Hunt the Space-Witch! (41 page)

Herndon sat as if stunned. His hands felt chilled; coldness rippled through his body. Loyalty to Krellig? His enemy, the person he had sworn to destroy?

The conflict seared through his mind and body. How could he fulfill his earlier vow, now that this diametrically opposed one was in effect? Transfer of fealty was a common thing. By the terms of Benjin's agreement, Herndon now was a sworn vassal of the Seigneur.

If he killed Krellig, that would violate his bond. If he served the Seigneur in all faith, he would break trust with himself and leave home and parents unavenged. It was an impossible dilemma. He quivered with the strain of resolving it.

“The Spacerogue doesn't look happy about the deal,” oversk commented. “Or are you sick, Herndon?”

“I'm all right,” Herndon said stonily. “It's the cold outside, that's all. Chills a man.”

Fealty to Krellig!
Behind his back they had sold themselves and him to the man he hated most. Herndon's ethical code was based entirely on the concept of loyalty and unswerving obedience, of the sacred nature of an oath. But now he found himself bound to two mutually exclusive oaths. He was caught between them, racked and drawn apart; the only escape from the torment was death.

He stood up. “Excuse me,” he said. “I have an appointment elsewhere in the city. You can reach me at my usual address if you need me for anything.”

It took him the better part of a day to get to see the Chief Steward of Moaris Keep and explain to him that he had been unavoidably detained in the far worlds, that he fully intended to re-enter the Moaris service and perform his duties loyally and faithfully. After quite some wrangling he was reinstated as one of the Second Stewards and given functions to carry out in the daily life of the sprawling residence that was Moaris Keep.

Several days passed before he caught as much as a glimpse of the Lady Moaris. That did not surprise him; the Keep covered fifteen acres of Borlaam City, and Lord and Lady occupied private quarters on the uppermost level, the rest of the huge place being devoted to libraries, ballrooms, art galleries, and other housings for the Moaris treasures, all of these rooms requiring a daily cleaning by the household staff.

He saw her finally as he was passing through the fifth-level hallway in search of the ramp that would take him to his next task, cataloguing the paintings of the sixth-level gallery: He heard a rustle of crinoline first, and then she proceeded down the hall, flanked on each side by copper-colored Toppidan giants and in front and back by glistening-gowned ladies in waiting.

The Lady Moaris herself wore sheer garments that limned the shapely lines of her body. Her face was sad; it seemed to Herndon, as he saw her from afar, that she was under some considerable strain.

He stepped to one side to let the procession go past; but she saw him and glanced quickly to the side at which he stood. Her eyes widened in surprise as she recognized him. He did not dare a smile. He waited until she had moved on, but inwardly he gloated. It was not difficult to read the expression in her eyes.

Later that day a blind Agozlid servant came up to him and silently handed him a sealed note. Herndon pocketed it, waiting until he was alone in a corridor that was safe from the Lord Moaris' spy rays. He knew it was safe; the spy ray in that corridor had been defective, and he himself had removed it that morning, meaning to replace it later in the day.

He broke the seal. The note said simply:
I have waited a month for you. Come to me tonight; M. is to spend the night at the Seigneur's palace. Karla will admit you
.

The photonically sensitized ink faded from sight in a moment; the paper was blank. Smiling, he thrust it in a disposal hatch.

He quietly made his way toward the eleventh-level chamber of the Lady Moaris when the Keep had darkened for the night. Her lady in waiting Karla, the bronze-haired one who had served as go-between aboard the
Lord Nathiir
, was on duty. Now she wore night robes of translucent silk; a test of his fidelity, no doubt. Herndon carefully kept his eyes from her body and said, “I am expected.”

“Yes. Come with me.”

It seemed to him that the look in her eyes was a strange one: desire, jealousy, hatred, perhaps? But she turned and led him within, down corridors lit only with a faint night glow. She nudged an opener; a door before him flickered and was momentarily nullified. He stepped through, and it returned to the solid state behind him.

The Lady Moaris was waiting.

She wore only the filmiest of gowns, and the longing was evident in her eyes. Herndon said, “Is this safe?”

“It is. Moaris is away at Krellig's.” Her lip curled in a bitter scowl. “He spends half his nights there toying with the Seigneur's cast-off women. The room is sealed against spy rays. There's no way he can find out you've been here.”

“And the girl—Karla? You trust her?”

“As much as I can trust anyone.” Her arms sought his shoulders. “My rogue,” she murmured, “why did you leave us at Molleccogg?”

“Business of my own, milady.”

“I missed you. Molleccogg was a bore without you.”

Herndon smiled gravely. “Believe me, I didn't choose to. But I had sworn to carry out duty elsewhere.”

She pulled him urgently to her. Herndon felt pity for this lovely noblewoman, first in rank among the ladies of the court, condemned to seek lovers among the stewards and grooms.

“Anything I have is yours,” she promised him. “Ask for anything! Anything!”

“There is one prize you might secure for me,” Herndon said grimly.

“Name it. The cost doesn't matter.”

“There is no cost,” Herndon said. “I simply seek an invitation to the court of the Seigneur. You can secure this through your husband. Will you do it for me?”

“Of course,” she whispered. She clung to him hungrily. “I'll speak to Moaris—tomorrow.”

Chapter Six

At the end of the week Herndon visited the Avenue of Bronze and learned from Bollar Benjin that sales of the starstones proceeded well, that the arrangement under royal patronage was a happy one, and that they would soon be relieved of most of their stock. It would, therefore, be necessary for him to make another trip to Vyapore during the next several weeks. He agreed, but requested an advance of two months' salary.

“I don't see why not,” Benjin agreed. “You're a valuable man, and we have the money to spare.”

He handed over a draft for ten thousand stellors. Herndon thanked him gravely, promised to contact him when it was time for him to make the journey to Vyapore, and left.

That night he departed for Meld XVII where he sought out the surgeon who had altered his features after his flight from sacked Zonnigog. He requested certain internal modifications. The surgeon was reluctant, saying the operation was a risky one, very difficult, and entailed a fifty percent chance of total failure, but Herndon was stubborn.

It cost him twenty-five thousand stellors, nearly all the money he had, but he considered the investment a worthy one. He returned to Borlaam the next day. A week had elapsed since his departure.

He presented himself at Moaris Keep, resumed his duties, and once again spent the night with the Lady Moaris. She told him that she had wangled a promise from her husband and that he was soon to be invited to court. Moaris had not questioned her motives, and she said the invitation was a certainty.

Some days later a message was delivered to Barr Herndon of Zonnigog. It was in the hand of the private secretary to Moaris, and it said that the Lord Moaris had chosen to exert his patronage in favor of Barr Herndon and that Herndon would be expected to pay his respects to the Seigneur Krellig.

The invitation from the Seigneur came later in the day, borne by a resplendent Toppidan footman, commanding him to present himself at the court reception the following evening on pain of displeasing the Seigneur. Herndon exulted. Now he had attained the pinnacle of Borlaamese success; he was to be allowed into the presence of the sovereign. This was the culmination of all his planning.

He dressed in the court robes that he had purchased weeks before for just such an event—robes that had cost him more than a thousand stellors, sumptuous with inlaid precious gems and rare metals. He visited a tonsorial parlor and had an artificial beard affixed in the fashion of many courtiers who disliked growing beards but who desired to wear them at ceremonial state functions. He was bathed and combed, perfumed, and otherwise prepared for his debut at court. He also made certain that the surgical modifications performed on him by the Meldian doctor would be effective when the time came.

The shadows of evening dropped. The moons of Borlaam rose, dancing brightly across the sky. The evening fireworks display cast brilliant light through the winter sky, signifying that this was the birth month of Borlaam's Seigneur.

Herndon sent for the carriage he had hired. It arrived, a magnificent four-tube model bright with gilt paint, and he left his shabby dwelling place. The carriage soared into the night sky; twelve minutes later it descended in the courtyard of the Grand Palace of Borlaam, that monstrous heap of masonry that glowered down at the capital city from the impregnable vantage point of the Hill of Fire.

Floodlights illuminated the Grand Palace. Another man might have been stirred by the imposing sight; Herndon merely felt an upwelling of anger. Once his family had lived in a palace, too—not of this size, to be sure, for the people of Zonnigog were modest and unpretentious in their desires. But it had been a palace all the same until the armies of Krellig razed it.

He dismounted from his carriage and presented his invitation to the haughty Seigneurial guards on duty. They admitted him after checking to see that he carried no concealed weapons, and he was conducted to an antechamber in which he found the Lord Moaris.

“So you're Herndon,” Moaris said speculatively. He squinted and tugged at his beard.

Herndon compelled himself to kneel. “I thank you for the honor your Grace bestows upon me this night.”

“You needn't thank me,” Moaris grunted. “My wife asked for your name to be put on my invitation list. But I suppose you know all that. You look familiar, Herndon. Where have I seen you before?”

Presumably Moaris knew that Herndon had been employed in his own service. But he merely said, “I once had the honor of bidding against you for a captive proteus in the slave market, milord.”

A flicker of recognition crossed Moaris's seamed face, and he smiled coldly. “I seem to remember,” he said.

A gong sounded.

“We mustn't keep the Seigneur waiting,” said Moaris. “Come.”

Together they went forward to the Grand Chamber of the Seigneur of Borlaam.

Moaris entered first, as befitted his rank, and took his place to the left of the monarch, who sat on a raised throne decked with violet and gold. Herndon knew protocol; he knelt immediately.

“Rise,” the Seigneur commanded. His voice was a dry whisper, feathery-sounding, barely audible and yet commanding all the same. Herndon rose and stared levelly at Krellig.

The monarch was a tiny man, dried and fleshless; he seemed almost to be a humpback. Two beady, terrifying eyes glittered from a wrinkled, world-weary face. Krellig's lips were thin and bloodless, his nose a savage slash, his chin wedge-shaped.

Herndon let his eyes rove. The hall was huge, as he had expected; vast pillars supported the ceiling, and rows of courtiers flanked the walls. There were women, dozens of them: the Seigneur's mistresses, no doubt.

In the middle of the hall hung suspended something that looked to be a giant cage completely cloaked in thick draperies of red velvet. Some pet of the Seigneur's probably lurked within: a vicious pet, Herndon theorized, possibly a Villidonian gyrfalcon with honed talons.

“Welcome to the court,” the Seigneur murmured.

“You are the guest of my friend Moaris, eh?”

“I am, sire,” Herndon said. In the quietness of the hall his voice echoed cracklingly.

“Moaris is to provide us all with some amusement this evening,” remarked the monarch. The little man chuckled in anticipatory glee. “We are very grateful to your sponsor, the Lord Moaris, for the pleasure he is to bring to us this night.”

Herndon frowned. He wondered obscurely whether he was to be the source of amusement. He stood his ground unafraid; before the evening had ended, he himself would be amused at the expense of the others.

“Raise the curtain,” Krellig commanded.

Instantly two Toppidan slaves emerged from the corners of the throne room and jerked simultaneously on heavy cords that controlled the curtain over the cage. Slowly the thick folds of velvet lifted, revealing, as Herndon had suspected, a cage.

There was a girl in the cage.

She hung suspended by her wrists from a bar mounted at the roof of the cage. She was naked; the bar revolved, turning her like an animal trussed to a spit. Herndon froze, not daring to move, staring in sudden astonishment at the slim, bare body dangling there.

It was a body he knew well.

The girl in the cage was the Lady Moaris.

Seigneur Krellig smiled benignly; he murmured in a gentle voice, “Moaris, the show is yours, and the audience awaits. Don't keep us waiting.”

Moaris slowly moved toward the center of the ballroom floor. The marble under his feet was brightly polished and reflected him; his boots thundered as he walked.

He turned, facing Krellig, and said in a calm, controlled tone, “Ladies and gentlemen of the Seigneur's court, I beg leave to transact a little of my domestic business before your eyes. The lady in the cage, as most of you, I believe, are aware, is my wife.”

A ripple of hastily hushed comment was emitted by the men and women of the court. Moaris gestured, and a spotlight flashed upward, illuminating the woman in the cage.

Herndon saw that her wrists were cruelly pinioned and that the blue veins stood out in sharp relief against her pale arms. She swung in a small circle as the bar above her turned in its endless rotation. Beads of sweat trickled down her back and stomach, and the harsh, sobbing intake of her breath was audible in the silence.