Lord Valentine's Castle

'Who are you?' she asked querulously. 'What is all this procession traveling here?'

'My name is Valentine, and we are traveling jugglers, and this Skandar is Zalzan Kavol, the master of our troupe.'

'And I am Lisamon Hultin,' the giantess responded, 'who hires as bodyguard and warrior, though there’s been little of that lately.'

'And we are wasting time,' said Zalzan Kavol, 'and should be on our way, if we are properly forgiven for having intruded on your repose.'

Lisamon Hultin nodded brusquely. 'Yes, be on your way. But are you aware this is dangerous territory?'

'Forest-brethren?' Valentine asked.

'All over the place. The woods are thick with them, just ahead.'

'And yet you feel no fear of them?' Deliamber remarked.

'I speak their language,' Lisamon Hultin said. 'I have negotiated a private treaty with them. Do you think I’d dare be munching on dwikka-fruit otherwise? I may be fat but not between the ears, little sorcerer.' She stared at Zalzan Kavol. 'Where are you bound?'

'Mazadone,' replied the Skandar.

'Mazadone? Is there work for you in Mazadone?'

'We hope to learn that,' Zalzan Kavol said.

'There’s nothing for you there. I come from Mazadone just now. The duke is lately dead and three weeks of mourning have been decreed in the entire province. Or do you jugglers perform at funerals?'

Zalzan Kavol’s face darkened. 'No work in Mazadone? No work in the whole province? We have expenses to meet! We have already gone unpaid since Dulorn! What will we do?'

Lisamon Hultin spat out a chunk of dwikka-fruit pulp. 'That’s no sorrow of mine. Anyway, you can’t get to Mazadone.'

'What?'

'Forest-brethren. They’ve blocked the road a few miles ahead. Asking tribute of wayfarers, I think, something absurd like that. They won’t let you through. Lucky if they don’t fill you with their darts.'

'They’ll let us through!' Zalzan Kavol exclaimed.

The warrior-woman shrugged. 'Not without me, they won’t.'

'You?'

'I told you, I speak their language. I can buy you a way through, with a little haggling. Are you interested? Five royals ought to do it.'

'What use do forest-brethren have for money?' the Skandar asked.

'Oh, not for them,' she said airily. 'Five for me. I’ll offer other things to them. Deal?'

'Absurd. Five royals is a fortune!'

'I don’t bargain,' she said evenly. 'There is honor in my profession. Good luck on the road ahead.' She favored Thelkar and Erfon Kavol with a frigid stare. 'If you wish, you may have some of the dwikka-fruit before you go. But better not be munching on it when you meet the brethren!'

She turned with massive dignity and walked to the great fruit beneath the tree. Drawing her sword, she hacked off three large chunks and shoved them disdainfully toward the two Skandars, who somewhat uneasily nudged them into the wicker basket.

Zalzan Kavol said, 'Into the wagon, all of you! We have a long way to Mazadone!'

'You won’t travel far today,' said Lisamon Hultin, and released a gale of derisive laughter. 'You’ll be back here soon enough — if you survive!'

—5—

THE POISONED DARTS of the forest-brethren preoccupied Valentine for the next few miles. Sudden horrible death held no appeal for him, and the woods here were thick and mysterious, with vegetation of a primordial sort, fern-trees with silvery spore-sheaths and glassy-textured horsetails a dozen feet high and thickets of bunch-fungus, pale and pocked with brown craters. In a place of such strangeness anything might happen, and probably would.

But the juice of the dwikka-fruit eased tensions mightily. Vinorkis sliced up one huge chunk and passed cubes of it around: it was piercingly sweet of flavor and granular in texture, dissolving quickly against the tongue, and whatever alkaloids it contained went swiftly through the blood to the brain, faster than the strongest wine. Valentine felt warm and cheerful. He slouched back in the passenger cabin, one arm around Carabella, the other around Shanamir. Up front, Zalzan Kavol evidently was more relaxed as well, for he stepped up the pace of the wagon, pushing it to a rollicking speed not much in keeping with his dour, cautious practices. The usually self- contained Sleet, slicing up more dwikka-fruit, began to sing a rowdy song:

Lord Barhold came to Belka Strand
With crown and chain and pail.
He meant to force old Gornup’s hand
And make him eat his —

The wagon pulled suddenly to a halt, so suddenly that Sleet lurched forward and came close to falling into Valentine’s lap, and a slab of soft wet dwikka-fruit smacked into Valentine’s face. Laughing and blinking, he wiped himself clean. When he could see again, he found that everyone was gathered at the front of the wagon, peering out between the Skandgrs on the driver’s seat.

'What is it?' he asked.

'Birdnet vine,' said Vinorkis, sounding quite sober. 'Blocking the road. The giantess told the truth.'

Indeed. The sticky, tough red vine had been laced from fern-tree to fern-tree at a dozen angles, forming a sturdy and resilient chain both broad and thick. The forest flanking the road was altogether impenetrable here; the birdnet vine sealed the highway. There was no way the wagon could proceed.

'How hard is it to cut?' Valentine asked. Zalzan Kavol said, 'We could do it in five minutes with energy-throwers. But look there.'

'Forest-brethren,' Carabella said softly. They were everywhere, swarming in the woods, hanging from every tree although getting no closer to the wagon than a hundred yards or so. They seemed less like apes at close range, more like savages of an intelligent species. They were small, naked beings with smooth blue-gray skin and thin limbs. Their hairless heads were narrow and long, with sloping flat foreheads, and their elongated necks were flimsy and fragile. Their chests were shallow, their frames meatless and bony. All of them, both men and women, wore dart-blowers of reeds strapped to their hips. They pointed at the wagon, chattered to one another, made little hissing whistling sounds.

'What do we do?' Zalzan Kavol asked Deliamber.

'Hire the warrior-woman, I would think.'

'Never!'

'In that case,' said the Vroon, 'let us prepare to camp in the wagon until the end of our days, or else go back toward Dulorn and find some other road to travel.'

'We could parley with them,' the Skandar said. 'Go out there, wizard. Speak to them in dream-language, monkey-language, Vroon-language, any words that will work. Tell them we have urgent business in Mazadone, that we must perform at the funeral of the duke, and they will be severely punished if they delay us.'

Deliamber said calmly to Zalzan Kavol, 'You tell them.'

'I?'

'Whichever of us steps out of the wagon first is apt to be skewered by their darts. I prefer to yield the honor. Perhaps they will be intimidated by your great size and hail you as their king. Or perhaps not.'

Zalzan Kavol’s eyes blazed. 'You refuse?'

'A dead sorcerer,' Deliamber said, 'will not guide you very far on this planet. I know something of these creatures. They are unpredictable and very dangerous. Pick another messenger, Zalzan Kavol. Our contract doesn’t require me to risk my life for you.'

Zalzan Kavol made his growling sound of displeasure, but he let the issue drop.

Stymied, they sat tight for long minutes. The forest-brethren began to descend from the trees, remaining at a considerable distance from the wagon. Some of them danced and cavorted now in the roadway, setting up a ragged, tuneless chanting, formless and atonal, like the droning of huge insects.

Erfon Kavol said, 'A blast from the energy-thrower would scatter them. It wouldn’t take long for us to incinerate the birdnet vine. And then—'

'And then they’d follow us through the forest, pumping darts at us whenever we showed our faces,' said Zalzan Kavol. 'No. There may be thousands of them all around us. They see us: we can’t see them. We can’t hope to win by using force against them.' Moodily the big Skandar wolfed down the last of the dwikka-fruit. Again he sat in silence for a few moments, scowling, occasionally shaking fists at the tiny folk blocking the path. At length he said in a bitter rumble, 'Mazadone is still some days’ journey away, and that woman said there was no work to be had there anyway, so we’ll have to go on to Borgax or maybe even Thagobar, eh, Deliamber? Weeks more before we earn another crown. And here we sit, trapped in the forest by little apes with poisoned darts. Valentine?'

Startled, Valentine said, 'Yes?'

'I want you to slip out of the wagon the back way and return to that warrior-woman. Offer her three royals to get us out of this.'

'Are you serious?' Valentine asked.

Carabella, with a little gasp, said, 'No! I’ll go instead!'

'What’s this?' said Zalzan Kavol in irritation.

'Valentine is— he is— he gets lost easily, he becomes distracted, he— he might not be able to find—'

'Foolishness,' the Skandar said, waving his hands impatiently. 'The road is straight. Valentine is strong and quick. And this is dangerous work. You have skills too valuable to risk, Carabella. Valentine will have to go.'