Treachery of Kings

by Neal Barrett Jr

  “Letitia…”

  “Oh, Finn, look away, please. I don't want you to see.” “I love you, Letitia, and I will not turn away. Just keep your eyes on me. Look at me, love… “ “Do it, Sigdin. Do it now.”

  Finn shouted her name until his throat was raw, until the cords about his neck choked off his words.

  Sigdin, the Badgie Guardsman, looked at his leader once, then did as he was told

  FORTY-SEVEN

  SICDIN DIDN'T CARE FOR HUMANS. THE FAY was good, but he was never comfortable around them. Humans didn't smell. They didn't smell bad, they just didn't smell at all. That was only one of the qualities he didn't like. Next to a Badgie, they had very little hair. Good, thick hair and a smell you could count on set a Badgie apart from humankind and most other Newlies, as well.

  A Bowser, now, creatures that every Badgie loathed, a Bowser had a most unpleasant smell. Especially a Bowser that was wet. Now that was not a good smell.

  The Mycer, she was something else again. The Mycer smelled nice. Musty, dusty and sweet. You wouldn't tell a Badgie female that, she'd tear you to bits. But it was true. The human tied up across the cell found the Mycer appealing, and Sigdin did as well. One kind of folk could find another attractive, it happened all the time.

  Sigdin felt bad about doing away with the Mycer, but he knew he'd feel a lot worse if he didn't do what Maddigern said. Everyone in the King's Third Sentient Guards feared the Captain/Major, and well they should. It was common knowledge in the barracks that Maddigern was completely deranged. Touched, wiggy, whacked-out, nuts. Cross him, look at him crooked, and he'd have your head on a stick.

  So, as much as he might regret it, Sigdin gave the Mycer's stool a little nudge, then another, and another after that. Slowly, the way the Captain/Major said. Soon, she began to make really awful noises in her throat, but the human male was screaming so loud, and the scaly thing was squawking, making such terrible sounds, that Sigdin could hardly hear her at all. …

  FORTY-EIGHT

  …IT SEEMED AS IF HIS SCREAMS WERE INSIDE HIS head as well, as if a horde of demons were in there, clawing, ripping, tearing at his skull. The pain tore like a fiery bolt from his head to his chest, exploded in his belly, cut, sliced through every tendon, every muscle, burst every vessel, snapped every bone.

  He could feel himself flailing helplessly about, feel his body smashing against the stone wall, quaking, shaking, jerking this way and that.

  The agony seemed to last forever, as if it had always been. Then, an eternity later, Sigdin was vaguely aware he was lying there, staring at the ceiling, wondering who he might be, and where he might have been.…

  YOU, WHATEVER YOUR FOUL NAME IS, CET OVER there now, cut the Mycer free or I'll boil your blood on the spot!”

  The Guardsman's eyes went wide. Cadigar wasn't afraid of much, but he was terrified by the seer. Obern Oberbyght's chubby finger trembled before his face, and he could feel a great mass of spiders, flies, and pale wet worms squirming about inside his head.

  He hesitated for scarcely a blink, then rushed to the Mycer, stumbling over his friend. Without even thinking of his knife, he snapped the cords from her throat with his hands, and set her straight on the stool.

  Letitia gasped, filling her lungs with the precious air. Finn gave a joyous cry that ended in a strangle and a choke.

  “Damn you, this is not your business, seer!”

  Maddigern clutched his fists at his sides, scarcely able to contain his rage.

  “It is, indeed my business, and you're the one damned, not I.”

  Oberbyght pushed Maddigern roughly aside, ran to Finn and sliced the cords about his throat with a small silver blade. Finn tried to mutter his thanks, but the words came out dry as dust.

  In spite of his anger, and his greater strength, Maddigern made no effort to lay a hand on the seer. One of his Guardsmen lay jerking about on the floor. The other stood trembling, his back against the wall, staring at nothing at all.

  “Both of your louts will be fine,” said Obern Ober-byght, following Maddigern's wary glance. “If I intended them harm, you couldn't sweep them up with a broom by now.

  “What is this about, Maddigern? You've committed torture here, dire affliction, and one step short of murder, it would seem. If I hadn't appeared—”

  “Murder, is it?” The Badgie stepped back and thrust an accusing finger at the floor.

  “Open your eyes, sorcerer. Murder's what brought me here!”

  When the Badgie's shadow vanished from the wall, Oberbyght saw the body there, eyes glazed in death, the blood now a necklace of black about its throat.

  “Dostagio?” The seer frowned at Finn for a moment, then turned his gaze on Maddigern again.

  “He killed this poor fellow? Is that what you're saying?”

  “No. I did not,” Finn said. “He knows that as well.”

  “Would it be too much to ask,” Julia said, flailing her body about, rattling golden scales against her cage, “for someone to get me down from here? This is a most improper position, and quite undignified.”

  “I think you will stay as you are for the moment,” said the seer. “You look proper enough to me.”

  “I am unjustly confined!” Julia protested, snapping at the iron bars.

  “Julia, you'll be all right,” Letitia said from across the room. “Truly you will.”

  “My legs and arms are numb,” Finn said. “I can't feel a thing. If you won't release me, at least see to her.”

  “No one's getting released,” Maddigern said. “You are held under the King's law.”

  The seer, too, ignored Finn's plea. “You saw him kill Dostagio? He did this deed before your eyes?”

  “No, he did not. What of it? You have no say in this. I don't need your spells.”

  “Tread easy, my friend. You are not on steady ground here.”

  Some understanding, some knowledge shared, passed between the two. Finn saw this happen, saw that though Maddigern would not back down, he would not, for the moment, push the magician too far. There was caution, distrust, even loathing between this pair, but there was something else there as well.

  “You should not have taken him out of the palace. That was a fool thing to do.”

  “I have reasons for what I do, Captain/Major. I do not have to explain them to you.”

  “This trickster came back and killed Dostagio, First Servant To His Majesty, and Most Esteemed among the Gracious Dead. That should concern you, I cannot see how it would not!”

  Too late, the Badgie knew he should not have spoken these words. Finn could see him draw in a breath, run a hand across his mouth. He could see, as well, the seer's eyes, see his face go rigid, see the dire warning there.

  “This is—a matter of the King's justice,” Maddigern said, looking at the floor. “I will handle it myself.”

  “I have still not heard how this killing came about.”

  “He came back to the palace. Murdered Dostagio, and came back again. Through another way.” With that, he briefly met Oberbyght's eyes.

  “So I have been informed.”

  Maddigern looked somewhat surprised. “I say again, stay out of this. I'll see the matter quickly done. The King will be distressed, but that will be that. Dostagio will be discovered in an alleyway.”

  Oberbyght shook his head. “You are a foul and disgusting creature, Maddigern. You have a great liking for all of this.”

  “I only serve. As you do, seer.”

  Oberbyght stepped away, his mouth distended as if he tasted something vile.

  “This time you will not serve. This time, it is you who will step aside.”

  “Be damned, Oberbyght!”

  The bristles on the Badgie's chin began to quiver as if they had a life of their own.

  The seer stood perfectly still. His eyes met Maddigern's, and the Badgie turned quickly away. “You dare not do your magic on me!”

  “I did nothing to you. I am a mirror, my ignorant friend. If you saw something that ma
de you squirm, that is your reflection, not mine.

  “No, don't speak. Listen, and let your blood cool. You need say no more than you've said about this fellow's ventures, for if he's strayed somewhere he shouldn't be, it is I who must deal with him now. In my own way.”

  “I see no need for that.”

  “Yet I do. And if it is done, what does it matter how it is done? You want more wretches to meet your needs? They are not hard to find, you don't need these.”

  “And that one?”

  Oberbyght frowned. “Dostagio is dead. What would I need him for? I shall take Master Finn with me now. Leave the girl where she is, but she need not be so tightly bound that she loses her limbs. Although I'm sure you are not concerned with that. Leave the mechanical fiend in its cage.”

  Oberbyght raised his voice so the Guardsmen could hear. “Post guards in the hall, but tell them they are not to come in. That goes for you as well. Until I think on this, consider that I shall leave a few—very small spells about.”

  Oberbyght paused. “Do leave them alone, Maddigern. Is that clear enough for you?”

  “Do as you will. And don't think I'll forget. You have said things this day that cannot be so easily unsaid.”

  “Then I won't bother to try.” The seer's face split in a warm and generous smile. “Loose the fellow, please. And bring Master Finn to me. We'll be having our little talk, up there… “

  It was only a very small gesture, hardly a nod, barely a motion at all, but enough to raise the hairs on all the Badgies there, for none of them wanted to think about what might lie in Obern Oberbyght's lair

  FORTY-NINE

  THERE WERE DOORS, LOCKS, LATCHES AND BLOCKS. Bolts, bars, narrow twisting stairs. Finn had been down in the dark and narrow maze beneath the palace; now he was learning there was also an up.

  The seer, Obern Oberbyght, in the kindness of his heart—a kindness that cheered Finn not at all—had given Finn time to let the blood flow back into his limbs, which were cold to the touch after Maddigern had so fiercely bound them up.

  And why not? For he never intended to loosen them again….

  Thoughtful though he might be, the seer had given Finn no time at all to look to Letitia's care, only a glance between them before he was gone. Finn could only think of her still in torment, her flesh chilling cold beneath the tight, unyielding cords.

  No guards at Finn's back, no warnings or threats. No one to stop him but the pleasant, stout, and clearly deadly seer. Finn made no effort to get away. He had seen what happened to the Badgie Guardsman in their cell. He had surely not forgotten what this happy sorcerer had done to him before. There would come a chance—he had to believe this was so—and when that chance came, he would take it, whatever risk that entailed.

  THOUGH FINN HAD HEARD VERY LITTLE OF THE talk between the Badgie and the seer, it was clear their meeting had been most intense. Maddigern, cruel, cunning, past the edge of madness, had nevertheless backed away from Oberbyght in the end.

  There's hope in this,he told himself. This pair cannot be done with one another, there is too much enmity for that…

  IT SEEMED NEAR FOREVER BEFORE OBERN OBERBYCHT came to a halt, took a silver key from his ring, and rattled it in a brass lock set in a heavy oaken door. Spiderwebs of cold, intense blue light danced along the silver key. The lock began to crackle, shiver and glow.

  Oberbyght cursed beneath his breath, words in a tongue that made Finn's stomach turn.

  The seer jerked out the key, frowned, gave it a sniff, polished it against the fabric of his robe.

  “Damned thing's not a thousand years old. They don't make them like they did anymore.”

  The sorcerer tried again. This time the lock protested with only a sizzle or two, before the key slid into place.

  “After you, Master Finn.” The seer stood aside and waved a welcoming hand. “The place is a mess, but nobody comes here but me.”

  Oberbyght loosed a hearty laugh. “A whimsy, you see. The jest here being no one could possibly come here but me. Why, you'd find a patch of grease on the floor if they tried!”

  Finn wasn't nearly as amused as the seer, but the point was quite clear.

  Oberbyght was right. The place was, indeed, a terrible mess.

  “It's home,” said the seer. “It's not much, but it serves me quite well.”

  “It is—very nice, really,” Finn said. “I expect there's an excellent view from up there.”

  “I suppose. Never been up there myself. Sit, Finn. I'll find us a jug of ale.”

  Finn sat, while the seer moved about, humming to himself.

  As the sorcerer said, it was nothing much, but there was room to move around, if one was careful where he stepped. The room itself was perfectly round—no great surprise, as Finn had climbed the twisted stairways of lofty towers before.

  A wooden ladder led to a trapdoor above, no doubt leading to the view the tower's owner didn't care to see. Past it, there would be a circular floor, a shoulder-high wall, and all one cared to see of Heldessia Town and beyond.

  Inside the seer's quarters, covering nearly every wall, were high wooden shelves filled with books, tomes, ancient scrolls, yellowed piles of paper stacked precariously high. Finn was sure they'd been there long before he, himself, was born—or possibly his father's father sometime before that.

  There were vials, pots, jars, a trail of gummy fluids hardened on the floor. Strange, unfamiliar smells, foul and aged odors that had long since eaten into the stony floor.

  “Here, then,” Oberbyght said, offering a mug of dark liquid in a most peculiar jar, with odd symbols on the side. Finn brought it to his nose and sniffed it, bringing another laugh from the seer.

  “It's ale, boy. Won't turn you into a stone. There's an easier way than that.

  “Now,” he said, leaning forward on his stool, “we have much to talk about. Or let me put it plainer than that. You have a lot to talk about, and I have much to hear.”

  In an instant, the cheery smile was gone, and the seer's heavy features turned merciless and grim. No matter how often this occurred, the abrupt change took Finn by surprise.

  “Good,” he said, tipping back his stool against the wall, as if he didn't have a care. “I do love a good talk. It's better than climbing those damnable stairs.”

  The seer was not amused. If anything, the room seemed to chill by several degrees.

  “A bold and jaunty manner will get you nowhere with me. If you think your life's not at risk here, you're a fool. I didn't save you from Maddigern's wrath so we could share a mug of ale like old friends.”

  He paused to stare at Finn over the fold of his hands.

  “Badgies can scarcely smell more than the food that cakes in their beards from one year to the next. Maddigern could not detect the drug on your skin and on your clothes, but I can. You reek of the stuff. I don't have to wonder, as Maddigern does, where you might have been.

  “He knows you came in through the underways. He can only guess what you saw down there. He didn't have to know for sure. If he strangled you, it wouldn't matter what you saw. That's Badgie logic, and I can't say it doesn't have its points.”

  “I've no need to speak any more than the truth about this,” Finn said, as calmly as he could, though the seer's words went right to his heart. “All I wanted to do was get back in to get Letitia and Julia out. I wasn't expecting to come upon something like—that.”

  “You did, though. And that is a problem. I expect you can see why that might be.”

  “I don't suppose you'd take my word…”

  “… that you would keep this all to yourself? Please, Master Finn.”

  “So I've traded Maddigern's justice for yours. I'm not making much progress here.”

  “You are in a rush to pass sentence on yourself, Master Finn?”

  “Does it matter if I'm not? Whatever is to happen, it will happen. And I suppose it will happen to Letitia as well. You may take offense if you like, sir, but I see little difference between you and
that brute downstairs. You left Letitia and Julia there. Under guard, perhaps, but the fact that you left them tells me you have no interest in their fate.”

  Obern Oberbyght showed Finn a weary sigh. “You're right, boy. I don't. Not a whit. It's a lack in my character, I suppose. I simply can't work up much sympathy for anyone but myself. Still, apart from that, I don't think the good Captain/Major will cross me on this.”

  Once more, Finn imagined the room had become even chillier still.

  “What did you see down there? Exactly, now. Start with who let you in the secret way.”

  “A guard. I gave him some coins. I told this to Maddigern—”

  It felt like a hot blade between his eyes. Finn gasped, grabbed his face and tumbled off his stool. The pain was there, then suddenly gone.

  “All right,” Oberbyght said, “let's try this once again.”

  Finn pulled himself up, found the stool and sat. Even the memory of the pain brought beads of sweat to his brow.

  “Bucerius. A friend. But don't blame him.” Oberbyght almost smiled. “Ah, that old rogue. Why did I bother to ask?”

  “You know him, then?”

  “He is extremely large, and has an annoying habit of sticking his Bullie nose anywhere a profit's to be made. How could I not know him?

  “I also know he was the one who brought you here. Now, we're going astray. Exactly what you saw there below, I'd hear about that.”

  Finn began to tell him. Everything, from the start. The sweet, overpowering scent of the drug extracted from the blood-red poppy. The still figures of the Deeply Entombed, the sorrowful chant of the Gracious Dead as they went about their chores.

  And, as he spoke, as he came ever closer to the part of his tale he hoped not to reveal, Finn allowed certain images to blur, fade, become vague and indistinct. Figures, colors, shapes began to run, as if a quickening rain had swept them away.

  It was a thing he had simply come to through the discipline of his craft, a trick of the mind that let him put all other thoughts aside, except a complexity of minuscule parts—cogs, gears and golden wires as thin as gnat's breath, motes, flecks, particles and specks, the workings of a lizard one could hardly see without the aid of a glass.