Beasts of Antares (13 page)

A whole lot of folk just want to carry on drinking and singing and laughing and having a damn good time, and get paid fairly for what they work at, and leave the headaches of sorting it all out to somebody else.

Another slew want to get in the driving seat and crack the whip.

I suppose, as was forcibly pointed out to me by the good folk of Vallia — and before them of Valka and Djanduin — you have to have some Joe Muggins to blow the whistle.

If that was what I was, a work-burdened, worried, run-ragged referee, then that was what I was.

Oh, they called me an emperor and I had a lot of land and chests of gold and jewels and a few palaces — many of them burned down — and that collection of objects is no recompense. I did have good friends and blade comrades. And — there was Delia.

So the full circle was completed. I was the emperor and I was stuck with it, at least until Drak took over. I told him, this tall, serious, intense son of mine, “Drak, my lad, I’m off to Hyrklana to fetch our friends — Naghan the Gnat, and Tilly and Oby — and you’ll run Vallia while I’m gone.”

“You recall, Father, what I told you in the flier over Ba-Domek on the way to Aphrasöe, before you disappeared as you so frequently do? I said I would not be emperor while you or mother lived—”

I was brisk. I thought I knew this strapping son of mine and I didn’t wish to make an issue of this now and harden attitudes.

“If your mother and I want to go off for a holiday, and I place the empire in your hands, will you refuse?”

“We-ell — no. But—”

“I was born a plain and ordinary fellow. I’ve been a sailor, a soldier and here and there an airman and a flutsman. I’ve done a heap of things. I’ve been slave. But you — you are born of a line of emperors, the son of an empress, and you are clearly not an ordinary sort of fellow at all. Your destiny is to be an emperor. I do not think that mine is.”

“Father!”

“Your brother Zeg is now King of Zandikar. Well and good. He is a splendid man, a Krozair of Zy, like you and me. He will not challenge you for Vallia — will he?”

“I do not think so. But—”

“And your brother Jaidur. He is a tearaway, reckless and feckless. He hates my guts—”

“No!”

“And he has other fish to fry. I don’t think he would seek to dislodge you from Vallia — would he?”

“No. But—”

“So that leaves you.”

Drak’s nostrils pinched in. He is sometimes an old sobersides, but he can be just as wild and barbaric as anyone whose name is Prescot.

“If you will let me get any words in at all,” he said. “I will say that I will go to Hyrklana. I went to Faol and fetched back Melow and Kardo, and—”

I was very nasty to him. I screwed up my eyes and I said, “And Queen Lush?”

He did not flush. He stared at me. “Queen Lushfymi—”

“Oho! So it’s Lushfymi, is it? Have you spoken to your mother?” I was well aware of the treacherous ground I trod. Delia and I wanted Drak to marry Seg’s daughter Silda, for we had seen how Silda had behaved, and I had seen how Silda would have given her life, willingly, to save Drak.

But at the slightest hint of parental maneuvering, Drak would act — well, he’d be just as stubborn and pig-headed as I am, Zair forgive us both.

He said, very quietly, “I have the greatest respect for Queen Lushfymi.”

“Good.” I wasn’t fool enough to ask, “And is that all?”

We were interrupted then by Delia coming into my study. She saw Drak’s face, and my ugly old beakhead, and she sighed, and — how it was done remains a marvel and a mystery — we were all talking about the fancy dress ball that night and planning costumes. I ask you. Costumes for a fancy dress ball! And we’d been discussing the dynasty of an empire!

There is no need to go into a description of the ball. It was sumptuous, superb and splendid. Everyone seemed to be there. The thing of note, the event that rocked me back on my heels, took place as I was taking my leave with Delia radiant on my arm. I looked at the crowd, and every face was smiling and glowing, and every face belonged to a friend.

Ah! There is the wealth that no empire can give!

“I’m off to Hyrklana day after tomorrow,” I said. “So I shall take the remberees of you now. Everything is arranged.”

They let Korero be their spokesman. He stepped forward.

‘That is good news, majister! A little adventuring will not come amiss. We are all ready—”

“What?” I said. An awful suspicion dizzied me.

“Oh, yes, majister. We’re all coming. Why, you don’t think we’d let our emperor go flying off into danger all on his own, do you?”

Chapter nine

“You’ll be just that, Dray Prescot! Arena fodder!”

The argument went on all next day.

“But,” I said, “I’m the emperor. You’re supposed to do what I say.”

That was a laugh, of course, in a matter of this seriousness.

“You just cannot fly off to Hyrklana all on your own!”

That claustrophobic feeling of being trapped in a cage of invisible iron bars engulfed me. Hitherto when I’d been flung about Kregen by the Star Lords I had hungered to return home. Now that I had a serious task to perform, rescuing our friends, I was being mewed up and allowed out only with a great gaggle of nursemaids to hold my hand and wipe my nose. Talk about a cage!

They all wanted to come. 1 and 2 ESW. 1 and 2 EYJ. Nath Karidge insisted on bringing EDLG. Most of the slate of Vallian nobility were lining up. Applications poured in from all the regiments.

“Think of fat Queen Fahia!” I said. “She’ll think we’re invading her island!”

With a judicious air, Lord Farris said, “I can spare you enough fliers to take a thousand men. They’ll have to draw lots to see who goes.”

“Well, I’m going,” said Korero, “and I’ll fight anyone who tries to steal my place.”

“And me!”

“And me!”

“By Vox!” I said. “This isn’t like the old days.”

“No,” said Delia. And she smiled, the cruel and heartless woman. “No, Dray Prescot. You are the emperor now.”

I groaned. Were the brave old days gone when I’d wrap the old scarlet breechclout about myself and take up my weapons and board a voller, richly stacked with wicker hampers provided by Delia’s loving forethought, and fly off to find adventure, hurtling across the face of Kregen under the Suns of Scorpio?

“By the disgusting diseased liver and lights of Makki Grodno! I’m not having this! If I am the damned Emperor of Vallia then what I say goes! How can I work my way into the Jikhorkdun in Huringa and rescue our friends if there’s an enormous lollygagging army of ruffians hanging around my neck?”

“Oh,” they said, “you’ll think of a way.”

Sink me!

Turko, who hadn’t left yet, talked darkly of sending north for Seg and Inch to come down and knock some sense into my obstinate vosk skull of a head.

“And then,” I snarled, “I suppose they’ll want to come, too.”

“Probably,” said Turko, and he flexed his muscles.

Despite all the lightheartedness of this there was a darker side. Oh, it wasn’t anything to do with questioning the authority vested in me as emperor. If folk didn’t want me to try to be an emperor, I’d quit, instanter, and they knew that. I’d told them enough.

But just suppose — just suppose the Star Lords took it into their superhuman heads to whisk me up out of Vondium and hurl me down into some other part of Kregen, all naked and unarmed, to sort out a problem for them? The Everoinye had been silent of late. I’d not even seen their spy and messenger, the Gdoinye, flying high and looking down mockingly on my doings. If that happened now, what would be the reaction of the people of Vondium, of Vallia?

This time, my disappearance would be viewed in an entirely different light. In, I could see, an unfavorable light.

I said to Delia when we were alone, “Look, I can’t manage the Jikhorkdun with that crowd along! Surely they can see that?”

“I am not sure you should risk the arena at all.”

“But — we want Tilly and Oby and Naghan back, don’t we?”

“Of course! But, dear heart, there has to be another way. An embassy to Queen Fahia—”

“She’d laugh at them. She thinks she is the leem’s claws. Hamal won’t bother her now because Hamal is so tied up with Thyllis’s mad schemes of conquest. Hyrklana must be doing very well, very well indeed. And their agents will be scouring the world for human fodder for the arena.”

“And you’ll be just that, Dray Prescot! Arena fodder!”

“Better me on my own than a great gang of—”

“No!” Delia put a hand to her heart.

After that, for a space, we were occupied. But, all the same, nothing was solved regarding my expedition.

The same difficulties that stopped Hamal from invading and conquering Hyrklana — as mad Empress Thyllis probably longed to do — prevented us from flying there in sufficient force to do what was necessary. We were overstretched and our resources were committed. Hamal had invaded north and south, although her invasion to the west had withdrawn. We were fighting to regain Vallia. Both empires grappled with problems that overtaxed their strength.

“All right,” I said, “then I shall not go to Hyrklana.”

I said that. I did not mean it. I had a plan.

In all this furor the Lady Zenobya continued on in her serene and yet enthusiastic way. She was a many-faceted individual. She clearly expected Vallia to give her assistance to regain her lost lands in Pershaw and kick out the Chobishaws. The Presidio was in sympathy with her. All the evidence we had, supported by reports from Vanki’s spies, indicated that the right of the case lay with the Lady Zenobya. But how, in our impoverished state, were we to help?

Certainly, our gold would buy mercenaries.

“Yes, and I thank you,” said the Lady Zenobya. “I shall avail myself of your kindness and use the gold, and you will be repaid, in full and with interest, in specie or in kind, when I am firmly established in Pershaw.”

So that was decided. The Lady Zenobya had very definite views on the type of warrior she required.

“The men must be well-armored,” she said, with that toss of her red-haired head that indicated she knew exactly what she was talking about. “They should have lance and mace. Under the armor they need a good thick cloth and where it shows, divided and out of the way above the legs, it should be heavily embroidered for the battlefield.”

We stood with a group of my rascally henchmen from 1ESW bellowing unkind orders at a bunch of coys, out on Voxyri Drinnik. The recruits were riding marlques and they kept tangling out of formation. It was lucky for them the spears were blunt. The Lady Zenobya had given the recruits a comprehensive look and, no doubt, dismissed them from any consideration for a season or so. A zorcaman rode slowly toward us from Voxyri Gate. The suns shone, the breeze blew, the dust and animals and oiled leather filled the air with familiar odors.

“The trouble with a cataphract with a kontos is that he’s a bit slow.” The Lady Zenobya was staring at the approaching zorcaman. “Cataphracts are a delight, of course. But you really need lights for scouting, and air, if possible. I’ll have to find flutsmen I can at least trust while they are paid. Their crossbows ought to keep them out of trouble with the Chobishaws — although their crossbows are wicked.”

The zorcaman turned out to be Filbarrka na Filbarrka.

His beaming face was a welcome sight. He was incredibly smartly turned out. His zorca was tremendous.

“Lahal, majister!” he called. And then his cheerful voice changed in tone to a remarkable degree. “Lahal, my lady.”

“Lahal, Filbarrka,” said the Lady Zenobya, and her voice, too, held a different, huskier note than the voice in which she spoke to me or anybody else.

Some poor wight out on the parade ground dropped a spear and the wrath of his Deldar was awful to behold.

“They won’t drop their kontoi in Pershaw when I’m through with them,” said Filbarrka.

I raised one eyebrow at him.

“I have asked Filbarrka na Filbarrka,” said the Lady Zenobya, her laugh exquisite, “if he will command my forces.”

Filbarrka’s fingers grasped the reins, otherwise they’d have been entwining like a nest of rattlers. “I have set up the whole organization for the second-line cavalry. My lads from the Blue Grass country are training ’em hard. You’ll have a good, dependable — if a trifle brittle — force there in no time at all.”

“Thank you, Filbarrka,” I said. “And so you are off to Pershaw with the Lady Zenobya?”

“Aye!”

And, of course, there was more to it than that, as was very obvious. Later on, Delia told me, “They make a superb pair, do you not think, my love?”

“Oh, aye! Filbarrka is getting all the fun, going off to adventures overseas, and I’m stuck here—”

“Hush!”

For just about the first time on Kregen I had the hankering for the damned Star Lords to seize me up and dump me down somewhere. I’d sort out their nonsense for them and then I’d be a free man, able to go to Hyrklana on my own, able to do what I wanted. Of course, there was Delia...

She would welcome the return of our friends from Hyrklana. And I did not want, most certainly did not want, my Delia risking her life anywhere near Queen Fahia’s Jikhorkdun!

This plan was typical of Dray Prescot. It was simple. When necessary I can invent complicated plans of fiendish subtlety; I prefer them simple. Although I am told my face is of that fierce damn-you-to-hell kind, I am able to assume an expression of near imbecility. This has served me well in diverse escapades. Now Deb-Lu-Quienyin was able materially to improve on nature.

“It is all a matter of muscle control,” he told me as we sat privately in my study. “You have attained a fair degree of control. I think I can improve on that.”

He made me do exercises with my ugly old beakhead. Also, without doubt, he exerted some of his supernatural powers. I do know that after a sennight he had me so composing my features that I did not recognize myself in the silver mirror.

“It is a miracle, San—”

“Not a miracle. A matter of tone, of muscle, of enhancing features and of reducing them. With practice an adept is able to suggest what his face is like. People do not see what they look at; they see what they expect to see.”