All this merely strengthened my determination to go downriver. I could not work for lack of strength, and could not really cope with the job of a stylor, for although I could read and write, I could not tell what I read or carry on a conversation—although, come to think of it, maybe they were exceedingly good reasons for me to be employed as a private secretary. Mulling this thought over in my still sluggish mind took a couple of the days we were due to spend in Ankharum. I'd have to make a decision soon, and find finance.
Do not imagine that I was blind to the ironies of my present situation when compared to what it had been such a short time ago!
Whilst I thus fretted over my best course and made firm decisions one day only to scrap them for something else the next, a freak storm swept the city. Ankharum, whose wide avenues, cluttered back alleys, houses with flat roofs and white walls, presented a pleasing sight, was further graced by many ancient trees. Tall serene trees lined the wider avenues, and all the courtyards had their own ornamental or shade trees. The gale broomed brutally across the city. The houses mostly escaped unscathed except where trees fell on them. The trees were mercilessly scythed down. They lay in droves as though brought low by the reaper's sickle. They looked like pathetic giants fallen from grace.
The gale lasted for most of one tormented night. From our lodgings we could hear the wind bellowing and blustering and shaking the whole building. Casements rattled dancing skeletons. I suppose that to a fellow like myself from northern climes the absence of rain in all the uproar and violence of the storm gave it its most macabre aspect. The wind howled and roared and next morning clearing away of the trees began slowly. Nothing like it had been known for season upon season. No one could even remember hearing of a similar storm in the past.
Mevancy put her head in the door, beaming most evilly, to say: “A wonderful great tree has fallen full on Trylon Nanji's Merkaller. Squashed it flat. Such a shame."
And I said: “Such a shame."
What came out, what sounded, was: “Susha shame."
“Cabbage!” exclaimed Mevancy, delighted. “You're making sense!"
“Sense but no strength,” I more or less said.
“Keep trying. Keep the old tongue mobile!"
“Yesh,” I spluttered.
The loss of Nanji's carriage delayed the caravan's departure. This I welcomed for I could thus postpone the final decisions about my own plans. Despite incredible exertions and body-shattering exercises, I gained no strength. I remained as weak as a woflo.
“Still,” said Mevancy in her newly-rough way, “you can talk a bit now and you can lift a pen. You'll do. I'll give you the gold you need.” She screwed up her eyes at me. “I don't feel responsible for you any more, Drajak."
“I give you my thanks,” I mumbled. “I will arrange passage."
“Well, if you change your mind, do it soon. Master Pandarun won't wait for laggards who can't afford to pay for the privilege."
So I went down to the levee and fixed up a passage aboard a flat-boat.
Now I had no inkling. I'd done my work. I was not myself as a result of that task, and resented that, I can tell you, by Krun! I said goodbye to Mevancy and I own I felt a pang. I owed her much, a damn-sight more than mere gold. She gave me a nice lynxter and the sword was a parting gift I knew I would treasure. We made the remberees and I walked off towards the river.
“Remberee, Drajak, cabbage!” she called after me again.
I turned. “Remberee, Lady Mevancy nal Chardaz!"
The words sounded almost as though uttered by a human throat.
Llodi appeared at my side and said he would stroll down to the levee with me, as the Deldar had gone off with a local girl for the afternoon.
A giant of a tree lying athwart the roadway was being cut up by gangs of slaves. It had fallen just short of the river and its leafy branches spread their debris alongside the landing stage where was moored my flat boat. Llodi stood back for me to pass around the stump end of the tree. This had been wrenched out of the ground to form a round saucer-like mass of earth and broken roots. Incongruously, still adhering in a ring to the flat surface, now on its side, neat rows of flat pavement tiles formed a wall instead of a road. So I inched my way around past the earthy bottom of the tree and a brick wall. The passage was narrow by reason of the gaping semi-circular hole the uprooted tree had left in the pavement.
That it should be at this precise point that I collided with Strom Hangol came as no surprise whatsoever to me.
This confrontation had been long in the making. This seemed a spot picked by the invisible referees of the Hyr Jikordur for the ritual initial insults.
Hangol simply snarled: “Out of the way, shint."
Well, now. I stood still and silent for a moment, and in that tiny space I heard Llodi call soft and urgently for me to withdraw. I supposed in that moment of indecision and self-mockery that, indeed, I would have to withdraw. I was in no case to fight this cramph now.
He took my indecision as a calculated insult.
He slashed at me with his riding crop.
To say that I dislike people who go around hitting other people for no reason, with riding crops or anything else, is a grave understatement. In the normal course of affairs I'd have taken the whip away from him and wrapped it around his head. But, as before, I was slow and weak and he caught me a slicing slash across the shoulder. Instead of staggering back, I thought to be clever and use an old ploy. So I gave a stentorian bellow of pain—and the fakery in that was minimal, by Krun!—and surged forward as though falling helplessly.
He was very quick.
He stepped back sharply so that I ran stumbling on, almost losing my balance, for five or six long paces. As I went past him so he hit me again.
I regained my balance and turned. Llodi came into view around the uprooted tree stump, a look of intense sorrow on his face. Hangol faced me and slowly thrust his riding crop down his belt and drew his sword.
“I have suffered under your insolence, you rast, and now will repay you."
There was no point in my hanging about. Already I was late for the flatboat, delayed by fallen trees, and I knew I would not last two passes in my present state if I allowed this brawl to develop into a sword fight. As I reached that insalubrious conclusion Hangol advanced on me, sword poised.
He wore a plain yellow tunic, with a fawn robe carelessly caught over his right shoulder. His face expressed the most lively anticipation of enjoyment.
He dropped his sword. He clapped his left hand to his neck, and he let out a surprised yell. I thought—I was not sure—I spotted a tiny stick-like object protruding from the side of his neck between his fingers.
Someone yelled fiercely: “Run, onker!"
So I ran.
I helter-skeltered down the side of the fallen tree to the levee. The master of the flatboat stood at the top of the jetty steps looking back. When he saw me he waved an urgent arm and I fairly flew along and clattered down the steps into the boat.
“You come finely on your time, dom,” he growled and his crew poled off.
* * *
Chapter seven
I, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor and Krozair of Zy, was far from a happy fellow that evening as I sat dangling my legs over the boat's bows and watched the twin suns go down.
Strom Hangol had run after me, yelling and waving the rapier he'd ripped from its scabbard. I had not waited. Rendi the Keel, the master, had decided he would not hang about, either. So, I had run off from a foeman. Well, I've run away before, and by Vox I don't doubt I'll run away again in the future. I am no longer the headstrong Dray Prescot who first came to Kregen under the Suns of Scorpio. All the same, it rankled...
And I can be even more headstrong and violent now than ever I could. The passage of the seasons has tended to channel the direction of those efforts.
The river burbled on and I settled into a fresh acceptance of my lot. The banks were flat and varied greatly in height. All away to the east lay flat d
esertland. The irrigations of the city persisted some way along the margin of the west bank, interspersed with buildings and little villages. They would soon peter out. I supposed this River of Oneness to have its sources in some vast range of mountains among the jungles of Chem. If it carried me down to the west of the South Lohvian Sea I could then sail eastwards and visit my kingdom of Djanduin. That appeared to me a particularly appealing prospect.
In floods and sheets of crimson and jade, of orange and emerald, with spears of gold and umber striking upwards, the twin suns sank. Luz and Walig vanished beneath the horizon and still light bloomed in the sky as the stars came out and the two second moons of Kregen eternally orbiting each other cast down their fuzzy pink moons light. The scent of Moonblooms reached me from the eastern bank. The smell of the river, dark and pungent, secret with secrets old before man ever sailed these waters, wafted upwards as the prow cut southwards. Well, then, I was sorry to part with Mevancy; but I would force myself to be content with my fate in that, and press on with what had to be done on Kregen.
In the last clash of colors as the final rinds of suns sank and the stars winked out and the Twins circled above I saw vaguely through the green and the crimson and the pink a wash of blueness steal between me and the stars.
The blueness swelled and bloated above me and the gigantic form of the phantom Scorpion leered down. I felt coldness. I was lifted up, gasping, for a crazy topsy-turvy instant seeing the flatboat sailing along over my head, and then down I went, splat! into the dirt.
My first action after I spat to clear the dust from my throat was to feel for the sword. It still swung at my belt. The blueness vanished and with it the spectral Scorpion. I sat up. Now where was I?
“By the revolting dangling left eyeball of Makki Grodno!” I said, breathing hard. “Now what the merry hell are the Everoinye playing at?"
For I was sitting in the dirt of a village street and from the shape of the church or temple at the water's edge I recognized a village we'd sailed past just a short time ago. So the Star Lords did not wish me to leave.
But—not leave what? I did not groan as I got to my feet; but I'd felt that thumping great arrival here. Was I supposed to stay with the caravan? With Mevancy? Here in Ankharum? Or perhaps one of the folk in the caravan was the target of the Star Lords concern. I just didn't know.
As to that, then, as I started to walk back, I'd find out.
With sensible rests and a good pace and a careful lookout the walk back through the narrow alleyways through the irrigations and past the occasional village took me round almost to the rising of the suns. I crawled into our lodgings and found a straw-heap by the downstairs door and flaked out.
Something hard and pointed jabbed into my ribs and I rolled over and saw it was a toe with a round pink toenail trimmed and shining.
I looked up. Past the pretty pink toenail the rest of a shapely foot and then a perfectly turned ankle and a calf of superb curve and proportion led my gaze to the edge of a violet towel obscuring the balance of a rich thigh and a swell of hip.
She said: “You nurdling great onker! That shint Hangol has sworn—he was foaming—he'll kill you on sight. You utter nincompoop! What the hell have you come back for?"
The fact I noticed was the smooth shining silkiness of her skin. I looked up at her face—a face not remarkable for beauty but noteworthy for strength of resolution and conviction—and saw black thunderclouds there that would have brought a whole regiment of aerial cavalry down in flames.
“Well,” I said, and then paused, and said, again: “Well,” and so said no more.
“Well?” she snapped, twitching the violet towel more securely around her. That smooth loveliness seemed somehow different on her forearms and the grainy look caught the light differently.
I'd absolutely no story prepared to explain my return, and I could not think of one on the spur of the moment. She saw me looking at her naked arms and her face flushed up—making her look suddenly vastly more attractive.
“Oh, you!” she flared out. “All right, cabbage. We'll have some breakfast and then I'll have to see Rikky Tardish. It might just be that I can save your bacon for you, you get onker you!"
So after she had dressed we had breakfast in the upstairs room and fine fare it was, too, to a poor wretch like me who had marched famished all night. The sleeves of her tunic were fastened more tightly than usual so that only small oval shapes of grainy skin were visible. If she'd suffered some accident as a child, say a nasty scalding, she ought not to be ashamed of that. Somehow I had the firm impression that had she suffered an accident and been disfigured she would not be ashamed but angry and defiant.
“Don't you care what happens to you, cabbage?"
“Usually,” I said, equably. Truth to tell I was pleased to be able to join in conversation again, even though I've always been more of a listener than a talker. “But there are priorities. At the moment, breakfast is the top priority. After that I'll start thinking of ways not to get killed."
“I have already thought. You must keep out of Hangol's way—look at you! You're hardly strong enough to slice that loaf!"
She exaggerated; but not, by Krun, by much!
She went on, her nostrils pinching and flaring: “We have to cross the Farang Parang to reach the capital. Once we get there we can—"
“P'raps we'd better think what to do when we get there when we get there."
She glared.
Then: “You, Drajak, are damned rude. But I suppose you're right."
“Who's this fellow Rikky Tardish?"
“Ah!” She perked up and I caught a distinct impression of a small girl planning mischief. “He thinks of himself as a sly rogue; but everyone takes outrageous advantage of him. He runs a traveling entertainment troupe."
So, at once, I saw what she planned.
I did not exactly groan. So far I'd avoided the old cliché, found in so many stories of Earth and of Kregen, of the famous hero or heroine hiding in a circus or troupe of players. The nearest I'd come had been with Rollo the Circle and his artists. I am not enamored of circuses. Still, she had the right of it in this: I had to steer clear of Hangol for a time yet.
“You will have a green face and a red nose, with ears of a size."
She did not exactly smack her lips at this prospect; but her eyes were bright and her lips curved in such a way as to show her deep mocking enjoyment.
“You,” I said, trying not to snarl, “are worse than a Witch of Loh."
Of course, I did not mean that in any literal sense—naturally!
Her face clouded. “Do not,” she said, and she spoke seriously. “Do not speak of the Witches or Wizards of Walfarg to Rikky Tardish.” She blew out her cheeks, and added: “He was englamoured of a Witch of Walfarg once, and did things he tried to forget, things that give him nightmares."
I thought of Kov Vodun Alloran who had been englamoured of a witch and had caused grievous harm in Vallia before Drak and Silda had saved him. Kov Vodun had raged against Hamal, like Cato and his refrain delenda est Carthago. Now Vallia and Hamal were allies, delenda est Carthago—or Hamal—was long put aside.
This reminder of the outside world did not depress me. The Star Lords had sent me here for a purpose which was still unfulfilled. Here in this vast stretch of country in Southern Loh the people were isolated from the greater outside world, it is true; but they had their ways and civilization and religious beliefs. They were not barbarians. What might depress me quite apart from the weakness upon me was the notion that I couldn't get away from here until I had first discovered what the Everoinye wanted done—and then doing it. For a time yet, I, Dray Prescot, was prepared to be patient. After that, mind you ... !
“If,” I said heavily, “this Rikky Tardish has been fooling around with a Witch of Loh, a Witch of Walfarg as you call ‘em here in Loh, then he deserves everything he gets."
She eyed me sharply.
“You sound as though—"
“Oh, no,” I said, so
mewhat hastily. “I'm not that much of a fool."
I was not prepared to go into details of my own war with Csitra, a Witch of Loh. And, by Zair! Didn't that seem a long time ago now!
“Well,” she said brightly, popping a paline. “Let us go and find the green paint for your face. And ears as large as maybe.” She rose from the breakfast table, brisk and businesslike. With a groan, I followed.
When a girl can't thump your pillows for you she'll find some other way of devilry to torment you. A Green face! And Ears!
Well, I thought sturdily as I trundled along abaft Mevancy, I'd damned well take comfort from the red nose, by Zim-Zair!
Rikky Tardish was all the things Mevancy had said. Lively, sparkish, thinking of himself, as a later age would express it, as one hell of a guy, he was three times ripped off even in the short time Mevancy and I talked with him. Once a decrepit object borrowed silver and went off whistling. Once a girl said she had a headache and was excused and was later seen with her lover in a low tavern. Once a coper swore the mytzer he was selling was in perfect condition, and that draught animal later expired of advanced colic.
“All the time, Mevancy?” said Tardish.
“All the time,” said Mevancy, with great firmness, “until you reach Makilorn."
I opened my mouth to speak and Mevancy snapped: “Shut your black-fanged winespout, Drajak. All the time! Dernun?"
“But,” I got out. “The ears? Not the ears!"
Scorpio Reborn [Dray Prescot #38] Page 7
