A young couple stood in the doorway, looking disappointed. She was young, lissome in the normal way and with fine eyes; at the moment she was pregnant. Her husband was a soldier, a Hikdar, handsome in his Tomboramic uniform. Naturally, I offered them seats at my table, and Wil, who had been brought in to help, quickly brought glasses and wine — a yellow wine of Western Erthyrdrin — so that when Tilda joined us we had already been thrown into the quick and casual friendships of the frontier. Inch had discovered a taboo and now came across, brushing sawdust from his long fair hair, and sat down. The young couple told us all the news. The Hikdar was a cavalryman and burning for adventure out here on the borders of the spreading empire of Pandahem. His name was Pando — the cause of my immediate reaction when they had entered — Pando na Memis. His wife’s name was Leona.
“Memis,” said Tilda, gracefully drinking the yellow wine. “I know it well, those tall red cliffs falling to the sea, the islands and their gulls — oh, millions of gulls! — and the wine there.” She laughed. “It is far smoother on the tongue than this Erthyrdrin-”
Pando na Memis looked somewhat confused and beckoned quickly. I watched the byplay. Young Pando trotted up, he also having, for a change, been conscripted.
“Bring a better vintage than this, young one,” said Pando na Memis. “It is not to the lady’s liking.”
Pando — the urchin of that distinguished name — made a face at me, whereat I lifted my fist, so that he scuttled off, laughing. Tilda looked gracious, oblivious of the exchange. Pando na Memis pushed the bottle of yellow wine away across the table — and a long lanky arm reached out from somewhere and Inch grasped the bottle by the neck. Leona na Memis had not missed a single nuance. Much of the traffic and trade of Kregen is devoted to this kind of mutual exchange of commodities. It is an infuriating fact of human nature that the grass is always greener over the neighbor’s fence; and that is why wine from Western Erthyrdrin reached Turismond, why in Zenicce we drank Pandahem wine when the good vintages of Zenicce were shipped to Vallia. As to Vallia, her wines were carried to the far corners of Kregen. Despite all that, I still preferred the fragrant tea brewed by my clansmen in far Segesthes.
Inch, I considered, would be happiest with a bottle of dopa, that fiendish stomach-rotting drink that I had seen at work in the warrens of Magdag.
Drunkenness is relative on Kregen. Few Kregans consider getting drunk the occupation of a fully rational man, and my two oar comrades, Nath and Zolta, although they might become as merry as nits in an eiderdown, seldom ever achieved that disgusting paralytic sick drunk common in certain so-called civilized countries of this Earth. Kregans love to roister; and that means enjoying themselves. Getting sick drunk and puking over everything is not, really, much idea of fun. The conversation wended on, and we heard of Pando na Memis’ plans for the future, of how he craved for action — at which Leona looked alarmed — and of how, soon, the Tomboramin would advance along the old Lohvian roads through the Klackadrin.
“After the old Empire of Walfarg fell,” said Pando, “the land must have gone back. The Hostile Territories are still there, waiting for strong men to ride in and take over. One day, and soon, we of Tomboram will do just that, before the rasts of Vallia or Menaham or anyone else!”
I made the right noises, saying nothing.
Then the name Marsilus came up. A great noble of that name, old, crotchety, more than half-mad, had just died back in Tomboram and his estates, reputed valuable beyond price, had fallen into the hands of a nephew, who was also a nephew to the king. Pando na Memis whistled when Tilda, rather sharply, I thought, said: “Are the estates then so valuable?”
“Are they not! They rival the king’s. Now that Murlock Marsilus, the nephew, has inherited, the king must be greatly pleased, for the kingdom may inherit also when the king dies. There was a son to old Marsilus. Unfortunately, he died.”
Speaking very precisely, Tilda said, “Was the son disinherited, then?”
“By no means. But he is dead and — there was a story — he was banished in disgrace. Married out of turn, so the story goes. Everyone has heard it — you must have, surely?”
“Yes.”
“I haven’t,” I said.
After I had given some explanation of myself, brief and almost totally untrue, Zair forgive me, Pando na Memis went on: “Murlock Marsilus is now Kov of Bormark, but the story goes that the old Kov, old Marsilus, screamed and shouted for his son on his deathbed. He relented of his punishment of the boy when he married. There was a grandson — but, of course, he stands no chance of the title and estates now that Murlock holds them under the king’s agreement.”
“The old man was stricken with the shrieking horrors,” said Inch, wisely. “It is known. He wanted to go to the Ice Floes of Sicce with a clean mind and with clean hands. One can visualize the scene. Poor benighted of Ngrangi!”
I leaned forward. “The king,” I said, “and this Marsilus, Kov of Bormark, who had died. They were brothers?”
“Yes,” said Leona, smiling at me. “You must be from some wild and untamed part of the world!”
“I am,” I told her. “Oh, yes, indeed, I am!”
The conversation changed course then; but I noticed Tilda was very quiet after that. The hated name of Vallia came up and with it tidbits of gossip and scandal. Of these I felt my heart lurch when Leona, speaking with a gentle malice quite natural in the circumstances, said: “The Princess Majestrix of Vallia!
Such a proud hoity-toity madam! Her father, the emperor has ordered her to marry-”
“To marry!” I shouted — and they all leaned back from me, their faces shocked, expressive of bewilderment and disgust. They must have seen that devil’s look on my face. I made myself calm down. My Delia! My Delia, Princess Majestrix of Vallia, ordered by the tyrant emperor, her father, to marry -
to marry some blundering oaf of his choice. I had to hold onto my sanity and my temper then. I do not apologize, so I just said: “You were telling us of Delia, Princess Majestrix of Vallia, Leona. Please go on.”
In a voice she struggled to keep from quavering, Leona went on speaking. And, as I listened, I felt a warm sweet relief flooding me, and I breathed easier.
For my Delia had defied her father!
She had flatly refused to marry the oaf picked out for her! She had stood up against his puissant majesty the emperor of Vallia, and told him flatly she would not marry. Not marry at all. This made my heart lurch afresh.
My Delia vowing never to marry?
Did she — could she — believe that I had abandoned her, as that scheming villain had planned when I had been drugged and dumped under the thorn-ivy bush? Had that foul scheme worked?
I had to get to Vallia — and yet, was there any greater urgency now than there had been? At least I knew my Delia was safe and well. She refused to marry. The emperor was still hale and hearty and, so the scandal went, quite prepared to wait and let his only daughter rot in maidenhood until she decided to marry the man of her choice. He would not force her; he would let time and nature take their courses. Once I had held Delia of the Blue Mountains in my arms and pressed her dear form close to my heart I had known that no other woman in two worlds could compare with her, no other woman could take her place. And I had known many women, blazingly beautiful women of arrogance and power, lovely women of lissome grace and refined artifice, women of passion and glory; and one had been to my Delia as a candle to the radiance of the red sun Zim. I had felt absolute confidence that Delia felt in exactly the same way about me, however little I deserved so marvelous a wonder. Delia was everything. No — she would not despair of me — she would not, she must not!
“You all right, dom?” said Inch.
“Assuredly, my long friend. Do I thus break a taboo?”
He chuckled and pushed the wine over to me and I drank and pushed the problem of Delia’s father, the emperor of Vallia, away for a space. At that time I had not settled the question. It rankled. I had to walk away from it for a space.
Leona, having exhausted herself on the scandal of a princess majestrix disobeying her father the emperor, had harked back to the Kov of Bormark, and was saying how lovely it would be if all that money were her Pando’s. Pando laughed. With what I considered to be deep wisdom, he said: “The money might be fun, Leona, my dearest; but what comes with it — ah, that is a different matter.”
Tilda was still sitting silently and sipping her wine and I saw her face suddenly tauten. I swiveled. Young Pando, his naked legs flashing, his brave zhantil tunic laid aside for the humble job of waiter, his hair tousled, was
