The Destiny of the Sword (47 page)

“A council of thirteen Rotanxis?” Tomiyano sneered. “Can you imagine it?”

“Barely.”

“And you’re going to send dial boy to them? The first thing they’ll ask him is how many sorcerers he’s killed.”

And Nnanji would tell mem.

“I don’t think I can stop him.” Jt sounded weak even to Wailie as he said it, but it was the truth.

Tomiyano was furious, his voice rising. “You know what they’ll see when they look at him? A trained killer! A boy monster! I don’t suppose sorcerers reach seventh rank until they’re sixty at least. They’ll be a bunch of frightened old men, Shonsu, and you’re suggesting something totally new. You want them to trust you—and you send Nnanjil You’re making my sister a widow, damn you! Do you suppose they’ll send some bite of him back to her as souvenirs?”

ttttt

The circle of seven had now become a circle of eight. Seven swordsmen sat on stools, the solitary sorcerer in a chair. The fire crackled and sparked, sometimes blowing out clouds of smoke as the wind gusted. Likely the chimney had not been swept in a century.

Yet the group of eight held subgroups. Rotanxi was a conspicuous minority of one in his cowled gown. The old man was understandably wary, a solitary cat hi a doghouse, being cautious and courteous.

Wailie himself felt strangely isolated, the other swordsmen’s suspicion walling him in like thick glass. As he described the tentative agreement he had made with the sorcerer, he could feel his words bouncing off it. They did not want to hear.

And Nnanji was another group all to himself. He was staying silent, sinewy arms folded and ankles crossed, gazing at his boots with a secret smile teasing the comers of his mouth. Even the silver pelicans on the rug did not upset him now.

The other five Sevenths were implacable. They had been given time to think about a treaty, and they thought even less of it afterward than they had before. Be nice to sorcerers? Shameful! A twenty,day truce with winter coming? Insanity! Liege Nnanji as hostage? Outrageous! All their war preparations to be thrown away? Treason! They were not saying so, but then, opinion was obvious. Rotanxi could not help but notice. He would surely

withdraw from the agreement if he felt that Shonsu could not count on the willing support of even bis senior officers.

Then Wailie played what he thought was his trump card, his argument,for,sorcerers that had apparently converted Nnanji—if mis struggle goes ahead, then swordsmen and even civilians will get hold of the sorcerers’ weapons. It did not work. It was too farfetched and hypothetical for the Sevenths. Their icy disapproval did not thaw hi the slightest.

Nnanji caught Wallie’s eye, grinned faintly, and shook his head. Nnanji was being uncharacteristically telepathic this day and he was saying that this was not the argument to use.

But what was? Why had he come around so dramatically? Even Wailie did not know, and the other Sevenths certainly did not. Nnanji had them all baffled—they kept staring at him, trying to understand his inexplicable change of heart.

Finally Wailie asked for comments or questions. A pall of silence fell, like earth on a coffin lid. As it dragged on, Rotanxi turned and gave him a quizzical and cynical glance—this is your support?

Wallie’s temper began to stir. Stupid iron,age barbarians! Ignorant savages! Why had he been given this impossible task? For the first time since his early days in the temple at Harm, he felt a great longing for his old life on Earth come washing over him and a bottomless contempt for this primitive culture and its mule,headed swordsmen. Almost he could want to wash his hands of the whole affair, of the tryst, of the gods’ mission. He could take Jja down to the River and find a ship and sail away to be a water rat for the rest of his days...

Which would be few and nasty, if he defied the Goddess.

“Shonsu,” Nnanji said, “perhaps we should allow the valiant lords a chance to discuss this without the sorcerer present?” He could not portray innocence nearly as well as his duplicitous brother could. He was plotting something. Wailie hesitated and men concluded that he had no choice. He would have to trust Nnanji.

“Very well! My lord?” Wailie rose and escorted Rotanxi to the door. As he had expected, Nnanji stayed where he was. The door closed behind them, Rotanxi turned to say something...

But Wailie had already gone.

There were only a few bodyguards remaining in the long antechamber—and Jja. He had set her on a stool and told her to wait, certain that she would be safe there, after what had happened the last time she had visited the lodge. Safe from swordsmen—but DOW she was standing with eyes downcast in front of a very tall woman in blue. Wallie hurtled along the room with giant strides.

“Doa!”

“Ah, there you arc, my dear!” the minstrel said in a voice that would have swarmed bees.

“I am very busy today, my lady!”

“That’s quite all right, darling. I was just interviewing this slave.”

“Interviewing?”

Doa’s large mouth showed all her teeth in a smile. “This is Jja, is it not? The one you promised to give me?”

For a moment her audacity left Wallie speechless. Jja was being as silent as a rock.

He had never seen them together before—and the glint in Doa’s eye said plainly that be had better choose which one he wanted.

Then Jja looked up at him, and the appeal he saw there would have hauled the sun god down from his heaven.

He stepped between them and put an arm around Jja, wondering what rubbish Doa had been saying. The swordsmen were listening and trying to appear otherwise. He must not lose his temper.

Jja moved against him, seeking contact. He remembered bis momentary dream of sailing away into the sunset, and remembered who had been included in mat dream. Not Doa.

“Yes, mis is Jja. Jja, my love, mis is Lady Doa. I am not planning to give you to her. Whatever she told you, she was lying.”

Doa’s face flamed scarlet. The swordsmen were being very quiet.

“Honorable Forarfi!” Wallie was keeping his voice calm only by immense effort. “Escort Lady Doa from the lodge. See mat she is not admitted in future. My lady, I shall not be available this evening to escort you to die heaters’ banquet.”

He thought for a moment that Doa was going to spring at him. He rather hoped she would.

“I shall go to the banquet anyway! They want me to sing. I have some new songs to try.”

“Watch your tongue, minstrel, or you will sing them to rats in the dungeon.”

Doa gasped, then she wheeled around and stalked toward the door.

Wallie put his other arm around Jja also. “I am sorry, my love, so very sorry! Don’t believe her, whatever she said.”

Jja just stared up at him, searching.

“Wallie?” she whispered.

“Who else?”

The door to the council chamber flew open and Nnanji’s voice sang out. “Brother!”

But Wallie was busy and did not hear. It was Jja who finally broke the embrace. “They are waiting for you, my love,” she whispered.

“Let them!” Wallie said, and kissed her again, for several more minutes. When he eventually released her and headed back to the meeting, he was feeling lightheaded and so aroused that he wondered if he even cared what happened to the tryst.

He had made a dangerous enemy in Doa.

Who cared? He saw at once that the mood of the meeting had changed. The five Sevenths were all beaming. Rotanxi, standing in their midst, was attempting to hide his lack of understanding under an aristocratic sneer.

And Nnanji was grinning from shoulder to shoulder. “I think the valiant lords have come around, brother!”

“It is a noble cause, my liege!” Zoariyi proclaimed. As the oldest, he was the natural spokesman. “Lord Nnanji has indeed persuaded me.”

The others nodded, smiling and apparently excited.

How?

Why?

Who cared? Wallie looked to Rotanxi and shrugged. “Then we can go ahead and swear our oaths, my lord?”

The sorcerer nodded uneasily. “What arguments did you use, Lord Nnanji, exactly?”

Nnanji smirked. “Exactly? Exactly the arguments mat Lord Shonsu gave you, my lord, and that you accepted. Word for word, and nothing else, I swear.” He was enjoying himself enormously. Being able to mystify Wallie was a new experience for him. “Shonsu, for an oath like this you ought to summon the priests!”

*T suppose so.”

“Then why not take Lord Rotanxi to the dungeons while we wait?” He sniggered at Wallie’s expression. ‘To show him how swordsmen treat prisoners? And meanwhile—“ He swung around in high glee to the castellan. “—Lord Tivanixi and I have time for our fencing match!”

Dungeons were dungeons—dark, dank, and damp, smelling of urine and rats. Wallie had been insistent that the prisoners were to be well treated. By the standards of the World, he had been obeyed. He let Rotanxi speak to them in private, assuming that the old man would explain that they were now counterhostages and therefore not in immediate danger. It would have been interesting to hear what they thought of the proposed treaty and its chances.

Yet dungeons were dungeons, and it was a relief to emerge once more into fresh air, even the fresh air of the lodge courtyard, tainted by the numerous outhouses and bathhouses now filling it. Their canvas still flapped and thumped, but over that noise Wallie heard a distant cheer.

“We still have some time to kill, my lord,” he suggested. “How about viewing a little fencing? Not your favorite sport, I should imagine, but another interesting tale to take back.”

The sorcerer was still blinking in the bright daylight. “Indeed!” he said. “But first tell me what happened with Lord Nnanji? How did he persuade the others?”

“If he says he used the same arguments, my lord, then I must believe him. I admit I don’t understand.”

Rotanxi frowned, worried. “If it were anyone else—even, with respect, yourself, Lord Shonsu—I should suspect treachery. But him...” He shook his head. During his captivity on Sapphire, he had come to know Nnanji. Even a sorcerer could not

expect duplicity from Nnanji. Nnanji would commit murder with a smile, but he would not lie about it.

Wallie led the way, through the tunnel and the archway to the steps before the lodge, evicting a half,dozen middleranks to make room. The polo matches were over, and now the assembled swordsmen were watching fencing. Almost every man seemed to have an arm around a woman as he celebrated mis holiday. Few noticed the sinister sorcerer standing with their liege.

In the center of this huge circle of onlookers, Nnanji and Tivanixi were dancing to and fro among the dung heaps, flashing foils.

“Ooo!” said the crowd, and Nnanji capered to show that he had a hit.

“The score?” Wallie demanded of a nearby Third.

“Two nothing, my liege. Best of five.”

Then the fencers closed again, whirling foils too fast to follow, leaping forward and back, impersonally masked, ponytails jumping. The crowd roared at a narrow escape, but neither man claimed a point and the battle continued. Wallie had never watched a match between Sevenths before. High,speed ballet with steel—it was magnificent, the grace of bom athletes in motion. He noted how tall Nnanji was, compared to Tivanixi, and how fast. Here and there he recognized some of his own favorite moves, but most were too quick for even him to analyze. Superb experts, inspiring each other...

“Ahhr That was it, the match point. Nnanji’s mask spun high in the air, his whoop of triumph lost in the roar as the crowd surged forward. Tivanixi’s face appeared, flushed and grinning, and he raised his foil in salute, while Nnanji was swept up on shoulders to be marched around the plaza.

Wallie stared in astonishment. So now Nnanji was a believable Seventh, not a convenient fiction, and a very good Seventh if he could beat Tivanixi. That just did not seem possible! Nnanji was a lightning,fast learner, but to reach such a level so quickly? Four weeks ago, he had barely made Sixth. Surely the castellan had thrown that match, faking it as a tribute to Nnanji’s display of courage in agreeing to go as hostage to Vul? If he had, would Nnanji have been able to detect the fraud?

The display of popularity was even more surprising. The

smait,aleck kid had gained acceptance by sheer perseverance, with sweat and innumerable bruises. A short while ago he had won over the Sevenths and now, apparently, the rest of the swordsmen, also.

Wallie turned to speak to the sorcerer and saw satisfaction on his face. A popular hostage was a valuable hostage.

Before they could speak, however, two sedan chairs appeared at the side of the steps. Honakura and Kadywinsi disembarked in a fluster of attendant priests and priestesses.

Wallie’s first reaction to Honakura was delight. A ruddiness had replaced the ominous pallor. Then the old man came creeping up the steps, leaning on a younger priest. At close quarters his skin had a strange transparency to it, and the brightness in his eyes was febrile. Sometimes a candle will flare up momentarily, just before it gutters out?