by John F. Carr
Sarrask rose to his feet sputtering, dropping half a cup of dark wine down his robes. "But Your Majesty, I'm not one to set watch over the Royal Nursery-excuse me, Queen Rylla, no offense meant. But I'm a man of plain words."
Rylla was up and fumbling for her dagger as if she meant to beard Sarrask or cut off his tongue.
"Order, please!" shouted Kalvan. "Prince Sarrask, you are a valiant warrior and one of my best commanders. I would prefer to have you at my side fighting the nomads, but I need someone here I can trust to guard my home and household. I can think of no one better able to protect my throne in my absence." Actually Kalvan could think of half a dozen in a second, but all of those he needed by his side and those he didn't, like Prince Ptosphes, would take it as a personal insult if he left them home.
Sarrask swelled up like a peacock on display and made a courtly bow in Kalvan's direction. Rylla, who sat at Kalvan's right, turned so that no one else could see and made a horrible grimace at her husband. "I will ask Prince Pheblon of Nostor to support us with three thousand of his troops, Prince Balthames of Shasta with another two thousand, three thousand from Nyklos, and I'm sure we can count on Ulthor and Kyblos to provide even more men, since they will be defending their own lands and can call out their lordly levies. Duke Mnestros has already 'offered' us the use of his troops." Younger sons and adventurers from all over Hos-Agrys had swelled Mnestros' cavalry force to better than a thousand mounted troopers.
Harmakros grinned. "That should give us thirty thousand or more for the Army of the Trygath. Enough teeth to grind their bones into dust."
Everyone smiled at that thought and there was another chorus of "Down Styphon!" followed by an equally loud one of "Death to all Barbarians."
"Harmakros and Chartiphon I want you two to get together with General Baldour and decide which passage we take, the northern Nyklos Road or the Akyros Trail through Sask. Besides the trail itself I want you to go over foraging areas, possible ambush sites and where to set depots in case we have to make a hasty retreat. Also consider that we might want to link up with some of the more civilized kings and princes once we reach the Trygath. Duke Skranga and General Klestreus I want you to make a list of every major Trygath king, prince, and baron and everything we know about them, from their fighting ability to whether they're known Styphoni sympathizers. I'd like it by tomorrow morning at the latest."
Skranga nodded and smiled as if he'd just been given a tasty morsel. His other intelligence officer, General Klestreus, looked like a fish that had just snagged a hook.
"Now, one last thing before I dismiss the council. The Pony Express route we've set up between Hostigos Town and the Army of Observation at Tarr-Locra has given us a four-day jump in our border communications. Unfortunately, the semaphore system I wanted for this spring won't be up and running until after next winter. I'd like to run another Pony Express route into Ulthor, and possibly Kyblos, so we can get some adequate intelligence rather than depending upon itinerant peddlers and vagabonds. Colonel Krynos I'd like for you to attend to that. Don't hesitate to pull as many of the experienced riders you need off the Great King's Highway route.
"That's it for now, gentlemen. This meeting is dismissed." Actually Kalvan would have preferred a working semaphore system to the pony express, but he'd decided that building the Great Kings Highway was more important. He didn't have enough trained manpower to do both. By Father Dralm's White Beard, he didn't have a tenth the trained manpower to do any of the things he wanted done, but give the University a few years… Then would he not only have good interior communications and roads, but then he could start working on some reliable vehicles, like a Butterworth stagecoach. Anything would be an improvement over the Conestoga-style wagons the Zarthani used for everything from overland transportation to mobile homes.
Note: After road is finished start stagecoach line. With leaf springs, too!
TWENTY SIX
I
Verkan Vail gazed at the mass of info wafers, message balls and data cubes that covered his desk and sighed. He was cooped up with beeping computers and chirping data writers while outside it was a beautiful spring day. At times like this Verkan wondered why he had allowed Tortha Karf to talk him into becoming his successor.
Being the best-trained man for the job did not make him the best man for the job, nor did it make that job any easier-especially when that job was being the final arbiter over a near-infinity of worlds. They all had to be policed. Maybe it was too much job for one man-Tortha Karf had been saying that for years. But committees do not like to make decisions, and when they did, their decisions were too often compromises. So, until the Executive Council legalized cloning, it looked as if Verkan was stuck with the job.
Verkan had spent the winter, shuttling back and forth between Home Time Line and Greffa, establishing his cover as Trader Verkan. It would not do to have Kalvan bumping into another Grefftscharrer who had never heard of Trader Verkan. The consequence was he had neglected his work here at Paratime Police headquarters and would have to spend the next two or three ten-days catching up. The squawk of his intercom interrupted his thoughts. He touched the com button with his toe and said, "What is it, Orthlan?"
"Vlasthor Arph to see you, Chief. Code Red."
"Send him right in."
Vlasthor Arph was a short stocky man with a quick step and bright gray eyes; if Dalla was his right hand, Arph was his left.
"Hate to bother you, Chief, but this could be important."
Verkan nodded for him to continue.
"We turned up some interesting irregularities on that list of Opposition heavy contributors you had me check out with the Metro Records Division. Our prime suspect is one Jorand Rarth-have you heard of him?"
"No. Who is he?"
"He's an outtime importer with possible connections to the Novilan syndicate, mostly gambling and prole prostitution."
"Those two Wizard Trader suspects who allegedly committed suicide last year both had connections to the Novilan syndicate."
Arph smiled, showing his teeth.
"This sounds like the link between the Wizard Traders and the syndicates we've been searching for," Verkan said. The Wizard Traders had been a large band of First Level slavers posing as outtime sorcerers. Unauthorized, they had infiltrated dozens of time-lines, using First Level technology as magic to take advantage of ignorant and superstitious outtimers. The Organization, as its members called it, had captured migrants and other disposable locals on isolated time-lines as slaves to be sold for gold and fissionables on other time-lines. The Paratime Police had closed the operation down eight or nine years ago, and were still trying to penetrate the upper layers of the Wizard Trader Organization.
"Where is Jorand now?"
"That's the bad news, Chief. We've had his quarters under close surveillance for the past four hours. Less than fifteen minutes ago, we picked up the landing beam from his aircar. Before we could move in, he fled. We lost his aircar in the city lanes."
"I take it his locator was off?"
"Yes, first thing we checked. Nothing registered for his car on the traffic monitors, either."
Verkan sighed. "Where do you think he may have gone, Arph?"
"A syndicate hideout-for now, would be my guess, Chief. Then he'll hop the first outtime conveyer. There's no place on Home Time-Line to hide for more than a few days. I'll put a search warning out on him to all the registered outtime firms."
Verkan moved his head in agreement. "I want an ID and picture of Jorand Rarth distributed to every Transtemporal terminal on the First Level. I also want his face on every news broadcast in this city by this evening. Arrange a pickup for all known associates. This is one fish I don't want to see slip away." Yes, sir.
"Rarth may be the key we've been looking for. So far, we've been looking everywhere but in the right places."
"I've got a few suggestions. Take a couple of the Opposition Party bigwigs and put them under narco-hypnosis; we'll get some answers, all right."
It was one of the many reasons Verkan preferred to spend his off time on Kalvan's Time-Line; there you could cut through the regulation knots with the nearest sword.
II
After boarding their horses at the Red Hound stable, Danar Sirna and Baltrov Eldra walked down the main street of Hostigos Town to the Silver Stag tavern where they were to meet a Dazour grain merchant named Tynos. As they walked down the wooden-plank sidewalk, Sirna asked, "Eldra, how are things back at the University?"
"It was nice to go back, if only for the showers. It wasn't much fun, though, having my brains picked twenty hours a day for two ten-days, I'll tell you."
"I didn't think there'd be that much interest in Kalvan's Time-Line.
"Thanks to the Danthor Dras publicity machine, Great King Kalvan is grist for every Dhergabar talk show and tavern in the city. Dras updated and rewrote his A Study of Techno-Theocracy in Action and re-titled it Fireseed Fanatics and it's selling faster than Voltor Lyra's latest outtime cookbook. There's even talk about sending in a First Level strike team to aid Kalvan in his war against the nasty priesthood of Styphon's House."
"That violates every precept of the Transtemporal Code! I'll wager Chief Verkan is not too happy about that."
"If Verkan Vail had his way, he'd quarantine Kalvan's Time-Line and make it his own personal playpen."
"You sound bitter, Eldra. Do I detect a bit of jealousy over Kalvan."
"I'd like to make him my personal plaything all right!" Eldra smiled in a way that reminded Sirna of a cat she once shared quarters with and how it grinned after tasting fresh prey rather than prepared food. It also reminded her that, despite her young appearance, Eldra was centuries older than herself and much wiser in the ways of the world. Eldra was a renowned historian, while Sirna was a lowly graduate student; Eldra was also considered one of the experts on Europo-American, Hispano-Columbian Subsector which was how she wrangled her way on to the Kalvan Study-Team.
"I hope that Tynos doesn't stand us up." Sirna had never ridden a horse in her life until last year and she still found them an unpredictable and uncomfortable means of transportation.
Eldra laughed. Sirna's dislike for horses was the camp joke, whereas Eldra was an excellent rider and horsewoman. "If his message boy says he'll be there, Tynos will be there. He loves wine second only to gold."
The Silver Stag tavern was a two-story plank and plaster building with an inn and house of ill repute on the second story and a tavern at street level. Inside the sides of the walls were lined with rough-hewn plank benches, which were filled beyond jostling capacity. At the center was a bar, made up of planks resting upon large ale barrels. Set around the rest of the tavern were small wine barrels acting as tables for men sitting on three-legged stools. Eldra pointed to an unoccupied 'table' in the corner.
Unescorted females were no novelty to the Silver Stag patrons, and before they were a quarter of the way to their table Eldra was jostled by a drunken muleskinner or trapper-so Sirna judged by the stench he gave off. From her previous visit to a Hostigi tavern, it appeared that any unescorted woman in a drinking establishment was fair game. One of his hands rudely groped for Eldia's chest, but before he could touch her,
Eldra's poniard was pressed tightly up against his not insubstantial stomach.
"Presume on my person and I'll open you up from groin to sternum!"
The drunk's eyes turned mean and Eldra made as if to press her blade home when a loud stentorian voice boomed through the tavern. "That is Royal teat you're trying to grasp, Eyllos! Release the lady's person and put your hands on a fresh tankard at my expense."
The drunk frowned and then let go. A fresh tankard arrived almost as quickly. "To your health, Prince Sarrask!" Eyllos bowed, chug-a-lugged the tankard, and then promptly passed out.
The room greeted this spectacle with uproarious laughter and Sirna figured the trapper wasn't the first drunk to find himself so disposed-good crowd control technique on Prince Sarrask's part.
When they passed by Sarrask's table, Eldra bent over-giving the Prince an eyeful of her bosom-and whispered something in the big man's ear. As Eldra pulled away, Sarrask roared with laughter. "My fair lady, some day I may hold you to that promise."
When they reached their stools, Sirna asked, "You like him?"
"Sarrask's type can be a lot of fun, if you like your men hale and hearty. I've had worse. But I'm after much bigger game than a mere Prince.
Sirna shook her head. "You had better be careful before your head winds up on a pole decorating the outer walls of Tarr-Hostigos. Rylla strikes me as the type who doesn't like competition, especially regarding her husband's affections."
"They are not always going to be together…"
Sirna thought Eldra was being stubborn, but there wasn't anything to be gained by upsetting her only female ally on the study-team, so she changed the subject. "Where is Tynos? We need to leave for Nostor Town in less than a moon."
"I thought he'd already be here finishing last night's dregs. Maybe he's more sober when it comes to business. Or maybe he's hoping we'll be in our cups."
"Why do we need him anyway? If we are going to establish a second Royal Foundry at Nostor Town, we will have to put in a transtemporal conveyer-head sooner or later. Why not sooner and save all this bother?"
"Chief Verkan is only building a foundry in Nostor Town at Kalvan's insistence. It's nice to have an unlimited pipeline of goods, but you don't want to get the locals curious as to where it all comes from."
Their conversation was interrupted by Tynos' arrival. After being introduced to Sirna and giving orders to his bodyguard, Tynos said, "You are a clever trader, Lady Eldra, to bring so lovely a vision to becloud my mind from business."
Tynos was a swarthy black-haired man with the deceptively soft look of a fighter gone to fat. Sirna suspected that underneath that layer of fat was a lot of healthy muscle and she wasn't about to get into a verbal, or any other kind of, wrestling match with him.
"My good trader," Eldra said, "I suspect Styphon's next miracle will occur before any woman clouds your mind regarding matters of business."
Tynos started to laugh, then looked around furtively.
"No, Tynos, you'll find no priests of Styphon's House or their agents in this hot-bed of heresy."
"You may be right, my Lady, but Styphon's agents multiply faster than bedbugs in the cots upstairs. In Hos-Harphax a man learns to grow ears at the back of his head if he wishes to keep it on his shoulders. But enough of this unpleasantness, how can I be of further service to you Ladies?"
"Let me remind you, Tynos, you were to search out sources of lead ingots for us."
"Oh, yes."
"We make many molds for our casting masters and have a great need for lead. Like yourself, we too are foreigners here, come to make money. We see little to be gained by involving ourselves in local matters in these uncertain times, unless-of course-there is a profit to be made."
"By Tranth's Teeth, you speak truly. Since the selling of war materials to any Hostigi is under Ban of Styphon we will have to break up your ingots into three or four shipments-this of course will be more costly."
"Of course."
"Since you are a citizen of Grefftscharr, you are not directly subject to the Ban. But as you are residing and working in Old Hostigos, the agents of Styphon's House may see it otherwise, so there will be bribes to be paid and additional men-at-arms to be hired. Does this meet with your approval?
"Yes, as long as you understand that this is lead we are talking about and not silver or gold."
"Speaking of silver and gold, Lady Eldra, I must make it clear that our return will be even more dangerous than our coming and we will wish to travel light."
"Plain speaking, you wish to be paid in gold."
"Now you are speaking my
tongue, Lady Eldra!"
Eldra brought up her purse and dropped a dozen gold Hostigos Crowns onto the table. The trader's eyes shined as brightly as the golden coins.
"Truly, by all the True Gods, you read my innermost thoughts. Yet," he added, pointing to the coins with the crossed halberds on the obverse and Ptosphes' image on the face, "with all your skills at casting might it not serve us both better if these coins were transformed into some image-well, less offensive-in the eyes of Styphon's priestly agents. Men of commerce love gold in all its myriad forms, but priests are different that way."
"Yes, that is agreeable, Trader. Now as to price. In the past, we have paid one piece of silver and ten coppers for each ingot-"
"Impossible, my Ladies. With all this fighting, lead is becoming as scarce as your most precious of metals. Why in Harphax City I saw a lead ingot sell for ten pieces of silver. To cart it all the way here over mountains and past Styphon's plague of agents, well, I think two golden Rakmars for each ingot is only fair."
"Two Rakmars-highway robbery!" Eldra shouted. "At those prices we could use silver to cast our molds and save money. We two are not Sastra-gathi bumpkins who have never seen a city before, Trader. We are Ladies of birth and breeding from a city of such antiquity that your forefathers were herding cattle in the Cold Lands while ours were trading iron for gold with the Ros-Zarthani in the far west."
"Forgive me, if I inadvertently insulted a Lady of breeding, but my wife and four children would never forgive me were I to be picked up by Roxthar's Investigators-mistakenly, of course-and burned in boiling pitch for trading in Hos-Hostigos. Were I, however, to end this life, leaving behind a substantial sum, I could acquit myself in Dralm's Hall with honor. What do you say to one gold Rakmar and twelve pieces of silver?"