Talons of Scorpio (16 page)

The woman pushed him on, shrieking: “Get on, Nodgen, get on and spit him!”

He gave her an impatient thrust of his free hand, clearing her out of his way.

“Stand back, Mitli, stand back—”

She tripped on a body and fell helplessly. The point of the upright spear pierced her through. Even as this fellow Nodgen, who was a bit of a swordsman, yelled and charged again, I saw the bright blood leap from the woman Mitli’s mouth.

“Stand and fight, you tapo! By the Blade of Kurin, you are for the chop now!”

He was very good for a mercenary, not a paktun, hired out as your ordinary kreutzin, a light infantryman. He wanted to fight as he had always fought, sword against sword, and to him the victory.

There was no time for that.

I took him with a nasty little trick that left his thraxter twirled up with my main gauche while my rapier went stick-plink through his throat above the brass rim of his leathers. He choked and dropped.

Instantly, the bloodstained blades naked in my fists, I had to hare off to round up the wandering children.

Controlling their direction, I found, could best be accomplished by shouting: “Naje! Candies!” to them, and shooing them along. Only when we’d crossed that street and were well down the next could I afford to relax a little. A couple of folk hurried past, avoiding us. They were gauffrers, with flat hats pulled well down over their rodent-like faces, minding their own business. City folk, gauffrers, suspicious of trees and grasslands, making their varied livings out of city customs.

The half-imbecilic face I’d put on to assuage any fears my ugly old beakhead might inspire in the children did little to reassure the gauffrers. The bloodstained weapons in my hands... Well, on Kregen that sight is not as infrequent as it ought to be. Carefully wiping the blades on an inside flap of the little cape I wore, I thrust them back into their scabbards. A matched pair I’d received as a gift from Captain Nath Periklain aboard
Schydan Imperial
, they ought not to be maltreated. Then we set off on the next stage of this Hamelin-like progress.

This crocodile of girl children could be taken down to the docks to join the other children we had rescued aboard
Tuscurs Maiden
. What Captain Linson would say almost made me decide to do just that. They could be taken back to the palace. Wherever they went, they and I would attract attention and the spies from the Leem Lovers would smell us out. Wherever we went we’d bring grief with us...

That meant
Tuscurs Maiden
was out of the reckoning. The girls would have to go along to the Zhantil Palace. It was high time that young rip Pando took the running of his kovnate seriously. If he faced grief from the adherents of Lem the Silver Leem, that might make him shake himself up. If he still pretended to be a member, maybe he could get away with that. Either way, I wanted to unload this pathetic collection of human and juvenile detritus — for that is what the girls would be in the eyes of most folk in Port Marsilus — and get on with the job. For a start — Pompino would gape at me when I told him of this damned adventure, and say: “By Horato the Potent, Jak! And you didn’t burn the temple down!”

Huh, I said to myself, he should’ve been there!

The chances remain problematical whether or not I might have shepherded the girls all the way safely to the palace. We passed along the street before the low-doorwayed entrance of a building of slate roofs and many small windows. Few people walked the streets this close to the hour of mid. Over the doorway which crouched bowered in Moonblooms a sign showed up in weathered gold leaf. The gold leaf was a reminder of past glories.

The sign said, simply: “If you are of impure heart you are welcome, stranger, for purity exists only with the Dahemin.”

Without pulling the bell cord I pushed the low door open and we all trooped through into a flower-bowered courtyard. The Dahemin, the twins, the god Dahemo and the goddess Dahema, had fallen out of favor when the green religion of Havil was new. The pious women here, the Sisters of Impurity, kept up the old mysteries and beliefs. I felt I could appeal to them for help. If I could not, there was nowhere else as far as I knew in all the city.

The Sisters oohed and aahed over the children and, fluffing clear yellow kerchiefs around their noses, led the girls off to be bathed. This bathing would be of an entirely different order from that in the Silver Leem’s temple. The Mother Superior — to give a bowdlerized form of her title — made me sit down to a glass of parclear and a plate of miscils. As the tiny cakes melted on my tongue she asked me and I told her. I told her that the adherents of Lem the Silver Leem would seek out the whereabouts of the girls to take them back for sacrifice. I did not expect her to keep them here in her house of seclusion. I did not tell her where I intended to take them.

She said her name was Mistress Mire. She was not old, clad in a severe gray gown with a rope girdle and bare feet, a flap of gray cloth over her hair, which shone most beautifully. The Little Sisters of Impurity ministered to any who sought their services, and the small charges they made sustained them in their frugal way of life. I refused to pass any judgments.

Pompino’s gold spilled out of the purse onto the table between us. I’d take up a loan from Pando next, if necessary. Sister Mire smiled her sweet smile.

“We can offer you a refreshing personal service—”

“I am in need of keeping an appointment, sister. I hope I do not offend by this refusal?”

“When you feel the imperfections of the spirit and the flesh, you will call on us. We are here to minister to your needs in the supernal name of the Dahemin, man and woman both.”

“Quite. I give you thanks. I will make arrangements to collect the children later when the Suns have gone.”

There was clear disappointment on her face. No doubt she was hoping I’d just leave the girls and clear off. They’d make a capital addition to her house of seclusion when they were a few seasons older.

When I left I started to make the rote farewell along with the remberees — “May Pandrite have you in his keeping.” I halted myself. These women followed a religion old before the religion of Havil, which here in Pandahem had been materially supplanted by that of Pandrite. She might have considered that I blasphemed her. In impurity are all hearts as one.

As they say in the inner sea, the Eye of the World: “Only Zair knows the cleanliness of a human heart.”

Bidding Mistress Mire remberee I hurried off to the Awkward Swod, keeping a sharp lookout. Naghan was still waiting. He’d secured a side table under a wide black beam, and ale stood upon that table, and a meal which, covered, was still edible.

“Trouble, Jak?”

Eating, I told him. “I’ll have to arrange tonight to—”

He lifted a hand. “Leave all that to me.”

“My thanks.”

“It is now certain that Kov Pando follows Strom Murgon as fast as he can. It is said that when they meet one will die.”

Naghan would have messages carried by relays of merfluts, or possibly some other form of Kregan homing pigeon. Merfluts are exceptionally fast and reliable.

“And Pompino is not back yet, I’ll warrant.”

“He is not.”

“And no message from him?”

“None I’m privy to.”

I didn’t say that if Naghan Raerdu knew of no message it was certain sure no message existed. But that was so near the truth as to convince me Pompino had sent no message. Or, rather, no message had been received at the Zhantil Palace.

He drank and then said: “I must tell you that this morning someone unknown burned down the Vallian embassy here.”

Quelling my annoyance was not difficult; after all, with the temper of this place it was a wonder they hadn’t burned our embassy before this. I said: “Was anyone hurt?”

“No, thankfully enough. The ambassador sought refuge in the palace. It adds another complication.”

“Too right it does, by Chusto! I don’t want him catching sight of me up there.”

“Strazab Larghos ti Therminsax knows you well enough, I’d think, seeing he received the title of Strazab at your hands.”

One of the Vallian diplomatic corps, Larghos ti Therminsax was an earnest, serious man who, loyal in the Times of Troubles, had made a career in the diplomatic. As a strazab, an imperial creation on a level with a strom in the regular nobility, he was of the right rank to be ambassador to Bormark. In fact, ambassadorial status was high for a mere kovnate within a kingdom, and that was because of my personal feelings regarding Pando. I frowned. I’d been using the Zhantil palace as a base; I didn’t really fancy poking around to find a new.

With a squeezing shut of his eyes and a copious flow of merry tears, Naghan said: “It may be that Strazab Larghos will happily return to Vallia. If it is suggested.”

In rather too sour a voice, I said: “Well, you can’t suggest it to him, and neither can I.”

Naghan Raerdu was not discomfited.

“I will go down to see Captain Linson and have a messenger return with word from Vallia. It can be arranged. Strazab Larghos can be recalled.”

“H’m. It might work. Although Linson’s a stickler, and you’ll have to cross his palm with gold, not silver. And that reminds me. I paid all the gold I had to the Little Sisters of Impurity—”

Naghan Raerdu laughed so much he almost choked.

“—so, my friend, I shall crop your ears for a loan.”

“Done, Jak, done!”

If Strazab Larghos believed a Pandahem argenter brought the signal for his recall from Vallia, it would be a wonder. But honest and loyal though he was, he’d be in the frame of mind for a recall. Then I expounded my scheme to Naghan, and he listened, growing grave, although every now and then whetting the throstle with a glug or two.

At one point he said: “I refrained from setting anyone on to keeping an observation on you. I surmised you would object.”

“I’d have been glad of some help when those poor girl children were running about all over the street, I can tell you!”

“Just so. The riding animal is easily obtained — a totrix, or hersany—?”

“No. A freymul, I think, the poor man’s zorca. That will suit the style.”

“You’ll see to providing the robes and badge yourself?”

“Oh, aye,” I said. “I’ll see to that.”

“Until you spoke so freely to me I had taken little interest in this Lem thing. There has been little time. But I fancy, with some help from Opaz, that I can insinuate a fellow into—”

I looked sternly at this unlikely-looking secret agent.

“I caution you most strongly, Naghan. The Leem Lovers have their rigmaroles of secret signs and passwords. If you try to put any poor fellow in without sure knowledge, he’s done for.”

He rubbed a finger around his blobby gristle nose.

“I believe I have paid good red gold to just such a one. A little questioning more, a little suggestion — and the fellow has a girl, too. She might be the more useful.”

“Just don’t get good people killed on my behalf.”

We were sitting comfortably in a tavern, the Awkward Swod, and drinking and eating and taking our ease, and we plotted dark doings and nefarious expeditions. What we decided could cause many deaths, could cause riots and conflagrations, and not always to the evil ones of the world. We had to step with great caution.

Naghan said: “Just in case, then. Tipp the Kaktu. Monsi the Bosom.”

“I’ll remember.”

As I may have remarked before, a number of times, if you want to stay alive and in one piece on Kregen you have to remember names.

“My information contains nothing on Zankov, Jak.”

“Confound it! By Chusto! I was hoping — still, no matter. He’ll turn up like a hole in your sandal.”

“Strom Murgon will be coming in through the west gate. The Inward Gate is not grand enough for him, it seems.”

“As they say in a place I know — when the chavnik’s away the woflo will play.”

“I’ll meet you there in three burs.”

“Capital.”

Naghan rose on his stumpy legs, puffing, finishing the last of his ale. He plunked the jug down, lifted his purse and unlatched it and thunked it down on the table. I picked it up. It weighed.

“My thanks, Naghan.”

His laugh was a marvel of compression and of explosion. The one of his eyelids, the other his tears.

“You paid it to me, Jak, you paid it to me.”

“Aye. And you’ll have it all returned, with interest. I’ll see you at the west gate in three burs.”

On that, with the remberees, we parted.

Going out of the Awkward Swod into the streaming mingled radiance of the Suns of Scorpio, two thoughts made me reflect that, one, it was a grand comfort to a fellow to have loyal helpmates, and, two, it was just as well that Pompino the Iarvin was still not with me. By Krun! I’d have had one hell of a job keeping his itchy fingers off a tinderbox!

Chapter fourteen

Strom Murgon puts on a show

Pando’s chief city of Port Marsilus was set into a cup-shaped indentation of the coastline on the western edge of the Bay of Panderk. Consequently, the north and eastern sides were washed by the sea, and the southern flank, being walled off by a ridge of ground the locals called the Spine of Lhorcas, the road wound in and around this ridge and so fetched up with the main gate of the city, the west gate.

There were other gates; but I fancied, along with the judgment of Naghan Raerdu, that Strom Murgon would choose to ride in through the chief gate of the city.

Murgon Marsilus, Strom of Ribenor, cousin to the Kov of Bormark, stood no nonsense from anyone. A powerful man, dark of temper, an adherent of Lem the Silver Leem, he was not content to lord it over his little stromnate within the kovnate; he lusted after greater power.

If Pando was in trouble with King Nemo — and why hadn’t he burned up with his damned palace? — Murgon would step forth more openly in his ambitious designs.

They both craved this Dafni girl to increase their domains and power. When two men want the same girl, and the girl has a mind of her own, empires may totter and fall. I did not know how much credence to put in Tilda’s words when she’d told me that Dafni Harlstam had settled on Murgon and then Pando had happened along to upset the arrangements. If he had, it could mean that Dafni Harlstam herself had wanted that. Otherwise Pando’s suit would have fallen.