A Wizard and a Warlord

by Christopher Stasheff

  He turned away, not waiting for a response. Gar exchanged a glance with Alea, then shrugged and followed the priest. Alea went along, a little surprised that she was allowed to do so-at home, Odin's priests would never have allowed a woman to set foot in his temple, let alone an inner chamber.

  The room was perhaps eight feet by ten, the longer walls curving with the shape of the temple, whitewashed and hung with tapestries showing the god in his chariot, riding through a storm with lightning being sucked into his scepter. Another showed the temple with the sun rising behind it, and inside the sun the god in his chariot. A third showed a huge tree, its trunk in the shape of the god. Alea caught her breath; in this one form, the priests summed up three of Midgard's gods.

  The priest gestured to two hourglass-shaped chairs and sat in another across from them; at his side was a small table with a tall pitcher and two cups. "I must know first if this is a matter of the heart, for if it is, we should go to the goddess's temple and ask a priestess to join us. Are you bonded, my friends? Or considering bonding?"

  Not "son" or "daughter," Alea noted just "friends."

  "No, Reverend," she said, "we are only fellow travelers, road companions." She felt a churning within her, the sort of apprehension that goes with speaking a lie, but pushed it out of her mind.

  "It is wise not to travel alone, either on the roads or in life," the priest acknowledged. "What troubles you, then, my friends?". .

  "The sages, Reverend," Gar replied, and at the priest's puzzled look, explained, "We're from very far away, very far indeed, and have no such wise men where we come from."

  "I see," the priest said slowly. "But what could trouble you about good and gentle people who only lead others into wisdom?"

  "The ease with which they advise," Gar said carefully, "and the people's quickness to turn to them when they are in difficulty. You approve of them, then?"

  "Approve?" the priest asked in astonishment. "It is not something for approval or disapproval-the sages simply are."

  "A force of nature?" Gar asked. "Still, when people are troubled, should they not come to a priest or priestess instead of to a sage?"

  "Ah, I see your problem." The priest' ,s face smoothed into a smile. "The great crises in their lives they bring to us, the emotional turmoil that knots them up so that they cannot go on with living-but lesser problems they take to their sages, and glad we are to have them do so."

  "The sages relieve you of some of the burden, then,." Gar said slowly.

  "There is that." the priest acknowledged, "but it is more. We are priests; our concern is religion-worship of the god and goddess, and the ways in which the soul relates to them."

  "Not morality?" Gar frowned.

  "A moral life is a continuing prayer," the priest explained. "The sages, however, seek to understand all the other ways in which people should relate to the world, and to one another."

  Gar still frowned. "Surely they have some concern for the soul!"

  "Surely they do," the priest agreed, "and perhaps of a greater soul, a union of all souls-but only there do we begin to share concerns."

  "You are not jealous, then?" Gar asked. "You do not see them as rivals?"

  The priest laughed gently. "Rivals? Oh no, my friend! We are not jealous at all, for we see the god and goddess as containing all souls that strive to do right, whereas the sages see that all souls unite to form a god."

  "You are content with this division?" Gar's voice was carefully neutral.

  "Quite content, for their wisdom differs from ours, and the people bring their everyday problems to the sages, but their eternal problems to us."

  "I see ... I think," Gar said. He gave Alea a perplexed glance, but she could only lift her shoulders in a tiny shrug. He turned back to the priest. "So the sages are not religious, only philosophers and counselors?"

  "Counselors, yes-though rather cryptic ones." The priest's smile was amused.

  "I see," Gar said slowly. "In that case, Reverend, I have only one question left."

  "Ask, my friend."

  "Who empties the Scarlet Company's collection boxes?"

  14

  The priest blinked with surprise at the change of topic but answered easily. "The god knows, my friend, and the goddess-but no one else, except the Scarlet Company itself."

  "And if anyone else knows, they're not telling," Gar said in an angry undertone as he strode down the temple steps.

  Alea hurried to catch up with him. "He really doesn't know, Gar. His mind was blank with astonishment and no knowledge of the answer filled it."

  "I didn't detect anything else," Gar agreed, "and it was an ambush question, sprung on him out of nowhere. If he knew the answer, it would have leaped to mind immediately, no matter how well he kept it from showing in his face."

  "Perhaps there really is no one who knows about the Scarlet Company-except the few who are in it."

  "And they do seem to be very few," Gar agreed, "a minor element in daily life, always there at the back of people's minds but rarely thought of-they really don't have much to do with day-to-day living." He halted, fists clenching on his staff and driving its heel against the stone step. "Blast! It's all wrong, all completely wrong! It just can't happen this way!"

  Alea hid -a smile.

  "A society can't exist without a government," Gar ranted, "not even a village culture like this one! There has to be a ruler, a council of councils, an Allthing, a Parliament, a committee of the wealthy and powerful, a hierarchy of priests-something!"

  "We've looked everywhere," Alea demurred. "There must be someplace we've missed, some structure we haven't thought of! Peace and prosperity are impossible without government, even if all it does is keep people from robbing one another and killing each other off!"

  "The villagers themselves do that, in the countryside," Alea reminded him, "and the neighborhoods seem to do the same in this town. When everybody knows everybody else's business, you can't get away with anything."

  "So all they have to do is gang up on the culprit and scold him into unbearable humiliation until he straightens out-and if he won't straighten, they kick him out to live in the forests as well as he can!"

  "Where he becomes a bandit," Alea said, "but there aren't enough of them to be much of a threat until somebody like General Malachi comes along."

  "Whereupon they all sit back and wait for the Scarlet Company to stop him," Gar fumed. "Don't the idiots realize that they have to band together, train for battle, elect a war leader, do something to stop him themselves?"

  Alea said nothing, only fought to keep a straight face.

  "They don't, and they never will!" Gar growled.

  "Come on, let's get out of this town-so much innocence is oppressive! Let's go out into the countryside, where wild animals fight it out and the only order is the food chain!"

  "Good idea," Alea said, "but I'd rather not be in the middle of that food chain."

  "No, the top is a much better place," Gar said, frowning, "and right now, that looks to be General Malachi and his band."

  "I don't want to be gobbled up by them, either!"

  "Definitely not to my taste," Gar agreed. "I'd better become a half-wit again. Let's go, Alea. One more good look around, say five more villages, and I just might have to give up in defeat and admit there's a planet that doesn't need me!"

  Alea swallowed her amusement and kept pace with him to the city limits.

  As soon as they were out of sight of the town, they stepped into a thicket, where Gar stripped off his trader's clothes and folded them. Alea packed them away as Gar rubbed dirt on assorted portions of his anatomy and gave his face a light powdering of grime. Then, wearing only a loincloth and a blanket, he followed Alea out onto the road. As she strode west, Gar hunched, scuttling beside her, and said, "It's odd,-although I think it's very important to be honest with my friends, I don't hesitate for a second to put on a deception like this for my enemies."

  "That's nothing strange," Alea said scornfully. "You
might as well say that a warrior in battle can't hit his enemies unless he's willing to hit his friends, too."

  "Well, that's so," Gar said thoughtfully. "I'd always thought of honesty as a moral issue, not a tactical one." "Honesty isn't. Dishonesty is," Alea told him. "Besides, anyone believing you're a half-wit is doing their own deceiving. A blind man could tell you're no idiot."

  "Why, thank you," Gar said, somewhat surprised. "Still, it's the ones with keen eyesight I'm worried about, not the blind."

  "If you feel any guilt, it should be for the idiots," Alea snapped. "That's whom you're insulting with that disguise."

  "Well, yes," Gar said, "but then, I am an idiot compared to some men I've heard of."

  And to some women who've heard you, Alea thought waspishly. In the same tone, she said, "Don't let that worry you. All men are fools in one way or another."

  "And all women are wise?" Gar asked.

  "If I want a wise woman, there are plenty of them in the forest," Alea retorted, "though I'm not one to hold with potions and simples."

  "Present company excepted, of course?"

  "You may not notice half the things you should," Alea said, "but that doesn't make you simple. You do a good job of faking, though."

  "How do you know I'm not really doing a good job of pretending not to notice?"

  That gave Alea pause-but not a long one. "Because you said you value honesty with your friends."

  "Yes, but you have to weigh one good action against another," Gar said. "It's all right to lie about small things to keep from hurting someone's feelings."

  Alea stopped, rounding on him. "You mean you see a host of flaws in me you don't talk about!"

  "Not flaws," Gar said, "but traits that you might think are flaws."

  "Such as?" Alea snapped.

  "Taking every chance you can to pick an argument with me," Gar said.

  "I do not!"

  "You see?" Gar asked. "It's only a matter of my perceptions, and I'm likely enough to be wrong-so if I did, think you were quarrelsome, it wouldn't be right to say so."

  "I'm not quarrelsome!"

  "Perhaps not, but you do enjoy a good argument." Gar's eyes were alight with the pleasure of this one. "Oh, and I'm the only one, am I?" Alea's eyes were gleaming, too. She felt angered and aggravated but felt a strange sort of relaxation, too-as though she knew no harm could come from this.

  She was wrong. The two were so intent on their wrangling that they forgot to pay attention to the thoughts around them, and the patrol came upon them before they knew it.

  The sound of hoofbeats and the shouts to halt finally penetrated. Alea spun with a gasp, staring at the approaching horsemen.

  "Run!" Gar snapped. "I'll keep them from following until you're good and lost!"

  "I can't leave you to fight them alone!" Alea's staff snapped up to guard.

  "Of course you can! They won't hurt me, though I'll let them think they have! And how will I break free of them if you aren't there to shoot an arrow at the right moment? Run-please!"

  "Oh, all right! " Alea huffed as she turned and dove into the roadside underbrush.

  Men shouted behind her, and trotting hooves broke into a gallop. Gar roared, and Alea risked a look back. Through the screen of leaves, she saw the "half-wit" unfold into a grizzly bear, charging the leader's horse. The beast reared, screaming with fright, and the bandit, taken by surprise, went sprawling with a bellow of pain. Gar leaped, caught the reins left-handed and hung on, dragging the horse down, then vaulting onto its back, staff still in his right hand.

  The leader bellowed with anger as he scrambled to his feet, shouting, "To me! Seize this impudent idiot!"

  The two men who had been chasing Alea reined in, turned their horses, and went galloping back. The other three closed on Gar, pulling clubs from their belts and swinging.

  They landed on shoulder and ribs. Gar howled with pain, swinging his staff in wild overhand arcs. They seemed to be the flailings of an untrained, uncoordinated simpleton, but Alea heard more knocks on wood than thuds on flesh-and knew that the blows that did land on Gar didn't do anywhere nearly as much harm as they seemed to, that he had robbed them of their force with telekinesis. Still, he roared in agony and she winced, knowing that he would be black and blue tomorrow. All right, I'm safe! she thought.

  Gar promptly fell off the horse and cowered in the roadway, wailing, arms up to protect his head and face. Clubs drubbed on his back until the red-faced leader held up a hand and called, "Enough!"

  His men held off but still hovered near, clubs raised. The leader stepped up to seize Gar's hair and yank his head back. "Let that be a lesson to you, bucko, and don't you ever raise your hand to a sergeant or an officer again! From now on you'll do as you're told, and right quickly, too-for you're one of General Malachi's soldiers now!"

  "Him? A soldier?" one of the bandits cried, scandalized.

  "And why not, I'd like to know?" the sergeant demanded. "He's big, and scary when he's angry, we've all seen that and he can fight, though not very well. He'll do fine to drive in front of us against the next batch of villagers who decide to talk back to General Malachi."

  "Drive?" Gar asked, peeking through his fingers. "That's right, drive, like the ox you are!" the sergeant snapped. He turned to his men. "Tie his hands with a leading rope and let him run behind my horse."

  "Aye, Sergeant!" one of the men said, gloating. "We can drive him against the enemy broken as well as whole!"

  "He'll have to be able to walk, at least," the sergeant grunted. "If he falls, we'll give him a'chance to get up-but he'll be properly weary before he gets back to camp!"

  As they lashed his hands together, Gar thought, Don't worry, Alea--they won't do me any real damage, no matter how badly they want to. Besides, after what we've seen, I'm all ready to meet General Malachi again!

  Alea shuddered at the thought. He may have been right when he thought you were a danger to him-but don't forget he's a danger to you, too! I want you back alive, Gar Pike, not in pieces!

  His answer wasn't worded, only a warm glow that seemed to enfold her for a second, then withdrew as the sergeant kicked his horse into a trot and Gar jerked forward as the rope tightened. Then he was off running, chasing the tail of a cavalry horse while the other bandits whooped and rode alongside, aiming stinging slaps at his head and shoulders. Gar wailed dolefully and stumbled rather theatrically, but managed to keep up.

  Alea stood watching him go, numbed and shaken. Why had he answered her scolding with such warmth? What did he think she'd meant, anyway? And was he right?

  Unnerved, she stared. after the soldiers until they were gone. Then she realized that she had been staring at an empty road for several minutes and gave herself an impatient shake. She knew what to do, what she had done before-the physical part of it, at least.

  She found a tree with low branches, took a rope from her pack and tied it to the straps, also her staff, then laid them on the ground and leaped up to sit on the lowest limb. She rose to her feet and started climbing. Twenty feet high, she found a branch that forked almost at the trunk and sat down, tieing herself to the trunk with the end of the rope. Then she hauled up her gear to set the pack on the fork before her and her staff across her knees. There, where she would be secure from attack for at least long enough to come awake and defend herself should the need arise, she closed her eyes, listening for Gar's thoughts, concentrating on them until they became more real than the breeze that fanned her cheek or the songs of the birds that began to come back and settle near her, thinking the immobile woman only part of the tree.

  Gar came panting into the camp, stumbling behind the sergeant's horse, and this time he wasn't faking. The sergeant reined in and Gar fell to his knees, sucking air in hoarse gasps and shivering in the chill autumn air. Inside, though, he was simmering with anger at the casual cruelty of his captors and ready to explode with frustration at a country in which everything progressed smoothly and peacefully, but without a government.

>   Everything, that is, except the bandits and a baby warlord named General Malachi who was showing signs of growing up all too fast-into a full-fledged tyrant. Gar might not have been able to find the government or even the Scarlet Company that was not stopping General Malachi, but he could certainly do it himself.

  No! Alea thought with anguish. They'll kill you!

  But Gar wasn't listening-he was looking up in feigned fear and apprehension at the sergeant, who was sneering, "Aye, you should cower! If General Malachi were here, he'd see you scourged smartly, be sure! But he's not and not likely to be, for we're an outpost, here to watch our next target, spy out its supply routes, and be ready to fall upon it when the general brings up his main force."

  Gar felt a stab of keen disappointment and an urge to break out of this nest of robbers, to hike back along the highway until he found the main camp and a general he could strangle. Still, where there was even an outpost of the army, the general would come sooner or later, and before he did, Gar might be able to size up the situation and learn its weak points. With telekinesis and teleportation, he probably could have killed Malachi by a bearlike rush, main force, and a straightforward attack, but the chances of his coming away alive weren't as high as he would have liked. He throttled down his impatience and his anger, deciding to stay, learn the lay of the land, and be waiting to ambush the general when he came.

  The sergeant stepped back, surveying Gar as though judging his worth. "Filthy beggar, aren't you? Wash him, boys."

  Gar yelped as the soldiers descended on him, two to each arm and leg, and hauled him running to the nearest horse trough. They slung him in; then six of them held him down while the other two scrubbed with harsh soap and the sort of brush that's used on horses. The sergeant stood by, grinning and calling directions.

  "Don't forget his hair, there's liable to be as many lice in there as there are squirrels in the wood! Under his armpits, now, that's the way! And don't forget to reach where he can't, or likely doesn't."

  Gar howled, and didn't have to pretend-the stiff brush was scraping him raw.