The prisoners — and there were very many of them — were told they would be repatriated. Even at this late date some of them were unaware that Vallia had ceased to employ mercenaries. They were astonished when they offered their services to us that they should be refused. They had fought well and earned their hire. They had honored their contracts. Why, then, should we refuse their employment?
I knew I had to think again about this policy of mine. What if, instead of Vallian citizens lying dead on the battlefield, they had been paktuns from foreign lands, paid their hire for fighting for us? Well, would not that be a better arrangement for Vallia’s sons and daughters?
Delia said to me as we dismounted from our nikvoves: “Come on, you great hairy graint. Everything is being attended to. Bengarl’s Blight is a great victory. Now come into the tent and have a good wash and something to eat and drink.”
“Aye,” I said. “And now Vallia is whole again.”
Chapter eight
Drak and Silda
Deb-Lu-Quienyin said: “Khe-Hi and Ling-Li and I have managed to fabricate what one might call a Hood of Misalignment.”
We were sitting comfortably in our tent, and wine had been served. Delia looked marvelous in a robe of lavender, and her feet were bare. She did not wear toe rings. I wore a plain lounging robe of yellow, girded by a scarlet sash. As for Deb-Lu, well, he wore what was clearly a brand new robe, plain, yet contriving to look as though he’d slept in a haystack all night. His turban toppled, as ever, dangerously over one ear. Khe-Hi and his bride, Ling-Li, looked perfectly turned out in correct and expensive and yet not sumptuous robes.
“The task was interesting, if difficult,” said Khe-Hi-Bjanching. He looked at his wife. “Ling-Li was fantastic.”
Deb-Lu let rip a dry wheeze of a chuckle. “By Hlo-Hli! These two lovebirds make me wonder why I never married!”
With all the sedateness of a Witch of Loh, Ling-Li said: “Dear Deb-Lu. Who’d have you?”
Delia turned her laugh into a sound that frizzled me right down to the backbone. We all knew Ling-Li, after that start that could have been so awkward, was fitting into the group easily. She and Khe-Hi shared a special relationship in sorcery that made them far more powerful as a team than they were individually.
“And this Hood of Misalignment?”
“It means, in layman’s terms, that if Csitra uses her kharrna for a sending, tries to inflict another plague, it will strike dwaburs away from its intended target.”
I said: “I don’t want innocent folk suddenly embroiled in sorceries — frogs and insects and suchlike falling out of the sky on their heads.”
“We can deflect the plague accurately enough to drop it into the sea, for example.”
“Pity the poor sailors on a plague night like this.”
“We can,” said Deb-Lu, “ensure that Vondium is kept clear of interference for the period of the wedding.”
“That,” pointed out Delia with great satisfaction, “is splendid for us. But we cannot harm innocent people.”
“We will ensure the plagues drop into an empty ocean.”
One of the jurukkers on guard duty, Nath the Point, put his head into the tent opening to bellow: “Prince Drak, jis, the Prince Majister of Vallia!”
Instantly, Drak walked in, flinging his cloak off. He looked dusty and only a little tired if travel-stained. Once again, I remarked to myself his commanding figure, his air of habitual authority.
The lahals were exchanged and wine was poured and Drak slumped down into a chair and stuck his booted feet out.
“So we’ve done it,” he said. “At last, thanks be to Opaz.”
“Where,” Delia wanted to know, “is Seg?”
“He’s gone up to Evir, mother. He took a little army with him, too.”
“Ah,” she said. And then: “Milsi is a splendid wife for him. But — Thelda...”
“He’s all right,” I said in a gruff way that displeased me. I felt for my blade comrade, Seg Segutorio, in the matter of believing his wife Thelda was dead only to discover she was alive and married to a fine man and with children by him.
“I believe so.”
“It’s in my mind to offer Lol Polisto the kovnate of Evir. That would please Thelda.”
“Oh, it would!”
Then we both laughed. Oh, yes, we were cruel to poor Thelda. She always meant well and disaster trailed her. Still, good friends in the northernmost province of Vallia was a seemly prospect, Zair knows.
It was left to Ling-Li to ask the next obvious question.
“She went with her father. I offered to go, too, but — well, family business.”
“Very much our family, soon, Drak,” pointed out Delia. “You will have Thelda as a mother-in-law.”
At this point in my narrative, pursued by the ghosts of a million music hall jokes, I will move onto the time we spent in Vondium for the wedding and what followed.
The most delicious item of gossip going the rounds, and the subject of considerable investment in the way of gambling and betting on the chances, was the simple question: “Would Queen Lush attend the wedding?”
There were at least two schools of thought, and the odds varied with each. One said: “Queen Lush turned down by Prince Drak will never go to his wedding to another woman.” The other said: “Queen Lushfymi of Lome is a great and marvelous woman of considerable powers who would never dream of insulting her hosts in Vallia by refusing to attend the wedding of the Prince Majister.”
So, you took your pick and you laid down your golden talens, and you awaited the outcome. I didn’t tell Delia; but I placed a small sum on Queen Lush coming to the wedding. Petulant, with a high opinion of herself, overly imperious, she still remained a fine woman through all the flattery and flummery that had gone to her head. Her tragedy was that she hadn’t married a good man like Drak long since.
If fate had not thrown the ivory cubes the way they’d fallen, Delia’s father would still be emperor, and Queen Lush would be empress. Had he not been killed, would Vallia have been spared the Troubles? No, decidedly not. Vallia had been marked for plunder while her citizens squabbled.
Now — the period of Drak and Silda’s wedding turned into a fairy-tale time. The brilliant days moved along like acts in a play, limelit, larger than life, gorgeous with color and action and poetry. Everybody bore a smile. Old enmities were laid aside. Children received presents when it was not their birthday or a Day of Meaning, and they understood that when a Prince Majister of Vallia marries, then the days of the ceremonies are sacred and vitally important to the welfare of the country.
The guest lists filled a thick volume of beautiful Kregish script written out fair for all to see.
Who came? Far better, by Vox, to ask who didn’t come!
By lavish use of our best and fastest airboats, with Delia handling a great amount of the detailed planning, folk were brought in from all over those parts of Kregen that had featured in our lives.
For the first time in many many seasons, the whole family was united and under one roof. Incredible!
Drak’s twin sister, Lela, flew in with Tyfar. They could not stay long for they were embroiled in a nasty business out on the western borders of Hamal; but I joyed to see my blade comrades again. Delia was radiant with happiness. The nudges and winks, the sly comments; and still, as far as I could see, Prince Tyfar of Hamal, and Lela, Princess Majestrix of Vallia, were still circling each other like strange dogs without an idea in their heads how to resolve their love and follow Drak and Silda in the obvious course.
A particular joy to us was to see King Zeg of Zandikar and his family. They flew in from the Eye of the World, the inner sea of Turismond, and we had long talks into the night about the Krozairs of Zy, and how the Zairians fared against the green Grodnims, all of which I will relate in its proper place. Queen Miam looked more lovely than ever and the children were a joy.
Zeg’s twin could not be with us. We thought of her, though, the first Velia. When the secon
d Velia, released for the occasion by the Sisters of the Rose, walked into the private room where we talked, Zeg’s face lost all its color. He did not quite sway. But he put a hand to the back of his chair, and I noticed the yellow skulls made by his knuckles.
“It is uncanny,” he said.
“No,” I said, and damned sharply, too. “Velia was lost to us, and her husband, Gafard, the King’s Striker, the Sea Zhantil. And in love Velia was given to us. But this is Velia, and she is her own person and owes no debt to the dead.”
This was a highly important point and one I would not have misunderstood.
Didi also was there, daughter to Velia and Gafard. From what I gathered, these two youngsters, Velia and Didi, were right hellions with the Sisters of the Rose, and we could expect mischief and adventures from them in the future.
Jaidur, King of Hyrklana, and Lildra his queen, turned up with their new arrivals. Delia said to me one evening: “I think there may be a rift in the lute there, Dray.”
“They fell in love with the speed of a bird through the air. They seemed idyllically happy. If you are right I am most upset — damn it all, by Krun! It can’t be true!”
“I hope I am wrong. But be prepared.”
It is not all sweetness and light in romance on Kregen, oh no, not by a long chalk.
Then Ros the Claw arrived, clad in black leathers, swinging her whip, rapier and main gauche strapped around her slender waist, her fearsome Claw in its bag. As Delia kissed her and said: “Dayra! Lahal and Lahal, my dear,” I itched to find out how Dayra, alias Ros the Claw, had fared and if Jilian was with her, and then Jilian Sweet Tooth walked in, another edition although subtly different from Dayra of those splendid Jikai Vuvushis of the Sisters of the Rose.
There was much news to be learned.[5]
Finally, I wonder if you can understand my pleasure as I welcomed in two rascals, who pretended to be quite unimpressed by the glories of Vallia, since they’d seen them all before, and shook their hands in a mutual explosion of glee.
“Stylor!” they crowed, and engulfed me whole.
Yes, my two favorite rascals from the Eye of the World, Nath and Zolta. Ah! What times we had seen together!
Among the greatest joys for Silda in those tumultuous days was to throw her arms about her twin, Valin, and her elder brother, Drayseg. These two had much to relate, all of which I will tell in due course.
Then Lol Polisto turned up with his wife, Thelda, and their family.
Delia was superb.
The confrontation could have been embarrassing and disastrous. Seg had had a few adventures, and, again, what transpired there is grist for another story. Suffice it to say that Seg and Milsi, and Lol and Thelda, acted with natural courtesy and politeness and, indeed, they were four fine people able to come to terms in a civilized manner with what had happened to them.
It is my experience that going through an adventure with another person, risking your life and fighting free of perils, does not automatically make you life-long comrades. It very often does. It is not mandatory.
Now — to the wedding of Silda and Drak.
Well, as you may imagine, my mind flew back to those days in Vondium when Delia and I had been married. The Proud City was vastly changed; many great buildings had been destroyed and not rebuilt. Yet we had continued with our building program, concentrating on structures of use rather than ornament. The circuit of the walls was immensely stronger now. So as Drak and Silda took the prescribed and formal routes through the city on the different days devoted to the various ceremonies, they passed through a city in the process of rebirth.
Just as I had done on that long-ago day, Drak wanted the procession to pass by that certain inn and posting house by the Great Northern Cut called The Rose of Valka. When I had been banished by the Star Lords to Earth for twenty-one miserable years, Drak had grown into manhood and had taken over the reins of the island stromnate of Valka. He had been called the Young Strom. For all my love for him, I couldn’t see myself parting with Valka until they shipped me off to the Ice Floes of Sicce.
Since the Times of Troubles there were many vacant estates in Vallia. Drak would be well served in lands and wealth.
The Suns of Scorpio poured down their opaline radiance upon the face of Kregen, and the canals and avenues of Vondium glistened brilliantly in the light. Flags and banners, ribbons and scarves, massive banks of flowers, decorated all the ways. Fountains played. And the people gathered in their thousands to yell their heads off as Drak and Silda passed.
Much treasure had been spent in providing wine and food and palines for the folk. Everyone was happy. As for the presents showered on the bridal couple, they filled room after room in the palace.
What a week that was, when my lad Drak married his sweetheart![6]
And not a single sign of the baleful influence of Csitra disturbed the joyous occasion.
What particularly pleased me was to note that among all the throng of friends and comrades, no one jostled for a better position. No one tried to pretend they were more important than anyone else. Among all the people well aware of the pecking order of Kregan nobility, the ranks fell naturally into order. I suppose, being human, among them there were rivalries. But, on this day, everything went off smoothly and without a single hitch.
Toward evening of the last day, after a procession that had wended its gorgeously barbaric way about the canals, everyone of the guests and high nobility, and as many of the citizens of Vondium as could be squeezed in, crowded into the vast Kyro of Opaz Omnipotent, Best and Greatest.
The square in its immensity could hold thousands of people, and its extent had been considerably increased by the destruction of buildings all along one side. The people perched on the rubble looked like flies.
Bands played music and the people sang. Sweet scents invigorated the evening air, and the Moon Blooms drenched everything with their perfume. The whole mass of people were intoxicated on emotion and the splendors of the occasion.
With care I had selected a Stentor Corps, men with expansive lungs and carrying voices, and these were stationed about the Kyro to carry on the words spoken from the dais to the furthest corners.
The priests performed their final rites. Various notables spoke in praise of Drak and Silda. Drak and Silda, themselves, each said a few heartfelt words.
Man and wife, they turned as I called: “Now.”
Drak said: “If it is your wish, father.”
“It is your mother’s wish, also, my son.”
Delia said: “Yes, oh, yes! And I shall say so!”
My arm about Delia’s waist, my right hand at my side gripping the old Savanti sword, I stepped forward and Delia stepped forward with me.
The radiance of the Suns of Scorpio fell full upon us. We stood looking out across the Kyro of Opaz Omnipotent, and over that immense multitude fell a deep hush.
I raised that superb sword high and the light flashed upon the blade.
I made it short and brutal.
“People of Vallia! Friends! Opaz has willed this joy upon us in the happiness of Prince Drak and Princess Silda.” I twisted the sword and the opaline radiance gleamed. “The Empress Delia and I have decided. I have to tell you now that the Empress and I take our farewells of you. We abdicate.” Absolute silence in that enormous congregation. I repeated myself. “The Empress Delia and I abdicate and renounce the crown and throne of Vallia.”
Delia called across: “I, the Empress Delia of Vallia, abdicate and renounce the crown and throne of Vallia.”
The stentors bellowed repetitions of our words over the heads of the throne. The crowd began to stir.
I half turned, still holding Delia, to stare at Drak and Silda.
“On this happy wedding day here stand before you the emperor and empress.”
The sword above my head glittered a shaft of light.
“Hai Jikai, Drak, Emperor of Vallia. Hai Jikai, Silda, Empress of Vallia! Hai Jikai!”
Then the tumultuous roars
burst full-throated from the crowds.
“Hai Jikai! Drak and Silda, Emperor and Empress of Vallia!”
Chapter nine
Armada against Csitra
I, Dray Prescot, the Lord of Strombor, and Krozair of Zy, was no longer the Emperor of Vallia.
“By Zim-Zair!” I said. “And about time, too!”
“Well, my old dom, you always said you would, yet precious few people believed you.”
Thelda chattered on, fussing away: “I can’t believe it, Dray, my dear. Why, if I were empress I’d never abdicate.” Then she put her head on one side and in her funny way added: “But it does mean I am now the mother of the empress. That is very nice.”
Lol Polisto gave her a look and I noticed Milsi put a hand to her mouth to hide her smile.
After we’d seen the married couple safely off, a few of us had gathered to talk over the events of the day and, inevitably, given the situation, to gape at Delia’s and my decision.
The lads of my guard corps were in a quandary.
I said to Targon and Dorgo and Cleitar and the other chiefs: “You are the emperor’s bodyguards. You formed yourselves at a time when the emperor’s life was in danger. Your duties remain. There is the emperor to serve.”
“Yes, but he’s not you!”
“He is my son and the emperor.”
Just before they took themselves off to sort it out among themselves in the democratic way they’d set up in the guard corps, Targon said very suspiciously: “This doesn’t mean we’re not going with you to the Coup Blag. Oh, no, we’re not having that, by Vox!”
“No, by the Blade of Kurin!” and: “Not likely, as Jorgo of the Snickersnee is my witness!” and: “We’re all going, by Bongolin!” And other similar vehement affirmations.
Balass the Hawk said, “A good sword and shield man, that’s what you want down there, Dray.”
Oby snapped out: “You’re not leaving me behind!”
Hap Loder, who ran the fearsome Clansmen for me out on the Great Plains of Segesthes, wanted to know about this Coup Blag, and expressed his interest in tagging along. Others made inquiries; all seemed to feel a little holiday up there in the Snarly Hills would do wonders for their circulation.
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