Ice and Shadow (30 page)

“Far from it. His personal physician revealed that he had been suffering from a fatal illness for several months, that he had really made a supreme effort to rise from his deathbed to cement the alliance pictured here. It was cemented over his body by those shocked into fellowship by such a loss.”

Still—Jofre was too well versed in the devious tricks played by the valley lords to completely accept that story. It was far too convenient for the present Holder—an alliance at the death of his predecessor, sworn to by men who had doubtless been completely stunned by that death—too much a whim of fortune. He had heard tell of other deaths, carefully executed to order by issha trained to complete anonymously action requiring months of tortuous intrigue. Not that it mattered now what had happened fifty years ago—unless Zurzal’s time scanner could produce a copy of just what they were viewing now.

“Can it be done—that scene brought into being again?” He wriggled one finger at the screened picture.

“You can answer that perhaps as well as I can.” Zurzal’s good hand arose to rub across the growing stump of his maimed one, as if the renewing flesh and bone itched as might a wound in the progress of healing. “I have had some fleeting successes, it is true.”

He did not continue but Jofre thought he could pick up what the other was leaving unsaid, that Zurzal was honestly wary of any success in this venture. Which meant that they could have only a fleeting value to their captors.

Frustration bit at Jofre but he could do nothing, save prepare as best he could for the first chance he would have which would promise even the remotest chance of escape.

In the days which followed he had to fight against the constant urge for action. He refused to let himself walk the floor as sometimes his body demanded, wanting to be free. All he could do was draw upon the Center—

There was one small thing to which his mind continually turned—the fact that when he had been, he was sure, very near death from the stass weapon, contact with the stone from Qaw-en-itter had somehow given him the strength to hold on. He took to studying the stone and made small discoveries, though he was cautious about it—it came from a cursed place and some of the darkness which gathered there could well cling.

He found that if he held it cupped between his palms when he did his Center seeking, he was brought much more quickly to the state of body awareness he wished. Once, when trying a memory exercise he pressed it to his forehead and then nearly dropped it when he was answered with a painful burst of jangled images which even left him partially blinded for some very frightening moments.

Something kept him from showing his find to the Zacathan. He only brought it out when Zurzal was resting or deeply occupied with the studies which had to do with the scanner. By now Jofre was convinced that what he held could only have broken off of the Lair stone whose death had signified also the abandonment of Qaw-en-itter. No one—except the Masters and the senior priests—knew the relationship between men and the Lair stones. Those were assha—of the innermost of the Shadows. Nor had Jofre ever heard of anyone possessing an artifact such as he had found.

Perhaps a prudent man would have left it where he had discovered it—any Brother would—but—it remained that he was not by birth or blood a Brother—he was an off-worlder. And when he thought of that he knew a trickle of cold within. From what world had he sprung in the beginning? How did that other breeding limit—or aid—the issha now ingrained in him?

There would be more than one trial ahead to test both his limits and his successes, and all he was must be pushed to making certain he faced all squarely and alert.

CHAPTER 12

THEY DID NOT TOUCH FOOT
to Tssekian soil once they had earthed. Rather Jofre found himself squeezed in between Harse and one of his look-alikes on the second seat of a flitter which had made a precise connection with a landing platform. While Zurzal was wedged in with the Horde Commander and the pilot on the fore seat. Just as his first glimpse of Tssekian architecture via the vision screen had impressed him with stark utility and no concessions to any softening of line, so did the loom of the buildings between which their present vehicle streaked its way offer a vague threat, as if each was a sentinel on duty and those of the population about were prisoners.

They did not linger in that somber pile of a city but rather sped on into open land beyond. Jofre could not move enough in his seat to see what lay below them. But the walls were gone and, except for sight of a distant skeletonlike erection or two, they were now in the clear.

Their craft apparently had reached maximum speed and was being held so. However, they were not alone in the sky. During their flight through the city they had passed a number of similar craft and, once they had reached the outer ways beyond that stand of buildings, a second flitter hung close, a little behind, but apparently bound for the same goal.

Jofre had made no resistance to the somewhat rough handling which had steered him to his present seat. Neither of the guards broke silence, and their craggy features were set in stolid, almost stupid, patterns. However, Jofre was well aware that in no way must he underestimate these followers of the Holder. He was lucky in that he had not been placed in bonds and would continue to be most biddable while he noted all he could pick up from his surroundings. Both of these guards were trained, though not, he believed, in the more outré systems of the issha. Armed or not, and given the smallest of chances, he could take them both. But that must wait upon a time when such a move could be made profitable. At least they had not stassed him again and he was given that small freedom.

The flitter fell into a circling pattern and began to descend near a building some four stories high. It was not the stolid block of the city structure but rather a different design altogether. There had been some ornamentation about the windows and one could catch flashes of color through those as if they were curtained. Then their craft set down on a perch extending from the side of the building just under the rise of the top story. Facing them one of those windows had been expanded into a doorway by which a man in a brilliant yellow tunic stood waiting.

At the sight of the Zacathan he bowed—apparently the subterfuge that Zurzal was a welcome guest was to be carried on. Jofre was given a sharp dig in the ribs to send him after his employer as the flitter took off, just in time to clear a landing spot for that second craft which had followed them from the city.

The yellow-tunicked man was waving Zurzal in before him and a meaty hand on Jofre’s shoulder hurried him in the same direction. He gathered, by the placing of that goad and a certain tenseness of his two guards, that they did not want any passenger which the second craft might have brought to be seen.

She did not have to be seen. The strict training of years kept Jofre from any halt in his step. He did not turn his head as every atom of him wished. Here—! Who was she?
What
she was he knew from that faint whiff of scent which had reached him. Only in the Lairs was that distilled, to be one of the minor weapons of the Others—the Sisters, of whom he had seen exactly two in his full lifetime, and then only from a distance. Daughters were few in the Lair and those were born there, not recruited from the land at large as the Brothers mainly were in childhood. Their fabled prowess in their own field was the bed from which legend and rumor both grew mighty tales.

One of the issha—and a woman! He allowed his arm to swing loosely by his side, twice brushing the thigh of the guard who had herded him to the doorway. His forefinger and thumb moved. She might never sight that signal, nor sighting it, have any desire to reveal herself. Certainly she was here on a mission and he could not believe that that had anything to do with him or Zurzal. But the fact that she would be under the same roof—or so it would seem—was a new factor to be considered.

She certainly was not following them. He caught no trace of sound and that faint touch of scent on the air was gone as he passed into the room beyond that door. Nor did they linger there, for the Zacathan’s guide had already reached a matching portal on the other wall of the small chamber and was bowing Zurzal through. While Harse and his companion, paying no heed to any such formality, propelled Jofre along in their wake.

A twist down two corridors and they entered a room where the walls were an eye-searing riot of color, great sweeps of brushwork in vivid shades seeming applied with no reason in sometimes crisscrossing directions. The floor was thickly carpeted in a material possessing the texture of some kind of fur—and there was furniture gilded, carved, and inlaid, within tawdry splendor which fought valiantly with the walls. It was a room in which to keep the eyes shut if possible.

“Ask whatever you wish, Illustrious Learned One.” The man in the yellow tunic was speaking trade language in an oily voice which matched his moon-round face and thick-lipped mouth. “All is at your command.”

Jofre’s guards had not crossed the threshold; that hand on his shoulder had merely propelled him within. He stood where he was and Yellow Tunic had to take a side step to pass him in order to reach the door. As soon as that closed Jofre went into action. A single stride brought his ear flat against the panels and then he nodded. They had been locked in.

Zurzal’s snout grin was plain to read. He put the box he had refused to let anyone touch on a table which stood in the middle of the room.

“We are indeed honored guests,” the hiss underlay that observation.

Jofre had been forcing himself to eye those riotous walls. The Zacathan had been sure on board ship that they were under observation—how much more certain that must be here in the enemies’ own home territory. He had to blink and blink again; staring too intently at any of the swathes of color hurt his eyes. Perhaps that was exactly what was intended—to keep any inmate from a prolonged examination of the walls.

“For how long?” He thought he dared ask that aloud.

“For as long as is necessary to satisfy the Holder’s need of us.”

That was an answer which could be translated two ways and one of them deadly.

Jofre set himself to inspect their quarters. They had been favored with a suite, all lavishly furnished—including a room with a pool of water which bubbled a little at one end from which there arose a cloying scent. Zurzal stooped and dabbled a finger in that.

“Sooooo—Yes, we are indeed honored guests—and well prepared for. This might well be my Zoxan home quarters—even the vantan pool for relaxing.”

Jofre had gone on to another discovery. Although the walls of this building had been pierced by those windows he had sighted during the descending circle of the flitter, here there were no openings on the outer world at all. Nor was there any sign of another door such as the one through which they had entered the apartment. They were sealed in as much as if they had been escorted into some valley lord’s deepest dungeon.

There was a sound—Jofre’s head twisted so he looked to the wall from which that had come—a thin wailing, shrilling which made him wish to raise hands to cover ears. It slid up and down a scale worse than any Whine drum.

“Yessssss—all the comforts of home,” Zurzal continued. “Now that is the second movement of Zamcal’s Storm Symphony. It is a pity I am not a lover of Zamcal’s work—something a little lighter would be more to my taste.”

As abruptly as it had begun that wailing ended. Jofre shot a side glance at the Zacathan and saw a taloned finger move in assent. They were under observation. But he also commented aloud.

“It would seem, Learned One, that your voice is enough to summon or dismiss.”

“Yessss—how very enterprising of those who designed these quarters. We shall doubtless find much here for our benefit. Now, I see that our luggage, such as it is, has preceded us. Shall we deal with that?”

Jofre was surprised to discover that his own shoulder pack had indeed appeared along with Zurzal’s personal baggage. It had been ruthlessly ransacked and anything which could be classed by the inspector as a weapon had been taken. However, as he crouched on the floor, Jofre slipped his hand along the edge of the overflap and felt that reassuring resistance to his fingers. So—the Makwire remained to him and, even though it might be nothing against a stass gun, he felt a surge of satisfaction. Every inch of that hidden chain was known to him by weight, by feel, and he knew just what it could do in close quarters.

Zurzal was prosaically stacking his clothing and other belongings away in a chest but Jofre merely dragged his pack to one side, allowing his shoulders to sag as he did so. If he were in luck, any watcher would believe that he learned of his weaponless state and was cast down by it.

It had been midafternoon when they had earthed on Tssek—it must now be close to evening. Where was that other he was now sure was under this same roof—and what did she prepare—and for whom?

She was making herself felt indeed. One glance at walls, nearly as violently disfigured as those in the Zacathan’s suite, had brought an instant and vigorous protest. Screens had been hurriedly found and set here and there and even lengths of cloth hung to cover those eye-torturing lines. Her own baggage was extensive and she refused to allow the maidservant they had produced to touch most of the contents, inspecting the girl’s hands disdainfully and dismissing them as being too rough to be entrusted with her fine belongings.

All the time she was bending these Tssekians to her will in this enjoyable fashion, another part of her mind had fastened on one thing. Those other two, plainly prisoners who had preceded her from the ship to this place. One was a Zacathan, so of course, the one Sopt s’Qu had been so vocal about. The other one—Without thinking her right forefinger touched the thumb beside it. Issha—! She had been right. And—surely it would be too much of a coincidence to believe that this was other than that outlaw Zarn had been so intent on eliminating. He was certainly taller than any of the Brothers she had seen—but she must be wary. To make any move before one knew one’s path was the way of a fool.

Besides her own mission must and would come first. She would take the first step to insure that this very night.

The messenger they had expected arrived at last. As the man who had ushered them into these quarters, he wore a yellow tunic, this also garnished by gold lace as if he strove in part to outglitter the walls about.

“Illustrious Learned Ones,” he introduced himself, “I am Dat s’Lern at your service. Is all to your liking?” He addressed the Zacathan only, but his eyes had lingered for a second on Jofre who sat cross-legged against the wall, his shoulders a little hunched, his demeanor very much of one helpless and sulking because of it.

“Your hospitality, Dat s’Lern, leaves nothing to be desired,” returned Zurzal blandly, “except of course the small matter of our freedom.”

“Freedom? But, Illustrious Learned One, that is, of course, entirely yours—”

“In return for?” Zurzal was lounging in one of the easirests, showing no form of polite return to any effusiveness the other might offer.

“In return for your word, Learned One, your word that you will be willing to await a peaceful meeting with our Leader.” The man’s right arm swung up in a stiff salute. “He wishes nothing but your comfort, truly, Learned One. This is his country place for rest and relaxation; it has many amenities; please make yourself free of any you wish to sample. Your—guard, however—” That stare was turned once more in Jofre’s direction.

“Yesssss—” Zurzal hissed as the man paused, “What of my guard? You have left him empty handed, disarmed. Do the noted warriors of Tssek fear attack by his bare hands?”

“Learned One, it is only by special favor that he shares your quarters. The regulations state that personal guards are permitted only by the favor of the Holder and he does not give that often. Perhaps—since your service is about to mean so much to him, he may make an exception. However, even if your guard is made free of this place, he will bear no arms; that is forbidden!

“Now, Learned One,” he had stepped back towards the door, “I am to summon you to a meeting with the Holder; he has most graciously invited you to share his evening meal The Holder lives simply here—he does not dine formally, rather wishes to be able to converse easily with those he has a particular desire to meet.”

Zurzal arose from the easirest. “Since I have also a particular desire to meet him at the present moment, this is very fortunate. Lead on, House Master.”

As the Zacathan passed Jofre his hand shaped the message: “Watch out!”

As if he needed such, Jofre thought, with a small bitterness—though his NOT watching out, being prepared for all eventualities, had landed them right here. The door closed behind the Zacathan and the Tssekian, and he was left to brood.

Except brooding was a waste of time. Either his eyes had become somewhat accustomed to those flashing walls or else some of the strident color had been dimmed. Perhaps the whole effect was meant to distract newcomers into these apartments, throw them somewhat off guard. Now he made no move to rise from his position near floor level but he began a squinting survey of the nearest spread of flashed, crooked lines, and splashes of raw color.

Within a short time he believed he had located at least two spy holes in that length. Jofre gave his eyes a rest by centering outward sight on his two motionless hands and concentrating the inner strength. He was alert enough not to be startled when the door slid open—foresense had given the proper alarm.

Harse entered with a tray which he dumped unceremoniously down on the top of the table. He stood, hands on his hips, fingers brushing in passing significantly against his festoon of belt weapons, his thickish lips snarling as he stared at Jofre. Then he grunted something in the guttural local tongue and went out.