your sister, Ma’in Kriithai, has more swordsmanship than you. But your three permitted champions may defeat them, and you would easily overthrow them in the tests of sorcery and magic. No, it is your third brother, Mridobu, whom you fear, he who sits in the High Chancery at Avanthar and cons the arts of administration and statecraft even as you pore over your tomes of wormy runes! Without our bargain, Mridobu-or some princeling as yet unrevealed by the Omnipotent Azure Legion-will sit upon the Petal Throne. It will be your shade that will go howling down into the crypts of Sarku’s many hells!”
The second man extended a dun-coloured hand, palm up, and his voice dropped to a gentle, almost dulcet note. “Let us not fall out, Baron. Our alliance is delicate enough as it is. We only weaken both our lands through war. Instead, I propose an even greater sweetening to our bargain. Join with me in more than just blood and pillage! Why should Yan Kor and Tsolyanu not be united under our rule? I as Emperor in Avanthar, and you as First General of the Empire? If our present scheme does succeed, then I am Emperor, and you seize Khirgar and parts of our north by force of arms. Yet you know that I must then put on a show of repelling you, whatever we may agree here, and much would be lost to flame and plunder. Others would rejoice as well: the Salarvyani yearn for our southeastern Protectorates of Kerunan and Chaigari; the Red-hats of Mu’ugalavya would swoop to take back their lost Chakas-and mayhap parts of your little allies, Pijena and Ghaton, which border their lands. It is not said that, ‘when water meets fire, both turn to harmless vapour’?”
“Our alliance rests upon our mutual benefit, Prince. Yet your sweetening is still not sweet enough. You know my reasons.”
“I am well aware. But for both our sakes put aside those offences which Tsolyanu certainly offered you. With me in Avanthar and yourself as my First General, you will gain more wealth and power than a hundred, a thousand, lootings of Khirgar could ever bring. Forget Kaidrach Field-”
The fist came crashing down again. “Speak not to me of that place, Prince! It was your conniving aristocrats and their puppet generals who left me there to defend a hopeless position! Do you accuse me of treachery that I then kissed Yan Koryani gold? After all, who was I to your Empire-a hired mercenary, a wild warrior from Saa Allaqi? What mattered a little army and a loyal fool who was naught but a northern tribesman and a half-cousin to the men of Yan Kor?” His voice dropped to a deadly whisper. “Though I was betrayed, still I bore you Tsolyani no great ill will, for I knew that such are the vagaries of politics and men. Even after I had climbed to my present station over the heads-¦ and blood-of Yan Kor’s squabbling chieflings, still I would have been your father’s friend. But then he dispatched his legions to take me, as huntsmen take a Jakkohl, and his accursed general, Kettukal, sent his officer, Bazhan, to seize my lady Yilrana from my citadel of Ke’er. Bazhan did her to a shameful death! And so did he suffer for it.” White ridges of pain drew downward from the thin lips. “If you speak to me of power and wealth, Prince, then I spurn them! I seek blood payment-my own kind of Shamtla — for all that was done to me and to mine, and this shall I have though I have to raise all the myrmidons of the many hells to do it! No, make me no offers and plot me no plots! Our bargain gives you the Petal Throne; I take Khirgar, Chene Ho, and the northlands. I have sworn before my mountain gods to end our blood feud only when these cities are delivered up to my vengeance. -And note well that this debt is not paid until General Kettukal is also in my hand, even as was Lord Bazhan!”
“Kettukal hiMraktine is at Chene Ho, and there I shall try to detain him until you can come to collect him. You shall have him, for I have almost the same love for him as you.”
The first man shifted restlessly and looked away. The second said softly, “Beware, Baron Aid, that you do not raise myrmidons who will not serve you but master you instead. You do not summon maidens to a summer’s frolic! There are hints of forces beyond all that we know-and can control. The relics-”
He would have continued, but the third man interrupted. “Our Mihalli colleague grows weary. The globe dims, and our contact must soon be dissolved. Let us make an end to it. Come, Prince, agree to action: block the plots of the temple of Thumis and seize the Llyani relics. Keep them if you wish, an assurance against any threat of our duplicity. This should satisfy you.”
“You do not fear that they may contain power? That you do not hand me a sword too sharp for your own liking?’ ’
“It is possible,” the third man said, “but there are many Skeins. One is drab: the possibility that the relics are lost, false, or inoperative. The second Skein is brighter: you halt the priests of Thumis, seize the relics, and find that your interests are better served by cooperation with us than by using them against us- for which we also have further counters. Unlikely are weavings that take you on to success in your land and victory over us-or, conversely, our defeat of you. Such chances we must take. No, Prince Dhich’une, the best course is for you to join with us, use your agents now to frustrate your rivals, and aid us in creating a Skein that leads you to the Petal Throne-and my master here to his rightful vengeance. A denouement you can easily afford. Agreed?”
“I protest. As I said, my agents are all too soon seen: bright-plumaged Kheshehal-bkds sitting upon a leafless branch! If they are caught, we are undone! My sources hint that the relics may be of very great importance to you indeed: it is possible that they can give your foes the means to halt your ‘Weapon Without Answer’-and to slay the He’esa, the minions of the Goddess Who Must Not Be Named! Even to drive Her from this Plane! Would you have that? The end of your schemings because you now underestimate the danger? Use one of Her He’esa to destroy the priest-boy and those who aid him!”
“As well shoot a Dri-ant with a ballista!” the first man growled. “Your lesser folk can take care of the Thumis priest. I see no need to involve my own people at all. The Goddess’ creatures are still more valuable: they are indetectable by sorcery, and they have other, longer-term uses, including the removal of certain of your Imperial siblings, Prince. No, we will watch- and we will act when we must. This-and only this-do I promise you.”
“Hold to our alliance most carefully, then, Baron. It is a vial of thin crystal that can spill much poison if broken.” The second man rose, flinging earth-hued robes about his thin shoulders.
“Agreed,” grunted the first. Armour clattered as he stood up.
The fourth raised red-ruby eyes from the smoke-blue globe. It flickered, pulsated, and went dark.'
The place that was not a place was empty, a featureless void, as it had always been since time’s first eternal moment…
Chapter Ten
In the days that followed his first attempts at spell-casting, Harsan began work in earnest upon the Llyani relics. The golden hand and the map symbol he examined carefully but soon discarded as containing little new information. Instead, he turned to the pile of crumbling manuscript leaves. The temple apothecaries provided him with the dried bark of the Voqu’o — plant and certain other substances, and he boiled these into a sticky syrup with which he painted each fragment, as he had learned to do in the library of the Monastery of the Sapient Eye. The fibres of the ancient Hruchan — reed paper took on new life. The tattered shreds became strong enough to be separated. The tomb-damp and the deterioration of the glazing had taken their toll, but some of the text slowly started to return to near-readable condition.
The Pe Choi continued to dissect the three lumps of rust in order to free any artifacts inside. Each day he laid out his chest of knives, picks, and files that were almost too delicate for human fingers and chipped away at the aeons-old corrosion. He also sometimes coached Harsan in the elements of spell-casting, and the latter started to show progress. Small objects now usually went “around the comer” with ease, though larger ones still defied his efforts. Some returned; others did not. At times, as he' told Chtik p’Qwe, he could almost feel the strange power of the Planes Beyond throbbing just beyond his fingertips.
Harsan also requested and got permission to move from the noisome dormitory cell to the upper chamber within the pyramid. He was thus both closer to his work and also cooler. It was the middle of Drenggar, and the heat of the plains swathed the city in a blazing, suffocating blanket of misery.
He soon regretted this move, however, for the off-duty troopers who slept in this room were not slow to perceive the virtues of cool underground quarters. First they took to bringing in jugs of heady Ngalu-wine, then their comrades from the sweltering barracks, and finally their mistresses and courtesans to go with it all.
They were joined by not a few of the temple’s female acolytes, for who might not appreciate the cool relief, liquid refreshment, and ever-festive company? The attractions of a brawny soldier’s embrace, instead of those of the scholars of the Lord of Wisdom, also probably had something to do with it. The noise and ribaldry rapidly grew
