We crossed the open space swiftly, and now we ran with naked steel in our fists. Fordan stayed close to Tilly.
“The Racters sent a note to each of us, saying the other must desperately meet. So I went to the meeting place, and Ortyg went too, and—”
“The Racters surprised you and kidnapped you, and sold you as slaves!”
“Yes and no.” We slowed our run to a walk and Fordan assisted Tilly and Oby and I helped Fransha. “No, Strom Luthien wanted to kill us out of hand—”
“He would.”
“But the Kov of Falkerdrin would not permit it. He said we would go to his estates and be held prisoner until the Time of Troubles was over.”
“Nath Famphreon, you mean? The son of Natyzha?”
“Yes.”
“I know him. In this, he acted as I would expect, I think. He has notions of honor and loyalty. The pity of it is, in one cynical sense, that his loyalty is to his mother.”
“He was kind to us. He apologized for what had been done. And I believed him.”
We went down an alleyway between hedges, heading toward a squat, flat-roofed building supported on many thick pillars. That had the look of a landing platform.
“Nath Famphreon betrayed you?”
“No.” Fransha was now gaining better control of herself. Her memories of what she had gone through were being pushed aside as she spoke of the very beginning of her ordeal. “No. Our airboat had to come down — well, you know how unreliable they are. We were captured by flutsmen. The kov was not with us, and his men fought, but they were overborne. He employs mighty paktuns to work for him. But some were slain and others were captured. We were sold...” She stopped. She did not like to recall this part of her adventures; it brought back the hideous nightmare, and she shook.
Tilly said, “Leave her alone for now.”
“That is the platform,” said Fordan. He carried the Rapa guard’s thraxter. I was pleased to see he gripped it in the fashion of one who knew how to use the sword.
“No, Tilly.” I spoke as gently as I could. They all jumped anyway. “No, there is yet one more thing I must know.”
Fransha laughed, too shrilly. “Ortyg? My love, Ortyg Voinderam?” She was shaking so much now her hair swung and matted before her face. “I do not know. I have not seen him since they brought me to this hideous place!”
The racter party had been very clever. They had spiked our guns in the matter of our plans to invade them. But, all the same, I was glad to have confirmation that Phu-Si-Yantong was not instigating this latest plot against us in Vallia.
We paused in the shadows of the landing platform. An ornate staircase built of stone, with iron balustrades and chemzite facings, led up to the roof. Hyrklana is rich in iron. On the roof the overhanging eaves of hangars for the fliers told us the private flierdrome was of some capacity.
“Listen,” I said. “Other escaped slaves will probably come this way, seeking vollers. You, Naghan, and you, Oby, will see to it that our party gets onto the roof and into a voller. Fordan will care for Tilly, I feel sure—”
The Fristle nodded. “With my life.”
“So that leaves the Lady Fransha to you two.”
“And you?”
“Listen! Take a suitable voller and lift off at once—”
“Now just a minute!” started Oby, furiously.
Naghan began expostulating.
I quieted them down.
“Listen, you two! I want you up and away and out of it, with the two ladies. There are still chores I must do here. For one thing, I can’t just walk off and leave old Unmok the Nets, can I? He risked it all coming here with us. And there is Ortyg Voinderam. If he is here I want to find him. That is for the good of Vallia.” I did not add that, also, I had an appointment with Prince Tyfar and Jaezila and their retainers, Barkindrar the Bullet, Nath the Shaft and Kaldu.
“But wecan’t just fly off and leave you!”
“You can. And you will. I came to Hyrklana to get you three out of the Jikhorkdun. Thank Opaz, that has been done — or nearly done as soon as we bag ourselves a voller. And we’ve found the Lady Fransha, which is a blessing, and unexpected, although all of a piece, given the habits of flutsmen and slavers. But I have other things to do.”
Well, there in the shadows, with the shouts of guards beginning to rise from the grounds of the villa, these two wanted to start a fierce whispered argument. I wouldn’t have that. I was somewhat fierce.
In the end we padded up the stairs and knocked over a few guards who wanted to stop us, and we found a palatial voller with a cabin amidships and a steeply lofting poop aft. She had fast lines. She was worth much gold in Hyrklana and a small fortune in Vallia. Oby said she would do.
“No more arguments! Up and away. All the way home to Vallia.” I gave them a very rapid rundown on the altered state of the empire, and cautioned them to beware of everyone until they reached the imperial palace in Vondium. I did not think that would have fallen again. They wanted to know all about the Time of Troubles, but Fransha said she would explain. She called me majister as a matter of course. When, in his biting tones of argumentative sarcasm, Naghan addressed me as prince this and prince that, Fransha looked alarmed.
“But, Naghan — this is the emperor!”
Naghan looked at me. Oby shut his one good eye.
“Emperor?”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said impatiently. “For the sweet sake of Opaz! Take off. Guard yourselves. I’ll be back home in Vondium in no time.” I told them that Delia and a gang of cutthroats might be following me and added that they were to be told what I’d told Naghan and Oby. Privately, I hoped the two parties would not meet up. If they did I knew what would happen. The whole raving bunch would come roaring down to Huringa ready to take the place apart stone by stone.
Of course, that might be a Very Good Thing, as Deb-Lu might say; it did not happen to fit in with the plans we had for Vallia. First things first.
“Now,” I said, and a brusqueness harshened my voice. “Get in the voller and take off!”
And then a party of slaves ran shrieking into the area below the landing platform. That did it. Fordan helped Tilly up into the voller, and I noticed how they both observed the fantamyrrh as they entered. Oby turned to Fransha. But she was looking over the parapet, her fists gripped on the stone.
“Ortyg!” she said, choking, shaking, trembling uncontrollably. “My love! Ortyg!”
Down there vicious guards were herding slaves into a huddle. Whips rose and fell. Shrieks rent the air. And, clearly in the mess of slaves, beaten to his knees, Ortyg Voinderam staggered and fell.
Chapter nineteen
Mazdo the Splandu
What a confounded mess!
I swung to glare at my friends.
“Stay here!” I spat it out. I know my face must have blazed that old devilish look, I know I sounded like the craziest of all mad emperors. “Stay here. Keep a watch from the voller. Slay any guard who tries to molest you. If I fail — lift off.”
“But...!”
“We will...”
“We won’t let you...”
“By the Black Chunkrah! Will you do as I ask?” Then, cunning with the frantic pressures of the moment, I bellowed, “For the sakes of Tilly and Fransha!”
They had not seen what I had glimpsed among the trees and shrubbery beyond the corner of the landing platform. A small stairway led down over there. Without giving them any further chance of argument, I leaped away, raced across the roof.
Their faces must have shown shock and horror in that fraught moment — for I ran away from the ornate stairs with their iron balustrades and chemzite facings. I ran away from the brutal guards and their whips below. I ran away from Ortyg Voinderam, so cruelly beaten into the ground.
I, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor, Krozair of Zy, must have seemed to them to be fleeing.
Just as my head whipped below the level of the platform I half turned and bellowed, “Do as I say as you value your li
ves — and my friendship!”
Then I was down, haring like a maniac for the secluded path leading to the space before the landing platform.
Along that path, hurrying, came the cadade.
With him half ran, half scurried, a gesticulating guard, a Fristle, who had evidently brought the bad news to the cadade. The florid face was more flushed still, the eyes mean, the jaw fiercely set. Sweat dripped from the brim of that splendid helmet with its panache and plumes. He hurried. But he would not sully his own dignity by running.
That pompous self-esteem of his gave me the chance to get down the little back stairs from the landing platform and into the corridor between the hedges.
There was little time for finesse. The Fristle saw me coming and started to yank out his sword. He was slow.
The cadade let rip with a blinding bellow of rage and ripped out his own over-elaborate sword.
Now, I had no wish to slay them, either of them. But this had to be done nip and tuck. I belted into the Fristle, slid the blow of the thraxter, slammed his head back with a simple and unsubtle right cross. Before he slumped to the ground I’d ducked, spun, kicked the cadade and then dug my thumb into his windpipe. After that it was a mercy to tap him alongside the head — having first picked up his sword and tipped off his helmet. He went to sleep.
A voice said, “By Opaz! As neat a piece of work as—”
The voice stopped. It stopped abruptly and on a choked grunt. The reason for that was my fist wrapped around the throat of the speaker. I recognized the golden-furred numim we had released from the Recalcitrants House. I let him go and stepped back and instantly bent to the unconscious cadade.
“You were nearly a dead man there, dom,” I said, matter-of-factly, stripping off the ornate bronze and silver kax, ripping the silver-tissue vest away, getting at the blue tunic beneath. The kilt was mostly bronze and silver. That went on me first, wrapped and thonged with swift and sure knots. I was driving my arms into the tunic before the numim got his breath back.
“You — you are mighty quick, dom.”
“When necessary.” I still did not pause, dispensing with the silver tissue — it had ripped clean across, anyway — getting the kax on. Without being asked, the lion man stepped up and helped me buckle up the straps.
“My thanks, dom—”
“I am Mazdo the Splandu.” He spoke the name simply. But I grasped much by the cognomen — not that there was time for the pappattu. I had to get out into the open space among the slaves before my bunch of revolutionaries came boiling down those ornate stairs to rescue Voinderam themselves.
“There are vollers up there. You had best take one swiftly — I have other work to do.”
“I shall take an airboat from these rasts. But, cannot I help—?”
“Again, my thanks, Mazdo the Splandu. But — no. Best for you to take your freedom while it is still on offer.”
The cadade’s sandals would have to be high-thonged, of course. I slapped the leather thongs about as fast as I could. My heart was beginning to let me know it could beat a right old tattoo. The sword belts, the last check to make sure everything was shipshape, and finally, grabbing the helmet and lifting it up and feeling the weight, and settling it on my head. The kax strained as I raised my arms. But the cadade was a big fellow, as I’ve said, and I could wear his armor albeit with some constricting discomfort.
“You—”
“If you must, call me Chaadur. Now I am off. Remberee, Mazdo the Splandu. We may meet again.”
I bustled along, half-turning, and then banishing that superb specimen of the race of diffs we call numims — lion-men — from my mind. He called after me, soft-voiced, “If we do meet again, Chaadur the Sudden, I stand in your debt.”
I lifted my arm, not looking back, and so rounded the last hedge.
Here I concentrated. I knew the lineaments of the cadade. I forced my face into an approximation, thinking of what Deb-Lu-Quienyin had said, pumping up the blood, getting a flush to spread. Mind you, that wasn’t difficult, not after the rushing about I’d just been doing. I was not exactly panting, but I was breathing faster than usual when I rounded the end of the landing platform and paced rapidly out toward the knot of cowed slaves and the belligerent guards.
They sprang to instant attention as the glory of the bronze and silver kax, the waving plumes, the glittering helmet, bore down on them.
Now for it...
I started bellowing in the hoarse commanding voice I had heard in the outer courtyard. Deb-Lu was right. Habit, acceptance, seeing the clothes and hearing the vicious words of command, all these things added up to the cadade to these guards. I was the cadade. Who else?
This was quite clearly a random collection of slaves. They’d been going about their unending labor when the guards had rounded them up. Quite probably there was not a single one of those who had escaped from the Recalcitrants House.
I stalked across, giving the guards the rough edge of the cadade’s tongue — for a few moments of listening to him in the outer courtyard and experience of his kidney before had given me his measure.
“Take them away,” I foamed. “They are not the ones — fools, dolts, onkers! Nulshes! Pick up this one.” I pointed at Voinderam who lay, a dark trickle of blood staining his pale face. He looked in a bad way. “Bring him. I will question him. He will know the answers.”
Peremptorily, I indicated that two Rapas should drag the slave I had picked out. “The rest of you — about your business, or I’ll have the skin off your backs jikaider! Grak, you yetches, grak!”
The guards started to lead the rest of the slaves off. The two Rapas, blank-faced, petrified with fear, followed me. I headed for the ornate stairway. Halfway up I turned and bellowed down, “What are you skulking for! Hurry, you cramphs! Bring him up here!”
They hurried. The sounds of the others receding gave me little comfort. But, by Zair, a man can do only so much in this wicked world.
At the top I walked half a dozen paces across the roof. The two Rapa guards, shaking in their sandals, started after me, dragging Voinderam between them. His shoulders stuck up like windmill sails, his head hung down, draggling. I quelled any feelings of pity — for anyone.
“Thank you,” I said, and turned back and with a simple one, two, put the Rapas to sleep. I managed to catch Voinderam before his face hit the paving of the roof. A scuffle at my back brought me around — it was Oby with Naghan. Half hysterically, Fransha threw herself forward. Between us, we levered her free, carried Voinderam across to the voller, pushed and pulled Fransha into the airboat.
“Now, take off, keep low, and then go fast. Go as fast as you can. And may Opaz go with you.”
My face did not hurt, and I realized that somewhere up those fancy stairs I’d been forced to let the cadade’s features slip away. I looked at my friends, and I felt the glow of comradeship. Then they started up their protests again.
“I will not tarry long. But you would not — in honor — have me abandon Unmok? Surely?”
“But we should go with you—”
“I am not starting again. By Vox! I left Vallia to get away from that!”
Well, there was little time. A group of slaves ran up the back stairs down which I had gone, and I saw that one carried a bloodstained sword. I fancied he’d got that from the Fristle I’d knocked unconscious. So one did not need to be told whose blood sullied the blade.
The slaves simply raced for the nearest voller, clambered in, and in heartbeats she lifted.
Among that group of ex-slaves maddened by near despair and now gripped with the determination to be free, there was no sign of the splendid golden numim, Mazdo the Splandu. I fancied he’d make his own way out of Noran’s villa, aye, and crack a few heads in the doing of it.
“That does it.” I had to make my friends grasp the essentials. “That lot will arouse the dead. You must go now!”
Finally, reluctantly, but anxious for the welfare of Tilly and the Lady Fransha, they shouted down t
he remberees and the voller lifted off. I did not intend to lollygag around. The flags of the roof were hot underfoot, bathed in the mingled streaming radiance of the Suns of Scorpio. Shadows lay hard and tinged with the old emerald and ruby fires. I darted across into the shade of the hangars, caught the first lifting yells of approaching guards and raced flat out over the roof for the other small stairway, twin to the one down which I had descended on the cadade. As I reached the top and bolted down the first guards boiled up onto the roof.
Below me stretched a maze of little outbuildings. Vegetation smothered the alleyways. This was a relatively neglected quarter in Noran’s villa that offered capital concealment. I stripped off the fancy armor and chucked it down under a bush. With my own clothes once more revealed I sprinted on, twisting and turning, heading back for the outer courtyard, and Froshak and the werstings.
Slowing to a walk and going along briskly but with caution, I angled around the main buildings and so came up to the courtyard from the flank. The uproar in the grounds of the villa really was rather satisfying. Slaves looked uniformly scared; which did not please me. I saw no guards until I reached the courtyard, and they were all staring the other way. I looked, right along with them.
“No,” Froshak was saying. “Not me. Know nothing.”
He stood in the grip of two Rhaclaw guards. By reason of their immense domed heads, Rhaclaws are often badly served in the way of helmets. These two wore helmets fashioned from strips of iron, filled in with boiled leather. They held Froshak firmly.
Callimark, nervously pacing, fiddling with his sword, looking agitated, swung back to glare at Froshak.
“I do not believe you! By Flem! If you’re lying...”
“Know nothing — notor.”
The werstings, still handled by our tame slaves, were being herded into wheeled cages. The pampered dogs, killers or not, went in eagerly enough at the sight of the red meat within.
I walked slowly forward.
This might be a little tricky.
I was still unobserved.
The well where the old bent-over Fristle woman had drawn me a copper bowl of water partly concealed me. The stone coping was dry. No drier, perhaps, than my mouth.
Beasts of Antares Page 20
