Authors: David Drake

Queen of Demons (55 page)

BOOK: Queen of Demons

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“There are thousands of Hairy Men down there,” Sharina said. “Tens of thousands.”

She looked again down into the natural harbor. A mass of timber was sliding toward the mouth of the bay. The trees must have been tied together as well as bound by their entangled branches.

“They must've cleaned both banks of the East River
for leagues to get all that wood,” Unarc said. “I noticed some trees down when we followed the West River tooâ”

Sharina hadn't noticed any cut trees. The river itself was merely a thrum in her consciousness for most of the day's journey.

“âbut I didn't think much about it.”

Over the raft swarmed many hundreds of Hairy Men. They wereâ

“They've built rafts,” Sharina said as she rose again to a squat. “They're pulling themselves out to sea by ropes or something. More Hairy Men at the jaws of the bay are holding the other ends of the ropes. I think there's more rafts in the open sea already.”

Hanno dropped so suddenly that Sharina almost fell as she squirmed clear. “Well I
will
be fricasseed in a pot!” the big hunter said. “That's what they're doing, missie. That sure is.”

Unarc's brow wrinkled. “They're drownding themselfs?” he said.

“Hanno?” said Sharina. “You said the current carried west all the way to Ornifal. Could they â¦?”

“There goes another lot,” Unarc said from his viewport. “May the Shepherd shear my bum if they don't!”

“Yeah, it might be that,” Hanno said as he got to his feet. “I don't know what they'd figure to do on Ornifal.”

“There's a powerful lot of them,” the bald man said reflectively. He rose to a kneeling position, but he checked the edge of his hooked knife in the light before he stood completely.

Hanno nodded. Both hunters resumed climbing the steep slope. Sharina, caught by surprise, took long strides to fall in between them again before the light faded.

Breathing was easier now. A breeze past the tube's unseen mouth higher up the mountain drew air in through the root holes. Sharina recognized the mustiness of the tube's stagnant lower level only now that she was past it. Any air after being submerged in the mud-black water had
left her lungs too grateful to complain about the quality of what was available.

At first Sharina thought the sound she heard,
felt
, was the crosswind reverberating in the depths of the tube. Garric played a shepherd's pipe of reeds stoppered at the bottom with wax so that each different length vibrated at a graduated note.

Sharina climbed higher. She began to hear unintelligible words in the pulses of sound. Light seeped from above. The rush of molten rock had drawn striations down the lava tube while the walls were still plastic. Hanno held his spear crossways. His right hand was at the balance and his left just below the broad head, prepared to thrust or throw.

Sharina could see the opening above them. The lava had poured from a notch in the lip of the volcano, cooling as it plunged downward. The eruption that formed the tube must have been a later one since it had engulfed full-sized trees that grew from the existing cone. The walls were thinner at the top of the tube than they became by the time they reached the river. They'd crumbled away for a distance of twenty feet below the lip, but the notch had weathered deeper also.

Sharina drew the Pewle knife. Without looking around, Hanno gestured her and Unarc to wait.

The big hunter crept to the tunnel mouth. His limbs didn't seem to move at all; it was like watching a snake climb a tree. He glanced around, then slithered fully into the open to peer over the edge of the notch.

He signaled the others forward. The air throbbed with the sound of the huge voice chanting, but Sharina still couldn't understand the words.

She stepped out of the sheltering lava, bending low but not attempting to crawl because the porous surface would scrape her to the bone. Hanno must have some technique that even Unarc lacked, because the bald hunter hunched out just as Sharina did. Though they were at the top of
the volcano, part of the cone now blocked their view of the harbor.

Sharina looked over the lip of rock, expecting to see a hollow filled with bubbling magma. Instead, the volcano had been dormant so long that grass covered the bottom of the crater. The walls were weathered to the color of rust.

“Oh â¦ ,” Sharina whispered. She squeezed her knife hilt for the comfort it gave her.

A fifty-foot outcrop had remained in the center of the basin when the surface around it slumped back into the earth. Someone had shaped it into the form of a Hairy Man with a ball in his right hand.

“It wasn't like that six months past,” Unarc whispered. “Hanno,
what
are the Monkeys up to?”

Sharina swallowed. The idol's eyes and mouth were carved deep. Wisps of colored smoke drifted from the openings to form a cloud like faded rags above the brutish head.

The sound of chanting came from the huge effigy. Though the words were still meaningless, Sharina now recognized the rhythms of wizardry.

“There's no Monkeys down there now,” Hanno said. “Except for whoever's inside the statue making that noise. I guess they're all gone to the harbor.”

“The cloud,” Sharina whispered. “It's shaped like a demon.”

She should have recognized the smoke image immediately: the cadaverous body; the limbs like wires knotted at the joints; the long skull and undershot jaw. The phantasms directing the Hairy Men were in the same mold and of similarly insubstantial fabric, but the scale of this semblance had deceived her.

“I don't see any point inâ” Unarc said as he started to back toward the concealing tube.

The smoke-demon moved.
Drifting in the breeze
, Sharina thought, but there suddenly was no breeze.

The smoke stared at them with yellow eyes.

“Run!” Hanno shouted as he jumped to his feet. When Sharina paused to let him lead as before, the big hunter grabbed her and half-shoved, half-flung her toward the mouth of the tube.

Sharina ran through the darkness in exaltation. The crisis had so taken her out of herself that she wasn't aware of her footing, let alone concerned. In Sharina's present state she was as much a part of her world as a fish swimming; and as with the fish, she instinctively
knew
the environment through which she moved.

She'd sheathed the knife. The sturdy blade would be useless against the present dangers and she didn't need the feel of the grip to remind her of Nonnus.

She reached the light diffusing from root holes across the passage and leaped it in the same gazelle-like bounds that she'd been making in the pitch blackness above. The two hunters padded along at their own best speed, but for once they seemed noisy and slow compared to the girl they'd sent ahead of them.

Sharina wasn't thinking about what she would do when she reached the river. Did religious folk ever reach the sort of closeness to Godhead that she felt now? All existence was one, and she was one with all existence!

The lava walls began to glow with red light as though she were running through a cloud lit by sunset. She heard Hanno and Unarc shout in surprise from far away. They must see the light also.

Sharina took another leap. Ahead of her the walls of light bulged inward. A huge clawed hand, smoky but still more substantial than the rock it penetrated, reached through and began to close.

Hanno shouted again. Sharina would have liked to stop, but the momentum of her spirit no less than her body carried her forward.

She was trying to draw the Pewle knife when the demon hand clamped shut, squeezing Sharina into darkness again as it drew her back the way it had come.

2nd Day of the Fifth Month (Partridge)

“A
h, there's the baron's brontothere coming!” said Ascelei, letting out anger as well as informing Ilna and Cerix, “You could buy every house on this street for what that animal cost, and out of our taxes!”

Cerix squirmed to get a better look at the great beast pacing slowly around the angle of the street. Ascelei's house stood on the Parade, the broadest thoroughfare in Divers, but even the Parade bent and wriggled on its course from Baron Robilard's palace to the harbor.

Ascelei the Mercer, Ilna's host and employer for the past four days, was one of the most prosperous men in Divers. He'd added an ornate railing to what had probably been an open balcony when the house was built a century or more in the past. The flat, pear-shaped banisters were attractive and made the balcony safer for people who needed mechanical help to avoid falling into the street. Cerix in his cart could see more through the slats than if he'd been at street level behind the legs of the other spectators, but only a little more.

“Do you want me to lift you?” Ilna said. She kept her eyes on the procession so that the cripple could avoid embarrassment by pretending she hadn't spoken if he wanted to.

The brontothere resembled a horse more than it did any other animal Ilna had seen, but it weighed several tons and its head looked like a gigantic saddle. A broad, sideforked horn stuck up from the nose like a pommel, and the forehead was dished in to curve upward to the thick neck. Despite the beast's great size, the skull didn't have much room for a brain.

“No, I can see,” Cerix muttered, drawing himself up to look over the railing. He had to use the strength of his upper body to keep his weight off his stumps, but he clearly preferred that to accepting help from somebody else.

Ilna smiled wryly. She didn't have a lot in common with the cripple and she despised the weakness that caused him to drug himself for the pain; but she could at least applaud his desire to do without the help of others.

The crowd cheered to see the brontothere, though there was less enthusiasm than Ilna would have expected for a spectacular parade. There'd already been a troop of cavalry in polished armorâonly twenty of them, but Third Atara was a small island which had to import the grain that horses needed to stay healthy. Then came a band with horns, cymbals, and even a copper kettledrum carried in a frame between two men and beaten by two more who walked to either side. Next were nearly two hundred sailors keeping step as they marched in tight companies.

The sailors surprised Ilna till Ascelei mentioned that they were from the baron's war galleys. The fixed rhythms of rowing made them better able to keep pace than most folk.

And now the brontothere, a striking sight even had it been alone. The only folk in the street who seemed to be cheering unreservedly, though, were ragged fellows who probably had nothing to be taxed on. Very possibly it wasn't just wealthy merchants like Ascelei who felt the burden of Robilard's shows.

“He claims to be descended from the Elder Romi,” Ascelei said bitterly. “Him! His grandfather was a bodyguard for my grandfather when he was trading to Sandrakkan. If Robilard's a real noble, then I'm the Lady! And everybody knows Romi was celibate anyway.”

Cerix cocked his head to look up at Ilna. “Romi was the wizard who ruled Third Atara after King Carus drowned,” he explained. “During the hundred years
Romi lived, he kept Third Atara peaceful while the rest of the Isles fell apart.”

“You know about the Elder Romi, Master Cerix?” Ascelei said with for the first time a degree of respect for the cripple. He'd allowed Cerix to view the procession from the second storyâthe sleeping loftâof his shop only because Ilna had insisted and Ascelei was afraid to lose her services.

The mercer was a sour man, though astute and scrupulously honest in his dealings. Ilna had gained a place in his household minutes after she and the two wizards had arrived in Divers four days earlier. The mercer was having a gastric attack. Ilna had cured it with a quickly knotted pattern that settled Ascelei's stomach as no healer's nostrum had managed in the decades previous.

“I've visited Third Atara in past years,” Cerix said. “But Romi I know from my studies. He was one of the greatest wizards of all time.”

The brontothere paced stolidly down the center of the roadway, crushing the coarse limestone gravel into dust with its three-toed feet. Two men walked beside the creature holding beribboned cords attached to its collar, but no one could imagine that they'd restrain it should it decide to bolt. The horsemen riding to either side with lances leveled at the brontothere's rib cage were the real control on its behavior.

“Robilard, Baron Robiman,” Ascelei said. “He claims he's going to regain the glory of his ancestor the Elder Romi. If it would bring back Romi and the golden age, I wouldn't grudge the way taxes have risen, but all we get for our money is pomp like this, gilded armor and brontotheres from Shengy!”

He gestured down toward the handsome young man with a goatee, a spike mustache, andâas the mercer had saidâgilded armor, brilliant in the sunlight. Ilna had thought the chariot in which Robilard stood was harnessed to the brontothere, but she saw now that the double line of footmen following the vehicle pushed it along by
means of a pole. The baron was apparently doubtful enough about the brontothere's tractability that he didn't choose to tether himself to the beast.

“What a ridiculous display!” Ilna said. She'd seen too much human folly to claim that this example surprised her, but familiarity didn't keep her from feeling disgust at each latest manifestation.

“Romi isolated Third Atara from the rest of the Isles,” Cerix said. He'd exhausted the strength of his arms, so he lowered himself awkwardly onto his chair again. Breathing heavily he continued, “While he lived, he could do that: no ship reached the island without Romi's permission. If they tried, though they sailed forever the island would move away as quickly as they moved forward. But when Romi finally died, Third Atara was no different from any other place, and the pirates came here too.”

Ilna saw movement behind the line of spectators. She leaned over the railing for a better view. Because the lofts of this and other houses facing the Parade overhung the ground floors, it was difficult to see pedestrians who walked close to the building fronts.

She'd been correct in her identification, though. “Here's Halphemos coming at last,” she said. “He wasn't required to, of course. An invitation isn't a command.”

She heard the bitterness in her own voice and grimaced. “A truth that I should listen to myself, I see,” she added.

Halphemos and Cerix had lodged at an inn, the Dog and Cat, with the last of their money. Ilna had become the guest of her employer as part of her wages. The wizards had held street shows while Ilna returned to weaving as a way to earn a living until she got a sense of the situation.

Ascelei had quickly judged the value of the feelings of well-being which Ilna's woven panels brought. He'd have advanced her money to lodge at the Dog and Cat if she'd wished to. She didn't see any reason to do that; but she
had
expected both the wizards to accept her invitation to
watch the spectacle from the vantage of the mercer's house.

Cerix had wheeled himself to the house under his own power, explaining with some embarrassment that Halphemos had another engagement but would be along shortly. Cerix hadn't been willingâor perhaps ableâto say what the other engagement was. Ilna assumed it involved a woman. Though she didn't have the least romantic inclinations toward Halphemos (the boy!) she was irritated to note a flash of jealousy in her reaction.

“Your other guest, mistress?” Ascelei asked.

The chariot had passed Ascelei's house and was nearing another bend in the Parade that would take it out of sight. Baron Robilard had remained perfectly still during his progress.

Ilna's lip wrinkled. The baron might better have dressed a statue in his glittering armor and used the time to do something useful himselfâlike clean the palace chamber pots.

Behind Robilard's chariot came a dozen or so litters and sedan chairs carrying courtiers of both sexes. Some of the nobles had the decency to look embarrassedâthough from what Ilna knew of the nobility, those were probably folk who feared their display wasn't as splendid as that of their rivals in other conveyances.

Ilna hadn't had any contact with the nobility when she lived in Barca's Hamlet; if she thought about them at all, it was to wonder why people believed that what their ancestors had done somehow made them better than anybody else. Nothing she'd seen since she'd entered the wider world had given her a better opinion of the class.

Third Atara, the last of the smaller islands trailing Atara proper, exported its wines and the colored marbles of its quarries all over the Isles. Ilna noted that perhaps as a result of its far-flung trade, court dress here ran to marine colors. There were blues, greens, and even a pale violet that must have come from eggplant rind. The aubergine's
smooth consistency impressed her with the dyemaster's skill.

Silks purchased by the nobility's agents on Seres and Kanbesa predominated among the fabrics. Ascelei's clientele came mostly from the class to which he belonged, wealthy merchants who favored woolens and fur trim. The small panels Ilna had been weaving from fine wool were already bringing queries from the palace, thoughâa matter of considerable satisfaction to the mercer.

The majordomo stepped onto the balcony and whispered in Ascelei's ear. The mercer gave an irritated wave of his hand and said, “Yes, of course he should be admitted. It doesn't matter that he came separately!”

He looked at Ilna in apology. She nodded curt understanding. Ascelei had a dozen servants in addition to the clerks in his shop below. He needed them because of his position in society, he'd explained to Ilna. Her opinion was that if Ascelei had at least ten fewer of the officious busybodies in his house, his position would have been a great deal more comfortable.

The very tag-end of the procession was passing, a pair of drummers and a body of palace servants on foot. The latter were probably only those who could afford impressive clothing, but there were still scores of them.

Ilna grinned. She imagined a horde of ragged scullery maids, stableboys, and undergardeners following to demonstrate just what it took to maintain one young fop in gilded armor in what he deemed his proper state. From what Ascelei had said, at least the taxpayers of Third Atara were already well aware of the cost.

“Master Halphemos, who does not give his patronymic,” the majordomo announced, making clear his disdain for a man he classed a common mountebank for all the young wizard's silk robes. To be fair, the red brocade was considerably the worse for wear since Halphemos had been jailed in it.

Ilna wasn't in a mood to be fair. Halphemos had left what he thought was paradise for her. In a cold rage she
turned and grasped the collar of the majordomo's robe. She ran her fingers across the fabric, lace over a tight serge. With closed eyes she let its patterns flow into her conscious understanding.

Ilna opened her eyes again, taking her hand away from the garment and reentering the waking world. The majordomo was gabbling; Ascelei watched with questions but no concern in his expression, and Halphemos slid past the tableau with his right hand in his left sleeve.

“Do you know who
your
father was?” Ilna asked harshly, her eyes holding the servant's. “I do.”

“I'm Othem or-Almagar!” the majordomo said. “My father was Baron Orde's personal valet!”

He patted his collar to make sure that Ilna hadn't torn it. As if she'd take her anger out on innocent fabric!

“Your father was named Garsaura and he was a groom in the palace stables,” Ilna said, raising her voice so that the several servants standing beyond the balcony door could hear clearly. “Would you care to learn more about your real ancestry, Master Othem?”

“That's notâ” the majordomo said. He didn't finish the thought. His mouth remained open as he turned. He left the balcony faster than his dignity of a few moments before would have allowed him to do.

Halphemos grinned appreciatively, though he seemed a little embarrassed to have needed a woman to stand up for him. “Thank you, mistress,” he said. He nodded in the direction the majordomo had vanished and added, “He won't sleep till he's proved there wasn't a groom named Garsaura in the palace forty years ago, will he?”

Ascelei's eyes moved in quick increments from Halphemos to Ilna. It was Cerix, looking over his shoulder because there wasn't room on the balcony for him to turn his chair, who said, “But there
was
a Garsaura in the palace then. Wasn't there, mistress?”

“Yes,” said Ilna with a smile that could cut glass. “As a matter of fact there was, Master Cerix.”

“She doesn't bluff, boy,” the cripple said to his gaping
ward. “She doesn't lie. And by whatever gods you believe in,
don't
get her angry.”

BOOK: Queen of Demons

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