Past Imperative_The Great Game

by Dave Duncan

  D’ward’s scene came near the end. Eleal slipped out through the bushes to sit on the edge of the crowd and watch. The doomed Trastos, having defied the gods’ command to abdicate in favor of a democracy and then challenged the rebels to send forth a champion to meet him in single combat, had now learned that this champion would be his own son, Daltos Liberator. Trong proclaimed his despair in a long soliloquy, crumbling by stages to the grass. He ended lying prone, howling out the cue: “Gods, send me courage!”

  Golfren entered, wearing the golden loincloth that identified him as Tion. Even in Narsh, the audience had reacted a little to this dramatic confrontation. The Sussians sat in stony silence to hear what the god might say to rescue the evening from disaster.

  “I will send you courage!” Golfren announced, and began to play. Eleal heard a few angry whispers near her. Golfren, too, sensed the crowd’s displeasure, for he shortened his solo, raising the music swiftly to the rallying call that was D’ward’s cue.

  “I am Courage!” D’ward Scholar strode into the light of the fires, tall and lean, wearing an identical costume and holding a symbolic lantern high. How handsome he was! Surely every woman in the amphitheater must have felt her heart quicken at the sight of him! Surely every man would identify with his youthful bravado? The spectators gasped to see a god and one of his own aspects on stage together.

  Piol had written better poetry, Eleal thought, but she had never heard any of it better spoken, and in a fine Joalian accent, too:

  Courage alone is bone to shape our flesh.

  Without such spine of mettle, man remains

  Earthbound, a carrion worm perceiving death

  In every shiver of a grassy blade.

  Look up, look up! Behold the beck’ning stars!

  Spurn not the gods who loaned you life to be

  The wherewithal of deeds, not end itself.

  Affection, reputation, pride and joy

  Are but frail branches sprung from sturdy stem

  Of valor, which defies the storms of fate,

  Onslaught of age, the petty and the base,

  To raise a crown above the common line

  And stand one sunlit hour as mark and gauge

  Of what may sometimes be…

  And so on, in forty or fifty lines of rousing verse. It built to a satisfying climax with a local Sussian reference or two. All the time old Trong was recovering, rising with the poetry—to his knees, to one knee, until at the end he was erect and defiant, brandishing his sword at the stars and roaring out an echo of the final line, inspired to die bravely.

  The audience was on its feet also. The hollow rang with cheers. D’ward had to come out again and repeat the entire thing twice. Then he and Trong had to take a special bow, while the audience screamed hysterically and threw gold coins.

  Never had Eleal seen such a triumph! Later she limped around through the crowd with a bowl. Money clinked into it like rain until it became unpleasantly heavy. The others’ bowls were filling up as well. She saw smiling faces everywhere. There was a huge throng around D’ward—mostly women, she was annoyed to notice—and she hoped he was managing the conversation successfully. Probably none of it was very subtle. She could not even get close to him.

  Eventually she sidled up to Trong, to hear what was being said by all the admiring citizens clustered around him. Many of them were old friends she recognized from past years, who might have a kind word to say about her own debut. One of the others was an ancient priest from the temple, conspicuous in his splendid yellow robe. He seemed to be somebody special, for everyone was deferring to him.

  Then Klip came lounging by, empty-handed.

  “Here!” she said, thrusting the weighty bowl at him. “Some more loot!”

  Klip whistled as he took it. “You’ve done well, Eleal!”

  The old priest turned around. “Eleal? Is your name Eleal, my daughter?”

  She curtsied. “I am Eleal Singer, Your Holiness. You heard me earlier, in my role as the gods’ messenger. I have an onstage part in our other play where I—”

  He must have sharp ears to have overheard Klip. He had very sharp eyes, too. His hair was silver, his shaven, wizened face had a snowy texture. “And this remarkable young actor we witnessed this evening…D’ward?”

  “D’ward…Scholar, Your Holiness.” Staring into that needling gaze, she felt a sudden uneasiness. “He’s from Rinoovale.”

  “Is he, indeed?” The old man glanced around at his companions. “Excuse us a moment.” He laid a spidery hand on Eleal’s shoulder and urged her back a few paces, away from onlookers. He bent over, putting his face very close to hers, and he smiled in a grandfatherly sort of way. “There is an Eleal mentioned in the Filoby Testament. There is a D’ward mentioned there, too. What can you tell us about this strange coincidence, child?”

  Curtain

  57

  EDWARD WAS SCREWED—SCAMMERED, CORNED, FRIED, paralyzed, and plastered. Intoxicated, in other words. He had not been drinking. First there had been that explosion of adulation from the audience. Now he had been backed against a bush with worse thorns than a wait-a-bit by a gaggle of gabbling, animated women. Some of them were old enough to be his mother; some of them weren’t. Some of them couldn’t keep their hands off him; some of them weren’t. He wasn’t wearing much more than a lace doily and terrible things were starting to happen. “Thank you, thank you, that’s very kind of you, well, I’d love to, but…” They kept peppering him with invitations to parties, dinners, dances until his head spun—he thought he’d already accepted at least three for Thighday. And somewhere deep down inside, under all the fizz, if he could only have an instant to think about it, lurked the certainty that he’d made an epochal blunder.

  Rescue arrived in the shape of old Trong, who came barging into the melee, thundering apologies while parting the crowd like a charging bull. Assisting him was Ambria. Behind them came a bent, elderly man in sumptuous gold vestments. The admirers fell back.

  “Here he is, Your Holiness!” Ambria declaimed. “D’ward Scholar. D’ward, we are greatly honored by the presence here tonight of the Holy Kirthien Archpriest.” Ambria was never serene, but she seemed more genuinely agitated now than he had ever seen her—why?

  Having no idea how to greet a senior clergyman in Sussland, Edward merely bowed low. When he straightened up and saw the razor glint of mind in the age-ravaged face, his head cleared with a rush. Epochal blunder! And there was Eleal, at the old man’s side. She was so flushed that her face looked fevered in the firelight; she was hopping up and down on the grass, up and down, up and down…Worse than epochal?

  A word from the Archpriest worked wonders. Trong and Ambria shepherded the spectators back, aided by a couple of younger, lesser clerics. Edward was left alone with Kirthien Archpriest and Eleal. Sweat dried cold all over him.

  “D’ward Scholar?” the old man murmured. “That is, of course, merely your stage name?” His withered lips wore a smile, but his eyes were as deadly as snakes’.

  “It is, er, Your Holiness. I have reasons for not divulging my identity.” He took another glance at the effervescing Eleal and knew that she had blown the gaff. She was precocious, but she would be no match for that sly Kirthien.

  The priest chuckled softly. “Your performance tonight was a revelation to us, my son.”

  “Er, thank you, Your Holiness.” Oh, damn! damn! damn! Why had he ever been such an idiot?

  “Such virtuosity can only be a blessing from the Lord of Art.” Kirthien was playing with his prey. “It behooves you to give thanks to him in person, my son. You have visited his temple recently?”

  Edward stammered. “I do intend to go there…come…very shortly. Tomorrow, or…Soon…Thighday?”

  “You will be welcome to ride back with us in our carriage—now.”

  That was an order.

  “Er…” />
  “Oh, yes, D’ward!” Eleal cried, clutching at his hand. “You must come and give thanks to Tion and he will cure my leg!”

  “What?”

  “His Holiness says so!” She was beside herself with excitement and hope, terrified that he would not cooperate.

  Kirthien tut-tutted. “Now, child! I made no promises! I merely said that I thought there was an excellent chance that the noble god would look with favor upon you for your assistance to the Liberator.”

  “Please, D’ward! Please? Oh, please!”

  “I must change just a minute excuse me I will be back directly…” Edward ran.

  He dodged past more of his starry-eyed admirers and hurried along the path to the shack that served as the men’s dressing room, as fast as he dared go in bare feet.

  Why had he been such a muggins? He should never have taken part in the play. It had felt like a way of repaying the troupe’s kindness to him, even good camouflage, making him seem like one of them. He had not intended to create a sensation. The audience’s enthusiasm had struck him in a tidal wave and swept him away. A rank novice had upstaged Trong Impresario, an old trouper with considerable talent and more than thirty years’ experience—but only because that novice had the charisma of a stranger. Did the old priest know of that vital distinction, or had he merely made a shrewd guess? It didn’t matter now, because he had obviously extracted the truth from Eleal.

  Was Tion Robin or the Sheriff of Nottingham? Did he play for the Service or the Chamber? Edward was about to find out. If he did not submit to the archpriest’s orders, then the old man could summon all those efficient-looking gold-plated guardsmen. Suss was too small a town to hide in. There were only four passes out of the vale. The population was fiercely loyal to its patron god and would not harbor a fugitive. All in all, the chances of escaping from Tion now were nonexistent, even without allowing for the workings of magic. The astonishing thing, really, was that Edward had evaded detection for so long.

  He reached the shack. He should have brought a lantern. A three-quarter Trumb lit the sky, but the trees were casting heavy shadows.

  As he threw open the door to the black interior, someone spoke behind him: “By George, you really let the bally cat out of the bag, didn’t you?”

  The voice was unfamiliar, but the words were in English.

  He spun around, stubbed his toe on a rock, and almost fell into a bush.

  “Who?…”

  There were two of them. One was a youth of his own age, or perhaps slightly younger. He was slim, golden-haired, and wearing even less than he was—wearing, in fact, nothing but an inexplicably self-assured smile.

  It was the woman who had spoken, though. She was tall by Sussian standards, and her smock revealed thin arms and bony shoulders. He could make out almost nothing of her face.

  “Monica Mason,” she said. “Delighted to make your acquaintance, Mr. Scholar. May I have your autograph? I suspect it will shortly acquire rarity value.”

  He resisted a mad impulse to fall on his knees and kiss her feet. He found his voice somewhere. “Delighted to meet you, also, ma’am. You are with the Service, I presume?”

  “Of course. I am usually known as Onica, by the way. What the hell were you doing, making an exhibition of yourself like that?”

  “It was indiscreet.”

  “Indiscreet? Indiscreet, the man says!” She moved closer, and the moonlight gleamed on a hard, mannish face, framed by longish dark hair, hanging loose. She was wearing the standard local smock as if it were a coronation gown. “There are reapers in town, you dunderhead! Even if there weren’t any in the audience, they’re going to hear about you soon enough. And if they don’t, then Tion will!”

  “Tion already has! I mean his high priest or someone did. He knows who I am. He wants me to go back to the temple with him.”

  She snorted. “I came here to rescue you, not bury you. That is, if you want rescuing?”

  “Want? Of course I do! Creighton was killed by—”

  “I heard! The dragon trader told us. Well, if you want to come with me, then you’d better get some clothes on. Running around in that getup isn’t going to help. You look like a bloody cherub sprouted in a dark cupboard.”

  Clothes…He pulled his wits together, stifling a swarm of questions buzzing around in his head. He turned to the blackness of the shed. “I need a lantern.”

  “Never mind! Even a pinafore would be better than that. Grab whatever you can. Move!”

  She shoved him. He stepped into the dark and promptly stubbed his toe on a stool. The youth came in after him and raised a hand. Instantly a faint glow illuminated the plank walls, the rough benches strewn with clothes, the footwear lying around the floor.

  He dived for his smock and sandals. “Gosh! Is this mana?”

  The boy just smiled.

  Edward repeated the question in Joalian, but still received no answer. Pulling his smock over his head, he went out. “Where are we going?” Home, Home!

  Mason was a rangy black shape against the moonlight. “Anywhere we can, I suppose. Zath has his dogs loose, and as soon as that priest gets word back to the temple…He can probably notify Tion directly from here, actually. He’s not on a node, but it’s not far. He’s bound to have some ritual or other.”

  Edward fumbled into his sandals. There was nothing else he needed. Naked he had come into this world; he had acquired no possessions yet. The woman turned and he began to follow…Then he remembered Eleal. His mouth went dry and his heart froze in his chest.

  “Wait! What happens if I go to the temple?”

  She stopped and looked around. “Can’t say. Tion may turn you over to Zath. You’re not serious?”

  “The girl, Eleal. She saved my life! She stayed and nursed me when I was ill, although she knew the reapers were hunting me.”

  “You don’t…What of it?”

  “She’s a cripple. The priest says that Tion will cure her limp.”

  Mason snorted again, a very unladylike noise. “And you have a huge honorable schoolboy lump of guilt, I suppose? Well, it’s your neck. I’m leaving, and leaving pronto, because I value my skin. One reaper I might just be able to handle, if I saw him in time. Several reapers I can’t, and God knows I wouldn’t have a hope against Tion.” She did not move, though.

  Oh, hell! He clenched his fists in agony. “Would Tion cure her? I know he can. Would he?”

  “Impossible to say. He’s mad as a hatter. They all are. A few hundred years of omnipotence boils up their brains.”

  “He’s one of the Chamber?”

  She shrugged. “Probably not, and he can’t be very happy having Zath’s killers all over his manor.” She frowned. “Tion fancies himself as a collector of beauty—pretty girls, pretty boys. He has unorthodox tastes in what he does with them. You would most likely find yourself in the temple guard, I’d think. He favors that role for tall young men.”

  “My preferences wouldn’t matter, of course?”

  “Not in the slightest. He’s quite capable of turning you into a woman, if that takes his fancy, but he can do whatever he likes with you. You’ll probably enjoy it, although I can’t guarantee that, even. He’s better than some, but I shouldn’t want him as a friend.”

  Judging by her companion, who wandered around so shamefully in the altogether, she had liberal tastes in friendship.

  “But Eleal saved my life!”

  Mason tapped her foot on the path. “Make up your mind. Tion may very well appoint you a god, you know. That’s what’s prophesied. Whether that comes after the hanky-panky or instead of, I don’t know.”

  “Make me a god?”

  “There is no god of courage—hasn’t been for a couple of hundred years. Gunuu was one of Tion’s but he switched allegiance. You must know about the Testament by now, surely?”

  “I haven’t read
it. What does it say?”

  He could hear voices. Someone was coming, probably looking for him. The woman had heard them also. She glanced around as she spoke. “D’ward shall become Tion. He shall give heart to the king and win the hearts of the people. D’ward shall become Courage. That’s it. Come on, laddie! Time to go.”

  Eleal! Blasted, meddling Eleal! Giving him the part of Gunuu had been all her idea. She had arranged the whole debacle. She must have found that passage in the copy of the Testament they had left back in Ruatvil. That was how the old priest had guessed. But…

  “I fulfilled that prophecy tonight, in the play!” Bless you, Eleal!

  Mason uttered a harsh bark of laughter. “Damn my eyes! I suppose you did. Actually, that’s quite a relief, old man. We were worried about that one. Good show.” She took a couple of steps and then looked back. “Are you coming or not?”

  Time! He needed time to think. He turned to the youth, who merely shrugged, seeming amused but not about to offer any helpful suggestions. He had not spoken a word so far.

  “Good luck in your new career, whatever it is,” Monica Mason said. “Give my love to Zath, or Tion, whichever gets you first.” She disappeared into the shrubbery. The youth went with her.

  “Eleal saved my life!” Edward wiped his forehead. With a crippled leg, she could never have the stage career she craved, could never enter Tion’s Festival. She had braved the deadly reapers to stay and nurse him through his fever. He had always thought that honor enabled a man to choose between good and evil. He had never seriously considered that a decision might lie between two evils. Be a god? Be plaything to an omnipotent pervert?

  That damnable Gypsy witch, Mrs. Boswell, had defined the conflict exactly: You must choose between honor and friendship. You must desert a friend to whom you owe your life, or betray everything you hold sacred.