I do not laugh easily, as I have said; I simply stood up and went across to my corth—the one with the trapeze and the thongs—and readied him for flight. Seg followed me.
When the corth was ready I turned to Yuong.
“You had best fly with us—there are leems hereabouts—"
He shook his head.
“Nay, Jikai. If you lend me one of those thick anachronistic flint-headed spears, I will fare well enough."
“As you wish. The spears were unnecessary, after all. They were a failure, like my plans."
“Dray!” said Seg. “All is not yet lost."
“Come!” I said, and I was abrupt with Seg. So we left the Wizard of Loh, San Lu-si-Yuong, there with a flint-headed spear to await the dawnrise of the twin suns of Scorpio and the opening of the gates to Hiclantung.
We rode the same corth for the short journey and by taking turns we both dropped off the swinging trapeze onto the trip-wired and fan-spiked roof of the Queen's palace and let the corth go where he willed. I fancied that sharp eyes peering out in the pink light of the twins would have spotted us from one of the many watchtowers rising in the city. That did not concern me as yet. We padded down stairs carpentered from sturm-wood and opened lenken doors with our swords. We did not kill the guards we encountered, for these were, after all, our hosts.
No incongruity of repetition struck me as we crept silently down past the guards, for this time I carried no high palpitations of hope and fear for my Delia; now we were merely attempting to do the right thing by a comrade—and then I remembered the way Seg felt about the callous and shallow Thelda, and I sighed, and wondered just what I did wish for this baffling comrade of mine.
Truth to tell, I felt a queasy sense of responsibility for Yuong; how could his frailty stand up against the awesome ferocity of a wild leem, flint-headed spear or no?
A young Hiclantung guardsman very smart in the ornate robes of a Queen's spearman with the gold and silver buttons and buckles in place of workmanlike bronze or bone was very pleased to assist us when Seg placed his dagger at the lad's throat. We were led past a doorway into an area of dust and cobwebs. It was a long narrow passage and every now and then thin slits let lamplight fall across the floor, so I knew it to be one of those seemingly essential items to certain palaces—the place of observation hidden behind the walls of the chambers. I have used these observation galleries many times, and no doubt will do so in the future. For some reason the minds of many rulers on the world of Kregen are obsessed with this desire for secrecy and for hidden observers ready to leap out in surprise and deal with the slightest hint of treachery or assassination. I have used these galleries many times—but not for the purpose for which they were built.
Seg tapped the lad lightly on the head when he indicated we had reached the correct loophole and I caught him in my arms and eased him silently to the dusty floor. Then Seg below and I above looked through the slit.
This was a small chamber within the Paline Bower which nestled securely beneath a wing of the palace. The first thing I noticed—before either of the women—was the chased silver dish containing a pile of palines, luscious, full-bodied, juicy, invigorating, and I licked my lips thirstily.
Seg whispered: “The Queen has a dagger in her hand!” The mellow light from the samphron oil lamps shining through wafer-thin scraped-bone shades splintered back in hard-edged reflections from the jewels in the dagger hilt. A star winked and dazzled from the dagger's point. That point hovered over Thelda's breast.
I felt for the edges of the crack that would reveal the doorway. Seg was breathing loudly, almost gasping.
That secret chamber was furnished in casual unostentatious luxury, with ling furs upon the low couches, silks and satins scattered here and there in a riot of colors between the tumbled cushions.
“You forget that I am the Queen!"
“And you forget that I am a Lady of Vallia!"
“Vallia! I spit on your Vallia!"
“What is this miserable dung-heap called Hiclantung? My country is a great nation, united under an all-powerful emperor! The power of Vallia is like a leem compared to the puny rast-city of Hiclantung!"
“By Hlo-Hli! You will pay for this insolence!” I sighed. The girls were at it again. But poor Seg was taking it all in with a very visible distress.
Lilah wore a long scarlet gown, very tight as to the bodice, slit up the sides to reveal her long legs. Her hair and bosom and arms were smothered with gems. Much of that satanic look about her that came from the widow's peak and her upslanting eyebrows and the shadows beneath her cheekbones was absent now as she argued and wrangled with Thelda. Thelda—poor Thelda—another man than Dray Prescot might have chuckled at her now, knowing what I knew about these two. Thelda was clad in a short and raggedy brown shift that left her thick thighs naked, that hung lopsidedly on her shoulders, sagging, and her wrists were bound behind her back with golden cords. Yet she lifted her head defiantly, and I had to admire her, despite all the ludicrous scenes that had passed between us.
“I know why you're so much of a female cramph!” spat Thelda now, her face flushed, her eyes bright, her breast heaving like the seas of the Eye of the World after a rashoon has passed. “It's my Dray! My Dray Prescot you covet!"
“Your Dray!"
“Yes! You know nothing of what we mean to each other. I love him and, now the Princess Majestrix is gone, he will love me! I know—"
“You know nothing, rast! What can you offer him? I am the Queen, a Queen in all her glory, Queen of a great city and a great nation—"
“Surrounded by enemies waiting to tear your heart out!"
“They may wish to—but they will never succeed. I can offer Dray Prescot everything—you—"
Thelda threw back her dark brown hair and opened those plump lips and laughed. “You!” she spluttered. “A skinny rast-bag like you! Dray Prescot needs a woman, a real woman!"
Lilah's hand trembled and the dagger shot sparks of fire into the corners of the room. “You great fat lump of lard! Dray needs a woman of fire and passion who can meet him, breast to breast, spirit for spirit!"
Seg put his hand on the secret panel. I suffered for my comrade during those minutes.
A sharp rap on the door opposite brought Lilah around, catlike, the dagger upraised. The knock also halted Seg's pushing hand. The door opened and a little slave wench with golden bands upon her gray slave kirtle skipped in, bending and genuflecting, showing in Councilor Orpus. His powerful bearded face was filled with extreme animation and the many rings on his fingers flashed in the lamplight. He swept his embroidered robes to one side as he inclined deeply. When he straightened up, he said: “Forgive this intrusion, oh Queen! But—great news! We think we have discovered the location of Umgar Stro."
“What do you mean—you think?” Lilah replaced the dagger in its sheath at her waist. She advanced on Orpus like a leem. She was all queen now, all regality, lofty and cold and demanding, merciless to failure.
“The scouts report—"
“Wait.” Lilah beckoned. “Guards! Take this miserable creature to the cells; let her rot there until my pleasure is known. Come, Orpus. We must go to the council chamber—summon the scouts, my generals, and my councilors. We must plan—now!"
As Orpus stood aside to let the Queen sweep past him, her long scarlet gown trailing, her naked legs strong and thrusting before, her guards inclined, their helmets low. They moved into the chamber, and their Deldar prodded Thelda with his spear point. That spear point was steel, as befitted a spearman of the Queen's guard.
“Up, little one. We have need of playthings such as you in the cells!"
They closed upon Thelda and dragged her away and as she went she screamed most piteously.
Seg put his hand to the secret panel, but it was my foot that kicked it open.
Together, Seg and I, we burst into the empty chamber. Our swords were in our fists. Shoulder to shoulder we started for the door.
* * *
Chapter Fifteen
Seg, Thelda, and I stand before Queen Lilah
On the way across to the door I used my left hand to scoop up a great mass of the palines. Juice dribbled through my fingers.
“Here, Seg. Munch on these—"
“No time, Dray! Don't you realize what they're going to do to Thelda?"
I pushed the palines at him.
“Take them, Seg! You need them!"
I stared at him, eye to eye. With a savage curse he pushed past me, scooped up a mass of the palines and stuffed them into his mouth. Then, and only then, I ran for the door.
The guards had just reached the first turn in the corridor. We ran swiftly and silently down toward that corner. I checked at the bend beside an alabaster statue of a risslaca seizing a leem, and the leem in its turn seizing the risslaca, and peered around. Seg hopped with impatience. The guards were moving Thelda along briskly. A few other slaves and functionaries moved along the corridor, which here broadened with a supporting aisle of thick-bodied columns down its center. I had visited the palace enough times to have a vague and general idea of its layout; but unlike most of the palaces I had encountered on Kregen this one, because it had been built in the midst of a city closed up around it within its encircling walls, had not sprawled out in an ever-growing maze of passages and courts and halls.
We marched smartly out and cut along the corridor.
Slaves looked at us, but slaves are slaves, and they took only enough notice of us, two warriors, to keep out of our way. I hate and detest slavery; here was one facet of slavery clearly apparent. The guards hustled Thelda around another bend. When we reached the corner where a vast pot of Pandahem ware—and how old it was I wouldn't care to guess—brought up a few memories, I saw before me a double-corridor I recognized from its decoration. Down that corridor lay the council chamber where Lilah, the Queen, was now meeting the scouts who had brought information of the whereabouts of Umgar Stro.
Without hesitation I started off down the corridor.
“Dray! They went this way..."
I turned. Seg was looking at me, and I could not read the expression on his tanned face. A stray shaft of torchlight caught in his blue eyes and gleamed back lambently.
“Umgar Stro—” I said.
“The guards have taken Thelda down here, into the dungeons!"
At once I came to myself. This was Seg Segutorio, the man who had unhesitatingly followed me to the tower of Umgar Stro in Plicla to rescue Delia. Now I must go with him to rescue Thelda. Of course. How could I have thought otherwise? I would fight my way to Umgar Stro—never fear. So I thought as I ran after Seg down the corridor branching at right angles, through the bronze-bound lenken door at its end, and down bare stone steps into the dungeons of the Queen of Pain.
It was not as easy as I have made it sound. Every cell of my body screamed in agony that I must go to seek my Delia, my Delia of the Blue Mountains. I did not think then, I could not, of what might be happening to her. But the agony I suffered would only increase if I allowed poor Thelda and Seg to be destroyed. I knew my Delia would understand that and approve; and I also knew I used her acquiescence as a mere excuse.
The guards had been joined by men in the traditional uniform of their trade. They wore black aprons and black masks and their brawny arms were bare. Thelda's pitiful brown rag had been stripped from her and she huddled against a stone wall where iron rings fixed into the stone gaped open for her. Two sets along they supported a skeleton clothed in decayed scraps of flesh and skin.
One of the men gripped Thelda and lifted her arm toward the iron ring. Beneath the mask his fleshy face showed a vastly unpleasant sniggering enjoyment.
Seg had sheathed his sword.
Before I could run in with my brand naked in my fist Seg's first arrow punched meatily into the broad black-leather-clad back. The torturer screamed like a de-gutted vosk and toppled away. Then I was in among the guards. I laid about me with the flat of my sword, for in all the desperate anger blazing in me I still retained sense enough to try to mitigate the Queen's rage. One torturer she might overlook; more would cause untold problems for Seg and myself.
“Don't kill them, Seg!” I yelled, as I felled the Deldar and swung back and laid my blade flat into his companion's guts, bringing the hilt down on his head as he doubled.
Seg gasped and swore and stowed that great longbow away and thwacked his long sword down onto the guards. So sudden, so vicious, so fierce was our onslaught that the guards wilted and fell in swathes. Only two managed to bring their steel-tipped spears up and these we slashed through with our brands and then knocked their wielders out, a neat one-two flicker of movement,
“I'll make a swordsman of you yet, Seg!” I said. The brisk action had stirred my sluggish blood.
But Seg Segutorio was cradling Thelda in his arms, holding her naked body to him, crooning unintelligible words over her.
“Oh, Dray!” shrieked Thelda. “I knew you would come! I knew you would save me!"
“Thank Seg,” I said with a harshness of tone I had no need to simulate.
“But—Dray—” She struggled free of Seg. She stood there, her arms outspread, her bosom panting, her color very high and flushed. “That Lilah—that Queen—female cramph! I hate her! But you, Dray—you have saved me!"
I did not look at Seg.
He said, in a hard clipped voice: “We must get out of here. Now. Before these sleeping beauties awake."
“Put your dress on, Thelda,” I said. “You and Seg must get away at once.” I stripped a long, lavishly embroidered cloth from the Deldar, rolling him over and over so that his nose squashed on the filth of the stone floor. “Put this on, too, as a cape. You can make the outside safely; you know the way—"
“Dray! Aren't you coming?"
I did not laugh. “I have a matter to discuss with Lilah."
Thelda started back as though I had struck her.
“You—Dray—you—and the Queen! No!"
For all her words a change had come over Thelda, my lady of Vallia. Much of her bounce had gone. I remembered her screams as the guards had dragged her off. She thought then that she was doomed; dark fears of that memory would haunt her for the rest of her days, I expected. She looked more haggard, the plumpness of her sagging; her eyes looked dull.
“Not Lilah and me, Thelda, no—not like that. She has news of Umgar Stro, and I must have news, also."
“If you go to stand before the Queen,” said Seg, “then I go with you to stand at your side."
“Seg—"
“And me?” shrieked Thelda. “I dare not go—"
“I do not think, Thelda, the Queen will harm you if Dray intercedes for us all."
Seg's words, so calm, so sure, so filled with all the dark wisdom of his hills of Erthyrdrin, rattled me. Loh was, indeed, a continent of mystery.
“I am frightened—” Thelda looked it, too.
I started to walk out of the chamber, back up the stone stairs. “The Queen will listen to me,” I said. “Let us go."
We were not molested on our way to Queen Lilah's council chamber.
It is a strange fact to me now to recall that I have only the dimmest memories of her council chamber. Oh, it was wide and lofty and supported by the massive Hiclantung pillars with their garlands of risslaca and snake, and with pediments fashioned in the form of corths; there was color and torchlight and many people; but I recall only the tall scarlet form of Lilah, with her piled mass of gem-encrusted red hair with its wedge-shape over her forehead, of her deep dark eyes and the upslanting eyebrows, the shadows beneath her cheekbones and that scarlet-painted, small, firm, and yet sensuous mouth.
“So you have come back to me, Dray Prescot."
I remembered her, prostrate before me, groveling, imploring me to take a seat at her side on her throne, offering me everything. Her chin lifted as though she, too, understood my thoughts.
“If you have news of Umgar Stro, oh Queen, then tell me that I may take his throat b
etween my hands and squeeze until he is as lifeless as a rag doll."
“Gently, gently, my Lord of Strombor! It is not sure. The scouts believe; we await confirmation."
“Tell me where and I will confirm—"
“Not so fast.” Lilah looked at Thelda. Guards surrounded us, their steel spear-points glinting. Seg held his strung bow in his left hand, and idly held an arrow in his right hand. I knew he could bend the bow and send that shaft clear through the heart of this Queen of Pain long before he was cut down by her spearmen. “Not so fast. What is this—woman—doing with you?"
I stared at Lilah, challengingly, eye to eye. I forced my meaning upon her.
“She is innocent in all this, oh Queen. We found her in circumstances that would displease me mightily if I thought they were of your doing."
She returned my stare. Our eyes locked.
“I see."
“There is a man, a Wizard of Loh, a San, one called Lu-si-Yuong."
She gasped. “What of San Yuong?"
“Seg Segutorio and I rescued him from the tower in Plicla. He was the only prisoner. He will enter Hiclantung when the gates are open at dawn, although I venture he would find it a blessing if you sent guards to let him in now. There are leems."
“Yes.” She gestured and a Hikdar moved off at once to carry out her unspoken orders. “The San is precious to me. I grieved at his loss in the massacre. And you have rescued him!"
“Seg Segutorio and I."
“Yes.” She seemed somewhat at a loss. It was with a considerable reduction of her powers that she said: “It seems I am in your debt again, Dray Prescot."
“You know what I seek. Umgar Stro. Tell me—"
“As soon as the news of that evil person's whereabouts is brought to me you shall be told. But, my Lord of Strombor, I put a thought to you. We believe he is in Chersonang."
Chersonang was the adjoining country and city in hereditary rivalry with Hiclantung. I could foresee problems.
Lilah leaned forward a little on her throne, her white hand beneath her white chin, brooding on me. “I shall send all my army up against Umgar Stro in Chersonang. I believe we can break both him and them, together. This will be your opportunity, Dray Prescot, to seek and find the woman you desire. I offer you the chance to command my army, with my generals, to go up against Umgar Stro at the head of a host. Come, what do you say?"
Warrior of Scorpio [Dray Prescot #3] Page 17