Allies of Antares [Dray Prescot #26]

by Alan Burt Akers

  Rather naturally, I expected him to see the advantages of what was offered in time—although I was prepared for his final refusal—and to join with us in persuading his father.

  “Erdil, Edin,” said Jaezila. “You are very welcome. You must tell me more of the fight."

  “Right willingly, majestrix,” barked out Erdil, straight and rigid and straining his equipment.

  “Majestrix?” said Tyfar.

  “You misheard, prince,” said Seg, stepping up and putting a shoulder between Tyfar and the two Valkan flyers. “The Valkans compared the wildmen to masichieri. Your head—"

  “I'm not an imbecile, Kov Seg. Think that at your peril."

  My daughter Lela, called Jaezila, looked at me. I stared back at her, and I raised my eyebrows. That was a giant grimace, in those conditions, meaning much. Jaezila nodded, hard.

  She put a hand on Seg's arm. He turned at once, head bent and face intent, completely attentive.

  “It is time Prince Tyfar of Hamal learned, Uncle Seg. Would you do us the honor of making the pappattu?"

  “Pappattu?” said Tyfar. “Between us? We were introduced, as I recall, after our first meeting in that hayloft when you held an arrow nocked on us.” He pointed off to the side of the cave where in firelight Barkindrar the Bullet and Nath the Shaft stood up to watch, sensing some crisis by the way we held ourselves. “When you cared for Barkindrar in the hayloft in Blue Vosk Street."

  I said, “When the beastie tried to chomp you in the swamp, you both reacted, and we were using names. I recall it perfectly. No pappattu has been made between you."

  Both Jaezila and Tyfar looked surprised. They began to cast back in their minds to see if I was right, and, more or less, so I was.

  “Then this flummery cloaks a deeper design—"

  “Of course, Ty. Now, Seg, you know who Prince Tyfar of Hamal is. Go on."

  Seg cleared his throat. Kytun moved up a trifle closer and he casually freed one of his swords. Seg spoke: “Prince Tyfar of Hamal, you have the honor of being in the presence of and of being introduced to Lela, Princess Majestrix of Vallia."

  * * *

  Chapter seven

  Of the Wounds of Prince Tyfar of Hamal

  Well, and wasn't it right and proper, perfectly fitting, that Seg Segutorio should make the introduction? Should close one episode and open up a whole bushelful of new?

  Seg stepped back, and he was smiling as only he can, the kind of smile that reaches right down into a fellow and curls his toes.

  Tyfar closed his mouth. It had been open only just long enough to have trapped half a dozen flies, had any been foolish enough to enter.

  “Lela. Princess Majestrix of Vallia."

  Tyfar did not lose the color from his face. He stood up straight, watchful, like a deer pausing on the edge of a water hole. His head was lifted, and slightly inclined. He remained perfectly still.

  “Ty?"

  Apprehension—that showed in Jaezila.

  We stood there among the mountains, on a dusty ledge blood-soaked and cumbered with corpses, and the sounds of men moaning and the crackle of the fires mingled with the snorting of the saddle flyers and the rustle of their wings. How to overemphasize the shock of this revelation to Tyfar? Warily, he looked at Jaezila, and warily I looked at him. In one way I could expect any wild reaction, and in another I guessed what his reaction would be. I could still be wrong...

  “I loved you, Jaezila, and you worked against me, betrayed me—"

  “Not you, prince,” said Seg sharply. “Against that maniac Thyllis."

  Tyfar barely heard Seg. His gaze fastened on Jaezila. She stared back, and after that first tremor, she did not flinch.

  “I've called you a ninny, Ty, and it isn't true. How do you think I felt? Do you imagine I liked acting this part with a man—with the man—?"

  “Why didn't you tell me?"

  Kytun slapped that everready sword back into the scabbard with the hand that happened to be grasping it at the time, and gestured irritably with two others. “Act your age, prince!"

  “A spy—” Tyfar drew a breath. “Sucking our secrets—"

  Seg broke in, as annoyed as Kytun.

  “We've offered to support your father's just claim to the throne. We've all heard excellent reports of you. We want to be your friends. You've got to accept the realities, prince; you have to accept the needle."

  If this was the right way or the wrong way, I did not know. Seg and Kytun were in no doubt. Jaezila was in agony, and so was Tyfar, and all because a silly woman who was Empress of Hamal had been obsessed with ambitions and conquest.

  I said, “That Jaezila is the Princess Majestrix of Vallia has no bearing on our friendship. We have said we are blade comrades. Well, then, let us prove it."

  “You are right, of course.” Tyfar spoke in a musing way that would, for anyone who did not know him, cause intense astonishment that he was not roaring and swearing away and dragging out his sword and threatening all kinds of dire retributions and hurling recriminations about like hailstones. “It was a shock. My opinion of Vallia has not been high."

  I could feel keenly for Tyfar. A shock, he said. By Zair! What he must be feeling now! And yet his face remained calm and composed, a trifle too pale, and that bandage beginning to leak an ugly red stain.

  Jaezila cried out. “Ty! Your head!” She swung on Jiktar Erdil Avnar, who had proved the catalyst in the revelation. “Erdil, run for the needleman—the prince bleeds!"

  “Quidang, majestrix—"

  “It's only a scratch, Zila,” protested Ty.

  I let out a breath. A big, a mighty big, hurdle had been leaped in those few words.

  The dam broke on that, and a babble of words flowed out, everyone talking at once, and then stopping, and starting up again. Tyfar sat down on the ground, thump, suddenly. Jaezila bent above him, her face drawn with concern. The doctor with Kytun was a Djang, and he swung his four arms into action at once, putting a fresh bandage around Tyfar's head and sticking a few acupuncture needles artfully into him to take away the pain. Tyfar fretted under this fussing.

  “I'm all right. And you—Zila—you're a damned Vallian, and a spy, and a princess—no. No. The Princess Majestrix—"

  “I couldn't have told you before, Ty. Could I? You see that?"

  “Of course.” He looked up at me. “And you, Jak?"

  “I did not know until very recently. It was a shock to me, too."

  “And you didn't—"

  “There was just one chance of telling you, Tyfar, and it passed away because I considered that this matter lay between you and Jaezila."

  “I suppose we should call you Lela now, Zila."

  “No. I like Jaezila."

  I heard what I had just spoken. The words rang in my head. I had as good as said this was no concern of mine. Well, Zair knows, I've dropped myself into plenty of scrapes on Kregen in affairs that were no concern of mine. But, in this...

  I stood back a little. I looked down on Tyfar who had been made comfortable on the ground with a cloak, and on Jaezila who sat at his side, holding his hand. No doubt assailed me that they would reach their own understanding. Tyfar was probably more hurt and weaker than he realized. But my own words thundered at me, and the implications drew blackness into my face. This business really was between these two. Their lives were involved, not mine, their futures together were at stake, not mine. But it was my business, too.

  Tyfar saw my face. At the sudden frown Jaezila twisted to look up at me.

  I said, “Prince Tyfar, we must set the record straight, seeing we have been through much together, and have an empire to heal and a deadly foe across the seas to fight."

  “Jak?” He was puzzled. “Now what—?"

  I stared down at him, aware of the firelight against the rocks, of the evening breeze, of the silence now that the needlemen had tended the wounded and eased their pains.

  “Prince Tyfar, Jaezila is my daughter."

  He laughed.

&nb
sp; Tyfar laughed. His head fell back against the bunched folds of the cloak. The bandage stood out in a streak of yellow against the blue.

  “Your daughter? Does that devil Prescot, the Emperor of Vallia know? Is that why you two venture off—?"

  He sat up. He sat up as though bitten clean through.

  He glared at me, and the blood rushed and collided in his face, and his eyes caught the firelight and glared in red madness.

  I nodded.

  “Yes, Tyfar. That is the way of it. Jaezila is my daughter in all honor. So that makes me—"

  He shook his head and did not wince.

  “You needn't say it.” He sounded drugged.

  “So that I can and will have your father, Prince Nedfar, crowned Emperor of Hamal."

  “Is that all you can think of, Father?"

  “No. But it is a good thought to hold onto now."

  “Dray Prescot.” Tyfar savored the words, the name, rolling it around his mouth like a gob of rotten fruit. He spat it out. “The great devil, Dray Prescot. By Krun! You've had a good laugh at my—"

  “Tyfar! Do not think that! By Vox, lad, never think that!"

  “Oh, no Ty! Surely you can see father would never laugh at you like that! For the sweet sake of Opaz! We are blade comrades!"

  Tyfar fell back on the cloak. His face remained flushed and his eyes looked feverish. Sweat shone on his forehead under the bandage. Jaezila sponged the sweat away gently.

  Seg rolled over. He put his hands on his hips, looking down on Tyfar. He said, “Prince, I can tell you this. Dray Prescot may be a cunning old leem hunter but he is a man who knows friends and what friendship means. If you are fortunate enough to count yourself a comrade of Dray Prescot, then you are fortunate above most men. And I know."

  I repeat this, you will readily perceive, to illustrate the arguments various folk used to ease the torment Tyfar was experiencing. I think chiefly he felt used, diminished in his own eyes. But I believed in him. Jaezila was no fool. She knew Tyfar better than did I, and she was not deceived in him, I felt sure.

  This scene had been painful for us all. Now it had to finish. In the ensuing hours, on and off, Tyfar would talk of the times we'd had together, and see them in a new light. “All the time I was working for Hamal, you were working for Vallia."

  “For Vallia.” Jaezila's face, caught in reflected fire glow, looked impassioned. “That is the point, Ty! Had you seen some of the terrible things the mercenaries and slavers did in Vallia, at the command of that horrible woman—and who weeps now that she is dead?—had you seen that..."

  “War—"

  “Not the kind of war the new Vallia fights. No. If those dreadful things had happened to your Hamal, wouldn't you fight?"

  He looked weak, his face wan, the yellow bandage unhealthy against his skin. “I did fight—"

  “The position is,” said Seg. “Thyllis has been got rid of with the minimum of damage and trouble. Hamal is virtually unharmed. Your father can take over a running empire. Back in Vallia we still face the troubles your country has brought us."

  At times desultory with exhaustion, at others impassioned, the talk went on through the night. No one slept very much. Too much lay at stake here. These hours witnessed events of the most momentous significance. We all felt that. The very night air seemed imbued with intimations of the future.

  At one point Tyfar sat up, looking wild. “I feel so dirty!"

  “That is a natural reaction, understandable. The name of spy is universally condemned. But if a spy acts in honor—"

  “As we have done, Tyfar,” I put in, speaking hard.

  Jaezila nodded vehemently. “And you had better rest. I don't like that hole in your head."

  And Tyfar said, “Which one?"

  Barkindrar the Bullet and Nath the Shaft, who had been with us through many perils, looked numbed when they were told. They were flabbergasted. I watched them narrowly, believing they would take their lead from their prince; but ready in case they decided that their duty to their country called on them to attempt to slay the Emperor and Princess Majestrix of Vallia.

  “Jak?” said Barkindrar in his uncouth Brokelsh way. “You're an emperor?"

  “Of Vallia?” Nath the Shaft's brown fingers curled around his bowstave. It was not a great Lohvian longbow; but he was a remarkable shot with the compound reflex weapon.

  “When I am in Vallia. Here I am Jak the Shot, your comrade, and comrade to Prince Tyfar. You must help him grapple with this. After all, we went through the Moder together, and that underground horror was far worse."

  Tyfar, whom I had thought asleep, rolled over and half sat up. “I wonder?"

  That worried me.

  “I must bathe myself,” he said in a slurred voice. “I must take the Baths of the Nine."

  Nath and Barkindrar looked concerned. “There are no facilities—"

  “Here, prince?"

  “Fetch the needleman!” cried Jaezila.

  When the Djang doctor arrived and examined Tyfar he pursed up his lips.

  “It is not promising, king, not promising at all. The prince will develop a fever and needs better attention than we can give him here."

  “Like father like son,” said Seg. “I left Nedfar with the best needleman in Hammansax. We'll have to get this fiery young zhantil to him as well."

  “Yes."

  “Except that I left the voller with him to take Nedfar on. Hammansax itself was in a bad way, as you know."

  “We'll have to mount up, strap Tyfar on, and fly as fast as we can. If any bird can do it, a flutduin can."

  “The flight—” The needleman spread his hands. All four of them. “I cannot answer for—"

  “We understand, Khotan,” said Jaezila.

  Khotan the Needle nodded, not very happy at the prospects.

  Barkindrar and Nath turned away, out of the firelight.

  Some of the wounded were too badly hurt to move, and men and attention must be left with them until we could get a flier back. Jaezila looked across the fire at me, her cheeks shining and lined with shadow so that, for a moment, I shivered. I shook myself roughly. By Vox! Tyfar had had a shock; he'd get over it, get over the mental wounding as surely as he would the physical. All the same, one had to be prepared for him to break out as a high-tempered prince, strong on honor, had every right to do. This mess was nowhere near over yet. If Tyfar took himself off into a voluntary exile to brood over his betrayal, as he would see these unfortunate circumstances, and then resolved to join King Telmont to strike against his country's victors—who could blame him? In my view he would be wrong; but I was prejudiced.

  As the twin Suns of Scorpio rose between the mountain peaks bringing with them a new day of puzzles and emotions, I was thinking that, by Zair! what it would be to be just a semi-brainless adventurer wandering the face of Kregen with a ready sword, instead of a semi-brainless emperor attempting to guide the destinies of a world. Shouts of mingled anger and mirth lifted and I turned to see a group of swods manhandling somebody out of a cave entrance, somebody who struck me instantly as strange, weird, eerie.

  * * *

  Chapter eight

  Pale Vampire Worms

  Over by the flutduin lines Tyfar was being assisted into the saddle by his own people. The Djang owners of the saddlebirds stood back. Jaezila hovered, anxious, with Seg and Kytun beside her. We all sensed that at this moment Tyfar wished to have his own people about him. This mood would pass. I had to believe that.

  The group of yelling men dragged their captive down toward us. My first reaction remained, reinforced the nearer he came. A shock of wild hair, brown and gray, sticking out like a porcupine's quills, a raggedy collection of skins and leaves, scrawny arms and legs, those bandy legs of the wildmen, and a face like a squashed rat's convinced me this fellow was bad news to anyone. He was gagged tightly with a strip of leather so that his face was drawn back into a stretched grin.

  “A Havil-forsaken moorkrim sorcerer!"

  “Cut o
ff his head—now!"

  “Burn him!"

  The uproar continued as the swods roughhoused their prisoner across the rocks to their Deldar. Deldar Fresk Thyfurnin looked grave. Like us all he was exhausted from the aftereffects of the fighting and the lack of sleep. He said to me, “They were lucky to catch the Arditchoith. Nasty customers, as dangerous as a wounded leem."

  One of the sub-officers, a matoc, reported in that the wildman sorcerer, the Arditchoith, had been snapped up by a party as he tumbled from a rocky ledge in the cave. Both sides had been surprised and shocked. But here was the sorcerer, wild as all hell, safely gagged and bound.

  “Make sure the gag is tight, matoc."

  “Quidang, by Kuerden the Merciless!"

  The uproar attracted Seg and Kytun and they walked across from the flutduin lines. Presently we would have to take off with Tyfar and pray he survived his ordeal.

  Seg was just saying, “They'll never get any information out of him if they rough him up like that,” in a judicious way when the sorcerer—by some sleight of thaumaturgy, no doubt—broke momentarily free. Those few moments were enough. His bandy legs twinkling, he broke through the startled swods, leaped for a boulder, balanced, leaped for the far side, and tumbled clean into the all-embracing arms of a party of Djangs come to see what the excitement was all about. They held him, and he would not escape them.

  “By Zodjuin of the Silver Stux!” rapped Kytun. “This fellow is a man! Let's find out more about him."

  The Djangs grasped the wildman and he was run up to stand defiantly before Kytun. Now Kytun is a majestically impressive figure, broad, bulky, regal of mien, and his four arms are so evidently capable of dealing out punishment and destruction that he inspires universal respect. Also, as I know, those same four muscular arms and deadly hands can be infinitely tender in caring for those he loves, and in looking after the flowers that so delight him in his garden back home in his paradise island of Uttar Djombey.