The Far Kingdoms

by Allan Cole

  But Cassini had not fled. He was not running. I saw him just where he'd been before the mob attacked. He stood in the center of the street. He was all alone - his advisors and assistants must have fled with the rest. I do not know if he was in shock, or under some compulsion.

  Suddenly he spread out his arms to the sky, and began shouting, shouting words in some unknown language. I drew back for my spearcast, and then froze. The thunder from the heavens rose, booming, louder than the Guard's drums, louder than an entire army's percussion. Everyone - soldiers, my servants, Janos, the wounded - were as if petrified. White faces looked upward.

  The thunder grew louder. Then, from the still completely cloudless sky, a great hand formed of blue flames. The hand reached down, toward us. I wanted to scream, to bury myself in the earth, but could not move.

  The hand came down on Cassini. His shouts became shrieks, and then the fingers closed on the Evocator. They lifted him perhaps ten feet above the ground... and squeezed, like a gardener killing a worm. The fingers opened and dropped what was left of Cassini onto the roadway. Then flames, hand and thunder vanished, as if they'd never been.

  I turned away. Janos was standing there, still mazed. I walked past him, through the ruins of my door, over the bodies scattered across my anteroom. Outside I could hear shouts and cries as reality - or what we accept as reality - returned.

  I did not wish to share my thoughts with anyone at this moment. We had won, yes. But the "war," for that is what it was, wasn't over for me. There was one more battle to be fought, one more victory to be gained, a victory owed to the dead and to the yet-to-be-born.

  * * *

  "Lord Amalric Antero, and Sir Janos Kether Greycloak, please step forward."

  Janos and I were in the Citadel of the Magistrates. It was less than a week later, but it was if an era had passed in Orissa. The Old Guard who'd believed themselves triumphant had vanished from the halls of power. Now Ecco sat at the center of the Magistrates' Bench. Sisshon had announced he was suffering from a rare disease within two days of the battle of the villa, and retired for intensive, private treatment. His supporters had similarly found tasks that generally took them far from the city.

  Three days after the battle, the Emergency Regulations had been suspended and Orissa began working its way back to normalcy. But there were changes - one of the most notable had been the knighting of Janos. He noted, a bit amusedly after the ceremony that his knighthood would not be hereditary - "evidently they worry about what a half-breed's bastard offspring might bring upon them in the years to come, assuming I have any such issue. But I am well content with this honor, since as we all know the world shall end with my death or transfiguration." He laughed mightily and, in the company of Sergeant Maeen and Rali, drank his spurs on.

  Most importantly, the Evocators' stranglehold on the city had been broken. Those who'd been in Cassini's camp were no longer to be seen in public. As a matter of fact, none of the Evocators paraded through the city with the same panoply they had in the past. Jeneander, Prevotant and their ilk were busy trying to determine what the new order would be, and how they could somehow control it.

  Gamelan had returned, and now spoke for the Evocators. For this momentous event he now sat beside Ecco at the bench. We stood at attention as he spoke. Behind us was a throng of our supporters, from Rali to Malaren to, it seemed, half the inhabitants of Cheapside.

  "It is the decision of this Council," Ecco went on, "after full consideration and consultation with the proper spiritual forces, that the city of Orissa proclaim a Great Finding, a journey intended to unite the men and women of this city with the fabled beings of that land commonly known as the Far Kingdoms. To this end, we direct all citizens of Orissa, and all residents of lands under their protection, provide Lord Antero and Sir Greycloak with anything they need to successfully complete their task. We now proclaim a crusade, a crusade of peace that will open a new and golden age.

  "Lord Antero... Sir Greycloak, go forth now. And seek the Far Kingdoms."

  * * *

  PART THREE:

  THE LAST VOYAGE

  * * *

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CITY OF GHOSTS

  There were but twenty of us, and we were all hard, fit and young. We had but one goal: the Far Kingdoms; and one rule: never do the expected. It was good we thought of this expedition as if we were going to war, because from the time we left Orissa following the last winter storm, through our landing on the Pepper Coast to our journey to the river's headwaters, nothing was either peaceful nor normal.

  When we embarked secretly at the mouth of Orissa's river on one of my newly-built twin-hull fast traders, which was captained by L'ur, all of us could feel strangeness gathering - like fog wraiths collecting around an autumn fire. We made a fast crossing of the Narrow Sea, our intended landing a few leagues below the Shore People. Janos and I planned to visit Black Shark, inform him of our presence in his land, obtain what few supplies we needed, and request neither he nor his people boot our presence about. We unloaded our cargo on a beach and began assembling our equipment as L'ur took his ship swiftly back out to sea, leaving no sign of our arrival. There were two asses for each man, each one ensorcelled so they were voiceless. On them we carried our armory, dried foodstuffs, certain weapons, and rich gifts intended for use when we reached the Far Kingdoms. We intended to treat the animals as if they were treasures themselves: in our company were two hostlers with excellent reputations for knowledge and dedication.

  Leaving the unloading in the capable hands of Maeen, Janos and I headed for Black Shark's village. Fortunately dawn broke before we reached it, because we might have passed through its center without noticing - the village and all its people had gone. The huts had been torn down and burnt, but other than that, there was no sign of violence. We searched the shore and the riverbanks: none of their boats remained but one, and that was an old four-man canoe that had sunk unnoticed next to where their dock had been. I asked Janos what he thought had happened. He shook his head, not knowing. Greycloak waded into the river, and asked me to help him drag the wrecked canoe out. Puzzled, I did as he asked. He drew his dagger, hacked splinters from the craft, and put them into his belt pouch. We rode back to our party, and marched off.

  We were moving both fast and slowly, which seems a contradiction but is not. Janos and I had spent much time discussing this expedition before even soliciting volunteers. Once we had defined our expedition, we put out the word that men were needed. Despite the disaster of the second voyage, half of Orissa volunteered. We took only the young, the fit, the patient and those with senses of humor as hearty as their muscles. Rali tried to enlist, but I convinced her that at least one Antero must remain behind, if for no reason than to make sure Orissa did not revert to its old evil ways in our absence. She grudgingly agreed. The twenty volunteers we accepted were wildly varied: two had seen service with the Frontier Scouts, for example; one had been a forester; two brothers had, I suspected, been poachers; and so forth.

  There was even a rather effete teacher of music whose avocation was climbing castle walls without rope nor spikes. The final member of our party was 'Lione. A message was brought to us by his warder. Evidently the man had not improved his ability to live with other people, and was now in a condemned cell. Humorless he may have been, and unpleasant he certainly was, but bravery and toughness counted much in this undertaking. I paid his blood-fine, and he became the twentieth.

  On the first day the twenty were assembled at one of my remote country estates, Janos told us we were to behave as if all men's hands were turned against us. He said we must think of ourselves as if we were a band of irregular soldiers or bandits; and all of us must be supremely fit. That was taken care of during the drear winter, as Maeen, who I now realized was a demon in human guise, ran us over rough country until we pleaded for mercy. At that point he would make us do individual exercises, climb trees or scale cliffs. We also played games - games intended to develop our eye for cover a
nd the country. Hare and Hounds sounds childish, until the rules are changed so that the hare, if captured, is thrown into a millpond. In the dead of winter that penalty is not laughable. When completely fatigued, Maeen would have us draw maps or solve intricate puzzles. Little by little we formed ourselves into a team. The nightmare of the unknown caverns came back to haunt me, but I was so exhausted from Maeen's exercises it did not trouble me more than twice.

  Janos had little to do with us during this time; he was busy with his own travels. He had asked for, and received, the services of Captain L'ur and his new proa, the Kittiwake III. Where he went no one knew, and no one asked. Once he said something about the wild hills back of Redond, and he told me it was still possible to enter and leave Lycanth without notice. A third time he mentioned he'd seen my old "friend" Tepon of the Ifora, who'd purchased an excellent husband with the gold she'd made as a harlot. It was noteworthy that no one, from Ecco to Gamelan, had asked whether our expedition would require an Evocator. I suspected all of us knew what the plan was.

  Now, moving through the lands beyond the Pepper Coast, we became skilled in the arts of banditry. We spent long hours in cover, observing open land before we crossed it, especially paying attention to the behavior of the animals and birds. It was another ominous note that we encountered few game animals, and heard birdsongs but seldom, as if the land had been hunted out. Or, I thought, as if the animals had sense to flee from a storm gathering to threaten their land. The few villages we'd seen on my Finding were also abandoned, and we never saw any of the hunters or scouts who'd peered at us through cover.

  We travelled to the headwaters of the river without incident, although all of us could feel foreboding presences around. But there was one relief - we were not troubled by the minor curses we had been on my Finding. Perhaps, I wondered, our enemies sensed we were beyond such harassment, and would prefer to obliterate us cleanly with some Great Spell in the future. We saw Watchers several times, and hid. Since we did not know whether they boded good or evil, we thought it wisest to simply be invisible.

  We never moved in a manner which might be expected. Thus, if the easiest route would lie along a valley floor, or on that old long-abandoned road we had used on my Finding, we never approached it. Nor did we ever use the peaks of the hills for our course. Not only were hillcrests the province of the Watchers, but we could be easily seen from below. We zigged and zagged as we travelled, always keeping within range of the areas we knew from our earlier travels, but never repeating a former route. This expedition was also no endurance contest: we typically travelled for two turns of the glass, then rested for half a turn. Exhaustion, Janos kept telling us, was as deadly an enemy as any ambusher; a tired man, for instance, might stumble up a hill into a trap because his eyes were sweat-blinded and his mind intent on his tortured, wheezing lungs.

  As before, we cooked only at midday, and that with sheltered fires of dry wood. Frequently we did not cook at all, and contented ourselves with grain mashed into water and spiced. Twice we netted fish from the river, and filleted them, "cooking" them in the sour juice of a fruit native to the region Despite all the caution, we reached the flatlands in shorter time than my Finding had taken; and in less than half the days it took the massive Second Expedition to mark the same point. Then we moved with even greater caution, since there was little cover but the copses of trees and occasional folds in the ground.

  Four days after passing where I'd arbitrarily decided grasslands had become desert, we encountered the slavers. As before, their outriders appeared and flanked our course. Janos called a halt, and drew me aside. "We have a choice," he said. "We can either wait until they attack us, either magickally or in person, and then deal with the situation... or we strike first. It is my mind to do the latter. I have had quite enough of these skulking nomads. In future days, they or their brothers will harry caravans and travelers to the east, and be a continual plague. I believe we should set a terrible example now, so that in days to come no one will dare trouble travelers from Orissa."

  I hesitated, thinking surely there must be a way to avoid such slaughter; we lose them, or find some other means to trick them. Then I bitterly recalled how kindly manner we had been treated on the Finding, and how even more charitable the slavers would have been if we had surrendered rather than attacked. Then I thought of Deoce: rage rose red, not entirely directed at these nomads. "Do what you will," I snapped; and to this day I am sometimes troubled by that decision.

  "Good. We shall annihilate these hyenas," he said. "But not solely by force of arms. We shall use other, more convincing tools." We changed course, now traveling toward the slavers' outriders; but directly, not wishing to give even a hint of our intent. Before dusk they galloped off into the distance. But we could see where they were headed - toward another oasis where the remainder of their party would be encamped, waiting.

  "We will take them as they sleep," Janos said. He ordered us to give him our daggers. In the sand he drew a Vee that was pointed toward the oasis. A second, shallower Vee closed the open end of his figure, so that it now looked like a spear- or arrow-head. There was no pretense Janos was not spell-casting, nor that he was not serving as an Evocator, even though such acts were still forbidden to all Orissans who were not Evocators. He drew a large circle below the spearhead and placed all of our daggers in it - points toward the center. Next, he took practice arrowheads from our quivers and laid them in the circle in the same manner - their small heads touching the dagger tips. He took a pack from one of the asses, a pack that contained some of the supplies he'd acquired in his travels. At the three tips of the spearhead in the sand he imbedded tiny wooden wedges. He spoke words, and the three wedges smoked and flamed, without ever being consumed. Then he carefully lifted a vial from the pack, and unsnapped the two catches holding its lid in place. Ten feet away the smell from that vial hit us, and I almost retched. The stink was long-rotten meat, from what creature I did not care to guess. Janos laid a bit of this corruption at the center of the dagger-ring, then quickly covered the vial and walked back to us. The reek seemed not to bother him.

  He considered his work thoughtfully. "A bit of blood would help," he mused. "But not from one of us. That would give a wrong indicator. Perhaps... yes. You. 'Lione. Take this measure," and he handed the swordsman a miniscule gold cup from the pack of sorcerous implements, "and bleed one of the asses. Take no more than is required to fill it." I saw 'Lione's hand shake as he took the cup. But he obeyed orders without question and soon the ass's blood was sprinkled across the dagger blades. Janos stood behind the circle and began his incantation. As usual, it consisted of unknown words - names of gods, perhaps, or just a foreign, wizardly tongue? - interspersed with phrases I could make out: "This is... gift... Beyond life... death... worm corrupts... And dies itself... gift... The White Peace... beyond... Until the jackals come." The small tapers flared... then went out.

  Janos turned back to us. "The spell is complete. Each of you take your blades, and the men who carry bows divide these arrows among you. Under no circumstances, until I cast a counterspell, use either arrows or blades for any purpose; and make very sure - as you value your life - not to cut yourself. "We will watch until their campfires burn down. Then we shall close on them. If they have sentries, I promise you they will not see us as we approach. We will take position on this side of their camp. Each archer is to select a target; and then, on my signal, hit the man with your dart. Then we attack. Do not use any weapon other than your daggers unless you must. You will need but to touch an enemy for him to be destroyed. I will indicate one person in their camp. I will be responsible for him. Do not harm that man, or you shall face my wrath later. Now. We shall eat and rest."

  Late that night we crept out from our camp toward the oasis. Again, I thought of Deoce, and my eyes blurred. The boil of danger caught me, and I became nothing but a long knife and a silent shadow. Whether by caution or by a spell, the two sentries indeed did not see us. Janos indicated one to 'Lione, and he t
ook the other. Both sentinels went down without a sound. We moved on to the camp. There were no tents pitched, and the fifteen or so nomads slept peacefully, using their saddles for pillows. One man snored some distance from the others, and this man Janos indicated for himself. The bowman readied themselves... and Janos' hand flashed down. The arrows, little more than toys, arced out.

  We shouted once and charged. A half-fuddled man arose in front of me, trying to fight free of his blankets, and my blade sank home - body forgetting Janos' orders to but touch an enemy. Another nomad stumbled across my path, shouting pain from a gashed arm. I prepared to finish him... and before my eyes he collapsed. Dead... and I saw him putrefy. In an eye blink, what should have taken days or weeks to occur happened - the body swelled, bloated, burst, blackened and then the flesh withered, until there was nothing but a skeleton lying on the sand. This, then, was what Janos' spell had called the "White Peace."

  I recovered, looked for another enemy, and saw a slaver bounding toward the darkness beyond. An arrow whispered past and touched but his arm before ricocheting away. That man, too, shrieked, died and rotted. Then there was only one man left alive among all those foul corpses: their chief, on his knees and writhing in terror in front of Janos.

  Janos ordered him tied to a nearby palm. "You speak the trader's language?" he asked. The man nodded. "Look well, then. This is the fate of those who are my enemies. This... or worse. You are permitted a chance to live. Not because I would not love to see your gleaming bones like the rest of your pack, but because I wish the tale to be told to all your people of what happens to those who stand against Orissa. I am the first... but there will be others traveling this same route. Remember what happened tonight, and stand well clear of my people. Do you understand?"