In the Palace of the Khans

by Peter Dickinson

  “Only chess.”

  “I’m impressed. Pity you didn’t get on with Uncle Zhiordzhio. Challenged for the national championship once. He’d have given you a game. I guess you don’t dream about playing chess for real, though. That’s what games freaks do, most of us. If you’d come to me with what you’ve told me as an idea for a game I’d’ve turned you down. Way too old hat. But to play it for real …

  “Let’s go back a bit. Before we can use the passages we’ve got to get there. Forty armed men, say. We could sneak them into the city, one or two at a time, but not if they’re carrying guns. There’ll be searches on all the gates. And we’d still have to get them into the palace. You’ve thought of that?”

  “Do you know about the fishing boats? They go out in the evening when the fish are rising and come back and unload them at the fish quay. Just the other side of the Iskan bridge from the palace. It must’ve been about ten-something when we got there, and they hadn’t come back yet. Some of the boats belong to one of Janey’s neighbours. I thought if you paid him enough he could pick you up somewhere on the lake …”

  “Uh huh. I’ll look into it. Anything else?”

  “Rahdan used to be in the palace guard. He’ll know stuff about how they do things. I thought—we’d have to ask him about this—I thought …”

  “Hold it. Dad’s going to make a speech. I’ll just …”

  And he was gone, picking his way rapidly round behind the diners and reaching his father when he was already on his feet, waiting for the chatter and bustle to die down. He turned to listen to Mizhael, frowned, shrugged, turned back to the room and started to speak while Mizhael came quietly back.

  “Didn’t want him saying anything about you,” he whispered. “He’s totally wound up. He’s got something up his sleeve.”

  Even not understanding a word of Dirzhani Nigel could tell it was true. It looked like everyone else in the room could too. They listened in expectant silence, apart from occasional murmurs of agreement, and an angry rumble at the name of Adzhar Taerzha. On Nigel’s left Zhiordzhio Baladzhin was nodding vigorously. Chief Baladzhin worked up to a climax, turned to his left and flung out an arm like a TV host welcoming a star guest. A door beneath the gallery opened, and Taeela came in, unveiled, but wearing deep mourning, black from head to toe, with almost no make-up. She was followed by what had to be Janey, unrecognisable in a black dahl with the purple shoulder sash of a khan’s attendant.

  After the first hush of astonishment the clapping broke out. The attendants joined in. Chief Baladzhin bustled to meet Taeela. The applause only died away as he led her round the room, introducing her to everybody there, followed by Janey a pace or two behind her. She touched hands with them all, said a few words now and then and passed on, just like you see the British royal family doing when they’re launching a submarine or something.

  Mizhael and Nigel rose together as she reached them, almost last in the room. She touched hands with Mizhael, but said nothing for several seconds, simply looking at him. Nigel could see her face but not his. What were they thinking, these two people who were booked to marry each other and didn’t want to? She spoke briefly, smiled at his answer and moved on to Nigel.

  Regally she eyed him up and down.

  “Wow! You look really, really hot in that gear, Mr Riddle,” she said softly.

  “Better not tell Janey you think so.”

  Her lips twitched and straightened, and she moved on to Mr Baladzhin. He’d been fidgeting with excitement ever since she’d come in, and now he couldn’t wait for her to speak. A flood of words burst out of him, a public speech, meant to be heard by everyone there. Taeela nodded gravely, and flicked a glance at Nigel. He answered with what he hoped was a warning look.

  She listened a little longer to the tirade, then tried to stop it by holding up her hand. He paid no attention. She turned to Chief Baladzhin for help, her face tragic, on the verge of tears. Chief Baladzhin said something. Mr Baladzhin ignored him. Chief Baladzhin took Taeela’s arm and started to lead her away. Mr Baladzhin tried to follow, still ranting. Mizhael lunged across and grabbed his wrist. Mr Baladzhin tried to shake him off. An attendant joined in, and together they forced Mr Baladzhin back onto his seat. He sat there muttering while Taeela and Chief Baladzhin finished their circuit.

  “That’s lost him a few friends with luck,” Mizhael whispered as he returned, panting slightly, to his place.

  Their tour done, Taeela and Chief Baladzhin held a brief discussion. He stood aside; she turned to face the room and waited for silence, then spoke a few sentences in a clear, sad voice. The clapping that broke out as she left was quieter, respectful of her sorrow, but continued for some time after she’d gone.

  CHAPTER 17

  “Hearts and minds!” said Mizhael. “Apart from Uncle Zhiordzhio, of course. Probably just as well. I’d rather have him as an enemy than a friend. Only what’s she going to be like when she’s twenty?”

  They were sitting in Mizhael and Lily-Jo’s living-room waiting for Taeela, Nigel now very conscious of the long day it had been and how late it was. The darm had left his bloodstream and his body yearned for his bed.

  He was back in his own clothes. Mizhael was wearing dark green slacks and a top half a bit like a Hawaiian shirt, only clearly Dirzhani. Lily-Jo had got Doglu up to say hello to his father and was putting him back to bed.

  “She wasn’t faking it,” said Nigel. “Her dad was the only person who mattered to her in the whole world, him and Fohdrahko, and they’re both dead. She covers up what she’s feeling, mostly. She just let them see it.”

  “I guess you’re right. Lot more impressive that way. Hope she can lay on a repeat performance when the rest of the chieftains show up tomorrow. Going to be touch and go. We’re a patriarchal bunch up here for a start, and the notion that a twelve-year-old girl might have any more to say for herself than a pet dog is pretty foreign to us. Top of that a couple of them are cronies of Uncle Zhiordzhio’s, and they’ll all have it in for one lot of Dirzh or the other …”

  He broke off at the click of the key in the outer door and reached the inner door in time to let Taeela and Janey in. Lily-Jo arrived a moment later, cradling the sleeping Doglu. She’d changed into a soft golden housecoat, and looked, Nigel thought, terrific. Mizhael’s wife, with his son in her arms.

  Among other things that meant she couldn’t shake Taeela’s hand when Mizhael introduced them, but she acknowledged her presence with the smallest possible bow. For several seconds they stood looking at each other in silence.

  “I grieve for your loss,” said Lily-Jo. “You may come in to our home, but I cannot for myself give you a welcome. My husband’s father plans for you to marry my husband.”

  “Nobody chooses who I will marry,” said Taeela, equally stiffly.

  “That’s all right then,” said Mizhael, totally ignoring the chill in the air. “Hell, I’m happily married already. Why change?”

  For once Taeela was taken aback. She turned and stared at him and broke into laughter, her old self for the moment. Mizhael joined in with the Baladzhin guffaw. Lily-Jo relaxed more slowly but had managed a smile by the time they stopped laughing.

  “Then of course you’re welcome,” she said. “Why don’t you sit down? I’ll just put Doglu to bed.”

  They sat. Nigel broke the silence she left behind her.

  “Hi, Taeela. How are you doing? I’m dead. You’ve got to be too.”

  “I’m tired. I try not to be dead. Your arm is better?”

  “They’ve got a knowing woman here. Alinu. She’s really amazing. But look, Mike’s got to talk to you before these chieftains get here tomorrow. He’s OK. He’s dead set against fighting. But he says you’re going to have a job persuading the chieftains. Mr Baladzhin—Zhiordzhio, the guy who started yelling at you—he’ll try and stir things up. A couple of them are mates of his.”

  She nodded and turned to Mizhael.

  “Your father? What does he think?”

  �
��That’s part of the problem. Trouble is he’s a guvla, know what I mean? And of course, he’s not diradzh—that’s senior chief, Nick. Paramount, I suppose. Urvdahn Idzhak’s diradzh, and the bastards have got him in Dara Dahn. My ma can usually make Dad see sense, but she won’t be there tomorrow, and Dad’ll likely have committed himself before she can get at him. If that happens, she’ll have to get him to play for time. You’ve met her?”

  “I think she does not approve of me. To show my face. To speak how I did to the men.”

  “Yeah, she’s pretty old-fashioned. She doesn’t stand any nonsense from Dad, mind you. Anyway, Nick and I’ve been talking about how we might get our blow in first. That’s what I mean about playing for time. He says you’re thinking along the same lines, right?”

  “Yes. I will do it. I have a secret way into the palace. I will find good men. How many?”

  “Twenty, minimum. With weapons and supplies. It’s not just a question of getting them into the palace. You’ve got to get them into Dara Dahn first. Nick’s got an idea about that. Nick, when you’ve stopped yawning?”

  “You tell them,” said Nigel. The two or three little organising notions he had had under the influence of the darm were swamped by the huge tangle of the unknowable. The whole idea was crazy. Vaguely he was aware of Lily-Jo coming back and settling quietly onto the sofa beside Mizhael, and seeming to be listening just as intently as Taeela.

  Taeela must have read his mood.

  “It will work, Nigel,” she said.

  Involuntarily he shook his head. She thought it would work because she willed it to work. But the world isn’t like that

  “It will work, Nigel,” she insisted.

  “I think it might,” said Mizhael. “We’d have to get it just right, but …”

  “We?” said Lily-Jo. “You are not doing this, Mike. This isn’t one of your games. Don’t be stupid. This is real. Anyway, you hate guns. Khanazhana, you don’t want him. He wouldn’t be any use. He never takes any exercise. He can’t run. He can’t do the tough stuff. OK, Mike, you can be the back-room boy, get it all ready, deal with the guys who’re going to do it if you can find anyone that stupid, but you’re staying right here.”

  Mizhael laughed.

  “Another one who doesn’t take any nonsense from her husband,” he said. “We do pick ’em.”

  “She is right, Mizhael,” said Taeela. “We cannot take many men. I thought only a few, but I didn’t think of the fishing boats. We can take more in them. Your friend will do this, Dzhanayah?”

  Janey shook her head doubtfully

  “Perhaps I write to him letter,” said Janey. “Rick is good friend for Nardu. Lend him money for buying one boat. But this is big ask. Rick is friend for him, not you.”

  “We’ll find somebody,” said Taeela. “If we pay them enough … Anyway, somehow we will get there.”

  “You’re planning on going yourself?” said Mizhael. “That’s even crazier …”

  “I must go,” said Taeela. “I know the passages—not all of them, there are so many. They are very dangerous, full of traps. The through-ways are hidden. Nigel can tell you. I must show the men how to find them.”

  “Isn’t all that in your map?”

  “I can’t tell. The passages that I do know, even. The map is very old, very difficult. I can’t read the writing. Look.”

  Carefully she drew Fohdrahko’s map out from under her clothing, unfolded it and spread it out on the coffee table. Nigel stared at it in dismay. It was hand-drawn onto what he thought might once have been be very fine white linen but had now gone brown, and crumbly at the folds. It showed all four storeys of the palace. At least, there were four separate plans, plus a couple of smaller ones, but they weren’t anything like an architect’s floor-plan, just a lot of fine spidery lines wriggling to and fro round small, shapeless spaces filled with neat patches of tiny writing, Dirzhani he assumed, but not in any letters he could read. Where was the Great Hall, for heaven’s sake? It should have been obvious on at least three of the four storeys, but it wasn’t on any of them. It was like trying to read a book in a dream. The details seemed to waver, change …

  “Hell, it’s in old script,” said Mizhael’s voice, somewhere in the distance. “Those aren’t letters, they’re syllables. There are about nine hundred of them. We’ll have to ask Doctor Ghulidzh. Dad’s librarian. He should be able to read old script.”

  Again a voice woke him, a woman this time.

  “Time to wake up, Nick, if you’re going to have any breakfast.”

  Who …? Where …? The daylight seemed blinding. But he’d heard that soft lisp before.

  He dragged his eyes open. Lily-Jo was standing over his bed. He had no idea how he’d got here. Darzha, the Baladzhins’ servant, was watching from just inside the door. He peered at his wrist-watch. Half past nine.

  “You’ve got an hour,” said Lily-Jo. “The Khanazhana wants you for when she meets the chieftains. Something about being a witness. Mike says to wear my clothes again, but you’d better come and have breakfast in your bedclothes. Here’s a bath robe.”

  “OK, thanks. Give me five mins.”

  The bath robe matched the pyjamas, dark blue with a pattern of yellow lilies. Breakfast was fresh orange juice, a poached egg, toast and wild honey from the mountains.

  “Mike gets it on Sundays, provided he’s kept his weight.” said Lily-Jo. “One ounce over and it’s crisp-bread.”

  “It’s great,” said Nigel. “Just like home.”

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Fine. Better than fine.”

  It was true. His shoulder had been pretty stiff when he’d woken and was still bruise-sore if he prodded it, but he’d managed to ease it without pain, and apart from that he felt as well as he’d ever felt in his life, alive, interested, confident that he could cope. There were only two things wrong with his world. His parents would be worried stiff about him—he needed to talk to them. And he wasn’t seeing enough of Taeela.

  He’d hardly started eating when Mizhael came bustling in.

  “You’re up? Great. Slept OK? Any problems, apart from Lily-Jo’s taste in nightwear?”

  “My taste!” said Lily-Jo. “Men have so little imagination. I am given lilies. Doglu gets dogs.”

  “Could be worse,” said Mizhael. “You might have been Camilla. Yes, Nick?”

  “Is there a secure line out of here? I want to tell Mum and Dad I’m still OK. There was one in the palace, like I told you, and the embassy line’s OK, and it’s fixed to tell you if anyone’s listening. Whenever I tried after the palace someone always was. I had to talk in code, sort of, or Spanish. But even if I do that now they’ll still be able to work out where I am, and they’ll guess Taeela’s here too, and they’ll come and try and get her.”

  “Day or two and they’ll know anyway, after yesterday. No way you can keep something like that quiet, not in Dirzhan. Got to think about that, before they come and bomb us flat. Anyway I can do a phone-line for you. Have to be this afternoon. You’ve got a date with the chieftains this morning. The Khanazhana says she needs you for a witness. Know what that’s about?”

  “I think so.”

  “Great. After the chieftains, will you see if you can make sense of that plan of the passages? Doctor Ghulidzh can read old script. Doesn’t speak much English, I’m afraid. Point is, you’ve seen them …”

  “Only that once. I’ll give it a go if you like, but Taeela …”

  “She’s going to have her hands full helping Dad keep the chieftains in check. My Ma’s been talking to Dad. Laid down the law a bit. He’s going to play for time, negotiate about returning the Khanazhana in exchange for …”

  “No!”

  “Her own idea. Not going to do it, of course, but it’ll hold the bombers off for a week or two … Tell you later. We’ve got to get on.”

  The chieftains were meeting in the room where they had dined the night before. It was already crowded—fifty or sixty men, Nigel guessed.
Most of the furnishings had been cleared back against the walls, apart from a semi-circle of low seats beneath the gallery, where the seven chieftains sat, each with a group of men standing behind him, wearing the different coloured shoulder-sashes of their clans. You could have knitted a romper suit for a camel out of their beards. Zhiordzhio Baladzhin was in the group behind Chief Baladzhin, still looking flushed and furious.

  One of the chieftains was on his feet, thumping his fist into his palm as he made his points. Each time he did so mutters of agreement rose from among the watchers. The strong bearded faces were easy to read, some fierce, confident, spoiling for the fight, some scowling disapproval, or anxious and uncertain. There was a bit of applause when the speaker sat down, and Zhiordzhio Baladzhin elbowed his way across to pat him on the shoulder.

  By the time he got back to his place another chieftain was speaking, making much less of a meal of it. Mizhael whispered the gist of it. Did they want Sodalka bombed flat? Where were their anti-tank guns? And so on. Some of his audience looked ostentatiously at their watches, yawned and muttered among themselves, others nodded and murmured agreement. He too got a bit of applause when he sat down, not as loud as the first speaker, but from just as many people, Nigel thought.

  Two of the chieftains must already have had their say before Mizhael and Nigel arrived, because only three more followed. The first was another hawk, the second wanted to get the hostages back and then decide what to do, and the third was a little old man who’d been sitting out of sight behind Chief Baladzhin and needed to be helped to his feet.

  “My ma’s uncle Doglu,” whispered Mizhael. “Dog-dog’s named for him. Dad doesn’t get to speak because he’s in the chair, so Uncle Doglu speaks for the clan. They’ll listen to him. He’s a good guy. I’ve been talking to him.”

  Despite his frail appearance, Doglu Baladzhin spoke in a slow, firm voice, pausing to gather his strength before each sentence, which gave Mizhael time to translate. His audience listened in respectful silence.