Swordships of Scorpio [Dray Prescot #4]

by Alan Burt Akers

  “One day, perhaps, the Phokaym will go away and leave us in peace,” said Ooloo. It was pathetically transparent that she did not believe this would ever happen.

  By continuous perseverance I discovered I could move my fingers a little within the constriction of the blood-red strands. I kept working away, pushing and pulling one muscle against the next in well-remembered drill, seeking to keep them flexible and the blood coursing through my body. If I was to escape I could not have the agony of blood returning to circulation slowing me down.

  I was working on my upper arms when the Phokaym amid a loud noise of clashing weapons and scaled armor came for me.

  “The voryasen!” whispered old Ooloo. As I was dragged out with a great shouting and much buffeting I heard her say, “Jikai, Jikai,” and I thought she sobbed.

  We warriors always felt a trifle contemptuous of Ochs with their little round shields when it came to combat; but I think I can trace my emergence of a better feeling for them from that encounter with old Ooloo there in the fetid caves of the Phokaym.

  Clouds drifted across the sky and She of the Veils, the fourth moon, shone more fitfully even than usual, while the first moon, almost twice the size of our own moon, the Maiden with the Many Smiles, was already setting far across the Owlarh Waste.

  The collection of food and the production of tools and utensils were the primary concerns of the crushed-down people, both men and half-men, under the despotic rule of the Phokaym.

  Tonight was to be a spectacle night, an occasion when the risslaca Phokaym emphasized their absolute power. A man was to be tossed to the voryasen. Consequently, so I gathered, more torches than usual were lit, painfully gathered by the slaves from the waste, twisted and gnarled branches they had so painfully gathered set alight gleefully by the Phokaym to illuminate their celebrations.

  I saw stone jugs passing from claw to claw as the Phokaym gathered. Their scales glittered in the torchlight. It was difficult to distinguish just what was armor and what was their own scaly hide. I was dragged toward the stone lip of a great pit. Above the pit an arrangement of wooden supports lashed together projected, like the boom of a crane. The Phokaym crowded toward this pit. I was hoisted upside down and my lashed ankles were fastened by a rope painstakingly woven from dry stems. Torchlight glared upon the scene, ruddy and orange, streaming light and driving weird shadows cavorting among the rocks and the stunted bushes.

  Up I swung, twisting and turning, upside down, hanging from the rope. The boom moved and turned and I was carried out over the pit. I looked down.

  A voryas is a form of risslaca one might imagine in nightmare, part crocodile, part tylosaurus, a giant fang-filled mouth, all jaw and muscle, and an agile scaly body and bludgeoning tail, that one would do well never to imagine, even in nightmare, let alone care to encounter.

  Bound and helpless, with all my weapons about me and unable to use them, I swung upside down above a water-filled pit crawling with the saurian horrors.

  They lifted from the surface of the water, hissing and spitting, their jaws wedges of fangs, their eyes red and wicked and glaring upon me with voracious intent.

  The Phokaym had fun.

  They kept paying out the rope and lowering me down toward the surface of the water so that the voryasen would leap up at me, giant scaled forms gleaming dully emerald and amber, surging upward to fall back, baffled, hissing their rage, as the rope was hastily hauled in.

  Up and down I went, and the voryasen leaped and hissed, and the world turned scarlet from the thrum of blood in my head and my eyes threatened to start from their sockets, and my body grew numb.

  By a stupendous effort I managed to jackknife my body and look upward. A Phokaym, his teeth glinting as carnivorously as any voryas in the pit below, held out a blazing torch. He was touching the fizzing and sputtering torch to the rope holding my bound body above the pit.

  Furiously I struggled with the blood-red cords, but they would not yield.

  If I could swing, I could reach the timber support of the boom from which I hung suspended. The smells, the shrieks, the whole cacophony of noises spurted up to rumble and roil in my head. I was helpless. Below me the carnivorous water-predators saw the flame of the torch and their hissing redoubled.

  They knew what would happen when the torch burned through the rope.

  They knew!

  I was sweating now; everything whirled about me. One crunch of those gigantic fanged jaws below and I would be cut into two bloody halves.

  There could be no last-minute rescue. There was no one within a hundred dwaburs who could aid me now—no one anywhere on this wild and savage world of Kregen.

  The pit yawned beneath my dangling head. Torchlight splintered back from the scales and the eyes of the voryasen below. Now their hissing bounced back in magnified echoes from the pit walls. I craned up again—the rope was burning!

  I could see the frayed and blackened strands parting, one by one, curling out like spent matches.

  The torchlight burned into my eyes.

  The shrieking and yelling of the Phokaym deafened me.

  I swung...

  My mouth was wide open, but I was not yelling.

  This might be the end of it all, of all the high dreams I had had, here on Kregen, of winning my princess and of taking her to my palace and estates in Zenicce, of once more riding with my loyal clansmen across the great plains of Segesthes...

  I swung...

  The world dizzied before my swimming eyes. Smoke and flame mingled and blinded me.

  But I could see the fire of burning rope, see the strands parting, see the evil flickering flame gnawing through the only thing that supported me above the fangs and jaws of those merciless risslacas below...

  I saw—I saw the last strand burn, the rope part and break and then I yelled—

  * * * *

  At this point the tapes from Africa end.

  The following narrative picks up the story later on in Prescot's life on Kregen. It begins in the middle of a sentence.

  The end of the last cassette came with a noise—a sound—of such unimaginable ferocity as to chill me to the heart when I first heard it, and which I hesitate to play over again. After that the tape spins emptily through the heads. Whatever it was that made that frightful sound, I have grave doubts that even the African jungle harbors its creator.

  The beginning of the fresh cassette is garbled and there is some confused noise as of laughter and—I guess—the popping of champagne corks. This, as I think you who have followed the saga of Prescot this far will agree, is well in keeping.

  The writer who has been giving me invaluable assistance in editing these tapes, a distinguished author with an international reputation, when he heard this portion observed, with what I took to be wry admiration: “Dray Prescot has successfully pulled off one of the oldest classical clichés in the book."

  “Of course,” I told him. “That's Dray Prescot's style."

  I do wonder, though, if we will ever be privileged to hear what failed to record at the beginning of this tape. Just how did Dray Prescot do it? Those of you who have followed his saga so far will have no doubts whatsoever that he could do it...

  And, there is the yellow fang of the Phokaym Prescot gave to Pando to act as a clue...

  Alan Burt Akers

  * * * *

  ...bringing me up out of the light doze into which I had fallen and this time louder and more urgent. I opened my eyes and cursed and stretched out a hand across the wide rumpled bed where the fused jade and ruby light from the twin suns threw a miniature landscape of mountain and valley. The light glinted back from the hilt of my rapier as I took it up into my fists. Again the scream knifed up the narrow black-wood stairs of The Red Leem. I cursed, and groaned, for my legs were still rubbery and my head throbbed as though an impiter smote me with his coal-black wings.

  “What in the name of Makki-Grodno's diseased armpit is going on?” I yelled.

  By the time the third scream ripped o
ut I recognized Tilda's voice. I staggered a little, and gripped onto the bedpost. The wooden floor with its scattered rugs of bright Walfarg weave swayed under me like the deck of a frigate blockading Brest. I shook my head. I had my old scarlet breechclout wrapped around my middle and my rapier in my fist. Hastily I snatched up the main-gauche and started for the door.

  The door burst open and young Pando appeared, his hair wild, his eyes reflecting more of the red light than the green, his whole body animated with anger and furious defiance. He shouted at me, his words tumbling over one another, a little dagger in his fist that shook with his passion.

  “The Pandrite-forsaken devils!” He danced up and down. “They're insulting Mother—Dray! Come on! You've got to help!"

  “I'm coming, Pando.” I set straight for the door and bounced from the jamb. Pando grabbed my arm and steered me through the doorway. “You'd best not stick ‘em with that toothpick, Pando,” I said. “You'll only upset them."

  “I'll degut ‘em all!” he shrilled. He was only nine years old, as I had to remind myself, and he thought everything in life was black and white.

  Then, as though commenting on my thoughts about him, he gave me a kick to help me on my way. I wobbled toward the black-wood stairs, twisted, my feet shot from under me on one of the Walfarg rugs, and down the stairs I went, bump, bump, bump, to the bottom. The bottom hit me hard.

  Through the arched opening into the main room of the inn I could see the counter with its ranked amphorae, its trim rows of sparkling glass cups, the covers over the food, everything neat and tidy and waiting for evening when the men and women of Pa Mejab would crowd in for their evening's entertainment.

  The chief source of their entertainment was now struggling in the grip of three men. They were ruffians, all right, intent on their prey. As I stood up, smarting, and stared blearily at them I fancied they were leem-hunters, men from the back hills away to the west and probably men who would venture almost to the Klackadrin itself. They wore clothes made from leem pelts, and broad leather harness, with swaggering rapiers and daggers and large riding boots and all seeming to me to be very powerful and blurry.

  I blinked.

  Tilda's blouse had ripped down over one shoulder and then the other, and the men laughed.

  “Let go, you stinking cramphs!” Tilda was yelling. Her long mane of black hair floated freely from her head, swirling out, in truth, very much like the wings of an impiter. She got one arm free and slapped a leem-hunter across his leathery, whiskered cheeks, whereat he roared with laughter, and, catching that arm, bent it back and drew his face close to Tilda's.

  “You won't dance for us, ma faril, when we ask all politely, so you'll dance to another tune now."

  “Wait until we open our doors, rast!"

  “Hold on!” shouted another of the men, too late, for Tilda's naked toes slammed into him. He doubled up, clutching himself, and rolled away, both laughing and retching.

  Yes, they were ruffians, all right. In from the country and wanting their fun. Pando ran past me, straight up to them, and struck wildly with the dagger at the man gripping his mother.

  “Pando!” I yelled, alarmed.

  The man back-handed Pando off. He staggered back, cannoned into a table, went over spilling the vase of moon-flowers onto the floor. The man roared his good humor. About to bend again to Tilda he caught sight of me, in the doorway, the rapier and main-gauche in my fists.

  He straightened up and threw Tilda into the arms of the third man, who grabbed her—most familiarly, I thought—whereat she squealed and tried both to kick and bite him.

  “So what have we here, by the gross Armipand himself!"

  He ripped his rapier from its sheath, and the dagger followed as quickly. The man Tilda had kicked hauled himself up, turning to face me, his features still twisted and the tears still in his eyes. For a moment the tableau held in the main room of The Red Leem. I was conscious of the stupidity of all this. My head rang as though a swifter's oars were beating my skull all the way along the hull of a two-hundred-and-tenswifter.

  “You had best release the lady,” I said with some difficulty.

  They guffawed.

  “A tavern wench a lady! Haw, haw!"

  I shook my head in negation—and that was a mistake. All the bells of Beng-Kishi clanged resonantly inside my skull.

  “She is not a tavern wench. She is Tilda, the famous entertainer, a dancer and actress. She is,” I added with words more like myself, “not for scum of the likes of you."

  “Ho! A ruffler!” The leader of the leem-hunters abruptly threw himself into the posture of the fighting-man. “A swagger with a rapier and dagger! Come on, little man, let us see you back your words with your sword point."

  When I say my legs felt like rubber, it would be more correct to say I could hardly feel them at all, and my knees seemed like mashed banana. I took a step forward, and my rapier point described trembling circles.

  The three men laughed hugely.

  “Serve him as you served the landlord, Gorlan!"

  Portly Nath, the landlord, lay huddled beyond an overturned table. All I could see of him were his legs and feet in their satin slippers, and his balding head, the face turned away from me, and a small trickle of blood. He was not dead, for he moaned; but he had been struck a shrewd blow.

  “I am not a fat old innkeeper,” I said.

  “Then I will open your tripes and find out!” said this Gorlan, flickering his blade very swiftly before me.

  He lunged.

  My dagger seemed—of its own volition and without any conscious effort of my muscles—to do as it pleased. It sliced up, deflected the rapier blade in a screech of metal, and so drove Gorlan back, with a spring, his face abruptly blackening with thwarted anger.

  “You miserable cramph!” he bellowed.

  He drove in again, powerfully, overbearing me by sheer weight and ferocity. My twin blades beat him off. The metal slithered and clanged, sliding and twisting with many cunning tricks and turns. He scored a long slicing cut across my left arm and then my rapier point pressed into his throat and his dagger flew spinning across the inn. I did not hear it land.

  “Oh, Gorlan,” I said, rather thickly and with the world jumping and dancing with purple spots and streaks of white fire. “Oh pitiful little Gorlan!"

  His face blanched. It was a very wonderful sight to see that swarthy visage drain of blood, the eyes glare in terror upon me, the lips go suddenly dry.

  “Dray!” screeched Tilda.

  I swiveled to my right, taking the rapier around ninety degrees and showing its point to the man Tilda had kicked and who was now rushing upon me with drawn sword. My left hand gripping the main-gauche swung around with my movement and my fist smashed sloggingly into Gorlan's jaw. He dropped like a sack.

  The second man hauled up, his rapier engaging mine, and for a short space we circled. With an oath the man grasping Tilda flung her from him, drew his own weapons, and charged in upon me at the side of his companion. The difficulty of focusing nearly betrayed me; I did not want to kill these two, as I knew they would not wish to kill me. This was a tavern brawl over a woman—as far as they were concerned a tavern wench—and they knew the arm of the law of Pandahem stretched here to Pa Mejab. As for me, the same strictures obtained. That Tilda was in very truth a famous actress, here in this colonial port city of Pandahem only because she had married for love, and her soldier husband had been killed here, leaving her stranded with her nine-year-old son Pando, meant nothing to them, although it meant a great deal to me.

  So I engaged, and parried, and feinted, and took their blades upon my dagger, and thrust in the attempt to disable them. And all the time the world pressed roaring and swirling in upon me, my sight dimmed. I felt my banana knees bucking, and their onslaughts grew stronger and stronger as I grew weaker.

  By a desperate piece of sheer outrageous Spanish-style two-handed fencing that would have had my old master, the cunning Spaniard, Don Hurtado de Oquendo, foamin
g with outraged professionalism, I managed to disarm the second man and send him reeling back with blood spurting from a pierced bicep.

  But the other fellow bored in and my sluggish legs wouldn't drag me around in time to meet his attack.

  Then—like an avenging angel—Tilda rose up at his back and, two-handed, brought down a jug of purple wine upon his head.

  He grunted and lurched forward and his rapier skewered the floorboards as he smashed on past, the blade vibrating backward and forward and the hilt seesawing like an upside down metronome.

  As though hypnotized by that rhythmic motion I went to my knees, toppled slowly forward, and so came to rest beside the leem-hunter—and all of Kregen fell on me in blackness.

  * * *

  CHAPTER FIVE

  A zhantil-skin tunic for Pando

  Tilda would not tell anyone—not even me—any other name by which she might be known in Pandahem. Tilda was her professional name, her stage name, and by it she had become famous. What personal tragedy lay as the cause of her moldering, as I termed it, here in a distant colonial port city she also would not reveal. I gathered this had something to do with her husband, and of him all she would say was that he had married her against the wishes of his family. As a soldier he had been posted to Pa Mejab and, leading his squadron one day, had been slain.

  She was fanatically proud and possessive of Pando, who was, as you have seen, an engaging imp of a rascal. She fretted continually over his safety and welfare, constantly chiding him for not wearing enough clothes, for not eating enough, for fighting the other children thronging the busy streets. But, in all this, she never lost sight with a clearheaded practicality that Pando was the son of a soldier, that she must look to him one day, and that he must develop as a man.

  I confess that I grew to a better liking for both of them with each day that passed. My room at The Red Leem had always a vase of colorful flowers, and the sheets and sleeping furs were changed with hygienic regularity. Old Nath, the landlord, recovered of the knock on the head, consented to allowing me a reduced rent when I went on the guard duties by which, perforce, I earned my daily crust. He was only too well aware of the business Tilda brought into his inn. In the evening when she sang and danced, when she gave recitals of the great parts in Kregen drama, tragediennes and comediennes, performances so moving in both cases that they brought tears to the eyes of her audiences, rapt in silent admiration, Pando and I would sit companionably together and listen.