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

by Flamesong (v0. 9) (epub)

  It went back again into his belt pouch.

  The contents of the car were more interesting: a dozen of the flat, silvery-gray canisters; a jumbie of metallic discs that might be buttons or possibly coins, though they were too light to be silver or gold; three little boxes with glass circles and lenses upon them, and short, stiff, metallic cords that ended in odd pincer-like clips of unknown purpose; the long tube Horusel had almost triggered; a squat, black cylinder with a hole in one end; and four metal bars with handles. One of these last ended in a crescent-moon of bright metal, perhaps a religious symbol, while the remaining three had spatulate tips that could be honed down to serve as daggers. A heap of miscellaneous parts and pieces completed the lot.

  Trinesh experimented with the tube-device, but pulling its lever produced only a loud click, and he laid it aside. Two of the other items proved to be of greater interest. The first was the cylinder: when its handle was squeezed, a finger-like flame appeared from the aperture in the tip. The other useful item was one of the boxes; this had a transparent stud that lit up with a soft yellow radiance when one twisted its knobs. They now had fire—though no fuel for cooking—and also a lamp to light their exploration of the passageways around the plaza.

  It was thus that Trinesh learned the bad news. Horusel and Chosun returned all besplattered with Hu-bat dung to say that there was a third corridor all around the second. As in the first and second rings, this had exit doors to some presumed fourth and outer corridor as well—or perhaps to the second courtyard beyond—but those doorways had been sealed up with huge blocks of stone mortared together into a solid barrier that only siege-tools could breach!

  Whoever dwelt in the city did not welcome visitors arriving via the tubeway cars!

  They could still use their makeshift rope and grappling hook to descend into the courtyard beyond the surrounding building of corridors. Balar, however, had the foresight to toss one of the canisters down there before descending himself. The container had hardly stopped rolling when a myriad tiny, whitish lizard-things with spiny tails and a dozen sets of legs poured forth from crevices between the stones to snarl and worry at its metal shell with all the fury of enraged Zrae-beasts. The canister remained undamaged, but Trinesh doubted whether their boots, sandals, and bare feet would prove as durable.

  The longer they watched the lizards’ performance, the less friendly their unknown hosts seemed.

  There ought to be a solution—something other than getting back into the vehicle and trusting their Skeins to the mercies of the Ssu or its previous owners, those nameless Ancients who had built it. They would have to try that route if they could not get across the outer courtyard, but the destinations shown by this car’s view-portrayers lacked appeal. Moreover, Trinesh argued, who would build a great citadel, a masterpiece of masonry and sculpture, with no way in or out? There was probably a secret door or a tunnel beneath some flagstone that bypassed the lizard-things’ courtyard. Whatever the reasons for sealing off this area—Ssu or other unpleasant guests, presumably—those were human beings down there, and Trinesh’s ragged little party posed no threat. Why harm helpless travelers?

  He resolutely refused to think of slavery, sacrifice, or various other unsavory practices of the societies with which he himself was acquainted.

  They had time. He set his people to devising ways to deal with the lizard-things. He himself tried the “Eye” upon them, but they only stared up at him from unwinking, bright green eyes. None of the other devices did any better. Arjasu opened one of the canisters from the car, poured its oily contents down into the courtyard, and rejoiced as a dozen of the monsters ate of it and died. Their fellows soon swarmed over the corpses, however, and even the skeletons disappeared. Trinesh then set fire to the brownish grease in yet another container; this produced black smoke but almost no flame, and the lizards evaded it easily. There had to be a way!

  By the end of the second day they finished the last of their tubers and dried meat. With plentiful water and no strenuous activity it would take them several six-days to starve, but Trinesh had no intention of waiting for that unhappy denouement.

  Indeed, there had to be a way.

  Three more days passed, each hungrier and less pleasurable than the preceding one. The Tsolyani and Tse’e spread their desert-cloaks as sleeping mats in a single small area of the first ring of corridors, while the two Yan Koryani women kept their distance around the comer. Thu’n chose a place farther down that same passage, and this moved Trinesh to post one of the sentries inside the portico itself. There must be no unscheduled—or unaccompanied—departures via the tubeway car! Chekkuru took up separate residence across the plaza apart from everyone else and devoted himself so enthusiastically to his rituals that his chanting became a single, monotonous, sing-song drone in the background. No one spoke much, there was little to do, and they grew increasingly morose and surly. Trinesh found himself yearning for the rough camaraderie of his Legion and wondering who had taken command after he had vanished. Even the rigours of army life took on a mellow, remote, sparkling quality that trickled away like the last dregs of sweet Tumissan wine from a flagon.

  It was Tse’e who eventually discovered food.

  On the morning of the sixth day after their arrival, he awoke Trinesh from a vision—daydream or sleep-dream, who knew?—of spiced Jakkohl-meat and succulent Khaish-root stew. The old exile’s hands overflowed with a darkish substance that dribbled brown juices upon the mosaic paving. He grinned and thrust a fragment into his mouth.

  “No—!” Trinesh cried in horror. “Don’t! We are not reduced to eating—that—yet!”

  Tse’e blinked at him in puzzlement; then he cackled. “Not what you think, Hereksa! This is Ozhain—fungus! It grows wherever one finds darkness and Hu-bat dung or other carrion! The outer corridors are filled with it. The Folk of Na Ngore consider it a delicacy.”

  Whatever it was, its appearance and texture were strongly scatological. Fortunately, it did not have the fragrance to match. Trinesh sniffed dubiously and was reminded of a damp cellar. His stomach made urgent demands, but his gorge threatened to rise in revolt. Still, it was better than starvation—or departing once more in the tubeway car. He accepted a piece, put it to his lips, and found it moist and unpleasantly spongy. The taste was not bad: like Dna-porridge mixed with sea-fish and seasoned with swamp water.

  “Eat, Hereksa!” Tse’e chortled. “As nourishing as anything served to the Emperor in Avanthar! This Ozhain is somewhat different from what we had in Na Ngore, but it is food! Now we do not starve! There’s enough to feed a legion—and if you leave a little, it grows back!”

  Trinesh looked past him to see a ring of grinning faces. The others had already been informed. He took more of the Ozhain from Tse’e, hobbled up to his feet, and grandly declared a feast-day.

  Saina scorched some of the fungus over the tiny flame of their cylinder device, improving its flavor considerably thereby, and they ate their fill for the first time since leaving Fortress Ninu’ur. Their mood lightened, became first genial, then raucous, and finally culminated in off-key folk songs from Saina and Arjasu, followed by epic poetry (with histrionic gestures) by Chekkuru, and a Tumissan love-sonnet from Trinesh himself. Even the Lady Deq Dimani joined in with a Yan Koryani lyric, her voice as dark and melancholy as her northern seas. Trinesh felt giddy, silly, raised above all the world like a God! This Ozhain must contain a drug, he decided; it was either that or the effects of a full stomach after several days of fasting.

  He looked across the circle to the Lady Jai; she smiled tentatively at no one in particular. Both Gayel and Kashi were up, hovering just above the black-silhouetted fretwork of the parapet, and her eyes were pools of green and red moonlight. Balar, next to her, proffered a fresh tidbit of Ozhain and murmured something in her ear. She made no response but stared vacantly out into the darkness. The young crossbowman might fare no better with her than Trinesh had, but he was persistent: he continued with further whisperings and little attentions
. The Lady Jai returned him a faint smile.

  Jealousy swept over Trinesh in a thundering wave. He felt his cheeks blazing, and raw fury welled up into his throat. Who was this Balar! No more than a swaggering animal, a member of a clan of no importance! He was a subordinate, a common soldier!

  Trinesh’s fingers slid all of themselves to his sword-hilt. He struggled for restraint and forced them away again. Saina sat beside him, and he was next amazed to find his startlingly independent fingers sliding over to caress her smooth thigh. It was like the hypnosis of the Ssu! Her small, callused hand came down unseen in the darkness to close hard upon his and lead it on to softer and more interesting locales beyond. She wore nothing but the desert-cloak she had acquired in Na Ngore, and when its folds were pulled aside ...

  Scarlet lust blinded him, and he sucked in a ragged breath. He turned to her and realized that in another moment they’d be coupling together on the floor before everybody, like the chief entertainment at a Jakallan orgy!

  Then someone brushed between them and broke the spell: the Lady Deq Dimani.

  “Your pardon, Hereksa," the Yan Koryani woman purred. “It is hot, and I would swim before I sleep . . .” Her voice sounded distraught, choked, and shaky. “Come, Jai.” The girl followed her, one silken calf gliding against Trinesh’s arm as she passed.

  Trinesh gasped for air, found nothing but the fire-smoke and the baked-fish smell of cooking Ozhain, and staggered outside to the nearest pool to lave his forehead with cool water. The veil of lust receded from his eyes; the feast was over.

  He sought a place apart from the others and lay down. Yet the sleep-demons refused to come, and his head whirled with streamers of fragmented thoughts. He must be insane, drugged by the Ozhainl He could ill afford to lose control now.

  He looked up to see Saina standing before him, her desert-cloak hanging open from her sturdy-peasant shoulders.

  “You wanted me, Hereksal" she asked tonelessly. The question was deliberately double-edged.

  He found that he did.

  Later he lay beside her, relieved of his passion but still thrumming inside with a roiling turbulence to which he could put no name. She turned her broad, pretty face to his and licked her full lips. He knew that she would have him begin all over again.

  “Tomorrow we leave in the tubeway car,’’ he muttered shakily. “If we stay here, there’s naught to eat but the madman’s fungus. Mayhap he’s too senile to feel its effects, but the rest of us will suffer more of this delirium!”

  “And is that wrong?” Her wide, flat nose nuzzled his cheek, and she sketched skillful kisses along the line of his jaw.

  “Yes—no . . Lust awoke again in his loins. He drew away and sat up. “Damn it, woman! It’s well enough for two or three of us! But what of the others—you cannot serve us all—!”

  “There’s Dineva. She does as she pleases. Tonight I think that her pleasures include Horusel—or Chosun—or both.” She pulled her desert-cloak up to cover her heavy breasts. “And the Yan Koryani: those two may act the haughty princesses now, but after a day or two they’ll join in with a will, you’ll see.”

  “You—you don’t think that the Lady Deq Dimani and the Lady Jai are lovers?” The question had been in his mind for some time.

  “Them? I doubt it. I’ve seen enough during my army days to make me believe otherwise. La, I suspect that officer-woman is as hot-blooded beneath her dainty armor as any harlot in the temple of Lady Dlamelish.”

  Naked passion returned once more to becloud his vision, and he cast about for a less dangerous topic. “Listen! Along with this—this sexual joy, there’s another side to Ozhain: jealousy—rage—hatred! I almost slew Balar tonight! We’ll fight, kill, murder each other over you women or any other stupid pretext. Not one of us will ever see home again! Do you understand me?”

  She paid this argument no heed. “We can manage—-share,” she mused. “Many men have more than one wife, and many wives more than one husband. Dineva and 1 alone can manage the lot of you—even without the accursed Yan Koryani and her pretty pet!”

  “Think, Saina! Who serves Chekkuru hiVriddi? What of the damned NininyalT ’

  “The priest is married to his god. If he needs a woman, Dineva and I will each eat a fistful of fungus and see who surrenders to it first!” She giggled. “And I doubt that the Pygmy Folk are interested in human females.”

  “The Flame bum it all!” he shouted, not caring who heard. Anger engulfed him, and he wanted to hit her, beat her, kick her senseless. It must be the Ozhain again. He dug his fingernails into the intricate molding of the wall beside him. “We have a duty to return alive—bring back this Lady Deq Dimani, rejoin our legion, fight the Flame-scorched war! We can’t stay here forever rutting like Chlen-beasts!” “Cha!” she pouted and made a face. “The army’ll do without us. We can spend our time here exploring, learning, finding a way out of this building—not even our miserly General Kutume can deny the rightness of that. We need the relaxation. And what’s the harm in enjoying ourselves—?” Despairingly, he tried one last tack. “And the results? Children—babies bom here in this empty ruin of a palace?” “Well, we would have to think of that sometime.” She considered. Then her face brightened. “I have a supply of Lisutl-root in one of my pouches, Hereksa, enough to keep all of us women safe from pregnancy for a month—maybe two or three. After that, though. ...”

  He saw that this argument had reached her.

  “I am right,” he said. Some of the vapors had cleared from his brain. “We’re all alive and healthy tonight, but who knows how many of us will live through another day—a six-day, a month—of eating that vile stuff? No, we leave as soon as we can get ready tomorrow.”

  “It is yours to say, Hereksa." She turned to leave.

  Her dark-cloaked shadow was abruptly limned in scarlet as a flare of ghastly red light burst forth upon the roof above them.

  They both cried out and threw their arms up to shield their

  eyes.

  “Up there!” Trinesh yelled. “The rope! Quick!” He fumbled for his weapon, as blind as a Hu-bat in the sunlight. He heard the pounding of footsteps, boots, clattering, shouts.

  “We’re attacked!” Chekkuru screeched from somewhere in the dazzle.

  “Who? where—?” That was Aijasu’s lighter, calmer voice.

  “Sorcery!” Dineva called back. “Or a fire-missile from a mangonel!”

  Trinesh had no idea how he reached the roof. The spinning blotches of ruddy flame before his eyes dwindled away as his vision returned.

  “Careful—!” There was a snicking sound to his right as Arjasu cocked his crossbow. Mejjai crouched watchfully in front of him.

  “If they’re coming up over the battlements—” Arjasu began. His words trailed off in puzzlement.

  The roof lay empty before them.

  “Who was posted up here?” Trinesh demanded. “Whose watch was it?”

  “Chosun’s,” Horusel grunted.

  “Not mine,” the big man snapped back. “Balar’s.”

  “Where in Lord Vimuhla’s sacred Flame is the bastard?”

  Dineva moved past him on silent, bare feet, as cautious as a Jakkohl in a farmyard. “Chosun sent Balar off to his duty a Kiren ago.”

  “Sire! Look here!” Horusel crouched by the far parapet, that which overlooked the city. He pointed at the low retaining wall.

  They stared. A section of the stone fretwork was charred and smoldering, the upper courses actually melted and sagging like hot wax. The very flagging of the roof itself was blackened for a good man-height in every direction all around! Horusel touched a bare toe to it and leaped back with an oath.

  The stock of Balar’s crossbow lay just within the burnt area, little tongues of flame still licking up from the wood. The bow itself was gone. Beyond, at the base of the parapet, a heap of embers crumbled and drifted in the cool night breeze. A puddle of yellow metal gleamed there amidst those ashes.

  Balar had worn a ring and an armlet of gold
.

  Trinesh had all of his senses back. He strode over to a cooler part of the wall to look down. Only unrelieved darkness met his eyes. He turned around and counted heads. Arjasu, Mejjai, Chosun, and Dineva stood in a wary huddle. Horusel crouched in front of them, his axe in one scarred fist and his feet spraddled in fighting stance. Thu’n and the Lady Deq Dimani waited farther back. Saina guarded the rear, watching the rooftop across the other side of the courtyard. Chekkuru hiVriddi’s bald head presently appeared above the parapet where their grappling hook hung; the priest was puffing and out of breath from the climb. Below him, Tse’e called up a question in his cracked, aged voice.

  “Where is the Lady Jai?” Trinesh asked.

  “I am here, Tsolyani.” She glided out from behind her mistress. She had not stopped to don her desert cloak.

  As she came up to Trinesh, he saw that her eyes sparkled, and her cheeks were flushed with excitement. Briefly he wondered if she was one of those women who take their pleasures from violence rather than the gentler arts of love. It was the first time he had seen her so animated, but he felt no inclination to admire her beauty, not now.

  “Were any of you on this roof—with—with Balar?”

  They eyed one another and shook their heads. “He was on watch alone, as you ordered, HereksaHorusel said. Chekkuru came up. “Lord Vimuhla—” he intoned. Trinesh quelled him with a furious snarl. “No god did this, priest! No flame-demon flew up here to strike Balar down!”

  4 ‘The crossbowman may have tried some experiment of his own with one of the tools of the Ssu,” Thu’n put in. That seemed more plausible.

  Trinesh felt for the “Eye” in his belt pouch, but his fingers only slapped against the naked skin of his belly; he had been too busy with Saina to think of clothing. The device must be below, with his garments.

  What a sight they must be: hardly soldiers at all! Horusel had managed to don his helmet and portions of his harness, but he made a ridiculous picture in his breastplate and greaves without a kilt. Most of the others either wore desert cloaks or nothing at all, although everybody did have a weapon. That, at least, was useful! Nor could Trinesh play the camp drill-master and burn the ears off his motley followers, not when he himself was one of the prime culprits! The blame might lie with Tse’e’s stinking fungus, but that was no excuse for this dismal failure of Legion discipline. What must the Lady Deq Dimani think of the Tsolyani army? At least she had her tunic on, if not her boots and armor!