by Paul Collins
‘Well, yes, there are ringstones, but they are obscured behind the terraces of channels. They give the place such an ancient, old-fashioned aspect. They are necessary, of course, but why have them on view?’
‘You say the place is no longer used?’
‘Oh, my philosophers and priests use the device to view other worlds without going there. It is far safer. What we can do is find your world by allowing you to see it from the vision chair. What is the name of your world?’
Zimak was about to say Q’zar but Daretor coughed loudly. ‘Name?’ he asked. ‘It is just the world. It has no name.’
Zimak silently cursed himself. Jelindel had often told them that knowledge of someone’s ‘truename’ or a world’s ‘place name’ gave power to magicians. Daretor was simply being careful.
The prince waited for Zimak to have his say, but when he deferred to Daretor, he said, ‘It is sure to have a name, you just don’t know it. What to do, what to do? There have been travellers from your world to ours. That is, no doubt, where our common language comes from. They, and others, have told us many world names. We could use these to view dozens of worlds until we find yours.’
‘When can we begin?’ asked Daretor.
‘Tonight. There is no special preparation needed. I am a priest of some ability, and I know many world names. I shall sit in the throne behind you, chanting the names. When we see cities, mountains and forests from your world, tell me. Then Zimak can take my place, and you can both be sent back by means of a more powerful spell.’
‘As a sign of gratitude for saving your wife’s life?’ Daretor asked.
‘Why, of course, Daretor.’ Prince Ulad rested his hands on Daretor and Zimak’s shoulders. ‘My wife has instructed me to lavish upon you both my utmost hospitality. Preparations for your safe return home began the moment we received word of your bravery.’
________________________
As was his routine, Daretor went out to the pell yard to do some sword work before the evening meal. Zimak watched from a tower window. Outwardly he was calm, but inside he was frantically trying out a multitude of plans. If he returned to Q’zar he would no longer be exceptionally strong. If he stayed behind, he would no longer have Daretor’s protection. If he returned home, he would be there when Daretor discovered the truth about him getting his martial skills from an enchanted ring.
There was a rustling of cloth behind him. When he turned around, he saw a very old man leaning on the window ledge beside him. Together, they looked down on Daretor. The man’s embroidered cloak marked him as a priest. Its cowl was down, revealing a circlet of exquisitely wrought silver with a single gem embedded as a third eye across the forehead.
‘A magnificent swordsman,’ the priest said sombrely, appraising Daretor.
‘Nobody can deny that,’ Zimak replied. He edged marginally away, sensing a power within the man.
‘My name is Modar,’ he said, airily. ‘I am the high priest of the temple. You are, of course, Zimak.’ He stroked his goatee with jewel-encrusted fingers.
‘What god is the temple dedicated to?’ asked Zimak, with no real interest. Anything to deflect the man’s penetrating stare. He looked back at Daretor.
‘No god in particular. It is actually no more than a building to house the ringstone. People hire the main chamber for religious ceremonies every so often, so I suppose it does have religious function. My own role is not so much that of a priest, as warlock. I look after magical matters, administer the place, organise ceremony rosters, lead the chanting, and generally make sure the place runs smoothly.’
Zimak looked at the priest. ‘Tell me about the process for being transported back to my homeworld,’ he said, casually. ‘Do Daretor and I go together, or does he go first?’
‘Oh, either way is possible. In this instance, the plan is for our monarch to go with Daretor, scribe the location parameters, then return and send you. We would like to establish a … friendly place to visit on your world. A place where our explorers can arrive and not be set upon by hostile locals.’
‘Tell me, is there any reason why I should be sent back at all?’
Modar paused. ‘No, but don’t you want to return home?’
‘No, to be really honest. I like it here. I am stronger than anyone else on this world, other than Daretor. Your girls are very pleased to be in my company and, generally, I like to be here. What is more, I can be of great value to you.’
‘And how might that be?’
‘I have travelled widely on my world. I can make many journeys with, say, yourself. I can show you safe and interesting places. Places of power and treasure. I would trade my knowledge for a dozen gold coins a month, a pleasant suite in the palace, and the company of your monarch’s more pleasing concubines.’
‘That seems a very reasonable offer … but from your tone I gather that you would prefer that Daretor did not find out.’
Zimak shrugged. ‘Daretor is a boor. He wouldn’t understand.’
The priest raised his hand and snapped his fingers. For some moments nothing happened, but when he and Zimak turned around there were two girls of about twenty standing behind them. Each was holding a gold tray, upon which was a gold cup. The priest gestured to the girl who was standing before Zimak.
‘Let us drink a toast to our arrangement,’ he said, staring levelly at Zimak. ‘This drink is yours. You may keep the cup if you wish, along with the tray. Even the slave is yours, if she is to your fancy.’
The girl smiled demurely. Zimak winked at her as he took the cup – then he cunningly took the priest’s cup as well. Both were about half filled with some sort of golden wine. Zimak poured the contents of one cup into the other, then poured out half of the mixture into Modar’s cup.
‘To our very special arrangement,’ he said, contentedly. He raised his own cup, and handed the other to Modar.
‘And to our strong sense of mutual trust,’ replied the priest, accepting the cup. With a smirk, he drained it.
Zimak looked reflectively into his own goblet before taking a gulp. The wine was a little sweet for his taste, but he decided he would have no problem drinking it in great quantities if nothing else was to hand. He opened his mouth to speak, but his throat was fast becoming numb and paralysed. He could not move, or even breathe. He stared wide-eyed, uncomprehending, as the room reeled.
The two girls gently took hold of the aged priest and laid him face-up on the floor, then one straddled him and began to push and lift with her hands on his chest. The other girl approached Zimak, who was only standing because his body was totally rigid and leaning against the wall. She eased him to the floor, sat astride him, and began to pummel his chest.
She worked on Zimak’s paralysed lungs until he began to breathe easier. ‘The poison only lasts for a few minutes, but by then you will be securely bound and in a very deep and soundproof dungeon, indeed,’ she said. ‘My lord Modar thought it wise to use some potion that subdued you without any lasting effects. He ordered that both cups be drugged, you see.’
After a few minutes Zimak was able to breathe again, but not move or speak. The girls bound his hands and feet. Then a burly guard carried him away. Zimak took note of the wending stone stairs and corridors, but suspected that it would do him little good. The dungeons were a long way underground.
He was placed carefully in a cell, and the door was pulled shut. It was small consolation that the guard had not harmed him, which meant he was not to be killed … yet. There was no window, and no lamp. Despite the near pitch black, he sensed he had company. But there was nothing he could do, of course, being paralysed.
Squinting, Zimak etched out the form of a woman. She was watching him carefully, almost inquisitively, barely moving. Her breathing was hoarse and rattly, as though the dankness of this place had lodged deep into her bones.
After what seemed an eternity, the woman finally spoke. ‘Zimak.’
‘Uh,’ managed Zimak, his vocal chords partially defrosting.
T
he woman moved, making herself comfortable now, as though she knew he posed no immediate threat. ‘I saw you when the door was opened. You know me as Andzu.’
Andzu, the girl from the caravan, thought Zimak. The Matriarch’s handmaiden. She sounded more like an old crone than the canary-voiced beauty he remembered. Almost like the voice of the Matriarch, but somehow disconcerted, as though puzzled by something. His heart quickened. What had they done to her?
‘The Matriarch is Prince Ulad’s consort,’ Andzu went on slowly, reading his confusion. ‘I was coming here, under her protection, disguised as a servant. I am Princess Andrella, from the distant kingdom of Bazite. I was supposed to marry the son of Prince Ulad, but he has no son. I know that now. I know a great deal now.’
She laughed bitterly. ‘Oh yes, I slept with you, yet I was to be wed to the Matriarch’s son. How foolish of me not to have realised I was being duped when Premiel ordered me to bed you. I naively thought it some strange initiation rite, a dark custom of these heathens.’
‘Baz … ite,’ Zimak managed.
Princess Andrella cocked her head. The outworlder spoke the name with some familiarity, despite his speech impediment.
‘I was given up by my father to strengthen an alliance with these heathens against the dragonriders. Once wed to Ulad’s supposed heir, our two people would join forces against the sky dwellers.’
‘What … what’s happening?’ Zimak’s throat constricted and he almost gagged with the effort to speak.
‘Premiel sent you here by a long detour. We arrived first. I was strapped into one side of an accursed double seat in the centre of the temple, then the Matriarch was strapped into the other. Priests and wizards, people in robes, lots of strange people came in and did things. There were sparks and lights, a blinding flash of light, pain like every square inch of my skin was being roasted and stripped. When I raised my head, I was in the Matriarch’s body. She stepped out of the chair, and she stood before me in my own body. She told me that I was to be kept alive to answer questions about my life and home, to help when she had to write letters to my family. They have spells that force you to tell the truth.’
‘Is Prince … going to swap with me?’ said Zimak, gaining better control of his tongue.
Princess Andrella stopped speaking for a moment. ‘No, the prince has chosen Daretor. Modar, the high priest, intends to swap with your young, strong, and above all, virile body.’
She told the rest of her story in a tortured way, her voice sometimes struggling with the words, failing, continuing. At one stage she screamed ‘Shut up! Stop yelling!’ causing Zimak to jump.
The poor girl had obviously been tortured to the edge of sanity. Her story was macabre, to say the least. It would seem that Prince Ulad and Premiel were nine hundred years old. Both had body swapped into younger bodies many times. When a young body aged, they simply swapped into another. The prince planned to take over Daretor’s body this evening.
With effort, Zimak eased himself up. He sucked saliva from his gums and swallowed. Briefly, he told Andrella of the other Bazitian they had met, and how he had escaped with a precious female dragon.
‘I have never heard of this … Osric, but that matters not,’ Andrella whispered. ‘All is not lost then.’ She smiled. ‘I felt as though I had let my people down … but now …’ she said, dreamily.
‘Are you bound?’ Zimak rasped.
‘As securely as yourself,’ she said. ‘They take no risks in this place. And forget about escape. No one ever has, or so I have been told.’
‘I once knew a girl who thrived on doing the impossible,’ Zimak said. ‘And the worst thing you could ever say to her was “prove it”. Now, can you wriggle over here until we’re back to back?’
‘Our feet are tied to rings on opposite sides of the cell,’ she replied, stonily. ‘You would have been better off with your girlfriend, I fear.’
‘She was never anyone’s girlfriend,’ Zimak snorted. He wriggled across the straw-strewn ground. His feet touched a wall. ‘The cell is not wide. If I stretched out I would be two thirds of the way across.’
Despite her better judgement, Andrella fishtailed across the floor. Her new body was nowhere near as supple as her own had been. Her movements were sluggish, as though she were pushing through water. ‘That is not enough to get our hands together,’ she said, irritably. ‘They are bound behind our backs, remember?’
‘Maybe so, but I’m not of this world. My teeth are especially strong, if you catch my meaning.’
Stretched out in the darkness, Zimak found that his face just reached Andrella’s hands. He began to nibble at the knots, methodically working at them until they became slightly looser and more pliant. Traces of the Matriarch’s exotic perfume hung about Andrella. He could feel that her hands were wrinkled and her fingernails long and manicured. At last he pulled a loop free, then Andrella did the rest. With her hands free, she slowly untied Zimak’s hands. Then they untied their own feet.
‘I know you are very strong, but the door looks too much even for Daretor,’ she said, easing circulation back into her limbs. ‘I am sorry, Zimak. But I am so very drained. This body ill suits me and is near to death.’
Zimak felt an unaccustomed pang of sympathy. But Andrella’s position had given him an excellent idea. For him to carry through with it, he could spare no room for empathy. ‘Always check a door for possibilities, any thief will tell you that,’ he said. ‘This one has an external bolt, and opens inwards. I noticed that it tends to stick as well. The guard who carried me here had to kick to get it open, and that is good.’
‘We are trying to get out, yet you’re pleased that the door is hard to open?’ asked Andrella.
Two hours later they heard the tramp of feet approaching.
Zimak cocked an ear. ‘Two of them,’ he whispered. ‘Now just do precisely what I said.’
They got into position. Andrella sat with her back to the wall and her feet against Zimak’s back. Zimak was sitting with his feet against the door.
They heard the rattle of the bolt being drawn, then the guard kicked at the bottom of the door. Zimak’s feet prevented it from opening. The guard kicked against the door again, then again.
‘Here, hold this,’ came a voice from the other side of the door.
Zimak scrambled to his feet, and Andrella got to her hands and knees before the door. The guard put his shoulder to the door with enough force to cause him to tumble in. Tripping over Andrella, he landed on the floor with a grunt.
Zimak cannoned into the second guard, who dropped the spear he had been holding and went for his sword. Zimak lifted him from his feet and slammed him against the wall.
Meantime, Andrella had scrambled outside the cell as well, and bolted the door behind her. Zimak let his victim fall to the floor, unconscious. He stared at Andrella in the light of a nearby lantern. She was indeed within the Matriarch’s body.
‘I need to find Daretor, and quickly,’ said Zimak. ‘What do you want to do?’
‘I have a very simple plan,’ Andrella replied, ‘but it does not involve you.’ Her dark eyes had a steely resolve and never left Zimak’s. She reached out and gripped his arm. ‘Where I have failed, this Osric might well succeed. I shall do my bit within this snakes’ pit.’
Zimak had seen such determination before on Jelindel’s face. Someone was in for a nasty surprise.
‘Those outside will be expecting at least one guard to come out with a prisoner, so we must stay together for now,’ he said.
Andrella clutched her head. The pain on her face was plain to see. ‘And … after … that?’ she said with difficulty.
Zimak glanced up the stairs, his features sombre. ‘We go to the temple. From there on, we’re on our own.’
‘Oh, that will suit me very well,’ Andrella said.
Zimak stripped the unconscious guard. The other guard beat against the door of the cell, but the sound did not carry far.
The guards had been carrying a hooded cloak. Zim
ak assumed that it was for him.
‘They don’t want you to be seen before the transference of souls,’ Andrella explained. ‘When the victim is not well-known they announce that the prince has been rejuvenated by the gods.’ She stopped to gather her thoughts. ‘When the donor of the younger body is known, they tell the people that the old prince has died, and named the young man his heir to the throne.’
‘But I am as well-known as Daretor,’ Zimak protested.
‘You are small, lean and do not stand out. I wager that soon it will be announced the old priest died of sudden illness, and a brilliant young foreign scholar has been appointed to run the temple. Trust me, Zimak, nobody will remember you.’
It hurt Zimak’s pride to admit it, but what she said was true. He looked unremarkable. While this was an advantage for a thief fleeing with someone’s purse, it did not help someone who wanted to be a famous hero.
Zimak stripped off his clothes and tossed them to the princess. Then he donned the guard’s clothing and pulled down the helmet grille. With Andrella in his clothes, and wearing the cloak and hood, anyone would think they were a guard escorting a prisoner.
‘Now give me the guard’s knife,’ Andrella said, holding out her hand.
‘His knife?’ Zimak said, warily. ‘But why?’
‘Do you want your distraction or not?’ She fluttered her fingers impatiently. ‘Quick now. Time is short.’
Zimak smacked the knife into Andrella’s palm, then escorted her up the worn stairs and past the posts and checkpoints. As they made their way to the temple, the guards grew more numerous. But nobody challenged them. They knew that the prisoner was being taken to an even more secure area.
‘Daretor and the prince will be alone in the great chamber during the body swapping. Both will be strapped into the double chair,’ said Andrella, as they climbed the steps to the temple.
‘How will I know if it’s too late?’ asked Zimak.
‘Purple lightning will be playing all around the inside of the dome before the transfer. If there is no lightning, but there is a strong smell of ozone, you will know you are too late. Listen for a hissing and crackling. That means that the charge is still building up, so you may have a minute or so more.’