Scorpio Reborn

by Alan Burt Akers

  On that rather insubstantial note she said she was retiring and told me to clear out. Her cart, tent and gear were all here correct. She had worn her proper clothes when the Star Lords had brought her back from her trip downriver. I wondered if a folk tale might grow of people who took passage on flatboats down the River of Oneness and then disappeared.

  As I bid her goodnight I reflected that the Everoinye looked after those kregoine they favored. Me, they’d fished up out of a Savanti reject. The old feelings I’d had of the Star Lords, that if they’d supplied me with a shield and a helmet and a spear, I’d think the less of them, seemed now, whilst still true in the savage barbarian code, hardly applicable to Mevancy.

  I found myself a corner and a bit of straw and slept the sleep of the mightily abused of the world.

  All the same, as I awoke, my second thought was a gleeful reminder that I’d kept the rapier. If you do not know my first thought by now, well, as it is the same as the last thought of all before I sleep... and if you still do not know, I can only say...!

  Mevancy seemed to me a trifle down as we ate the first breakfast. I surmised this might be because she’d been dragged back here by the Everoinye to nursemaid me when she clearly had other plans. Mind you, Pompino’s other plans always went up in smoke if the Star Lords called on him.

  The sense of doom surrounding the caravan had been lightened only temporarily by last night’s entertainments. Mevancy just toyed with her rasher and loloo’s eggs. “You’ll have to keep well out of the way, cabbage.” She heaved up a sigh. “I suppose I’ll see some more of Leotes, now. He at least among these people appears a person of culture and—” She interrupted herself sharply as she caught my eye. “And you needn’t mock, you fambly!”

  “Mock?” I said. “Mock? What, me mock a grand lady like you?”

  She threw a piece of bread at my head. I caught it, reached for the butter, spread it, said: “Why, thank you,” and popped the morsel into my mouth.

  She sniffed.

  “At least your reflexes are improving.”

  I did not feel in the mood to explain to her that they and skill were the only things that had kept me alive last evening.

  Following on that thought convinced me that Mevancy had not been flung back by the Star Lords to take care of me. Had they considered that then she would have arrived before Hangol began his antics.

  So, therefore, that line of argument carried me, what difference was there between this last return of Mevancy’s — not to rescue me — and the occasion when she had returned in time to knock off the vulture — clearly to rescue me? Or was I wrong in that, too? Her explanation of her escape from the bandits rang hollow, a matter of biting through bonds and sneaking out and of finding the two riding animals. Oh, no! The Star Lords had hoicked her out of the bandits’ camp, provided her with animals, clothes, weapons and money. Truly, I had been a starveling beggar where the Star Lords were concerned. Well, I could see changes there, startling changes, as you shall hear.

  “You look as though you’ve lost a zorca and found a calsany,” I said, a trifle sharply. “I do appreciate your concern for me, but—”

  “But nothing, fambly! Oh, you! You remind me of old Pontior when I was looking after him and I had to dress him up as a woman.” She put her head on one side, sizing me up. “No. I can’t imagine you dressed up as a woman.”

  “I have done so,” I said, equably. “And no doubt will do so again.” Then I essayed a nasty shaft. “Do you make a habit of going around taking care of people?”

  Her head went back. The piece of bread, butter and marmalade halted before those ripe lips. “And if I did, does that concern you?”

  I felt a mean beast.

  Just why I had not told her outright and at once that we both worked for the Star Lords I can only attribute to my natural secrecy where my hide depends on caution and a testing of the way. I would tell her, clearly, one day. Right or wrong, I judged that day had not yet dawned.

  “Not my concern,” I agreed, which was a lie.

  Llodi popped in to tell us that Strom Hangol had taken to his litter. His wound was turning septic and the needleman was concerned that septicemia would set in under the difficult conditions of the journey. Llodi did not smile when he told us this — well, not outwardly.

  “It’s a shame for him,” said Llodi solemnly. “Him being a lord an’ all.”

  “That Hargon — oh, yes, I know he likes to be called San—” snapped Mevancy. “Him and Hangol are thick as thieves. Leotes is too easy going.”

  “Yes, my lady,” said Llodi. “Hargon was beside the litter early this morning. What they talk about an’ all, I dunno.”

  “I’ve a nasty feeling I could make a shrewd guess not too far from the truth.”

  She sounded heated. How far, I wondered, had the friendship between her and Vad Leotes prospered?

  With the incapacitation of the strom helping us we were able to arrange matters for me to keep out of sight, what today would be called a low profile. I continued to help Rikky Tardish; I was not called upon to venture upon the stage again. When I say I was heartily glad to be rid of the green face, the red nose and the donkey’s ears, I understate my feelings. And yet — and yet, if farces are demanded and paid for then someone has to dress up like that. Why should I imagine I was above that? What! I’d been the buffoon for a damned long time and only very recently had I been gaining a different view of the Star Lords, an understanding a little better than an inkling of their purposes.

  The caravan wended its way westwards across southern Loh. Far to the north sprawling across the equator lay the jungles of Chem. South of them were the savannah type lands, grassy and open plains, filled with a teeming wildlife as well as roads and cities and civilizations. As the character of the land changed, its vegetation, its soils, its climate, people adapted themselves. This trail we were following, the Old Lorn Trail, traced a course at the interface of grass and desert. I asked questions, naturally, and was told the peoples of the north compressed these folk of Tsungfaril so that their homes were built along the rivers and in the oases. They ventured in guarded caravans across the true deserts to the south to reach the broad and fertile coastal plains to carry on a lively trade. Ng’groga, Zamrarn, Din’nagul and other nations, prosperous countries all, were regularly visited in the way of trade. To the west, to Tarankar, the folk of Tsungfaril did not go. Was it not well known that the evil beasts of Tarankar roasted and ate human babies?

  Despite this trading activity, and also despite its scattered nature, the land of Tsungfaril was relatively cut off and isolated. The people kept to themselves. Well, that is known. My Djangs do not often care to venture abroad save on the most urgent of errands.

  During these questions the name of people referred to as paol-ur-bliem cropped up. My natural queries were met by averted eyes, a shake of the head, and either silence or a change of conversation. Llodi did say, before walking off rapidly: “You must speak with a dikaster, him being a diviner an’ all.”

  “Where do I find him?” I shouted after Llodi.

  “I couldn’t tell you.”

  “Couldn’t or wouldn’t?” But he vanished around the lictrix lines and I did not follow, for Strom Hangol’s tent wasn’t too far off and his cronies were to be reckoned with in my puny state.

  To refer to that side of this trip for a moment, Mevancy had spoken to her friend Leotes and the word had gone out. Hangol and his cronies’ hands were stayed for now.

  All the same, Vad Leotes was far too easy going. His red moustaches bristled up in fine good humor, and he laughed endlessly. Well, by Vox, he had every right to, didn’t he? He was rich, pampered, was served hand and foot, didn’t do a stroke of work, and from what I gathered could do nothing at all he didn’t want to do — save in one thing.

  “The queen sometimes presses him hard, cabbage.” She shook her head. “Leotes is vastly loyal to her. Why, why else do you think he’d venture out on the Old Lorn Trail if it wasn’t because
she sent him?”

  “Is he married?” I said brutally. I knew marriage as an accepted form of union existed in Tsungfaril.

  “He was. His wife died. He has children, though—”

  “Then I’m doubly sorry for him, and also glad.”

  I knew she had the wit to understand what I meant. She cocked her head on one side. “You have children, then.”

  “Yes.” I wasn’t prepared to tell her that Drak was the Emperor of Vallia, Zeg was the King of Zandikar, and Jaidur was the King of Hyrklana. Nor that Lela was still prancing around Prince Tyfar of Hamal, the pair of them a couple of loons. Nor that Dayra was — well, where was Dayra, Ros the Claw, and what was she up to? And little Velia — well, little Velia was no longer little but a full fledged member of the Sisters of the Rose along with Didi.

  Oh, yes, I had children all right; yet I felt young, young, and could still act with all the thoughtless enthusiasm of youth when I forgot the cares of empire. She gave me a long look, and the subject was dropped.

  We crossed the Farang Parang, sticky but nowhere as unpleasant as the Great Salt Desert. In somewhat better land to the north, a ferocious nation of nomads effectively barred the easier route. Sometimes those who attacked the caravans were not just disaffected bandits but members of these nomad tribes, the Glitch Riders. They were also a pain to the civilized lands to the north.

  What she did say, once when referring to children, was that Vad Leotes’ children seemed unimportant. Singularly unimportant, Mevancy said.

  The subject of children came up when I tackled Rikky Tardish about the missing left hand dagger to the rapier he’d given me.

  He spread his hands, soulfully.

  “The vad had all the loot from the bandits, as is his right.”

  Somewhat crustily, for as close to the main gauche as this I was annoyed to be baulked of it by some damned vad, I said: “And I suppose it’ll stay in his family for generations and his kids will have it—”

  “Yes and no,” said Rikky Tardish.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Here in Tsungfaril,” he said, and averted his eyes, “we praise Tsung-Tan and we would prefer not to talk about the paol-ur-bliem — accursed to foreigners. Even those of good heart.”

  He would not be drawn any further so I took myself off wondering why Leotes, as he was one of these mysterious paol-ur-bliem people, should be accursed.

  Rikky Tardish’s long eight-wheeled plains wagon dropped its front two off-side wheels into a stone-strewn gulley and smashed the pair of them to flinders. The twelve mytzers hauling the wagon were unhitched after they’d hauled the wagon out and Rikky stared glumly at the wreck. Leotes sent word that the caravan would camp for the night here and now, as he wished to visit the abandoned city of Ivory Lorn. Rikky puffed out his cheeks.

  “The vad is a good man, Drajak.”

  “Aye,” I agreed.

  As a world Kregen is a remarkable place. Yet geography and natural causes, unless interfered with by savants, operate in much the same way as on Earth. The River of Drifting Leaves ahead of us on which stood Makilorn had once flowed southwards here. Its course was still broadly marked in the dust. Once both banks of the river had flourished with vegetation, rich with produce and fat cattle in the water meadows, the irrigations giving life to support the splendid city whose ruins now exerted so powerful an attraction upon the mind.

  Mevancy, glowing, said: “Leotes and I are going to explore the ruins, cabbage. I suppose it is no use you trying to help Rikky?”

  “Not much.”

  She laughed and walked off with that lithe swing of her hips and I saw her and Leotes mount up and gallop off towards the abandoned city. Well, if that was the way of it, then it was no business of mine. I felt that little itch of puzzlement over Mevancy; I still wasn’t sure she was apim. Not, of course, that it would make any difference if the races were compatible.

  The short day’s travel left me feeling restless and it was in my mind to have a look at these ancient ruins myself. When the river changed course the people had simply taken what they could carry and left what they couldn’t and traipsed off to find the river again to the west. The city left in the dryness still stood, in surprisingly good condition. Some of the temples remained impressive buildings, towering against the afternoon sky.

  The lictrix Mevancy had provided, Snuffles, gave me a leery look as I unhitched him from the lines to which he’d only recently been led. He pawed the ground; but he used his near side middle leg, so he wasn’t too upset. I had my foot in the stirrup when Master Pandarun hurried up, calling: “Drajak! A moment. Have you seen the vad?”

  “He went off to the ruins.”

  “I know but—”

  “Yes, I saw where he went.”

  “Zorca riders have come in. There is an urgent message from the queen. The vad must be informed at once. Will you—?”

  “Of course.” I mounted up, touched Snuffles, and set off thinking only that this was a reasonable excuse for me to have a look at the ruins.

  The city of Ivory Lorn must have been a tremendous place. I found myself comparing the pile with lost cities of two worlds. Ivory Lorn ranked high. As I rode gently down a broad dust-choked avenue flanked by the facades of still impressive edifices, I spotted two figures high on the flank of a temple. They’d tethered their mounts and climbed up to get a panoramic view. They were sitting close together, dangling their legs over the side. I found myself thinking that Vad Leotes wouldn’t mind if I shouted up.

  A projecting cornice obscured the two figures as I rode on, and when I’d passed that building and cleared the cornice away, there was no sign of them.

  My feelings were not wholly of annoyance. I wouldn’t mind climbing up and taking in the view. I tethered Snuffles and started the climb which was easy.

  Always I walk with a light tread, as silently as I can; it is a habit. A noise of a slide of loose stone took my attention back to the avenue. Three figures ran out and vanished into shadows opposite. I frowned. One of those men was Gandil the Mak, the second San Hargon and the third another of Strom Hangol’s cronies, Nalgre the Frunicator. I went back to climbing with great urgency. I felt a thickness in my throat. By Zair! If... I stopped that thought and climbed frantically.

  When I reached the place where I’d spotted them, there was no sign. I called: “Mevancy!”

  A voice directly ahead called back: “Cabbage!”

  I moved forward cautiously on that high platform and looked over the edge. Mevancy clung to a narrow ledge, a decoration in the stone, just an arm’s length below. She had the fingers of both hands hooked onto the ledge. Leotes had his arms wrapped about her waist and hips, hanging from her body. The avenue stretched a killing distance below them. Mevancy’s fingers slipped. There was not much time. Her head tilted and her face looked up, taut, strained, yet she said: “Lahal, cabbage. Can you do anything?”

  I lay down on my stomach, stuck my head over the edge, staring down. We were a long way up. One slip and it would be squashed tomato down there.

  I put both my arms down and could just reach her wrists. In the instant I grasped her, her fingers slipped again. She gasped. I felt her weight pull on me and my body scraped three inches forward over the platform.

  “We will pull you over too!”

  “Just hold on, Mevancy—”

  “My fingers are done for—”

  “I’ll hold you.”

  “You, cabbage! With your woflo strength!”

  I felt myself slide forward again. There was absolutely no way on Kregen I was going to pull them up. There wasn’t even a decent toe hold.

  For the first time Leotes spoke.

  “We will pull us all over. I do not want you to die, Mevancy.”

  She took what he meant instantly.

  “No, Leotes! You can’t! Help will reach us—”

  “You forget I am paol-ur-bliem, my dear.” He tilted his head back and I could see his fierce upturned red moustaches. �
�I just regret the time wasted. Still, youngsters grow fast when there is a reason for it.”

  I didn’t know what he was burbling on about. I did know that if help didn’t come damned quickly then I had a most horrendous decision to make.

  With a kind of snorting gasp I managed a hoarse bellow.

  “Help!”

  Mevancy took up the shouts, fiercely: “Help! To the vad! Help!”

  Leotes cut in. “We are slipping down. Help will not reach us in time.”

  She stared up at me and blood rushed into her face. “Don’t you dare drop the vad, Drajak! Don’t you dare!”

  She must have felt some movement of his arms about her, for she screamed again, almost incoherently: “No, no! Leotes! No!”

  My body scraped forward again, nearer to the edge where I would topple helplessly over.

  I’d be a red puddle down there unless I let go.

  And, truth to tell, I could feel the strength leaching away from my fingers and wrists. In all Opaz’s Truth, I couldn’t hold on much longer.

  I think Leotes saw that in my face.

  What he couldn’t see was the guilt I would bear for ever after, for I knew without the shadow of a doubt where my loyalty lay. The noise of my belt scraping over the stone sounded hideously. In only a moment or two I would have to act or die.

  Mevancy calmed down. She said something in a low voice and Leotes laughed — a weird jolly laugh, full-bodied and without mockery, devastating for a man in his position. “You will wait, my dear?”

  Mevancy said: “Of course, my love.”

  And Leotes let go and dropped down and down and splattered on the pavement.

  I felt the difference at once and knew I could hold Mevancy.

  So that was the way they found us when rescue at last arrived.

  Chapter ten

  Mevancy said: “There is no one in the caravan we can rely on who has power sufficient to hold the shint. Hurry, fambly! We must ride for the city and lose ourselves there as fast as maybe.”

  She was upset and hurt, that I could see. I believe she had a little cry in the privacy of her tent before she blazed into action. She was not distraught. She acted, and the impression I gained was clear, as though there had been an interruption in her plans.