by Duncan, Dave
“Not a bad thing?” Talitha exclaimed. “He’s planning to depose me and you say that’s not a bad thing?”
Rigel explained. “He’s planning to bell the cat.”
“What cat?”
“To attack Vildiar, I mean. He hopes to muster an army of starfolk to back him up, so he must have worked out some way around the guilt curse, although even Fomalhaut doesn’t know what that can be. Dad?”
Wasat shook his head. “No idea, lad…Wait!” He frowned, all hideous wrinkles. “There is a record from ancient times, back before the Dark Cells were invented, likely…As I recall, a group of starborn tried to put a powerful mage to death. They used poisoned throwing darts, designed so that it would take at least two hits to kill. They hoped that when their victim died after taking six or seven hits from a dozen or so darts, the guilt would be so equally divided among them that no one could know which ones did the deed.”
Talitha made a vulgar, un-queenly noise. “Did it work?”
“No, my lady. They all died. I think more of them died than actually managed to hit their victim, so even the intent to harm was enough to create a fatal dose of guilt.”
Rigel said, “I hope Kurhah has a better idea. The guilt curse works both ways, of course: they can’t kill Vildiar and he can’t kill them. Fomalhaut thinks they may try to overpower him and strip him of his amulets. That would cause Hadar and his pack to intervene, of course, but Kurhah could be counting on the fact that they, at least, could be killed without activating the guilt curse. Without his goons, Vildiar will be helpless.”
Talitha said, “Hah!”
“I agree. I think Hadar and company will make rat bait out of them. Kurhah himself is fiery enough, but the rest are good musicians and dancers. Unless the old boy has something tremendous up his sleeve, it will be a massacre.”
“I still don’t see this as anything but a bad thing,” Talitha said firmly. “An extremely bad thing! We must stop it.” She was a very typical elf, nauseated by talk of violence.
“But if you were to help?” Rigel persisted.
“Help? He wants to depose me and you say I should help him?”
“Yes, I do. If you stand back and let them all be killed, you’ll look weak and uncaring. If you stay out of it and yet they win, then you’ll certainly be deposed. You have to lend your support and hope to share in the glory. That way, even if Kurhah fails, you will at least have tried.”
She sulked for a moment, then asked warily, “Help how?”
“Send along a troop of centaurs, a couple prides of sphinxes, and some griffins. They’ll smash Hadar and his gang. Bellatrix has been wanting to do it for years, but of course she wouldn’t have a chance against Vildiar. With a Naos and a couple dozen starfolk to take care of him, she’ll kick his halflings’ teeth in easily.”
Talitha shied away from both him and the idea. “Rigel! I am sworn to uphold the laws and the queen’s peace. What you’re proposing is civil war.”
He played what he hoped was his trump card. “Not if we go in with a warrant for Vildiar’s arrest!”
Unexpectedly, she flared up in a sudden rage. “Oh, it’s ‘we’ now, is it? You are not going to Phegda, you hear? I absolutely forbid you to go to Phegda, today, tomorrow, or at any time in the next century.”
“But—”
“No buts. That is final.”
This he had not foreseen. Never let the boss fall in love with you! They all understood that Vildiar, if he could kidnap Izar again, could then coerce the queen into giving up the throne to him. Now the same was true of Rigel. More so, perhaps. Even Vildiar might hesitate to harm his own son, if only because of the public disgust it would create, but he would take great pleasure in sending Talitha some pieces of Rigel to reinforce his demands. And Talitha would yield to save her lover.
Before he could say more, she spoke even more forcefully. “Besides, I cannot issue a warrant for Vildiar’s arrest. A Naos can only be tried after a charge has been sworn on the Star. Vildiar himself said so in court last month and the counselor agreed. We have no proof that he has done anything wrong, so no one can make that charge.”
She was wrong, of course, but only Rigel had seen the correct answer. Even Pleione, who was the Starlands equivalent of a lawyer and had done his research for him, had argued for about an hour before agreeing that what he proposed was legal and would work. Talitha would very likely take longer to convince, and he had no time to waste.
“Fine,” he said. “I won’t go, I promise. That doesn’t matter! You say you don’t want a civil war? Well, Kurhah is going to start one very shortly. But if you give him a warrant to deliver, he’ll be acting legally as your agent, which means that the Vildiar goons will be in rebellion if they resist. Vildiar will be in the wrong! And then we’ve got him!”
“A warrant on what grounds?” Talitha asked, pouting more sourly than ever.
Rigel shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. The charge can be completely trivial. If he refuses it, he’s in rebellion.”
“And if he doesn’t? If he turns up in court? He’ll make fools of us all again.”
“Oh no, he won’t! This time we’ll be ready for him. Oh, darling! How many times over the last month have you told me you love me? How many times have you shown me how much you love me?”
She blushed furiously, because Wasat was listening. “That has nothing to do with—”
“Yes, it does! If you love me, how can you not trust me? Now trust me! Kurhah is presently wining and dining his guests, softening them up. At the end of the meal, he’ll launch his rebellion. I haven’t got time to explain, so you will have to trust me.”
She glowered at him. Even when Talitha knew she was beaten, she would never admit it. “You are not going to Phegda!”
Chapter 23
Kitalphar banked steeply over Alathfar. Rigel, fingers knotted in the ridge of hair along her back, was astonished by the extent of the valley and its battlements of mountains. Kurhah had to be an exceptionally powerful mage to have imagined a domain on such an impressive scale. Far below him a herd of large animals was grazing. He failed to appreciate their size until he noticed the familiar stone tower blind, which was a tiny dot next to their massive bodies. He was fairly sure that elephants did not eat grass, but rhinos? Hippos? Or were these mythical monsters?
As the hippogriff sailed lower, the mudling village came into view, set among taro paddies and fenced pastures. Beyond it, nestled in several clearings in the forest, lay the sprawling buildings of the station, covering much more ground than he had realized on his previous visit, with livestock corrals and the inevitable swimming pond, which in this case was a small lake. At the moment, a dozen or so air cars of various sorts were parked near the main house and at least as many watercraft were moored in the lake, which also contained two gigantic passenger swans. There were four hippogriffs and a pegasus in the paddocks, and an even larger group of air cars off in the trees, probably transport for the cooks and waiters who were catering the banquet.
The meeting was still in progress, and soon he saw the guests themselves, dining outdoors at white-draped tables tended by many servants. No doubt his approach would have been noted already, but he could not be recognized at such a height. At a quick count, he estimated about fifty starfolk, more than he had initially thought.
“As near the front door of the main building as you can, please,” he told his mount.
Kitalphar turned steeply and whirled him down in a dizzying helix. By then sunlight flashing off Meissa would have given him away, for no one but the marshal of Canopus strutted around in a bronze helmet. He hoped that Kurhah would grant him a hearing before blasting him out of the sky, but even magic might fail to hit a moving target moving at that speed. The hippogriff set down gracefully right at the base of the veranda steps.
He slipped off, his head still spinning, and bowed to her. “I am much in your debt for this favor, great one. I am on very urgent business for Her Majesty. I humbly beg you to wait here fo
r a few minutes, until I see if I am made welcome.”
To his relief, Kitalphar dipped her ferocious head in acknowledgment. Rigel turned to the steps and discovered his host standing at the top of them, fists on hips, glaring at him.
“I promised you no safe conduct, mongrel.”
Rigel raised his right hand to show the silver bracelet on his wrist. “I brought my own, my lord. But I come in peace.” He climbed up three steps, and halted one step lower than Kurhah.
“What do you want?”
“I came to help.”
The opalescent eyes narrowed. The old man had not expected that, or perhaps he just did not want it. “Help how? Did she send you?”
Diners at the tables behind Rigel were watching, whispering like bees.
“Are you still being observed?”
Kurhah glanced at his left hand. “Yes.”
“That is Phegda’s doing. My friends were, but agreed to stop seancing when I arrived here.” Achird had agreed; Fomalhaut might have overruled him, but it was safe to assume that Hadar, with his hundreds of helpers, was keeping Naos Kurhah under surveillance. He had probably been doing so ever since the old man’s reappearance.
“Am I supposed to be frightened of Vildiar’s dogs?” the mage barked. “I am not, nor am I frightened of you, boy, not even when you threaten me with your Lesath. It is time somebody restored order and respect for the law to the Starlands, and since that slip of a girl is clearly not up to the task, I shall do it myself, with the assistance of some of the noble lords and ladies gathered here today. You are neither wanted nor required, and you may depart.”
Rigel stood almost two meters tall on his bare feet, but Kurhah, like most male starfolk, was handily taller. He was also perched one elfin step up, thirty centimeters higher, and yet somehow he seemed small. By earthly standards he would be a very well-preserved forty, likely a retired basketball player, and he had no wrinkles or age spots to betray his many centuries. His voice was strong and steady, but the way he used it gave him away. His words—and probably his thinking—were those of a testy, cantankerous old man, rooted in ancient ways.
Rigel said, “Hadar and the rest of that pack have murdered three dozen Naos, several of them trained mages, my lord. Were all their victims blind fools? No one except me has ever killed any of them.” That was not strictly true, because Izar’s Lesaths, first Turais and now Edasich, had slain more than he had, but it was true in terms of personal combat. “Will you not at least listen to the advice I bring, and hear the support that Her Majesty offers?”
“I will give you five minutes, no more.” The Naos turned and stalked indoors. Rigel hurried after him. They crossed the big room, and strode along the corridor to the kitchen area, where mudling servants hastily stepped out of their way. Kurhah turned into a tiny storeroom, hardly more than a closet, its walls lined by high shelves. Rigel followed, pulling the door shut behind him. In a faint light from a ventilator grill, he was nose-to-neck with the elf.
The Saiph bracelet was quivering faintly. He was in some danger; not much yet, but some.
Kurhah barked, “This space is shielded from observation. Speak up.”
“We did spy on you earlier, obviously. You didn’t reveal your plans, but I assume that you think you can overpower Vildiar—one Naos against another—and that you’ll take along a dozen or so mages to hold off the Family?”
“Assume any accursed thing you want, boy. I don’t answer to you.”
“First, of course, you will have to find him, and he has all of Phegda to hide in.”
“Let me worry about that.”
Rigel quoted again the numbers he had spouted at Fornacis. “Are you aware, my lord, that Naos Vildiar still has at least two hundred and three trained halfling assassins at his command?”
Kurhah’s reaction was barely more than a twitch, but he clearly had not known. “I don’t believe it. He told you this?”
“No. I had it on the Star from two of his halfling sons who have sworn allegiance to Her Majesty.”
“Traitors to their sponsor, then!”
“Who is also their father, yes. Personally, I honor them for their courage and ethics in changing sides. Each one of those two hundred has killed at least one earthling with his or her bare hands. It’s part of their training. There may be even more of them now, because that was months ago, and it included only adults; there were a few dozen cubs coming along as well, eager and vicious. Of course the starfolk helpers you hope to enlist need not fear Vildiar himself, but they know how deadly his halflings are. Most of your dinner guests will vanish into the sky the moment you get around to asking for volunteers.”
The elf laughed scornfully. “You think I have not prepared suitable defenses for them? You think they’ll be braver if you’re there to help?”
“I am not offering to accompany you myself, my lord.” Rigel did not care to explain that the queen loved him so much that she kept him tied to her apron strings. “But Her Majesty is willing to provide you with battle-trained centaurs, sphinxes, and griffins.”
“Oh, rubbish! I do not need her circus animals. They would be worse than useless, because they would get in my way. If that’s the best you can do, boy, you’re wasting my time. Obviously your mistress realizes how negligent she’s been and wants to share in the glory after I’ve done all the work for her. Well, I have no intention of letting her have any of the credit. Open that door.”
The stupid ancient would listen to no one’s advice, and Rigel could smell disaster in the making. He produced the scroll he had brought tucked in his waistband. He did not offer it or unroll it, but it caught the old elf’s attention.
“My lord, may I ask, because it is vital, just what you propose to do with Prince Vildiar himself—if you can find him and if his thugs do not kill you all before you can get near him?”
“Pull his fangs and clip his talons. Now go back to your—”
“Impossible.”
Kurhah glared, and Saiph shivered a warning on Rigel’s wrist.
“You’re going to create a bloodbath, my lord.”
“Have you ever heard of a cockatrice, boy?”
“I’ve ridden one. The queen and I went to Tarazed with Starborn Cheleb the day before Hadar killed her.”
“Did you really?” The mage made no effort to hide his disbelief of this fantastic claim. “Then you know what one glance of a cockatrice will do.”
“It petrifies people.”
“Correct. Cockatrices are imaginary, of course. What one starborn can imagine, so can another, and I have imagined amulets that act like a cockatrice’s gaze, except on starborn. Us they merely blind, and I have other amulets to cure that blindness. So unless our beloved queen wants to decorate her palace with statues of centaurs, sphinxes, and griffins, she had best keep them out of my way. When Naos Vildiar has sworn on the Star that all his trained killers have been accounted for and he will create no more in future, I will restore his sight. But every year from then on, I will summon him to my court in Canopus and have him swear that he has bred no more halflings. Now open that door and get out of my way.”
“I hope your cockatrice spell has a longer range than Hadar’s bows. He cannot miss at three hundred paces. And I hope he hasn’t equipped his troops with basilisk masks.”
“I told you to get out of my way.”
Rigel offered the scroll. “Here’s a better way.”
Kurhah made no effort to take the paper. “What is it?”
“It’s a royal warrant, authorizing Prince Kurhah and a posse of his choosing to arrest Prince Vildiar and convey him to the Dark Cells at Dziban.”
Kurhah’s face flamed red. “On what grounds?”
“To await trial on charges still to be specified.”
“Get out of here!” The mage was almost spluttering. “How dare she treat me like a servant? How dare she menace Naos Vildiar that way, her senior by more than four centuries?” He shoved Rigel. “Move, boy!”
Sadly Rigel o
pened the door and went out. Kurhah pushed past him and strode back the way they had come, muttering furiously to himself. The kitchen staff continued their clean-up work, carefully not looking at the halfling in the shiny helmet. Rigel sighed and followed his host.
Of course it was good news that the starfolk were starting to fight back against Vildiar, although their timing was only barely better than never. They should have done it two dozen deaths ago. But Kurhah was not hearing anything he did not want to hear; very likely this myopic, pigheaded fossil was going to make matters much worse than they already were. Dare one hope that so many of his guests would have the sense to stay out of it that he would have to give up and try something else?
The great room was already almost full, as the guests returned from their meal to hear the rest of the plan. Judging by the babble, wine had flowed generously, probably much too generously. Discretion would be more valuable than Dutch courage if Kurhah was planning to start his campaign right away.
Meanwhile, there was no reason for Rigel Tweenling to stay around at Alathfar. Rather than jostling his way through the incoming stream of jabbering starfolk, he turned and retraced his steps to the kitchen area. The root portal he had used the last time he was in Alathfar had disappeared—as had its other side, in Canopus, where the camel yard had metamorphosed into a copra warehouse several months ago. Unless Kitalphar had waited for him, he would have to wait and beg a ride home from one of the starborn. He left through the kitchen door.
This was where most of the air cars had been parked, on a wide lawn enclosed by even more cabins, with forest spreading out on all sides. He headed for the corner of the main building. Just as he reached it, Saiph began vibrating fiercely on his wrist and a bright light flashed from a point almost straight ahead of him, between two cabins. He thought it must be the sun reflecting off a mirror, but then he saw another like it, two cabins over, below a rising swirl of pale smoke. He thought, Oh God, why didn’t I foresee this? and started to run.
