Lod the Galley Slave (Lost Civilizations) (13 page)

The four iron rings of his sword hand moved convulsively with the twitching of his fingers. If the necromancer tried to escape his doom, Gibborim or not… Rank sweat clotted Eglon
’s silk garments, making them cling to his swells of fat. Dare he slay a Gibborim? Dare he try? Was such a feat even possible by a man?

The trumpet pealed again. It was strident, commanding, a clarion call of doom: his own, he was certain.

He ripped a drumstick off the half-devoured fowl at his table, gnawing the greasy flesh, chewing mechanically. His sucked at the hidden caches of flesh, the little bits that tried to cling to the bone. Oh no, no, no. His teeth clacked against the bone and his blubbery lips drew out whatever morsel it possessed. Then he pitched the bone out the porthole, and with his thick fingers he tore off a strip of breast. This too disappeared into his mouth and down his gullet.

To ease his nerves he plucked the choicest vintage from under his pillow. It was a green bottle of Shurrupak wine, from the gardens of Prince Amraphel. With a savage motion he smashed open the neck, and he gurgled the fine wine, gulping, gulping, ah… He smacked his lips. Choice wine indeed: he pitched the empty bottle out of the porthole. Lastly he dug a thumb into a peach, tearing it in half,
showing one part into his mouth, savoring the sweet taste and then dropping in the second. The stone he tossed into the sea.

For the third and final time the trumpet blared.

A snarl lifted the left side of his mouth. He was so hungry! He wanted to eat, to devour his sorrows, to calm this dread sense of ending. He sucked down air and dipped a rag into scented waters, swabbing his face and cleaning his fingers.

Oh, to throttle someone, to hear them gasp for mercy… Why did they have to use
his
galley?

Eglon lumbered to the cabin door. He yearned to kick it apart, to burst through. Instead, he twisted the handle, composed his features and stepped outside onto the deck.

Rows of archers stood at rigid attention, their peaked caps oiled and glistening, their wooden bow and arrow-cases hanging from their belts and lacquered so they shone. Vendhyan sailors scampered into line as shrill whistles blew from the rowing hold below.

Eglon recoiled from the vicious slave stench. How could anyone get used to that? He dug into a pouch and brought up his nard-soaked
cloth, holding it against his nose. A thump told of a punt striking the side of the galley. Sweat prickled Eglon’s scalp and now his turban felt too tightly wound upon his head. It seemed too as if lead lay in his stomach. His elephantine knees quivered.

A dark-haired painted harlot of exquisite beauty strode up the wooden stairs hung alongside the galley. She had purple-shadowed eyes, blood-red lips and wore a golden tiara. She moved with a dancer
’s grace and possessed marvelous charms. They were poorly concealed by diaphanous strands of silks and dazzling strings of jewels.

The rows of archers stirred. They stared at her with obvious longing, a few of them glancing at each other in amazement. She was wanton, lewd and bold, arching, strutting and taunting them with her smile.

Eglon swallowed in a tight throat. It had been so long since he had stood in the Master’s court. He had forgotten the aching beauty of the courtesans and the way each with a glance could ignite him with consuming passion. He had to remind himself that this harlot was a Gibborim’s pet. She no doubt had sunk far into depravity, deep into perverted abandon. As well embrace a viper.

“
Prostrate yourselves!” she cried. “Do not dare to behold the approaching magnificence. Fall and grovel, for Lord Lamassu comes!”

For all his bulk, Eglon threw himself face-first onto the deck faster and with more agility and servility than any of the archers, sailors or soldiers. He well knew the Gibborim and their studied attempts to ape the Master.

After the last rustle of cloth had stilled and the clatter of a wooden scabbard, dread silence ruled aboard the
Serpent of Thep
until somewhere below a rower coughed and then from above a gull screeched. Eglon trembled as the silence continued. He felt the scrutiny, sensed the evil stare and the oppressive aura of the other, the Gibborim, the Nephilim-born, a child of Yorgash.

“
You may rise, Captain,” said the harlot.

Composing his features, willing himself to cringe, to cower and whimper if need be, Eglon huffed and grunted as he worked himself to his feet, all while staring fixedly at the deck.

“You are the wrestler?” The words were softly spoken, as if a cobra had whispered them.

“
Yes, Your Excellency,” Eglon said.

“
You’re more bloated than a hog,” said with the same cobra whisper, “a ripened pig for feast.”

Eglon dipped his head. He had learned long ago not to take offense at anything a Gibborim said.

“Look at me, hog.”

Eglon raised his head, for the briefest moment daring to look into the Gibborim
’s eyes. They were like dots of heated ink, with as much humanity as a preying mantis shows while chewing its kill. With an inward shudder Eglon dropped his gaze. The Gibborim’s face was stiff, stark white and flawless as Pishon marble, his features handsome as a god, a mask almost without emotions. The thin lips betrayed a gigantic haughtiness, a surety of vast superiority. Lord Lamassu, as most Gibborim, was tall and thin, clad in black leather and bearing a narrow sword at his snakelike hip. Eglon knew the Gibborim to have muscles similar to bands of steel, and they were unimaginably fast. He had once seen one scale a wall like a lizard and another snap the neck of a stampeding bull. Worst of all, Gibborim practiced necromancy. It gave all of them—Lord Lamassu included—the taint of handlers of the dead, a sense of crawling things hidden under damp rocks or the sinfulness of a corpse stirring in its tomb.

“
He is a buffoon,” Lord Lamassu said softly.

The harlot strutted around Eglon, plucking at his silken garments.
“He sweats like a hog so his garment clings to him.” She sniffed loudly. “And he stinks.” She laughed. “Look! He holds a perfumed handkerchief, no doubt because he despises his own stench.”

“
I do not tolerate buffoonery,” whispered Lord Lamassu. He scanned the deck. “Over there, an archer dares to stare at me.”

Eglon stepped toward the fool. He knew how to deal with that.

“Hold!” hissed Lord Lamassu, throwing out a thin arm, pushing Eglon backward.

Cold sweat leaped upon Eglon. For an instant he had felt the Gibborim
’s inhuman strength. Lamassu stood so tall and thin, looking as if Eglon could break him like a twig. Were a Gibborim’s bones denser than a man’s, his muscles heavier?

“
I gave you no leave to move,” whispered Lord Lamassu.

Eglon threw himself onto the deck, groveling and whining for mercy.

“There is a semblance of wisdom in this one,” the harlot said.

“
No,” Lord Lamassu whispered. “It is base cunning you witness. He thinks himself clever. It is stamped upon him as if he wore a fox’s pelt. Perhaps that is what so amused the Master, or maybe that he is so obese. I could dine a week on him, perhaps nine days if I kept him alive for the first several carvings.”

“
And yet he is so quick,” said the harlot, “almost nimble. There is a nicety of obscenity to it. The fact of his nimbleness bespeaks great strength. How else can he heave his lard so quickly one way and then another?”

“
My pet, you anger him.”

The harlot laughed, a brazen sound, as she knelt beside Eglon and grabbed a handful of his jowls.
“Not so clever after all,” she said, “Just another boar with rutting instincts. A pity,” she said with a sigh, wiping her hand on his raiment.

“
Rise,” whispered Lord Lamassu.

Eglon scrambled to his feet, keeping his eyes riveted onto the Gibborim
’s black boots.

“
You will turn your vessel south, hog, and move us with haste until I say otherwise.”

Eglon dipped his head.

“The offending archer… Trail him in the sea as shark bait. Let your beastmaster—”

Eglon shuffled his feet.

“Yes?” whispered Lord Lamassu, menace oozing from him.

“
We have no beastmaster, Your Excellency.”

“
Ah,” whispered Lord Lamassu. “Did he have a tragic accident?”

The leaden weight in Eglon
’s gut twisted into terror. Moisture fled his mouth, leaving him unable to eject words.

“
Speak, hog,” said the harlot, prodding him in the belly.

“
H-he fell from the yardarm, Your Excellency.”

“
Did he now?” whispered Lord Lamassu, “How odd.”

Eglon tried to work his mouth in order to explain. He couldn
’t. Sweat trickled into his eyes.

“
It matters not,” whispered Lord Lamassu “—for now.”

Eglon almost collapsed in fright.

“Use the offending archer as shark bait,” whispered Lord Lamassu, “and when the beasts arrive and begin to feed make sure to line up your soldiery to watch. I detest this simian curiosity, this staring at their betters. I will cull it from this herd. But if that does not suffice…perhaps you will next trail as bait, but not for sharks, my bloated buffoon.”

The harlot laughed.

“Go,” whispered Lord Lamassu. “Attend to your tasks. And make certain that your cleverness does not interfere with your obedience. Your fate has been set by Unrelenting Yorgash, and nothing you do can alter it.”

-9-

Eglon paced the stern deck beside the pilot plying the tiller. Subdued archers and soldiers sat in clumps about the galley, whispering and casting fearful glances at the captain’s cabin. The sun sank into the western horizon, producing long, menacing shadows. They were alone in the vast sea, a small island of rotten, creaking wood, alone but for the triangular fins cutting the waters behind them. The screaming archer had lasted a scant minute once the first shark had taken an arm. There had been blood, rabid churning and the sight of thirty-foot monsters. During the proceedings a few archers had betrayed their unease with twitchy fingers, as if they planned to string their bows and sink shafts into the sharks. Hard looks from bronze-armored soldiers, those who had served before with Gibborim, had dampened such mutinous thoughts. Now the archers sat ashen-faced, mumbling among themselves, forgoing their usual banter or the rattling of dice.

Whistles trilled from below. Giant oars slid against wood as the slaves drew them inward. Other slaves pushed out their oars.
The changing of the watch had come.

Eglon turned to the pilot.
“Is this why we braved the open ocean? Is this why I hurried to Iribos?”

The pilot shook his head.
“It was to forgo impalement, to avoid singing the paean of pain.”

Before Eglon could respond, an eerie moan emanated from the captain
’s cabin. Wood rattled and a harsh red light poured through the chinks between the boards. The hellish glare startled the soldiery, many crying out and pointing. The moan became a high-pitched scream, but not one a woman would make. It grated on already tense nerves. The shadows nearest the cabin flickered as if with infernal life. The scream lasted too long. It stretched impossibly, and then the wicked light snapped off and the scream died. Silence and returning gloom lent a sinister air to the
Serpent of Thep
. The mumbling had quit as men waited expectantly, many holding their breath.

“
Necromancy,” whispered Eglon.

“
Skull magic,” said the white-faced pilot.

Eglon peered at the captain
’s cabin. What if flames truly lit the rotted wood? What if his quarters and those within burned? And lose all that hard-won plunder, he asked himself. Yes! If through it the Gibborim died. Eglon licked his lips and with clammy hands adjusted his turban. Better to not even think such thoughts. Gibborim divined secrets by their arts, by their inhuman cunning. Better by far to play the buffoon. And die?

“
Do you know his plan?” whispered Eglon, unable to hide the quaver in his voice.

The pilot eyed him sidelong.
“He has not made me privy to his secrets, no.”

Eglon moistened his lips.
“How do you think we shall defeat the fire ships of Eridu?”

The pilot scratched his curly black beard.
“Hadn’t given it much thought. By magic, I suppose.”

“
Yes,” whispered Eglon, “black magic, necromancy, the summoning of—”

A creak of wood stilled his speech.

Motion ceased from the clumps of hunching soldiery. Every archer, swordsman and Vendhyan sailor turned toward the cabin. Out stepped the harlot. Tears streaked her painted face. Fear, stark and wild, twisted her beauty into an ugly mask. It profaned her smooth limbs, aging her. Like a sleepwalker, a somnambulist under spell, she closed the door and shuffled to Eglon.