Ashthera sits down crosslegged on the floor, inviting Romond with a gesture to sit on the cot. His manner is easy and goodhumored. The hound settles down at once beside him, head on forepaws, eyes watchful: habit, love, and training.
ASHTHERA: Duty. A strange thing. My brothers, my brother- in-law, my councillors, the generals, the priests, they all know what my duty is. But when I ask for justice, nobody answers.
ROMOND: (answers with evident caution) Will you play at dice with King Kammin for this province that’s in question?
ASHTHERA: I won’t be allowed to. Kings can’t play. Blood’s what kings drink, not water.
ROMOND: But if you could — you’d risk half your kingdom on a game?
ASHTHERA: Risk it? I’d give it to him! And give my brothers the other half. Bet with Bolhan for it, maybe, best of three; he’s always wanted it. But he’s no gambler. And he’d lose. He always does.
Ashthera looks shrewdly at Romond before he goes on:
It’s no secret that I’m king against my will. I always win; but that doesn’t mean I choose. What I’d have chosen would be to walk, to walk on the roads, in the forests, by myself, alone. But Fezat is right. There’s no way out, no road into the forest. The righteous king must lead the rightful war… I had a dream the other night that a little animal was in my pocket, like a pet mouse a boy might have. I took it to the GreatTemple to show to the priests. I had to show it to them. I knew they’d take it and sacrifice it. Why is it that one can’t choose, in dreams? While they were doing that, I came back here and searched all over the palace for something I’d lost, but it wasn’t here. Something I couldn’t find, no bigger than a mouse, a little frightened animal. Today I keep on feeling in my pockets; but there’s nothing in them but my hands.
Ashthera looks at his hands, palm and back; then strokes the dog’s muscular neck.
ROMOND: (speaks cautiously, curious, testing) I have heard that King Kammin is a tyrant, bloodthirsty.
ASHTHERA: In his country you’d hear the same of me.
ROMOND: It’s not true, then?
ASHTHERA: Of course it’s true. I tell you, kings drink blood. Where have you travelled, Romond the Traveller? Where you’ve been, do kings go into the forest alone, and drink water, and sit so still that mice make nests in their shirt pockets?
ROMOND: No, my lord.
ASHTHERA: Where you come from, do tigers live on grass?
ROMOND: No, my lord.
ASHTHERA: Tigers are obedient. They do their duty. They drink blood. What is my conscience to the will of God?
ROMOND: What is your conscience but the will of God?
ASHTHERA: Ah! I knew the stranger hid a friend!
ROMOND: You bring the stranger quickly to the hidden room.
ASHTHERA: I am a gambler.
ROMOND: So I see.
ASHTHERA: When I bet, when I act on chance, on the fall of the dice, I win. When I act as I ought to do, as duty bids, I lose. I’m a hound that can start the hare of chance and run it till it drops, but that’s not the nature of a king. Kings are tigers, killing with a blow. Kings are above chance; they are Fate, they are Destiny. Isn’t it so, in the country you came from?
ROMOND: In the country I came from there are no kings.
ASHTHERA: A messenger of good news. No kings! I’d like to hear about your country. Kida tells me you made some suggestions about the commerce of our Southern ports; I want to hear those too. Come eat with me, we’ll talk.
He gets up, lithe and almost boyish; Romond stands up too.
ASHTHERA: Will you accept a house here in Aremgar for as long as you want to stay — and whatever furnishings you need?
ROMOND: The gift is kingly.
ASHTHERA: It’s not a gift. I’m laying stakes. Come this way, Romond.
Ashthera leads Romond out the second, higher door of the room, into a particularly splendid series of hallways and rooms, furnished grandly, in contrast with the austerity of the inner room. The door closing behind them is hidden by a flowery tapestry. They go off together, talking, the dog following at a little distance, tail up and head down, sniffing at carpets and chairlegs.
The House of the Traveller.
The Palace Compound is a kind of town within the city of Aremgar; the gardens are extensive, and among them are many houses for courtiers and guests. This is the house the king has given Romond — a pleasant place, with a deep porch all round shaded by big, dark, old trees and with slatted blinds for privacy. Fatheyo and Jaga, middle-aged servants, man and wife, are showing Romond about the house; the rooms are bare and airy, very clean. Jaga, slightly lame, says nothing and hangs back, uneasy with the foreigner. Fatheyo, the wife, is respectful, but treats Romond rather as if he were deaf or childish, because of his foreign accent. They come into a room which runs almost the length of one side of the house, and the outer wall of which is all sliding doors, now open, that give on the shady porch.
ROMOND: Ah, here’s where I’ll sleep, I think.
FATHEYO: (nods vigorously) Sleep here, very good. We’ll bring the feather bed in here —
ROMOND: There’s a cot here already.
FATHEYO: A string cot, no, no, we’ll bring in the feather bed.
ROMOND: I’d prefer this. Really.
Fatheyo is resistant to the idea, sneers at the string cot, frets, accepts the inevitable since all foreigners are crazy, and nods resignedly. Romond smiles at her. She responds with a dignified smile.
FATHEYO: You clap your hands if you want us. All right? Like so. Loud, if you want the old man! He’s deaf.
ROMOND: Thank you, Fatheyo. Thank you, Jaga.
FATHEYO: Thank you, Sir Traveller.
As they leave, Fatheyo bumps into Jaga because she is going backwards, partly out of respect and partly out of curiosity, keeping an eye on the foreigner. They go off grumbling connubially at each other.
When Romond is alone in the room he goes out onto the porch and surveys it and the deep, shady gardens beyond it, then comes in and slides the doors shut. He opens and shuts the door the servants left by. He sits down then on the cot and from a concealed pocket in his silver tunic takes a device like a small dictaphone. After some tuning or fiddling he speaks into it, with no foreign accent.
ROMOND: Bara Romond. Record for Anduse Deji…. Listen, Anduse. I’m in a very interesting situation here. I definitely want to stay on. Register me for a depth field-report on a Class 8 H-N society. Two T-years at the minimum. Say ten at the max. Use this coordinate for confirmation or directives. Right? Stop record.
He clicks off the instrument, looks around for a place to store it, finds a small sliding-door wall-cabinet with a key, which he pockets after locking the device away. He looks distinctly pleased with himself: a scientist with a sweet piece of research. He reopens a sliding door to the sweet, shady air and flowering vines of the porch, and stands there, stretching.
Outside the GreatTemple of Aremgar.
The outer courtyard of the GreatTemple is a very large paved area, partly walled, opening onto a wide, dusty street. Across it, facing the street, rise the long steps and the austere facade of the temple, blank white walls, fiercely bright in the hot sunlight. The courtyard is full of a cheerful, restless crowd milling around and talking, children shouting and running, all in a festival mood. Batash and Romond are making their way through the crowd, getting jostled on the way and occasionally separated, which does not keep Batash from talking on.
BATASH: After the goat sacrifice he asks divine support for this war, you see, and then he’ll come out with his brothers and the queen. You haven’t met the queen yet, it’ll take a while, she keeps to herself. Northern women, it’s hard to know what to expect, that part of the country is very backward, very backward.
The high, carved doors of the temple are flung open wide, and from them issues music, ringing and percussive: gongs, bells, woodblocks, and the huge, deep, dragging notes of long horns. The crowd goes silent, attentive, all faces to the temple. From the dark interior a p
rocession comes out into the glaring light: priests and priestesses, barefoot and in white; then Harish Ashed, beaming, holding up his hands which are covered to the wrists in blood. The crowd cheers, a rhythmic hai! hai! hai! hai! Then Bolhan and Fezat come out, Bolhan looking glassy-eyed; then as the great horns blow, a short, dark woman with a grimly set face; then the king. As the others descend the temple steps the king stops at the top of the steps and speaks to the crowd in a ringing voice.
ASHTHERA: You who go forth to fight or who send your beloved forth to fight, do not be afraid! It is the soldier’s duty to kill or to be killed, and glory rewards the dutiful. If you strike down the enemy you win the right to his lands and goods. If you are struck down in battle you win in that moment the right to heaven. So go forth gladly to this way, knowing that you dance the dance of God!
He holds out his arms in the same position as those of the figure on the tapestry in the inner room: his hands and arms are red with blood. The crowd shouts out its wild rhythmic chant of enthusiasm. Priests scatter tiny gold sequins in showers from the steps, and people push to catch them. Ashthera makes his way straight down the temple steps into the crowd, which parts widely for him, two moving walls of smiling, cheering faces, many people bowing to touch the earth or dropping on their knees. Ashthera, looking ahead, strides past his wife and brothers, Romond and Batash. He is dressed very splendidly and walks erect and rather fast. Fezat and the queen follow him. Harish Ashed runs part way back up the temple steps and shakes his bloody hands, exhibiting them, and the crowd falls back into the rhythmic cheering chant.
HARISH: We’ll drive those mad dogs back! They’ll learn what color blood is! We’ll be back to celebrate our victory, here, before the summer’s over!
The Inner Room.
It is dusk; the high, white walls of the room are dim. Ashthera, alone, sits motionless on the floor, crosslegged, in a posture of meditation, but profoundly dejected. Silence. The last unfinished call of a bird outside. The hound is crouched beside Ashthera, and it sniffs once at his hands, which are still masked in blood, now dried brown and scaly. Ashthera’s expression is inward-turned, but his gaze is steadily on the tapestry, on the feet of the dancing figure, and the innumerable small figures under its feet, gazing at the tangled scenes of war and famine and misery, gazing till the images, the eyes and hands break up into the meaningless textures of the warp and weft, and go dark.
The InnerGardens of the Palace in Aremgar.
In the warm spring of this warm land, the trees are in full leaf, casting dark shadows on bright grass; the sun shines on great flowering bushes, ponds where the lilies are opening, fountains. Sheltered by a wing of the Palace and by high walls, the inner gardens are beautiful and peaceful. The two children of the king run and play here, the princess Shiros, a bright-faced, dark-eyed girl of ten, and the prince Hantammad, a stout eight-year-old. He is chasing his sister, shouting.
HANTAMMAD: Wait, Shiros! Wait! Shiros, wait!
But she outruns him, and they vanish among the trees and shrubbery. Swallows dip over the ponds, Birds sing near and far. Presently the queen, Tassalil, comes across the grass from the Palace. She is a small woman, compactly built, no beauty, about the same age as her husband.
TASSALIL: Shiros? Hantammad?
But she is not calling aloud, not really trying to find where the children have got to; they’ll turn up. She stops to examine a rose-tree, rubs a leaf for rust or mildew, sniffs a blossom with an intent, almost unbelieving look. She stands to gaze across the sunlit pond. She is self-absorbed, very quiet. The nearby bird sings again.
From the Palace side, Fezat approaches her among the flower- beds. She sees him, and they greet each other with a smile, reserved and affectionate, saying nothing at first.
FEZAT: I hate to disturb you here.
TASSALIL: You never disturb me.
FEZAT: What a nice place this is!
TASSALIL: This is my kingdom.
FEZAT: And the heart of ours. The inmost garden of the Inner Lands.
They separate a little, Fezat walking down to the pond’s edge. From there he speaks without fully turning back to Tassalil.
FEZAT: Have you seen him?
TASSALIL: Not since the sacrifice.
FEZAT: Two days now.
TASSALIL: I’ll have to go.
FEZAT: In that room — ?
TASSALIL: (nods, gazing across the pond.)
FEZAT: At least he doesn’t run off into the forest anymore.
TASSALIL: No. Not even to the gambling house.
FEZAT: He can’t stay in there.
TASSALIL: (shakes her head in agreement. She is impassive.)
FEZAT: I know — I think I know how he feels. But you’re the one to speak to him.
TASSALIL: The children are over there somewhere.
FEZAT: I wish I could stay here with them.
As he goes towards the trees he calls the children, “Shiros! Tammad!” — and they come running across the grass to him. The queen goes slowly towards the palace, with a pause and a long glance back at Fezat and the children.
The Inner Room.
Tassalil comes through the splendid, sunlit rooms that give on the inner garden, and lifts the hanging that conceals the door of the inner room. As she does so she looks back to make sure no one is watching her. Her movements are unhesitating, circumspect, calm, controlled. She knocks once and opens the door slowly.
In the high, bare room, bright with sunlight, Ashthera is sitting in the same position, crosslegged, his back straight, his face turned to the tapestry. His hands are on his knees. His face is hard and haggard.
Tassalil stands a moment watching him, then speaks in a very low, quiet voice.
TASSALIL: I’ll bring water, Ashthera.
When she comes back with a pitcher and basin, the hound follows her and comes in with her, uneasy, wanting to greet Ashthera but restraining itself, waiting unhappily. Tassalil sets the basin on the table and then touches her husband on the shoulder, holding the pitcher ready. He takes it from her and drinks, a long draft. She takes it back and pours water out into the basin. He kneels at the table and begins to wash the dried brown blood off his arms and hands, running his wet hands over his face and hair. Tassalil kneels facing him, quiet. The hound watches and whines once. The tabby cat is fast asleep up on the window ledge. The sound of birds singing and once a child’s shout comes in the window from the gardens.
Tassalil speaks very quietly, unemphatically; her voice is rather husky, and there is a singsong quality, a touch of dialect, in the way she speaks.
TASSALIL: War has been declared…. The messenger from King Kammin came this morning. I saw my brother Harish Ashed later on, all in harness, pawing at the ground....My women say the city’s like it was on coronation day. Flags, and rumors, and running up and down....
There is a pause. Ashthera sits back on his heels. They are not quite facing each other. Both of them speak quietly; the room is secret, quiet, high, full of light.
TASSALIL: Do you think we might lose this war?
ASHTHERA: I’ve already lost.
TASSALIL: Lost what?
ASHTHERA: My truth.
TASSALIL: (shakes her head in calm, absolute denial.)
ASHTHERA: I lied. Aloud, and knowing that I lied.
TASSALIL: Never. You have never lied.
ASHTHERA: “Go kill and be rewarded, be killed and be rewarded, heaven and earth are yours by right of war!”
TASSALIL: The words are sacred. They’re in the Book of Ashantari.
As she speaks she touches the old book on the table beside her. While Ashthera speaks, she watches the serene face of the dancing god/dess above him.
ASHTHERA: Spoken with the heart against it, any word is a lie. I never lied till I stood there on the temple steps. I never hoped to know what the truth is, but I thought I could hold to the piece of it that had been given me. Not the sun, not the moon, only a little rock, a little stone, my truth. You drop it and it’s gone. How can
you tell it from all the other stones, all the pebbles, the grains of sand on all the beaches….
TASSALIL: You said what you had to say. You had no choice. Regret is weakness.
ASHTHERA: So I came in here with my weakness.
TASSALIL: But you must come out soon. Strong.
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