Scorpio Triumph [Dray Prescot #43]

by Alan Burt Akers

  A fanfare of the famed silver trumpets of Loh heralded Satra. Dumpy, plump and homely she might appear; she still commanded presence. We all stood up and when she was seated sat ourselves. Tiresome to recount the meal in all its sumptuousness. We ate and drank well. At one point Satra leaned on a rounded elbow and spoke quietly. We listened.

  “My twin sister—oh, yes, I had a twin, as so many of us do in the world. Princess Satra and Princess Csitra.” At this name I sat up. “I loved her and she me. We were inseparable. She was the elder. When we were six we learned that one day, when Csitra grew up, she would become the Empress of Loh.” The queen took a long draught of wine and a slave girl wiped her lips. “The very next day—oh, it was sad, sad!—poor little Csitra tumbled all the way down the grand staircase. Her skull was split open. I cried at the mess.”

  Delia's eyes met mine. So that was how a Queen of Pain got started!

  A fat major domo, his girth swathed in a violent sash of madder and gold, waddled in and bent to whisper in the queen's ear. She gave me a sliding glance and then nodded. The major domo strutted up to me.

  “There is a Lady Mevancy outside who wishes to have a word with you, my lord. It is a matter of the utmost urgency.”

  A guard detail of my lads had accompanied us to the queen's camp area where the queen's retainers had taken over. I welcomed the idea of getting out of this hot-house atmosphere and having a few words with my jurukkers.

  I stood up and made the necessary floridly polite excuses and Satra waved a white plump arm and I was at liberty to leave. Seg was looking fixedly up the table and I turned as I left to give a swift glance there. Schian was leaning back in his chair and wearing a look of extreme pleasure. They'd placed the Lady Merlee beside him at table and he'd been trying to win her attention during the meal, and now she was beginning to melt. Licria leaned forward sharply, so sharply she knocked over a goblet of wine.

  Anyway, what in a Herrelldrin Hell did Mevancy want now? Moodily I supposed it had something to do with the Everoinye.

  Two of Satra's impeccably clad guards stood each side of the tent opening, the four being armed as churgurs with blazoned shields; the two guards on the other side of the opening were Bowmen of Loh. I gave them a curt nod as I passed into the canvas-enclosed anteroom. Like any thoroughgoing crew of chamberlains and major domos, Satra's lot surrounded the queen with as many barriers to the outside world they could contrive. Without massive stone walls and only canvas to work with they still managed an impressive maze. Hitching up my rapier I went off along the tented corridor.

  They really should have waited until I reached the junction of tents at the far end. There were four men and a woman and they were far too eager. Much too forward. Movement in the mouth of the cross tunnel took my gaze away from the five would be assassins. Mevancy stood there, her arms twisted up her back, her face black with fury. She was held by two more men and another woman stood at her side, holding a dagger to Mevancy's throat. So the whole picture was there to read.

  All of these people wore tunics of so dark a blue it appeared black. They had the courtesy to wear black half-masks. What the quality of assassins in Satra's time might have been I wasn't sure. Probably very high, given the employment opportunities of the times. These stikitches had turned up in droves to deal with one girl and one man.

  My right hand crossed my body to the left and my left hand crossed to the right. I moved slowly and deliberately. I did not draw in a showy flashing Bladesman's draw for action. The rapier and main gauche were not out of their scabbards when the first fellow gave a small and surprised grunt.

  He carried a lynxter, the straightish cut and thrust sword of Loh. He dropped it. He put both hands to his chest to clutch at the long Lohvian arrow sprouting there. The fletchings were red and gold, just like the fletchings of Queen Satra's personal bodyguard of Bowmen of Loh.

  Before this fellow fell to the canvas floor the man next to him, the woman, and the fellow on the other side, were all struck through with accurate shafts. I did not think these arrows had been loosed by any of Satra's guards. “Would you care to stand a mite to the side, my old dom—?”

  I complied and a shaft whipped past to bury its head in the face of the fifth stikitche.

  “I hope,” I said without turning my head, “I sincerely trust you did not damage Satra's bowmen.”

  “Not at all! Not at all! The second one was most happy to lend me his bow, most happy indeed.”

  I didn't care to ask about the first one. I was staring at Mevancy as she was forced out from the tented junction towards us. That dagger at her throat looked damned sharp—the damned sharp dagger was no longer pressing against Mevancy's throat—it was flying through the air and the woman was shrieking with an arrow through her hand.

  Before I—a mere swordsman in all this—could do anything, two more arrows finished off the stikitches. They were not all dead, Seg wasn't that stupid, although it was obvious who had contracted with them for this work.

  “Now we'll see the quality of stikitches they have around here,” said Seg. He stepped up beside me, giving the bow a little shake. “Not a bad little juicer, not bad at all.” From Seg that was high praise.

  The woman made no attempt to pull the arrow free—that would have ruined her hand for good—instead she gripped that wrist with her other hand, sprang about, and started to run off.

  Seg said: “I don't really believe...”

  I said: “No more nor I.”

  Mevancy shrilled out: “Shoot the vicious shint!”

  The woman whipped around a canvas corner and the chance was gone.

  “No need to ask if you are all right, then, pigeon.”

  “All right! I—I—” She panted a bit and swung her hair up out of the way. “I tell you, cabbage, when that woman's dagger kissed my throat, it was like—well, look!” She took her hand from her throat. The fingers shone wet. “The shint cut me!”

  “Not deep, Lady Mevancy,” said Seg. “Not deep.”

  “Of course not! if it had been deep she'd have slit my throat!”

  Although everything had taken place at such speed we could expect inquisitive guards at any moment. I said: “The guards will be here soon—”

  “Of course they will,” said Seg in his bold bluff confident way. “I should hope so! Let them see the disgraceful way they take care of the queen's guests.” I felt the bubbles of amusement rising—it was not often after a fracas like this I didn't have to run off sharpish, by Krun!

  Mevancy said: “They would have killed you, then me, saying they discovered me in the act. And you let her run off!”

  “If we wish to find her, that should not be too difficult.” Seg wasn't going to argue ethics. “A woman with an arrow through her hand.”

  “I suppose,” said Mevancy with extreme sarcasm, still panting, still wrought up, “if it had been a man you'd have shafted him without thought.”

  Whether or not Seg was now prepared to argue ethics, and with them the peculiar reversal of values in the female viewpoint on certain issues, I didn't know. Across the canvas floor-covering a little reddish-brown scorpion trotted along, his eight legs going up and down like organ keys, his sting high and curved and arrogant. He cocked his head on one side and those bright beady eyes beamed brilliantly up.

  I took hold of Mevancy around the waist and I shouted to Seg: “We're off now—tell Delia—”

  My words died in the hollow coldness that descended as the enveloping blue folds of the giant Scorpion closed about Mevancy and me. The Star Lords had sent for us. Hurtling into a long blue void, feeling the rushing of unseen wings all about, up we went, up with the phantom blue Scorpion of the Star Lords.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  * * *

  Chapter seven

  Existing through the experiences of sitting down to a formal dinner with all the trimmings when I was down in the earth surrounded by monsters and magics, and having to put up with a clumsy assassination attempt, impinged on me wi
th a high degree of Unreality. How could I take all that nonsense seriously? It was all Unreal.

  Going up to see the Star Lords—I felt as though a fluid weight had sunk through my body—that was Real. I was back in Reality once again.

  The cold blueness swirled all about me and the warm firm feel of Mevancy's body was gone. We had been torn apart. Head over heels I went up in the blue mist.

  “And mind you don't drop me again!” I bellowed up. “You nurdling great apology for a Scorpion!”

  In the next instant I expected to go tumbling across the deck of a boat to find myself alone in a broad ocean. Up and still up I went.

  All right, then—if there were to be no boat then I'd see fireworks splattering all across the firmament as Star Lord argued with Star Lord, the red of what I thought of as the establishment and the acrid green of Ahrinye the rebellious trouble-maker. Still up and up in the blueness I went.

  Was I, then, to be transported in a hissing chair through multicolored veils? Would I walk into the room of the three silver-framed pictures? Perhaps they would dump me down in that cool oval room with a comfortable chair and a table bearing a flagon of fine wine. The Everoinye might, as they had indicated, send me to the bacra area, a weirdly mysterious place of squared off metal boxes being eaten up by horse-sized caterpillars. Or, there must be a chance they'd hurl me to that damned freezing-cold cave of the ice winds and, if they did so, I wouldn't want to hang around in conversation too long as I'd foolishly done before. And, finally—and probably most scary of all—they might just fumble-finger and I'd wind up casually chucked down any old where and languish until I starved to death.

  Still up and up in the blueness I soared.

  There was no use worrying about Mevancy. The Star Lords had called us and she'd be seen just as I'd be seen—if, that was, the ancient dodderers got it right and we ever did arrive where we were going.

  “By Makki Grodno's pustular—” I started to say to myself. Then I stopped. My heart wasn't in it. I just wanted to discover what the Everoinye wanted this time. The truly awesome elements of power and control had been blunted for me over the seasons; now I saw more clearly just what was really happening in this Reality. Where were these places to which the Everoinye summoned me? They were ancient beyond memory, what was their true history? Their power was so vast it must clog the breath in one's throat.

  My feet hit cold hard stone.

  The blueness all about swirled and swayed and parted gradually to reveal an angry crimson sky. That sky looked like the sky above a burning city. I turned about slowly on the cold stone. I had no clothes, no weapons; that was normal in places like this. I had never been here before. As I finished turning about to face my original direction a series of rounded humps began to become visible ahead. They rose slowly, black and stark against that ominous crimson. Just as the notion occurred to me they looked just like the heads of a gathering of people, in each separate shape two spots of scarlet fire abruptly flashed. Eyes! Eyes of the Everoinye, studying me like a specimen.

  On my right side three humps rose, rounded, black against the red. I just stood, limp, waiting. The three shapes flashed their eyes—green! The acid green of Ahrinye, acridly shared now by two companions.

  The Everoinye before me, the establishment as I thought of them, clustered the domed shapes in a way reminiscent of amphitheatre seating. Tier on tier they rose, extended from side to side. Could Ahrinye stand against this colossal display of power?

  The twin scarlet eyes in each head—did the Star Lords have heads, then, as they once must have done?—lowered balefully on me.

  The voice was familiar, hoarse, resonant, clanging.

  “Dray Prescot! You have incurred our wrath! We are displeased with you, with your arrogance and presumption.”

  The sheer volume of sound after the deathly silence preceding struck like a whiplash. I pressed my feet against the stone, and tilted up my head.

  “How?”

  I expected them to rant on about my own plans for Paz which included designs like making Inch and Sasha a king and queen of some suitable country which would then join our alliance. That was power-crazy, I suppose, to people unable to see past their noses.

  The voice deepened, rumbling like a volcano.

  “You have the arrogance to pursue other ends than defeating the Shanks. You have the presumption to put your life at risk for no cause.”

  “Hold on!” I shouted up. “If you mean the Skantiklar—that's important to our resistance to the blasted Shanks, confound you!”

  There ensued one of those long silences that punctuated conversations with the Star Lords. Each time I imagined details of grisly punishments they were debating. Finally the hiatus was broken by: “And your presumption?”

  “My life was at risk long before I started working for you.”

  “You misunderstand, as onkerish as ever! Some petty quarrel and assassins could deprive us of a kregoinye. That is your presumption.”

  I could not stop myself from saying: “You mentioned before my life was valuable to you. That's pretty new! You see I have some value to your schemes. You've just found that out. Well, it's a damned pity you couldn't have found out earlier, when I was almost killed time after time chasing after your mistakes!”

  The silence this time held, at least for me, a more mellow tang.

  There was no doubt the lowering presence of those tiered rows of heads, brooding down on me with fiery eyes, the eerie feelings cobwebbing this place, produced most profound feelings. The violence of the sky blood-red over all, the gimlet punctures of Ahrinye's green malevolence, the very absence of sound, all were calculated to intimidate, to frighten, to cow.

  These superhuman beings could fling me four hundred light years back to Earth, debar me from Kregen for ever. I'd never walk in the streaming mingled lights of Zim and Genodras, never look up to She of the Veils among the stars, never see my Delia again—never! Never! That must not happen! I must remember the scheme I'd promised myself of acting humbly before the Star Lords, of kowtowing—I must hurry to speak.

  I said: “The quarrel and the resulting assassination attempt were not of my doing. I did not initiate this problem.”

  The answer rapped out straight away.

  “Yet you were involved. Your life was needlessly risked. The Shanks press closer. You are guilty of presumption.”

  “So if some rast insults your wife you don't—” Then I hauled up, flaming with passion. The very excuse was muddled with the cause and could finish me off. Anyway, did these superhumans have husbands, wives?

  “Enough! You have been called the Prince of Onkers, and we find you to be the Emperor of Onkers.” Oh, yes, the rows of them up there all hunched and glaring red-eyed down on me, oh, yes, that was a Court, a Court sitting in judgment.

  “Then give him to me!”

  The acidity of the words, the sheer nerve-scraping screech shattered into my mind. Ahrinye! I swiveled like a puppet to see the green eyes flaring brighter, malevolent, demanding, ruthless.

  If Ahrinye was allowed to control me—run me, as he phrased it—he'd kill me off in no time with impossible demands.

  “Give me Dray Prescot and you will see!”

  His searing voice scythed into my brain.

  I could feel my heart up in my throat. I could feel—I do not know—I could feel nothing.

  A softer voice said: “I think not, Ahrinye.”

  Even before I switched around from facing the green eyes of Ahrinye to stare across to the left of the tiered Everoinye I knew what I would see.

  Joy burst up in me. The shape was not hunched and domed, the shape was that of a beautiful woman. All about her hung a shimmering cloud of yellow, so that she seemed to float in a shimmer of gold.

  “Zena Iztar!” I fairly shrieked out her name. “Zena Iztar!”

  “Perhaps you have been foolish, Dray Prescot, perhaps not. I have been away. I must go away again. But Ahrinye shall not have you.”

  I tried to speak
, and gargles came out, so I started over.

  “Zena Iztar—there is much to tell. The Kroveres prosper—”

  “Yes. Continue.” The voice changed from that soft tone to a sharper demanding note. “Is the decision made? Or must I—”

  “No,” The hoarse voice interrupted. “No, Zena Iztar, you have no need. The decision is made.”

  “Against me!” screeched Ahrinye.

  “For the good of Kregen.”

  Flashes of green light struck fanlike up from my right and Zena Iztar's yellow brightened on my left. Sparkles irradiated the air with color. The violent sky washed lambent crimson over all, yet green persisted. Yellow and green, one against the other, with red holding the balance.

  Zena Iztar was a more mysterious figure than the rest of this lot put together. Regarded by the Everoinye with reserved condescension and uneasy apprehension she was treated by them with cautious respect. They had spoken ill of her, contemptuously, yet I fancied she'd have the last laugh over them.

  “Very well!” With the suddenness of a slammed door on a lighted room, the green radiance vanished. The three forms of Ahrinye slowly sank down.

  “The Skantiklar—” I said.

  Zena Iztar interrupted: “Find it. Then destroy it.”

  “Is that wise?” said the hoarse voice.

  “It is of little practical value as humans weigh these things.”

  “Then?”

  The golden yellow halo about Zena Iztar's form flickered, began to fade. Her voice sounded as soft and warm as when she first spoke.

  “Then what will happen will happen. Yes. Probably that will be for the good, also.”

  The beautiful shape bathed in golden glow vanished.

  “Remberee, Zena Iztar!” I said to myself.

  “Dray Prescot! You have heard the judgment. Do not behave stupidly again.” The menace in the clanging voice rang unmistakably.

  “I cannot hold myself responsible for fools who force quarrels on me. Surely you can see that?”