Armada of Antares

by Alan Burt Akers

  Trouble over slaves plagued me in Zamra; but that it a story for another time.

  Expecting perhaps another Nath or Naghan, I went down with Exand to see the thief. He was a fat and oily fellow, all smiling and hand-washing, a far cry from the lean and hungry villain I had expected. He was no Nath or Naghan, either, being a soberly named Kornan, and very willing and lubricious with it.

  What he had to say may be summed up as: Yes, there had been strangers in the city, frequenting the taverns and dopa dens, hard, edgy men, with faces scarred and seamed from experiences most men might shudder away from. In the taverns they had asked questions, mainly of the guards of the fortress. Some had given them dusty answers, carelessly, others had drunk enough to tell more than they should. Here Jiktar Exand swelled. His face turned that purplish plum color and I fancied later this Kornan would remember a few names and faces for Exand. Well, that was his province. I admit I felt an unease at the simplicity with which the guards of Valka had been culled. The tavern at which these strangers had put up was named the Admiral Constanto and I halted Exand with a word as he prepared to storm off.

  “Hold, Exand. There is more to tell yet.”

  “Aye, Prince,” he said, with that sullen fury boiling away in him. I felt that since I had escaped with my life I could therefore scrape some comfort from the improvements in fortress discipline that would follow. My men of Valka are the very devil in a fight; this intrigue among simple swods came as altogether fresh. I did not blame Exand. But I would blame him if the same thing occurred again. This he knew.

  “Old Naghan the Hook tried to dip one of these men,” said Kornan. He belched and afterward covered his mouth with his hand, being in polite society. “They cut off his hand.”

  “I was not informed of this.”

  “No. The reasons would be obvious, Prince. Naghan the Hook prefers to take his chances with one flapper.”

  There were no names to be had. No, Kornan had never heard of any Traga. No, these men did not wear black, only decent Vallian buff. The thieves steered well clear of them, and the sequence of events was all too obvious. Seg said, “I will go down to this Admiral Constanto tavern and ferret them out.”

  “Aye,” I said. “And tread carefully.”

  He went off, taking with him a party of guards clad in civilian clothes, a mere party of roisterers out for a night’s airing. Kornan the Thief swallowed and licked his lips. “May I ask what—?” he began.

  “No, Kornan,” said I, very friendly and cheerful. “It is best for your state of health you do not ask.”

  His lubriciousness congealed a little, but he nodded and mumbled that he knew nothing, by Diproo the Nimble-Fingered. As soon as he spoke, he cursed himself.

  And then, as we stood there by the lower guard gate, with the frowning walls of Esser Rarioch rising above and the watch fires burning, with all the stars of Kregen spread above and She of the Veils swimming in her golden haze, Kov Lykon descended the narrow stone steps to us. He walked with the dainty and yet heavy tread of authority picking its way. With him he had two Chail Sheom, poor girls scantily clad and in silver chains, after the debased fashion of Hamal or Hyrklana or any of those nations which feel a woman in chains gives pleasure to a man. I had spoken to the Emperor about this; he had merely replied that this had been a custom in the long ago and there were no laws of Vallia proscribing the custom.

  With Lykon Crimahan and the two girls came down also a young Numim, very thick of arm and leg, very bull-like of neck, with the small round head of the fighter, dressed in leather clothes of supple cut. A rapier and dagger swung at his sides from golden chains. His nose was broken and set quite well, except that it lent his whole hard lion-face an aura of savageness much in keeping with his attitude of overweening pride.

  “What goes on here, you cramphs?” demanded the Kov before he came fully into the torchlight, obviously before he had seen that I stood there, also.

  “A mere matter of routine, Kov,” said Jiktar Exand.

  “A mere matter, eh? You all look confounded glum.”

  “Some business over a wench,” said the thick-necked muscular young Numim, switching his rapier up. “The foul rasts waste their time instead of guarding us. I’d have them flogged jikaider, every last mother’s son of them!”

  This was Ortyg Handon, a young Jen[1] of Crimahan’s retinue. We all knew what he was: a professional bully, a man kept to provide sport for the Kov, a man who delighted in thrashing other men who lacked his strength and his skill at arms. I had to tolerate him in my home for the sake of his Kov, who was high in the councils of my father-in-law.

  Balass the Hawk, a hyr-kaidur, had marked this Handon and mentioned him to me with a few belittling words. I had had to say most sternly to Balass, that fierce man: “Do not cross swords with him, Balass! I don’t want a corpse spouting blood over my carpets of Walfarg weave.”

  So Balass had kept out of his way, and I had given the word to my chamberlain, old Panshi, to pass along to Kov Lykon’s chamberlain that the professional swaggerer, Ortyg Handon, must behave himself or else he would be guested in the dungeons for his visit here. I meant it, too.

  I was about to step forward and make myself known when I saw a shadow cast in the pool of torchlight above the last step leading up from the great Kyro of the Tridents. A black, deformed shadow leaped the steps, and then a young man appeared, walking forward into the lights. I looked at him and felt a strange — a weird! — sensation in my throat. I had never seen him before. I knew this to be so and it was true. I did not know this young man.

  But something about him — the way he held his head, the way his open, ruddy, handsome features broke into a genuine smile as he advanced, all the clean limber strength of him — caught at me. I was in shadow and I remained there, staring at the young man, feeling this uncanny sensation and not liking it one little bit.

  “Lahal!” called the stranger in greeting. He wore a beard, which I thought heavy for him, and mustaches which jutted arrogantly above his upper lip. He wore a rapier and a dagger, and his clothes were clean although poor and patched, the decent Vallian buff. He wore sandals, not boots.

  The effect of what I call his open and handsome features, as I have recounted it, was purely subjective. For he wore the usual Vallian hat with the wide brim and the two slots over the eyes. There were no feathers in the hat.

  “Lahal,” said Jiktar Exand, no doubt experiencing relief at this excuse not to talk further to the bully and rapier-rattler Handon.

  “I have business in the fortress,” said this young man.

  “Your name?”

  “I am called Zando—”

  Before he could speak further Kov Lykon burst in with anger trembling his voice.

  “We are talking about your dereliction of duty, Jiktar! Tell this scum to clear off before he is treated as his sort deserves.”

  Still I did not intervene. There are uses for lengths of rope if allowed to lie around.

  “But my business is pressing,” persisted Zando. His face, as I have indicated, lay mostly in the shadows of his hat and the beard concealed the rest; yet I clearly received the impression of a genuine smile. “I must speak with the Prince Majister.”

  “Ho!” said Exand. But he knew me and knew I would speak with anyone, given the correct procedures. “I think we have had enough of strangers seeking to speak to the Prince this day. Your business?” The last lashed out like a risslaca tongue.

  “That I am not at liberty to reveal to any living soul but the Prince. But I can give you messages for him that will—”

  “Enough!” Kov Lykon swaggered forward. His day had not been the best, for the Emperor had heeded my words on the Hamalian question and Lykon Crimahan still smarted. “Schtump, you cramph! Schtump before I have you flogged.”

  This young man Zando put his left hand to the pommel of his rapier. His back went up. Clearly he did not relish being thus addressed with schtump, which is a crude way of telling a fellow to take himself off, a w
ord meaning hurry.

  “I do not have the pleasure of your acquaintance,” he said. “But I assure you, sir, I do not take pleasure in being addressed in quite that way.”

  Lykon gave a half-snarl and swung to his toady Handon.

  “Unsheathe that blade of yours, Ortyg, and teach the cramph manners!”

  “With the greatest of pleasures, Kov.” Ortyg Handon stepped forward, sleek and feline like a leem, and drew his rapier and dagger with that slow languid grace of the professional Bladesman thirsting to draw blood.

  Even as Ortyg Handon stepped forward, clearly about to take the utmost pleasure in killing this young man, the rapier and main-gauche appeared in a twinkling in the fists of Zando. I saw that draw, and I sucked in my breath.

  “I cannot allow brawling here,” protested Jiktar Exand.

  Kov Lykon said, “Keep a still tongue in your head, rast. I shall deal with you later.”

  Kornan the Thief withdrew into the shadows, so near he almost touched me; his hoarse breathing rasped with his terror. If Exand wondered why I did not step forward, he knew enough about me to know I would never allow him to suffer unjustly at the hands of this popinjay from Vallia.

  Young Zando spoke softly. “I do not wish the blood of any man upon my blades. Put your sword up, Koter, and let me be about my business.”

  “I shall cut you up first, you who call yourself Zando, and then I shall spit you through like a side of vosk!”

  “I wish you all to witness that this is upon this man’s head.” Zando spoke firmly. Then, to Jiktar Exand, he said a few words that made the whole of Kregen spin about me, in a whirl of disbelief and impossibility:

  “I would take it as an honor if you, Jiktar, would inform the Prince Majister that one called Zando wishes to speak to him. Say to the Prince, this Dray Prescot, say to him that I am a messenger from a Krozair brother who needs his assistance at this moment. Remember that, Jiktar, a Krozair of Zy.”

  Chapter 6

  The mysterious Krozair

  I, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor and Krozair of Zy — I stood there like a loon. About to step forward, I saw the quick and deadly glitter of the rapiers and the daggers as they crossed and clashed. If I stepped forward now, I knew only too well what would happen. This young Zando would put up his blades and that kleesh of a Handon would spit him as he stood.

  So I stood, with all the wild surmises hurtling about my head. What an onker I am! I should never have allowed this to go so far. Fully prepared to stop it at that moment, I had been halted, stone cold halted, in my tracks by those few quietly spoken words.

  Only a few people of the most close relationship with me — Delia and Seg, Inch, Turko, and Korf Aighos, too, and some others who knew more than most about me here in the island empire of Vallia — knew that I was a Krozair of Zy. They did not fully comprehend what being a Krozair brother meant. Long and long had I yearned to return to the inner sea, the Eye of the World, far away on the western side of the continent of Turismond. But quite apart from the long months of sailing, quite apart from the awesome mountain ranges of the Stratemsk and that hideous crack to the very bowels of the planet exuding its noxious vapors, the Klackadrin, there had been no time in my desperate adventuring for any return to be possible.

  So how could a stranger come walking out of the night and talk about the Krozairs?

  It could not be.

  But he had said the words. And now he was hotly engaged with a noted Bravo fighter, a Bladesman who would laugh as he skewered home his final thrust.

  This Zando was not a Krozair. He had not used the words in speaking of those mystic and martial orders which would identify him as a Krozair and, if he wished, the order of which he was a brother and, further, if he so willed, the rank in that order he held. I was a mere Krozair; I was Pur Dray, not a Bold or any other of the adepts, yet to me, as you know, being a Krozair of Zy is the most important fact of my life on Kregen — apart from my Delia, my Delia of Delphond, my Delia of the Blue Mountains. I could only hold my passions and watch to see how quickly young Zando would dispose of this Handon.

  He was not a Krozair, those superb fighting men who use the Krozair longsword with such uncanny skill. His rapier work was smooth and businesslike, economical, with many touches about the art that reminded of my own style. I watched and, like any fighting man, I became absorbed with the art and the skill as the blades screeched and rang, touched and parted. The torches flared down and the stars shone, and She of the Veils was joined by the Maiden with the Many Smiles, so that a bright and fuzzy, pinkish golden moonslight glowed down and gave all the light needed for the death of a man.

  The fight was quick and deadly, very close. Handon began with cocksure swagger, confident that he had the measure of this youngster, for all his heavy beard. But soon Handon grew to understand that he faced a swordsman. The blades flung back the golden moonslight in drops of purest gold, and then those drops turned to drops of blood as Zando delicately sliced through Han-don’s guard and pierced his right wrist. The two daggers clashed and fell away, and Handon staggered back, cursing foully.

  I stepped forward.

  “Let this be a finish,” I said. “Jiktar Exand, take the Diproo Nimble-Fingered man away and see him rewarded by ten talens. I shall ask him again, later, so let him keep his eyes and ears open.” I turned to Handon. “You. Go up and have your wound attended to.” I half turned to glance at Kov Lykon. “I think you overreach yourself, Kov. I command here. Go back to the Emperor and ponder well what you nearly accomplished.”

  “I go, Prince, and I shall ponder well.”

  Well, it was just about all he could say without having me knock him down on the instant.

  Now I could speak to this Zando.

  But he was staring at me with a look of sickly surprise on his face. I looked into his eyes, liquidly gleaming below the wide brim of his hat, and I thought I saw fear lurking there. Fear? I thought I must have misread him. He was pallidly white now above the beard, below the shadow.

  “Dray Prescot!” he said. He breathed the words as though he did not believe them.

  I took his arm. He shuddered at the touch. I led him up the stairs along the wall of Esser Rarioch and through a small postern then, by flang-infested stairways — for this was a private way to which only a few of my intimates had the key — we went up into a small study. There I flopped him down into a chair and poured him wine. I poured him the best Jholaix. He sipped, but he was over his panic and he looked up at me over the brim.

  “You spoke of Krozairs,” I said. “Krozairs of Zy. Tell me, Zando, what is a Krozair? What is a Krozair to you?”

  “I bear a message from a Krozair brother. He is in some desperate straights. It is necessary, for the sake of your vows, that you supply him with arms, with money, with a voller.”

  I nodded. “All that I shall do, of course. But tell me of this Krozair brother—”

  “I may not do that, Prince.” He got the title out with a slight hesitation, as though playing a part. “It is an interdiction laid upon me. The Krozair said you would give me all I asked for, without questions.”

  “That is so,” I said. I felt certain that this could be no confidence trick on a gargantuan scale. No stranger could possibly know of the connection I had with the Krozairs. He could scarcely know of them, although that was a possibility.

  “So you will not tell me?”

  He was over that fraught reaction, I thought, to the fight. “I may not do that, Dray.”

  I looked up quickly.

  “That is — Dray Prescot, Prince Majister.”

  “Hum,” I said. “Very well. You wish the supplies tonight?”

  “As soon as is humanly possible.”

  I rang for Panshi and he slippered in, smiling, bringing with him a fresh bottle of Jholaix. I said, “Panshi, give this young man Zando all he requires. Do not stint.” I glanced over as Zando finished his glass at a gulp. He was one relieved mysterious visitor. “As to vollers, you ask a grea
t deal. We have a need for every voller we can lay out hands on.”

  We used the word voller, which is more generally heard in Havilfar, although coming more into use in Vallia.

  “I understand that. I may only ask of your goodness.”

  “Hum,” I said again. I detested the procrastinating word, but it served a purpose. I said to Panshi: “Have Hikdar Vangar ti Valkanium turn out a first-quality flier. The best we have. When he shouts that the order is impossible tell him I know he will shout and object, but that the order is so.”

  Panshi bowed, put the bottle down, and went out. A quiet, patient, knowing man, Panshi my chamberlain could organize a twenty-course banquet in the fiercest typhoon of the outer oceans, and bring on a theater production to follow.

  Zando laughed. He threw back his head and laughed. “You ask all the right questions and behave exactly as I knew you would. By Zair, Dray Prescot! I praise Opaz the day I met you—”

  “You swear by Zair,” I said somewhat sharply. “And you do well to thank Opaz for what I give you. You will leave something of my treasury to me?”

  “A thousand talens, I think, will suffice.”

  I took some pleasure in not allowing any expression to cross my ugly old face, and so pique him, I thought, by my lack of response. He merely chuckled.

  “And Dray Prescot, your iron self-control is also pleasing to me.”

  I knew he was mocking me, like so many of my friends, and so I said, still in that sharp voice, “When you are ready to take off let me know and—”

  “I shall, with your permission, take the money and the supplies and the voller and depart as soon as I may.” He stood up. “If you would have someone show me the way . . .?”

  He was a cool customer, all right. I had him seen to and then, on an impulse, I stretched out my hand to shake his, in the wrist-gripping way favored over most of Vallia. He hesitated. When at last he clasped hands I felt his arm trembling. Then he said, “Remberee, Dray Prescot. May Zair have you in his keeping.”