The arrangements for the shooting itself were simple enough. Sightseers clustered. Marshals waved their wands. Music played and flags fluttered. The targets were set at stipulated distances and entrants were required to shoot their set number of arrows. A miss resulted in instant dismissal from the competition. In an atmosphere of tense excitement the better archers were whittled down until the final half dozen were left to shoot it out.
In the continent of Loh, what more natural than an archery competition?
Relaxed and confident, Rodders said to me: “I feel I am in great form, Drajak. Huang is the man to watch. You shoot well; but—” he spoke in his easy way, “but I feel I have the beating of you, with all due respect, you understand."
If Seg were here and inevitably betting on the outcome, he'd put all he could on me. I knew I had the beating of Rodders and this Huang, who was not as good as Rodders imagined. This is not boasting, which I abhor, but simple professional assessment. A little wind puffed and died and the flags blew out and then hung limply. The crowds kept up their animated chatter. Vendors went around doing a brisk trade. About to make some noncommittal reply, for I just intended to shoot and win and so take the purse—the Aigrette itself could also be sold, I judged—I was stopped in my tracks at Rodders’ next words.
“By Hlo-Hli! I am determined to win the Aigrette for Kirsty. She will be queen of the ball this evening, as the Hork guides my shafts!"
The expression on his face left no doubt that he meant every word. Even penniless as I was, in my precarious position, with my hopes resting on his goodwill, could I risk beating him out of the Aigrette he so coveted for his lady? By Makki Grodno's disgusting diseased liver and lights, what a confounded unwanted complication this was!
* * *
Chapter fourteen
What a mess! This was a completely unwanted complication. There was absolutely no question of my winning, of keeping the purse I so desperately needed for myself, and of presenting the Aigrette to Rodders for his lady. That would demean his honor. Oh, no. Where honor and pride in shooting skills are concerned, you walk over live coals.
I have very little truck with pride, as you know, and as for honor: mine may be a chameleon beastie, it remains intact in those areas of importance to me.
So, I made up my mind on a course of action.
Yes, very well. I, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor, Krzy, etc. etc. etc. ad nauseam, chickened out.
Huang and Rodders were left to shoot it out as my last shaft hit the spot at which I'd aimed, a spot a good thumb outside the aiming mark.
“Ha!” exclaimed Rodders, his red hair fairly bristling. “You see!"
The crowds yelled and cat-called, a single hyena-note made up of individual shouts and cries and curses. The Suns shone. Young boys ran everywhere scattering perfumed water to slake the dust. I held my face admirably still and noble, letting Rodders see how chagrined I was at missing the mark.
“You will win, Rodders, and my very best congratulations."
He nodded to the flags drooping on their staffs.
“You over estimated the breeze."
“Aye."
He smiled and turned back to finish his conquest. I let out a breath of relief. Not until he mentioned the breeze could I be certain he had been fooled by my shooting. Offering him the Aigrette after I had beaten him would have been bad enough; to have let him see I allowed him to win would have been disaster.
In the event he squeaked home over Huang. The prize was presented by a fat woman, the wife of a high official. She smirked and simpered and Rodders took the spray of gems and feathers into his brown fists. He lifted the trinket high and the audience yelled. Then, with the conscious solemnity of the occasion, he gave the trophy to Kirsty. Her face was a picture. She was pleased. There was no doubt of that. That she should be accorded this favor fitted well with her feelings of her own superiority.
I managed a brief: “Congratulations, Kirsty.” Whereat a tiny frown dinted in between those heavy eyebrows before she dazzled me with her smile. “Thank you, Drajak.” I wasn't having any kow-towing and inclining where this lady was concerned, no, by Krun!
After that, it was all a helter-skelter as the final preparations were made for the Grand Ball as the Suns went down.
The oasis town of Orphasmot in which the Springs of Benga Annorpha rose so magically and refreshingly to the earth's surface might be drowsy, dusty and suns-baked, it provided capital entertainment. Here the division of status was clear and simple. There were the people here for the cure, as at any spa, out to enjoy themselves, and there were those many more, slave and servant, here to serve. As the last of the preparations were made, I wondered, not without an ironic smile at my own expense, just which side of the divide I belonged. A fellow with all the lands and titles I had amassed—and all he had were the clothes he stood up in!
The third half—if I may use that typically shorthand Kregen way of expressing a complicated thought simply—of the people here was well represented. These were the merchants and traders. They'd sell anything to make a profit and the folk taking the waters were in the holiday mood where they'd buy anything.
There'd be no expensive fancy dress for me tonight. I'd probably buy the cheapest mask I could find and leave it at that. What little cash was left had to go on filling my stomach.
As for the fancy dress that turned out as the twin suns, Luz and Walig, sank in their suffusions of light—it was fancy. Highly ingenious and decorative, the costumes dreamed up by the people responsible created a riotous confusion of color and glitter, a never-still river of fantasy and delight pouring through the town.
On this night the folk of Tsungfaril threw off their usual air of lassitude, of waiting to go up to Gilium, and threw themselves wholeheartedly into enjoyment. Much was the wine drunk and many the dances danced and songs sung. Drifting along with the crowd, wearing my silly little black mask, I just absorbed impressions. Later I was to meet Rodders and Kirsty. The scenes of laughter and jollity all about inevitably drew my thoughts to far off Vallia. How often we had rioted through the avenues and along the canal banks! And in Ruathytu and Sanurkazz, too, folk had seen their fair share of hedonistic enjoyment. So I began to think of my comrades and the times we had had.
Many societies of Kregen—and I suppose some of Earth, too—fervently believe that thinking of an event or person will attract that event or person to you. Talk of the devil, as they say.
My old comrade Wizard of Loh, Deb-Lu-Quienyin, along with Khe-Hi-Bjanching and Ling-Li-Lwingling, had many times shrouded a thaumaturgical shield over me. Of what value a warrior's puny sword against theferocious might of a wizard's sorcery? So, as I put my foot upon the lowest rung of a ladder leading from this roof level to the next higher level, I stepped back to allow the man bundled in the blue cloak to descend the ladder first. Just how he'd appeared so suddenly above me I couldn't fathom. I'd been about to go up and the next instant, there he was, on the ladder and descending.
The scent of Moonblooms wafted from a doorway at the side where the flowers grew in a rotund ceramic pot. The light of the Moons fell aslant the doorway, and a man slumped there, fast asleep, his turban slipping.
The fellow on the ladder stomped down, heavy brown boots descending the treads with clumsy authority. A smell of rank fish coiled among the scents from the Moonblooms. I stepped aside and saw the ladder above through the blue cloaked body of the man. Through his body. He was not fully realized.
As I reacted to this piece of information, the man reached the tiled roof beside me. He moved with a heavy ponderous swing of wide shoulders and thick waist. He half-turned to brush past.
I saw a wide sullen face, heavy, with pouched eyes half-hidden by the drawn-forward cloak hood. He sucked in a breath. “The necklace,” he said. His voice gusted ludicrously thin and reedy from such a gross frame. He sucked another breath. “You have one more chance. No more."
The dark blueness of the cloak was fading. As he spoke so he appeared to need
to shake his body, perhaps to shake out the words. He was becoming faint, drizzle-thin, was vanishing into thin air. No doubt he calculated that the evanishment of an apparition would scare me sufficiently to rush off at once to secure the necklace for him.
He was gone.
A voice from the side said: “Very pretty, Dray. I really believe we may have Discovered an Adversary in him.” The slumped man with the slipping turban in the doorway was sitting up. “Friend of yours, Dray?"
Turning slowly to face Deb-Lu's apparition, I said: “Hardly. That was Na-Si-Fantong. I've never met him in the flesh.” Deb-Lu's creased old face smiled up at me under that vast and toppling turban. He smiled. That, I can tell you, cheered me in a most heart-warming manner.
“I suppose you have Contemplated the Si in His Name?"
When Deb-Lu spoke with Capital Letters, it behooved the listeners to listen.
“Aye."
“H'm. Well, since you disappeared from Esser Rarioch we've been searching all over for you. And now I've found you it is Distressingly Difficult to Maintain Contact."
His form wavered as though seen through a column of hot air. He was somewhere up in Vallia in person, and in that mysterious and magical state of lupu had sought and found me down here in Tsungfaril in Loh.
“Tell Delia I'm all right, Deb-Lu—"
“Naturally. She Has Spoken Somewhat and At Length upon your Disappearance. You are detained here?"
“Yes."
“Ah."
What Deb-Lu-Quienyin knew or suspected of the Star Lords I wasn't sure. What I did know was that any Wizard of Loh walked circumspectly anywhere near the ambiance of the Everoinye. He was aware of my disappearances from time to time. He and his comrade wizards erected defenses for my comrades against unhealthy sorcery. Even if Deb-Lu could only maintain a tenuous contact with me I felt vastly reassured. Na-Si-Fantong wasn't going to turn me into a little green frog—at least, not without a struggle!
“By the Seven Arcades!” said Deb-Lu. “This plane is most confoundedly dismal!” His form fluctuated, and brightened and darkened.
He'd explained to me that on the surface of Kregen two places might lie many miles apart yet on another plane they would be cheek-by-jowl. So if you wanted to go from one to the other you crossed as many intervening planes as might be necessary until you found yourself on the right one. The trick here was that the ‘you’ of the quotation would need the many years’ training and experience undergone by an initiate of the Cults and Orders which possessed the knowledge. At that point in my knowledge of Kregen the pre-eminent colleges of thaumaturgists were those of the Wizards of Walfarg, better known to the outer world as Wizards of Loh.
Deb-Lu's spectral form quivered like a reflection in water.
“This is difficult, Dray. Please Excuse Me."
Quickly I gave him the few details I had concerning the queen's necklace. This was Wizard's work. As his form at last dwindled and expired, his final words were: “Prospects and Interesting Possibilities open upbefore us, Dray! I shall return! Remberee!"
“Remberee,” I called; but Deb-Lu was gone, hurtling back across the planes to far Vallia.
The thought occurred to me that Loh was Deb-Lu's birthplace. He was a renowned Wizard of Loh—a Wizard of Walfarg. Something must be going on somewhere to account for the difficulty of communication quite apart from the distance involved.
The flat roof suddenly filled with a crowd of people, all fluttering scarves and feathers, flushed faces, laughing eyes. They sang and danced their way across rooftop after rooftop and gathered other folk until the procession broke up into fragments along the main streets. Well, this was not the usual behavior of those seeking to enter Gilium. The atmosphere of general pleasure and the visitation from Deb-Lu combined to put me in a happier mood. I would see Delia again, soon. I knew, and with a sudden somber shiver, that Deb-Lu was right. There were vast possibilities in the future—possibilities and perils, by Vox!
* * *
Chapter fifteen
“You kept yourself well out of the way of all the trouble, cabbage. Well, I've got news for you. We have a crisis on our hands."
“That's news?"
“Oh, you!"
As predicted, when thequeen's death became general knowledge in Orphasmot a mass exodus ensued. My simple-minded plan had worked and I'd tagged along with Rodders and Kirsty. Now, taking a chance on San Chandro, I'd trotted along first to the Mishuro villa to find Mevancy. I'd found her all right. She lost no time in bringing me up to date with the dramatic events that had taken place in Makilorn whilst I'd been away.
Lunky had in some way managed to persuade his fellow Diviner Yoshi to become an ally. Maybe some emotional tangle had caused Yoshi to fall out with Vasama. The importance of this became apparent when not one but two babies were discovered with claims to housing the spirit of the queen.
Vasama, ‘quivering like a jelly’ according to Mevancy, had stated that the baby of the noble lord Pling-Fe-Hwang had been chosen to receive the spirit of the reborn queen. She had proudly brought the baby forth from Hwang's villa to display to the multitude.
At the very same time across the river Lunky had divined the queen's spirit in the baby of Tsun and Hosifi Shiang. They were potters and the baby's cradle was formed from half of a smashed pot. Lunky brought the baby out of the pottery kilns and across the river to the queen's palace to be confronted by an enraged Vasama clutching her choice.
Two factors determined the outcome.
One, that Yoshi had fallen out with Vasama and was willing, out of spite, to side with Lunky, seemed to the college to be the lesser reason.
The important reason was simply that Lunky was already recognized as a Diviner of great power. There were politics simmering away in the background, as, by Krun, there usually are! The upshot was that Lunky's choice, the Shiang baby, was judged to hold the queen's spirit.
“Presumably, cabbage, that was why the Everoinye wished us to save Lunky."
“It would seem so."
“All would have gone as the Everoinye wished, only—"
“What?"
“You remember I told you about Kaopan?"
“Oh, no.” I felt a pang, for the baby, for the queen, for Lunky.
“Yes. Someone had the Shiang baby killed according to the rites of Kaopan.” She shook her head. “The queen is now truly dead. She will not return to Tsungfaril in another body. She will not go up to Gilium in glory. She will go down to the Death Jungles of Sichaz."
I said nothing. I really didn't know if I believed all this mumbo-jumbo about the accursed, the paol-ur-bliem, returning to Kregen for life after life as a punishment. On Kregen there are enough weird and wonderful things, by Opaz the Eternally Veiled, to last many a lifetime! The whole story, the religious beliefs, the reincarnation, all of it, all could be true.
“That damned lot led by Shang-Li-Po,” I said. I heard my own voice. I heard the snarl. Snarl! If I were a free agent and the constraints imposed by San Chandro brushed aside, I'd do more than snarl. I could feel the blood pounding in my head, and I had to hang onto this new Dray Prescot whose image I had been so assiduously creating. To rush off and deal with Shang-Li-Po and his cronies, in memory of the queen, would serve no one. I had to remain cool, calm and collected. For Dray Prescot even in this latter day that was asking a lot, a whole lot, by Krun.
I could still see the queen standing by the pool's edge. Vibrant, superb, quivering with all the eagerness of a girl embracing life to the full, she limned indelibly in my memory. As the scented water ran in wanton rivulets down her body and the black-masked assassins padded towards her, their naked swords ready to kiss her naked body, so she lifted that rounded chin in a haughty stare of utter contempt. If only...! But, paradoxically, what happened next was mercifully veiled from me by the blue veil, the very blue fragment of the Scorpion that dragged me away.
“Your face has gone putty again, cabbage."
“I was thinking of the queen."
&nb
sp; She shook her head, her cheeks flushed. “And what would your—?"
Her mouth closed with a snap, the sentence unfinished, for she had seen my face and I know, to my despair, that the old devil look had flashed there. What she had been about to say troubled me, for I thought she was over her silliness. A trifle breathlessly she said: “Well, there it is, then. The queen is truly dead. Now they have to find a successor."
“That is college and council business. I suppose the Star Lords will have to put their oar in."
“Cabbage! Must I keep telling you? Have a care."
“The Everoinye wanted Lunky's choice to be queen. She would be, as it were, on our side. Given that San Chandro represents our side and Shang-Li-Po heads up the opposition."
“The Everoinye will not take a rebuff lightly."
“Of course not, pigeon! There will be plenty of work for you and me, never fear!"
She bit her lip and turned away. I was wrought up enough not to feel proper compassion for her until after we'd parted to go about our different tasks. Then, as I headed for San Chandro, I did feel I ought to have been more gentle with her where her sensibilities regarding the Star Lords were concerned.
As for Queen Leone—what a tragedy, what a waste!
In addition—and most darkly, most deeply dreadfully darkly indeed—Queen Leone had been slain because the Star Lords had snatched me away.
Could—and I dared to think the thought out of anger and compassion—could the Star Lords have wanted the queen slain to further their own unfathomable ends? And were those ends now confounded by the fine Italianate hand of Shang-Li-Po? Was there more horror to come? Well, this was Kregen, and however wonderful and beautiful that world truly is, horror formed all too potent a part of its makeup.
Leaving the Mishuro villa I went the long way round to the palace, striding out, breathing deeply, trying to bring myself under control. Many thoughts jostled inside my cranium. There was the affair of the queen's necklace yet to be settled, a damned sorcerer to be dealt with, a gang of cutthroats to be cut down to size. There was the ever-present urgency of getting this whole imbroglio over fast so I could return to Vallia and Valka. There was the mystery of Carazaar and his minion Arzuriel. Lurking like some monster of the deep below everything else the hideous problem of the reiving Shanks from over the curve of the world remained. They would not go away until everyone of Paz united to drive them off.
Scorpio Assassin [Dray Prescot #39] Page 12
