“In the name of the Church I command you to cease this blasphemy,” Lord Prelate Balountar shouted, leaving his place to advance on Glo, head thrust forward and tilting from side to side like that of a wading bird. Toller, who was irreligious by instinct, deduced from the violence of Balountar’s reaction that the churchman was a strict Alternationist. Unlike many senior clerics, who paid lip service to their creed in order to collect large stipends, Balountar really did believe that after death the spirit migrated to Overland, was reincarnated as a newborn infant and eventually returned to Land in the same way, part of a neverending cycle of existence.
Glo made a dismissive gesture in Balountar’s direction. “The main difficulty lies with the region of neutral… hmm… gravity at the midpoint of the flight where, of course, the density differential between hot and cold air can have no effect. That problem can be solved by fitting each craft with reaction tubes which.…”
Glo was abruptly silenced when Balountar closed the distance between them in a sudden rush, black vestments flapping, and clamped a hand over Glo’s mouth. Toller, who had not expected the cleric to use force, sprang from his chair. He grabbed both of Balountar’s bony wrists and brought his arms down to his sides. Glo clutched at his own throat, gagging. Balountar tried to break free, but Toller lifted him as easily as he would have moved a straw dummy and set him down several paces away, becoming aware as he did so that the King had again risen to his feet. The laughter in the hall died away to be replaced by a taut silence.
“You!” Balountar’s mouth worked spasmodically as he glared up at Toller. “You touched me!”
“I was acting in defence of my master,” Toller said, realising that his reflex action had been a major breach of protocol. He heard a muffled retching sound and turned to see that Glo was being sick with both hands cupped over his mouth. Black wine was gouting through his fingers, disfiguring his robe and spattering on the floor.
The King spoke loudly and clearly, each word like the snapping of a blade. “Lord Glo, I don’t know which I find more offensive — the contents of your stomach or the contents of your mind. You and your party will leave my presence immediately, and I warn you here and now that — as soon as more pressing matters have been dealt with — I am going to think long and hard about your future.”
Glo uncovered his mouth and tried to speak, the brown pegs of his teeth working up and down, but was able to produce nothing more than clicking sounds in his throat.
“Remove him from my sight,” Prad said, turning his hard eyes on the Lord Prelate. “As for you, Balountar, you are to be rebuked for mounting a physical attack on one of my ministers, no matter how great the provocation. For that reason, you have no redress against the young man who restrained you, though he does appear somewhat lacking in discretion. You will return to your place and remain there without speaking until the Lord Philosopher and his cortege of buffoons have withdrawn.”
The King sat down and stared straight ahead while Lain and Borreat Hargeth closed upon Glo and led him away towards the hall’s main entrance. Toller walked around Vorndal Sisstt, who had knelt to wipe the floor with the hem of his own robe, and helped Lain’s two assistants to gather up the fallen easel and charts. As he stood up with the easel under his arm it occurred to him that Prince Leddravohr must have received an unusally powerful reprimand to induce him to remain so quiet. He glanced towards the dais and saw that Leddravohr, lounging in his throne, was staring at him with an intent unwavering gaze. Toller, oppressed by collective shame, looked elsewhere immediately, but not before he had seen Leddravohr’s smile twitch into existence.
“What are you waiting for?” Sisstt mumbled. “Get that stuff out of here before the King decides to have us flayed.”
The walk through the corridors and high chambers of the palace seemed twice as long as before. Even when Glo had recovered sufficiently to shake off helping hands, Toller felt that news of the philosophers’ disgrace had magically flown ahead of them and was being discussed by every low-voiced group they passed. From the start he had felt that Lord Glo was going to be unable to function well at the meeting, but he had not anticipated being drawn into a debacle of such magnitude. King Prad was famed for the informality and tolerance with which he conducted royal business, but Glo had managed to transgress to such an extent that the future of the entire order had been called into question. And furthermore, Toller’s embryonic plan to enter the army by someday finding favour with Leddravohr was no longer tenable — the military prince had a reputation for never forgetting, never forgiving.
On reaching the principal courtyard Glo thrust out his stomach and marched jauntily to his phaeton. He paused beside it, turned to face the rest of the group and said, “Well, that didn’t go too badly, did it? I think I can truthfully say that I planted a seed in the King’s… hmm… mind. What do you say?”
Lain, Hargeth and Duthoon exchanged stricken glances, but Sisstt spoke up at once. “You’re absolutely right, my lord.”
Glo nodded approval at him. “That’s the only way to advance a radical new idea, you know. Plant a seed. Let it… hmm… germinate.”
Toller turned away, suddenly in fresh danger of laughing aloud in spite of all that had happened to him, and carried the easel to his tethered bluehorn. He strapped the wooden framework across the beast’s haunches, retrieved the rolled charts from Quate and Locranan, and prepared to depart. The sun was little more than halfway between the eastern rim of Overland — the ordeal by humiliation had been mercifully brief — and there was time for him to claim a late breakfast as the first step in salvaging the rest of the day. He had placed one foot in the stirrup when his brother appeared at his side.
“What is it that afflicts you?” Lain said. “Your behaviour in the palace was appalling — even by your own standards.”
Toller was taken aback. “
“Yes! Within the space of minutes you made enemies of two of the most dangerous men in the empire. How do you do it?”
“It’s very simple,” Toller said stonily. “I comport myself as a man.”
Lain sighed in exasperation. “I’ll speak to you further when we get back to Greenmount.”
“No doubt.” Toller mounted the bluehorn and urged it forward, not waiting for the coach. On the ride back to the Square House his annoyance with Lain gradually faded as he considered his brother’s unenviable position. Lord Philosopher Glo was bringing the order in disrepute, but as a royal he could only be deposed by the King. Attempting to undermine him would be treated as sedition, and in any case Lain had too much personal loyalty to Glo even to criticise him in private. When it became common knowledge that Glo had proposed trying to send ships to Overland all those connected with him would become objects of derision — and Lain would suffer everything in silence, retreating further into his books and graphs while the philosophers’ tenure at Greenmount grew steadily less secure.
By the time he had reached the multi-gabled house Toller’s mind was tiring of abstracts and becoming preoccupied with the fact that he was hungry. Not only had he missed breakfast, he had eaten virtually nothing on the previous day, and now there was a raging emptiness in his stomach. He tethered the bluehorn in the precinct and, without bothering to unload it, walked quickly into the house with the intention of going straight to the kitchen.
For the second time that morning he found himself unexpectedly in the presence of Gesalla, who was crossing the entrance hall towards the west salon. She turned to him, dazzled by the light from the archway, and smiled. The smile lasted only a moment, as long as it took for her to identify him against the glare, but its effect on Toller was odd. He seemed to see Gesalla for the first time, as a goddess figure with sun-bright eyes, and in the instant he felt an inexplicable and poignant sense of waste, not of material possessions but of all the potential of life itself. The sensation faded as quickly as it had come, but it left him feeling sad and strangely chastened.
“Oh, it’s you,” Gesalla said in a cold voice. “I thought you were Lain.”
Toller smiled, wondering if he could begin a new and more constructive relationship with Gesalla. “A trick of the light.”
“Why are you back so early?”
“Ah… the meeting didn’t go as planned. There was some trouble. Lain will tell you all about it — he’s on his way home now.”
Gesalla tilted her head and moved until she had the advantage of the light. “Why can’t you tell me? Was it something to do with you?”
“With
“Yes. I advised Lain not to let you go anywhere near the palace.”
“Well, perhaps he’s getting as sick as I am of you and your endless torrents of advice.” Toller tried to stop speaking, but the word fever was upon him. “Perhaps he has begun to regret marrying a withered twig instead of a real woman.”
“Thank you — I’ll pass your comments on to Lain in full.” Gesalla’s lips quirked, showing that — far from being wounded — she was pleased at having invoked the kind of intemperate response which could result in Toller being banished from the Square House. “Do I take it that your concept of a real woman is embodied in the whore who is waiting in your bed at this moment?”
“You can take.…” Toller scowled, trying to conceal the fact that he had completely forgotten about his companion of the night. “You should guard your tongue! Felise is no whore.”
Gesalla’s eyes sparkled. “Her name is Fera.”
“Felise or Fera — she isn’t a whore.”
“I won’t bandy definitions with you,” Gesalla said, her tones now light, cool and infuriating. “The cook told me you left instructions for your… guest to be provided with all the food she wished. And if the amounts she has already consumed this foreday are any yardstick, you should think yourself fortunate that you don’t have to support her in marriage.”
“But I do!” Toller saw his chance to deliver the verbal thrust and took it on the reflex, with heady disregard for the consequences. “I’ve been trying to tell you that I gave Fera gradewife status before I left here this morning. I’m sure you will soon learn to enjoy her company about the house, and then we can all be friends together. Now, if you will excuse me.…”
He smiled, savouring the shock and incredulity on Gesalla’s face, then turned and sauntered towards the main stair, taking care to hide his own numb bemusement over what a few angry seconds could do to the course of his life. The last thing he wanted was the responsibility of a wife, even of the fourth grade, and he could only hope that Fera would refuse the offer he had committed himself to making.
Chapter 5
General Risdel Dalacott awoke at first light and, following the routine which had rarely varied in his sixty-eight years of life, left his bed immediately.
He walked around the room several times, his step growing firmer as the stiffness and pain gradually departed from his right leg. It was almost thirty years since the aftday, during the first Sorka campaign, when a heavy Merrillian throwing spear had smashed his thigh bone just above the knee. The injury had troubled him at intervals ever since, and the periods when he was free of discomfort were becoming shorter and quite infrequent.
As soon as he was satisfied with the leg’s performance he went into the adjoining toilet chamber and threw the lever of enamelled brakka which was set in one wall. The water which sprayed down on him from the perforated ceiling was hot — a reminder that he was not in his own spartan quarters in Trompha. Putting aside irrational feelings of guilt, he took maximum enjoyment from the warmth as it penetrated and soothed his muscles.
After drying himself he paused at a wall-mounted mirror, which was made of two layers of clear glass with highly different refractive indices, and took stock of his image. Although age had had its inevitable effect on the once-powerful body, the austere discipline of his way of life had prevented fatty degeneration. His long, thoughtful face had become deeply lined, but the greyness which had entered his cropped hair scarcely showed against its fair coloration, and his overall appearance was one of durable health and fitness.
While he was donning his informal blues he turned his thoughts to the day ahead. It was the twelfth birthday of his grandson, Hallie, and — as part of the ritual which proved he was ready to enter military academy — the boy was due to go alone against ptertha. The occasion was an important one, and Dalacott vividly remembered the pride he had felt on watching his own son, Oderan, pass the same test. Oderan’s subsequent army career had been cut short by his death at the age of thirty-three — the result of an airship crash in Yalrofac — and it was Dalacott’s painful duty to stand in for him during the day’s celebrations. He finished dressing, left the bedroom and went downstairs to the dining room where, in spite of the earliness of the hour, he found Conna Dalacott seated at the round table. She was a tall, open-faced woman whose form was developing the solidity of early middle age.
“Good foreday, Conna,” he said, noting that she was alone. “Is young Hallie still asleep?”
“On his twelfth?” She nodded towards the walled garden, part of which was visible through the floor-to-ceiling window. “He’s out there somewhere, practising. He wouldn’t even look at his
