Legions of Antares [Dray Prescot #25]

by Alan Burt Akers

  “And, master, that is all the army can provide the Three Valleys, and Folding Mountain and High-Trail Forks, to give us protection.” Nulty spoke as much to the Jiktar of the supply service as to me.

  “I suppose they fly from valley to valley on patrol,” I said. And, then, in a mean spirit, I added, “I would guess they pray each night that they do not meet wild men on a raid."

  Nulty put a hand to his mouth. The Jiktar's brows drew down. But I waved a hand, very much your high and mighty Hamalian lord, acting the part of one of those hateful abusers of authority. “You will be leaving us soon, Jiktar? Good. We have the valley to make flourish again ready for your return. It is not for us to go around collecting food; we have to grow it."

  He spluttered.

  I went on: “And the hides. Our hides are of the finest. Our people have to grow the animals, and skin the hides, and we tan with birch-bark and emboss a beautiful grain with cunning rollers, and then the hides are bundled ready for you to come and collect—and you burn them all up."

  “There is going to be an inquiry, notor.” He could hardly get the words out. His face was the color of bruised plum. “A strict inquiry—"

  “And very proper, too. Someone was damned lax. As for me, I was asleep at the time. And my people were abed. By themselves.” The meaning about the two idiots and Pansi did not escape him. “The laws require me or my Crebent to make full reports of any trials held under our jurisdiction here."

  He didn't like that.

  As soon as he could he collected his swods and they trooped silently into the five remaining famblehoys. When they took off and spread their canvas into a tidy breeze, we all breathed easier.

  The incident had given me hope. And the sight of tough flutswods of the Hamalian army flying brave but inferior little fluttlanns also gave me a lift. Thyllis was really scraping the barrel to continue her wars. And this reminded me that as the man responsible for Vallia I ought to be commanding armies and maneuvering fleets instead of fiddling about burning a few flying sailers. Ruathytu beckoned. I now knew I could move about Hamal freely using my name of Hamun ham Farthytu. There, in the capital city, I could do more good than here in Paline Valley, and, perhaps, if the gods smiled, more even than commanding those armies and maneuvering those fleets.

  A last few duties had to be discharged.

  Pansi had to be reassured and I made sure that all we could do was done for her. Lalli, too, had to receive the best attention. Sundry other folk were dealt with according to their desserts. The slaves were integrated. This was not easy, it never is; but Nulty and I showed what we intended and the people who had been slave responded. The valley was not overcrowded yet, and fresh settlers were still welcome. The sennight I had promised myself passed, six busy days, and then I selected a middling quality mirvol from the perching towers.

  “But, master!” protested Nulty. “You should take the best."

  “No so, old friend. Where I am going he is likely to be stolen as quick as my purse. By the government if nobody else. He will fly me to Ruathytu, never fear."

  Amid a dust-blowing threshing of wings the mirvol took off, and the shouts of “Remberee!” shrilled into the morning air. Middling quality this mirvol might have been; he was a superb flying animal, strong and limber, hurling me on through the sky headlong to Ruathytu and perils I could not imagine.

  Buckling up the straps of the clerketer tightly I leaned forward along his neck and we pelted into the windrush. A sack of provisions and a sack of coins balanced each other at his sides, for I had taken plenty of food and a share of gold. The fine thraxter snugged in the scabbard. I had a knife at my belt and a crossbow pouched by my knee. That had belonged to an Opaz-forsaken flutsman. The four fluttrells I had left with Nulty, for he had plans for them for the future.

  So, whirling across the sky, I flew for Ruathytu, capital city of the empire at war with my own country.

  There remained one adventure at least before I reached the brilliant and decadent city at the fork of the rivers, and it began unspectacularly enough as I slanted in to a landing in the square of a small town toward evening. This was Thalansen, two temples, a fortress, a scattering of industry, mostly cattle and mining, huddled houses of brick and enough taverns and inns to make it not worthwhile to count them. The lingering radiance of the twin suns of Antares flooded the town with jade and ruby and cast twinned shadows long and umber. I sent Bluenose, the mirvol, to the perching tower before the inn called The Fluttrell Feather and with my sacks over my shoulder pushed open the door.

  Fingers grabbed the sacks and someone hit me over the head with an exceedingly knobby stick.

  * * *

  Chapter seven

  Some Artists of Kregen

  Had those fingers not grabbed for the sacks first, there was every chance the very knobby stick would have hit me four square. That scrabbling slide of warning gave me time enough to lunge sideways. The confoundedly knobby stick only hit me over the head with sufficient force to drive me headlong into the capacious stomach of a large man and start around half the bells of Beng Kishi clanging in my skull.

  The large-stomached man said, “Whoof!"

  I fell over him, already starting to pitch onto a shoulder so as to roll and come up snarling. The tap room blurred in a haze and three fierce and deliberate blinks barely cleared the mist in my eyes. Stomach belched and leaned down.

  “I'll forgive you the onslaught on my stomach, young man, seeing Black Sadrap hit you.” He took a breath. His eyes were large and round and blue, and his cheeks were large and round and red, and his stomach was large and round and being rubbed by a heavy hairy hand. “Best stay still. ‘Tis no fight of yours."

  The fight was one of your ding-dong knock-down drag-out affairs. There were knobby sticks in evidence, and short straight blatterers, and bludgeons and cudgels of curious expertise. Fists and boots lashed and kicked. But there was not one pointed or edged weapon being used in all the mayhem.

  So, feeling my head jumping up and down, I sat back next to the man of the stomach, and we watched the fight, exchanging knowledgeable comments, and oohs and aahs at a particularly clever dirty trick or a spectacular exit from the inn.

  The two sacks were still gripped in my left hand, and the man of stomach, who introduced himself with a Llahal as Rollo the Circle, advised me that no one had been attempting to steal them. They had just wanted them out of the way as they knocked me down. And I sat there, and essayed one of my inane smiles, and said nothing. The fight had nothing to do with me. Ergo, I would have nothing to do with it.

  The taproom looked to be just another pleasant inn room with a low ceiling, sanded floor, a long bar, and with wooden tables and chairs. A few booths beside the windows had their curtains closed. Against the fall of night the lamps had been brought in, but their mineral oil glow was not yet necessary in the suffusing radiance of Zim and Genodras.

  Rollo the Circle told me he was not a fighting man, and kept out of it. He said, “That Black Sadrap will look after our interests for us. We sleep here this night and Horparth Hansh the Perspective must look elsewhere for lodgings."

  “I am dry, Rollo the Circle,” I said. “A stoup of ale before the meal will set me up nicely."

  “Whisht, dom! Careful—"

  Two struggling men fell alongside us. Both hit and kicked in an unscientific abandon, very energetically. One had tapped the claret of the other, and he had popped the eye of his assailant. “Which one is yours?"

  He looked down over his treble chins thoughtfully. “The one with paint still in his ears. Naghan the Brush. A marvel with red ochre when it comes to sunsets.” And Rollo laughed. “And something of a marvel with red, too, when it flows from his nose."

  Dodging aside and easing my way to the bar I looked over and as I expected saw a fellow cowering on the floor. I spoke in a conversational tone, pitched just above the din of breaking chairs and grunting fighters. “Two stoups of your best ale, dom."

  He glared up at me, half
-hiding his face under his green-striped apron.

  “Are you bereft of your wits! If you think I'm standing up to fetch you ale—"

  I regarded him. “Very well. I will fetch the—” I moved sideways and the fellow who tried to bash me with a length of lumber staggered past. I kicked him up the stern to assist him, and finished: “—two stoups of ale."

  Out here the ale was kept as wine, in amphorae, and I decided to carry an amphora along so that Rollo and I might sup in comfort without worrying over refills. I judged him a devotee of Beng Dikkane, the patron saint of all the ale drinkers of Paz.

  Only three struggling men had to be cleared out of the way back to Rollo. We settled down comfortably under a sturdy table backed against the wall and started in on sharing the amphora. I had taken his cognomen to be an euphemistic reference to his stomach, but as we talked I saw I was mistaken, indeed, that I had misjudged this rotund Rollo the Circle.

  “Right hand or left, Zaydo,” he said. “And when I'm a trifle merry, both hands at once."

  He fished around inside his tunic, which was a bright patchwork of various complementary colors, and produced a stick of chalk. He stared up at the table over our heads, for we half-reclined to fit in. Then—and it was a marvel—he drew a perfect circle on the rough wood. Judging circles is not a profession in which I have taken any degrees; to me the round was perfect.

  “It is, it is,” said Rollo. He supped ale. “Find the center and stick in a nail and run your string around. Perfect."

  “And both hands at once?"

  “When I've finished the amphora."

  “It is a great gift."

  A man fell under our table, his upside down face most comical, his eyes crossed. Rollo pushed him out. He rolled under trampling feet and other bodies crashed down.

  “Black Sadrap is taking his time.” Rollo cocked an eye and instantly withdrew as a flung tankard clanged against the table edge. “We need our sleep tonight. We are for Ruathytu and must start early."

  “You have a commission there?"

  “The temple of Werl-am-Nardith by the Hirrume Gate in the old walls. A small edifice and in need of embellishment. Perhaps you know it?"

  “Indeed, although I have not patronized it. I've been through the Hirrume Gate and along the Boulevard of Hamando enough times."

  Hamando's Boulevard, named after an ancient king of Hamal, led to the Kyro of the Horters. “When the Games are on in the Jikhorkdun and there are races in the merezo,” said Rollo, “you get weird sound effects along there.” He moved his bulky body to allow a broken chair to smash to further destruction against our table bulwark. “But, of course, we shall be working in the temple inside the old walls."

  “In the Sacred Quarter,” I said.

  He completely mistook my tone. I had some vivid and blustery memories of fights and brawls and general raffish behavior in the Sacred Quarter of Ruathytu, and, for all that the life was essentially decadent and the city an enemy city, there remained an undeniable fascination with that way of life. Strong affinities with my ambivalent attitude to the Arena in the Jikhorkdun, in Huringa and here in Hamal, were only too plain. But Rollo took my attitude to be the awed respect of your ordinary working fellow for the brilliant lords of the Sacred Quarter.

  Yet he made no attempt to preen himself on his access to the Sacred Quarter. He did say, “My company are known as first class. We travel where the commissions are, of course; but we have had our share in the Sacred Quarter.” He started to tell me of the decorations he'd put up in a sumptuous establishment of the Baths of the Nine, and as the fight bellowed on in smashings and crashings, I gained an insight into the way of life of these traveling artists. He made it sound most attractive.

  A knobby stick thumped onto the floor beside our table and a flushed face adorned with a quantity of jet black hair in various positions looked in. “You are safe, master?"

  “Perfectly safe, Sadrap. But for the sake of Kaerlan the Merciful, throw Horparth Hansh the Perspective out speedily. I need my meal and bed."

  Black Sadrap's bristly face grimaced at me. “Not long now, master.” To me he said, “You have a thick skull."

  I said, “Do not mention your little mistake again, Sadrap."

  “No. Only that I mistook you for Handal the Pigment coming in. He wears just such a silly grin on his face."

  Then Black Sadrap went away to bash a few more skulls and earn his hire.

  “A useful man,” said Rollo. He drank and wiped his mouth. “He is good with his knobby stick."

  Now Hamal is a civilized country, and was at this time, but when wars ferment the blood in men's veins and normal values seem pushed aside, all manner of mischiefs break out like diseases. This fight for accommodation at the inn was a simple rambunctious knock-down between rival groups of artists. On the morrow they might nurse sore heads; but that would be the end of it. Or so I judged. So I was unprepared for what followed.

  The quietness gradually came back to The Fluttrell Feather and when Rollo and I crawled out Sadrap was helping the company belonging to Horparth Hansh the Perspective out of the door. He used his knobby stick or his boot indifferently for the task.

  Rollo stretched. Indeed, his stomach was a glory. We moved away from our table across the windows and past the curtained booths. Here Rollo bent down and picked up a blatterer, the cunning bludgeon. You have to know how to use one of those skull-indenters. They are short, very short, scarce six inches of solid wood past the handgrip. They are sprung here, with leather or a coiled spring, and that gives them their power. But you have to be exceedingly sharp to get in, for you have to get inside, get in close, to deliver the knockout blow.

  “That's it, then, fanshos!” called Black Sadrap.

  He finished dealing with the fellow he hurled out of the door and swung back. Nath the Brash, the backs of his hands sticky with blood from his nose, bent to a man sprawled on the floor.

  “Hup, Hondo, you rascal. Next time—"

  The man on the floor unwound. His arm in a split sleeve lifted, drew back, hurled, quicker than Nath the Brush could follow. The blatterer this Hondo threw streaked like a dart for Rollo. Rollo just stood, his mouth agape, gripping the bludgeon he had just picked up.

  The blatterer missed him by the thickness of a dying man's last breath.

  It slammed into the curtain at our backs, bulging the material in and then rebounding and falling to the floor to roll away under the next curtain. The sound of a glass smashing and a woman's startled cry from the curtained booth was followed immediately by the curtains being swished back. A man's face glared out, enraged, the veins purple on his forehead, his cheeks with their redness almost breaking through the skin. He saw Rollo standing there with the little bludgeon in his hand.

  “Rast! We have endured your brawling without complaint. But now you have gone too far."

  The woman with him wore a white dress, very décolleté, and sleeveless. Red wine splashed her and the dress from neck to waist. She had that silly vapid kind of face that goes with fluffy fair hair and protuberant blue eyes and thick red lips; but she was just a girl, and some hulking great boor had smashed her wineglass and soaked her dress. She looked most upset.

  The man escorting her leaped from the booth. He wore a blue tunic and trousers and around his waist was wound a sash of brown threaded with silver. At his sides on jeweled lockets swung a rapier and main gauche.

  In a twinkling he ripped his rapier free and flourished the point under Rollo's three chins.

  “You scum have no respect! I shall cut you up and serve you diced to the fluttrells! Cramph, call on your gods of the stews!"

  The innocent blatterer fell from Rollo's hand. He took a step back, his stomach quivering, and sweat started up all over his round face.

  I said, “Your pardon, horter—"

  I got no further in what was intended to be a placating remark. The fellow with the brown and silver sash flicked his blade at my face. He said, “Stand off, rast.” The quick flick
ing strike was intended to cut my cheek. I saw he knew how to use a rapier and main gauche, these weapons having gained a strong foothold in the arsenals of the Hamalese nobility. I moved my head aside.

  “This man has done you no wrong,” I said, as the rapier switched back. “I will gladly pay for the lady's gown."

  The lady sniffed back a sob.

  “Cramph! You will pay with your hides! Both of you!"

  Black Sadrap started across the floor, knobby stick dangling. He looked worried. He would not tangle with this sword-wielding noble, for Sadrap would be out of his class.

  I said, quickly, jerking my head away again from the slice of the rapier: “Stand back, Sadrap. This yetch is no horter.” That, I judged, was a suitable insult, for horter, being the name given to a Hamalese gentleman, is highly prized. Also, I called him a yetch, which is not polite at all.

  He gobbled in his fury. I wondered if he thought to question why his two—and now three!—quick slashes at my face had failed to strike.

  From being just a roughhouse over accommodation, this incident had blown up into what could turn into an ugly and terminal scene. It seemed to me, although this affair was none of my business, that the world of Kregen had need of artists.

  As always when I enter a fight I am aware it may be my last. Always, there may be another Prince Mefto the Kazzur to best me, in some if not all of the arts of the sword. I would not fight this stupid red-faced idiot, and I judged from what I had seen of his skill so far he was only of middling proficiency with the rapier and dagger, the Jiktar and the Hikdar. I would not draw my thraxter against him. There was a surer way.

  Now he turned his full attention on me, for I wore a sword.

  “I shall teach you foul infestations to respect your betters? I am a noble of Hamal, and you—what are you? Lower than rasts that infest dunghills!"