The Wazir and the Witch

by Hugh Cook

  ‘Friend Froissart,’ said Tin Char in his sweetest tones, ‘do I have your permission to invite you to take part in this ceremony of torture?’

  Froissart hesitated. He had conceived a great terror of this cramped, hot, shadowy place, a bloodstone tomb ever infiltrated by screams from some agonized creature enduring great trials elsewhere in the Temple, a close-packed place crowded with the rank and hot-breathing bodies of prisoners, guards and terrified acolytes.

  ‘Of course we wish to participate,’ said Manthandros Trasilika, annoyed by Froissart’s hesitation. ‘What do you want us to do?’

  ‘I would be greatly honoured if your priest would consent to make an initial sacrifice for me,’ said Tin Char.

  ‘Of course he will,’ said Trasilika, before Froissart had a chance to protest.

  Whereupon Tin Char lifted the lid from a copious covered dish. Within lay a vampire rat, its paws tied together with threads of gold and silver. Despite these cords of bondage, it had thrashed around inside the dish. And, as it had befouled its place of imprisonment, streaks of brown smeared its luxuriant orange fur.

  The vampire rat screamed in agonies of intelligent anticipation. Froissart grabbed it. The rat twisted, snapped, bit. Blood streamed from Froissart’s hand. If this rat was rabid - and rabies was endemic amongst the vampire rats of Injiltaprajura - then Jean Froissart was going to endure a very unpleasant death.

  ‘Gath!’ said Froissart, swearing in his native Toxteth.

  Then the child of Wen Endex smashed the rat with his fist, grabbed the knife and cut its throat. Blood streamed forth into the dish, mixing swiftly with urine and excrement.

  ‘There,’ said Froissart, smearing blood across his forehead as he wiped away a lathering of sweat. ‘It’s dead.’

  At that point, a servant intruded. A low-browed young man who had but one eye, the other being covered with a black patch.

  ‘Master,’ said the servant.

  ‘Silence!’ said Tin Char. ‘You have the manners of a drummer.’

  ‘Master, I—’

  ‘Silence!’ roared Tin Char.

  And resolved to have the man beaten as soon as the ceremony was finished. To thus intrude on holy ceremony was perilously close to blasphemy.

  ‘But master,’ said the servant desperately. ‘I must—’

  ‘You must be quiet!’ said Tin Char. ‘If he speaks again, gouge out his other eye!’

  The servant did not speak again.

  Instead, the man started to wring his hands in frustrated anguish.

  Dui Tin Char waited for Froissart to proceed with the next step demanded by ritual. The drinking of the blood. But Froissart did no such thing.

  ‘That was well done,’ said Manthandros Trasilika, when nobody else seemed inclined to speak.

  Trasilika’s ignorance was pardonable. But Froissart’s inaction was something else again. Perhaps Froissart had forgotten how to proceed. An unlikely event, for all priests of Zoz the Ancestral familiarized themselves with the rites of the closely associated Temple of Torture. Unlikely, yes, but not impossible. Or perhaps Froissart was in no condition to drink the blood. The child of Wen Endex was bleeding from a bite from a possibly rabid animal. His face had assumed an unnatural pallor; he looked shocked, exhausted, close to collapse.

  One way or another, the ritual must be brought to its proper conclusion. Any other course would be blasphemy.

  ‘There is the matter of the blood,’ said Tin Char carefully, thinking that would suffice.

  ‘The blood?’ said Froissart.

  ‘Yes,’ said Tin Char. ‘The blood.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Froissart.

  He picked up the big dish. He breathed the fumes of blood, excrement and urine. Sweat dropped from his chin and splashed in the unorthodox cocktail he now contemplated. The fluid trembled as Froissart’s hands shook. He opened his mouth as if to say something. Then, quite calmly, he vomited into the bowl. He stood looking at the vomit. The heavy dish started to slide in his sweat-greased hands. Froissart tried to put it down. But the dish was going, going, gone, a slosh of filth and vomit splurping over the side. Impact! The dish smashed down, spraying its contents across Trasilika’s feet.

  ‘Jean Froissart!’ said Tin Char in shocked surprise. ‘You disgrace yourself!’

  Froissart grovelled in the mess of muck and vomit.

  ‘It blasphemes,’ said Dardanalti, affecting shock. ‘It sins against our faith with malice. What makes it priest? It has not the Skin.’

  So spoke Justina’s lawyer, speaking of Jean Froissart with all the resources of racial hatred at his disposal. Then the lawyer dared a most unlawyerly thing. He kicked the cringing priest.

  ‘This is no priest,’ said Dardanalti, kicking the thing again. ‘This is a fraud.’

  Dardanalti was making the greatest gamble of his life. He suspected - but was not certain - that Jean Froissart was a false priest. But he had no proof of that whatsoever. There was therefore every possibility that Dardanalti might shortly find himself entertaining five million red ants with a most extraordinary generosity, or, to detail just one of the many alternative fates which might befall him, taking his ease on a sharpened roasting spit.

  Dardanalti, then, gambled with his life.

  Froissart sat up.

  ‘I,’ he said, ‘I’m—’

  Outside, someone screamed, as screams a man of nervous disposition when a dentist wrenches an ulcerated wisdom tooth from the living flesh of the gums and, gripping this trophy in a pair of rusty pliers, holds it aloft in all its gory glory.

  Froissart opened his mouth.

  Closed it.

  Began to cry.

  ‘Pull yourself together,’ said Manthandros Trasilika roughly, as blubbering tears streamed down Froissart’s face, washed through his sweat then dropped to the disgraced flagstones.

  ‘I . . . I’m sorry,’ said Froissart.

  Then he could no longer help himself. He broke down altogether. He wept, then smashed his head against the stones. Once, twice, thrice. Hammering his forehead against that obstinacy with full force. As if to fracture his skull.

  ‘A false priest,’ said Dardanalti. ‘I knew as much.’

  ‘No!’ said Trasilika.

  But there was not one person in the room who doubted Jean Froissart’s guilt. He was an imposter. A fake. A blaspheming charlatan.

  ‘He - he’s mad,’ said Trasilika, speech starting to blunder as panic took grip.

  ‘Not mad,’ said the Empress Justina, speaking up from her torture table. ‘Not mad, but guilty. A false priest with a false wazir.’

  Thus spoke Justina, effectively pronouncing Trasilika’s death sentence. For if Jean Froissart was a fraud, then Manthandros Trasilika must be a criminal imposter likewise.

  ‘He’s - it’s the voyage,’ said the heavyweight would-be wazir. ‘It’s, it’s the, the malaria, or rabies, the rat which bit, it bit, he’s blood, blood, he’s bleeding, he—’

  Trasilika was babbling.

  But Juliet Idaho was perfectly calm as he said to the Temple acolytes standing alongside of him:

  ‘Cut me loose.’

  They obeyed. Knives they had. In moments they triced through his bonds, the neck-noose included. Then Juliet Idaho said to the nearest soldier:

  ‘Give me your weapon.’

  Wordlessly, the soldier handed over his scimitar.

  ‘Stop him!’ said Trasilika in panic. ‘A blade, he’s got a blade, he’s going to—’

  ‘Foreign filth,’ hissed Dardanalti.

  Trasilika rushed for the exit door. The acolytes met him, punched him, threw him back. He crashed into the torture table. Went down, but got to his feet again. Too late! For Juliet Idaho was already upon him. In that enclosed space, there was precious little room to manoeuvre. But there was room enough to swing a scimitar.

  Trasilika’s head went bouncing to the floor. The headless body swayed. Sprayed the ceiling with blood. Then toppled. And Idaho was already moving, arm striking, blade
plunging, steel ripping, fingers delving. Moments later, Juliet Idaho stood in triumph with a trophy in his fist. A beating heart. Jean Froissart’s heart.

  ‘Bravo,’ cried Justina faintly.

  Then faint voice gave way to fainting fit.

  And, at a nod from Tin Char, guards disarmed the still-panting Juliet Idaho.

  ‘Well,’ said Tin Char, wiping some of the much-splattered corpse blood from his face, ‘this is not a good start to the day. Nevertheless, we’ve profited from the experience. We know that Aldarch Three has victory in Yestron.’

  ‘We know no such thing,’ said Dardanalti, confronting probabilities with possibilities as a lawyer must. ‘Two liars we have for certain. Two shiploads of liars, possibly. But as for Al’three, why, he may be dead, and his enemies victorious.’

  ‘I’ll take a chance on that,’ said Tin Char, who doubted that a couple of frauds could have suborned two whole shiploads of sailors. ‘As Aldarch Three has triumphed in Talonsklavara, the time has come for the rule of the rightful to be restored to Untunchilamon. In the absence of any other appropriate candidates, I therefore declare myself wazir of Injiltaprajura.’

  ‘Master,’ said the one-eyed servant, venturing at last to speak again. ‘That’s what I came to tell you about. We have a new wazir.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Tin Char. ‘Me.’

  ‘But Master, there’s an Ebrell Islander in the courtyard outside. It’s got a sledge hammer. Guy, it’s called Guy, Chegory Guy. It’s got an Ashdan with it, a girl Qasaba. They-they—’

  ‘They what?’ said Tin Char. ‘They want to be a two-headed wazir? What madness is this?’

  ‘Not madness, master. Messages. They bring a message from the Hermit Crab. The Crab has declared itself the wazir of Injiltaprajura.’

  Dui Tin Char gave a little moan. He remembered his last encounter with the Crab. Without laying so much as a claw upon Tin Char’s flesh, the Crab had exerted a Power which had wrenched Tin Char’s arms back further and further until both were dislocated.

  ‘Show them in,’ said Juliet Idaho decisively.

  Two acolytes moved to obey.

  In came a redskin, the heavily muscled Chegory Guy, with Olivia Qasaba beside him.

  ‘We’re here with a, a message,’ said Chegory, holding tight to his sledge hammer, his sole source of comfort and reassurance in this most difficult of situations.

  ‘Yes,’ said Olivia, in a firm though girlish voice. ‘The Crab brings pardons for those who obey. As long as . . . as . . .’

  ‘If it’s now,’ said Chegory. ‘Now that they obey, I mean. If they obey later, it’ll be too late.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Olivia.

  ‘The Crab’s wazir,’ said Chegory. ‘Hence should command obedience. Yes, wazir, that’s what the Crab is. Wazir of Untunchilamon. And it orders, uh, the immediate release of the Empress Justina. Of course. And Juliet Idaho, Shanvil May, Pokrov and, uh, the wizard here.’ ‘Or else,’ said Olivia.

  ‘So get moving,’ said Chegory. ‘Zozimus, he’s the most important. The Crab is hungry. It wants its next meal. And fast. Oh, you’ve got centipedes! Good, we’ll take those. And, um, there was someone we had to, what was it?’

  ‘Bring along,’ said Olivia. ‘Tin Char, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right,’ said Chegory. ‘Dui Tin Char. That’s you, isn’t it? Come along then. The Crab wants to see you.’

  Dui Tin Char howled in anguish and then, reluctantly, submitted to the inevitable.

  For the Crab was a Power which none on Untunchilamon durst disobey.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Naturally, there was consternation in Injiltaprajura when it was known that the Crab had declared itself wazir. But, in the days that followed, remarkably little changed. Decrees were published in the name of the Crab, saying that Justina Thrug should remain in the pink palace for the time being as its custodian; that religious freedom should prevail as before; and that all civil and uncivil servants were temporarily confirmed in their positions.

  Thus consternation was soon replaced with disappointment; for the mob saw that there were to be no wholesale torturing or executions, no mass arrests or persecutions, no opportunities for looting and rampage; and a sense of anticlimax prevailed in the city.

  Nevertheless, while there was no, major public drama in those days, there were private dramas in plenty, as there always are in any great city. And, turning our attention to one of those dramas, let us record the following:

  This was the number:

  011010100001.

  And this was the demand:

  One thousand dragons.

  And the lever was a page of the Injiltaprajuradariski, The Secret History of Injiltaprajura, a work now gaining a certain underground fame on Untunchilamon.

  Bro Drumel read the page through yet one more time. Was it really as dangerous as he had thought at first blush? He was inclined to think that it was.

  So what was he to do?

  Pay the thousand dragons?

  He could. But doubtless there would be further demands to follow the first. For such was the nature of blackmail. So what was the alternative? Hunt down the blackmailer and kill him. Obviously. But much easier said than done. In fact, it might well prove impossible.

  Bro Drumel, captain of Justina’s palace guard and Governor of Moremo Maximum Security Prison, began to work on his fingernails, easing the overgrowth of skin back from each moon in turn. While his skin was Janjuladoola grey, the fingernails themselves were a blood*flushed pink. Pink nails. White moons. He found them fascinating. And beautiful. Indeed, Bro Drumel had little eye for the sculptural masses which make up the body as a whole. What delighted him was the elegant finishing touches. Fingernails. Earlobes. Eyes.

  Those oh-so-elegant finishing touches which so delight the torturer.

  Bro Drumel looked out of the window of his office in Moremo. He closed his right eye experimentally. And, as he had expected, the view dimmed.

  Year by year, the colours perceived by his left eye had slowly been growing darker and dimmer. He supposed that in the fullness of titne he would go blind in that eye. He could live with that. He could face the thought of such idiosyncratic failures of the flesh, and the inevitable generalized degeneration of old age which must one day follow.

  But the horror that would befall him if he became a victim of the rage of Aldarch Three . . .

  Bro Drumel squeezed both eyes tight, trying to close out light, thought and vision together.

  If he did yield to blackmail, his persecutor would hand certain documentation to Master Ek, High Priest of Zoz the Ancestral. Then certain doom would in due course befall him. So what should he do?

  Bro Drumel fought with panic.

  And, finally, decided to go and see the Empress Justina.

  The Empress had been restored to the pink palace five days earlier, after her release had been ordered in the name of the Crab. Since she had the Crab’s favour, perhaps - just possibly - she could give Bro Drumel some help. Or reassurance at least.

  But, first, he should shave.

  Soon Bro Drumel was at work, soothing the steel across his skin. He paused in his work. Slid two fingers to the carotid artery which lay beside his windpipe. The skin was hot. Hot and slightly sweaty. The pulse beat beneath his fingers. A rhythm strong and slow. He made his resolution. Both jugular veins and both carotids and the windpipe too. A single sweep. A grin.

  That’s all it takes.

  He would do it.

  Yes, if torture threatened, he would do it.

  And, now that he knew he would never be taken alive, Bro Drumel felt stronger, calmer and more confident. The game was not over yet. And, while the game yet ran, life was still sweet, and had many, many satisfactions.

  Shortly, a clean-shaven Bro Drumel was at the pink palace and deep in conference with the Empress Justina and Juliet Idaho. Both the Empress and her untame Yudonic Knight examined the blackmail documents with interest.

  What particu
larly attracted their attention was the page from the Injiltaprajuradariski which had been sent to Bro Drumel. The page was a sheet of ricepaper covered with scorpioned Ashdan orthography scripted in purple ink. The words were in Slandolin, the literary language of Ashmolea South. While neither Justina nor Idaho could read this tongue, both by now could recognize a text written in that argot.

  ‘You’ve had it translated, I take it,’ said Justina.

  ‘I have,’ said Bro Drumel.

  ‘What does it say?’said Idaho.

  ‘It . . . well . . .’

  ‘Out with it!’ said Idaho, harshening his voice.

  ‘Peace, Julie,’ said Justina, laying one heavy and sweaty hand upon Idaho’s wrist.

  ‘But we must know what it says,’ growled Idaho. ‘Or must we call in our own translator?’

  ‘It . . . it tells of a ... a relationship between myself and our Empress,’ said Bro Drumel. ‘My blackmailer threatens to send a duplicate copy to Nadalastabstala Banraithanchumun Ek.’

  ‘And what if he does?’ said Justina.

  ‘It . . . this would damn me in the eyes of Aldarch Three,’ said Bro Drumel.

  The Empress snorted.

  ‘You’re damned already if that’s all it takes for damnation,’ said she. ‘Your close connection with me is no secret. Come! You helped Varazchavardan when he sought to coup against me. If I remember correctly, your help was so strenuous I had need to hit you with my handbag.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Drumel, remembering the shattering impact of that blow.

  ‘So this blackmailing is no more than a nonsense,’ said Justina briskly. ‘But I would dearly like to catch the blackmailer, for capture might give us a clue to the source of the Injiltaprajuradariski, The Secret History of Injiltaprajura. You know it, I take it.’

  ‘Well...’

  ‘You must have heard rumours,’ said Justina.

  ‘A few,’ said Bro Drumel cautiously.

  ‘Come, let’s not be so close-mouthed,’ said Justina. ‘It’s no secret. Untunchilamon’s a place too small for that. Someone has written a Secret History. We know not who. What we do know is that pieces of it are scattered all over Injiltaprajura. The Cabal House had a piece.’