Blan had arrived at the castle the night before last and had seemed in better spirits. Arnapa was not fooled. Blan was making an effort to contribute but Arnapa feared that the girl’s broken heart and emotional state would drive her to some risky venture. Fortunately, things were under control in Austra County now that the castle had been secured and the coming storm had made it even more difficult for Black Knight to launch an early attack.
Arnapa had seen to it that Blan ate well and drank plenty of pineapple juice (into which Arnapa had poured a small quantity of soothing tincture), then took her to a house which belonged to a local dignitary. The house, previously requisitioned for use by enemy officers, had now been liberated back into the hands of its owner who was delighted that one of the liberation elite would be using it.
“I thought I had lost this house forever,” the owner had said, “so use it as long as you need it.” It had also occurred to the man that he was lucky to have a well-mannered young lady as a tenant rather than what he had expected. His imagination had conjured up a rowdy bunch of warriors spilling beer all over his floor and dirtying his linen entertaining equally rowdy women. Now he saw himself putting up a plaque to record that the house had been the residence of the Grand Vizier of Krar in the aftermath of events of great historical moment. Future tenants or buyers would be very impressed by that, he thought.
Blan was watching the river traffic when she noticed Actio 28 flashing. She had brought all three Actios with her to the house, not yet sure how she should deploy them. If she handed them out to all and sundry there would be a greater risk of one being captured by the enemy. Possession of even one Actio would be a great advantage to Black Knight. He might be able to dispense with his cumbersome Geode and, worse by far, track the other Actios, seize them and use them for his own evil purposes.
As she lifted the Actio, Blan thought about the two Actios she had sent with Pelembras before she realised just how powerful they were, or how dangerous should they fall into enemy hands. She need not have worried. A surge of relief came over her when she heard the message Actio 28 had for her.
“Blan dear, I’m so sorry to hear about Telko.” It was not her own voice, copied from her mind by the Actio. It was the dear voice of her grandfather, Praalis.
“Oh, gra, how did you hear?” Blan said with tears coming to her eyes yet again. She said it aloud, having forgotten that she need only direct her mind to the Actio.
“Pelembras arrived last night and delivered the two Actio devices to me. I have studied and tested them all night. Then carrier pigeons brought us news of Telko early this morning. How are you holding up? You were in love with him, weren’t you, Blan?”
“Yes, I love him,” Blan said. Her voice then caught and she could say nothing more for a while. Her anguish was detected by Actio 28, transmitted to Actio 8 and felt by Praalis as surely as it had been in his own heart.
Remembering the unquenchable bravery of the Akrinans he knew many years ago, Praalis was moved to ask, “What was the last thing that Telko said to you, Blan?”
That terrible moment came flooding back to Blan. It brought with it a pristine memory of Telko’s purple eyes beseeching her.
If I don’t return, lead my people. Stay strong! I love you. Telko’s words came into Blan’s mind and were transmitted to Praalis even though Blan would not have been able to say them aloud without breaking down. Hardened as he was to loss and suffering, Praalis could not stop his own tears when he felt Blan’s sorrow. He had experienced that same anguish when his beautiful Silquooay had been murdered.
“I know, gra, I’ll try,” Blan sputtered, seeing why Praalis had asked the question. “I must stay strong to lead his people, our people, but I feel so weak without him. If only I had not sought him out and conscripted him into our plans, he might still have a wonderful, sunny life ahead of him, full of promise and happiness.”
“Telko loved you, so he would not have chosen any other life than the one he had with you in it, short as it may have been. You are a strong person, Blan. You always have been. Telko would have admired that in you. I didn’t know him personally, but I knew his family and his people. Telko would not have asked you to lead them if he did not feel proud that you could do that. And here’s another reason to be strong, someone who insisted on talking to you.”
Blan sensed her grandfather release Actio 8 and then someone else engaging it.
“Unidentified operator activating Actio 8,” was the message from Actio 28. For a count of twenty, all Blan saw was some strange flashing of faint lights in the crystals, and she heard some more-or-less musical sounds. At last she heard a voice.
“I’ve missed you, Blan, and I’m so sorry about Telko.”
Without an adult’s facility to conceal emotion, Memwin had directed her unfiltered feelings to the Actio. This reminded Blan that Telko was not the only one who needed her.
“Don’t worry, I’ll come back soon. I love you, Memwin,” Blan replied soothingly. It was all she could think of saying. She had wanted to stay to see if Telko’s body would be found. However, she had now changed her mind. She did not want his dead body to be found. She wanted to believe that he might still be alive somewhere and come back to her one day. She knew that she was being illogical to deny the obvious, but it was a dream that promised to help her move from one day to the next.
Praalis then took back the Actio from Memwin. He told Blan that he would make further study of them and call back later that day. He advised Blan to teach Arnapa and Nightsight how to use Actios 19 and 25. He would show Azimath how to use Actio 5. Then they would be able to coordinate their operations.
“We can assume that most of the Geodes will be near regional enemy headquarters or installed on quimals near major naval units, so we can use the Actios to track Black Knight’s major moves,” Praalis suggested, trying to coax Blan further into her logical work and away from her emotional turmoil.
He was pleased when she said, “At least that’s our hypothesis. But you haven’t mentioned the glass plates I sent you, gra. I hope you received them.”
“Ah, I was so excited about the Actios that I nearly forgot the plates,” Praalis explained. “They are the same as the ones I found in the library at Belspire. I found ten plates there hidden behind a shelf of books and it took me three years to decipher them. You have sent me hundreds of them. I still recall some of the methodology I used, but it will take a long time to decipher these. Besides, my mind is weaker than it was in those days. Your mind is stronger now, stronger than mine ever was, and you are still waxing to your full powers. The task will, I’m afraid, be yours.”
“No, gra, I couldn’t make any sense of those plates and I don’t believe that my mind will ever be as strong as yours,” Blan resisted.
“You will be able to do it. You will need time, as I did.” Praalis knew that there was no point arguing with Blan when she was being humble. “I can still help a little. I will make a start and see if I can refresh my memory. Then you won’t have to start from the beginning. That’s how advances are made; each scientist adds to what was done before.”
38
Word spread quickly among the Akrinans that Telko had appointed Blan as his successor in the event of his death and as his deputy in the event that he was lost or captured. He had done this secretly in a sealed letter that he sent to Proequa with Pelembras, and he gave a sealed copy to each of his most senior officers. These letters had now been opened and Blan was declared Temporary Ruling Princess.
She was glad of the word Temporary. When she heard it, she felt a tingling sensation run up her spine and she had the strange sensation that somehow Telko was with her, guiding her and, most of all, still loving her. Of course, the legal reason for the word Temporary in her title was that, under Akrinan law, Telko could not be considered dead until twenty years had passed, unless his body was found in the meantime. There was no objection to Blan’s appointment. As Grand Vizier of Krar she was a suitable person in everyone’s eyes, and Tel
ko had no siblings or children.
Blan spent several days receiving allegiances and compliments from Akrinans. They all wanted to say something to her. Perhaps, she thought, it was their way of reaching out to Telko, to speak to the one he held most dear. She received them all respectfully, with a mixture of dignity and sympathy for their own loss. None were disappointed.
The new recruits, former enemies who had changed sides to join the Akrinans, also wanted to pay their respects to Blan. Later many made enquiries about applying for Akrinan citizenship. A procedure had to be invented for it. Hitherto people just settled in Akrin and eventually became Akrinan or, if they were slow to adapt to new ways, their children would become Akrinan. This was the first time anyone had wanted a fast-track in the form of documents and ceremonies. Being Akrinan had become trendy. In this case, those aspiring to become Akrinans came from neighbouring lands, so they already knew that Akrinan ways were not so different from their own, and they were impressed by Telko’s fight back against the oppressive Kraran dictatorship as well as by his choice of Temporary Ruling Princess. They found it much easier to submit to the authority of a beautiful and respectful young woman than to Black Knight who they saw as an oversized Krariscan bully who showed them only contempt.
Blan’s most important interview was with Admiral Wayhooay, the most senior of Telko’s letter holders and second-in-command of the Akrinan expeditionary fleet. He was a man of about fifty years who, despite being a second cousin of Telko’s late mother, bore little resemblance to Telko. Slightly more than a fathome in height, Wayhooay was a thickset man with a grizzled, battle-scarred and, Blan suspected, somewhat fire-damaged face.
“Admiral, as you must know, I have no experience as a military commander. I cannot possibly replace Telko. How can I lead our people in a war like this?” Blan had asked.
“Don’t worry, Princess, the chain of military command is well established. Telko was our military leader because he was trained to be such, as his late father was before him. He need not have taken that course. You need do no more than appoint your generals and admirals and support the morale of your followers.”
Greatly relieved, Blan asked, “What would you advise me to do now?”
“You are entitled to appoint new commanders. However, leave things as they are for now,” the admiral advised. “On this mission our field commander is Baroness Arnapa Sirsette, as she is called here. Our comrades in Proequa are commanded by Azimath the Navigator and Count Nargin. You need only review the situation when the current missions are complete.”
“Thank you, admiral. I accept your advice,” Blan said, even more relieved. Then two questions occurred to her concerning what he had told her. She dismissed the first because she realised that she really was a real Princess in the eyes of the Akrinans, both as Grand Vizier and as Temporary Ruler of Akrin.
“Admiral, what did you mean about Arnapa when you said ‘as she is called here’?”
“That is something she will have to tell you herself,” Wayhooay replied, smiling at last. “Suffice to say that I know of Arnapa and her family from the last war when I led the Akrinan expeditionary force on behalf of Telko’s father. We managed to keep out of trouble most of the time, but my spies infiltrated the Free Alliance command. They brought me some interesting information about Arnapa. You can rest assured that none of that reached Black Knight or his secret police.”
The admiral knelt on one knee, took her hand and kissed it. Then he promptly departed to go about his business. As he left the room, he thought of his own daughter, about the same age as Blan. He was glad that his daughter was not confronted by the dilemmas now facing the new Princess. Blan was still very young, so recently graduated from childhood. Even with her brilliant mind and wisdom far beyond her years, she could not yet understand the dangers that were waiting in store for her, especially now that she had assumed responsibility for the fate of nations. She would witness horrors that would plant seeds in her dreams to bear fruit at night or at unexpected moments. Wayhooay knew what that was like. All the dangers she overcame in her career would seek to return under new disguises to test her again.
About fifty paces from the door of Blan’s lodgings Wayhooay stopped for a moment and turned to face the building. “Good luck, Princess,” he said under his breath. “Keep to the Great Plan and you will survive and succeed.” Then he headed for the castle.
39
Once Blan had taught Arnapa and Nightsight the basics of using the Actios, there was little else for her to do, and yet everyone else seemed to be working flat out repairing or building defences or patrolling the harbour and its adjacent islands. Blan would have liked to go back to her waterwheel on Pitpet Brook but there was no one with the time to help her get there. She felt too frail and depressed to push her way upstream through the tropical jungle as she had done before, albeit under emergency conditions and with the incentive of saving her injured grandfather. To go through the jungle alone now without compelling cause and expose herself to danger from jungle creatures and enemy incursions, not to mention simple mishaps, would be unfair on those who worried about her.
Praalis and Azimath were now in regular contact with Arnapa and Nightsight via the Actios. Blan kept Actio 28 and used it to monitor all these communications as well as the movements of the Geodes. This enabled her to deduce that the enemy had sent many ships back to blockade Austra Great Harbour. However, Black Knight’s armies had made great advances and would soon be able to lay siege to Port Fandabbin itself. On the side of the Free Alliance, Azimath and Nargin were planning a breakout and it was assumed that the pirates would eventually try the same. However, the enemy navy would still be overwhelming in number and size of ships and weaponry.
Blan considered how Praalis had been able to block the operation of the Geodes in the last war long enough for Carlcan Fandabbin to ambush the enemy’s main army and turn the tide of the war. This time, however, the enemy forces were larger than last time, whereas the Free Alliance had fewer soldiers and fewer ships. The cost and damage caused by the last war had weakened the nations of the Free Alliance and this had been made worse by several years of poor crops and labour shortages.
“Even if gra or I can use the Actios to block the enemy’s Geodes, would that be enough?” Blan voiced to the empty room. “Would the Free Alliance be strong enough to overcome the enemy, even in an ambush?”
After a while Blan took Actio 28 in her hands and addressed it, “I must take you to Port Fandabbin. They will need you there.”
She judged that the journey should be safe enough while the enemy was still held back on land. Fetching more Actios from the sky ship would be dangerous to try alone and would take many extra days, so she resolved to take Actio 28 to Port Fandabbin before the enemy blocked the way. It would be quickest to take a fast horse along the highway to Sirsette Manor and she was sure that Gardolinya would help her find a suitable horse and advise her on how to get back across the mountains.
She looked down at the Actio and saw the curves of light on its face form a map of the far southern part of Arctequa. She asked it to zoom in to the area of the mountain pass. After some trial and error, the Actio highlighted a road or track which crossed the mountains along roughly the same path as the mountain pass as she remembered it.
“You know about the pass,” she confirmed. “That means it was already there twenty thousand years ago when you were programmed. It will have changed since then. Earthquakes and erosion may have altered it very much.”
*
Gardolinya had become so exhausted by his efforts to rally the local population that Arnapa had told him to relax and do nothing for a few days. After five days he was now looking for something to do and was delighted to be asked to guide Blan back over the mountains. They rode off on the eighth of October. Blan felt better about leaving the others now because unexpected help had arrived.
After setting sail from Three Islands, Penntrafa had encountered another Langardam pirate ship and had aske
d the captain to issue a call to arms. Penntrafa later left supplementary messages at Unnamed Fjord. This bore fruit when, before dawn of the day before Blan set out with Gardolinya, ten pirate ships from Langardam Island managed to use deceptive manoeuvres to dodge past the blockade and enter Austra Great Harbour. With these additional ships and crews Austra Great Harbour was now almost as secure from enemy attack as Nantport. It was a major irritation to Black Knight and equally a relief to Blan, Arnapa and their comrades.
40
Ooggah and the Orbears
The orbears fed mainly on the foods they found in the jungle: fruits, roots, leaves, stalks and nuts. But the bear in them quite often gave them a craving for fish. The bear in Ooggah was especially strong and she liked to take her family three or more leagues southward to the mangrove swamps by the sea. There they would catch some larger fish and have a real feast. Sometimes, depending on where their favourite fish were swimming, Ooggah would lead her family many miles along the coast to the east or even, at greater risk of having to hide from humans, down as far as the mouth of Panners Stream.
The day after Blan departed the cavern, Ooggah led her family out for just such a fishing picnic by the sea. She saw that Blan was still working on her waterwheel, so Ooggah went out through another tunnel on the other side of her rocky hill and promptly set off for the coast. The orbears could move through the jungle much faster than humans. They reached the coast long before Blan left Pitpet Brook.
Ooggah led her two granddaughters and some of her younger great-nephews and great-nieces out into the open sea to search for fish. There was little to find there. The fish were somewhere else. One of her sons had gone further east and reported that it was the same there: no fish worth the effort. Ooggah saw that her family were disappointed. Instead of going home empty-handed, she decided to risk going closer to the humans’ habitations.
Grand Vizier of Krar Page 15