The Virgin of Zesh & the Tower of Zanid

by L. Sprague De Camp

  “But besides our own strong left arms we have something new. ’Tis a weapon of such fell puissance that a herd of wild bishtars could not stand before it! If all goes well ’twill be ready by Fiveday’s drill—three days hence. Prepare yourselves for stirring action!

  “Now, another matter, my chicks. The Juru Company’s notorious in Zanid’s guard for lack of uniform—wherefore you’re not to be blamed. By your weird diversity of form you defeat the very purpose of a uniform. However, some measure must be taken, lest you find yourselves upon the field of furious battle without means of telling friend from foe, and so be swallowed in confusion and swept into ill-deserved oblivion by your own side’s ignorant arms, as happened to Sir Zidzuresh in the legend.

  “I’ve searched the arsenal and found this pile of ancient helms. ’Tis true they be badly scarred by the subtle demon of rust, albeit the armorers have ground and scoured them to oust the worst corrosion. But at least they’re all of a pattern, and in want of other means of identification they’ll distinguish the heroes of the Juru as well as protect your skulls.

  “In addition, the proper uniform of the Juru Company—as well you know—comprises a red jacket with one white band sewn to the right sleeve, and not these trifling brassards you wear on patrol. Therefore if any of you hath aught in his closet that could serve this vital turn, let him bring it forth. Its cut matters little, so that it be red. Then set you your sisters and jagainis to sewing white bands upon the sleeves. No petty foppery is this—your lives may hang upon your diligence in giving substance to this command!

  “One more matter, also a thing of weight and moment. It hath come to the government’s keen and multitudinous ears that agents of the accursed Ghuur do slink like spooks about our sacred city. Guard, then, your tongues, and watch lest any fellow citizen display unwonted curiosity in manners of no just concern to him! If we catch one of these rascals in his slimy turpitudes, his fate shall make the historian’s pen to shake and the reader thereof to shudder in generations to come!

  “Now form a line for the fitting and distribution of these antique sconces, and may you wear them like the heroes stout who bore them in the great days of yore!”

  As he lined up to get his helmet, Fallon reflected that Kordaq had not been very discreet himself that morning. It also occurred to him what a fine joke it would be if he, Anthony Fallon, were killed because of some of the information that he had sold to the opposing side.

  Fallon was lured into Savaich’s on his way home, and spent hours there talking and drinking with his cronies. Therefore he again slept late the following morning and hastened to cross the city to pick up Fredro at the Terrao.

  It seemed to him that a subtle excitement ran through the city. On the omnibus, he caught snatches of conversation about the new events:

  “. . . aye, sir, ’tis said the Jungava have a force of bishtars, twice the size of ours, which can be driven in wild stampede through the lines of their foes . . .” “Methinks our generals are fools, to send our boys off to the distant prairies to fight. ’Twere better to wait until the foe’s here, and meet them upon our own ground . . .” “All this stir and armament is but a provocation to Ghuur of Uriiq. Did we but remain tranquil, sir, he’d never bethink himself of us . . .” “Nay, ’tis a weak and degenerate age, sir. In our grandsires’ time we’d have spat in the barbarian’s face . . .”

  Fallon found the archeologist typing on his little portable an article in his native language, which, as Fallon glanced over his shoulder, seemed to consist mainly of z’s, j’s, and w’s. Fredro’s chin and lip were still adorned with the mustache and goatee, which he had simply forgotten to remove.

  Fallon nagged his man until the latter came out of his fog, and they walked to the shop of Ve’qir the Exclusive. After an hour’s wait they set out, with their robes in a bundle under Fredro’s arm, for Fallon’s home. The omnibus was clopping past Zanid’s main park, south of the House of Judgment between the Gabánj and the Bácha, when Fredro gripped Fallon’s arm and pointed.

  “Look!” he cried. “Is zoological garden!”

  “Well?” said Fallon. “I know it.”

  “But I do not! Have not seen! Let us get off, yes? We can look at animals and have the lunch there.”

  Without waiting for Fallon to argue, the Pole leaped up from his seat and plunged down the stairs to the rear of the vehicle. Fallon followed, dubiously.

  Presently they were wandering past cages containing yekis, shaihans, kargans, bishtars, and other denizens of the Krishnan wilds. Fredro asked, “What is crowd? Must be a something unusual.”

  A mass of Krishnans had collected in front of a cage. In the noon heat most of them had discarded shawls and tunics and were nude but for loincloths or skirts and footgear. The Earthmen walked toward them. They could not see what was in the cage for the mass of people, but over the heads of these an extra-large sign was fastened to the bars. Fallon, with effort, translated:

  BLAK BER; URSO NEGRO

  Habitat: Yunaisteits, Nortamcrika, Terra

  “Oh,” said Fallon. “I remember him. I wrote the story in the Rashm when he arrived as a cub. He’s Kir’s pride and joy. Kir wanted to bring an elephant from Earth, but the freight on even a baby elephant was too much for the treasury.”

  “But what is?”

  “An American black bear. If you want to elbow through this crowd to look at one fat, sleepy, and perfectly ordinary bear . . .”

  “I see, I see. Let us look at the other things.”

  They were hanging over the edge of the ’avval tank, and watching the ten-meter crocodile-snakes swimming back and forth in it—one end of a given ’avval would be swimming back while the other was swimming forth—when a skirling sound made itself evident.

  Fallon looked around and said, “Oy! Watch out—here comes the king! Damn—I should have remembered he comes here almost daily to feed the animals!”

  Fredro paid no attention, being absorbed in extracting from his right eye a speck of dust that the wind had wafted into it.

  XII

  The sound of the royal pipers and drummer grew louder, and presently the whole procession swung into sight around a bend in one of the paths. First came the three pipers and the drummer. The pipers blew on instruments something like Scottish bagpipes but more complicated; the drummer beat a pair of copper kettle-drums. After them came six tall guards in gilded cuirasses, two with ivory-inlaid crossbows over their shoulders, two with halberds, and two with great two-handed swords.

  In the midst of them walked a very tall Krishnan of advanced years, helping himself along with a jeweled walking-stick. He was dressed in garments of considerable magnificence, but put on all awry. His stocking-cap turban was loosely wound; his gold-embroidered jacket had the laces tangled; and his boots did not match. Behind the guards trailed a half-dozen miscellaneous civilians, their clothes rippling in the breeze.

  The crowd of Krishnans around the bear cage had dispersed at the first sound of the pipes. Now there were only a few Krishnans in sight, and these were sinking to one knee.

  Fallon yanked Fredro’s arm. “Kneel down, you damned fool!”

  “What?” Fredro looked out of a red and watery eye from which he had at last dislodged the foreign particle. “Me kneel? I am citizen of P-Polish Republic, good as anybody else . . .”

  Fallon half-drew his rapier. “You kneel, old boy, or I’ll bloody well let some of the stuffing out of you!”

  Grumbling, Fredro complied. But, as the band went past, the tall, eccentrically clad Krishnan said something sharp. The procession halted. King Kir was staring fixedly at the face of Dr. Julian Fredro, who imperturbably returned the stare.

  “So!” cried the king at last. “ ’Tis the cursed Shurgez, come back to mock me! And wearing my stolen beard, I’ll be bound! I’ll trounce the pugging pajock in seemly style!”

  Instantly the gaggle of trailing civilians began to close in around the king, all chattering soothing statements at once. Kir, paying them no h
eed, grasped his staff in both hands and tugged. It transpired that this was a sword-cane. Out came the sword, and the Dour of Balhib rushed at Fredro, point first.

  “Run!” yelled Fallon, doing so without waiting to see if Fredro had the sense to follow.

  At the first bend in the path, Fallon risked a glance to the rear. Fredro was several paces behind him. After him came Kir; and after the king came pipers, drummer, guards, and keepers strung out along the path and all shouting advice as to how to subdue the mad monarch without committing lèse majesté.

  Fallon ran on. He had been to the zoo only twice during his stay in Zanid and so did not know the ground plan well. Hence when he came to an intersection, and the path ahead seemed to lead between two cages, he kept right on going.

  Too late, he realized that this was a service path leading to a locked door in each of the flanking cages; beyond that point, the path ceased. The ground sloped sharply up to a rocky crag that formed the back of both inclosures. One could climb up this slope a few meters only before it became too steep for further ascent. At the topmost point that could be reached, the bars of qong-wood that formed the cage stood only about two meters high, as the slope of the rock inside the cage at this point was too steep for the inmates of the cage to scale.

  Fallon looked back. Despite his age, Fredro was still close behind him. King Kir was just galloping into the service way with gleaming blade. There was no way to go but up the slope.

  Up Fallon went until he was using his hands. Where a hint of a ledge provided a toe hold, he looked down. Fredro was right below him, and the king was just starting to climb, while the royal retinue ran after and a horde of shouting spectators converged from all quarters. Fallon could of course have drawn his own sword and beaten off the king’s attack; but had he done so, the guards—seeing him in combat with their demented lord—would have plugged him on general principles.

  The only way out seemed at this point to be over the fence and into one of the cages. Fallon had not had time to read the signs on the fronts of the cages, and from where he now stood he could see only the backs of these signs. The right-hand cage held a pair of kargáns, medium-sized carnivores related to the larger yeki. These might well prove dangerous if their cage were invaded by strangers. Whatever was in the left-hand cage, it was at the moment withdrawn into its cave at the back.

  Fallon grasped the tops of the bars on the left and heaved himself up. Though he was getting on in years, the less-than-Terran gravity, plus the fear of death, enabled him to hoist himself to the top of the fence, which he straddled. He held out a hand to the panting Fredro who, he noticed, still clutched the bundle containing the priestly robes. Fredro passed this bundle to Fallon, who dropped it on the inside of the fence. The bundle struck the nearly level rock at the base of the fence, then tipped over the edge and slid down the smooth slope until it stopped at a ledge.

  With Fallon’s help, Fredro also hauled himself to the top, then dropped down inside just as King Kir appeared outside the bars. Clutching a cage bar to keep himself from slipping, the Dour thrust his sword between the bars.

  As the blade flicked out, the two Earthmen slid off down the slope as the bundle had done, stopping on the same ledge. Here Fredro collapsed in a heap from exhaustion.

  Behind them rose the yell of the mad monarch: “Come back, ye thievish slabberers, and receive your just guerdon!”

  The retinue, having sorted itself out from the mere spectators, was climbing up after their king. As Fallon watched, they surrounded Kir, soothing and flattering, until presently the whole crowd was climbing back down the slope and walking out from between the two cages. The guards shooed the curious out of the way, and the royal party set off, the pipers tootling again and the king completely surrounded by keepers.

  “Now if we can only get out . . .” said Fallon, looking around for a path.

  The rock was too steep and slippery to climb up the way they had come down; but at one end, the ledge ran into a mass of irregular rock that provided means of descent to a point from which it should be an easy jump to the floor of the inclosure.

  A little knot of park officials had collected at the front of the cage, and seemed to be arguing the proper method of disposing of their unintended captives, gesticulating at one another with Latin verve. Around and behind them, the crowd of spectators had closed in again following the passage of the king.

  Fredro, having gotten his wind back and recovered from his unwonted exertions, rose, picked up the bundle, and started along the ledge saying, “Not good—not good if this was found, yes?” He panted some more. Then: “What—ah—what does ‘shurgez’ mean, Mr. Fallon? The king shouted it at me again and again.”

  “Shurgez was a knight from Mikardand who cut off Kir’s beard, so our balmy king has been sensitive on the subject ever since. It never occurred to me that that little goatee of yours would set him off—I say, look who’s here!”

  A thunderous snarl made both men recoil back against the rock. Out from the cave at the back of the cage, its six lizardy legs moving like clockwork, came the biggest shan that Fallon had ever seen. The saucer eyes picked out Fallon and Fredro on their ledge.

  Fredro cried, “Why did you not pick safer cage?”

  “How in Qondyor’s name was I to know? If you’d shaved your beard as I told you . . .”

  “He can reach up! What do now?”

  “Prepare to die like a man, I suppose,” said Fallon, drawing his sword.

  “But I have no weapon!”

  “Unfortunate, what?”

  The Krishnans in front of the cage yelled and screamed, though whether they were trying to distract the shan or were cheering it on to the assault, Fallon could not tell. As for the shan, it ambled around to the section of the inclosure where the Earthmen were trapped and reared up against the rock so that its head came on a level with the men.

  Fallon stood, ready to thrust as far as his limited footing allowed. The park keepers in front were shouting something at him, but he did not dare to take his eyes from the carnivore.

  The jaws gaped and closed in. Fallon thrust at them. The shan clomped shut on the blade and, with a quick sideways jerk of its head tore the weapon from Fallon’s hand and sent it spinning across the inclosure. The beast gave a terrific snarl. As it opened its jaws again, Fallon saw that the blade had wounded it slightly. Brown blood drooled from its lower jaw.

  The monster drew back its head and gaped for a final lunge—and then a bucketful of liquid fell upon Fallon from above. As he blinked and sputtered, he heard Fredro beside him getting the same treatment, and became aware of a horrid stench, like that of the sheep-dip.

  The shan, after jerking back its head in surprise, now thrust it forward again, gave a sniff, and dropped back down on all sixes with a disgusted snort. Then it walked back into its cave.

  Fallon looked around. Behind and above him a couple of zookeepers were holding a ladder against the outside of the fence at the point where Fallon and Fredro had scaled it. A third Krishnan had climbed the ladder and emptied the buckets of liquid upon the Earthmen below him. He was now handing the second bucket to one of his mates preparatory to climbing back down the ladder.

  Another Krishnan, lower down the slope, called through the bars, “Hasten down, my masters, and we’ll let ye out the gate. The smell will hold yon shan.”

  “What is the stuff?” asked Fallon, scrambling down.

  “Aliyab juice. The beast loathes the stench thereof, wherefore we sprinkle a trace of it upon our garments when we wish to enter its cage.”

  Fallon picked up his sword and hurried out the gate, which the keepers opened. He neither knew nor cared what aliyab juice was, but he did think that his rescuers might have been a little less generous in their application of it. Fredro’s bundle was soaked, and the Krishnan paper, which had little water resistance, had begun to disintegrate.

  A couple of the keepers closed in, hinting that a tip would be welcome as a reward for the rescue. Fallon, somew
hat irked, felt like telling them to go to Hishkak, and that he was thinking of suing the city for letting him be chased into the cage in the first place. But that would be a foolish bluff, as Balhib had not yet attained that degree of civilization where a government allows a citizen to sue it. And they had saved his life.

  “These blokes want some money,” he said to Fredro. “Shall we make up a purse for them to divide?”

  “I take care of this,” said Fredro. “You are working for me, so I am responsible. Is matter of Polish honor.”

  He handed Fallon a whole fistful of gold pieces, telling him to give them to the head keeper to be divided evenly among those who took part in the rescue. Fallon, only too willing to allow the honor of the Polish Republic to meet the cost of rescue, did so. Then he said to Fredro, “Come along. We shall have to work hard to get all this stuff memorized.”

  Behind them, a furious dispute broke out among the keepers over the division of the money. The Earthmen boarded another omnibus and squeezed into the first seats they found.

  For a while, the vehicle clattered westward along the northern part of the Bacha. Presently Fallon noticed that several seats around both Fredro and himself had become vacant. He moved over to where Fredro sat.

  Across the aisle, a gaudily dressed Zanidu with a sword at his hip was sprinkling perfume on a handkerchief, which he then held to his nose, glaring at Fallon and Fredro over this improvised respirator. Another craned his neck to look back at the two Earthmen in a marked manner through a lorgnette. And finally a small spectacled fellow got up and spoke to the conductor.

  The latter came forward, sniffed, and said to Fallon, “Ye must get off, Earthmen.”

  “Why?” said Fallon.

  “Because ye be making this omnibus untenable by your foul effluvium.”

  “What he say?” said Fredro, for the conductor had spoken too fast in the city dialect for the archeologist to follow.

  “He says we’re stinking up his bus and have to get off.”