“I think, if you will permit, Nath,” and Seg spoke seriously, “I would like to spend a little time with your chodku. The bowmen can be smartened up.”
We knew Seg was not speaking of drill or uniform but of the controlled discharges of flights of arrows, of the rhythm and speed. Seg Segutorio is the finest bowman of two worlds, for my money, and he would work wonders with these lads, even though they were not Bowmen of Loh.
“You will have my gratitude, Seg.”
As the Phalanx, neatly divided into its various component parts, marched, my attention left Nath and Seg discussing just what Seg would do. Well, and, of course, the Phalanx looked superb! The lads could, at least, march in rank and file and keep their pikes all aligned. The red flags flew. The uniforms, plain and sensible with much hard leather and bronze, gave plenty of room for strenuous activity. The shields — what the swods in the ranks call the crimson flowers, among other less flattering names — all at the same angle, just then caught gleams of light from the two suns and all together flashed in combined reflections like a bolt of lightning.
I make no apology for mentioning the Phalanx. To have lived and to have seen the Phalanx in motion is to have lived twice over. Yes, the brumbytes in their files were superb. And, staring out with my emotions all stirred higgledy-piggledy by the realities of comradeship and war and peace and repugnance I have often spoken of, I refused to be struck by a self-indulgent and maudlin thought — “What is all this for?”
At my back the duty squadron of 2ESW sat their zorcas in what of patience they could summon. This was not the same squadron as the one on duty yesterday. I had an unpleasant task before me there, for the young lad whose throat had been torn out, Jurukker Larghos Vontner, had a father and mother and they had been informed and an appointment arranged at the earliest possible moment.
They would be traveling up from their small estate in the country now, shattered by this evil news.
This black thought made me turn my head away from the glittering and gorgeous pageant of the Phalanx to stare balefully at the duty squadron. They, of course, looked the splendid bunch of rapscallions they were, hardened old kampeons and fuzz-faced youngsters. I sighed.
Then I stared harder.
By Vox!
Along at the end of the line, tagged on, a group of Zorcanders sat as silently and as still as the rest of the juruk. These riders did not have fuzz-faces. Their faces were smooth. Their eyes in the shadow of each helmet sometimes flashed a liquid gleam; their armor was of a different shape. I looked at them, these Jikai Vuvushis, and I realized that so far I’d been lucky — supremely fortunate — not to have to worry my head personally over the fate of a bunch of hare-brained girls in the day-to-day problems of running an empire. Now, if assassins struck, I’d be more concerned over these warrior ladies—
I halted my runaway thoughts.
Idiot! Onker! These girls were perfectly capable of taking care of themselves. They were soldier women, fighting ladies, Jikai Vuvushis, and now I had them in my juruk — for the guard had taken them in for good.
With the Fifth Phalanx seen safely off to barracks and with the guard trotting at our backs, we set off for the next function of the declining day.
“I could do with a wet, my old dom,” said Seg.
“Aye. Even inspecting troops is thirsty work,” said Nath.
“The disease is catching,” I remarked, and felt no little surprise when they laughed at my comment.
So, laughing, we reined in before a neat little tavern we knew pretty well, The Frog and Jut, and dismounted. Thinking of the juruk jikai — which is one fancy name Kregans have for a guard corps — I was aware that I’d have to make the decision about the kind and number of animals they rode. The guard regiments kept up nikvoves and zorcas. The nikvove, heavy, powerful, is one of the better animals to ride in a thumping, rib-jolting charge, knee to knee. The zorca with his spiral horn is altogether more dainty, short-coupled, exceptionally fast and beautiful. The commanders of ESW and EYJ considered both animals essential. But Vallia was short of riding beasts, juts were difficult to come by in any war, Zair knows, and I had, therefore, to make the decision pretty soon.
The guardsmen dismounted and each jurukker was hell bent on slaking his thirst to the greater glory of Beng Dikkane, the patron saint of all the ale drinkers of Paz.
About to walk up the few steps leading under a brick archway where purple and yellow flowers blossomed exotically under the low rays of the suns, we were halted by the sound of galloping hooves from the street. A rider bolted up to the gate, half fell off and half dismounted, didn’t bother with the reins, and came flying across the small courtyard toward us.
As a matter of course half a dozen burly lads of the guard magically appeared before me.
We could all see the man’s uniform, a smart affair of crimson and yellow, with tasteful silver lace here and there. We all recognized him as a messenger sent by my chief stylor, Enevon Ob-Eye. In his left fist he clutched a fold of paper. Clearly, therefore, Enevon, who ran the office with meticulous accuracy, had sent me a message. Equally clearly, the lads of the duty squadron were going to keep a very close eye on proceedings.
Well, that is the way of it if an emperor has to have all these fancy bodyguards.
“Let Farren through, Deldar Naghan, if you please.”
Although I spoke quite pleasantly, Deldar Naghan, exceedingly large, exceedingly scarlet of face, and exceedingly conscious of his position, bellowed in his exceedingly enormous voice: “Quidang, majister!”
The guards stepped aside and young Farren ti Wovoing walked through. He was still breathless from his gallop through the streets of Vondium to find us.
Now I had in my mind’s eye a picture of what had happened. Enevon had probably said: “Take this message to the emperor, young Farren. And — bratch!”
The message was quite possibly of world-shaking importance; far more probably it was just routine. That made no difference. If a message he had to deliver had to go to the emperor, then young Farren, like every other bright spark of the messenger service, would break all the speed records getting it to its destination.
I managed a quirk of the lips which passed for a smile and took the paper.
Majister—
Nath Naformo, a messenger from Natyzha Famphreon — not the Racters — brings a message he will confide to no one but yourself.
Enevon K.S.[2]
I crumpled the paper.
“Thank you, young Farren. Do you tell Master Enevon Ob-Eye I will return directly.”
With a snapped out acknowledgment, Farren turned himself about and ran off to his zorca. He was a young fellow desperate to make a mark for himself, like so many of them in Vallia, so many...
I showed Seg and Nath na Kochwold the paper, and then crumpled it again and stuck it down into a pouch on my belt.
“Say nothing of this, of course.”
“All the same,” said Seg as we went into the snug of The Frog and Jut, “it rings oddly.”
The Racters with their black and white favors had once been the most powerful political party in Vallia. Their insurrection had failed and now what was left of them held the far northwest where they warred against the self-created King of North Vallia northward of them and against Layco Jhansi to the south.
They had previously offered an alliance against Layco Jhansi, as he had offered one against them. I did not think this mysterious messenger was Strom Luthien, who did the dirty work for the Racters in this department.
As we downed the refreshing ale served here by a sweet little Fristle fifi in a yellow apron and her fur brushed to a polish of perfection, Seg went on: “And from old Natyzha Famphreon, herself, personally. Not from the Racter party. I suppose she’s still a leading light? Maybe they’ve thrown her out and she asks your help.”
“Would to Opaz someone would slit her throat,” was Nath’s comment just before he buried his nose into his jug.
“You have to give this Nath
Naformo full marks for courage.” Seg slugged back a gulp of ale. “Any Racter walking into Vondium is likely to have his throat slit, by the Veiled Froyvil!”
We drank up and then remounted to canter off to the palace where a meal awaited us. Still resplendently dressed, and therefore feeling foolish, I decided to see the messenger from Natyzha Famphreon first. Seg and Nath went with me into Enevon’s office where we were shown into a small anteroom. The walls were painted beige, the ceiling was white, there were two desks and four chairs, and the carpet was quite ordinary, with a flower pattern of intertwined Moonblooms. Nath Naformo rose from a chair as we entered.
“Majister.” He started to go into the full incline where he’d scrape his idiot nose on the carpet and stick his rump waggling into the air.
I stopped all that nonsense and said: “Sit down, Koter Naformo, and spit it out.”
He looked at me frankly. He was in the Kregan way hard, of a middle-age, I judged, given that Kregans live better than two hundred years, and wore decent Vallian buff. His weapons had been taken from him.
“Majister. I am not a Racter. I am employed merely as an agent, between you and the person who wishes to speak to you.”
“More mumbo-jumbo!” said Seg, blowing out his cheeks.
“Surely you recognize the necessity for a Racter to show circumspection here, kov?”
Seg nodded his handsome head in agreement.
“Well?” I said, and I own my voice made the poor fellow sitting opposite jump. Naformo swallowed down.
“If you will attend the upstairs room at the sign of The Piebald Zorca this evening, the person I represent will await you — alone and unarmed.”
Enevon screwed up his one eye at me, and pursed his lips. Despite his seniority, he still managed to get ink on himself. “The Piebald Zorca? H’mm, majis, that was well-known as a haunt of the Racters when they held power in Vondium.”
“And in a highly insalubrious part, too,” said Nath. As a citizen of Thermin, up in the north midlands, he’d assiduously acquainted himself with Vondium.
This Nath Naformo certainly did have courage.
“Am I to understand you fear to go through fear of treachery—”
“Fear?” yelped out Nath.
“Oh, I’ll go,” I told Naformo. “And I’ll have a couple of squadrons of my lads ready if your principal attempts treachery.”
Uncharacteristically it was left to Seg to say what lay in our minds.
“Treachery? That we can deal with. It’s this dratted werewolf we’ve got to look out for.”
Chapter six
Natyzha Famphreon sends a request
The Piebald Zorca had been rebuilt since the earlier structure had been burned down in the Times of Troubles, but the upstairs room was furnished with a faded glory that reminded one of bygone days. There were even black and white decorations to the cornices. They could, of course, have been merely an artist’s fancy...
Nath snorted when he saw the decorations, and chucked his wide-brimmed hat down onto the table. Then he sprawled out in a chair and stuck his black boots out.
“Drinks all round, landlord, and sharpish!”
“At once, my lord.”
Seg and I stared at the person in the black cloak and wearing a black iron mask who rose at our entrance. He wore no weapons. We were fully armed.
“Would I know you, then, koter?” I made the inquiry in a flat voice.
“You might, majister. When the landlord has served us I will remove the mask.”
“Make it so.”
The room was illuminated by mineral oil lamps, and their slight tang rankled unpleasantly when compared with the sweet aroma of the samphron oil lamps those with more money could afford. When the landlord, a bulldog-faced Brukaj in an almost clean yellow and green striped apron had retired, we broached the bottles and settled about the table.
With a firm gesture the stranger unhooked the clasps and removed the iron mask.
Well, I knew him. But only slightly.
“Lahal, Strom Volgo.”
“Lahal, majister.”
He was apim, like me, with stern and austere features, bearing the marks of experience. His nose was full and his lips of the thin variety, yet he was not unhandsome. His eyebrows drew down.
“I serve the kovneva, and hold my lands at her hands. She commands, and I obey.”
A strom, which is something like the rank of count here on Earth, may hold estates direct from the emperor or king, and also from a kov, or duke. The dowager kovneva Natyzha Famphreon of Falkerdrin owned vast lands. There were many nobles beholden to her.
“Well, jen,” I said, which is the correct way to address a lord in Vallia, “you’d better spit it out.”
He was not discomposed. He’d heard of me, right enough, since the days when the Racters believed I was merely a propaganda prince, a puffed-up bladder of nothing.
“I have to inform you that the kovneva believes she will soon die—”
“Ha!” exclaimed Nath. “Then you do bring good news!”
Strom Volgo took no notice outwardly; but I noticed his forehead crinkled just a trifle. This man served old Natyzha, and was well aware of the upheavals that would follow the death of a noble.
“She is aware of the enmity shown you by the Racters. She calls to your remembrance her enclosed garden, and the chavonths that escaped and would have killed her and her friends. She grieved, then, that you and she stood in enmity, one against the other.”
I said, “I did what was necessary. But I, also, remind her that her son, Nath Famphreon, stood shoulder to shoulder with me. And he was armed only with a rapier.”
That had been a blood-stirring little scene, the escaped chavonths, ferocious hunting cats, leaping out ravenous to kill and eat us. Yes, I’d always felt that Natyzha’s son, Nath, was not the ninny everyone thought him. His mother was so powerful, so overriding, so intemperate in her demands, that young Kov Nath vanished in her shadows.
As Strom Volgo went on speaking I realized we were handling high politics, secret understandings, the stuff of which empires are made.
He unhooked the black cloak and tossed it over the back of a chair. He wore Vallian buff, and his long black riding boots were still splashed with mud. He’d come a goodly way southward from Falkerdrin, which lies north of the Black Mountains and north of Vennar, over the River of Rippling Catspaws. My blade comrade Inch was still fighting to regain control of his Black Mountains, and my comrade — never a blade comrade! — Turko was struggling to hold onto his new kovnate of Falinur and to hook left into Vennar whose borders marched westward of him. And, of course, Vennar was the kovnate of Layco Jhansi, the old emperor’s chief pallan, traitor, forsworn murderer.
“You still fight Layco Jhansi, then, Strom Volgo.”
“Of course, to all outward seeming.”
I didn’t like the sound of this. Neither did Seg. He sat up.
“Oh?”
Volgo spread his hands. He wore the colored favors and symbol — known as a schturval — of Falkerdrin. Black and gold the colors, a chavonth the symbol. The schturval glittered in the oil lamps’ glow.
“I have been commanded by the kovneva to tell you whatever you wish to know, majister. She feels she is near death—”
“And is this sooth? Is Natyzha really dying?”
“Yes.”
“From all accounts,” put in Nath na Kochwold, “her son Nath Famphreon is no man to be a kov. He’ll have his head off before he leaves the graveside.”
“Yes,” said Strom Volgo.
Seg fidgeted away at what had been said earlier.
“What d’you mean, strom, about to all outward seeming you still fight that bastard Layco Jhansi?”
“I have been commanded to tell the emperor all. The Racters have come to an understanding with Layco Jhansi—”
“The devil they have!”
“Aye. The Racters will turn their main efforts against this maniacal King of North Vallia, and Jhansi wi
ll in likewise smash this new Kov Turko of Falinur.”
“By the Black Chunkrah!” I flamed out. “This is ill news!”
“And it explains why Turko has been having such a bad time recently.” Seg gripped his square brown fist onto the smooth shaft of his bowstave. “I’ll have to go up there, my old dom, and—”
“Too right! And I’ll be with you, and with reinforcements for Turko. The whole front could collapse and then — by Krun! It doesn’t bear thinking of!”
Strom Volgo rubbed salt into our wounds.
“Now that Layco Jhansi has access to the sea through Racter territory he has been hiring many mercenaries.”
“That does it,” declared Seg. He stood up, big, handsome, his dark hair wild, and prowled about the room like a veritable leem.
“My thanks to you, Strom Volgo, and to Natyzha. She has done us a good service with this intelligence. Although—” and here I confess I stroked my chin, “I am at a loss as to why she should so inform us.”
“That is why I am here. When the kovneva dies she is confident that the lords of the Racter lands will descend like warvols upon her kovnate. Her son Nath, whom she loves in her own hard fashion, will be swept aside. He will likely be slain. Certainly, she believes, Kov Nath will never inherit Falkerdrin.”
“That seems reasonable,” said Nath na Kochwold.
But, having had a glimpse of the purpose and steely determination in Natyzha Famphreon, I thought I could see what she wanted. And I stood aghast. I had to let Volgo spell it out, for it was a request I did not wish to hear.
“The Kovneva Natyzha Famphreon of Falkerdrin begs and demands of you, Dray Prescot, Emperor of Vallia, that you guarantee the legal and actual inheritance of her son, the Kov Nath Famphreon of Falkerdrin.”
“Do what?” Seg’s voice as he stopped pacing and swung about, head jutting, was a snarl. “Is the woman insane?”
“She has, Kov Seg, taken the measure of the emperor. This request cannot be dealt with by anyone else.”
Quite mildly, I said: “If I accede to this astonishing request, and I send — or, rather, ask — Kov Seg Segutorio, to go up to Falkerdrin and sort it all out, then, believe you me, Volgo, Kov Seg will sort it all out — and in a most handsome way, by Vox!”
Werewolves of Kregen Page 5