by Janet Morris
And he took his gol-knife and cut the hair that bound her mouth. The shorn tresses fell to the floor. He pulled the balled, soaking hair from her mouth. She chose for him then, as I had so long ago. With quaking voice she proclaimed herself crell. She gave her life to another, that she might not die. I felt, for the first time, a twinge of sorrow. Chayin was not playing. He truly did not like her; doubtless he would not keep her. I wondered what her lot would be like in Nemar.
Sereth rubbed his hand up and down my arm. He touched me lightly on the lips. I started, realized I had been staring.
“Celendral” Sereth snapped. She raised dumb eyes to him. She seemed stunned.
“I want you to tell me exactly what precautions you have taken against your master’s forces. You do not know how much I know. If I were you, I would not lie.”
She tossed her head. For a moment I saw Celendra, haughty and regal, who had once said to me that there were not many men who could conquer her, even for a night. Then that woman was gone, and a velvet-soft stranger looked out of those eyes at him.
“I knew it,” she whispered. “Each night, I waited. I knew it would come. When they could not kill you, I knew it just a question of time. I am glad.” She choked. “Glad the waiting is over.” And her shoulders shook, though she kept them well back. Sobs wracked her. Sereth shook his head and leaned back upon the couch, impassive.
Chayin struck her across the face. She composed herself. Her breasts quivered.
She told us what she had done: she had called upon the Slayers, who waited for Day-Keepers’ approval. If they got it, any approaching army of Parsets would be dealt with by a contingent of Slayers, who were already preparing. When that was in progress would more Slayers swarm into Astria herself and dispatch the yra of jiasks who pleasure there. Also, she told us what we already knew—of Dellin and M’ksakka—and what she said, we knew was true.
“I want you to call a messenger. You will issue certain orders,” Sereth said when she had finished. He still leaned back, nonchalant and easy upon the couch.
“No,” she whispered. Hope lit her face bright.
“Do not tempt me,” Sereth advised, sitting up. He regarded her, amused.
She shook her head. “If you need me, there is hope yet. No.”
“Little fool,” he mused, as he got to his feet. He took the tether and unclipped it from the couch, arching her up until he could hook the clip to the chain between her ankles. She lay there, her body a tight bow, helpless. She had sought to bite him. He was not pleased.
“With your permission, Cahndor?” Sereth paused, kneeling over her, his hand in her chald.
“I have always wanted to see how you do it,” said Chayin, leaning forward. “I have seen the results, but never the work in progress.”
“It is only”—Sereth grinned—“a matter of timing.”
In less than an enth Celendra wrote the message that Sereth wanted. In fact, she pleaded passionately to be allowed to do so. When Sereth’s hand came close to her lips, she kissed it. They unbound her hands that she might write it, and then they reshackled her.
She begged that they leave her hands free until she had seen the messenger. Sereth would not allow it. They had seen her thus before, he said. It was only she who saw the difference, only her submission that shamed her, he pointed out, locking her wrists again to her ankles.
Sereth, wisely, gave her no rest from his hands, lest she come back to her contentious self too soon. Over and over he, repeated to her what she was to say.
“Should you not hide?” asked Chayin.
Sereth chuckled. “Clump yourselves. Often in Arlet there were more than two in a couching. I doubt it is different here.” I saw the flaw in his thinking, but he had bid me be silent.
I was between Chayin’s legs where he sat upon the couch, with Lalen curled around him, when the messenger’s knock came.
Sereth opened the right-hand door, keeping it between his body and the messenger’s sight. Those carved doors had been in my family two thousand years.
The man stood there, blinking. He noted Celendra, expressionless. Sereth closed the door. I twisted to see him better.
“High Lady!” he gasped, and went upon his knees, his forehead to the Parset rug.
Sereth momentarily went blank. I stood, uncertain, half-risen. Then he nodded.
I went and knelt before Ges, whose father’s father had been in the service of my mother’s mother. I touched his shoulder. He raised misted eyes to me. We were within a year the same age. His open-faced countenance had not changed. His blue eyes sparkled with joy. I offered my cheek that he might kiss it.
“We thought you dead, Estri.” He waved his hand around. “Things are troubled.”
“More than you know,” I said softly. “But I am not dead.” I smiled at him. I hated to do it, but the contingency was upon us.
“I need your help,” I said to him.
“Anything,” he promised. My eyes found Sereth’s, for confirmation. He gave it.
“At sun’s rising, put upon the door the sign of Feast of Conception, that none may disturb us. Between now and then, find, if you can, every man and woman loyal to Astria and bid them wear a white armband, that we will know them, and fight beside us to reclaim the Well.” White and silver were my colors, once the colors of this room, for four generations the colors of Astria.
“There will be many anxious to do so. What of the Parsets?” He did not see, as we had thought such a one would not, that I had no right here, and that what he did would make him outlaw.
“They are my helpers. We will fight Celendra’s men, and what Slayers raise hand against us. These messages of Celendra’s are our doing. See that they get to the hostel. And more you must do.”
Ges, like a trustful tasling about to be slaughtered, nodded. “There are few here who would uphold her,” he said.
“Listen to her, take these words of ours from her mouth, spread them, and return.”
And Sereth bade Celendra speak, that she might take a hand in her own destruction.
“Tell Rin that the morning is over.” She wept. “Do you understand? It is the code we keep for signal. By that he will know.” Her voice went from her. Sereth’s hand upon her helped her find it. “By that he will know the message is truly from me, that you are my envoy.” And the message Sereth gave to Ges, in Celendra’s hand, informed Rin diet Tron that she had the Parsets in Astria under control, and that he need no longer keep alert for reinforcements from the south.
“That is all?” wondered Ges. He turned to me, his face troubled. “High Lady, I do not understand.”
“Then you must serve me without understanding,” I said gently. “Do as I say. Tell no Slayer of what we plan; deliver instead this falsehood. Trust me.”
“I do,” he said, his huge eyes sincere. He turned to go.
“And do not forget to place the sign of Feasts of Conception upon the door at sun’s rising. It is of utmost importance,” I urged.
“But who has conceived?” he asked.
“No one. Lie. Work something out with a girl. Just do it!”
Those blue eyes stared through me. He nodded slowly.
“I will talk to Cia. We shall say it is she.” Sereth, at the door, struggled to contain his amusement. He opened it. Ges, uncertainly, turned to leave.
“Tasa, Ges!” I called after him. He waved, smiling over his shoulder. Sereth closed the door he had opened, and leaned against them where the two doors met. He let out a long, sibilant breath through his teeth. Celendra lay where he had left her, softly sobbing.
“You should have hidden,” growled Chayin. He walked over to Celendra and put his foot upon her. “You make one more sound, and I will fill that mouth of yours too full for you to make a second. Do you understand?” She strangled a final sob. He reached under her and jerked her into the air by the chains, throwing her upon the couch as if she weighed nothing. Lalen barely scrambled out of the way. She lay there, unmoving, fighting for control. Even
as she started screaming, Lalen’s hand came down upon her mouth. I barely noticed.
I thought of Ges, whom I had betrayed. But I could not have told him. If he had known that the Ebvrasea stood before him, he would not have asked why we sought to deceive Rin diet Tron, First of the Slayers’ Seven of Astria. Rin diet Tron, father of Jana, whom Celendra had surely murdered, was a man to whom chaldra was everything.
By chaldra he determined the law within, and thus did he live. Though he had been my most-loved teacher, though he had taught me all my fighting skills, I could do no other than deceive him. It was his chaldra to protect the reigning Well-Keepress. He would assuredly do so.
Ges, of course, never delivered his message. Another message went out of Astria, to the Slayers’ hostel, drafted by those who apprehended him, by those who monitored our every word and action through the surveillance devices Celendra had installed in each couching keep of Astria. Somewhere, at the end of those cables we had passed in the crawlways, sat Celendra’s monitors—those who had sent a man I knew to us as messenger, those who thought that to such a loyal servant we would reveal our plans. And so out of Astria went the message we really desired—that we held the Keepress, that we awaited our army, and most important, that through Celendra’s monitors was her safety assured.
Sereth called me to the window where he had waited, silent, more than an enth. Together we watched the lone threxman speeding, through the night toward the Slayers’ hostel. Though Celendra might do as she pleased in Astria, Rin diet Tron had no receiver for her star toys in his fortress. The rider, speeding, was proof: Celendra, who could speak to any Liaison upon Silistra at the flick of a switch, could not contact a Slayer or a Day-Keeper any faster than a threx could run.
We stood long together, waiting for Celendra’s men to do our work for us. Muffled but unmistakable sounds of swordplay came to us from the floors below—Celendra’s men, hastening to bind any whose loyalty to her was not sure, before they fell upon us. Celendra heard it, too, and laughed beneath her gag.
To fool a forereader, I thought as Lalen bestirred himself in response to a cadenced scratching upon the half-door at his back, is no easy matter.
Chayin took up his sword, smashing the hilt of it into a small mirror set in the gol beside a torch sconce. Celendra’s head turned to watch him. Her eyes widened. She struggled. Two more of the spy-eyes did Chayin dispatch, while Celendra watched helpless, and in through the low door squeezed Wiraal and half his force.
Wiraal’s drawn blade dripped redly. He was scratched, and his cape had been torn away. Breathing heavily, he leaned against the wall. Lalen stuck his head into the crawlway, peered around, closed and locked it.
Sereth had Celendra by the hair, dragging her bound blackness across the floor. He threw the Parset mat off the star-bought communicator she had used to summon the messenger. His sure hands woke the machine, readied it to speak to every room.
Only then did he lift his foot from her hair.
“I am going to free that flapping tongue of yours, and you are going to call them off! I want every male and female in this tower in the common room. They will bring with them all their weapons, and pile them there upon the floor. They will bring with them, each one, sufficient chains for their binding, and lock them upon one another, Wiraal will collect the keys. If we find one armed Slayer, one missing key; one fleeing coward, I will kill you.” And then he knelt down and took the gag from her mouth, and she knew, as I, that he would, surely, kill her if she disobeyed.
She looked at him a moment, almost smiling. Then she bent her head and gave his orders, and for the first time her voice held defeat. Celendra had met her match. She had lost, and she knew it. She trembled, and her skin seemed gray, and she did not even raise her head when Sereth ripped the communicator apart, though wires and sparks and shards of glass showered her where she knelt.
“How?” she wondered, barely audible. I thought he would strike her. He did not. He squatted down and grinned at her. Wiraal cleaned his sword upon the shining well silks. His men, ten of them, tended each other’s wounds. Their talk was sparse and gruff, that of men upon the kill. Uris pouches were passed. Leaning against the window, between two jiasks I did not know, I availed myself of one as it passed. So easy was Celendra brought low, despite all her skills. Knowing her, he had found it so easy. Even her last and most subtle ploy, that of the messenger, he had turned against her. She had orchestrated Sereth’s destruction, knowing he would come, knowing even that I would be with him. He had taken the composition from her hands and played it for her, but his own arrangement.
“How?” Celendra begged to understand.
A knocking came at the double doors. Men shifted as one their weapons ready. Chayin crossed the crowded keep in a dozen strides and cracked the doors. Then he opened them both as wide as they would go.
In that torchlit hallway stood the rest of Wiraal’s jiasks. They were eleven, scruffy, bleeding, grinning. Upon their arms were draped necklaces of crell chains, brought with them from Nemar, for which they had not yet found use. They flanked their number in Slayers, whose slate leathers had been pulled from them, and replaced with manacles. Their necks were bound together with locked loops of a single length of thick chain, as is done with mine crells.
“Looks as if you can kill her, Sereth,” said Chayin sourly, regarding the wounds upon his men.
“Is there resistance out there?” Sereth queried the room in general, as the jiasks pushed their prisoners within.
“Not since that voice in the air,” chortled one jiask. “We started fighting these beforehand, a slight miscalculation. When they heard it, they just threw their swords down. It was the most amazing thing I ever saw!” The jiask shook his head, still laughing. In his humor he had lapsed into Parset.
Sereth put his hands upon Celendra, unresisting, and rebound her. He removed all but the leash and collar, and the wristlets, which now secured her hands behind her back.
Pointing first at Lalen, then at Wiraal and Chayin, he pushed Celendra through the crowd out the door.
Though he had not invited me, I ran to him. He stopped, just in the hallway. Lalen took up his stance at my side. Sereth’s cold eyes measured me.
“You may,” he said.
The kill lust was upon him, then, as it was upon Chayin, and every male face I saw. Even Lalen, always stern, seemed transformed. Their eye-whites glittered and their teeth flashed. They stood poised there, in that white-gol hallway with its amber floor, waiting for his word to unleash them.
“You may, but stay close,” he said again, turning to the crowded room. I reached down and set my razor-moons, that they would leap unimpeded to my hand if I chose to use them.
“You”—he pointed to the jiask who had spoken—“I give you charge. Take half your force and rip out every cable and machine you can find. Do not neglect the crawlways. Be cautious, be thorough. The rest of you, split into twos and check every chamber, a floor at a time, starting here. I want no living thing anywhere in Astria but the common room. If you run out of bonds, kill them. These few men ...” He looked upon the Slayers, those who had once been his brothers. The black strands of their calling gleamed darkly from the chalds at their hips. “These few men,” he said again, “bring also to the common room. But last. Make sure they are well secured, leave a guard on them. Those you find bound by her people, free, and bring them also.”
Behind us, the sea of men began to part, as they separated the tasks among them and drifted to the new leader Sereth had appointed.
“He is not whom I would have chosen,” grumbled Wiraal to Chayin.
Chayin bade him be still.
“Here,” said Sereth, pushing Celendra toward the cahndor. “She is your crell. I might need my hands free.” She stumbled, fell upon the amber gol like some shadow cast there. Sereth looked at her in disgust. The tether dangled from her collar.
“Sereth, please, no.”
“Get up,” said Chayin wearily. “I hope we do not have
to go through all this again because you did not believe it the first time. I have not so long to spare.” He hefted his Parset sword. Celendra got up and walked meekly between Wiraal and her owner, the cahndor.
“We must stop at the chamber Wiraal used,” Chayin demanded of Sereth.
“Why?”
“He left his huija there.” Chayin grinned.
“In his saddlepack, I suppose?” Sereth shot back.
“Where else?”
“And that is where all the crell chains came from?” Sereth asked.
“Would you have bound them with couch sheets? Where a Nemarsi goes, so goes his saddle.”
“And whatever happens to be in it.” Sereth laughed.
“What,” asked Wiraal, as we descended the stairs that wound around the tower’s inner core, “is the disposition of these women? I left a beauty trussed next to my gear.”
“Do what you will. Only, do not burden yourself with too many. One cannot fit a wellwoman in a saddlepack.” We came out upon the second floor, which is all sea-green. I wondered how any girl in this low-priced section could have taken the jiask’s interest.
When Wiraal opened the chamber door, I wondered no longer. Lovely and ripe was that brown-haired, gray-eyed girl. She was very young, and it was her inexperience, not anything else, that priced her so low.
Wiraal patted her where she lay, bound and gagged as Celendra had been, upon the couch. “I will be back for you,” he promised, and her terrified eyes were huge upon him.
Then he turned to his saddlepack, and as he routed among its contents, I realized that Celendra never had a chance. Wiraal alone could have stood against formidable odds a good long time with that arsenal. He took his huija and shook it loose. The metal teeth gleamed, embedded in that supple leather. He snapped it, cracking, and Celendra screamed.