh, oh,” he moaned.

  “Oh, do leave off, Palfrey, for the sweet sake of Harmonia!” Dagert's voice held a strong note of amusement, although his light laugh did not accompany his words. “Just say thank you nicely to tyr Drajak.”

  “Thank you, master, thank you,” gabbled Palfrey still clutching his leg which stuck up in the air like a half-masted flagpole. “I'm shot through!”

  “No you're not, you fambly. Now get on your feet and run with us. D'you want me to leave you alone here—with all those pirates?”

  The flagpole leg came down like a drawbridge and Palfrey shot to his feet. “Notor! You wouldn't—”

  “Don't try me, is all.” With that, Dagert of Paylen started off through the trees. Even on the uneven surface in the shadows he strode along with a lithe easy swagger, your bold adventurer, your dashing cavalier, to the life.

  I bent and took Palfrey's foot in my hand and twisted it to get a look at his wound. He yelped. The gash was a mere graze with a little blood. He'd live.

  I said: “As soon as we can safely stop we'll bind it up. Now come on.” And I gave him a friendly push in the right direction.

  “Oh, the persecution I have to put up with!” But he trotted along smartly enough and did not fall behind.

  Well, now, I considered as we threaded our way between the tree trunks, my first objective of getting out of doomed Amintin had been achieved. Now it was necessary for me join up with Fweygo and our charges. My confidence in Fweygo was already very high even in the short time of our acquaintance and with the powerful numim Ranaj to assist, the party should have won clear with the head start I'd given them. They were making for Bharang which lay over to the west. Therefore, it was necessary to cross the river, preferably unobserved. That meant this same night as ever was.

  If this bright spark Dagert had a flier parked somewhere to the north, he might give me a lift.

  In the general confusion of the night, of my interrupted duty, of my feelings about getting this job done and haring off home to Delia, I was fully in the mood to make sure Dagert of Paylen offered me a lift.

  Palfrey kept on glancing down the backtrail as he hobbled along.

  “They won't bother to follow a few fugitives, dom,” I told him. “They'll know that long before we can bring a rescue force they can be aboard their ships and vanished like ghosts.”

  “Oh, master, please don't mention ghosts!” He squeaked up the scale like a mouse caught in a trap. “Especially now, at night, in the forest! It's positively unhealthy!”

  Each to his own. I made myself say in a grave voice as we went on: “All the same, you don't have to worry over the renders any longer.”

  Apart from his untidy shock of straw-colored hair, this Palfrey who was body servant to Dagert of Paylen possessed a round snub nose, a twist of native cunning to his lips, a feeling that he understood far more than he admitted. In the fight back there his short sword had been stained with blood, but only slightly, as though he'd stabbed at a reiver once and then considered his duty done. The half-cloak he drew about him from time to time with a nervous gesture was patched but of good quality. No doubt it was a reach me down from the Amak. I did not think you could easily pigeonhole friend Palfrey.

  We spent the next couple of burs moving swiftly through the woods—they were scarcely the forest Palfrey had dubbed them—until we passed over a slanting hill tall with rough grass and descended the far slope towards the thin darkly-gleaming streak of the river. We did not speak.

  At last Palfrey broke the silence.

  “Notor! Can't we rest now—please? My leg burns like fire. I'm sure my foot is—”

  “Your foot will do what feet are sent to Kregen to do. March!”

  “Notor,” wailed the unhappy Palfrey. But he kept on going.

  We were circling wide around the town to reach the river north of Amintin. The thought occurred to me to wonder why Dagert of Paylen had considered it necessary to land his flier here, when there was bound to be a vollerdrome, however small, within the confines of the walls. That action smacked of secrecy. Bright spark though he was, there was a spirit of deviltry in this fellow, of that there could be no mistake.

  Southwards to our left a dull orange reflection hung in the sky. What wind there was carried the sounds away from us. Pirates are, in general and with certain notable exceptions, unpleasant vermin. Their boldness this night of terror boded ill for the coastal towns, indicating a power that felt it economical to destroy a seaport. Killing geese that lay golden eggs is not an economical proposition for thieves.

  Palfrey's injured foot hit a stone or other obstruction in the grass and he staggered and fell against me. I clapped an arm about his narrow waist and hoicked him up. A gasp of pain puffed between his lips.

  “Hard,” he half whispered, half stuttered. “H-Hard man!”

  “The notor will rest in a moment.”

  “Only when we reach the ruins and the voller.”

  Judging by the fleeting glimpses of the Maiden with the Many Smiles as clouds passed overhead I fancied it would rain again before dawn. Used though I am to roughing it in all kinds of weather, like any normal person in any normal circumstances I generally prefer to be under cover and dry when it rains. These ruins would offer cover of a sort. If, that is, I could afford to waste time lollygagging about instead of being up and about my duty for the Everoinye.

  Anyway, what in a Herrelldrin Hell was this fine fancy Dagert of Paylen doing hiding his flier in some ruins and then footslogging it into Amintin? Mind you, the Star Lords had flung me into the town in something like the same way. And—ruins. We were skirting the riverbank now, heading south towards the fireglow in the sky. The land looked unkempt. It has been said that when buildings grow old the English rebuild and add wings, the Americans knock them down and build new and bigger and the Irish just leave them and build new along the road. From the little I knew this was an ancient land shrouded in mystery with new peoples merely imposing a surface culture. A hardened adventurer feels many emotions at the prospect of ruins and, of these, two are pre-eminent. One: the excitement of financial gain. Two: the anticipation of danger and death.

  Palfrey had called a few trees a forest. Dagert had chosen to conceal his voller in ruined buildings rather than in the woods. That presumably indicated they were both urbanites.

  As O
paz in the guise of Whetti-Orbium ordained, the rain began as we reached the dark vegetation shrouded mass of the ruins. What they had been in their prime was hard to say; a monastery, a castle, a fortified villa, a series of structures at the least of considerable extent sloping down towards the riverbank. Rain pattered against ancient stone blocks. Mud slicked underfoot. One could hope that the deluge would extinguish the fiery agony of Amintin.

  Dagert of Paylen did not hesitate. Between crumbled stone pillars he stalked into the half-darkness of a courtyard. Cracked paving stones surrounded what had once been a fountain. Low, jagged-edged walls surrounded the space. Here no roofs had survived. Everywhere in crack and crevice grew thistles, hardy, bright purple and lustrous green, and nettles of a richer lighter green, loaded with stingers. Ahead gaped blackness beneath an arch of desiccating brickwork. There must be some remnants of roof left over there, then.

  Speaking in a soft voice, Dagert said: “Bring her out, Palfrey.”

  “Yes, notor.”

  Palfrey started across. The odd thing here was that he showed no apparent apprehension about wandering about sinister ruins at night yet he had expressed serious concern over ghosts in the woods. One would have thought that no matter how accustomed to city streets he might be, dark ruins would be another thing altogether.

  Despite the smells of mud and damp vegetation the penetrating stink of incense irritated my nostrils before the monotonous sound of chanting reached my ears. Palfrey stopped as though poleaxed.

  Dagert's fist reached down for the hilt of his rapier.

  Palfrey half turned and his eyes were the whitest things in his face.

  “Over here.” Dagert's voice sounded like silk drawn over a sword blade. He pointed to the ruins of the courtyard to our right.

  The two guards, silent, moving like clumsy dolls, vanished into the shadows as Dagert pulled Palfrey in. Here we were completely concealed and could look out without being observed. I glanced at Dagert's servant. Poor old Palfrey, his fears of the ghosts of the forests had transferred themselves across with sudden terror to these ruins.