temples, and even my father’s people. Did you know that the Yan Koryani were there was well? Half of the Five Empires chasing each other like Hrihayal’s greasy priests plucking at little boys, and not a hair of the thrice-damned catamite ever seen again!” Taluvaz debated how much to say, but the Prince was still speaking:
“And while this was happening, the Temple of Thumis found it opportune to pull poor Surundano out of their temple at Hauma and declare him a Prince! One day a clerk in a copying-hall, the next a Prince of the Empire!”
General Kettukal guffawed, an unseemly and ignoble sound. “And then-of all the stupid times to act-the Temple of Vimuhla began to worry-as fearful as an old lady goosed by an Ahoggya! Two weeks ago they trotted forth a Princeling of their own! somebody named Mirusiya, raised in secret by the arrogant Vimuhla-loving Vriddi clan of Fasiltum! Did you hear of this, Lord Taluvaz? The fellow was trained as a warrior, an officer in a good Legion-that of the Lord of Red Devastation, as devoted to the Flame-God as a babe to its mother’s teat-and all too appealing to the army and the temples of our war-gods.”
Taluvaz had NOT heard. It overturned the entire Den-den board!
He struggled to look knowledgeable, thinking furiously all the while. What the Prince had left unspoken was that such an heir would be almost an exact copy-on the side of the Lords of Change-of Eselne himself! Dangerous! The war-gods’ temples, Lord Karakan of Stability and Lord Vimuhla of Change, had been close to a rapprochement of sorts; now there would be no reason for it, and the intrigue for alliances and power must begin all over again. The Temple of Vimuhla deserved to rot in Sarku’s wormy hells for causing this turn of events!
This new Prince-and the shattering of what had until now been a secure power base-cut right under the foundations of Prince Eselne and his Military Party! Dismay ran through Taluvaz’ limbs like a fever: everything was changed. All the effort spent cultivating Eselne and his brash, loutish generals would be for nothing! There was no time to start afresh with this wretched flame-worshipping newcomer-though Tsamra would certainly send someone as soon as the Livyani Legate in Bey Sii heard of it. An immediate stroke was needed. Prince Eselne must have a victory: some resounding deed that would echo through the palaces and temple of Tsolyanu like a Tunkul- gong. The defeat of the Baron’s armies here in the west suddenly became urgent and imperative, whatever the cost.
“-Frightened that Prince Eselne would make too much capital out of the war with Yan Kor,” General Kettukal was saying, “or perhaps that Ma’in Kriithai would betroth herself to Eselne and thus bring about an unbreakable alliance between her Goddesses and our Military Party! At any rate-”
“Yes, at any rate there are times when I wish I could candle my ever-victorious father’s head! We not only have a major war upon our borders, we also have a well-fueled fire in the heart of our Empire! How many puling brats has my father spawned anyway-and hidden here and there about the country as a Shqa — beetle hides its eggs in a ball of dung? Now Karakan knows how many more little Princes and Princesses lurk behind the altars of this temple or that! How many noble clans have little boys and girls with the Omnipotent Azure Legion’s golden seal upon their plump arses? One more such revelation and I renounce the Gold and retire to Salarvya to breed virgins for Lady Dilinala!”
The three girls in the comer giggled.
Taluvaz strove to think the matter through. He felt like a swimmer in a rushing mountain river. An idea surfaced, and he snatched at it. He almost pushed it away: it was too perilous, a jag-edged Ssu sword that would cut many ways! Secrets would have to be disclosed-he ought to check with Tsamra and his colleagues in the Vru’uneb first. The Tsolyani might gain too much. Yet it was almost certainly the key to more Tsolyani cooperation than Tsamra could have hoped! There was no time. What should he do? Taluvaz again wished the Temple of Vimuhla and its flame-loving Prince into Lord Qame’el’s darkest and coldest hells.
Still, the more Taluvaz thought about it, the better his key seemed. But to use it could mean his death. The secrets of the Shadow Gods and the Vru’uneb and the High Council were not for one man to babble freely. Yet…
Prince Eselne and the stem-faced General were looking at him.
Slowly, carefully now. Taluvaz fumbled for his cup of Chumetl, something to delay with, to hold back his words until he had had time to weigh each one. The stuff burned his throat like Vimuhla’s raging flames. He could not help making a face. He gasped and spoke:
“Mighty Prince, I have made our needs plain to you, plainer than I would have spoken them to my own brother-priests.” The language was coming easier, the musical Tsolyani — syllables following one upon the other of their own accord. “I am honoured by your, ah, confidence.” He paused. Now he must plunge into the maelstrom. “Know that we-were indeed aware of the Man of Gold, the weapon to defeat the horrible device brought forth by the Baron Aid.”
General Kettukal made an impatient sound in his throat, but the Prince gestured him to silence.
“My Lord, we were indeed aware of the priest of Thumis, and of something of what he might have discovered. But it was not-useful-that he be found-by any of you-ah, at that time.” Taluvaz spread his hands palms downward in a gesture of apology. “Too much power-either to Tsolyanu or to Yan Kor- you must understand…”
Prince Eselne gave no sign. Politics were politics. Thus far Taluvaz had said nothing that Tsamra would find objectionable. If his guess were wrong, what he was about to add now would seal his death warrant at the hands of the ever-efficient Vru’uneb.
“We did not seek very diligently, nor did we use all of our resources, mighty Prince. Had we done so, we would have found the priest as assuredly as the journeying of the sun through the sky. For-for we can command the aid of-” he filled his lungs with the dry air, “-the Heheganu, the Old Ones of Purdimal.” “What-?” The Prince looked puzzled; then his gaze hardened. “We are old, my Lord, older than Engsvanyalu, older then the First Imperium of the Bednalljans, or any of the empires that have come and gone upon Tekumel. We do not say it, but our Shadow- Gods are not distorted forms of the Gods of the Priest Pavar, as those outside of our sanctuaries are led to think. Within, we carry on the traditions of Llyan, of the First Kingdom after the Latter Times-of Llyan of Tsamra, my Lord. We have wisdom lost since the days of man’s first creation, from the ages before the Time of Darkness, before the lights in the sky were extinguished, and the lamps of the Old Gods went out, and the earth shook, and the waters walked, and the fires rose from the hells below…”
“What has all this mythology-?” General Kettukal began. “Hear me. There are peoples and things-from the First Times-allegiances and liaisons made then, before the world was as it is. One of these, ah, relationships is with the Heheganu, the Old Ones of Purdimal, who are now debased, a race so circumscribed and so poor and so disillusioned-and so disinherited-that they dwell in the places below and no longer walk abroad in the light of day. They know where your priest is, mighty Prince. They have given him refuge. They want no resurgence of the great conflict that he-the Man of Gold- would revive from the dust of the ancient past, no battle between that thing and the ‘Weapon Without Answer’ that the Baron drags down toward your frontiers.
“Yet we-who are allied by certain bonds to them-can cause them to bring forth the priest and aid in finding his device. We can winkle him out for you. If the Man of Gold is as it is supposed to be, if it still operates after all these millennia, if-” “In return for which, we aid you with Tsolei and Mu’ugalavya- and the southern continent,” Prince Eselne drew a long breath.
“Yes, those-and perhaps certain other mutual favours to be discussed-I must speak with my superiors in the High Temple of Qame’el at Tsamra. But I have opened the kernel of it for you. Yes, we will help you stop the Baron of Yan Kor. And you shall give us what I have asked today.”
Prince Eselne stood up. He clapped his hands twice. A panel opened in the wall, revealing darkness within. “You are there, Chiyurga? Take these three girls and apply your magic to their minds; let them recall nothing of what was said here. Harm them not.”
The slavegirls squealed, terrified in spite of the Prince’s soothing and the fat purse of gold he tossed to them.
The three men remained talking until late in the night. Taluvaz eventually received not only an ewer of excellent, cool wine but a fine dinner as well.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
They often came here, up where the wind off Thenu Thendraya’s mighty flanks drove the dank mists away in grey rags and tatters. It was cool, less muggy, and-what they meeded most of all-less crowded and oderiferous
