A knight accompanied him and signaled each prisoner’s number as it was applied. The paint rubs off easily, he kept saying. Anyone found with a bare forehead will be given to the Holy Beasts immediately.
Perspiration trickled down many foreheads, but Darzek, number thirty-three, noticed that no one brushed it away.
There was movement in the arena. A Beast dived hungrily at the barred door and then swooped upward. Momentary panic followed as the prisoners fled to the other end of the long room and the knights angrily sought to restore order.
Darzek fled with the others. He could not account for the sudden wave of terror that swept over him, but he experienced a dizziness he could only attribute to uncontrollable fright, and his pounding heart set his pulse booming in his ears. He wondered if there was some primeval impulse in all life forms that reacted with stark terror to the threat of being eaten—a threat both human and Kammian ancestors once had to contend with daily.
One of the few prisoners who seemed unaffected was the youth who reeked of the Duke of OO’s special scent. When the others fled, he strolled nonchalantly after them. Now he drifted back to the other end of the corridor to peer into the arena, and Darzek followed him. But Darzek’s uneasiness, and his pounding pulse and dizziness, continued.
A pair of lackeys began to haul on a rope that pulled the central cage toward the barred door.
Suddenly the Protector himself entered and strode the length of their room with a retinue of black knights trailing behind him. He stood for a moment looking out into the arena. If he felt triumphant at this, the moment of restoration of the Storozian kingship for which he had labored so long, he gave no sign of it. A knight spoke to him with fluttering fingers, the Protector delivered a shrug of approval, and marched away, still trailing his escort. Around the arena, a new row of torches flared, lighting the upper barred openings from which the dukes and their parties were to watch. A group of faces peered from each, but Darzek was too distant to identify any of them.
The outer door opened again, and a black knight strode into their room carrying a ceramic jar. When he reached the opposite end of the room, he stood for a moment peering into the arena. A lackey stood beside him with a torch. He waved it. In the opening across the arena, a torch answered.
The knight turned. He reached into the jar and pulled out a wood disc. Thirty-seven, he announced. He tossed the disc to the lackey with the torch, who pocketed it. Number thirty-seven, a large, beefy individual, toppled to the floor in a dead faint.
Lackeys dumped water on him, revived him, and hurried him to the arena door. The cage stood there, hauled into place by waiting lackeys. It was as tall as the door, and when the door was opened, it completely blocked the opening. Number thirty-seven was shoved into it. The cage’s door was closed; the arena’s door was closed and secured. The lackey waved his torch again, and there was an answering wave from the opposite door. Lackeys there hauled on the rope that would pull the cage back to the center. The moment it arrived there, the torch waved again, and the cage jerked upward. The victim was left crouching in the arena in helpless terror.
Darzek watched with a compulsion born of horror as wave after wave of dizziness swept over him and his pounding pulse produced both faintness and nausea.
For a terrible moment nothing happened. Number thirty-seven, suddenly imbued with hope, got slowly to his feet, looked about him, and bolted for the side of the arena. The first Beast to plummet downward raked his back and sent him sprawling. He rolled over, lashing out with arms and legs, as the Beasts swarmed onto him. Somehow he managed to clutch a wing, and there was a momentary stir of alarm among the watching knights and lackeys; but another Beast found his eyes, and another his throat. The feast had begun long before his struggles weakened. And while the Beasts squabbled and gorged, the cage was lowered and hauled back toward the waiting victims.
The knight reached into his jar again. Number forty-two.
Lackeys dragged him forward, and four years of luck ran out on the wizened little male who thought to die of old age. Fear paralyzed his legs, and the lackeys had to support his body while they rudely stuffed him into the cage.
When the cage was raised, he had slumped to a kneeling position, covering his face with his hands. A Beast circled slowly and landed on his back. Pain goaded him into a furious struggle, but he had waited too long. He never did regain his feet.
Already those grotesque horrors seemed to have dulled Darzek’s sensitivity. His dizziness was lessening; his nausea decreased; his pulse seemed to be returning to normal; and all the time the Beasts squabbled and threatened each other with bloody fangs while they tore at the dead bodies, which now were being dismembered. One Beast flew off triumphantly with an entire leg.
The third victim was female. She behaved more courageously and resourcefully than either of the males. While the cage was being hauled to the center of the arena, she had removed her billowing skirt; and the moment the cage went up, she ran, twirling it about her head.
For a long, suspenseful instant the Beasts seemed befuddled by this, and she actually got two thirds of the way to an open door. But when they finally descended on her it was with the irresistible force of a ravenous horde. Again the nausea and dizziness swept over Darzek, and his pounding pulse returned, as he watched the Beast shred the unfortunate female’s flesh.
In the room where Darzek waited, the knight announced another number: Seventeen. Darzek, still standing beside the youth who reeked with the Duke of OO’s scent, was ready. He had set his amulet stun weapon at full power and positioned himself so that no one else would catch the beam. Now he pointed the gaping snout of his amulet and triggered it. The youth collapsed instantly.
No one thought anything of that. One victim already had fainted that day; no doubt it happened often. Lackeys dumped water on the youth, dumped more water, finally became curious. They examined him and called for a knight, who looked him over perplexedly. Probably few victims had been frightened completely to death when their numbers were called, and this one was dead.
But no one gave the oddity more than a moment’s thought—the dead male was doomed to die anyway, and there were other victims waiting. There was, in fact, a prisoner who had carelessly wiped the sweat from his forehead and removed his number—as a chorus of his fellow prisoners indicated with urgently fluttering fingers. It was not even necessary to hold another drawing. Knights seized him and rushed him toward the cage.
Darzek, feeling smug over his successful disruption of the Duke of OO’s sordid plot, stiffened as the substitute was hurried past him. This victim, too, smelled of the duke’s special scent—and Darzek could not get a shot at him without hitting at least two knights. He was in the cage before Darzek could think of a way to take action, and Darzek could not get close enough to the barred opening for an unhindered shot at him in the arena.
Cursing himself for underestimating the duke’s resourceful perfidy, he could only watch helplessly as the reeking figure acted the part of a terrified victim. He ducked and dodged, stumbled and fell, struggled to his feet, lashed out helplessly at the swooping Beasts. But the scent repelled them, as Darzek suspected it would. They dove, but each time they veered away, and the duke’s stooge finally worked his way to one side of the arena and darted through an open door.
The door swung shut. At the same instant all the torches in the ducal boxes save one were extinguished. In this revival of an ancient Holy Custom, the Duke of OO had been chosen King of Storoz.
Tension in the victims’ room relaxed immediately. The prisoners wiped the numbers from their foreheads, and knights and lackeys began organizing them for the return to their cells.
Darzek spoke tersely to Kjorz, and the two of them managed to keep the Synthesis agents, including Rok Wllon, together. The other prisoners had been living in dormitory rooms, ten to a room. There were no room assignments; the lackeys simply counted the prisoners off in tens, and each group of ten was marched off to one of the rooms. By holding back,
Darzek and Kjorz managed to get themselves, Rok Wllon, and the other four Synthesis agents counted into the last group, which contained only nine prisoners.
Their turn came, and a knight and two lackeys marched them away. Darzek studied their route with care and searched for clues as to the way out of the place, and Kjorz was doing the same. The took a corridor that slanted upward steeply; then a walk of fifty paces and the climb of a corridor slanting upward in another direction brought them to the level where the prisoners were kept.
A lackey moved ahead and opened a door. The two non-Synthesis prisoners entered obediently. Darzek, at the head of the Synthesis group, calmly plucked the door from the lackeys hands, swung it shut, and dropped the bar in place.
Lackeys and knight were thunderstruck. They were unarmed—probably no hint of rebellion ever had occurred in that place. The rebel would have been fed to the Beasts at once, and all the prisoners knew that.
Darzek dropped the knight and one lackey with a single shot from his amulet. The other lackey turned to run and was cut down before he’d taken a step.
Kjorz hurried down the corridor and found a remote room that was empty. With Rok Wllon and the other four agents looking on in bewilderment, Darzek and Kjorz dragged the knight and lackeys into the room. While Kjorz removed the clothing from the knight and one lackey, Darzek checked the three of them over carefully. He had set the amulet at medium charge. He saw no need to kill them, but he wanted time to get the Synthesis agents beyond pursuit before they woke up.
He donned the knight’s clothing, carefully perching the helmet at the proper angle, and Kjorz took that of one of the lackeys. Then they barred the door, and they started the Synthesis agents back the way they had come—Darzek, the knight, leading the way, followed by five prisoners, with Kjorz bringing up the rear as a lackey.
After the first barrier, Darzek was confident that everything would be all right. A grating spanned the corridor, with a lackey in charge of its central door. He opened it without hesitation, closed it after them. They walked on.
But it took them more than an hour to find the exit, and Rok Wllon and the four mistreated agents were becoming tired and increasingly difficult to handle when Darzek finally reached a fork in the corridor, caught a draft of chill, fresh air coming down one branch, and turned in the right direction.
None of the lackey guards at the main entrance looked twice at them. They were trained to obey a knight instantly and without question, and probably the Protector had instilled in them more concern about unauthorized persons entering the sacred precincts than about escaping prisoners. Darzek, knight of the Winged Beast, led his detachment of prisoners away under a warm afternoon sun; but the moment the lane curved out of sight of the entrance, he hurried everyone up the mountainside and into the trees. There they paused to rest.
“From here on, it’s up to you,” Darzek told Kjorz.
“You’re not coming?”
“I’m just getting a glimmer of what this is all about. If I can understand that glimmer, I may be able to accomplish something. Take them over the crest and down the other side as far as they’re able to travel. Watch out for air shafts on this side of the mountain. When they can’t go any further, find cover for them and wait until dark. Then go down to the encampment and get help.”
Kjorz looked at him doubtfully. “You’re sure you’ll be all right?”
“No,” Darzek said. “But I sense an opportunity here that may never happen again, and I’m not about to run off and leave it.”
“You’d better tell me about this encampment. Where do I go to get help?”
Darzek described the encampment and the positions of his own wagons and tents. As he talked, he began to feel doubtful himself. It wouldn’t do to take this bedraggled group of agents into the camp—the black-capes would know about it within minutes. They’d have to make a wide circuit and hide near the surlane until Sjelk could arrange to pick them up at night and smuggle them out of the central province in one of his returning empty wagons.
A sudden movement in the undergrowth brought him to his feet. An instant later a small figure hurled itself at him.
It was Sajjo.
When her tears had subsided, he presented her to Kjorz and the others. Then, speaking slowly with his hands, he told her precisely what had to be done. Quickly! he said. There’s no time to waste. Their lives depend on you.
He embraced her again and stepped back. She smiled and turned to the others, motioning them to follow her.
The other agents and Rok Wllon got to their feet bewilderedly. Kjorz turned again to Darzek.
“You’re sure you’ll be all right?”
“When I leave this place,” Darzek said, with more confidence than he felt, “I expect to be traveling in a much finer style than you will. Now get going.”
He watched them move off into the forest, with Sajjo bounding along ahead of them. Just before they disappeared, she turned and waved at Darzek. Then they were gone. Darzek turned and moved laterally, following the lane at a safe distance. The forest drew close to it where it met the surlane coming down from the mountain pass, and Darzek settled down there to wait. Whether it would be for an hour or a week he had no idea. He hoped the religious ceremonies for the new king would be brief.
While he waited, he examined with care the glimmer he had seen, and focused and amplified it; and when he finally had his thoughts arranged, only a few confirming details were lacking for him to shape the final solution to the mystery of the Silent Planet.
Or so he hoped.
He continued to wait.
Finally he saw the procession coming. Again the Protector led the way, mounted on his solid black nabrulk, with his retinue of black-caped knights riding behind him. Next in line came the red-caped party of the Duke Merzkion. Darzek scrutinized it with care. The duke was there, and all of his retainers, but the duke’s treasure was missing. He knew that the Duke Merzkion had taken a treasure over the mountain with him. He had seen him fluttering about it anxiously as the outgoing procession got underway. Now the Duke Merzkion was treasureless.
Following him came the silver-caped party of the Duke Rilornz—with no treasure.
And then the purple-caped party of Duke Fermarz—with no treasure.
And the parties of the Dukes Pabinzk and Tonorj, oranged-caped and brown-caped, both treasureless.
Then, in the center of the procession, came the new King of Storoz, formerly the Duke of OO, with his gold-caped followers. And the new king still had his treasure. It rode on a litter carried by four mounted black-caped lackeys; and the treasure chest, covered by elegantly embroidered cloths, was at least two meters high, two meters wide, and three meters long.
Darzek studied it calculatingly. “A little large for diamonds,” he murmured.
He pointed his amulet at it.
As it came opposite him, he touched the trigger, giving it an unusually long blast of maximum power.
The sudden clump was audible even at his distance, but the procession of deaf Kammians moved along serenely. Darzek remained where he was, watching the parties of the remaining dukes: The Duke Borkioz and his deep blue-caped followers, no treasure; the redheaded Duke Dunjinz and his pink-caped followers, no treasure; the Duke Suklozk and his gray-caped followers, no treasure; the Dukes Lonorlk and Kiledj, with followers cloaked in pale blue and white, both treasureless. None of the remaining dukes possessed the treasure he had started out with.
When the end of the procession reached him, Darzek turned with a grin and loped off through the forest until he overtook the Duke of OO’s party. By the time he reached it, the entire procession had halted. The new king, his knights and retainers, and black-capes from elsewhere in the procession had gathered about the treasure. As Darzek watched, the Protector rode up.
Darzek turned away, climbed higher up the mountain to be safely out of sight, and hurried back toward the caverns. His next hunch was that the entire procession would be returning to the underground temple of th
e Winged Beast, and he wanted to get there well ahead of it.
CHAPTER 20
If the lackeys guarding the entrance remembered Darzek and thought it odd that he was returning without his work party, they said nothing. Neither did those at the barricades. Darzek’s principal problem was in finding the dormitory rooms: He had to mimic the sedate pace of a knight while searching with frantic haste.
He lost his way several times, and he was fighting a sensation of panic when finally he located the correct ascending passage. He first looked in on the knight and the two lackeys. They were still unconscious and showed no signs of reviving. He took the trouble to dress the knight in his armor. Then he barred that door, opened the door of the last occupied dormitory, and closed it after him, trying to coax the bar into dropping partially into place as the door slammed. It did—barely. His two cell mates were asleep after their emotional exhaustion of the morning, and they didn’t see him enter. He stretched out on an empty pallet and quickly fell asleep himself.
He was awakened abruptly and herded into the corridor with a crowd of bewildered prisoners.
What is it? the prisoners were demanding.
It’s another Choice, a knight told them maliciously.
But we just chose a king!
So we did. Now we’re going to choose another king.
He turned away. The prisoners were marched off, one dormitory at a time, and if anyone noticed that Darzek’s room was short six prisoners, no mention was made of it. They retraced their route of the morning, winding their way down to the long room reserved for prisoners.
Darzek hurried to the opposite end and looked into the arena. The torches already had been lit, including those in the ducal boxes, with one puzzling exception. The box that had been occupied by the Duke of OO was dark. The door under his box was closed. All of the others doors were open—except, Darzek assumed, the one occupied by the Protector, who was not eligible for the kingship. That door must have been the one adjacent to the one the victims entered, for Darzek could not see it.
[Jan Darzek 04] - Silence is Deadly Page 22