Gary Gygax - Dangerous Journeys 3 - Death in Delhi

by Gary Gygax

  Rachelle smiled. "It is a vision unreachable for most. I will serve you. Ah, but Lady Sujata, a moment! Doesn't the great goddess you are sworn to take umbrage at making a pact with the lords of the netherrealms?"

  "Don't be silly. Why should black Kali object to my service to darkness? She may slay some dwellers therein, but it is her own place as well. I further her aims by being both a sworn witch and priestess of the goddess Kali!"

  Rachelle stood up, inclined her head. "I will serve you as you command. Great Lady Witch."

  "Of course you will take an oath to that effect."

  "I swear my fealty and pledge my bond by Neith the Huntress."

  Now the pirimah arose. "Not good enough. Follow me." She led the amazon into her bedroom. There she opened a tall cupboard, drew forth a box, and from inside it took out various items. "Hold out your hand." There was hardly a tremble as Rachelle thrust forth her little hand. "Pretty, but too calloused," Sujata observed as she used a lancet to pierce the tip of one of the fingers she grasped firmly. When a drop welled up as if it were a ruby bead, she touched a little doll to it. Now the figurine had a crimson mark upon its breast. "I place this upon the alter of Kali. Do you place yourself in the arms of the Black Goddess thus?"

  "Yes," Rachelle whispered. She could say nothing else.

  The witch used some charm to search for deception, then cast an augury to see if that revealed any duplicity. Neither means showed anything other than an unyielding determination on the part of the young warrior. "Then you are bound to her and to me. If you betray your oath, Kali's vengeance will take you—if my own fails, which I doubt."

  —— 12 ——

  DENIZENS OF DELHI

  He arose and left their rooms so quietly that even the catlike senses of the amazon were not alerted to Inhetep's departure. He didn't concern himself with the sleeping Rachelle, for she had had her instructions, knew her work well— almost as well as he, the magister thought to himself with a satisfied grin. She looked so beautiful and childlike where she lay, but woe to the foe who thought she was vulnerable! Slipping out the door, the magister avoided the sentinel, heading for the rear portion of the palace. Surprisingly, he felt thirsty and a trifle hungry too, so Inhetep located the royal kitchens and asked for tea and something to eat. Wide-eyed, a scullion ran off to bring a cook, who in turn fled upon seeing the /Egyptian standing there. The pantler begged his forgiveness, at least, before hurrying away to find the steward.

  "Please come this way, Sahib Magister," that 189

  worthy intoned. "I will have a morning room prepared, a proper repast ready in but a brief time."

  "Pish! You'll do nothing of the sort. Ill not budge from here. Listen carefully. I desire a big glass of tea and some food—bread will do. I want that brought to me here, now!"

  The wizard-priest tapped his foot in impatience as the steward went around in confusion tiying to comply with the foreigner's strange orders even while making that part of the kitchen complex into something resembling a proper place for an aristocratic guest of the ma-harajah's to break his fast. Inhetep forbore scolding. He understood that the steward feared for his head if he displeased him or displeased his monarch by not treating a guest properly. The process was creating an ever greater uproar without increased promise of fulfilling the magister's instructions. Inhetep walked into the next room. Behind him there was a babble of shouting and the commotion of a dozen people trying to do their best to be in the same spot at the same time. The steward, pantler, cook, and baker were each demanding he be obeyed immediately. Thus, none noticed the departure of the one who had created the bedlam.

  "Ill have that," Setne said firmly as he passed a startled worker and plucked a wooden bowl filled with a steaming, aromatic morning tea from him. He quaffed it off in big gulps as he continued along to another room, grabbed and ate a radish as he passed through. Outside finally, he found himself in the yard where ovens yielded flat loafs of bread. In fact, there was a whole pile of bread in his path. He snatched the top one and pulled it into two portions. "Wonderful!" the magister exclaimed as he sniffed at the fresh odor. "And it has onions baked into it, too. Perfect!" He stuffed a big hunk in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. "Ahh." He ate more, but after the loaf was about half gone, he had had enough.

  Despite raised eyebrows, Inhetep managed to find and exit the palace compound through the rear servant's entrance. He was clad in the simple garb of a Hindi working man, but his towering height and copper-hued complexion set him apart at a single glance. Ignoring the uneasy glances of those who passed, the magister used his long legs to effect. Inhetep still held the hunk of onion-laden bread. In the space of a few minutes, he was many streets and a whole world removed from the splendor of the Maharajah Sivadji's tightly guarded fortress.

  Seeing a grubby child with skinny limbs and a big belly standing in the street before him, the magister went a little out of his way to hand the boy the remains of his breakfast. "Here, lad, take this." The urchin grabbed the bread and ran off clutching his prize. Not knowing whether to laugh with shared joy at the boy's good fortune or cry at the conditions which allowed such abject poverty, the wizard-priest simply dusted his hands and walked on. If there were those who decried the near-absoluteness of the monarchy of Pharaoh, he thought, they would laud it after seeing what a true despot brings to his subjects. Only the determined could find a way to starve in /Egypt. Between industry and the many charities of temple and fraternal societies, not one in a thousand lacked sufficient, if plain, food. "Like bread and onions," he said aloud as he turned a corner suddenly.

  Of course he was being followed. Inhetep's sixth sense had informed him, not that he actually needed such intelligence. Common sense told the wizard-priest that the maharajah and other officials would put their agents on his trail to watch where he went. With his legs moving very quickly now, he covered the ground between the corner and a narrow passage before anyone following could get a view of him. Then Setne ducked into the gangway and broke into a lope, bent over so as to minimize his height. One or two startled pedestrians hastily withdrew from his path. There was an even smaller adit angling off to the right. Inhetep jogged into it, followed it to where it branched into two dead ends, then went left and up a steep flight of stairs, almost lost in the deep shadows of this nearly lightless place where only a little rectangle of sky far overhead allowed day to show.

  "Perfect," he panted aloud. There wasn't a soul in sight to hear him or to see what he was about to do. His ploy was as obvious in its own way as those following him. That is, whomever was trailing after him would know he was a practitioner of heka and expect him to use it to alter his appearance. Once it was certain that he had managed to get away from constant surveillance, some device to detect mag-ickal disguise or change would be used to attempt to locate him again. "Time for the alteration," he murmured. Less than a minute later, he was again Chandgar. He drew a strip of blue cotton from his baggy loincloth, replacing the white turban he wore with a blue one by wrapping the long strip around his head. The casting which altered his physical appearance also blanketed the wizard-priest in such a way as to conceal emanations from his person. Thus, he would be nearly invisible to searches for aural or magickal radiation. Too invisible, and thus visible—unless there were decoys.

  The magister came back along his trail to the small passage. There he turned right, so as to continue away from the route which brought him to the hidden spot. Now none of the people he met gave him a second look, for he was just another Hindi dwelling in Delhi. The little lane soon opened into a courtyard. There was a fountain in its center, an upthrust block with a spout trickling water for the residents of the neighborhood. Around the plaza were a handful of peddlers, vendors, and a sprinkling of customers. Inhetep went to the busiest stall, a place where vegetables were offered, and thrust himself between a man and a woman to get to the very front so as to be able to peer closely at the produce offered. The two he had brushed past glared, and the man muttered a curse which
the magister ignored. "Not what I want," he said to the seller, who likewise sent doom after him as he walked away. In about five minutes, he had been to each place there, bought nothing, but incurred the enmity of a dozen citizens by his rudeness.

  "Who was that fellow?" one asked.

  His neighbor shook his head. "A stranger here. Say, do you suppose he was a pickpocket?" As he said that, the resident began to check his person for loss. He kept his small horde of coins carefully folded inside the waist of his loincloth. So too his fellow who was likewise frantically searching to see if his money had been stolen. "No. I have not lost anything," the second man said in relief. "He was just a pushy bastard."

  More cautious than his fellow, the second local not only touched his coins but counted them. Even though no thief would take only some, it was reassuring to check just in case. The man was startled to find there was a silver one among the bronze and copper coins he knew he had. He hid his surprise. Where had the worn old chuckrum come from? He could t hink of only one way: somebody had carelessly given it to him in change. "I too have all my money," he said finally. It was most unwise to reveal newfound wealth to anyone, of course, even a good neighbor.

  By then the magister was a long way from the two. Smiling contentedly to himself, he sought out the worst slum of Delhi to begin his work. Behind him were nine people with strong heka emanating from them. Each had a silver chuckrum, and the coin was the source of the magickal radiation, in particular indicating physical disguise. "Let them try to follow those false trails," he said to himself. Before long some of the coins would change hands, and silver should be hidden on the receiver's person. It would be an hour or more before the ruse was discovered—if any were indeed clever enough. By then he would be hopelessly lost to anything save a full-scale search of the city. The master of Delhi wouldn't do that. "Ill be given a hot reception when I return, but by then 111 have found all I need to know here," Inhetep ruminated. He came to the quarter he had sought, and entered the first public house he saw there.

  "Beer," he said to the barman.

  The fellow gave Inhetep a hard look of appraisal, and brought a wooden tankard. "One anna," he said loudly as he set the container on the stained and worn plank.

  The magister produced the coin, dropped it on the bar, picked up his beer, and turned his back on the servitor. It was a typical dive: little light even in bright morning sun; narrow, deep, with many odd tables and chairs cluttering its length. As his eyes adjusted fully to the dimness, Inhetep saw there were already more than a handful of customers in the place. He chose a table as far away from them as he could. He put his back to the wall and drank.

  For a few minutes, he was the subject of guarded scrutiny. Then he was ignored by the patrons and barkeep alike. Ignored but not accepted, he thought. He finished his beer, walked back to the bar, and asked for another. The process was the same as before, but this time he was eyed more closely by the man as he put the refilled tankard before the wizard-priest. Without attempting any conversation, Inhetep went back to his table. He glanced neither right nor left. This time he drank more slowly, waiting.

  "Buy me wine?" The whore had come from the depths of the tavern's rear. Even in the gloom the magister could see she was very young, very well-built, and would have been extremely pretty had her face not been badly scarred by disease. He slapped his hand down on the table before her. She started a bit, unsure of what he was doing. Then he moved it, and she saw a bronze coin lying there. "Wine is a rupee, master," she told him in her toneless, professional voice.

  "Drink beer then or do without," Inhetep responded with an emotionless tone which matched hers.

  "Come on, master, you're a sport aren't you? Buy me wine, and then maybe 111 treat you to something special later." Inhetep ignored her wheedling. The whore grabbed the anna, got up angrily, and left him alone. Two minutes later she returned, a tankard in her hand. She plopped down in the chair opposite him, gulping the beer.

  "Tea or fruit juice would be better for one so young," the magister observed in a low, flat voice.

  "What the hells are you, some kind of a holy reformer?" She was angry because her commission on wine was an anna; for beer she got only the drink. "Do you want to get laid or don't you? It's a hundred—" His harsh laughter made her break off what she was saying. "All right. Because its early, 111 let you go for fifty annas."

  Inhetep shook his head "Crap. The rate is half that. Do you think me stupid?" He finally looked into the too-old eyes in the young, pocked face. "Your name is Braji. No. I am not a spy for the maharajah. No, I am not any sort of policeman, either. Yes. I am not going to pay you for sex, just as you fear. No. It isn't because your face is ugly—it is scarred but pretty, by the way, and the smallpox which caused it happened when you were eight," he added as the astonished girl stared at him with her mouth agape.

  "You read my mind. You are a swami!"

  "Lower your voice," Inhetep commanded. "Otherwise you won't be paid." He saw that got through to her. She was ready to flee from him at the slightest provocation, but her desire for money held her there tenuously. "You are close, girl. Suffice to say I am a practitioner of the arts. No more stealing thoughts. Relax. I did that only to show you I am no enemy."

  It took no magick to see from her expression that she thought that total bullshit as she replied, "Okay, you're my pal. Where's the money you promised, and what do I have to do to earn it? I don't do exhibitions with ani—"

  "Shut up and listen to me, Braji," the magister said in a voice so harsh that the young whore froze silent in her chair. But as he spoke thus, he made a copper rupee appear on the table. "There are more, chuckrums too, if you play this right."

  She in turn made the coin vanish. "For small change I don't do much of anything," she warned. She didn't mean it, though. Business for her was never good, and money always scarce.

  "No lies or even misleading answers," the wizard-priest warned. "Remember I can read your thoughts if need be. All we are going to do is talk. When I'm satisfied you've answered a question fully and truthfully, you get paid. I have a lot of questions. ..."

  "You got a deal. Ask away." If he said anything out of line, asked her to tell him anything he shouldn't know, she was determined to walk away. With a little luck, she'd at least have some jingle in her purse when she did that. She quickly shut away the rising thought of what would happen if it turned out he was one of the . . .

  "Why do you sell yourself?"

  Oh, so maybe this fellow was just another one of those kind. "My father is dead, my mother an invalid. Someone has to bring food home for my little brothers and sis—"

  "Don't be a fool. Tell me the truth, I said, or else you can get your ass out of that chair now!"

  "I have no hope of marriage—not looking like this. My family threw me out after a soldier raped me. I have to live, and there's no other way." A coin appeared. It was a rupee, and she took it wondering if she might have earned a chuckrum if she had been truthful in the first place.

  "The government doesn't serve the people here, does it?"

  That made Braji swallow hard. She risked it. "No," she managed in a small voice. The payment was silver.

  "Can you recall a time it was less tyrannical, when it was maybe all right for what it was? Is it getting worse now?"

  "Things have never been good from what I've heard, or what I recall as a child. That bastard who raped me wouldn't have dared doing that years ago—my parents said that, even though they blamed me. It is becoming worse all the time too, and if you are one of the maharajah's spies, I'm as good as dead now."

  The magister smiled at her, a paternal and reassuring show. He produced a rupee and another silver chuckrum. "Buy yourself wine, Braji; then come back. I have more questions, but we want no suspicions as to what is really being transacted between us, do we?"

  In a bit, she returned. She had her wine in one hand, a beer in the other. "On me," she said. When she saw Inhetep's questioning look, Braji told him, "Don't
worry about the barman—Upura is a good fellow and won't say anything even if he suspected you were a rebel recruiter."

  "Do you think I am?"

  She shrugged. "I don't know—I've never met one. Are you?" The young whore actually giggled when he asked her for a chuckrum if she wanted an answer. "Right," she said as she regained her composure. "You ask, 111 answer and get the coin."

  "How great is the hatred for the maharajah? Are there active rebels here in the capital? Have there been incidents?" As he posed the string of queries to her, the magister slipped three silver discs partway across the table.

  She looked at the coins, then at Inhetep. "What you ask of me is very dangerous! I am afraid to answer, even for so much money."

  "Here," Inhetep said. "Take them and don't answer if you are so afraid. Know that I am here as one able to assist those who wish to change things, and I will never reveal anything I learn to those who are tyrannizing you."

  He had measured her character well. Braji was a prostitute but otherwise a very decent girl. Despite enforced hardness, she couldn't help trusting him. "The toad is the most hated man in the world!" she hissed. "He is not fit to rule a swamp. He has now surrounded himself with officials as bad as he is. His soldiers are rotten and the new mercenaries who swarm over the land worse. Tax collectors extort the last coin from widows. If my face were not so horrid, I'd probably be kidnapped for a slave in one of those pig's harems," she concluded, touching her scarred cheek, then adding, "I should be happy for this . . . blessing!"

  "I understand. You became so vehement you forgot to speak about active opposition here in the city. Are there insurgents here in Delhi who are fighting back?"

  She nodded, looked around to be sure nobody was near. "Yes. They have even come here once or twice to find men and women willing to join the cause. They have done small things only up to now. Killing a tax collector, making a particularly brutal soldier disappear. Even such little attacks have brought terrible reprisals—executions of randomly seized men, the burning of a building suspected to house a rebel sympathizer. If the opposition tried anything major, it would mean slaughter among the people. The maharajah's men would be loosed to do as they want here."