The Tides of Kregen [Dray Prescot #12]

by Alan Burt Akers

  I felt strange, outré, a stranger, in my decent Vallian buff. I wore a longsword, true, but it was not a real Krozair longsword, crafted by master smiths in the workshops here. Out of habit I still swung a rapier and main-gauche from my belt. I took a step forward, and a dozen longswords were whipped from scabbards and leveled at my breast.

  “Lahal, my Brothers,” I cried. “Lahal and lahal, in the name of Zair."

  “There is no lahal for you here, Dray Prescot,” said a Krozair Brother, a Bold, one of those dedicated to the most intense efforts within the fraternity, a man whose whole life was bound up in daily service to the order. “Forsworn! No longer are you Pur Dray, Krozair of Zy."

  I gaped at him. I did not understand.

  “Forsworn, Dray Prescot, less than nothing, Apushniad, ingrate, traitor, leemshead. You are no longer a Krozair of Zy."

  * * *

  Chapter Eleven

  Apushniad

  Apushniad!

  That was a terrible word to a Krozair. Traitor, ingrate, leemshead, outlaw.

  A man cast off from the order.

  A man denied fellowship, a man despised by those who had once been his fellows.

  And I, Dray Prescot, had been dubbed Apushniad!

  I stood within the Hall of Judgment. The room was small, holding only a double hundred of Krozairs, ranked in their pews along the walls, the banners hanging in the lamplight above, a dusky, glittering mass of gold and scarlet. Small, that Hall of Judgment was, hewn from the living heart of the Rock of Zy. Small, because it was so seldom used. Once, long ago, I had witnessed the ritual trial and banishment of a Krozair Brother, accused of a crime no Krozair could own to and remain a member of the order. The ceremony had created a deep and lasting impression. So I knew what I faced.

  They had clad me in a white surcoat and on my breast blazed the great symbol of the order. They had hung a scabbarded longsword about my waist. It was my own sword, not a Krozair longsword, but a good workmanlike blade fashioned in the armory of Valka at Esser Rarioch by Naghan the Gnat and myself. It had served me well before. Now I stood in the Hall of Judgment, robed and armed like a Krozair, and I had no memory of how I had come there, how I had been dressed, what had happened after those terrible words had suddenly fallen on my uncomprehending ears.

  If I say that in the days and sennights, aye, and months that followed, I do not clearly recall all that happened, I think it no marvel. I was gripped in a stasis of horror that seemed to me impossible and that must vanish in the next heartbeat, yet it never left me as day succeeded day. So I stood there, facing my accusers. In the high throne sat the adjudicator, a Bold, a man in whose heart no mercy for the Grodnims could exist and therefore a man in whose heart no mercy for those who did not fully support Zair could exist either.

  To one side, in a throne with a hooded carapace fashioned after the likeness of that mythical bird, the Ombor—for whose name my House of Strombor in Zenicce was named—sat the Grand Archbold.

  I had thrown him a single despairing look, expecting to see my old friend Pur Zenkiren, expecting to receive some acknowledgment, some sign of understanding.

  Pur Zenkiren did not sit in the Ombor Throne.

  I knew the man who sat there.

  He sat with bitter down-curved lips, this man, the Archbold. This man who had succeeded Pur Zazz held the destiny of the Krozairs of Zy in his hands. I remembered him as a bold, free, ruthless Krozair captain, a man who would ram his swifter into the very jaws of the Overlords of Magdag. This was Pur Kazz of Tremzo, but different. A ghastly wound puckered the whole left side of his face, taking out an eye so that only the socket glared forth, rawly red. His bitter mouth twisted in the tail of that terrible scar. He sat hunched forward, his scarlet robes drawn about him, and I saw his hands shaking.

  A Krozair Brother lifted a scroll.

  “Step forth, oh man who is called Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor."

  A longsword point in the small of my back emphasized the demand. I stepped forward, onto the round raised pulpit where cunningly arranged lamps shed a concentrated light. I felt dizzy. I forced my head up and stood straight bracing those wide shoulders of mine back with a conscious effort.

  “I am here!” I cried. “And I do not understand! What—?"

  The Brother with the scroll began to read, drowning my words.

  As I listened I felt my spirit tremble and shrink. I, Dray Prescot felt the awful weight of what he said crush down on me and rend my ib so that I had to grip the lenken rail and hold on while all of Kregen rocked about me like a swifter in a rashoon.

  I heard his words—vague snatches of them recur in times of nightmare. I feel that neither my walk from the Phokaym across the Klackadrin nor the coronation parade of Queen Thyllis in Ruathytu, when I stumbled along at the tail of a calsany, scarcely moved me more, could have been more terrible. There have been other awful experiences through which I have gone on Kregen; perhaps this being out of the Krozairs of Zy affected me more powerfully than any of them, although, when I think back, I now understand that I did not really believe what was taking place before my eyes.

  The Call had been sent. The great Call had been sent out, the Azhurad, the Call to Arms which would bring every Krozair of Zy to fight for his order against enormous perils. Every Krozair of Zy had answered the Azhurad, as was his sworn duty, every Brother had come joyously to fight for Zair against the evil of Grodno, every single Brother—except one.

  All except Dray Prescot had answered the Call.

  I shouted: “But I did not know!"

  The adjudicator leaned forward.

  “That is a lie! You live, therefore you must know."

  A Brother stood up at my right. He was a young man. He did not relish his task. But the Krozairs point a path of justice in their dealings; they do not punish without trial and reason. This man, this Pur Ikraz, had been appointed to speak for me in my defense.

  He said: “It is true that any living Krozair must hear the Azhurad when the Call is sent. But is it not possible that, in this one instance, Pur Dray, somehow, in a manner we cannot guess, did not receive the Call?"

  The Adjudicator said, “It is impossible."

  Through the mazy sounds of that chamber I recalled speaking to Pur Zenkiren and to Pur Zazz, promising them that wherever I might be in Kregen I would answer the Azhurad. It had been explained to me. As part of the initiation ceremony I had been escorted down into the heart of the Rock of Zy and in a great cavern scooped from the living rock I had been shown the Horn of Azhurad. I knew nothing then of radio waves and of telepathy; I did know that when the Archbold set the giant bellows into action, pumping air through the myriad holes in the rock, the Horn would sound. The Azhurad would tingle with powers that could fling a note around the world, resonating in the skulls of every member of the Krozairs of Zy. Only through mystic disciplines of which I do not speak could a Krozair Brother hear the Azhurad, only one trained in the arts could understand. Hearing and understanding, he would joyfully don his surcoat with the hubless spoked wheel blazing within the scarlet circle, belt on his longsword and so go up with his Krozair Brethren against the foe.

  I gripped the rail. I shouted over their noise: “And if I did hear the Call, am I not here? Have I not answered? I was in the world of Kregen outside the Eye of the World. It has taken me many months of travel to reach you here."

  I was prepared to plead anything to avert the horror.

  The Adjudicator placed a forefinger to his lips as he spoke. “So you did hear the Call?"

  I would not lie.

  “No. I did not hear the Azhurad. But I am here now!"

  “It is known that it is impossible for a living Brother not to hear the Call. You stand condemned on two counts: if you did hear and did not come, you are condemned; if you did not hear that can only mean you were never properly a Krozair of Zy. You were not pure enough of spirit, your ib remained befouled with the dross of everyday life, so you stand condemned on that count, also, to be banished
, Apushniad."

  A thought occurred to me so despicable I winced at my own vileness. I lifted my head again and jutted my jaw out like the rostrum of a swifter.

  “My son Drak! Prince of Vallia! He was to join the Krozairs of Zy! And my second son Segnik, he who is now Zeg, he was also to join the Krozairs of Zy!"

  I could not go on. Not for myself could I use my sons.

  The Adjudicator hissed between his teeth.

  “Your sons answered The Call! They came with great gallantry and they fought with joy for Zair! But you—"

  “They are safe?"

  “They live still. It was they who told us you were not dead, as we had believed. They did not know where you were. Had you been dead it would have been better for you."

  Now Pur Kazz, the Grand Archbold, lifted his golden rod. Everyone fell silent and turned to the Ombor Throne.

  “When you did not answer the Azhurad, cramph, you were tried and condemned in your absence. Now you have the effrontery to arrive here crying and mewling. The sentence of that trial will be carried out. We stage this trial now in order to show you, who deserve nothing, that the Krozairs of Zy do not punish vengefully, out of spite, but out of law and order and love of Zair."

  I stared at him. His voice slurred. His hands trembled. I remembered him as arrogant and brash and filled with vigor. The disfiguring scar must have addled his brains. Besides, he had called me cramph, which is a term of abuse. Not one other of the Brethren had descended to insults.

  I shouted at him. “And my Delia! The Princess Majestrix of Vallia! She is here! I demand to see her!"

  “You demand nothing!"

  The Adjudicator's quick words were chopped by the bellow of rage from Pur Kazz. I could not understand what he said, and I do not think anyone else could either. But we were all fully aware of the passions of anger and enmity blazing in him.

  “Let the sentence be carried out."

  Pur Ikraz, the man to speak in my defense, started to plead in mitigation, but Pur Kazz waved his golden rod and brought it down with a crash and bellowed. My defense withered away.

  I do not fully recall what happened next. I have memories, lurid, black, lightning-shot, of men coming forward and speaking ritually above me. Of others ripping the bright insignia from the white surcoat. A dull realization of why they had clothed me in the emblems of the Krozairs of Zy shook me then. I had been clothed so that I might be stripped, in humiliation and shame.

  My longsword was lifted from the scabbard. I could see three different reflections of myself in tall mirrors, the Three Mirrors of the Ib, positioned to reinforce what went on in the mind of the accused, to make him see himself in all his shame.

  As the sword whispered from the scabbard I swung back. I saw Pur Kazz leaning over the golden rail of the Ombor throne. I saw the torches and the lamps, the massed faces of the Brethren; I heard the chanting as they exorcised the evil; I heard and I saw and I do not remember anything else until I found myself standing in that cleared space below my pulpit, the sword grasped in my fists in that cunning Krozair grip, cocked. I heard myself yelling—wild, strange, mad words, tumbling out pell-mell—and saw the ring of watchful Krozairs, bearing their swords in grips like mine, waiting, circling, ready to destroy me.

  I saw my reflection in the Three Mirrors of the Ib.

  I saw a madman. I saw the huge rent in the breast of my white surcoat. I saw the face: that devil's face with the furrowed brow and the snarling ugly mouth, the eyes like leems', glittering, maniacal, mad. I saw a man I did not recognize.

  But I knew the truth.

  The maniac brandishing a sword here in the Hall of Judgment, who would not accept the dictates of his onetime fellows in the Krozairs of Zy, that man who had reverted to all the old intemperate ruthlessness I had tried so hard to overcome, that devil incarnate here in the seat of wisdom and learning and great devotion—that madman was me, plain Dray Prescot.

  I threw the sword down with a clang.

  “You cannot understand why I could not answer the Call! If I said I was in a place where the Call did not reach, you would not believe! If I say I prize being a Krozair of Zy above all else on Kregen, you would sneer! I have failed you in your terms! But I have always kept the faith, I have not failed! It is you, who do not believe in Krozair Brother..."

  But I could not go on. How could they believe my wild stories about living on another world? How could they conceive of a world with only one sun, a world with only one moon, a world with only apims?

  Then, truly, my reason left me.

  Only vague and rending impressions remain.

  Someone must have picked up my sword. It hung before me in the air, the lamplight striking a star from the tip, the blade gleaming straight and true. A crazy thought afflicted me: how would Naghan the Gnat relish what was being done to his handiwork?

  For the sword was placed across the twin Stones of Repudiation. Basaltic blocks, hard and bleak and unforgiving, they hunkered like extensions of the very earth itself. The sword glimmered. I saw the Hammer of Retribution lifted. It rose high, poised in the muscular hands of a Krozair Brother whose title I will not repeat. I saw his naked arms flex. They bunched. I wanted to look away. I could not. The Hammer of Retribution smashed down. My longsword rang once, with a gong note, twisted, echoing, lost in the crash of sundering metal and the hammerblow against the rock.

  In shapeless shreds my sword lay on the floor.

  I cannot tell what happened next. I can only piece together those earlier memories of seeing a Krozair of Zy receive the Apushniad. It is painful. It is so painful I will leave that scene of desolation and horror. I was finally led away, head hanging, and although chains were placed on me they were unnecessary.

  I do remember the hissing and vindictive voice of Pur Kazz, Grand Archbold of the Krozairs of Zy, shouting at my back.

  “So goes he who once was Pur Dray, Krozair of Zy. Apushniad! Let no Krozair Brother's hand be lifted to help him. He is accursed. He is banished from our midst, as his sword is broken and his banner burned, and all the goodness of our hearts and faces is turned from him. Apushniad!"

  It was finished.

  * * *

  Chapter Twelve

  Conversation in a fish cell on the Island of Zy

  No, I do not wish to dwell on those moments in the Hall of Judgment, nor on the days that followed. You who have listened to my story know how I would willingly, gladly, have given up all the tawdry, tinselly titles I had accumulated, every one, to remain a Krozair of Zy.

  Apushniad!

  Outcast, leemshead, I was thrust from the warm circle of the order, and yet there was still work I might perform, still a use to be found for my unworthy body.

  I was not to be executed.

  Oh, make no mistake, the Krzy would think no more of executing an Apushniad than they would of lopping the head off an Overlord of Magdag.

  They knew my strength. Many in that small Hall of Judgment had fought with me in the long-gone past. They knew I had slaved as an oarsman in the galleys of Magdag. Now one of the minor points of the Zairians I had been forced to slide away from and overlook and condone was brought home: the men of Zair also employed slaves in their swifters.

  So I knew my fate.

  Down and down we went, the guard surrounding me with ready swords. They were expert swordsmen, as indeed they must be to become Krozairs at all. It would have been a great and bonny fight. It would have been a fight to warm a man.

  But I knew as we went down the stairs with the water dropping milkily about us and the torches hurling black-bat shadows ahead, that I could not fight those who had been my Brothers merely because they would not understand my wild talk of an earth with one sun, one moon and only apims. No, I had found, as I caught that dramatic reflection of the devil-figure who was me in the Three Mirrors in the Ib, that I could not strike out in hatred at a man who was a Krozair Brother, who wore the hubless spoked wheel within the circle as his emblem. Maybe there were other reasons. Per
haps, after all, I had grown weak and flabby, lacking the will and the old cutting edge. I do not think I felt fear. If anything my feelings had been the reverse and I would have joyed to leap forward to my death.

  Even then, though, even then I knew that I was still the old Dray Prescot, a stubborn onker who would never give up the fight but would always struggle on against despair and defeat.

  They thrust me into a narrow cell whose walls glistened wetly and the iron bars clanged with that soul-destroying sound of finality.

  Then they went away and left me to the darkness and the emptiness of self.

  How long did I spend in that cell? It is of no consequence.

  I was fed at intervals, washed, shaved, given a gray slave breechclout. My chains were checked and I was at last led out and up those long slippery stairs in the heart of the rocky Island of Zy beneath the gracious living areas of the extinct volcanic throat. Straight to the small harbor within the immense rocky arch I was led. It was night. The stars shone in spattering reflections on the water. There were no moons in the sky.

  Among the guards I heard a muttering, as of a low-voiced discussion that could not easily be resolved.

  Ahead I could see against the quay a long, low, impressive shape of power. There had been no swifters when I had flown in. There was no sign of my voller. Perhaps I would still not have made a break for it even if I had seen the airboat. I was down, beaten, face-first in the muck of life.

  The moored swifter possessed two banks of oars and was lean and powerful. Despite everything, I found myself noticing that she was bereft of much of the ornate panoply to which I had become accustomed in the swifters of the Eye of the World. She had been stripped for action with a vengeance.

  I heard one of the guards, a tough old bird with a scarred face, speaking hotly.

  “To the Ice Floes of Sicce with him! He is Apushniad!"