Scorpio Assassin [Dray Prescot #39]

by Alan Burt Akers

  Well, that is what I thought then, and as they say in the Eye of the World, men sow and Zair reaps.

  We talked a little further, generally about the situation, and I was able by a few casual remarks to assure myself he knew nothing of the queen's necklace affair. If Leone wanted to tell him, that would be between them. At last he suggested I ought to be lodged in the palace; there were rooms enough in his own apartments. I accepted and asked that my belongings be brought round from Mishuro's villa. “There is a particularly fine longbow I just bought from Master Twang. But I don't think that will come in down these passages!"

  He smiled, a little wanly, and gave orders for my stuff to be brought round. I took a handful of palines and stood up. “I'll make a start."

  That first little recce down the dusty flang-infested corridors hidden in the walls yielded precious little. I orientated myself and checked on three or four quick routes back to Chandro's apartments. I might need a quick getaway if affairs went wrong. I looked in on a number of interesting tableaux; but as they had nothing whatsoever to do with the plot, I refrain from mentioning them.

  For, plot there was. And a damned ripe rascally plot, too!

  The thought did cross my mind that the Star Lords wanted Mevancy and me to protect the queen. That notion was rapidly discarded. The queen had not been in the burning dancing rostrum. Once I had done my stint of spying this afternoon when Yango and Shang-Li-Po would be together to sign papers, I'd really clear off and go see Mevancy.

  As the afternoon wore on I found myself pacing restlessly up and down Chandro's carpet of Walfarg weave. This shiftless kind of existence did not suit me. Oh, yes, there were many irons in the fire and lots of skullduggery was going on in the background and blood curdling action could erupt at any moment; all the same, I could not stifle the feeling that time was slipping away and nothing done.

  Leone came in to see me and demanded to know what had happened. As she said, hotly: “The queen wants to know, Drajak!"

  I told her that the necklace had been delivered safely to the thieves. “I expect they'll hand it to this new wizard today and collect their hire money. How long it will fool him, I don't know, nor does that posturing idiot Chang-So."

  “Drajak!” She was shocked. “You can't ... He is a famous wizard!"

  “He's scared stiff of this new one. What's his name, anyway?"

  “Na-Si-Fantong."

  I didn't like that Si in the middle there. It reminded me uncomfortably of another Wizard of Loh with a Si in the middle. Well, he was dead now, thank Opaz.

  “Na-Si-Fantong. Well, it's my guess, although I don't know, that he'll discover the gem is not the one he wants quite quickly. Just who will get the blame is an interesting speculation."

  “Not you, Drajak, surely!"

  Trying to lighten the conversation I made a bad gaffe. I thought Leone was taking this far too seriously, so I said off-handedly: “Oh, they're bound to blame the queen."

  She rounded on me like a leem. “So you've become her slave, too, like everyone else! You've seen her once. We've known each other for a very little time, yet I know you are—"

  “No, Leone, no. I am not. And you are not to say so. As for the queen, I think she is a wonderful woman and that is all.” I drew my eyebrows down at her. Her hand went to her lips. “Just stop all this foolery, Leone."

  This girl was easily led, that I knew. She could be told what to do, asked, ordered, begged, phrase it how you will. Yet she had courage. She flared back at me: “It is not foolery, Drajak! I know what I feel! You are the man—"

  “I am the man devoted to a lady who does not live in Tsungfaril."

  Her face went white.

  Then she ran from the room.

  Chandro came in with his head twisted on his neck. He regained his poise and walked across to me, saying: “A whirlwind, a veritable whirlwind of the desert! She almost bowled me over. What have you done to her?"

  “She harbors delusions more suitable to a schoolgirl."

  “Ah, yes. She is very—pliant."

  “Will you have a word with her? Tell her to find her own man?"

  “If it will do any good. Now her cousin, Kirsty, is quite different. If anyone is going to do any telling, it's Kirsty."

  “She sounds a likely lady,” I said, not really concerned, thinking of all the annoying consequences that might follow on this Leone nonsense.

  “Oh, yes. Very likely."

  A glance at the sand glass told me the time was near when Yango and Shang-Li-Po would be together ostensibly signing documents. If they were planning treachery then I wanted to hear.

  So, ensconced among the dust and cobwebs I peered through a little grille and listened and the two Repositers signed papers and barely exchanged half a dozen words. When they rose and stretched and left the room I felt absolute disgust. What a waste of time! On my return Chandro expressed himself as pleased I had carried out an observation without being seen. If he was satisfied, I most certainly was not. I broached the subject of my going off to the Springs of Benga Annorpha to visit a comrade.

  “Oh, I don't think so, Drajak. If we are to penetrate the secret plotting of these villains ... No. You'd best stay here."

  Now, of course, I could simply have ignored all that and gone off to see Mevancy as I had kept on promising myself. But I liked the old buffer and if he felt there was a genuine danger for the queen from these villains, why then—you see!—damned duty held me fast here.

  So the next couple of days passed. I got to know the corridors in this part of the palace very well. I ate enormous meals. And I did not leave the palace environs. I did put in a spot of archery with my new bow. This took place in an indoor butts used by the queen's bodyguards.

  After the shooting rounds we went off to their mess where they celebrated the birthday of a young Hikdar. The drinking was moderate. Then, like good Kregans, they started the singing.

  Very naturally we sang ‘The Bowmen of Loh’ and this was followed by ‘When a Wizard meets a Wizard, Sailing through the Air.’ After that we sang our way through many of the ditties of Kregen and one or two new to me; Lohvian songs and a plaintive little number from Tsungfaril: ‘Asleep by the Desert Lily.'

  I didn't count that short period wasted.

  When I returned, Chandro was about to sit down to a slap up meal and I joined him. He mentioned that I did not keep any body slaves. To go into that prickly subject at that time seemed to me inopportune. Instead I said I had a comrade who had been wounded in the attack on Mishuro. This Llodi the Voice, I said, I felt responsible for. Nothing would satisfy Chandro but that Llodi must immediately be brought here and Mistress Lingli must care for him. I was happy to accept this munificence.

  He waved a hand. “Gold is mere metal. A good heart weighs heavier in the balances. I could wish the queen—well, never mind that."

  All these half references from him and Leone didn't add up to a whole. Whilst I was prepared to spy on villains, I was not prepared to allow complicated situations concerning young ladies to arise. There was no doubt Leone was easily led and influenced, so therefore let some nice respectable young man, with the approval of the Repositers, court and win her.

  Llodi was well on the mend, thank Opaz, and his magnificent fissured nose positively glowed. He would take time to get over the treachery of Pulvia and the death of Mishuro. Meantime, he lay in bed and ate like your true Kregan.

  On the next occasion Chandro told me a meeting of the villains was in progress, I went quietly along the dusty secret ways and once again spied on them.

  Again, they barely exchanged half a dozen words. When they left the room my dissatisfaction was such that I went on exploring further than I'd been before out of the sheer desire to do something to stifle the frustration. The corridors all looked the same, narrow slots built within the walls. By the time I cooled down and decided I'd best return before I was lost, I discovered that I was lost.

  There was no cause for alarm. I could always peer through on
e of the many concealed grilles to find an empty room and then open the secret door. Once through that chamber and into the corridor beyond I'd ask my way back. No problem.

  Except that, well, yes, there was a problem.

  The chambers beyond the secret observation grilles were furnished magnificently. Luxury breathed everywhere. I saw why I was lost, and why I didn't recognize these passageways. It dawned on me that these secret runnels had not been marked on the map Chandro had shown me. That meant I was prowling around between the walls of the queen's apartments.

  If I barged out into a corridor here I'd be strung up before I could get the first Llahal out.

  Refusing to be worried over the situation and trusting to my bump of location, I began to work steadily in one direction. I passed a hallway shimmering with mother of pearl, no doubt brought all the way up from Zamrarn, and the next observation grille showed me the chamber beyond the mother of pearl hall. Alabaster columns upheld a glittering ceiling. Many fans worked by rope through high pulley-holes waved languorously to and fro and the perfumes wafted dizzyingly through my spyhole. A marble floor scattered with rugs surrounded a pool of water tinted a clear pale blue. Steam rose in wisps and I felt how sensuously attractive it would be to plunge in and relax in that warm and perfumed water.

  The bathing pool was completely deserted and even in my hidden corridor I could sense the feeling of waiting that assembly rooms have just before a meeting. This was like a stage set. At any moment there would be the sound of voices off, and the shuffle of feet, and then the beginners would step out and the play could begin.

  Carefully, I moved along the flang-infested corridor. The odd thing was, I found I could see very well in the dimness. This darkness was artificial, in the sense that it was caused by material objects blocking out the light of the Suns or the Moons and not natural in that the Suns or the Moons were absent from the sky. Lamplight, in a weird way, appeared to make no difference. There was no time to puzzle over this strange phenomenon at the time. I kept looking for footprints in the dust and found none save my own. I couldn't backtrack my own footprints for a number of the corridors had been swept clean. This puzzled me at first, until, coming across stone steps leading upwards, I went up to find a long clean corridor without a single observation grille. Instead ropes led from holes in the wall to wooden cylinders with iron handles. No one was up here and I realized this was the punkah operating room for a chamber below.

  Pressing on I descended and quickly found myself back in the dusty narrow channels between the walls.

  At a corner a pile of yellow bones lay in confusion. I looked with some sympathy for the poor unfortunate lost and trapped here, and saw the rusty dagger through one eye orbit. By the tusks sticking up at each side of his lower jaw he had been a Chulik. What, I wondered as I went on, was his story?

  The passage turned again and perforce I had to follow, aware that I was being forced in a circle and was going back in the opposite direction on the other side of the bathing pool chamber. Light cut across the corridor ahead from a grille set in a concealed door. I stopped and looked through.

  Amid much laughter and splashing girls were disporting themselves. Some dived in and swam about, splashing, their bodies shimmering in the wisping mists rising from the warmed and scented water. Others lay languorously on couches or rugs bordering the pool. The scene presented a spectacle of beauty that touched me, a grizzly old leem-hunter, with an awareness of what life could and should be. And, yet, of course, many poor people worked long and hard hours in the irrigations and sweat shops so that these pampered ones might enjoy sybaritic luxury.

  A cluster of handmaidens parted at the edge of the pool and the queen rose from the water, glistening, rosy, superb.

  Well, this was no place for me. My spying brief did not include the part of a Peeping Tom. So I began to turn away to continue my search for the exit and from the corner of my eye I saw the quick feline movements and the glitter of swords as killers burst into that warm and scented chamber.

  There were half a dozen of them, clad all in black, with black scarves about their heads. The feral glitter of their eyes matched the glitter of their swords. At once all was pandemonium and uproar. Girls screamed, and choked on their screams; girls ran and died as they ran.

  The queen drew herself up, shining, resplendent, breathing deeply. She stared upon her death. Paol-ur-bliem or not, that experience must have scored into her mind. She faced the assassins bravely, boldly, her fists resting on her hips as the scented water ran down and I could swear a small contemptuous smile touched her soft lips.

  My sword was in my fist and I hurled myself at the grilled door.

  A curtain of blue radiance dropped before me.

  Through that shimmering blue veil I saw another scene. I didn't believe what was happening, what I was seeing; but I saw another scene, a different scene yet one horribly the same.

  Black clad assassins went racing forward to cut down the shrinking form of a young woman, and a lad with empty hands stepped out bravely before her. Shadows from the twin suns streamed ruby and jade across the desert sand. I could see both pictures with equal clarity: the queen standing firmly on the edge of her bathing pool as her handmaidens shrieked and scuttled, and the young woman cowering back as the young man stepped before her. The scenes were superimposed and both were touched by the blue radiance before me.

  I hurled myself forward to smash the door down and go roaring across the marble into that secluded bathing chamber. I would fight for this woman, this Queen Leone of Tsungfaril. I would do what I could to protect her.

  The door was not there.

  Shattering coldness gripped me. I gasped with the shock of recognition.

  Two women in peril, black clad assassins about to cut them both down ... A curtain of blue radiance, sent by the Star Lords, a fragment of their phantom Blue Scorpion ... I rushed on, sword pointed.

  But—to whose rescue was I rushing?

  * * *

  Chapter nine

  Sand gritted under my feet. The late afternoon heat from the twin suns smote down.

  The cloying scents of the bathing pool vanished. The icy grip of the radiant blue portal sent by the Star Lords fell away and as I rushed forward with poised sword there was just time for one single scarlet thought of regret for Queen Leone.

  Now she had used up one more of the hundred lifetimes she had been condemned to spend in this sinful world before she might pass into the heavenly paradise of Gilium.

  Thoughts of the queen and of being condemned to life as a punishment were swept away by the young people's peril. The lad stood bravely enough as I knew he would. I saw that I would not reach him across the sand before the first assassin chopped him down with ruthless efficiency.

  The hilt of my old knife snugged into my hand and I drew from the sheath over my right hip and threw in a single flowing motion. The blade twinkled once as it flew. Running, I'd missed the target I'd aimed for. The knife smashed into the fellow's face below the glaring eyes, ripped through the black facemask, laid his cheek bare. My clansmen would tut-tut at that, well enough, knowing I'd aimed for the throat. The assassin did not tumble over straight away. He dropped his sword and put his hand to his face.

  The second assassin collided with the first and I heard his savage yell of anger. These stikitches, although well able to slay defenseless women, were not top class professional assassins. There were three of them and as the first reeled about trying to stop the blood pouring from his face the other two turned to face me.

  They were shouting now, some rigmarole about their patron saints and bolstering their courage with rote liturgies from their no-doubt secret assassin disciplines. There was no time for nonsense of that sort.

  The fellow with my knife through his face at last collapsed, trying to scream and producing only a bloody froth and sickening mewling sounds. They tried to meet me together, two blades to one, give them credit for that. So I circled, drawing them away from the two young folk,
and made a sudden and savage dart at them.

  That devilish screech as steel blades meet and cross, slide and chingle! Ah, well, swordsmen know what they know, by the Blade of Kurin!

  From these two I expected good quality swordsmanship, for despite their lack of professional stikitche know-how they should, at least, know some of the arts of the sword. I was not disappointed.

  So we set to.

  After a few passes it was established between the three of us that their skill would not match mine. Therefore, all things being equal, they were dead men.

  Things in this valley of tears, of course, are not equal.

  Knowledge of the sword, great skill in its use, vast experience, all may in certain circumstance avail nothing before a less skilled opponent. Well, didn't I remember Mefto the Kazzur! Resolutely I thrust thoughts of that unhanged villain away and let my self flow into the blade so that I could have fought these two blindfolded.

  After a few more passages they realized the truth of the understanding we had established between us. They stopped fighting and sought to escape.

  The heat of the suns blistered up from the sand and the light, all pervasive, blinded in a jade and ruby dazzle.

  Whether or not I would have let them go I cannot now say.

  The young man, who I now realized was Lunky, picked up the fallen stikitche's sword from the sand and with a loud and angry shout, rushed at these two trying to escape. He was coming in from the side and rear and they'd be perfectly able to chop him down as they ran past.

  “Get away, Lunky!” I roared.

  I don't suppose he heard me, for his blood was up. The young woman, who stood exactly where Lunky had left her, was Mistress Telsi. Her face glowed passionately, suffused with blood, and her fists were clenched over her breast. No wonder Lunky was fighting mad!