by Джеффри Лорд
Personally, Blade thought that the end of Kanda was an excellent idea. So did more than a few of the Rulami leaders, including, so the rumor ran, King Kleptor himself. They had always chafed at having to pay out good firestones for ivory and slaves. If Kanda and the Ivory Tower fell, this would end. Rulam’s boundaries could be extended a full two days’ march southward. And the Zungan army, weakened from its long campaign against Kanda, would be easier prey. Kanda and Zunga, a clean sweep of both rivals to Rulam’s power! Blade saw and heard sober elder statesmen drinking confident toasts to their city’s new glory.
Then there came rumors and then hard news of a fair-sized battle between Rulami patrols and the Zungan outposts. A battle in which the Zungan king himself had been present, and some of his family captured. There was no report of who had won, or of what the casualties had been. But rumor had it that the Rulami had been quickly beaten off after their first attack, and driven away with heavy losses. Considering how the same elder statesmen who had been prematurely celebrating victory suddenly began going around with sober, even grim faces, Blade was inclined to believe the rumors.
«But at least we’ve got some of that bastard Afuno’s family to play with,» said Roxala as she and Blade sat over dinner talking of the battle. «One of them’s a princess, daughter to Afuno himself.»
It took a greater effort than ever before, but Blade managed to keep his face calm. Then he fought down an impulse to ask about the princess. Her name, for example. Roxala did not know about him and Aumara, but if he started asking questions, she might easily become suspicious. And then the fate of the princess, whether she was Aumara or another, would at once become much, much harsher.
«Kleptor wants to hold the princess as a hostage. For what, I wonder? That band of savages can’t have any proper family ties. What good would it do? No, I have a better plan.» It seemed that Kleptor was going to hold a massive field day at the army’s camp, with large-scale combats between the various teams of arena men. This was to be Kleptor’s day of vaunting and glory. But Roxala would have her moments, too. She would offer the crowd an unprecedented show-the public execution, by torture, of a real live Zungan princess. She could be quite sure of getting her hands on the princess, so the matter was all but settled.
«And you will be there beside me, Blade, fully armed, with the firestone of the Queen’s Champion on your chest. You will lead my arena men in the contest, and Kleptor and all Rulam will get a chance to see you in action.»
Roxala kept that promise. When she took her seat in the Queen’s box at the camp arena three days later, Blade was indeed standing beside her. His helmet and armor were silvered, his sword of the finest steel with a gold hilt, his boots and shield choice polished leather from the hides of the Ivory People. A red plume nodded from the crest of his helmet, and on his armored chest dangled the promised ruby. It was the finest pigeon’s-blood color, and larger than he would have believed possible-as large as his own clenched fist. He heard a clank every time it swung on its gold chain against his breastplate. Queen Roxala wore another one of her tight-fitting gowns, this one a dazzling mixture of silver and gold, with rubies on ears, throat, wrists, fingers, and along the seams of the gown. Blade tried to reckon up the value of her rubies, then abandoned the struggle.
The arena before them was about two hundred feet on a side. From its hard-packed earth it obviously served as a drill field for Kleptor’s army. Wooden stands rose along one side for the high-ranking spectators. Of the other three sides, two were occupied by soldiers drawn up in flawless formation, standing motionless under the broiling sun. On the third side a vast mass of slaves, mostly Zungan, also stood motionless. What little breeze there was blew from them, blowing their stench across the arena to Blade and the queen. The queen buried her nose in a perfumed pomander, and even Blade found himself wrinkling his nose.
Now came a mighty blare of trumpets, echoed by the bellowings of the Ivory People. Through the corner between the two masses of soldiers came a procession of a dozen or more of the great beasts, each carrying half a dozen soldiers. Blade saw Horun mounted on the neck of the first one. At the end of the procession came a beast whose tusks had been gilded and tipped with gold balls, whose flanks were hung with silver cloth shimmering with rubies, whose claws had been painted a glossy black. On its back sat King Kleptor.
Like all the Rulami, he was a well-fleshed type. But even from this distance Blade could see that Kleptor had carried the tendency to extremes. A massive paunch swelled out his gold tunic, and his swollen thighs and calves strained at their hose. A square-cut black beard did not conceal the jowls, the double chin, or the sagging cheeks. Blade grimaced in disgust. Kleptor seemed an appropriate king for Rulam, proud, rich, and decadent as it was. He looked aside for a moment at Roxala. At least her decadence had some life in it. Kleptor looked like a thing dying, if not already dead.
The processions stopped in front of the stands, and four slaves ran out pushing a wheeled ladder to the side of Kleptor’s mount. The king heaved himself off the saddle and lurched and staggered down the ladder, while the slaves struggled to hold it upright.
«Once the slaves let it fall, and Kleptor with it,» said Roxala. «He had all four of them burned alive over a slow fire.»
As Kleptor lumbered toward the far end of the stands, two servants from his train ran toward where Blade and the queen sat. Each was carrying a ruby-studded gold cup. As they approached, Blade could see that each cup was filled with translucent green wine. Standing on the hard earth in front of the stands, they could just reach up high enough to offer the wine cups to Blade and the queen. Roxala stared at the slaves, then over at Kleptor, then at Blade.
«Slaves!» she barked. «You will drink first from each cup, then offer it.» Blade started, then stared down at the two slaves. Did the one in front of him look a little startled?
He leaned over and stared closer, then said, «The queen commands you to drink.» The slave with the queen’s cup lifted it to his lips and drank deep. The slave with Blade’s cup hesitated, then his cup too rose. Blade watched the wine trickle down from the corners of the man’s mouth. Then in one leap he was out of his seat, over the edge of the stands, and down on the ground. His sword rasped out and jabbed the slave in his wine-stained neck. His voice was a rasp as he spoke. «The queen said drink, you swine, not spit it out. Now drink! And I want to see your throat move.»
The wine cup rose again, and this time the wine did not trickle down. The slave’s throat jerked in swallowing motions once, twice, three times. He stood in silence a moment, the wine cup still raised to his lips. Then his hands loosened. The wine cup thudded to the ground, spilling out a green puddle. He bent double, hands clasping at his stomach. Then he fell forward onto the ground, kicking wildly. As he hit the ground, he began to scream.
Blade turned to Roxala. Her face was pale, but she only shrugged. «Kleptor must be getting overbold, to try to poison my champion before all the nobles and the army,» She smiled grimly. «Or perhaps he thought it would be part of the day’s entertainment. Perhaps I can make a few changes in the plans, too.» Blade did not like the expression on her face. If he had been Kleptor, he knew that he would have liked it even less.
Blade looked toward the king’s end of the stands. Kleptor was sitting as still and silent as a temple image. But watching closely, Blade saw the king’s eyes occasionally flicker toward the queen, then to Blade, and finally down to the slave dying in agony on the ground. There was no expression on his face during any of this. Kleptor, Blade suspected, would prove a shrewder plotter than the queen.
Then the trumpets blared again. Through the gap in the corner of the arena more armed men were marching. These were tough-looking, rangy men of all colors and sizes, in a variety of dress and fighting equipment. The arena men. They were marching in two columns of fifty-odd men apiece, one headed by the king’s standard, one by the queen’s. The players were here; the game was about to begin.
No, there was still something mi
ssing. The Zungan princess Roxala had snatched. Her death by torture was supposed to be the opening event. Blade was glad he had eaten only an early and light breakfast. Seeing helpless women die by inches was not something he could watch unmoved. But at least he hoped he could keep his face straight. Doing anything to arouse Roxala’s hair-trigger jealousy would simply prolong the girl’s torment.
There came another blast of trumpets, and after it the sound of a Zungan iron gong. Someone was beating it in a mocking parody of the Zungan processional.
Then three clusters of figures marched into the arena. Two Zungan slaves carrying a gong, with a Rulami walking behind them and beating it with a mallet. Four armed guards with drawn swords, escorting a large wooden stake carried by half a dozen more slaves. And finally four more armed guards, marching along in a square. In the middle of the square, a woman. Naked, her mahogany skin layered with dust, sagging under fatigue and the weight of the chains on her neck and limbs.
Princess Aumara.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Blade knew within seconds after recognizing Aumara that he was not simply going to sit quietly in the stands and watch her die in agony. King Afuno might forgive him for that, considering the circumstances. But his own conscience never would. In fact, there was no point in even trying to sit still. He knew he could never control himself well enough to avoid rousing Roxala’s suspicions. And her suspicions would lead to jealousy, and her jealousy to his death. He would simply be signing his own death warrant, without giving Aumara a quick and merciful death.
So he did not climb back into the stands and sit down beside the queen. He whirled, drew his sword again, and sprinted out into the arena toward the princess and her guards. As he ran, his mind was working furiously. Was there anything he could do for Aumara except give her that quick death?
His headlong charge across the arena took everybody totally by surprise. Before the gasps and yells rose into the air he was halfway to Aumara. The guards stared at him as though he were an apparition from another world.
He charged in among the guards around Aumara while they were still staring. His sword whistled through the air and through two necks before either of their owners could make a move in their own defense. One of the guards had the keys to Aumara’s chains on his belt. Blade snatched them from the falling man and threw them to the princess, then spun about to meet the surviving guards.
All six of them were coming at him now. Then the shrill screams of Roxala rose above the crowd’s roar as she yelled orders to her arena men. They swung about, and fifty of them began to move toward Blade. This is it, he thought grimly. He flicked a glance toward Aumara, who was almost free of her chains now. If he was going to kill her, it would have to be soon. He killed another guard, leaving five, then stepped back and raised his sword. Aumara looked up at it and then at him. She understood. He tensed-And then pulled his downstroke to a stop in midair as the king’s arena men also turned. Their swords and spears and maces rose. Then their commanders barked orders, and they moved at a quick jog toward the mass of the queen’s arena men. The five guards drew away from Blade, and dashed away, around toward the queen’s men.
Blade stared. So did Aumara. Then Blade realized what was happening-or at least what might be happening. Kleptor was pretending that the queen’s arena men had revolted, and was sending his own to wipe them out-and incidentally to wipe out Blade and rescue Aumara. The second goal Blade approved of, the first not so much. But with luck, though, Kleptor’s move would hurl things into such confusion that nobody would pay attention to Blade and Aumara. All at once they had a chance of escape.
But it was only a chance. The arena was still surrounded by Keptor’s soldiers, who could trap them if anybody gave the right orders. He and Aumara would have to move fast, before anybody thought of those right orders. Blade knew that whether he survived or not there would be more bad blood between Kleptor and Roxala over this day’s work, but he had a preference for surviving.
Here came a new danger. And, Blade suddenly realized, their best chance of safety! Horun had wheeled his mount out of the line before the stands and was goading it across the arena toward Blade and Aumara. The officer was crouching low in his saddle, bending far out and down and swinging a long sword in his right hand. The other soldiers that had ridden the beast had dismounted. Horun could not resist the chance to be a hero in front of the whole Rulami army by striking down Blade.
The big beast was moving at a trot by the time it approached Blade. Blade stood his ground as Horun thundered down at him. As the animal’s long tusks came within reach, Blade calculated the precise moment, then grabbed a tusk in each hand. Swinging his whole weight upward on his powerful arms, he vaulted onto the animal’s forehead before Horun could react. Blade’s sword rasped out of its scabbard again, whistled through the air, and sank with a meaty chunk into Horun’s neck. Blood spurted high, Horun’s eyes rolled up in his head, and with a bewildered and stunned expression he toppled off his mount onto the ground. Blade snatched the man’s goad out of his hand as he went down and pulled the animal to a stop. Then he yelled to Aumara, and a moment later she was lithely scrambling up beside him. Blade grabbed her around the waist and rapped the animal smartly with the goad again.
Before anybody realized what was happening and could give those necessary orders, Blade had his mount up to a full trot again. Everybody was too stunned by the swift flurry of events, or perhaps too engrossed in watching the arena men slaughtering each other to notice. Blade headed his mount to the right, toward the gap between the two masses of soldiers. A few hardy spirits broke out of formation and tried to block the animal’s path, then lost their nerve at the last minute and scampered to safety. One of them, slower of foot than his comrades, died screaming, spitted on the beast’s left tusk. Blade applied the goad again, and they thundered down the passage at a full gallop.
Blade kept the beast moving at that speed as he swung it still further to the right, down the main street of the camp and toward the main gate. If any orders to close those gates were given, the sentries either never heard them or were too stunned to obey. Blade took his mount through the wide-open gates at full speed in a cloud of dust and the cheerful curses hurled at the guards by Aumara.
Almost at the gate of the camp lay forest, the northern fringes of the great Rulami forests that stretched south toward Kanda-and now toward the Zungan army. Again Blade did not spare the goad, and they plunged into the forest still at a gallop. They trampled bushes and smashed aside small trees like a runaway tank, putting more and more miles behind them, between them and Kleptor’s army.
It was not until late afternoon that Blade let the animal drop below a trot. Even then, he would have kept it going if he thought it could have stood the pace any longer. But even the fabulous endurance of the Ivory People had its limits. A little while later they came to a stream, and Blade let the animal drink while he and Aumara dismounted and did the same.
After drinking, they let the animal browse among the bushes and saplings while they bathed. Blade felt as though he were bathing away more than the sweat and grime caked on him by the battle and the mad flight. He felt as though he were washing away the strain and frustration of his captivity as Roxala’s chosen stud, and all the filth and decadence of Rulam in general.
He looked at Aumara. She was almost as pleasing to the eye as before, as she splashed about with the water beading on her dark skin. She had not been a slave more than a few days, not long enough for hunger or confinement to thin her ripe body or take the spirit out of her. But her back showed a mass of crisscrossing welts, and her wrists and ankles were half raw from the chafing of the irons.
Blade pointed at her back. «Queen Roxala’s doing, by any chance?»
She nodded. Then she looked at him and said, «Blade, I knew you were favored by the Sky Father. But I did not think that he would work such a miracle for you and for me. How did we ever get away? I can hardly believe that we are here, free.»
«We�
�re not completely in the clear yet,» Blade cautioned her. «Kleptor and Roxala may not be at each other’s throats enough to prevent a search party from being sent out. But at least we’ve got a good headstart.» He shook his head to clear the water from his ears, then went on.
«I knew that Roxala and Kleptor were just short of open warfare. Not very short, considering that he tried to start off the day’s business by poisoning me in full sight of his whole army. And your death by torture was Roxala’s project-Kleptor didn’t approve of it at all. At least not right then. When Roxala ordered her arena men to kill me and get you ready for the torture, it looked to the crowd like they were getting out of hand. So Kleptor could order his arena men to move in on the queen’s, wipe them out, kill me, rescue you-and nobody in the crowd would know what was really involved. After that, Horun made us the gift of his mount, and there was nothing left to do but run like the wind. There’s an English saying that covers what happened today. ‘Order, — counterorder-disorder.’ And there was certainly enough disorder!»
Aumara nodded. «But before that?»
«Yes. I would have killed you, to spare you what Roxala had planned. I’d seen what her mind ran to, in the way of tortures.»
«So had I. I didn’t mind dying so much myself, but-Blade, I am carrying your child. I am glad that is safe for now.»
Blade held her for a moment, then said, «I think our friend of the Ivory People has got back some of his strength. It’s time we were on the move again.»
They were almost continuously on the move for two days without hearing any signs of pursuit. Occasionally they had to sneak past isolated forest dwellings or across roads, but there was little activity and less habitation in these forests. Aumara recognized this as more good luck, and made solemn prayers to the Sky Father in thanks for it and hope that it would continue.