Wings of Power

by Carl, Lillian Stewart

  Jamshid, still supported by his daughter, gestured Bogatyl so abruptly it almost toppled Srivastava. The Vizier sketched a hasty bow and he lumbered away. No doubt to report dissension among the Ferangi ranks, demons eat him.

  Vijay rapped his spear against the pavement and said, “All right then, brother-ji, since everything will be staked upon one throw of the dice, I will be our die.”

  “No,” said Raj.

  “What?” Vijay demanded. “Who else is champion of Ferangipur?”

  “I am.” Raj’s words were quiet, velvet draped iron.

  Gard bit his tongue to keep himself from blurting, “Are you so sure you can win?” The answer was obvious; Raj was not at all sure he could win.

  A cry of dismay wavered from the portico. Deva started in that direction, only to be restrained by Senmut. Ladhani, Narayan clutched to her skirts, looked over the ruined garden at her husband, with eyes as bleak as a moonless night.

  He turned. The grim set of his face wavered. He shook his head very slowly, right, left, his dark eyes seeing the same emptiness as hers.

  Narayan looked up at his father and offered a small but correct salute.

  A muscle jumped in Rajinder’s jaw. He lurched forward, hurried to the portico, set his arms about his wife and son, and took them away.

  Vijay cast his spear away with such vehemence that it pierced a lattice and hung there like a crazy wind vane, bobbing up and down, as he walked in staccato steps into the palace.

  Srivastava, sleepwalking, gave her arm to her father. Jamshid stumbled across the gaps in the walkways where paving stones had been pried up to serve as ballista shots. Gard reached out to help and stood, hands outstretched and empty. Jamshid was old. Old and tired, wondering if it had been worth waking up from his evil dream.

  Senmut muttered in his beard, “Rajinder is, is . . .”

  “Foolish?” offered Gard.

  “Brave?” Deva suggested.

  Feverfeverfever screeched the bird. The dragonet banged its head against Gard’s ribs feverishly. He stared at his hands as circumstances ran palpably through them and puddled upon the ground.

  * * * * *

  Late afternoon. A sky as brilliant as a faceted gemstone, a neatly divided quarter moon pasted upon it. Golden light draping city, land and sea so that everything blushed, mockingly, with health and peace. “Just the day for a game, a hunt, a festival,” Gard growled. “Anything but this.”

  “The ritual of sacrifice,” Deva replied quietly.

  Oh yes. On Minras, and in the Mohan, and through the world between, always sacrifice, and not necessarily of the deserving.

  The walls of Ferangipur were lined with faces. A vast arc of Allianzi were ranged upon the near bank of the Mohan. Heralds scooted up and down proclaiming titles and boasts, bandying the names of gods.

  The odor on the breeze was not quite that of sulfur, even though Tarek and Bhai conferred at the end of the bridge. Shikar and Menelik rode forward through the ranks of their followers, acknowledging their cheers. Jofar set his shield upon his arm, mounted a chariot, and looked in a certain bewilderment across the field to the walls of Ferangipur.

  Jofar. Of course. Who else would be their champion? A wave of nausea swept Gard from toe to crown. The dragonet writhed in his chest, bending and stretching. Kundaraja, Lord of the Dance—so what? he asked himself. So what?

  Rajinder’s family—father, brother, sister, wife but mercifully not son—stood in a prickly knot against the walls, defying anyone to come near. Senmut paced up and down the battlement, holding his spyglass behind his back, his face lurking somewhere amid its impenetrable shrubbery.

  The gates of the city opened. A chariot, gallantly decorated with plumes and banners, churned onto the field. Rajinder’s armor was cleaned and burnished, his face like polished death.

  A squeak came from Gard’s other side, the side that was not securely against Deva. It was Yasmine, her sari clasped around her head so that her face hung disembodied, her eyes as blank as a marble statue’s.

  Rajinder leaped from his chariot. Jofar stepped out of his. A roar went up from the Allianzi army, an answering cry from the walls of Ferangipur. It will be a fair fight, Gard silently promised Tarek. I will not let you interfere.

  Nor I you. Tarek’s answering thought struck him like a whiplash and he reeled back, Deva spinning along with him. “A challenge?” she asked.

  The dragonet coughed and spat out a puddle of sulfur and ash that ate its way like acid through Gard’s viscera. He shuddered. “A warning shot.”

  “Since when would Tarek allow a fair fight?”

  “Since he knows he can win it.” Gard lunged back to the battlement. The pentacle fluttered against his skin. The dragonet’s snout quivered. No, the odor was not the same sharp one, it was something sickly sweet, just a trace lingering on the cool evening air and marring its purity.

  Rajinder saluted Jofar. Jofar raised his sword in reply. Gard squinted. With a jolt, the dragonet began to dance.

  Surreal clarity, as if Gard held Senmut’s glass lens to his eye. Each face in the opposing ranks jumped out at him, Shikar grinning openly, Menelik half-smiling, eyes narrowed, Tarek’s brooding eyes inscrutable as always, and Bhai—Bhai was chuckling, rubbing his hands together.

  Senmut elbowed Yasmine aside and set his glass to his eye. “What is he so pleased about?” he demanded of no one in particular.

  The dragonet pirouetted. The odor was of herbs steeping into a tea. Gard gestured peremptorily. Far below him Jofar glanced up.

  “Damn!” exclaimed Senmut and caught himself just before smashing his glass upon the stone.

  “Hellfrost!” Gard spat. Jofar’s pupils were mere pinpricks of blackness in irises as brown and dull as Mohendra mud. He was drugged. Menelik, Tarek, Bhai—they were taking no chances that the lithe body of Rajinder, fueled by desperation, could overcome a strength which might well have been sapped by reluctance or love.

  Deva strained toward the distant figure of her father, fingers outspread. “Jofar is not ensorcelled. Herbs only—Tarek condoned it, Gard, he did not do it.”

  “A sin of omission is still a sin.” The dragonet’s dancing paws bruised Gard’s heart.

  Jofar’s black pupils flashed like one of Bhai’s incendiaries. With a piercing cry the huge warrior leaped forward. Rajinder parried and spun aside. Again the leap and the parry. The horses of the two waiting chariots stamped and whinnied, their drivers trying to soothe them. The clang of sword against sword echoed across the field and rolled down the sky.

  The distant figure of Tarek did not move. Deva’s hand fell limply to her side. “Do not try to reach him,” Gard muttered. “It is too late.”

  “I know,” she replied. “I know.”

  Rajinder lunged. With another cry Jofar met him and turned his blade. The huge shield flared with sunlight. “Beautiful metalwork,” said Senmut grudgingly.

  “But Tarek has removed the magical embellishment . . .” Deva said.

  “. . . so I cannot intervene with even that,” finished Gard. Curses bubbled from his lips. The dragonet leaped, swelling in his throat. His body twisted in a paroxysm of rage. Beyond the battling warriors, far, far across the field, Tarek staggered, his head snapping back as if struck.

  Bhai glanced around at him quizzically. One corner of Tarek’s mouth twitched in a thin smile. He gestured toward the walls.

  Gard’s pentacle hissed. The dragonet ducked. Missed, by all the gods—no, he was too proud to battle when there was no need . . . “You are stamping and bellowing like bulls,” Deva hissed in his ear. “Save your strength.”

  “You might need it,” Senmut said darkly.

  Jofar beat back Rajinder’s attack, sword pealing against sword, pursuer becoming pursued. Dust spurted beneath their feet and eddied upward in trails of translucence. With a fearful grimace Raj leaped and spun in a dance step worthy of Gard himself, avoiding the brunt of the counterattack. But his arm blossomed with a streak of blood.

&nb
sp; Gard leaned against the parapet. A low murmur ran among the watchers, Allianzi and Ferangi, like the chant of celebrants at a ritual. A group of Vaiswanara’s priests, their hats bobbing like the bills of ducks, raised their voices in wild ululations. Their opposite numbers, the priests of Hurmazi, made various liturgical pantomimes. The soldiers shouted encouragement and derision. Rajinder’s and Jofar’s swords rang like hammers upon an anvil.

  Each blow struck Gard’s awareness so that he swayed dizzily. A strike, and another—Rajinder was bleeding, his steps faltering. His face twisted more with regret than fear. Jofar’s face was as expressionless as if he were chopping wood, even as those normally mild brown eyes blazed with a sickening frenzy. Shikar snickered, Menelik frowned slightly, and the blood drained from Vijay’s face until the young prince’s complexion was faintly green.

  It was Rajinder who had blood in him, spattering his arms, staining the dust-dull scales of his breastplate. His breath wheezed like a bellows in Gard’s ears. How much longer? Gard wanted to scream. Raj, surrender . . .

  No, of course he would not surrender. Honor, that was what he called it. Doggedly the Ferangi prince fought on. The sun slanted down the sky and the gilt crust upon the watching faces thickened. The sky deepened into cobalt blue. The Allianzi ranks oozed forward. Jamshid drooped upon Srivastava’s arm. Ladhani sank slowly to her knees and crouched, her arms wrapped around her midriff as if keeping her viscera from spilling out.

  No magic. The air remained unsullied except with dust. If only, Gard thought, if only—what? He shook himself, unfurled his power, sent a tentative bolt toward Jofar—nothing strong, just a weakening spell . . . Gard choked and sputtered and the dragonet coughed rackingly in his stomach as the spell recoiled upon him. Tarek grinned.

  Deva looked from Gard to Senmut, to the field and back again. With a wrench she released Gard and went to lay her arms about Ladhani. Her sapphire shed a pale blue light around them both, but it was not enough.

  No, Gard wailed soundlessly. No, no . . . He heard his own voice telling Vijay, “Well, it is a possibility.”

  A mighty blow of Jofar’s arm. A thrust forward of the shield. Rajinder’s sword flew several paces away to imbed itself in the dirt. He turned, lunged for it and fell. The Allianzi ranks surged forward and Menelik ordered them back. He himself rode out onto the field. Shikar gabbled something in his ear. Menelik told him to be quiet. Tarek turned on his heel and started toward the bridge.

  Gard tasted dirt and blood in his own mouth. Jofar stepped forward, raising his sword. Raj lay back on his elbows and considered the poised weapon, its blade glinting with sunlight and his own blood, and beyond it the cruelly indifferent arch of the sky. His features, contorted with pain, exhaustion, regret, smoothed themselves. Dust hung in the air over him, muting his form as if he were already a faded image upon an old tapestry, some legend of splendid deeds accomplished without blood, without grief . . .

  Tarek was on the bridge, steadying himself on the handholds. Jofar hesitated and glanced wild-eyed toward Menelik. An idea drenched Gard like a bucket of cold water. Now! he screamed to himself. Now, the only chance! He leaped and spun. The dragonet detonated. Now!

  His mind turned itself inside out. A dart of silvered purple flew swift and sure, stirring the sunlight in a subtle chime, and burst in a spray of light against Rajinder’s mottled breastplate. Raj shuddered. The dark sad serenity of his eyes closed and he relaxed as gently into the dirt as into Ladhani’s arms. Jofar looked around, braced himself, and then, disappointed, lowered his sword to poke at the Ferangi prince. Who did not move.

  A sigh like a storm wind moved along the walls of the city. Gard slumped against the parapet. Senmut looked down at him and whispered urgently, “Just what do you think you are doing?”

  The scene before him faded into a white smear. No chimes, no purple sparklings. The humming in his ears was mingled shouts of despair and victory. Then with a scream of quicksilver, power flooded back into his mind and seared every nerve in his body. He gasped in pain.

  “Gard?” asked Senmut.

  The dragonet was wedged so securely in his throat he could hardly speak. The stone of the parapet was cold and gritty against his forehead. “The least I can do. The very least. Honor, Raj told us; it is all a matter of honor. Now if only I am strong enough for the rest.”

  Deva’s eyes glinted in understanding. She looked from Ladhani’s crushed form to the ashen features of Jamshid and spoke quickly to him. “. . . honorable funeral . . . least you can ask, Nazib-ji.”

  In one convulsive movement Vijay broke his spear over his knee and cast it down. Srivastava looked at the distant figure of Jofar and her lips moved on a curse.

  Tarek jumped onto the ground at the far end of the bridge and spun back around, as someone does who hears his name called. He stood for a moment as though listening. Then he shook his head and hurried into the camp.

  Menelik stood gazing down at Rajinder’s body. Jofar staggered as if drunk; then he leaned down and pulled off Raj’s helmet. He raised his sword again. Menelik caught his arm in one massive hand. Shikar rode forward and spoke to Jofar and the Apsuri charioteer. The Ferangi charioteer opened his mouth, thought better of interfering, stole away toward the walls. The sun touched the horizon and crimson flooded the sky, blood red unlike the dank darkness of the ground where Rajinder lay.

  Gard hauled himself to his feet. Strength, hoard strength . . . Senmut cursed, “Shikar, may your heart burst within your chest, rotten from within.”

  Shikar and the charioteer tied Rajinder’s wrists to the back of the chariot. Menelik made a quick dismissive gesture; Shikar shoved Jofar into the vehicle. The horses shuffled and stamped and then, at the flick of the reins, trotted off. The soil of Ferangipur sprayed over the body of its prince.

  Ladhani wriggled free of Deva’s arms and fled into the palace. Yasmine was already gone. Vijay strode with quick, brutal gesticulations toward the gate. Jamshid tottered in the same direction, Srivastava a wraith at his side.

  “Primitive,” said Deva in Gard’s ear. He did not react. The dragonet was stock still in his stomach, his mind was suspended within the shell of his skull. “Primitive rite, to plow the earth of Ferangipur with the body of its prince. Raj always said that the Apsuri were the more primitive.”

  “And therefore the stronger?” asked Senmut.

  Gard heard the bitterness in the old man’s voice. He saw tears glistening in Deva’s eyes, hope and sorrow chasing themselves across her face. He did not respond—strength, he needed strength.

  The chariot and its grisly burden swept past the jeering, gloating Allianzi troops and stopped before the city gates. Jofar dismounted and was violently sick over one of the glittering wheel-scythes, ridding himself of Bhai’s evil brew. Too late to save Rajinder.

  Too late for many things, said a small, still voice deep in Gard’s consciousness, but not to save Rajinder.

  Deva gripped his arm. Senmut tapped his spyglass against the stone. Rills of crimson light ran, to Gard’s supernally sensitive ears, with audible gurgles and trills across city, encampment, river, field. The figures standing, the figure supine in the dirt, the figure advancing out of the open gates, were garishly defined.

  Jofar’s pale face was painted with ruddiness. Shikar’s smirk and Menelik’s grave bow to the approaching form of Jamshid were shapes in carnelian. The old Rajah’s blasted features burned with a feverish glow. Srivastava’s look at Jofar flared red and then died into ash.

  On the far side of the field Bhai executed a clumsy dance step, giggling under his breath. Next to Gard, Senmut sputtered in disgust. Below them Jamshid conferred with Menelik while Jofar stood looking at his feet, face averted from the terrible husk that had been Rajinder.

  Jamshid sank onto his knees, plucking at Menelik’s greaves. “My son, give me the body of my son, I beg of you . . .”

  Shikar laughed malignantly. Menelik urged Jamshid to rise. He said to the charioteer, “Cut him loose. He deserves his fu
neral rites.”

  Several Ferangi soldiers ran forward to hoist the body of their prince and bear him away. Jofar tried once again to look at Srivastava, but she had already turned away, the sharpness of her shoulder and elbow a scathing rebuke. Vijay stood in the gateway, arms akimbo, his clean armor reflecting the sunset like martial ruby.

  “Now,” said Menelik politely, “about your surrender. About your opening the gates to us as promised . . .”

  Jamshid shuffled toward the city, behind the lolling head and splayed limbs of his son. He did not reply to Menelik. He might not have heard.

  “Surrender!” bellowed Shikar to Vijay.

  Vijay spat into the dirt. “Go to hell, Muktari!”

  Gard was not surprised. Neither was Menelik. He cocked his head and asked mockingly, “Frightened, puppy, of keeping your brother’s word?”

  “Go to hell, Apsuri!”

  “No,” moaned Deva. “Vijay, you fool, will you make Rajinder’s sacrifice worthless?”

  Will I? Gard asked himself.

  The soldiers and their burden, Jamshid and Srivastava, brushed by Vijay as if he were not there. The gates slammed. Menelik and Shikar strode back toward their officers, shouting orders. Jofar stood alone for a moment, gazing at the mark of a body in the dirt at his feet. Slowly he retrieved Rajinder’s sword, hoisted his shield, and trudged toward the bridge as if the ground were quicksand sucking at his feet.

  A spiraling cloud of bats swept across the scarlet sky and vanished, taking the sunset with them. Clear star-spotted night cupped the world. The Storm Lord was silent, thinking he had won.

  Gard’s mind followed the bats as they flew east beneath the sardonic smile of the moon. But he did not shiver. Like water flowing down a drain his mind centered itself and hung on the rim of resolve. Now, now, now . . .

  The stillness in him shattered and spewed flame into every interstice of his being. The dragonet leaped up, wings flapping in rainbow colors, pawing the air like a heraldic beast. It hurt, but it was exhilarating; Kundaraja, Leader of Souls.