nothing but an Ortelgan hunter. There was none to whom it was not plain that he was in truth the prisoner of his own all-consuming integrity, that he took no pleasure in the jewels and wine, the girls and flowers and feasting of Bekla. 'Ah, he speaks with Lord Shardik ' they said, watching as he paced through the streets and squares to the soft beat of the gong. 'We live in the sun, for he takes the darkness of the city on himself.' 'Gives me the cold shivers, he does,' said the courtesan Hydraste to her pretty friend, as they leaned from her window in the hot afternoon. 'You couldn't do even that much, to him,' replied the friend, flicking a ripe cherry down upon a young man passing below, and leaning a little further over the sill.
To himself, his integrity was unforced, rooted in the compulsion to seek, to discover a truth which he felt to lie far beyond the fortune he had made for Ortelga, far beyond his own role of priest-king. In his prophecies and interpretations he was less betraying this integrity than compounding with necessity in the face of his need for more time if he was to attain to what he sought; just as a doctor, feeling himself on the brink of discovering at last the true cause of a disease, may nevertheless continue to treat it by accepted methods, not from any intention to deceive or exploit, but because until he succeeds in his great aim there is nothing better. Kelderek, who might have drugged Shardik to be sure of standing safely before him on appointed days in the presence of the people; who might have introduced human sacrifice or elaborate forms of compulsory worship, so great was the veneration in which he was held, endured instead the danger of death and the twilit solitude of the hall where he prayed and meditated continually on an uncomprehended mystery. Something there was to be discovered, something attainable only at great cost, the one thing worth attaining, beside which all older religious notions would appear pathetic fragments of superstition, an esotericism as shallow as the whispered secrets of children. This it was that would constitute Shardik's supreme gift to men. And thus he himself knew that his priesthood, which seemed to others incapable of further magnification and therefore essentially procedural and unchanging in its nature, a matter of service and rites performed in due season, was in reality an all-demanding search, during which time was always passing and his steps never covered the same ground twice. This it was which by its tremendous nature would transcend – even justify – all wrong done in the past, all violence to the truth, even – even – and here the trend of his thoughts would fail, giving place to the picture of the road to Gelt at moonset and himself standing silent while Ta-Kominion led his prisoner away down the valley. Then he would groan and fall to striding up and down outside the bars, beating fist on palm as he strove to break his train of thought, and tossing his head as though in imitation of the afflicted Shardik.
For the memory of the Tuginda gave him no peace, even though the event had made it plain that Ta- Kominion must have been right and that she would have thwarted the miraculous gift of victory and frustrated the conquest of Bekla. After Shardik had been brought to the city and all but the southerly provinces round Ikat had recognized the rule of the conquerors, the barons had decided, with Kelderek's full agreement, that it would be both magnanimous and prudent to send messengers to assure the Tuginda that her error of judgment had been forgotten and that the time was now ripe for her to take her place beside them; for notwithstanding all that Kelderek had come to signify, no Ortelgan could lose that numinous awe for Quiso with which he had been instilled from birth, and not a few were uneasy that in their new prosperity their leaders should evidently have set aside the Tuginda. It was known that two priestesses had been killed between the corning of Shardik and the battle of the Foothills, and as long as the conquest of Bekla remained to be consolidated by subduing the provinces, the barons had been able to tell their followers that they had begged the Tuginda to remain in Quiso for her own safety. Many had expected that Shardik, once recovered, would be taken to Quiso, as in days long ago. Kelderek, however, from the time when he had set out from Bekla to find the bear, had never intended this; for if he were to go with Shardik to the Tuginda's island he must forfeit his supremacy as priest-king, while without the actual presence of Shardik he could not expect to reign in Bekla. With Shardik in Bekla and the northerly provinces subdued, there could no longer be any plausible reason for the Tuginda's absence except her own refusal to come, and the messengers – of whom Neelith had been one – had been instructed to stress to her the harm that might well be done to the people's confidence and to the fighting power of the army were she to continue to grudge Kelderek his superior power of divining the will of Shardik, and to show petty spite by sulking in Quiso and thereby depriving the people of all she meant to them.
'And this we can now put to her strongly,' said Ged-la-Dan to the other members of the baronial council, 'for make no mistake, she is no longer the figure we once feared in the days of Bel-ka-Trazet. She was wrong about the will of Lord Shardik, while Ta-Kominion and Kelderek were not. Her honour is as great and no greater than we are ready to accord to her, and will be commensurate with the extent of her use to us. But since many of the people still accord her honour, it will be prudent to add to our own security by bringing her here. In fact, if she will not come I will bring her myself.'
Kelderek had said nothing in dissent from this harsh assessment, since he felt sure that the Tuginda would be glad to accept her offered reinstatement, and that once she was in Bekla he would be able to help her to restore her former standing in the eyes of the barons.
The messengers had returned without Neelith. It seemed that on Quiso she had broken off her prepared speech to kneel at the Tuginda's feet in tears, begging her forgiveness and crying passionately that she would never leave her again as long as she lived. After hearing what the rest had to say, the Tuginda had merely reminded them that she had been sent back to Quiso as a prisoner. She had, she said, no more liberty than that now accorded to Shardik to determine for herself whether or not she would go to one place or another.
'But,' she added, 'you may tell them in Bekla that when Lord Shardik takes that liberty once again, I will take mine too. And you may also tell Kelderek that whatever he may think to the contrary, I am bound as he, and he is bound as I. And that he will one day discover.' With this reply they had been obliged to return.
'The bitch!' said Ged-la-Dan. 'Docs she think she is in any position to disguise her sulky mood with impudent speeches – she in the wrong of it and we in the right? I will be as good as my word; and I shall not be long about it either.'
Ged-la-Dan was absent for a month, which cost the army a serious tactical reverse in Lapan. He returned without the Tuginda and remained silent about the reason, until the tale told by his servants, under questioning from the other barons, began to make him a laughing-stock behind his back. It turned out that he had made two separate and unsuccessful attempts to land on Quiso. On each occasion a stupor had fallen upon himself and those with him and his canoe had drifted below the island. On the second occasion it had struck a rock and sunk, and he and his companions had barely escaped with their lives. Ged-la-Dan lacked neither pride nor courage, but for his second attempt he had been forced to make use of fresh servants, the original paddlers having utterly refused to go a second time. Kelderek, shuddering at his own memories of the night journey to Quiso, could only marvel at the baron's stubbornness. It was plain that it had cost him dear indeed. For many months afterwards, even in the field, he contrived to avoid sleeping alone and would never again travel by water.
Was it, then, to expiate the memory of the Tuginda that Kelderek cared little what he ate and drank, remained chaste and left to others the spending of the wealth considered proper to the king's grandeur? Often he felt that this was indeed the reason, even while he wondered for the thousandth time what he could have done to help her. To have intervened on her behalf would have been to declare himself against Ta-Kominion. But despite his reverence for the Tuginda, he had passionately supported Ta-Kominion and been ready to follow him into any hazard. The Tuginda's conception of Shardik's power he had never understood, while Ta-Kominion's was plain. And yet he knew that at bottom, it had been to vindicate his own courage in Ta-Kominion's eyes that he had thrown in his lot with what must surely have been the most desperate campaign that had ever proved successful. Now he was priest-king of Bekla, and he and not the Tuginda was the interpreter of Shardik. Yet how much understanding did he truly possess, and how much of the Ortelgan conquest was really due to him as Shardik's elect?
The thought of the Tuginda was never far from his mind. As, after a few years of marriage, a childless woman cannot be free from her disappointment, reflecting, 'What a beautiful morning – but I am childless,' or 'Tomorrow we go to the wine festival – but I am childless,' so Kelderek's thoughts were troubled continually by the recollection of himself standing silent while the Tuginda was bound and led away. She had known her own mind as he had not known his: and he had deceived himself in believing that she would ever consent to become a party to Shardik's captivity in Bekla. Sometimes he felt ready to renounce his crown and return to Quiso to entreat, like Neelith, her forgiveness. Yet this would be to give up both his power and his search for the great revelation, of the imminence of which he was sometimes almost sure. Besides, he suspected that if he attempted the journey the barons would not suffer one so disloyal to themselves to live.
From this dilemma his one retreat was to Shardik. Here was no undeserved reward of luxury, flattery or complaint, whispering pleasure by night, no riches or adulation – only solitude, ignorance and danger. While he
