He had lived, then, as a man of good breeding should. From the warnings Jarl had given him, he suspected life in Selzirk was going to be a shock to the system. But, he thought, forewarned is forearmed. Then realised Celadon was talking to him. '… which might be fun.' 'What might be?' said Sarazin. Weren't you listening?' said Celadon.
'Brother,' said Sarazin, 'your speech is so fair it warrants a second hearing.'
Such graciousness would have won him instant pardon amongst the sophisticates of Voice. But Celadon spat, then muttered something uncomplimentary in incomprehensible Churl. They were not getting off to a good start.
'I was talking,' said Celadon, as Peguero and Jarnel rode up alongside them, 'of the pleasures open to free men. It can't have been pleasant living as a prisoner.'
'It's been a tolerable life,' said Sarazin, diplomat enough not to confess that he wished himself a captive still. Tve had my studies, my sword-work, my poetry.'
'Poetry?' said Celadon. 'Dry stuff, dry stuff! The soldiering life, that's the thing!' You speak of war?' said Sarazin.
'Oh, a little hand-to-hand is fun on occasion,' said Celadon. 'But a little's enough for a lifetime, thank you very much. It's the career which matters.'
In fantasy, Sarazin had oft imagined winning glory with his sword. Leading armies into battle. Raising his standard on fields of victory. If he was fated to war, he was sure he would love it. And would do brilliantly. But to be a professional soldier in peacetime? That, surely, was a dull, narrow life.
'Pray tell the merits of this… this career,' said Sarazin. 'Comradeship,' said Celadon, without a moment's hesitation.
'He means,' said Jarnel, forgetting, in his enthusiasm, to speak Galish, 'we get together every night and get pissed as newts.'
Pissed?' said Sarazin, struggling to make sense of Jarnel's Churl. 'Newts?' All three of his brothers laughed. 'Drunk,' said Peguero. 'He means we get drunk.'
'Oh,' said Sarazin. I've been drunk once or twice myself.'
Well, when you join us in the army, you can get drunk every night of the year,' said Celadon. Why should I want to do that?' said Sarazin.
It was an honest question which sought a straight- forward answer. But his brothers merely laughed.
We'll take you to the recruiter as soon as we hit Selzirk,' said Peguero. You'll be bedded down in the cavalry barracks that very same night.'
Sarazin hoped Peguero was joking. If by chance he spoke in earnest, then he was out of luck, for Sarazin had no desire whatsoever to join the army, having decided that what interested him was the governance of the Harvest Plains.
Hi was Farfalla's son, and Farfalla was the kingmaker, therefore – why should he not aspire?
Thus Sean Kelebes Sarazin met his brothers, departed from the cool and shady city of Voice (city of the thousand wines, the seven shades of laughter) and descended to the lowlands. Though it was but early summer, it proved uncommonly hot. The days were ruled by heat, dust and horseflies, while whining mosquitoes tormented fever- dreams by night.
On the dusty coastal plain, they picked up the Salt Road and thereafter followed it north. They met Galish kafilas, and, for the first time he could remember, Sarazin saw (and smelt) camels. To his surprise, they did not walk like horses, but instead moved both the legs on one flank simultaneously. 'Mammoths walk likewise,' said Jarl. 'Mammoths?'
'Beasts of the Cold West, like the elephants of Yestron, only with shaggy fur and greater tusks.' 'Oh,' said Sarazin, all eloquence lost to him.
In that time of bewilderment he saw and heard of many people, things and places all totally new to him. One such wonder was the blood-red battlements of Veda, ancient city of the sages. Epelthin Elkin spoke of miraculous artworks housed within – masterpieces by artists such as Aromsky, Keremansky and X-nox the Dissident.
'Did you train within the walls of Veda, then?' said Jarl, curious about the old scholar's provenance.
'My training began at my mother's knee,' said Elkin. 'She taught me certain basics of politeness entirely unknown to the Rovac'
'I said nothing impolite!' said Jarl. 'Not this time, anyway. Are you ashamed of your breeding?'
'If you must know,' said Elkin. 'I was born a bastard on Burntos. My mother was a kitchen wench. I was fathered, I suppose, by a soldier of the Landguard. I was but five when my mother moved to Narba, where I was raised as a scholar.'
'Your mother a skivvy, yet indulged you in scholarship?' said Jarl.
'There's money in such in Narba,' said Elkin. The scholars are scribes, accountants and translators for traders dealing with peoples as various as Orfus pirates and the master of Hexagon.'
Then, while Veda's walls slowly receded into the distance, Elkin bored them at length with details of his doings in Narba.
As the free city of Veda lay by the shores of the Central Ocean on the border between the Rice Empire and the Harvest Plains, Sarazin was shortly in the motherland he had left at the age of four. It was low, dull, monotonous countryside, patchworked with fields worked by peasants from adobe villages.
In Voice, in the foothills of the Ashun Mountains, Sarazin had ever had the heights in view. He missed them. He was depressed and oppressed by the flatness, heat, dust and fatigue of their travels, by the nagging friction between Jarl and Elkin, by his brothers' inane booze-talk and clumsy bawdry. He longed for cool water, mountain breezes, a plane tree's shade and the prospect of an evening of intelligent conversation and sophisticated dalliance.
But dusk daily brought him the company of Thodric Jarl, who harassed him with questions.
'How many leagues have we come today? How many watering holes did we pass? That Galish kafila going south – was it battle-ready? What was its fighting strength? How many men could you quarter in this village? How many could this village feed? For how long?'
Nightly, Sarazin dreamt of dust, camels and muddy water holes; he woke every morning to regret the ever- increasing distance between himself and Voice. -Ah, Jaluba! Will I ever see you again?
CHAPTER THREE
It is 4324 years since wizards and heroes made their famous Alliance. In this time the continent Argan has seen: 1. The Long War, ending in the year 269 when the Alliance finally drove the monsters of the Swarms from Argan North; The building of the castle-guarded flame trench Drangsturm to protect Argan North against the Swarms; The Short War, ending in 374 when wizards defeated heroes and set themselves up as rulers of all of Argan North; The protracted power struggle which destroyed the Empire of Wizards, allowing smaller nations to arise in Argan.
As they neared Selzirk, regrets gave way to excitement. Soon Sarazin would be in the city where, after dreaming about it for years, he would have at last a chance of real power. Powerful foes would oppose his rise to the rule of the Harvest Plains, but at least he was guaranteed support from his mother. For surely Farfalla would approve his ambition once she learnt of it. Surely she would not want power to die out of the family with her death. Surely not.
By the time they reached the confluence of the Velvet River and the Shouda Flow, some seven days after passing Veda's bloodwalls, Sarazin was all eagerness. Just across the river lay the walls and towers of Selzirk the Fair, capital of the Harvest Plains, sovereign city of Argan's most powerful nation.
Improvising a rite of homecoming, Sarazin dismounted, walked to the river's edge – sun-cracked mud crunkling beneath his feet – knelt, cupped water in his hands, then drank of the mud-flavoured fluid. Closed his eyes. Let hot sun beat upon his eyelids. Committed the moment to memory. Straightened up. Stood. Saw a corpse leisuring downstream, a gash-beak black crow as banquet-class passenger. And laughed with sudden joy, feeling his youth, his strength, his life.
Again he scanned the riverdistant city, seeking land- marks. In the eastern (upriver) quarter rose an ancient
