Krozair of Kregen [Dray Prescot #14]

by Alan Burt Akers

  Vax did not step forward, and his voice was almost steady, as he said, “And his brother, Pur Zeg?"

  “At sea, upholding the glory of Zair for the Brotherhood."

  “Do these two brothers speak of their father?"

  I heard a noise and saw that Duhrra had rolled into the High Hall, yawning. He gazed around sleepily, puffy faced.

  “They say of him that what has been ordained is just.” Trazhan peered into the shadows at Vax. “Why do you ask?"

  Before Vax could answer, I said, “Do these brothers hate their father as much as this young man Vax hates his?"

  I own I wanted to stir it a bit, feeling vicious; but at the same time I wanted to know the answer to my question.

  Trazhan put his left fist onto his sword-hilt. “Who can say? They do not speak of him to others. He is Apushniad and therefore less than nothing. Now I would like to rest, and—"

  “You are, Pur Trazhan,” I said, trying not to sound too cold, “I trust, empowered to stay and fight with us?"

  “Well—” he began.

  I admit, with only a little shame, that I wanted to hit out. I owed the Krozairs nothing at this time. One of their number was fair game. They had done what they had done to me, and I was going to prove them wrong; but right now I would make this high and mighty Krzy wriggle a trifle. “After all, Pur Trazhan, you have admitted that Zy is not attacked, therefore your duty cannot lie there. Zimuzz is about to fall, and so to go there is useless. Here in Zandikar we successfully resist the cramphs of Grodnims and will never surrender. I would have thought a man's duties lay here. Particularly if he happened to be a Krozair of Zy."

  He took a half-step, and paused, and peered belligerently into the shadows.

  “Who are you, who speaks thus to a Krozair?"

  “I am Dak."

  “Dak,” he said. “I think the name is familiar—"

  “Oh, there may not be as many Daks as there are Naths and Naghans and Nalgres; but there are a lot of us.” I shot the last words at him like crossbow bolts. “Are you staying or not?"

  He swung his head at me, and then looked at Miam.

  “Who is this man?"

  Before she could speak I took a pace or two forward and planted myself in front of him. I glared at him evilly.

  “You may be a Krozair of Zy. But you address the queen of Zandikar in a proper and respectful fashion, or, by Zair, I'll pull your damned tongue out!"

  He wanted to start on me, then and there, but I would have none of it, not with poor Miam looking on distressed, and I backed away and bellowed for everyone to calm down. I finished, “And this great and famous Krozair, this Pur Trazhan, will be happy to stay with us and fight for Zandikar. He will honor his oaths. And, anyway,” I ended with gruesome levity, “we have ample mergem to feed him and his crew."

  After the fuss Trazhan agreed to stay and fight. Of course, poor devil, he could do nothing else.

  Mind you, I was not altogether happy about his performance. No Krozair I had known, for all we put no great store by kings and queens, would have flung up so brusque a question to a young queen like that. To some fabled Queen of Pain, perhaps ... Maybe standards were lowered in the Krozairs and they were being forced to let in a rabble. I own I can be most arrogant when it comes to those people and institutions in which I put value. But I had, at this time, still to remember I was an outcast, Apushniad.

  Just before we all left about our business, Queen Miam lifted her hand and we fell silent. She said something that was unnecessary and yet, at the same time, it made me feel warm to her. I figured Zeg would be a lucky fellow.

  “This man Dak,” said Queen Miam, “is the heart and soul of the defense of Zandikar."

  While it was not true—well, not altogether—it had a pretty ring.

  I bowed to her, and from somewhere deep in the bowels of Cottmer's Caverns, I shouldn't wonder, I scraped up a smile for her. She smiled back, so I fancy my face indicated some grotesque caricature of a smile.

  “We shall hold Zandikar, Queen Miam,” I said.

  “I wish to talk to you privately for a crooked mur, Dak."

  By “a crooked mur” Kregans mean a minute or two. We went into the small luxurious room behind the throne where she might doff the heavy robes of state and the crown and mortil-headed staff. When she was clad again in her own simple white gown she shooed out her handmaidens and turned to me, one hand to her breast.

  “I wanted to ask you, dear Dak, of your goodness, not to mention that you know Prince Zeg, Pur Zeg, to be Vax's brother. It is a thing he would not wish known."

  “Why does he not ask me himself?"

  “I rather think he does not realize what he has let slip to you as to me. If it is known ... Is this Dray Prescot, then, so terrible a beast?"

  I looked at her in the lamplight. She was beautiful. I felt for Zeg, not envying him, but feeling happy for him.

  “I think most young men take against their fathers at some time in their lives. When they mature they come to a better understanding—if their fathers are worthy, of course."

  “You do not answer my question."

  “No, Miam, I do not. I do not know. I have heard stories. I think it probable he was unjustly stricken from the Order of Krozairs of Zy. To be made Apushniad is a horrible fate."

  “Oh, yes!"

  “He will be your father-in-law. I think you would make any man see reason."

  We passed a few more words, then she said, “And you will remember about Vax and his father?” and I said, “I will,” and we parted.

  The name of Dray Prescot, the Lord of Strombor, once Krozair of Zy, could arouse as passionate a response here in Zairia as it inevitably could in Green Grodnim. I had heard more than one old soldier curse and spit and say he wished to Zair that Pur Dray was not Apushniad and could be in the forefront of the battle with his comrades in his accustomed place in the struggle against the rasts of Magdaggians. I was there, although they did not know it. But I wanted the Krozairs to reinstate me, not so that I might fight on for Zair, but so that I might go home to Delia.

  A few days after that, as the siege dragged on, Prince Glycas tried a new trick. He must have had the beasts landed from animal-carrying broad ships and driven them up to the walls of the city. The shouts rose as the lookouts bellowed the warning in a misty dawn light. By the time I was up onto my favorite tower, midway along the inland wall, with a fine varter to hand, I could see the mists coiling and rising, emerald and ruby in the mingled streaming light of Antares, see the huge rounded backs of the turiloths as they waddled ponderously on, see the crowding warriors following these mammoth beasts.

  “Turiloths! Turiloths!” the cries racketed about.

  Archers began to shoot. Their shafts simply bounced off the hard gray upper hide. The turiloth's hide altered in color to a dark bottle-green along the sides and a grayish streak ran along the belly. Sixteen legs has a turiloth, with six tusks and a tendrilous mass of whiplash tails, a veritable forest of Kataki tails at his rear. He has an enormous underslung mouth equipped with suitable fangery, and he is keen scented and he has three hearts. If this description sounds familiar, I assure you it is; the turiloth of Turismond is very similar to the boloth of Chem. I had fought a boloth on a notable occasion in the arena. Now we had twenty of these gigantic beasts plodding along to smash down the gates of Zandikar and let the swarm of warriors in to an orgy of destruction.

  A paktun near me screamed, “All is lost! We are doomed! Doomed!” He scrambled madly down the tower, running away. The panic spread.

  * * *

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Siege of Zandikar: III.

  The turiloths attack

  “We are doomed!"

  The cries rang out with chilling panic through the early morning mists.

  This was a time for instant action.

  There was no time to shaft the running paktun, as he deserved. I grabbed a varterist by the ear and ran him up to his engine. I hurled both of us at the wind
lass, for the varters were kept unspun to save their springs, and began a frenzied winding. “Orlon!” I bellowed at another varterist, who hung over the battlements, gaping. “Shove a dart in! Hurry, man!"

  The dart slapped into the chute as the nut engaged and the windlass clanked full. I swung the varter on its gimbals and sighted on a vast bottle-green hide and pressed the trigger.

  Praise Zair—or praise Erthyr the Bow, the guiding spirit of Erthyrdrin bowmen—the dart flew true. Its massive bulk smashed into the tough hide where an arrow would break or spin free. The turiloth squealed at first, and then when he realized how deeply he had been wounded, he began to scream. His six tusks whipped about as he tried to reach back to dislodge the cruel barb in his guts. His tendrilous tails lashed in frenzy. But he was not the monster aimed for the gate beneath our feet. I had had to shoot in enfilade to hit a flank. I glared about for Sniz the Horn, my trumpeter, and yelled, “Load another! Get at it, you onkers! These are only beasts and may be slain, the poor hulus! Sniz! Sound the rally! Blow hard!"

  “Quidang, Dak!"

  I had spared the time to shoot, myself. Now all who looked over the battlements could see at least one monster screaming in agony, and slowly sinking down onto his sixteen knees. Turiloths are usually ponderous and slow; but with their three hearts they can be whipped up into a short and vicious charge of surprising speed. If that happened before we got them all, any one of them could go straight through the timbers of the gate as a swifter's ram smashes through the scantlings of a broad ship.

  The watchfires of the night had not yet been doused.

  “Torches!” I roared. “Torches to set their tails alight!"

  After that first blind, unthinking panic my men rallied. Varters clanged from the towers along the walls. Torches were catapulted out. We had rocks ready, and vast caldrons of hot water that would come to the boil as the fires were stoked. It was a pretty set-to while it lasted. But with Sniz blowing his lungs out and the drums rolling and the air filled with varters and torches, with the boiling water spilling out and down on the last turiloth that lumbered into a charge, we held them. It was a near thing. The last one, bearing two varter darts, four of his six tusks knocked away by a rock, boiling water fuming from his gray back, slumped to his knees before the gate. One of his remaining tusks touched the wood. It made a sound so small it was lost in the uproar of continuing battle.

  For the Grodnims charged in, anyway, bearing scaling ladders. Their towers had been set alight many times and still they built more and shielded them with wet hides and sheets of bronze. We smashed them with varter rocks. The scaling ladders were pushed away with forked sticks. Arrows darkened the bright morning as the mists burned away. It was a merry set-to, as I say, and many a good man went down to the Ice Floes of Sicce, or up to sit in glory on the right hand of Zair or Grodno in the radiance of Zim or Genodras, according to his color.

  Before the Hour of Mid the last few Grodnims were shafted and sent reeling, the main pack retreating sullenly. Among the attackers there had been men who bore pikes, men with shields, men compact in the grouping of six cross-bowmen in sextets. So Glycas was sending in the new army, was he? Actually committing men trained to fight in the open in phalanx into the messy business of assaulting a wall? That was a fine omen for our continued holding.

  When the excitement had died down Duhrra found me. He did not look pleased.

  “Nath the Slinger has been wounded, a shaft through his arm. Oh, and the Krozair, Pur Trazhan, is dead."

  I said, “Fetch me his sword, Duhrra."

  Oh, yes, it was callous. But other good men were dead. And I could use the Krozair brand, where probably others could not. If pride had gone to my head, I trust I understood why. I went to see Nath the Slinger and found him cursing away, in good spirits, but very foulmouthed about the Magdaggians.

  “My shots were bouncing off their shields, Dak. A coward's trick, the shield."

  He but mouthed the usual opinion in Turismond.

  “I got one of ‘em, though, a beauty right under the helmet rim. And then his mate shot me in the arm."

  “Rest and have it seen to and you will be fine."

  “Oh, aye, I'll be fine. By Zair! It is not my slinging arm!"

  The turiloths were the subject of conversation for the rest of the day. As was my custom I sent strong parties out, well screened, to pick up every weapon they could among the corpses. As for them, we scattered pungent ibroi on them and gradually the smell went away. The boloth of Chem has eight tusks, and is apple-green and yellow; otherwise he is much the same as a turiloth. I thought of Delia, naked, tied with silver chains to the stake, and of the boloth—and of Oby and Tilly and Naghan the Gnat. By Kaidun! If a man could get out of a scrape like that, with good friends like Seg and Inch and Turko the Shield, then surely I could get out of this one with my son Drak flying to our rescue! The problem there was, as Pur Trazhan who was now dead had said, that Drak's army would most likely relieve Zimuzz first. We just had to hold. So I glared upon the gigantic mute corpses of the turiloths as my men picked up weapons, and debated how to dispose of the monstrous things before they choked us out with their stink.

  In the end the clouds of warvols attracted to any scene of death floated on their wide black wings from the sky and settled on the corpses and began the long and succulent job of picking the bones clean. The vulturelike warvol has his uses in nature. I had my eye on the bones, for the meat was not pleasant enough for us to eat, rich as we were with mergem. If we starved, we'd eat turiloth meat and gag and chew and choke, but we'd eat it right enough.

  This siege would be decided one way or the other before the mergem ran out. A small teaspoonful of mergem in two pints of water, boiled up, produces a rich and nourishing broth, with all the proteins and vitamins and whatnot a man's metabolism requires. For roughage we ate of the chipalines, and almost everywhere possible in Zandikar the flowers had been replaced by vegetables. Only along walls in those days were flowers to be seen in the besieged city.

  No, I will not detail all our sufferings and tribulations during the Siege of Zandikar. That siege was not really one of the great and illustrious defenses of Kregen; for one thing we did not starve. But we fought well. We held the Greens off. They vastly outnumbered us, and for all that we kept on killing the rasts, still they seemed never to decrease in number. Glycas had used a part of the famous new army of King Genod in the assault; so we were hurting them. A frenzy grew in the attacks. They became more and more desperate, lacking in finesse, wave after wave of yelling men hurling themselves frantically at the gray-white walls of Zandikar, screaming, “Grodno! Grodno! Magdag!” We heard the shouts for Prince Glycas, and, also, the shouts for King Genod. But for all the shouting and the onslaughts they did not pierce or climb the walls—unless we allowed them.

  On one crucial night attack a brave party of Grodnims managed to make a lodgment on the walls. They held a wall and a flanking tower. We came up, realizing we faced a task of gigantic proportions to force them off. But they did not drop down on the inside. They made a deal of noise, banging drums and blowing trumpets; but we released a series of firepots into the darkness beyond the walls and after a time the Grodnims dropped back outside the walls, abandoning what they had achieved.

  Roz Janri and Pallan Zavarin and others of the high officers were puzzled. They had become used to decisiveness in the Magdaggian army. I said, “This is a great and good sign. The rasts believed we prepared a trap for them. They have been caught before. They thought that if they attacked further we were waiting. Well, the mind is often more powerful than the muscle."

  The information heartened everyone in Zandikar.

  Now we believed we would hold.

  Then came the moment that I, alone among all those people with such high hopes in Zandikar, had dreaded.

  Yes, I had told the people of the city: yes, we will hold.

  But I had not told them that King Genod had formed an alliance with the empress Thyllis in far Hamal.
I had not told them that Genod had bought fliers and saddle-birds from Thyllis. I had not told them that as soon as the king arrived he would bring with him vollers and fliers.

  We did not know if he had been reducing Zimuzz, or if he had tried a fling at the sacred Isle of Zy. All we knew early one morning was that King Genod, the war genius, had arrived in his camp before besieged Zandikar.

  We saw the dots in the high air. People looked up and pointed. Exclamations broke out. They had seen the flier that Duhrra and Vax had brought here with Hikdar Ornol ti Zab. That had long since been smashed and no one knew where Ornol was. So they knew what these fliers were, and they also knew what they portended.

  I knew that this day, the very same day he landed here, the genius at war, King Genod, would launch his aerial armada against Zandikar. The walls would avail nothing. Assailed at a hundred points within the city itself, Zandikar must fall.

  * * *

  Chapter Eighteen

  Pur Zeg, Prince of Vallia, Krzy

  Had Miam not been the great-granddaughter of old King Zinna and the rightful heir to the throne, or had Starkey the Wersting realized enough to have had her killed, or had some other reason debarred her from being the pawn in my machinations, I believe Zena Iztar, whose supernatural powers were of an extent I could not comprehend, would have found some other road for me and my comrades to preserve the city of Zandikar. I did not believe she would have plotted as she had only to let all go to waste. No help in the shape of a vast sky army was to be expected from the Savanti. They might transit more Savapims. As for the Star Lords, well, the Everoinye had been very quiet of late and I fancied that was because in this internecine war of the inner sea they backed the Greens.

  The damned fliers and flyers of King Genod landed on the flat expanse outside the soldiers’ camps. I made myself stand and watch them. I counted. At least a hundred vollers, and perhaps merely twenty fluttrells, turning their headvanes with the wind as they landed with widespread feet and downturned tails, amid much wing-fluttering and dust. Their riders were ill-trained. That made sense in a society like the one of the inner sea where airboats and saddle-birds were exotic phenomena.