So, there we sat, gorging away.
Few slaves or guards were to be seen among all the furniture and treasures down there. I couldn't see the sorcerer or the Lady Hebe; but there was just a glimpse of Hurngal between two glass cases looking toward us. He turned around and went off to the far end of the chamber.
Shortly thereafter, the Lady Hebe's guard captain approached. The cadade marched smartly up the flight of steps and saluted Loriman with punctiliousness and then stood waiting to be noticed.
“Yes, Scancho?” said Loriman taking the wine glass from his lips.
“Pantor! The Kov Hurngal requests you attend him at the door."
“Oh, he does, does he?"
The way the request was phrased was bound to inflame the Hunting Kov.
And then one of Rogarsh's Rapas, feathers bristling, beak gaping, waving his arms about like a maniac, ran full tilt out from the furniture and bolted up the steps. He made no attempt at protocol or waiting to be noticed.
“We have been betrayed!” he shrieked. “Kov Hurngal has taken his people out and shut the door and bolted it fast! It is unbreakable. We are locked in. We are trapped in the maze!"
* * *
Chapter nineteen
Kov Hurngal's treachery isrepaid
When the shouting and raging and futile hammering at the door at last finished, I thought Kov Loriman was in fair case to blow up completely. The choleric face was a single scarlet blot, the eyebrows marvels of bristling anger, and he kept opening and closing his fists like claws, as though he had Hurngal's neck fast clenched there.
“The treacherous traitorous bastard!” he choked out, stuttering with the rage that possessed him.
I caught Seg's eye and nodded so we took ourselves off out of it for a space. Nath followed us. He looked downcast.
I said: “Did any of you see the outside of that damned door when we marched in?"
“No. Both leaves were folded right back against the wall.” Seg spoke quite calmly. “The Rapa says there was a bar as big as a treetrunk, and bolts of iron."
“There are ways of breaking down doors. That does not cause me concern. The effect on Loriman is unpredictable. And Hebe has been deprived of her cadade and has gone off with Hurngal."
“Scancho works for Loriman,” said Nath. “He was given the cadade's job to keep an eye on her for the Hunting Kov.” The way Nath said that indicated clearly his view of kovs, whether of the hunting variety or not.
“When Loriman intrigued to get Hurngal's cash and influence,” said Seg, “he didn't bargain that the lady in the middle would go over to the other side."
“Well,” I said, and I brisked up, “we'll burn the dratted door down and then we'll get after the witch."
Amid shouts and counter shouts, Loriman sent all his and the others’ people off to knock on the walls and uncover the secret doors that had to be here somewhere.
There were very few slaves trapped with us. They had not ventured up onto the railed area to eat and drink and they'd clustered among themselves. Now we could see that Hurngal had swept up everybody's slaves he could lay his hands on to carry his treasure. A bold confident planning kind of rogue, this, then.
I picked up a slender wooden chair and smashed it against the floor. It splintered into pieces.
Loriman ripped out: “By Armipand's black belly, Bogandur, that may do your bad temper good. It won't help us find a way out of this trap."
“On the contrary, kov."
Seg broke a wooden table up very smartly.
I said as I reached for another chair, “We'll burn the damned door down."
“Oh!” said Kov Loriman, the Hunting Kov.
The listlessness of this stranded party of adventurers, as though they labored under a doomdark fate, materially lightened when they set to work to pile inflammables by the doors. During our travels through the maze we had slept on and off, and it now seemed fitting before we set fire to the door and escaped that we should rest. Loriman would have none of that.
“After the rast! Top speed. I'll cut him down where he stands, the yetch!"
A few moments’ reflection convinced me that it was not worth tangling with Loriman over this. He was right, from his point of view, in pursuing the treacherous kov as quickly as possible.
That we had other fish to fry appeared to have been forgotten by him. Now, he lusted for revenge.
Although the sacred and magical number on Kregen is nine, there are many stories and legends current of the Secret Seven. These fabled champions, skilled, tough, quick of foot and eye, never downcast no matter how their losses mount, striving always to climb the ladder of success, provide a clarion call of honor and striving to the children of the lands of Paz on that monstrous and beautiful, terrible and lovely world of Kregen four hundred light-years from the world of my birth.
Revenge, the Secret Seven had proved in many a lusty tale of adventure, paid no dividends.
I said, “Very well, kov. We have yet to reach into the heart of Spikatur."
“We will, we will. Pandrite the All-Glorious will guide our footsteps after I have struck down that cowardly Kov Hurngal ham Hortang."
So we fired the huge jumbled pile of lumber heaped up high against the doors and retired to the railed area to await results.
The smoke wafted in flat oily streamers and the flames spat merrily. The clustered bat-creatures on the ceiling began to stir, to flutter wings, and to drop down erratically. San Aramplo had happened to mention that he believed these creatures to be Wargovols. They swooped down in droves, uncertain, disturbed, and circled and so sought to regain their perches in the ceiling. And the smoke wafted up among them and their shrill squeaking pierced through with a menace we could not avoid.
The lumber stacked up burned through in gouts of flame and the doors still burned when Kov Loriman seized an axe from one of his Chulik guards and hurled himself forward. Like a crazy man, he hacked and hewed at the door amid the smother of ashes and dust, the clouds of smoke and the spurts of flame. He burst the charred wood through and the leaves of the door creaked open.
Blackened, bloated, bold, the Hunting Kov smashed his way through the ruined doors to freedom.
“Hai!” I roared, giving him some of the accolade he deserved, for he was a spritely fellow, and yet withholding the “jikai” which was totally inappropriate at this juncture.
Seg said: “He may be a right bastard; but you have to give the old sod credit, by Vox!"
The brown breechclout I had had from Mistress Tlima was now soiled and in a distressing condition. I went across to the nearest red velvet drape and slashed a length free with the short sword. I fashioned this into a breechclout and drew the ends around my waist and up and so fastened all securely with the broad lesten hide belt with the dulled silver buckle. I own, the thought of the brave old red, even though it was more crimson than scarlet, heartened me.
Seg did the same.
We had to make a run for it at the end when the Wargovols, smoke-maddened, whirled down in a fluttering storm of wings.
They did not follow us from that chamber.
No difficulty at all presented itself to hinder us in our pursuit. The way Hurngal had taken was obvious and easy to follow. That route was marked. We simply followed along the trail of corpses.
As we pressed on so we saw that the character of the dead changed; at first they were all slaves, half-naked, weaponless and without burdens, then we saw the sacks flung down among the corpses and soon there were more guards than slaves and then no slaves at all and only fighting men lying there in their own blood.
“The witch is enjoying herself,” I said to Loriman. I'd bustled up through our people in order to get near him—just in case. His purple-veined nose had simmered down a trifle and his anger was now of that icy contained variety so frightening in a choleric fleshy fellow. “She is torturing these poor devils."
“I care nothing for them. I hope Hurngal is suffering. And if he lets any harm come to the Lady Hebe..."<
br />
Strom Tothor spoke in a most shrunken lion-roar. “They take all attention, for we are unattacked."
“Quite."
Loriman forced the pace on. “We must be close to the way out now. That is why the witch is so ferocious."
I did not disabuse him, for in his rage he was contradicting his earlier belief and agreeing with Hurngal. Among the dead littering the passageway lay many a fine hyrpaktun with the golden pakzhan at his throat, and many a mercenary with the silver pakmort. Csitra, I felt, had played with us enough and was now finishing it.
If she had indulged in another quarrel with her hermaphrodite child Phunik, both their attentions would be absorbed. Csitra had her limitations. It was possible to escape whole from the Coup Blag. There was, also, the overly handsome young man called Pamantisho the Beauty to slake Csitra's lust and keep her occupied.
We entered another of the enormous rooms in this labyrinth, of similar proportions to the chamber in which Hurngal had trapped us. By that treachery he had materially assisted his own doom, for we were a powerful fighting force.
So thinking, I strode into the chamber, and stopped, stock still, and everyone stopped with me, and so we gazed upon the hecatomb. We saw the end of it, there, in those wildly distorted bodies, in the agony and terror on those tortured faces, in the drippings and drenchings of blood splattered everywhere. They were all dead, all of them. San Aramplo the Khibil sorcerer was there in the shambles, and, as we could see, his arts had failed him.
Kov Hurngal was there. We recognized him by his armor and clothes, for his face was ripped off. A broken sword gripped in his fist told he had fought valiantly.
Near him lay the Lady Hebe.
Nobody went near Kov Loriman. We all gave him a wide berth. He knelt by the dead woman, head bowed, and knuckles on the floor, almost like a whipped and beaten curdog. He remained like that until the next phase in this ghastly maze, and no doubt might have stayed like that until he died of hunger and thirst.
Nobody said anything. We looked about like men drunk on terror.
Now the whole oppressive atmosphere of the Coup Blag descended on us. We were conscious of the weight of rock pressing down all about us. We found it difficult to breathe. Sweat started up all over our bodies. We all felt that amidst the horror and the terror we, also, must have reached the end of our adventure.
At the far end of the chamber a balcony extended the full width of the wall. How deep it might be I could only conjecture, for it was covered by green curtains and the hall under the balcony lay in deep shadow. Along the left-hand wall the balcony extended as a small gallery at a lower level. On the right-hand wall the balcony reached much farther and this extension, too, was covered by green curtains. That it projected only a couple of feet could mean that it was that narrow, or that its extent lay farther into the depths of the maze.
Green and red lights shone in the shadows under the balcony. They were not all in pairs. Some there were grouped in fours. The scuffling sound of furtive movement scraped on the marble pavement. The eyes brightened and grew nearer. Lambent green, smoky red, they leered upon us in their hundreds.
Slowly, out from the shadows of the balcony into the brilliantly chandelier-lit chamber, the horrors advanced. They wriggled and squirmed along; clawed feet rang sharply against the marble, soft and slimy pads made sucking sounds, some of the monsters flew hovering. So the host of nauseating monstrosities came fully into the light to reveal all their murderous hideousness.
“So that's what happened to these poor devils,” said Seg. He reached up for a rose-red-fletched arrow.
Nath the Impenitent drew his sword. His face was set. “We're done for, doms. But we'll give ‘em a fight."
“The last great fight,” said the Rapa, Tyr Rogarsh the Rattler. His feathers had never looked more colorful.
“Aye,” said the numim, Strom Tothor ham Hemfar. “The last battle. And, this will be a High Jikai."
Scancho the Chulik guard captain just set himself ready to honor his dark Chulik code.
So these people with me prepared for the last great fight, a struggle that would in Zair's own truth be a High Jikai.
There was no doubt that we were doomed, as the folk with Kov Hurngal had been doomed.
“What in the name of Numi-Hyrjiv the All Glorious are they waiting for?” demanded Tothor.
For the horde of unspeakable creatures shuffled and clicked and clacked and squirmed—and waited.
The green velvet curtains covering the balcony parted down the center. Slowly they pulled apart.
“I see,” said Seg. “The bitch."
On the balcony and bathed in an uncertain light reared a golden throne. Its edges were hard and defined where they were not smothered in chavonth pelts and ling furs and trailing multi-colored silks. High above the throne the monstrous head of a scaled risslaca gaped down, wedge-shaped jaws extended, forming a mantling canopy. The eyes were hooded ruby lights. To stand before the throne and gape up gave any onlooker a creepy feeling of ominous and malefic power ready to strike.
Half-naked Chail Sheom lay chained about the steps of the throne and weird men and women gripped the leashes of weirder beasts. The coiling miasmic stink of a multitude of overpowering scents wafted down.
Yet throne, scaled dinosaur canopy, the pearl-strung slave girls, the half-tamed throne beasts, and all the glitter of gold and gems paled beside the woman who sat in the chair of the throne.
Her face, as pale as the snows of the north, held no tinge of color. Severe, erect, dressed in black and green with much gold, she surveyed us with those eyes like sliding luminous slits of jade. Her dark hair swept down over her forehead into a widow's peak and was combed into long tresses over her shoulders. A small replica of the wedge-shaped dinosaur head studded the center of the jeweled band around her hair.
So she sat, her pointed chin propped on a beringed hand, arm girt with the glitter of bracelets. She brooded on us and on what would follow when she gave the word to her creatures to begin the slaughter.
We would fight. We would put up a brave show. We'd go down bellowing our defiance, shrieking the “Hai Jikai!” as our guts spilled, our faces were ripped off, or our heads rolled bouncing across her marble floor.
Seg stood calmly, bow half-drawn, ready for the end. The others waited in the same grim silence. This, then, was the end?
I threw off my leather war-harness. Clad only in the red breechclout, with the Krozair brand glittering before me, I stepped out alone.
“Csitra!” I bellowed in that old foretop-hailing roar and the echoes rang around that stupendous hall. “Csitra! I gave you my promise to visit you. Well, lady, here I am!"
* * *
Chapter twenty
The Scorpion of the Star Lords
The echoes of that shout rang and rustled and so died in the chamber.
Csitra did not move. I fancied those slit eyes of jade slid to regard me. Well, by Zim-Zair! She could hardly miss me, could she, stuck out as I was like a sore thumb before the remnants of the expedition.
What my comrades at my back were doing I didn't know; I just hoped they'd let me get on with it. Now I had to concentrate every ounce of my willpower to confront this stupendously powerful woman. If she willed, she could whiff me and all of us away in a single casual gesture of those slender white fingers, ring bedecked. At least, I supposed so.
At last she spoke, breathily, on a gasp. “I do not think I really believed you, my love."
Those last two words made me cringe.
“But you are here.” Her voice grew in strength. “You did come to see me as you promised."
“Certainly,” I said.
“But why like this? You might have been killed, for I did not know. Oh, my heart, if one of my clever traps had ... I cannot speak it. You must come up here at once, I will send...” She was fluttering like a teenager going to her first real grown-up dance. “You are here! You have come to visit me in the Coup Blag! That surely must mean—"
“Mother.” The whispering fragile voice penetrated with utter clarity into the hall and with utter horror. “It means he is here to be slain, surely?"
The green curtains over the side balcony parted. The first thing I heard sent a shudder of remembered revulsion through me. The tiny golden bells, tinkling and tintinnabulating around the palanquin, heralded the arrival of Phu-Si-Yantong, as now it heralded the presence of his brat, the uhu Phunik. The Wizard of Loh's procession came into view on the balcony.
All sliding cloth of gold curtains, massive bull-horned Womoxes to carry the chair, chained and beaten Chail Sheom half-naked yet draped with pearls, obscene beasts hardly of Kregen, a retinue of damned Katakis as evil a bunch of slavers and slavemasters as you'd hope not to meet, guards of fantastic and eerie appearance—yes, the child of Phu-Si-Yantong and Csitra could put on a show. As for the uhu, only a glimpse of a dark shadow against the red-gold and purple-black, the tilt of a small imperious head, furtive, furtive...
“That's a pity,” came Seg's cheerful voice over my shoulder. “And, my old dom, you were getting on so well with your light o’ love."
“You wait,” I said, without turning. “I think we must try a few falls for a remark like that."
“Absolutely. I'll wait. Shall I shaft the little horror?"
“You can try. I doubt—"
“Aye, you're right. Damned magic."
This pleasant byplay took heartbeats only, and Phunik's hateful voice whispered on. “You cannot be serious, mother, surely? For this man is dangerous and must die."
“No!” Csitra's gasp slapped like an open palm against a fleshy cheek. “He belongs to me!"
Now Phunik proved him, her or itself a true child to Phu-Si-Yantong. The voice scratched now like a nail against glass.
“Very well, mother, as the Seven Arcades witness the compact. You are no longer to be trusted to carry on my father's work. I shall dispose of this offal here and then you, too, must join the man, if that is your desire."
Phunik gave Csitra no time to reply. A shaft of pure white light sprang from the palanquin.
The light splashed against the floor ten feet from us, and the floor boiled and burned and melted. The sound of the uhu's laugh of pleasure was unmitigated evil. The next blast would do for us.
Omens of Kregen [Dray Prescot #36] Page 16
