Intrigue of Antares [Dray Prescot #44]

by Alan Burt Akers

I stood in a hall of parquetry, surrounded by armed guards of a most particularly impressive appearance, facing a tall throne in which sat a noble who could have my head off by a mere gesture of his little finger.

  I was, as they say in Clishdrin, well and truly paddleless up that famous creek. The armed men had turned out to be a mixture of the City Guard and a certain noble's retinue. You could tell the difference by their badges and insigne. I'd been marched past the sumptuous architecture of Oxonium where the kaotreshes flew in the breeze. There had been no need for us to leave Grand Central, for the palace of the noble lay hard by that of the king. Between two towers, one on each of their outer walls, king and noble had a private cable car system, spanning the branch of the artificial moat that surrounded the royal palace. Indeed, I was in powerful company here.

  The hikdar of the detail, Tygnam ti Fralen, went to give me a poke with the chape of his scabbard. The noble held up a hand.

  “Give him time to answer, Hikdar Tygnam.”

  “Quidang, notor!”

  I relaxed. This anxious hikdar had treated me perfectly correctly and fully prepared though I was to give him a crafty kick where it would do the most good, I had no pleasure in it. As for the problem of the moment, I could see no way around it. No way, at least, in which I might come off with a whole skin. The habitual use of authority in this place was marked by humanity. That I had deduced from what I'd seen and heard. All the same, failure would not be tolerated.

  Of course, I could lie and deny ever having had the blasted thing. But that wouldn't square with what I saw as a sacred promise to Strom Korden. In addition, the lie would be immediately punctured by the information these people had of me, my name and deeds on the road.

  Could I claim the assassins had made off with it? Don't, Dray Prescot, I said to myself, be childish. Tirivenswatha knew.

  So, I stared full on this puissant lord, this Hyr Kov Brannomar.

  In the middle part of life, I judged him, although that is always a difficult assessment on Kregen. There is on that planet this rather rare condition—if it be a disease the savants and doctors have not yet discovered or decided—in which a person's hair, instead of retaining its full color over most of the span of years, turns gray or white relatively early on in life. Kov Brannomar's hair was a silvery cap. His beard and moustache were silvery in color. With his bronzed powerful face, hard etched with command, with bright dark eyes and thin but mobile mouth, that silver poll gave him the formidable appearance of your true lord of the ages. The scar slanting down his left cheek, brilliant against his skin, added rather than subtracted from that aura of omnipotence.

  “Kov,” I spoke up. “Notor. The sword was taken in the affray in the Shrine of Cymbaro.”

  A little ripple of a sigh escaped the lips of the man who stood on the steps of the dais immediately below the throne.

  Him, I felt instinctively, it would benefit me to watch. He must be the kov's chief adviser, a pallan with powers almost as autocratic as those of Brannomar himself. He wore robes as ruby red as those of his master, although more ornate, for Brannomar's rig was as austere as the man himself. As to his face, this posed an enigma to which, at the moment, I did not have the answer. Like the kov, he was apim; but the darkness of his features, although not the true and velvet black of a Xuntalese, must indicate some of that island people's proud blood flowed in his veins.

  “What, Hikdar Tygnam, did you see in the Shrine of Cymbaro?” The words were soft yet unmistakably they carried the stamp of authority this man held under the hand of the kov.

  “There was great confusion, Lord Jazipur,” responded the hikdar at once. “When I saw this man Drajak the fighting had ended and he was talking to his companions.”

  Kov Brannomar leaned a little forward. “Tell me, Drajak.”

  So I told him. I ended: “This Fristle who took the sword can easily be identified. With your leave I will—”

  Lord Jazipur said: “He will be among the runnels by now.”

  Speaking up boldly, for, after all, I was well aware I was arguing for my liberty, if not my life, I snapped out: “Then I will follow him there!”

  The kov leaned back. One firm brown hand, without rings or jewelry, touched his chin. “Enquiries will be made. Yes, Drajak, known as the Sudden, I think you will go down into the runnels between the hills and find this man. And I think you will bring me back the sword.”

  He didn't say what might happen if I didn't. He didn't have to.

  This decision on the kov's part did not really ease the tension in the situation. The guard stood alertly. A number of people, all dressed according to their rank and position, waited each side of the chamber. Tall windows shed that mellow Kregish opaline radiance upon us.

  Then the kov said: “Why, Drajak, when you arrived in Oxonium, did you not bring the sword to me immediately?”

  This was the question I'd anticipated and had not relished. There were other pressing questions he could ask, and no doubt would, now. The very importance of actually getting his hands on the sword had been the big question, driving the others to wait their turn. I spoke harshly.

  “It was necessary for me to see a lady to the shrine.”

  “And that was more important? Your paramour?”

  I was curt. “No.”

  He gave absolutely no response to my rudeness. Hikdar Tygnam spoke up. “My lord, there was a temple dancer there.”

  Silence ensued for a moment in which, no doubt, one was supposed to imagine all manner of awful retributions. The next question, also, was obvious. “What did Strom Korden say to you?”

  “He was dying, in pain and was almost incoherent. He simply said that I should take the sword and take it to Hyr Kov Brannomar.”

  “That is all?”

  “It was difficult to understand. I took him for a gallant gentleman and was sorry to see him in that condition. That was all.”

  “Take the sword and take it to Hyr Kov Brannomar?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Strom Korden was a gallant gentleman. I mourn his loss. I hope I shall not have to mourn the loss of his sword.”

  “If it can be found, then I—”

  “Do not boast,” cut in Lord Jazipur. “Or promise what you may not accomplish.” His ice cold eyes looked at me as though I was a fish on a slab. “Your head is on it.”

  Kov Brannomar's hand half lifted, and then fell back. Was that a reflexive gesture in protest? Now that his chief pallan had made the threat, the kov, too, would be bound by it. At least, so I guessed.

  “You will send someone with him, Lord Jazipur?”

  “Assuredly, my lord. One of my best men.”

  In a soft voice, Brannomar said: “Make it your best man, Lord Jazipur.”

  Jazipur didn't say ‘Quidang!’ but he might as well have done by the way his back shot up. I did not smile.

  With that the audience was over. They wheeled me out.

  As though released by a spring, people moved in the chamber, going about their business for the kov. By the door as we passed under the archway a knot of people moved aside for the guard still surrounding me with military precision. Among the clerks and functionaries a man dressed in a shamlak so dark it was black looked across.

  He saw me. He started to laugh, so that great shining tears rolled down his fat red cheeks.

  We marched out through the halls and corridors to the main gates.

  Now what, by the pustular armpits of the Divine Lady of Belschutz, was Naghan Raerdu, Naghan the Barrel, doing in Oxonium?

  Naghan was just about the best of my personal spy apparat. Some of the network had been passed over to my lad Drak when he'd become Emperor of Vallia. Some, like Naghan, I'd kept on my personal and secret payroll. Well, now! By Vox, what a turn up! We marched out and there was a fresh spring in my step. Things were looking up.

  Things were, indeed, looking up.

  Tygnam was going to take me off to meet the folk detailed by Jazipur to keep an eye on me in the runnels between t
he hills. A man, very sure of himself, stepped up to the hikdar, halting our progress.

  “Hikdar!” His voice cut like sharpened steel, yet there was that lazy careless tone to it. “I'd like a word with that man.”

  “Only for a moment, notor—”

  Ignoring that, Dagert of Paylen walked up to me, casual, raffish, one hand on the hilt of his rapier.

  “I hear you're going after that Fristle.”

  “That's right.”

  How he knew so quickly was easily explained by gold and people listening and going out before me. Intrigue is a fecund plant.

  “Palfrey thinks he knows the feller.”

  “Indeed.”

  If he could play this cool casual game then so could I.

  He stroked his moustache, and his eyes for a moment gleamed white as he glanced up at my face.

  “I owe you a favor, my friend.”

  “Which I thought you had reclaimed.”

  “A mere trifle.” He twirled his right hand gracefully in the air. “Palfrey and I—we'll go with you. Bit of fun. Do a spot of rabble chasing down in the runnels. Show ‘em who's master.”

  A whole new dimension opened up about Dagert of Paylen. Oh, I do not mean because of his distasteful references to poor folk. Anyway, even that could be pretence. He wanted to go after Strom Korden's sword. I felt that strongly.

  “Thank you. Done.”

  He nodded, nodded to the hikdar, and stalked off. He made no remark about the way I addressed him. Any nonsense of notor this and notor that between us had been ditched, and he'd simply let that happen. Why?

  Why? He wanted that damned sword, that's why!

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  * * *

  Chapter twelve

  Give them their due, they did not stint on me.

  They furnished a slap up meal of local produce with a great variety of vegetables and fruit, and to drink a light local beer—or, at least, a brown fluid they called beer—rather flattish and with a miniscule head as though it had been watered. There were palines to follow. We sat in the guardroom annex for the meal and later on as the suns were thinking of declining beyond the western hills Lord Jazipur's man entered.

  Hikdar Tygnam greeted him cautiously, standing up to do so. I remained seated, enjoying the palines’ juiciness and freshness after the meal.

  The fellow was of that breed that can insinuate itself into the crannies of society and sniff out gossip and tidbits of valuable information. He wore a drab tan tunic and a three-quarter length cape thrown back. He did not wear a shamlak. He did wear three swords and a plethora of daggers. As to his face, he was apim, clean-shaven, and narrow as to feature, with deep lines running from the corners of his mouth to the sides of his chin. His hat was perfectly in character, being wide and floppily down-drooping. It did not sport a feather.

  He gave his name as Naghan—Naghan the Ordsetter.

  “My men are waiting outside. Let us get on with it.”

  There was genuine relief visible in Hikdar Tygnam that he did not have to venture down into the warrens between the hills.

  He bade me a courteous remberee and we stepped outside into the haze of jade and ruby dusk. It had rained earlier and up here on Grand Central the air tasted sweet.

  “Amak Dagert and his men have offered to assist us.” This Naghan the Ordsetter possessed a strange squeaky voice. “He will be useful if his man knows the whereabouts of the Fristle.”

  There was no answer called for. Dagert of Paylen and Palfrey joined us with a group of men at the cable car terminus. We were headed north, to the hill known as Rondjas's Hill. Apart from Palfrey saying in a quick excited voice that from there we must go to the Hill of Sturgies, we were a silent party as we boarded the car. The wheels whispered along the cable and the breeze blew in from the open cabin windows. The other cars passed us, swaying gracefully in their looping arcs from hill to hill.

  Lights were springing up everywhere all over the city. Their sparkles were much like fairy lanterns. As we swayed through thin air suspended by slender cables the very trance-like air of this enterprise forced itself on me most strongly.

  A lifter swooped down, passing us closely and flew on towards Rondjas's Hill. It showed only riding lights. The car began to climb the last looping curve of cable towards the terminus.

  Whilst this structure was nowhere near as ornate as that upon Grand Central, it had its architectural charm. A small knot of people waited to board our car. We alighted and, in a bunch of dark cloaked men, walked swiftly across the kyro and along a broad avenue towards the northern terminus. Here we would board the calimer for the Hill of Sturgies.

  Palfrey started to chatter and Dagert of Paylen snapped: “Quiet!”

  The clouds had mostly blown away and the stars glittered, high. The next leg of the journey was a replica of the first. The cable car swayed through the nighted air and the lights of the city passed away each side, scattered and dim along the runnels far below.

  The next landing stage looked deserted under a single string of lamps. The car touched the guide ramps and bumped to a standstill. The door opened and we stepped out, keeping in that tightly bunched formation.

  Something loud went Bang! The first noise was followed by others. Instantly we were enveloped in a cloud of stinging, choking black smoke. Just before all vision clamped down I saw a ceramic jar come flying through the air and go smash onto the stone slabs, letting out a searing spurt of evil black smoke. At once all was confusion as men shouted and fanned their hands against the smoke. A body collided with me and I braced myself and whoever it was bounced.

  A hand gripped my upper arm. About to turn intemperately and bash my attacker, I heard a breathy voice, hoarse with urgency, whisper in my ear: “Majister!” At once this was followed by: “Jis—this way!”

  I knew that voice. I relaxed. Whatever was to happen now, best to let it happen and then reckon up the consequences later. The hand guided me unerringly through the smoke. The noise of men swearing and shouting receded. That damned smoke was truly pungent, getting right up the hooter. It spread to encompass the whole landing area.

  My eyes were streaming tears that felt hot, by Krun. I was pulled, staggering, along and presently, although I could barely see for the water in my eyes, realized we were out of the landing area and out of that pestiferous smoke.

  “Jis—you are unharmed?”

  “Aye, Naghan, apart from my eyes which burn fiercer than the Furnace Fires of Inshurfraz.”

  “Better that than being parted from your head. This way.”

  Other bodies surrounded me as we ran along a street I sensed led around the lip of the hill, a narrower street, judging by the echoes. Not that there were many of them. These fellows wore soft shoes. Naghan Raerdu had seen me as a prisoner. Ergo, he had put in hand a plot to rescue me. This was nothing less than I would have expected from such a master spy. What he would say when I explained the situation I could only guess at. I did know, by Vox, that he would laugh!

  In no time at all we halted and I was guided up a set of wooden steps, told to duck my head, and then seated in a padded chair. My vision remained blurred. Men were talking quietly some way off, in another room, I judged. Naghan said: “There is an ointment, jis; but the wizard said it is better to allow the eyes to recover naturally.”

  “How long?”

  “A bur, maximum. We have masks with eyepieces that allow us to see and filters that allow us to breathe. Useless to put one over your face once the smoke was out of the pots. It would have merely trapped the smoke against your face.” He let a low laugh rumble up from his belly. “Those cramphs coughed their lungs up! The gold was well spent on the mage.”

  I felt a familiar movement under me, a feeling of pressure and then of lightness. “This is the voller that passed the cable car?”

  “Aye, jis. We've had an eye on you ever since I saw you in Kov Brannomar's hall.”

  “And who's the we?”

  “Oh, a few of my Valli
an fellows and some locals. I've set up a network in Oxonium. The locals are a strange lot. The wizards are not like the sorcerers at home. And the blood feuds and vendettas festering among the poor folk in the valleys are staggering. It is not easy to organize from one runnel to another between the hills.”

  “D'you know of a gang who wear olive green?”

  “No, jis. I'll ask.”

  “That can wait for my eyes. There are other questions.”

  “Oh, yes. Tolindrin has been seeking an alliance with Vallia. They're in a peculiar position regarding the production of airboats, as are their neighbors to the north, Caneldrin and beyond them, Winlan and Enderlin. The other nations of the sub-continent are more client kingdoms than anything else. There is constant friction on all the frontiers—its a way of life. But if all out war erupts—who does Vallia consider? The Empress Delia considered it appropriate that Vallia should know more.”

  I admired his primness in thus talking of his mission. But how sweetly the sound of Delia's name fell on my ears! By Zair! Yes.

  I said: “And the empress?”

  “Blooming as the rose the last time I saw her, jis. Your eyes—?”

  “Smarting like the devil. Is there a drink—”

  Almost before the words were out of my mouth a goblet was at my lips and a tartish wine sparked up my tongue. It was just the drink to clear my mouth of the stinking taste of that damned magical smoke.

  Naghan the Barrel went on: “It is still necessary for us to buy airboats from one country or the other in Persinia and Balintol. If we judge wrongly in this, bang go our supplies. Now the old king's son is dead here in Tolindrin the choice of a successor becomes of vital importance.” He let rip one of his tear-jerking wheezing laughs that made him shake all over. “May I ask, jis, what brings you here?”

  So I told him about Strom Korden's charge to me. I added that I was bound to protect Princess Nandisha, although I did not tell him why. I finished: “That cramph of a Fristle has the sword. I now believe this fellow Dagert of Paylen is after it. I am determined to honor my pledge to Korden and take the confounded thing to Brannomar.”