Grand Vizier of Krar

by W. John Tucker

  When Arnapa and Zeep reached the spot where Borckren had met his end there was already a thin layer of snow on the path. They travelled light, just one mountain horse each, with little by way of baggage apart from food, water and fleeces for warmth. They pressed on relentlessly through the mountain pass and reached Proequa citadel in three days.

  Arnapa would have preferred to head north straight away to catch up with Blan. However, without an Actio to enable her to communicate from a distance, both she and Zeep needed to return to the city: Zeep to receive orders from Tor; Arnapa to coordinate with Azimath and to consult Praalis.

  Neither Praalis nor Tor, who had by that time returned to the citadel, needed to be convinced that Arnapa should try to find Blan and give her whatever help and support that she might need. However, Tor had to decide whether he could spare Zeep to go as well.

  “Neep is very busy on Herald’s business, mostly riding between Nantport and the Proequa River shipyards, so you, Zeep, should really stay here, at the very least to protect Memwin,” Tor judged. He said this with some hesitation, as if thinking aloud. They were in Praalis’s room. Arnapa and Zeep had gone straight there after arriving in the citadel; they had not even stopped to change their travel clothes or to refresh themselves. Praalis had been talking with Tor when the women arrived, and he had watched, anxious and silent, as Arnapa had explained her plan to follow Blan, and Zeep had asked permission to go with her.

  There was a long pause. The look of disappointment on Zeep’s normally stoical face was as understandable to Praalis as it was uncharacteristic for Zeep. At last he broke the silence.

  “Zeep has a key role in your administration, Tor. However, there are other considerations.”

  Tor knew what Praalis meant. He was the only Proequan who knew Arnapa’s true identity and importance. Zeep was indeed hugely valuable to him as an effective agent and fearless warrior, and yet she was all he could now offer Arnapa. Furthermore, Zeep clearly wanted to go with Arnapa and her reasons were sound: Arnapa needed a strong and loyal companion on this quest as much as Blan did. Tor was wise enough not to oppose the wishes of his most trusted officers unless he had very good reason to do so; very often those officers saw needs and opportunities that he could not see for himself.

  “Memwin will be well enough protected within the citadel walls,” Tor decided. “There are plenty of nurses and governesses to look after her. Very well, Zeep, you go with Arnapa! Remember that Blan now travels under the name Blansnette, as an assistant herald.”

  It was a fateful decision.

  Zeep, much pleased, stood to attention and saluted Tor. Arnapa nodded and smiled her thanks to Tor and then to Praalis. Both women then left the room to make their preparations.

  Under normal circumstances the ever-wary Arnapa would have noticed the small, shadowy figure standing just beyond the door as she discussed her plans with Tor and Praalis, but Arnapa was very tired and her mind preoccupied with fear for Blan.

  Early next morning Arnapa and Zeep set off from the citadel. Within a few hours they passed the turnoff to the ruined fort and were riding along the same path that Blan had travelled just six days before.

  45

  By chance, the twins Aransette and Norsnette had overheard two stable hands talking about the urgent preparations ordered for Arnapa and Zeep and their journey north. They engaged the stable lads in conversation and a great deal of flirting. The twins were hardly great beauties but they were as good looking as most men could hope for, and their coordinated double act, honed from birth, could have undermined the resolve of the most tight-lipped male spy or, as in this case, mesmerised two awestruck and somewhat gullible lads. It was not long before the twins had extracted everything the boys knew about Arnapa’s mission to follow Blan.

  “Perhaps it was mean of us to lead those lads on quite so much,” Norsnette confessed unconvincingly.

  “We didn’t promise anything, and it was for a greater cause,” Aransette asserted with a mischievous smile.

  “So, what do you think? Arnapa could lead us to Blan. Will we be able to do it?”

  “We might not be seventeen for another six weeks,” Aransette said to her sister, “but we are free agents here. Our parents are back in Nessport, and nobody here has any more authority over us than they have over anyone else. After all, we are escaped slaves in transit; we belong to no one; and we are on a roundabout journey to get home.” This was the opening justification for what the twins intended to do anyway, with or without justification.

  “My thought too,” Norsnette agreed. “Blan helped us escape, so we must help her. It’s a matter of honour for us and for Nessport. That’s our reason for hanging around here.”

  “Apart from the little problem of not being able to get home anyway,” Aransette added.

  The twins made their own secret arrangements, in a hurry but with two brains working almost as one. They had each been paid a small allowance, well deserved for the help they had given Kem with his bombs, so they could afford to hire two small horses and buy some provisions. They found Citadel Library where, of all people, little Memwin showed them to the geographical books and charts and pointed out items of interest that she had been researching for herself before they arrived.

  “You are a very smart girl to be able to read and understand all these books at your age, Memwin,” Aransette exclaimed. “When I was your age I could hardly read anything at all.”

  “Oh, I’ve become so much better at this since Blan came,” Memwin said in a small, humble voice. She had never needed humility before because no one bothered with what she did or thought anyway, but she had quickly picked it up from Blan and she liked it. “I spend most of my time here now. Blan told Tor that I should be allowed to come here whenever I want.” Not that a simple lack of permission would have stopped Memwin doing what she wanted; she was playing what she liked to call Justifications which she had only recently realised could be played as a game, instead of just doing it without thinking like lots of people seemed to do, and as she had done herself before it had occurred to her what she was doing.

  Memwin had not yet had time to spy on the twins. Just as well, she thought. It would have been a waste of time because it was now so obvious what they were up to. She approved, but she saw no reason to amend her own plan.

  With the connivance of the two doting stable lads, Norsnette and Aransette rode off just before dawn on the day after Arnapa and Zeep had departed.

  46

  18th & 19th October

  After saving the twins from their imprisonment on Midsea Island, Bonmar felt that he had a special rapport with them, and a special responsibility to watch out for them.

  He sought them out that day to see how they were doing, but with increasing concern because he could not find them anywhere. It was not until nightfall that he got his first lead. He overheard two stable lads joking about their new girlfriends from the far western lands. Bonmar might have been shorter than the stable lads but he was manifestly stronger than both together and driven by anxiety. His most intimidating persona soon had them disclosing where the young women had gone. He ran to find Kem. They then both hurried to find Praalis who was in his room speaking to Pelembras about current conditions in Akrin.

  “Norsnette and Aransette have set out on a journey to Dabbin,” Bonmar blurted breathlessly. “I can’t order them to return but at least I can follow and protect them. Kem agrees. What would you advise us to do, Praalis?”

  Praalis was as concerned as anyone about the twins going off on a very long and dangerous journey by themselves. However, he understood why they had done it. He wished he could do the same. Everyone seemed to be finding reasons to head north with Blan. Despite his anxiety he perceived the Great Plan in operation and, besides, any attempt to stop what was happening was as fraught with danger as letting events flow as they would. It had been impossible to stop Blan, and she was like a magnet for allies and enemies alike. Only Telko could have influenced her, yet it was Telko’s
fate that had set Blan on her course.

  “My heart yearns to follow Blan,” Kem declared, “but our ships are desperately outnumbered and will need all the fire bombs I can make for them. Bonmar is resolved to go after the twins, so he must do so. I can only hope that he finds them all safe, the twins as well as Blan, for the twins have surely gone to help her.”

  Praalis felt powerless, that events were sliding away from him, and yet everyone in the room was watching him, expecting sage advice. He looked up enquiringly at Pelembras who was standing in the corner. The Akrinan shipwright accepted the invitation to speak.

  “As far as I am concerned, Blan is the princess of my people and I owe her my allegiance,” Pelembras said at last. “I will go with you, Bonmar, and I will offer my life to protect Blan and all those who seek to help her.”

  “I think your gallant words, Pelembras, settle the matter,” Praalis concluded. “It is better that you and Bonmar travel together.” He did not say it, but he felt happier now that Blan had six allies on her tail. Even the two young twins were tougher and more resilient than their youthful faces suggested, and they were devoted to Blan.

  Bonmar and Pelembras spent the rest of the night preparing for their journey. Nobody had noticed the small, cloaked figure standing just outside the door to Praalis’s room. Nor did they notice the same figure watching the courtyard as Bonmar and Pelembras rode out through the citadel gates at dawn.

  47

  26th October

  After eight days of solid riding north along Proequa River, Arnapa and Zeep reached the last town before the mountains and dismounted outside the warehouse occupied by the Proequan trade mission to the region. Arnapa learnt from the official Proequan representative there that Blan had passed through the town just three days before and was heading for Polnet River.

  One hour later Arnapa and Zeep were surprised to see Aransette and Norsnette ride up to the warehouse. The twins had made better time than Arnapa and Zeep! Dressed as harmless yet clean peasant girls, nobody had bothered to question their identity. Their tidy appearance and plaintive requests for help had paid off when they had been able to hitch rides with a number of carriages along the way, thus relieving their horses of some burden and enabling them to travel longer each day.

  Within minutes of Norsnette and Aransette arriving and explaining to Arnapa that they had no intention of going back, Bonmar and Pelembras rode into town. They had caught up by simply pushing themselves and their horses harder.

  Bonmar was about to confront the two youngsters with a stern dressing down when Norsnette spun around, marched up to him and thrust her chest out to within a finger’s width of his. Her chin was up and she stared him in the eye.

  “I know what you are going to say, Bonmar, but Aransette and I will be going to help Blan and that’s final,” Norsnette asserted. Bonmar’s mouth fell open as if to reply. No one said anything as Norsnette and Bonmar stood face-to-face staring at each other. At last Bonmar squinted as he tried not to grin, an act which he thought would not be tactful at that moment.

  “It seems we have a war party of six,” Pelembras declared jovially. Everyone started grinning and that soon turned to laughter. For all the dangers ahead, it was actually a great relief to every one of them that they would be facing those dangers together as a team with divergent strengths and talents.

  “I hope no more are following us,” Arnapa prayed with a smile.

  “Surely not,” Zeep laughed. She was partly right and partly wrong.

  48

  Memwin’s dogged loyalty was a characteristic that she had perhaps inherited from her mother, but her willpower? Some might have said that it came from her father, except that he had developed his willpower over many years. For little Memwin, her willpower was perhaps an echo of the tenacity which had enabled her ancestors to lead their people to safety during the Catastrophic War and the various cataclysms that followed, a tenacity which had now risen from dormancy to express itself in her.

  In the short time since she had met Blan, Memwin’s thirst for knowledge and understanding had become an obsession. Lately she had spent most of her waking hours in the library and the rest of them haunting the citadel, flitting around like a shadow, listening in to conversations and practising doing all this without being noticed.

  Now she was ready. She had been plotting and planning for the last eleven days, ever since Arnapa returned and spoke to Praalis about following Blan.

  Memwin had fallen ill, or so everyone thought. She had found a book which described diseases and their symptoms and another book which included stories about how some symptoms could be faked.

  Memwin had been ill before with various childhood diseases, so she had known the official procedure. A record book had been opened and a rota of nurses and physicians had been appointed. The book was kept in an office near Council Chamber where the tapestry of Fenfenwin was displayed. The physicians and nurses would check the book to see when they were on duty. If the rota had been altered a red ribbon would be tied around it. After a nurse or physician had looked in the book to note when they were on duty, they would thereafter just look into the room to see if another red ribbon had been tied around the book and, if not, they would assume that their schedule had not been altered. Memwin thought that this was a silly system. She knew it because she had immediately seen how anyone could corrupt the procedure, which is exactly what she proceeded to do.

  She had insisted that her sickbed be moved to her playroom. Nobody imagined that she would be well enough to use the labyrinth, the present from Blan which had enabled her to hide from Craskren, nor the new escape route through the wall behind it. In short, Memwin had the run of the citadel after dark when everybody thought she was asleep recovering from her illness.

  Just before dawn on the twenty-eighth of October Memwin slipped out of the citadel with the few things she needed. During the last seven days she had carefully altered the medical rota so that nobody would actually attend her for the next seven days. Everybody would think that someone else would be doing it. With luck, Memwin had seven days to pursue her mission before word was out.

  49

  28th October

  When the citadel administrators needed to send very urgent messages which did not require the presence of a herald and yet could not be transmitted by beacon, there was a special service that they could use. A letter or small packet could be sent by relay from depot to depot. At the smaller depots a courier rider would change his exhausted horse for a fresh one. At the larger depots the rider would find a bed for the night while his place was taken by a new rider fresh for the job. In this way a letter or small package could be sent far away without pausing for long.

  The courier rider was confused by the size of the package he had been asked to take. It was the biggest one for many years. However, it was just feasible, and it had been stamped with the official seal of the duchess, which the rider assumed to have been affixed by Count Tor. The sealed instructions stated that the package was to be taken to Quolow with maximum expedition. Fortunately, it was not as heavy as the rider had expected, so he strapped it to one side of the baggage horse with all the other packages and letters in a hold-all on the other side.

  Package secure, the courier paused once more to think about its unusual size, shrugged his shoulders, mounted his own horse and rode off swiftly, pack horse following behind.

  Memwin was not too uncomfortable yet. She had taken nothing except her peasant-child clothes, a large flask with enough water for a day, some dried fruit and nuts, her small dagger, some money and, of course, cushions all around her.

  As soon as the horse leapt away Memwin breathed a sigh of relief. She was on her way to help Blan! The difficult part would be sneaking out to get water during the brief stops when the riders would change over. Three days ago, in the still of the night, she had altered the trunk to suit her needs. However, she would still need to be very quick getting water. Food she could do without; not water.

  M
emwin reached for the end of the plug and pulled on it until the stopper came out. She felt a thin stream of fresh air against her face and she saw that light was coming into the sky outside the wooden trunk, her home for the next six or seven days.

  50

  Changing from one horse to the other at regular intervals, Blan made good time for the first ten days of her journey. She travelled for fifty leagues along Proequa River until it forked into two equally strong rivers. She followed the one on the right for another thirty leagues to the mountain foothills where the Arctequa Backbone was joined by the Upper Polnet Range, an offshoot which ran for fifty leagues to the west and provided multiple sources for Proequa River. All along the way she found populous towns and villages belonging to several different duchies, one republic and two independent counties. All welcomed her and treated her with respect. Tor had given her papers which described her as Blansnette, an assistant herald on official business for the Duchy of Proequa. He did not think it wise for her to use her real name or titles for fear that the news would somehow reach the enemy. Her nom de guerre was chosen to allow for explanation in case anyone was overheard calling her Blan.

  Everyone between Nantport and Port Fandabbin had heard of Zeep and Neep. People would make a special trip to the town square just to see them ride by. Although Blan had nothing of the size and commanding presence of Zeep or Neep, she made a sufficiently impressive figure to give substance to what her passport stated. She was surprised by how many people (especially men) commented on what a fine figure of a woman she was. That caused her to start thinking more carefully about how she might disguise herself. It was all very well to appear impressive among allies, yet she would rather not attract such attention when she came closer to the enemy.