The Elf stroked the package lying on the table thoughtfully, clearly looking for traces of magic. Tangorn held his breath: the dragon approached the bait and sniffed it warily.
Actually he had nothing to fear – physically, the package was clean and trick-free.
He smirked: “I hope you can detect the absence of poisons or directed magic without opening the package?”
“I’ll manage somehow…” Elandar hefted the package. “This weighs almost half a pound, and I clearly detect metal inside… quite a bit of metal. What else is there beside the message?”
“The message is wrapped in several layers of thick silver foil, so that it can’t be magically read from outside.” The Elf nodded almost imperceptibly. “The outer cover is sackcloth; the knots of the cords tying it are sealed and have metal rings woven into them right under the seals. It is impossible to secretly open such packaging: one can neither boil the wax away, since it’s too deeply infused into the sackcloth, nor carefully slice the seals away with a thin hot blade – the rings are in the way. This is how they seal government mail in Khand, and I know of no method that’s more secure. Another precaution is that the knots that secure the rings are unlikely to be known to any Elves. Please observe.”
With those words Tangorn quickly tied a piece of string around the handle of a fruit knife and handed it to Elandar. The Elf tried to figure out the elaborate pattern, then gave up with obvious displeasure: “One of the local marine knots?”
“Not at all. It’s just that the Elves are very conservative and only use a single knot to tie string to a bow, whereas there are at least three such knots, of which this is one.”
Elandar stuffed the package inside his jacket in annoyance and examined the knot again.
Sure, it’s annoying for a member of the higher race to fail at such a trifle. Tangorn froze, afraid to believe his eyes. The dragon swallowed the bait… he did… gulped it, munched, gobbled, wolfed it down! Suddenly, as if sensing the happy jumble of thought and emotion in his mind, the Elf raised his gaze and stared the baron in the eye. With horror Tangorn felt an irresistible force pull him inside the slits of Elandar’s bottomless pupils, felt cold fingers picking through his soul with habitual disgust… Even a small child knows you can’t look the dragon in the eye! He pulled away with all the power of his despair; so does a fox spring out of the steel trap, leaving behind scraps of hide, bits of flesh with shards of broken bones, and ragged sinews. I know nothing – I’m a messenger, nothing more! The pain was terrible, almost physical, and then it was suddenly over – he managed to free himself… or did the Elf just let him go? Then he heard Elandar’s voice, muffled as if in a dream:
“That you hate us is immaterial: politics bring even stranger bedmates together. But you’re hiding something dangerous and important about this package, and that is really bad. What if all that’s inside is some local state secret like the Umbarian fire recipe or one of the Admiralty’s maps, and the DSD is waiting at the door to send me off to the galleys for thirty years or so, or perhaps straight to the Ar-Horan gallows, it being wartime and all? Wouldn’t it be nice to have me arrested for espionage, eh?”
“That’s not so…” Tangorn objected feebly, unable to open his eyes; his tongue was leaden, and he felt like either vomiting or just dying. I wonder if this is what a woman feels after rape?
“Not so?” the Elf grunted. “Perhaps. Still, it seems to me that your little gift stinks!”
The dragon didn’t even consider swallowing the bait; all he did was sniff it lazily and drag it back to his lair, just in case, there to lie forever amidst shards of broken armor of those who had dared challenge the monster, kings’ crowns, golden chalices from leveled cities, and skeletons of fair maidens…
It’s over, Tangorn realized: he had lost the most important fight of his entire life. As Eru is his witness, he did everything humanly possible, but at the last moment Fortune turned away from him… him and Haladdin. Does this mean that he was mistaken and the Higher Powers do not approve of their mission?
In the meantime Algali came back to their room – it was time to wrap up. Elandar, having turned into a refined gentleman again, amused his companions with a fresh joke, complained about urgent business forcing him to abandon this pleasant company (“No, Baron, by no means should you accompany me; better spend another ten minutes or so here with Algali”), filled their glasses from a pocket flask (“To our success, Baron! This is real Elvish wine, nothing like the swill they sell at Elfstone, believe me”), drank the dark ruby liquid in a single draught, put the half-mask back on his face and headed out.
Tangorn and Algali sat across from each other in silence for a couple of minutes, the untouched goblets like border markers on the table between them. Dear Elandar is making sure I’m not following him, the baron thought lazily. I wonder if mister junior secretary knows that I can get out of this restaurant any minute through the restroom window? He could, although that’s unlikely… The thing is – I don’t need it any more.
What a rotten trick did I play on you, lad, he thought suddenly when he met the childishly open gaze of the ‘carrier of unsuitable information.’ Maybe that’s why the Higher Powers have turned away from me? Now it turns out that I swam in that indelible muck – with you and the guy at 4 Lamp Street – for no good reason. I played a trick on you, they played one on me; as usual, the gods have the last laugh.
“You know, I’ll sit here for a while longer, but you should make legs as fast as you can, if you value your life. Your Elvish friends have sentenced you to death. I suggest using the restroom window – someone your size will squeeze through with no difficulty.”
“Even if I believed you,” the youth answered disdainfully, “I would not have accepted salvation from you.”
“Really? Why?”
“Because you are an Enemy. You fight on the side of Darkness, so your every word is a lie, and your every deed is evil by definition.”
“You’re mistaken, lad,” Tangorn sighed wearily. “I’m on neither the Dark nor the Light side. If you need a label, I’m on the side of many colors.”
“There is no such side, Baron,” Algali bit out, and his eyes flashed. “The Battle of Battles is coming, Dagor-Dagorlad, and everybody – yes, everybody! – will have to make a choice between Light and Dark. Whoever is not with us is against us!”
“That’s a lie – such a side exists, very much so.” Tangorn was not smiling any more. “If I’m fighting for anything, it’s for this precious Dagor-Dagorlad of yours to never happen.
I’m fighting for the right of those of many colors to remain such without getting dragged into this total mobilization of yours. And speaking of Light and Dark – I suppose your master represents the Light?”
“He’s my Teacher, not my master!”
“Fine. Now look at this.” With these words he took a piece of white quartz-like stone attached to a silver chain out of his pocket. “This is an Elvish poison detector – ever seen one?”
When immersed into their goblets, the stone gave off an ominous purple light.
“Judging by the color, this poison works in about half an hour. All right, I’m an enemy, but is poisoning one’s Pupil a tradition of the forces of Light?”
Tangorn never expected what happened next: Algali snatched the nearest goblet, raised it to his lips and drained it before the baron could grab his arm.
“You’re lying!” The youth’s face became pale and inspired, filled with otherworldly exultation. “And if not, then so what: it means that it’s necessary to our Cause.”
“Thank you, lad,” the baron said after a minute’s stupor. “You don’t even know how much you just helped me…”
He headed to the exit without saying goodbye, but paused at the door for one last look at the doomed fanatic. Scary to even think of what will happen to Middle Earth should these boys prevail. Maybe I didn’t play my part too well, but at least I played for the right team.
…Jacuzzi mustered enough self-
control not to hang out in front the Green Mackerel himself, relying on the pros from the surveillance team. Neither Tangorn’s contact with the Elvish underground nor the identity of his interlocutor concerned the Vice-Director of DSD at the moment. He knew that the fates of both the Republic and himself hinged on one thing only: Tangorn’s next destination. Will he go right or left, to the port or to New Town? He knew that but could do nothing about it, so all he did was pray to all the gods he knew: to the One, to the Sun-faced, to the Unnamed, even to Eru-Ilúvatar of the northern barbarians and to Udugvu the Great Snake. What else could he do? So when he finally heard: “The target has left the restaurant heading to New Town,” his first thought was: which one of them had listened to my prayers? Or perhaps God is, indeed, one, and it’s just that He has different cover stories and code names for different countries?
The surveillance team leader reported, concerned: “The streets are already empty while the target is very careful. Tracking him will be exceedingly difficult…”
“…and not really necessary,” Jacuzzi finished for him and laughed; the Vice-Director knew with certainty now that Fortune was on his side, and the anticipation of victory – sweeter even than victory itself – filled him to bursting. “Pull back all surveillance and tell the capture team to switch to Plan B.”
CHAPTER 53
Umbar, 7 Jasper Street
Night of June 27, 3019
Jasper Street was deserted at night, but the habit of checking for a tail was impossible to shake. Tangorn smirked: if anyone was tracking him, he had an unenviable task. This was not the port with its ever-milling crowds, but a respectable aristocratic neighborhood whose streets held about as many people outside after dark as the Moon shining down on them.
But in reality, who would need him now that the idiot Marandil has been arrested? More importantly, does he need himself? Does Alviss? What he does need now is a quiet hideout where he can sit and meditate on the following: did he fail to win at the Green Mackerel, or did he not want to win? At the last moment, was he afraid of a victory, remembering his unspoken deal with the Higher Powers: the end of the mission would be the end of his earthly life? Not that he was afraid then, no – it’s just that at the cusp of his duel with Elandar he couldn’t grit his teeth and do it even against his will. It was not strength or skill he was short of then, not even luck – no, just plain persistence and doggedness…
Thinking these thoughts, he had reached the jewelry shop of the honorable Chakti-Vari (a bronze snake on the door informed potential thieves that the place was being guarded by king cobras, as was the Vendotenian custom; any doubters were welcome to check), crossed the street, checked for surveillance again and opened the little door in the eight-foot limestone wall with his own key. Alviss’ two-storey house was deep inside the garden, at the end of a sand path. The dashes of silver liberally applied by the Moon to the oleanders’ waxy leaves made the shadows under the bushes even darker, and the cicadas were singing a deafening chorus… whereas those who were waiting for the baron in the moonlit garden could easily hide on a freshly mowed lawn in the middle of the day and walk noiselessly across a creaky wooden floor covered with dry leaves. Not surprisingly, the blow to the back of the head (a large sock filled with sand – cheap and effective) took him unawares.
Plunged into darkness, Tangorn did not see several black-robed figures gathering over him; nor did he see another set of figures, their robes of a slightly different cut, coalesce out of the night around them. He did not see what happened next, either – not that he would have made much sense of it: a nin’yokve fight is not something an amateur can follow. It mostly resembles the chaotic dance of a pile of dry leaves blown up by a gust of wind; the battle rages in absolute, totally unnatural silence, broken only by the sound of connecting blows.
When seven or eight minutes later the baron was yanked out of his unconsciousness by the nauseating stink of smelling salts, it was all over. Once he opened his eyes, a robed man took the vial away from his face and stepped away without a word. His back was against something hard and uncomfortable; in a couple of seconds he realized that he had been carried up to the house entrance and propped against the stairs. The robed men moved quickly and noiselessly about; the ones in a large spot of moonlight right then were dragging a man-sized sack with a pair of soft boots sticking out of it. Two people were talking somewhere behind Tangorn, one with a drawl of a Peninsula man; Tangorn kept his head motionless and strained to hear.
“…nothing but corpses. We netted one, but he managed to poison himself.”
“Yeah… disappointing, to put it mildly. How did this happen?”
“I’ve never met tougher guys. We have two dead and two maimed, first time I can remember such losses.”
“Who?”
“Jango and Ritva.”
“Damn!.. Write a report. No traces here in five minutes.”
“Yes, sir.”
Approaching footsteps rustled across the grass, and a tall slender man appeared before Tangorn. Unlike the others, he was dressed in civilian clothes, but he, too, was hooded.
“How do you feel, Baron?”
“I’ve been worse, thank you. To what do I owe the pleasure?..”
“A special team of Aragorn’s people tried to capture you, probably for a debrief and a liquidation. We interfered, but we’re not counting on your gratitude, as I’m sure you understand.”
“Oh, so I was used as bait!” Having said ‘bait,’ the baron laughed sarcastically, but cut it short due to a stab of pain in the back of his head. “Are you DSD?”
“I’m not familiar with this acronym, nor is this important. I have bad news for you, Baron: tomorrow you’ll be charged with murder.”
“Of Gondorian spies?”
“I wish! No, of an Umbarian citizen Algali, whom you’ve poisoned tonight at the Green Mackerel.”
“I see. Why wait until tomorrow?”
“Because, for several reasons, my service is not interested in your revelations to the investigators or the courts. You have until noon tomorrow to leave Umbar forever. Should you delay and wind up in jail, please don’t blame us for assuring your silence by other means. Honorable Kantaridis’s caravan is leaving tomorrow morning via Chevelgar
Highway with a couple of available bactrians. The border guards will receive your description with an appropriate delay. Is everything clear, Baron?”
“All but one thing. The easiest solution would be to liquidate me right now. Why not?”
“Professional solidarity,” smiled the hooded man. “Besides, I really like your takatos.”
The garden was almost empty by now, the robed figures having vanished into the darkness whence they came without a sound. The hooded stranger followed his men, but right before disappearing forever into shadow between the oleanders he turned and said: “By the way, Baron, another bit of free advice – tread carefully until you’ve left Umbar. I’ve followed you today all the way from the Long Dam, and I can’t help but feel that you’ve used up your entire store of luck. One can feel such things instantly; I’m not joking, believe me.”
It did look like his store of luck was empty. Well, that depends: today he lost to everyone –the Elves, Aragorn’s men, the DSD – but managed to stay alive. No, wait – actually, he was allowed to live, that’s different. Or did he dream up the whole thing? The garden is empty, no one to ask but the cicadas… He got up and knew right away that he did not dream up the blow to the head, at least: pain and nausea sloshed around in his skull at about the ear level.
He put his hand inside his jacket to find the key and felt the warm metal of the mithril mail, which he had put on back at the bank, for extra protection before meeting Elandar. Yeah, it did help a lot today, right…
The moment he managed to insert the key into the keyhole, the door opened and he faced the sleepy butler, a huge phlegmatic Haradi named Unkva; Tina, scared, was peering from behind his shoulder. He moved inside past the servants; Alviss, closing her robe as
she ran down the stairs, was already near.
“Goodness, what happened? Are you wounded?”
“No, just a little drunk.” Dizziness hit him with such force that he had to lean against a wall.
“Was just passing by, thought I’d call on you for old times’ sake…”
“Liar…” she sniffled, and her arms went around his neck, leaving the wide sleeves behind.
“God, how I’m tired of you…”
…They lay side by side, barely touching, and his hand glided slowly from her neck down to the curve of her thigh – carefully, as if not to brush off the silvery moonlight.
He finally mustered the courage to say: “Aly!” and she, somehow understanding immediately what he was about to say, sat up slowly, hugging her knees and putting her head down on them. Words stuck in his throat; he touched her arm and felt her moving away a tiny distance that he would now have to spend the rest of his life crossing, without any guarantee that it would be enough time. That was how she was: constitutionally incapable of making a scene, she could be silent in a manner that made him feel like a total bastard for a week… and that’s exactly what you are, Baron. Didn’t she have some sort of a matrimonial prospect on the horizon before you showed up? She’s no little girl, she’s almost thirty… you’re an asshole, Baron, an indifferent selfish asshole.
“Your Secret Service courteously gave me until tomorrow noon to quit Umbar forever, or they’ll just kill me. I’m in their sights and can’t escape. So it goes, Aly…” He thought: this is probably how men tell their mistresses that they can’t see them while their wives are suspecting something; he almost cringed with self-disgust.
“You seem to be justifying yourself, Tan. Why? I understand – it’s just Fate. And don’t worry about me,” she raised her head and suddenly gave a quiet laugh, “I was more farsighted this time around.”
The Last Ringbearer (2011) Page 33