Witches of Kregen (12 page)
“Marion!” said Nango, in that kind of whispering, half-chiding voice that denotes unease at what a lovedove says.
I brushed that away, seeing beyond these two the hall gyrating, as it were, around the dancers, the orchestras playing by rote, the scents of good wines and foods in the air. Marion — the Stromni Marion Frastel of Huvadu — and Strom Nango ham Hofnar were not just paying the required polite moment of conversation here. Marion got it out smartly enough — well, she would, seeing she was a Jiktar in the Jikai Vuvushis raised by the Sisters of the Sword.
“Majister! After this period of time, do you not think my unfortunate girls can return to the imperial bodyguard? I mean—” she gestured with a beringed hand, “—they were not to blame that they created werewolves. And that is all over. We missed the Battle of Vendalume. Many of the girls were most cross about that.”
“Anybody who can show good reason to miss a battle should congratulate herself.”
She looked uncertain at this; was this, it was clear both she and Nango were thinking, was this the way an emperor should speak?
Letting the conversation wander on a little after that without directing its course, I realized that Marion felt deeply that her new regiment of warrior maidens had not been in the fight. But more worrying was the way she kept inadvertently referring to “unfortunate” incidents, and “regrettable” occurrences. If she reflected the general feelings in Vondium — and she was representative enough to persuade me she did — then the folk here were damned uneasy about all these sorcerous goings on. As they would be, of course, and understandably so, to be sure. But it was the way in which these fears were expressed that depressed me.
What Marion seemed to be implying was that: “It’s all your fault, majister, that we suffer so; but we don’t really blame you for our misfortunes.”
Was I to be an emperor on sufferance, then?
“As to your girls, Marion, Wendy and Mich are handling affairs commendably. The regiment comes along, I am told. I feel it correct that it should be composed of Jikai Vuvushis from various sororities.”
“Yes, majister. Also, the regiment is called The Beckoning Leems. Everyone agreed on the name, and—”
She saw my face.
“Majister!” Her voice quavered. Strom Nango put a hand down onto her shoulder, and I wondered who was supporting whom.
This name was just another example of that weird warped Kregan sense of humor, that the girls would beckon their foes and then like leems devour them. The leem was very often the symbol for savage power, untamed and destructive, and in the normal course of events one saw leem-symbols along with chavonths and strigicaws and mortils and all the other wonderful varieties of Kregan wildlife. Marion did not know, I believed, of Lem the Silver Leem.
“As well call your girls a regiment of churmods, Marion. Malignant, malevolent, not to be trusted. You must think of another name.”
“Yes, majister.”
They went away after that, very subdued.
Regiments liked to give themselves high-flown and resounding names. For the lads of my guard corps the number and the initials could not be bettered. That thought made me call over Chuktar Emder Volanch. He was a much-decorated kampeon, a Freedom Fighter of Valka, and an old comrade whom I do not believe I have mentioned before although we had served together enough times, by Vox.
“Strom — the regiment prospers, thank Opaz.”
He knew exactly why I’d beckoned him over. His face, hard as a nut, contrasted sharply with his casual evening robes. He told me that the new guard regiment had been superbly trained up and he was greatly desirous of seeing it in action. The regiment was the First Emperor’s Foot Bows. As Chuktar Volanch said: “Even Kov Seg Segutorio has given 1EFB the accolade for their shooting.”
“Excellent work, Emder,” I congratulated him. “You have done well. And, believe me, there will be work for you and your lads when we hit the Racters, Opaz rot ’em.”
“We are ready, strom.”
“Chuk Loxan is not to be seen?”
Chuktar Emder smiled. “Balass the Hawk took his regiment off into the wilds for rigorous training. Loxan welcomed this. He and I, strom, well, there is a rivalry between his 1ELC and my 1EFB to become the first into action.”
I could well believe it.
If my blade comrade Balass the Hawk was knocking sword and shield work into the First Regiment of the Emperor’s Life Churgurs, then, by the Brass Sword and Glass Eye of Beng Thrax! they’d find out what rigorous training meant!
I said to Chuktar Emder, “This is a bet that will never be collected. 1EFB and 1ELC are likely to go into action together.”
“As Opaz will, strom.”
A tremendous racket burst up just then and everyone turned as the happy couple prepared to make their exit.
Khe-Hi and Ling-Li really did look happy, and this gladdened me. We needed all the happiness we could scrape up in Vallia. Many and scurrilous were the shouted remarks as they were sent royally off, remarks that in other circumstances no one in his right mind would shout at a Witch or Wizard of Loh. They were showered with flower petals. When, at last, their narrow boat glided off into the moons light, we all trooped back for a final round of dancing and drinking, of talking and singing.
I said to Delia: “One dance, my girl, and then I’m off.”
Her gaze did marvelous things to my spine.
Later that night I said, “I really am going. Up to Falkerdrin — I’m not waiting for Natyzha Famphreon to die and then be called in.”
“Dray!”
“Oh, yes, I know. I shan’t slip a knife between her ribs or drop poison into her wine — although there are many and many who would say she deserves that quietus.”
“So you’re rushing off like a chunkrah—”
I kissed her and later said: “I’m going to have a little spying on my own account. We have to beat the Racters fast, because of this oaf the so-called King of North Vallia.”
She turned over and stretched. “I wish I could come with you. It would prove interesting. But I am committed to—”
“The Sisters of the Rose.”
I dearly wanted to know if she had been maneuvered into becoming the mistress of that secret Order. She would not tell, naturally. This, then, was another reason why I wanted so badly to contact the Star Lords. They’d know.
She made no direct answer, as I expected, but said, “If you are gone from Vondium that she-leem Csitra will search for you.”
“Without dupes she will not find me. And I have perfect confidence in Deb-Lu.”
“As have I, thank Opaz.”
So, after due preparations and fully kitted out I slipped quietly out of Vondium, heading north, flying in the mingled radiance of Zim and Genodras, and set course for Falkerdrin.
Nalgre the Point
Oby, Dwaby and Sosie Fintle set me down safely into a small woodland some way inside the borders of Falkerdrin. Triplets are not all that common on Kregen, twins being far more common than they are on Earth, and the Fintle triplets provided an interesting study for the student of genetics. They were alike as three peas in a pod, except for the fact that Sosie was a girl.
They belonged to my secret group of agents, and they’d been trained by Naghan Raerdu, who was a spy par excellence. His attitude was either to go invisible, or to go big.
He, himself, habitually went big, and yet could become inconspicuous on the spot if needs be — when he laughed. These triplets were of the invisible variety; once seen never remembered. They handled the flier I’d prised out of Farris very well, and I was confident we had not been observed.
“If only you’d let us go with you, majis,” grumbled Oby.
Dwaby added, “We wouldn’t get in your way, majis.”
And Sosie finished: “Majis, please say yes.”
I said, “Nope, and that’s final. Get my gear off and then you can shove off. Farris needs this voller.”
They didn’t enjoy this; they obeyed and soon my zorca, preysany and piles of kit were overside and under the trees. I bid them the remberees in a most cheerful fashion; they replied in a way that suggested that they’d seen the last of me. The voller rose beyond the trees, turned and fled hugging the contours.
I said to Snagglejaws, my zorca: “Well, my lad, you and Swivelears here are in for it now.”
He tossed his single spiral horn in reply, and stamped a hoof. That spiral horn was not particularly long. His hide was of a mangey grayish color, rather more hairy and tufty than smooth and sleek. He had a damned wicked eye. He looked a mess. Yet Snagglejaws was among the strongest, sturdiest, most willing of all the zorcas; he wasn’t in Shadow’s class; but then, what zorca was?
This reminded me of the time in Djanduin when I’d made the acquaintance of just such a zorca, Dust Pounder — although, to be fair, Snagglejaws looked a mess while Dust Pounder was a blood zorca.
The preysany, Swivelears, showed the whites of his eyes as I loaded the kit onto his back. It was perfectly clear he was saying in preysanish: “Why by all the gods do I carry the kit and Snagglejaws doesn’t?”
Still, that was the way of it on Kregen, and when I swung up into the saddle on Snagglejaws’ back I fancied Swivelears gave a whinny of satisfied amusement.
So we set off along a trail toward Fakransmot, a town where, so our intelligence said, Natyzha Famphreon recruited paktuns.
For, of course, despite the zorca between my knees, following Naghan the Barrel’s advice I’d chosen to go big. I’d be a hyrpaktun, one of the most renowned of all mercenaries. I’d wear the pakzhan at my throat, the silken cords looped up over my shoulder, and the golden dazzle of the Zhantil’s head device would tell any onlooker that here was a free lance of formidable reputation.
Naturally, I’d shifted my features around a trifle and allowed my whiskers to grow so that they helped disguise me, and the multitude of bee stings on my face that was the price of too drastic changes could be substantially muted.
The small golden or silver rings that secure the golden or silver devices to the silk at a paktun’s neck serve another purpose. If one paktun slays another in fair combat he takes the ring and threads it up on a trophy string called a pakai. I’d put on a whole hefty chingle of rings on my pakai. If I got into a fight I could secure it firmly so that no foeman could grab it and so catch me at a disadvantage. All the same, I didn’t like the thing.
Very briefly, then, I will say that I was equipped as a Kregan would like to be equipped — a stout zorca between my knees, a tough preysany loaded with kit, and armed with a Lohvian longbow, a drexer, a rapier and main gauche, a few odd knives and terchicks about my person, and the great Krozair longsword scabbarded down my back under the plain black cape.
In addition, a tough shield of an oval shape and with a snarling neemu on its face lay athwart Swivelears’ rump. I had no lance. There was a reason for this. When I was employed by Natyzha Famphreon’s officers, I intended to go for a swod as a bowman, not a lancer. The shield I would explain away. It was black, and the neemu of bright brass.
The forests up here in Falkerdrin extended for considerable areas over the kovnate. Some of them were infested with wild hatchevarus; but they were fierce enough to drag down a charcoal burner and not powerful enough seriously to challenge a soldier with a sword. I trotted on, easily, guiding Snagglejaws with my knees, although he followed the track and did not need guidance. Swivelears trotted along behind on the leading rope.
He was carrying the bits and pieces of armor I’d thought suitable. Reluctantly I’d discarded any idea of taking some of the superb supple mesh from the Dawn Lands. I had a kax, shoulder pieces, pauldrons, pteruges and greaves. Even then it was doubtful if I’d use the lot all at once. Wearing armor is a funny old business; you most devoutly need it in the heat of battle, yet you chafe under it and wish for the freedom of movement you’d have if you chucked the lot down.
Still, there it was if I needed it. Easing the zorca to a walk I let him amble along. The edge of the woods was soon reached and I debouched out into a long slanting valley, well-watered and lush with flowers, and with the sea distant and blue on the horizon.
We’d chosen to land here because the port of Roombidge on the north coast of the kovnate received the argosies from overseas bringing in the mercenaries hired by Natyzha Famphreon. The paktuns were streaming ashore at many ports along the coast, and at ports on the coasts of the Belains to the southwest and of Vekby to the west. The plan was for me unobtrusively to join up with a caravan journeying to Fakransmot.
To this end I reined in when a village showed up ahead. The suns were declining and I was lucky. A string of riders wended along the trail clearly intending to put up for the night in the village of Rernal, and as they dismounted by the single inn I eased in among them, as though seeking for a good position. I did not make a fuss over it. I was gambling that in the short distance from the coast everyone might not have come to know everyone else. From the conversations as the mercenaries spread out I realized they had traveled aboard ships different from their countries of origin. There were plenty of diffs among them.
I stayed with that bunch all the way to Fakransmot. The state of the kovnate impressed me. Natyzha was a damned hard overseer of labor; there were many slaves and the fields were in good heart. We had done as well down south; I doubt if we’d done better.
During the ride I spoke when spoken to, kept to myself and stayed out of trouble. This was the attitude of most of the paktuns; some of the youngsters — untried, green, coys — starting out on their first mercenary job skylarked around a little; the old hands kept clear of them.
Every day I rode for a considerable period with my eyeballs, as it were, out on stalks and scouring the skies. There was no sign of the Gdoinye, the scarlet and golden-feathered bird sent by the Everoinye to spy on me. Typical! Just when you wanted the flaming onkerish thing, it didn’t show up!
“Duck your fool head, dom!” The voice purred level and habituated to command.
Without thought I ducked.
The tree branch went past over head and the leaves snatched off my fancy wide-brimmed hat with the maroon feather. Hauling up Snagglejaws I looked around. We’d been riding slowly through a field moments before, when I’d been apostrophizing the Star Lords; feeling down, I’d put my head down for a space, and an angle of the woods had nearly kinked it off.