M A R Barker - [Tekumel- The Empire of the Petal Throne 01]

by Flamesong (v0. 9) (epub)

  “What does it mean?”

  “No idea— Sire. I’ve never heard the like of it. Why not ask the priest?”

  “Chekkuru is now otherwise occupied.”

  Horusel and some of his stalwarts had just entered the room, and the priest was haranguing them upon the importance of carting this “Egg of the World” all the way back to Avanthar. As if they could get it out of here in the first place! The picture of Chekkuru rolling the great silvery ball along the rugged roadway back to the Emperor’s Golden Tower was so funny that Trinesh snorted aloud, which earned him a puzzled look from Saina.

  Chosun came over to report no Yan Koryani in the chamber and no other way out. There might have been footprints in the layers of dust on the floor, but their own men had already tramped through the place, and any such signs were obscured forever. The tunnel below the sphere was impossible: no rope was long enough for that! Chosun had also tried an .experiment: he had dropped a torch into the shaft below the globe. It had never struck bottom, he said, but had tumbled and dwindled and disappeared into the depths as though the pit were a fathomless abyss leading straight out of the world into Lord Vimuhla’s flaming paradises themselves!

  “If there were any Yan Koryani here, they might’ve jumped into the hole, Sire,” Chosun said. “That’s their ‘Way of Nchel,’ their path of resignation: suicide, a way to end a Skein of Destiny that’s too badly tangled in this life. Any who decided to live—and fight—must still be inside the egg-”

  The latter possibility had already occurred to Trinesh. Anyone who tried it ought to be dead of suffocation, of course. If the egg had ventilation holes, the smoke should have done its work; if not, the air inside must have exhausted itself hours ago. Could the globe have its own air supply? It was clearly magical, after all, and who could tell what the Ancients might have wrought?

  “Horusel?”

  “Here, Sire.” The Tirrikamu strode forward into the torchlight.

  “Station half a Semetl of crossbowmen where they can fire in through that hatch from two directions, five men on one side, five on the other.”

  He had to be sure. It was time for a final test.

  When all was ready he summoned Jalugan. “Push the little indentation beside the hatch. Then fall flat—roll, get out of the way.”

  It was well that he took precautions. Something inside the globe clicked, and the hatch swung smoothly open. Jalugan had just time to yell a warning before sprawling down on the very lip of the pit. A flare of ravening scarlet radiance roared out from within the egg-thing, accompanied by a sizzling, screeching sound like red-hot metal thrust into a smith’s tempering bath. Three figures came hurtling out of the hatch even before the light had died away to darkness. Trinesh glimpsed corselets of overlapping metal scales, helmets with nose-guards and back-swept crests, oval shields, and wicked, three-pointed spears that resembled fishermen’s tridents.

  Caught directly in the naked scarlet glare, the crossbowmen on Trinesh’s right exploded into gray ash, their bronze buckles and accouterments splattering molten globules over the wall behind them. They did not even cry out. Chekkuru must have approved; it was a good death for worshippers of the Flame. Too bad the priest had not been included, Trinesh thought, but he could hear him squalling invocations somewhere in the dark.

  There was chaos. The spell-caster, some sort of priest or wizard, stood gazing out of the hatch for a moment more; then he crumpled forward, four crossbow quarrels protruding from his back like the spines of a Nenyelu-fish. The three Yan Koryani soldiers were already locked in a confused, swirling, clattering melee with the crossbowmen, Horusel, Chosun, and several of Trinesh’s axe-wielders. Men shouted, and torches danced wildly amidst the frenzy of battle.

  He himself got his sword up just in time to parry a blow from a fourth opponent who came leaping out of the egg-thing over the sorcerer’s body. This was no human but one of the Nininyal, the Pygmy Folk, who lived in the arid northeastern wastelands of Yan Kor and were Baron Aid’s loyal allies. It was manlike, except for a short, heavy tail, as small as a child, and furred all over. Its cruel, beaked jaw gaped open to display sharp, peglike teeth.

  The creature was almost too fast for Trinesh. He cut, parried left, and slashed. He must have hit it because it squawked and scrambled away toward Dineva behind him. It seemed more interested in flight than in combat.

  Dineva had her shield up, but the furry beast simply seized the upper rim and swarmed over. The weapon it carried, a weighted poleaxe barely the size of a human soldier’s hatchet, smashed down upon her helmet, but at that angle and range it could not have hurt her much. She jammed her axe-spike up into the creature’s belly as it clambered over her shoulders, and it squalled loudly, fell behind her, and struggled to rise. Dineva kicked it, danced back to clear her head, and smashed down with her weapon. It lay still.

  Trinesh got in one more blow against the unshielded right side of one of the Yan Koryani troopers. He thought that it struck home, under the man’s armpit instead of against his breastplate, but he could not be sure. Then it was over. A matter of seconds, and a half dozen of his comrades lay dead or wounded, their bodies jumbled together with those of the three Yan Koryani officers. The chamber still echoed with the clash of battle, and it stank of blood and bowels and sweat.

  Chosun emerged panting and red-faced from the press. “May be more inside,” he gasped. Perspiration glazed his plump cheeks beneath his helmet.

  “Careful, then!” Trinesh called, “They may have more magic! You—and you—tend to the wounded—see if any of the Yan Koryani still live!”

  Jalugan and the crossbowmen edged toward the hatch as

  they had been taught, in cautious patrol formation, three covering while the other two sprinted forward. One man crouched by the hatch and peered inside. He signaled for the rest to come up, and at last Jalugan waved for Trinesh to join them.

  The only occupants of the egg-thing’s single little room were two women.

  The taller of the pair looked to be in her twenties. She was almost as long-limbed as Trinesh himself; slender, dark, and intense-looking, and attired in the same red-lacquered scale armor and maroon tunic as her soldiers. She had no helmet, and her long black tresses swung out like the wings of a bird from her flushed, high-boned cheeks. She held a curved sword, its blade thickened near the point and weighted like an axe; this she dropped when Trinesh would have advanced upon her. She spread her hands.

  Jalugan stood watchfully before the other woman, a girl of perhaps eighteen summers. This one wore a chemise of deep scarlet cloth, an ankle-length skirt of black bordered with geometric designs in glittering red and green brocade, and a little skullcap of enameled and begemmed Chlen-hide: a pretty girl, not as luminously beautiful as the other but still lovely enough to set any bravo in Bey Sii to warbling odes in honor of her heart-shaped face and the arrows of her eyelashes! She was neither a soldier nor a priestess by the look of her. La, she reminded Trinesh of his clan-sister, Shyal! The girl shot a nervous glance at her companion and then she, too, let her hands hang open at her sides in surrender.

  “Let me bind them, Sire.” Horusel had entered the sphere behind them. “They may have weapons—may try to escape.” He gave the women a broken-toothed smile, but his words were for Trinesh. “When you’re done with them, you can pass them oh to the men. And when they’re finished, Chekkuru can earn us Lord Vimuhla’s gratitude by feeding them to the Flame.”

  “There is no need for bonds,” the older woman said. Her

  Tsolyani was passable, but she spoke the language with the dark, burring accent of the north. “Do as you will with me—I am a warrior, and I will sing my death-song when the time comes. But let my maid, here, go. She does you no harm.”

  “Have you chosen your ‘Way of Nchel,’ then?” Trinesh asked. “You submit?”

  “I will fight you with neither swords nor spells. On that you have my oath. I swear it—for both of us—upon my clan-mother’s eyes.”

  Trinesh
nodded and retreated a pace to make room for Saina and Dineva. “Search them, take any weapons and that one’s armor. Watch for hidden daggers—and magical devices. Use force only if necessary. One of them is noble, I think: maybe the visitor mentioned in the commandant’s document.” He put on a fierce glare for Horusel’s benefit. “As for our entertaining ourselves, that will not be allowed. Not with the warrior-woman, nor with the girl, not unless she be a professional harlot and is properly paid for her services. Else will you treat them with dignity. A heavy ransom will give you more ecstasy than would a year alone with either or both of these ladies.”

  “Sacrifices, then, Sire?” Horusel persisted. “If they can’t be ransomed, I mean. Or if they or their clans refuse? We ought to honor the Flame-Lord. Chekkuru—”

  The priest surprised him. From somewhere amidst Trinesh’ soldiers, his voice came as clearly as a temple Tunkul-gong. “These persons must be held either for ransom or for more appropriate sacrifice, Hereksa. Look at their garments: scarlet armor and dark red kilt, the livery of the Legion of the Isle of Vridu, which lies off the northern coast of Yan Kor. Vridu is the center of the worship of the Lord of Sacrifice, who is an Aspect—or another name—of our own mighty Lord Vimuhla. These ladies thus deserve a high ritual in a great temple, not a bonfire in a mud hovel such as this place!” He paused.

  “They might choose to enter the sacrificial flames voluntarily, their ‘Way of Nchel,’ to expiate the shame of their defeat here.”

  “I think,” Trinesh said, “that it is time to name ourselves. I am Hereksa Trinesh hiKetkolel of the Legion of the Storm of Fire. My clan is that of the Red Mountain.”

  The older woman replied gravely, “And I am Belket Ele Faiz, Tokhn of the Legion of Vridu, as your priest has already guessed. I am of the clan of the Fishers of Vridu. This is my maid, Jai Chasa Vedlan.”

  “Sometimes they use three names when they’re of high lineage, Sire,” Saina murmured. “The first is their personal name, the second that of their mother’s clan-ancestor, and the third is their father’s, who is not so important in the north. The lineages they mention are good ones.”

  “You escorted a visitor,” Trinesh continued. “Where is he—she?”

  “Outside. Dead. The sorcerer, Qurtul Hne Tio. Your people slew him.”

  “And your mission here?”

  She made a circular gesture. “This.”

  Dineva turned the woman roughly around so that she could reach the buckles on her corselet of scale armor. She made no protest. Saina ran her hands over the girl’s body, then exclaimed and held up a little knife, a handspan long. The Yan Koryani ate with implements like this, rather than with their fingers.

  Trinesh cleared his throat. There would be time for more questions later, and they had not yet inspected their prize, this egg-thing.

  The chamber occupied only about two thirds of the globe; the two prisoners stood against a vertical bulkhead which Trinesh intuitively guessed to be the back of the cabin. The door-hatch was just forward of this on the right. The roof was curved, the room small and cramped, not quite three man-

  heights long and two wide. There must be a considerable space beneath the floor, however, since the ceiling was low enough to graze his flame-crested helmet. As they had surmised, the globe did seem to have its own air supply; he felt a continuous soft breeze upon his face from vents in the ceiling. Three rows of metal frames, like tall chairs or benches, were bolted to the deck, but their cushioning had long since fallen away to dust; the ages before the Time of Darkness were inconceivably remote. These curious seats looked uncomfortable to Trinesh, who was accustomed to sitting, eating, and sleeping upon reed mats spread upon the floor. Cushions and back-rests were common in Tsolyanu, but these chair-things were overly high: they were too small to sit upon crosslegged, and one’s feet would hang down unpleasantly to rest flat-footed on the floor. Somebody—the N’liiss or the Ghatoni, he remembered—did prefer high seats like these. But then civilization had yet to reach those remote northern climes. >

  Along the front wall a rounded gray housing extended back toward the first row of benches, like a sloping waist-high table. The top of this contained a single row of ten bosses, little black knobs, rather like the rivets on a cuirass. Above this odd piece of furniture was a flat pane of gray glass, a poor sort of mirror, in which Trinesh could dimly see his own face. Three more such large mirrored plaques lined the side walls, and all around them were more rows of little studs interspersed with smaller circles and squares of transparent glass, within which delicate designs, lines, needles, letters, and unreadable numerals were visible. The Ancients had strange tastes in ornamentation!

  The mirrors brought back an urgent memory. He spun around to face the older woman, whom Dineva had now stripped down to a soldier’s tunic and short, knee-length skirt. Her armor and a dagger-belt lay in a heap beside her upon the floor.

  “Where is your baggage?” he demanded. “We found nothing in the fortress above—no clothing, no personal articles save for this one little mirror here.” He proffered it to her. She took it, smiled ruefully, and passed it on to her maid. Trinesh waited, but she made no further reply. He turned and called, “Hoi, Chosun—Horusel! Search the floor and that wall back there for hidden compartments!”

  The captives were shoved against the left bulkhead. The investigation was quick, thorough, and very fruitful: a dozen little closets and chambers and niches and receptacles. Most were empty, although a few held enigmatic artifacts, certainly not of modem manufacture. Chosun discovered a large sliding hatch in the floor; this he opened to reveal a welter of housings, rods, metal tubes, and bars, none of them easily removable—or intelligible. Jalugan found the prize, however, a largish panel in the rear wall.

  “Here’s their gear, Sire—” he called.

  It was almost the death of him. There was a scuffling noise, and the young soldier gasped and fell backward upon Dineva, his face a mask of blood.

  Trinesh yelled something, he did not know what, and stumbled against the table along the front wall. His outflung hands scraped along the row of little black knobs. Horusel already had the older woman by the hair, bending her backward over his knees, his axe-blade hooked around her throat. The girl struggled in Saina’s arms. There was pandemonium. Soldiers scattered, Chekkuru howled, Dineva struggled to her feet, and Chosun knelt to shield Jalugan.

  Something appeared in the darkness inside the rear hatch, a vulpine, furred, beaked face: another of the Pygmy Folk!

  “Hold, or this woman dies!” Horusel cried.

  The grayish-white beak withdrew into the darkness of the rear compartment. The beast shrilled something in guttural Yan Koryani.

  “Crossbows!” Trinesh ordered. He could see the little monster skulking back in there, a double-bladed dagger, the weapon that had wounded Jalugan, gleaming in its three-lingered paw. He spared a glance for the young soldier: Chosun was caring for him.

  “Kill us or not, it is already too late for you!” the woman spat.

  None of them had heard the outer door click shut. Only now did Trinesh sense motion. They were moving: the whole damned egg-thing was moving!

  His stomach told him that they were descending straight down.

  “Ohe, Hereksa of Tsolyanu.” The woman squirmed about in Horusel's iron grasp to gaze full upon him from dark, slitted eyes. “We are your prisoners, but shortly you will be ours. This thing, this sphere, is one of the Ancients’ tubeway cars that travel beneath the world! Soon we shall disembark in Yan Kor.”

  The children were not allowed into the Pavilion of the Eternally Valiant- The vast, domed chamber at the top of the keep contained temptations, however, that no boy—or girl, in matriarchal Yan Kor—could resist: tattered banners, shields bearing the marks of blows struck for causes no one could now recall, spears, swords, axes, armor, and even a great Sro-dragon head, whose ebon glass eyes still glared ferociously, though it had been slain and stuffed long before their grandmother’s grandmother had walked upon t
he green and black mosaic pavement of the hall.

  Ridek, the eldest, was twelve, and he knew enough not to touch things. The table upon the low dais in the center of the room, for example, was littered with scrolls, books, chests, reed pens, and inkpots. A goblet of filigreed gold set with bosses of blue-green malachite lay overturned there upon a stack of parchments, buff and brown and creamy-white, all crinkly, their rows of letters smeared with sticky, dark red wine. Ridek could read some of the documents, but others were in cipher, in Saa Allaqiyani, his father’s native tongue, or in one of the other languages of the Five Empires that he did not know. By twisting his head and craning, he could thus glean tantalizing snippets of battle reports, petitions from the clans, news of troop movements and supply columns, tidings of merchant caravans to strange lands, even letters relating to dark matters of espionage—a thousand things. But to move a single sheet a finger’s breadth was to rouse the wrath of their father, the Baron Aid of Yan Kor. That was not an event to be desired.

  Sihan, who was Ridek’s brother and younger by a year, hissed, “If father finds us here, we shall all be impaled.”

  He had come up behind Ridek and now stood gazing down into the chaos on the table. Sihan would have liked nothing better than to poke through their father’s papers for he had more scholarship than Ridek. Sihan was not very brave, however.

  “Father dpes not impale people.” Ridek glanced over at their sister, Naitl, who was six. Naitl cried easily and that could bring the servants or even stem Lord Fu Shi’i, their father’s counselor. Somebody would eventually have to do something about Sihan; his fervid imagination was fast becoming a matter of concern to them all.

  Naitl balanced on her father’s broad, low stool of carven Ssar-wood to stroke the bejeweled hilt of the great sword that lay atop the litter upon the table. The weapon was splendid indeed, damascened and engraved; yet it held little interest for Ridek. It was a sword of state and not a real fighting blade. So far as he was concerned, its best use was to hold down papers against the breeze that rustled in off the Northern Sea through the pillared portico at the end of the room.