Kingdoms of the Night (The Far Kingdoms) (5 page)

Eight strong young acolytes mounted the platform bearing an idol of Te-Date — the protector of ships and travelers. One hand was stretched out, iron palm up for the offering, while the other held a large chalice. With drums pounding and chanters singing the furnace in the idol’s belly was fired and smoke and flame boiled from his lips.

Palmeras and I stepped to the idol, flanked by four other wizards who carried big trenchers of sacrificial meat and a cask of blood from the slain oxen.

The Chief Evocator was an excellent showman and he put his best dramatic efforts into the business at hand. He threw back his robes so they billowed in the breeze off the river and his arms shot up above his head as he addressed the heavens.

“O great Te-Date,” he intoned, his magically amplified voice thundering over all of us, “once again we gather before you to seek thy blessing. Your kindness to travelers and seekers everywhere is legend. For long centuries you have especially blessed the people of Orissa, who live by the river and trade peacefully and honorably with the world. Our caravans and ships have carried your exalted name into the wilderness where it lights the savage darkness and shows us the way. Today a new daughter of Orissa is born. She bears our dreams and our fortunes.

“We beseech thee, O Lord Te-Date, to raise thy splendid shield to protect her from any misfortune.”

Palmeras whipped his wand from his sleeve and flourished it high. The other Evocators bowed their heads low to help concentrate and guide his power.

Lightning cracked from the wand’s tip.

The wizards stepped forward with their offers.

The crowd gasped as the idol stirred into life. The god’s iron hands reached out and the wizards quickly tumbled flesh into one palm, then filled the chalice from the cask of blood. Te-Date’s mouth opened, fire bursting out, and the hand bearing the meat tilted it through metal lips. The smell of scorched flesh filled the air. The other hand jerked upward, spilling the blood into Te-Date’s fiery maw. The godform became still and the crowd groaned in satisfaction. Te-Date had accepted our offerings.

More flourishes from Palmeras and black smoke spewed from the idol, billowing thicker and thicker until it became a dense cloud hanging over the godform’s head. Sparkling lights danced in the smoke, which swirled and columned upward into a funnel.

“Behold, O Great Te-Date,” Palmeras roared. “Gaze upon thy daughter. We pray you find her fair.”

The smoke shot toward the huge cloth pavilion that hid the ship. It hovered over it for an instant, then a hole opened and the smoke hissed through. Palmeras thrust upward with his hands and the tent quivered from the magical force of the smoke inside. Then stakes burst, lines ripped free and the giant tent lifted up and up until we could glimpse the bright painted timbers of the new ship.

Palmeras shouted: “Away!” And the pavilion filled like a sail and was swept off to the side, completely baring the vessel.

I’ve seen many such a thing before — although I must admit Palmeras’ unveiling was easily the most spectacular — and I knew what to expect. Still, I caught my breath. There are few things as moving as a newly born ship.

Palmeras whispered to me. “Quick, what’s to be her name? I forgot to ask.”

The naming of a new ship is always important and those of us who can claim parentage — and even those who can’t — spend long hours considering and discussing the options. Like a human child, the ship’s birth-name seems to affect its future. Ask at any dockside tavern and you’ll hear many a tale of ships with awkward names or unlucky names that came to misfortune. Some are even true. A large list had been presented to me, all, as I’d requested, of water-dwelling birds. I’d reduced the list to my favorites: Shearwater, Petrel, Tern and... Ibis. I’d seen whole flocks of that graceful, heron-like creature fishing a marvelous lake in a distant land I’d once visited. The Ibis, with the subtle beauty of its black and white plumage, is worshipped in that land and once you’ve seen one with its spear-like beak stalking the shallows on its long, slender legs, or soaring on the midday breeze, you understand why. So that is the name I chose and that name is the name I whispered -

“Ibis.”

“Quite fitting,” he said and turned back — his position as Chief Evocator forgotten for the moment — to gawk like the rest of us.

The
Ibis
was a lovely thing to look upon. She didn’t have the efficient carnivore lines of a ship of war, nor was she as fast. She was a shallow-drafted merchantman — ninety feet long and twenty abeam — built to take any seas and carry people as well as cargo in comfort. When she was completely rigged for sea she’d carry a single mast, but just now there were flag poles mounted for the ceremony, flying colorful banners.

There was a quarterdeck at her stern with the wheel, a maindeck forward, then the small-decked forecastle where the sailors would sleep. There were big cabins in the stern whose interiors would be lit by large, square, many-paned windows.

This was a ship ideally suited for exploring new seas to win new friends for Orissa and customers for the Anteros. Besides her sails she could be powered by six large sweeps. She’d roll some at sea, but with her shallow draft and maneuverability she could sail up rivers, or hug any coast line, and still have grace enough to impress a savage king. Although she could carry twenty five men and women with ease, she’d need no more than six or seven to crew her. I like my ships to have a bit of flair so I had her painted in bright, eye-pleasing colors that at the same time did not detract from the bright skies and sparkling seas she’d soon sail.

The only decoration still missing was the figurehead, which required not only much artistry but magic as well. It wouldn’t be finished for some days yet. The family who had created such masterpieces for several generations was notoriously precise — some said picky — and besides it was bad luck to mount a figurehead until the ship sailed.

Someone shifted at my side, and I noticed Kele inching forward to sneak a better look. As an excuse for joining us she had the green and cold ceramic flask that held the blessing potion. At the right moment I was supposed to break it against the side and officially launch the ship and name it.

“I’d trade my left tit to command her,” she whispered.

I smiled, as taken by the craft as she, and slipped the flask from her grasp. Palmeras nodded, signaling me to get ready.

The ship sat in a cradle, a frame made of wood that would collapse when she was launched. She was held in place by thick-beamed shores angled up to steady her. And the whole elaborate contraption rested on freshly tallowed ways she’d ride down into the river.

Palmeras raised his wand and a hush fell over the crowd. But the sudden stillness let another voice carry loudly through.

“Damn you!” I heard my son roar. “How dare you take the word of a stranger over your own blood?”

We all jolted to see Cligus nose-to-nose with Hermias. Both of them were so absorbed in their confrontation they didn’t notice that all eyes were on them.

“This is not the time to continue such a discussion,” my nephew said.

“I’ll not have you spread your filthy slander,” Cligus said.

My son’s hand went to his dirk. But Hermias beat him to it, his own hand shooting out to grasp Cligus’ wrist.

I recovered and found my voice. “Stop it, you two! Remember
who
you are!”

My words jolted them to awareness and they turned, flushing in embarrassment. I let my glare sweep over the crowd, putting all my authority into it, and I saw the looks fall away and return guiltily to the business at hand. So much anger was in that glare that even Palmeras quickly dissolved his “I told you, so” look into one of complete disinterest.

I raised my hand and the musicians caterwauled into what quickly smoothed out into stirring music of the sea.

Still angry, I braced to hurl the flask. But then I hesitated as the ship seemed to speak out to me; begging me not to let such emotion soil her luck.

“I’ll make it up to you,” I promised under my breath.

I flung the flask and it crashed against the ship’s timbers. The heady scent of the blessing potion cleansed the air.

“Before all who witness,” I declared, “I name thee
Ibis
. And may all your Tradewinds be Fair!”

Palmeras gestured with wand and the air crackled with the force of the spell he cast. The ship tilted forward, the cradle collapsed and the
Ibis
slid smoothly along the ways to enter the water as royally as any princess slipping into her bath.

There was much cheering and music. Men and women pressed around me to congratulate the Anteros for the newest addition to their fleet. The merry making began in earnest then. Roasts sputtered on their spits, wine flowed and couples, young and old, danced.

Cligus melted into the crowd and disappeared to sulk at home, I supposed. Hermias found a moment to come to me and apologize.

I waved him down. “I don’t have to tell you that you acted the fool,” I said. “Just as you don’t need for me to admonish you and say that I shall be angry at your behavior for some time. If you are the man I hope you are, you’ll know you deserve it and suffer in silence.”

Hermias blushed and bowed his head. He was wise enough not to speak.

“But I would like to know what you and my son were quarreling over that was so important.”

Hermias shook his head. “I’ll not say. Please don’t press me on it, Uncle Amalric. I’d hate to earn your further wrath by refusing. Refuse, however, I must.”

I could see there was no point in demanding an answer. He was an Antero, after all, and no one can match our stubbornness.

So I called for Quatervals and my carriage and headed home.

The day had left me in an even deeper quandary than before. I couldn’t delay much longer. But the incident at the launching did nothing to grease the ways for
me
.

* * * *

I repaired to my villa garden to listen to fountain play beneath my mother’s shrine. She’d died when I was a boy and I had little but my child’s imaginings to remind me what she was like. And that was mixed up with the gentle myths my sister Rali told.

Isn’t it odd to think an old man might still want his mother’s comfort and advice? Odd or not, this is what I wished for. And then a different light pierced the facets of that wish and I found myself mourning for Rali, my strong warrior sister whose common sense had been invaluable to me for many years. A final turn dredged up Omerye’s face and the memory of her flute which used to charm reason out of any mess I’d made of things.

I was Lord Amalric Antero, a man whose wealth and good fortune was the envy of many. But I had no one to lean on when weakness threatened.

No one I could trust to help.

Outside the villa walls I heard a horse trot up. Then a stranger’s voice hallooed the house. I rose from the stone bench and went to the grated window in the garden wall.

It was a woman. Despite my age, my eyes are sharp and I could see her clear.

She was young, fair of skin and form, but with a commanding presence. She sat tall and easy in the saddle of a fine gray. She wore a hunter’s tunic of forest green over a tight-fitting black body stocking that showed off shapely, but muscular limbs. Her hair was dark, cut short, and on her head was perched a jaunty hat with a long feather of green to match her tunic. A simple chain of silver or white gold gleamed about her neck. Small studs of a similar metal winked at her ears and as she waited for a response to her hailing I saw her draw off elbow-length riding gloves, revealing a pair of wide silver bracelets on each wrist.

Impatient, she slapped the gloves against the saddle, then dismounted. On foot she was not so tall as her high-split limbs had made her first appear. She moved with a wiry grace, full of energy and purpose. And I noted that her high boots were expensive if well-worn from travel. About her narrow waist was a sturdy, large-buckled belt which bore a slim dirk in a scabbard on one side and what looked to be a leather wand case on the other.

She hallooed the house again. A servant came out and although I couldn’t hear the conversation I gathered the young woman was asking for me. The servant shook his head, no, the master was not available. He was resting and had given orders not to be disturbed.

This was true. But curiosity overcame weariness and I hastened to send someone to tell the servant I’d changed my mind, and please show her ladyship in.

When she strode into the garden, a large purse of well-worn leather slung over one shoulder, I was not disappointed. She was a dark-eyed beauty and close up there was no mistaking her royal bearing. Only a slight bump at the bridge of her nose — hinting of an unset break suffered in some adventure — marred her chiseled perfection.

But I was too old to be dazzled by such things so it was not her looks that impressed me. Her eyes glittered with an intelligence that was so familiar I could almost say its name. I’d never met her but somehow felt I’d known her long ago. And she was far too young for the number of years my mind was leaping over. She smiled, white teeth glittering against her dark features, and once again I was reminded of someone I once knew.

A double jolt struck me when she spoke and I heard the rich timber of her voice. It was feminine, but deep and firm, and I felt an old ghost trying to roust itself from the tangles of my memory.