Chasing the Phoenix (7 page)

“In this you are correct, sir. The elegance of our rooms is famous far and wide and the landscaping such as to give pleasure from every aspect. But unfortunately a delegation from Southern Gate is staying here. Would they were not! By order of our own government, I must provide them food and lodging for free, and, since all princes have enemies, I am not allowed to rent out the empty rooms lest they be taken by assassins.”

“That is a great pity. Perhaps I could trouble you for a cup of water?”

“Hospitality is my business, good scholar, and my nature as well.” The hotelier went away and came back with a ceramic cup filled with cold spring water. “Would you like me to fill your water gourd while I am at it?”

Darger laughed. “Impossible! This gourd is full of the finest wine from the Hidden King's own cellars. It was a gift from him for some small services I was able to do. May I offer you some?”

“Ordinarily, at this time of day I would not. But how often does a man have the opportunity to taste a monarch's wine?” The innkeeper stepped inside, returned with a second cup. Darger poured. “Ahh! How pleasant to be a king, if only for one sip.”

“Allow me to top up your drink. The prince of yours—would that be the famous First-Born Splendor? They say he is an exemplary ruler. But perhaps your experience has been different?”

“Just as no man is a hero to his servants, sir, no prince is a hero to the man at whose inn he stays without paying. But he is a well-spoken young fellow who has no idea of the financial calamity he is visiting upon me and my family, so I bear him no personal ill will.”

“To the prince, then.” They clicked cups and the innkeeper drank while Darger daintily absorbed a few drops of water. “Allow me to refill that. You know, in my business it pays to meet as many princes as possible. Do you suppose there is any way I could chance to encounter Prince First-Born Splendor?”

“Well … at midday, he likes to walk alone in the peach orchard, in order to collect his thoughts and cultivate serenity. I gather that the negotiations with the Hidden King's ambassadors are very trying to his spirit. It's possible that, if you promised to … to…”

“Your cup is almost empty, sir! Let me refill it.”

For a time they stood thus, chatting pleasantly. Then the innkeeper declared himself uncharacteristically woozy and went indoors to lie down for a while.

Darger washed the two ceramic cups at a nearby spigot, strolled into the peach orchard, and chose a tree to sit beneath. There he waited.

*   *   *

PRINCE FIRST-BORN
Splendor emerged from the inn, hands behind back, lost in thought. Slowly, he strolled among the peach trees, taking no particular notice of the nondescript scholar sitting with his back against the trunk of one until he was upon the man. Then he merely nodded slightly and passed on.

“The Hidden King,” Darger said to no one in particular, “is a homicidal maniac who must be killed if this land is ever to know peace.”

The prince whirled. “Who is this who speaks such treasonous words about his own monarch?”

“The king is mad.” Darger did not stand, but raised his eyes to meet the prince's. “You have heard the rumors, and I, having stood in his presence, can assure you that they are true. But as I am but a mendicant scholar of no family or reputation, that is nothing. Ceo Powerful Locomotive also knows this fact, and that is a great deal. Not that he would ever admit to such a thing, of course. Not to your face.” He produced the two wine cups and filled them from his gourd. “Drink?”

The prince squatted upon his heels and accepted the cup. He did not raise it to his lips until Darger had done so first, and then he only took the lightest sip. “Is it him you represent?”

“Perhaps,” Darger said. Then, addressing the sky, “War is not a pleasant thing. But it is coming to your land.”

“Our soldiers are ready and the mountain passes are narrow. It would cost the Hidden King dearly to pass through Southern Gate without my leave.”

“Indeed. Only a madman would even consider such an act.”

The prince said nothing.

Still peering at the distant clouds, Darger said, “If only there were a way to turn this situation to your advantage.”

“What do you mean?”

“A traveler who is confronted by a pack of wolves does not raise his vision to consider the beauty of the mountains. He sees only the gleam of their teeth and eyes. So, too, all your thoughts are focused on what will happen when the Abundant Kingdom's armies enter Southern Gate. If they do so with your permission, it will be the easiest thing for them to, in passing, take your country and absorb it into the Hidden King's territories. If they are resisted, your cities will burn, your armies will be slaughtered, and your nation will fall anyway. So disastrous are your prospects that you cannot see that there is a third way.”

“What is that way?”

“Hold your hands up before you, prince.” After the slightest hesitation, First-Born Splendor did so. “See how clean they are! Spotless. Would you be willing to put up with a little dirt if it meant they would not be stained black with the blood of thousands of your subjects?”

Tense and wary, the prince said, “Perhaps.”

“Then listen to my proposal and say nothing until I am done speaking, for a conspiracy is like a machine, made up of a myriad of moving parts whose purpose may not be clear until one considers them all together and a plot which seems abominable midway through the telling is sometimes redeemed by its outcome. Pretend that I am a storyteller and all that I say but a fanciful tale to idle away a pleasant hour.

“Now. Let us imagine the possibility that rather than merely granting the Hidden King's armies permission to pass through your land, you were to propose an alliance with the Abundant Kingdom, one in which Southern Gate would be a subordinate territory. Sit
down,
sir! By beginning to listen to me, you made an implicit promise to hear me out—and, as I said, without your willing participation this is but a tale.

“That is better. Remember, you have committed yourself to nothing as of yet. I am a fellow of no importance. You have no reason to believe I have any influence with the Hidden King or, more significantly, with any members of his court. It does not compromise you to listen.

“Where was I? Ah, yes. You were about to propose an alliance. Not only do you pledge the resources of your country—your intact, unplundered country—to the Hidden King's war but you contribute military forces of your own to his armies. Led by you personally and loyal to yourself alone. That automatically makes you a member of his court and one of his advisors. You will not be trusted, of course. Secretly, the Hidden King will consider you a fool. But you will be useful to him and thus treated well. You will also have the opportunity to make friends among his advisors—and one whom I would most ardently advise you to befriend is Ceo Powerful Locomotive.”

The prince's eyes were unreadable. His lips were white and thin.

“The king, as I said before, is mad. However his war goes, in victory or defeat, there will inevitably come a time when his orders become so clearly disastrous that those closest to him must decide who is to survive—he or they. In that extremity, someone, and I cannot say whom, will see to it that the king is no more.

“Now, when a king dies, the matter of succession is a thorny one. If a general or even a ceo were to assume the title, grave suspicion would rest upon him. But if there were a potential figurehead close at hand, someone of noble birth yet not born in the country in question, well, he would be an obvious choice. For a year or three, provided that figurehead king were cooperative, he would issue commands and edicts on the advice of his most trusted advisor. Then, when said advisor—a military man, no doubt—had consolidated his power and felt ready to take the throne in his own name …

“Well, a second regicide would be an inauspicious beginning to the new king's reign. But suppose the figurehead king were a provincial from a small mountain kingdom of no great importance to anyone but himself. Imagine that his ambitions were modest. He might express a weariness with the duties of ruling a great nation and a yearning to retire to the land that gave him birth. In such a case, his successor would certainly feel grateful enough to present him with Southern Gate as his own possession, free and clear.”

Darger ceased speaking and waited.

“All this in exchange for letting your nation's armies through?”

“And for your promise to return to your own nation after two years' reign.”

“Exactly who are you again?”

“As far as you are concerned, I am a fellow of no importance. But a harsh truth from the mouth of a man you distrust is surely worth more than the most reassuring lies from the lips of those who would pretend to be your friends.” Darger stood, and First-Born Splendor did likewise. Stooping to pick up the wine cups from the ground, Darger said, “You and I have barely touched our wine. Are you willing to drink to our mutual understanding?”

The prince's face was hard, but he nodded. They drained their cups.

Then Prince First-Born Splendor squared his shoulders and turned back to the tavern. “I will have my scholars draw up a treaty immediately.”

*   *   *

WHEN DARGER
returned to the embassy tents with the treaty, Ceo Powerful Locomotive and Cao White Squall were waiting to confront him. But when he presented the parchment, their indignation turned to astonishment. The ceo snatched the document from his hands and read it through, scowling in disbelief. At times, his face looked inhuman. Then he handed it to White Squall, who was equally incredulous.

“How did you ever convince the prince of Southern Gate to see it our way?” she asked.

“I lied to him,” Darger said. “Funny that it never occurred to you to do the same.”

 

4.

Those who never met the Dog Warrior may be scandalized that human women would be so strongly attracted to one whose genome was purely canine. Those who stood in his presence and experienced his charisma, however, understood perfectly.

—
EXPLOITS OF THE
DOG
WARRIOR

TO A
civilian, watching from a distance, a great army being marshaled is a stirring sight. It flows endlessly down the road like a dragon in its strength and energy and perseverance. For the long hours it takes to pass, always changing and ever the same, it comes to feel as substantial and enduring as a stone-walled metropolis, a state of being that must surely last forever. Nothing, it seems, could possibly resist it. But to those responsible for the operation, it is one continual catastrophe. Wagon axles break and teams of horses panic and stampede. Soldiers are crushed under the feet of colossal machines and must be treated on the fly. The reports of scouts, imperfectly phrased or inaccurately transmitted, cause battalions of men to go astray, and when those in the lead, realizing at last that there is no way forward, give the order to turn back, those in the rear continue marching, to the confusion of all. Supplies are not what their providers promised and food arrives tainted. Fords prove impassable, so bridges must be built. Oxen wander off. Nightfall forces the troops to pitch their tents prematurely, far from water and on stony ground. All these misfortunes, though regrettable, are perfectly ordinary and doubly so when the army is inexperienced and new to warfare.

Thus it was that while the Hidden King's armies were struggling toward Battlefield Pass, word of their progress had gone before them all the way to the ancient city of Peace, capital of the Land of the Mountain Horses. There, the ruling council had quickly abrogated their treaties with Southern Gate and, sweeping southward across its borders, seized Dynasty along with the rich basin lands surrounding it. Then, knowing that there was but one way north from the Abundant Kingdom, they sent their armies south to the city of Bronze and from there set about building fortifications in the valley through which all traffic must go. By the time the armies reached the pass, there was an earthen wall stretching across its narrowest point and the soldiers behind it were dug in strongly.

At the king's command, Ceo Powerful Locomotive threw his forces against the enemy's defenses. But the mountains to either side of the pass bristled with snipers; streams had been redirected to create swamplike conditions below, limiting the land suitable for warfare, and the approach to the wall was dangerously exposed. Further, because the enemy had a great many cannons, the ceo was reluctant to hazard the weapons of the ancients, which, though puissant, were limited in number; these he initially chose to hold back for a later, needier day. Then, when he finally ventured to try them, he lost two spiders to the marshes and a crushing wheel to concentrated cannonade. Clearly, spies had been at work and the leaders of the Mountain Horses armies had devised ways of exploiting the machines' weaknesses and neutralizing their powers.

On the fifth day of fighting, Darger and Surplus stood at the fore of the main encampment, atop a slight rise, watching the white puffs of rifle smoke dotting the mountains to either side of the valley and the movement of cavalry and infantry between them. The desperate fighting was rendered sluggish and quiet by distance. Rifle fire crackled gently and the boom of ordnance was as soft and muted as faraway thunder. It was clear to Surplus that the Mountain Horses troops held the advantage and would not be surrendering anytime soon.

Then a team of rocket soldiers brought up the Red Arrow missile and fired it straight and true down the center of the valley to the enemy's defensive wall. There was a tremendous explosion when it hit, and through the ensuing smoke could be seen a gaping hole. With a roar, the Abundant Kingdom cavalry charged toward it.

Almost simultaneously, flames appeared on the forested mountain slopes to either side of the pass—lit by hidden arsonists whom Powerful Locomotive had sent out during the night. The flames merged, forming walls, and gunfire ceased as the snipers fled the conflagration.