rapier hilt and I gripped hard.
The Emperor strode on and we followed, his guards, my men with presents, courtiers, and attendants, and me, the Strom of Valka.
Delia had been sitting playing the harp. I didn’t know she could play the harp. Handmaidens bowed low before the Emperor. Everyone moved with smooth court ritual into their appointed places, forming a ring around the central figures of the Emperor and his daughter. She looked up from the pile of cushions, and handmaidens, all superbly dressed in sumptuous gowns, took the harp away. Here there was nothing of the naked pearl-strung slave girls of other palaces I had visited.
These magnificent chambers were merely the outer portion of her apartments, to which a visiting nobleman might fittingly be brought. Farther into the recesses of the palace would lie her private apartments. The thought of their beauty and evidences of sensibility dizzied me. She said: “I am glad you visit me, Father. We do not talk often enough.”
“You know the subject on which I wish to speak, daughter. But not now. We have a visitor who brings fine gifts, and also, as I judge a man, knowing something of his history, a man who is not seeking self-advancement.” He glanced at me. “I am aware of what you have done in Valka, Strom Drak. The racters must look elsewhere for slaves now.”
I could see he welcomed that.
“My daughter,” he said, and the icy mask of polite formality descended on him, “this is Drak, Strom of Valka.”
Delia looked up at me. I stood there, clean-shaven, dressed up in my fine new clothes, trying to make my lips form into something that might pass as a smile, looking down on her as if nothing in the world lay between us.
“The Princess Majestrix of Vallia.”
I performed a full incline. It was the perfectly proper thing to do, if somewhat florid, but I wanted to carry off the part. “Your most humble and devoted servant, my Princess,” I said.
“You are most welcome, Strom,” said Delia, Princess Majestrix.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
When I had been thrown down before her, with iron chains dragging on me, all bloody and foul and filthy, hairy and horrible, my Delia had recognized me instantly and flown to my side. Now I stood before her, clean and shining and fresh, and she greeted me merely with, “You are most welcome, Strom,” in the cold and distant words of formal politeness. Had she not recognized me? What a comment on the experiences through which we had gone together!
The ritual of greetings and introductions over — I had noticed how the universal formal “Llahal” was used here — we could lapse into more relaxed conversation. Light wine and miscils, which are those tiny fragile cakes that melt on the tongue, were brought, and the presents were looked at. In truth, they had looked fine enough when bought, and although mightily lessened by these gorgeous surroundings, they were still presentable. I had tried for quality and not quantity.
I stood politely talking to Delia and the Emperor, and we exchanged pleasantries. He was interested in Valka, and I was able to assure him that all went well there, and that he himself had personally the loyalty of every man of Valka.
This seemed to me a sensible attitude.
How true it was remained to be seen.
I thought to copper-bottom my bet.
“These are, of course, only small items I could bring myself. I have surprises from Valka that should please Your Majesty mightily.”
He made himself looked pleased. He had a lot of the strengths of Delia about him, her same clear brown eyes, but his hair, still abundant, contained none of those glorious chestnut tints. They must come from her mother. His face was furrowed with lines I could recognize, scars of experience put there by ruling a vast island empire. Then I realized why he was taking this interest in me, an obscure strom from a province many dwaburs away. He needed friends. He was desperately in need of allies against the racters, and the panvals, who were against the racters rather than for the Emperor, and a mysterious third party one heard whispers of.
He was a tragically lonely figure.
He had also ordered my head cut off.
It was worthwhile not forgetting that.
I said, “Has there been any news of Tharu of Vindelka?”
“How strange you ask that, Strom Drak! Vomanus of Vindelka has searched long and in vain — the world is strange and marvelous beyond the confines of Vallia — and he has been much in our thoughts lately.” And here the Emperor glanced at Delia.
She said, “Vomanus is the heir and he searches for Tharu with a devotion I find commendable.”
Point taken.
We talked on in general terms, and then Delia said, with a cool effrontery that amused me, “I had heard the Strom of Valka was a hairy man, very violent, who raped a tower of the maidens dedicated to the Maiden of the Many Smiles.” She shot a look directly at me. “You do not look like that, Strom.”
“That is not my idea of recreation.” I had heard the calumny, put about by the racters. “The truth is that a certain Foke the Ob-handed did that foul deed. It happened on a tiny islet on the eastern coast of Valka. I was in the Heart Heights at the time. Foke has not been caught. When he is I shall string him as high as the topmost stone of that tower of the maidens.”
The Emperor nodded, clucking his tongue.
“And very proper, too.” He looked about, his eyes gleaming white, a sudden and revealing gesture from an Emperor. “He belongs to the racters, does he not?”
“He does, Majister.”
“The racters.” He did not say any more. Poor devil — here was I, Dray Prescot, feeling sorry for this dread Emperor!
Delia said, “We had no warning of your coming to Vondium, Strom Drak.”
“I had business here, Princess.”
“Did you know Drak was the name of my grandfather when he ascended the throne?”
I inclined my head. “I have always taken great pride in that, Princess. I feel that our destinies are linked.”
If she could play this game, then so could I!
“Really!” She tinkled her laughter, so gay, so forced, so artificial. “I heard once — a story, a silly trifle
— of a man called the Kov of Delphond. His name, so men said, was Drak.” She laughed again, gesturing negligently with her arm. How I longed to take that rounded glowing arm and haul her to me and plant an enormous kiss on those luscious lips! “Delphond is a sweet place, very dear to me. If that man had been caught, assuming him to have existed, I would have asked you, Drak, Strom of Valka, to hoist him up to the topmost stone of the tower along with Foke the Ob-handed.”
The Emperor threw his daughter a puzzled glance. He reached out his hand to the empty air and immediately a handmaid placed a goblet in his fingers. He had no fear of poison, I judged, and recollected that poison is used so rarely on Vallia that when it is, it is marked and noted and remembered.
He moved away, talking to the Chuktar of his guard. The courtiers moved with him, always at their respectful distance, and only Delia’s handmaids were left with us. I had no idea how proper was my conduct in not moving with the Emperor.
“I ought to go, Princess, with the Emperor your father.”
“That is all right, Strom, in private. Our protocol is not overpowering. Come, sit with me.”
I looked at the Emperor in the instant that he turned to look back at me, his head half bent. He nodded. I
