deal with this man herself, personally. She will excuse no one who balks her of that. I tell you, you foolish man, and you will not listen.”
Kov Ornol puffed himself up and half drew his thraxter.
If he set to with Furtway the latter’s rapier would spit him before he could call on Malahak as a witness.
“Guards!” bawled the Kov of Apulad, this foolish, incensed, half-demented Ornol ham Feoste.
“Then you will have to know and see the truth, and the error you fall into Kov Ornol. And once I tell you, the guards must seal this yard and the Queen must be told. At once! There is great danger here for us all.”
“What in a Herrelldrin Hell are you talking about?”
“This man, this murderer you call Chaadur, is a man the Queen will give great riches for. And I am the man — remember that, Kov Ornol, and you who sit here — remember, I am the man who brought this rast to justice.” He swung around, the chavonth cape flaring. He pointed at me, evil triumph lending him a spurious but frightening dignity.
“That man is Dray Prescot, the Prince Majister of Vallia!”
Chapter 19
Empress Thyllis takes me for a stroll through Ruathytu
King Doghamrei slashed me across the face and screeched: “You lie, cramph, you lie!”
Queen Thyllis sat forward on her crystal throne, with the golden steps, the zhantil pelts, the Chail Sheom chained in their golden chains, and the manhounds lolling fearsomely below her. She propped her chin on one white hand and regarded me with those slanting emerald eyes.
“Bagor ti Hemlad!” she said. “What you say cannot be believed, for you could not have survived.”
I’d felt pretty rough, I can tell you. This cramph Doghamrei had drugged me and had me thrown burning from a skyship, as I have told you, and I suppose it was natural that Queen Thyllis should not believe that. She was far too wily a bird to believe what King Doghamrei said. She had that onker’s card marked. He was the King of Hirrume, a moderately sized kingdom within the Empire of Hamal, and he hankered after getting rid of the Queen’s husband, the King who was a mere cipher and a friend of Rees, and then King Doghamrei planned to marry the Queen and settle himself in comfortably as Emperor. I fancied that Thyllis, with her intuitive grasp of affairs, kept her husband under strict control as a counter to this idiot Doghamrei, who still had adherents and men who would cry for him. So, feeling weak, I lolled against the guards and used them to prop me upright. The torturer and his knives had done no real damage; my weariness came from many sources of punishment over the past sennights. I’d bellowed to the Queen what Doghamrei had done when I was being played with by the Queen, and she, not really finding it possible to believe what I said, while certainly not believing what Doghamrei said, chose a middle course and beckoned to Naghan Furtway. Furtway approached the golden steps. The slanting emerald eyes regarded him, and before she spoke the white pointed teeth bit onto a full moist lip.
“So you claim Bagor ti Hemlad is the Prince Majister of Vallia?”
“I know nothing of this Bagor, Majestrix.” Furtway spoke up. “But this is Dray Prescot. I know.”
“Majestrix!” brayed Ornol ham Feoste, struggling forward. “The cramph is Chaadur, the murderer of my wife!”
The Queen regarded the two of them in turn, and then looked at me. “So the man who is Bagor ti Hemlad, and with whom I have an account still open, is Chaadur and also the Prince Rast of Vallia, hey?”
The situation would have brought that marvelously delightful tinkle of laughter to my Delia’s lips. Even I could see the humor of it, and I was pig in the middle. They were debating here in the great hall of the palace, debating on a man who had three names, and all wishing to claim him as theirs. The Hammabi el Lamma contained many a dark secret and many a hideous story; I doubted if the stinking place had witnessed such a farce before. I had acted like a great onker here once, dressed in ridiculous and humiliating clothes. I had been hairy them. My beard now, although nowhere near as long, presented the Queen with strong memories of Bagor ti Hemlad, that was sure.
Across the shining marble lay the slab covering the hole beneath which grew the leprous-white syatra. Men and women who made mistakes and displeased the Queen were popped down there. . All these people knew they plotted on the knife-edge of disaster.
So, as I glared up at the Queen and pondered if I slew her now would that materially assist Vallia, I was aware that my Delia would laugh in amusement at the situation, but would feel absolute horror at the plight of her husband. Thank Zair, she was safe in Valka, in Esser Rarioch, and her women would be readying the layette. Doctor Nath the Needle and Thelda would be there, and Aunt Katri, also. .
“Bagor! Do you wish to feed the syatra?”
“No, Queen.”
“Are you Chaadur?”
One lie was as good as another.
“No.”
“Are you Dray Prescot?”
I stared up at her. Could I deny it? I saw the green glitter of her eyes, the corner of her lip caught between her teeth, the way she leaned to look at me, the betraying movement of the golden bodice. And I saw that she already knew the answer. Other men besides Naghan Furtway must have come to Hamal, fugitives from Vallia. There was his nephew Jenbar for a start. Possibly Nath Larghos, who had been Trylon of the Black Mountains, was here. I’d knocked his eye out and maybe he was dead. Anyway, Inch was now Kov of the Black Mountains. There must be others of the third party who had escaped. They were hatching a plot here, that was certain; but more immediately they could identify me. I was sure they already had. That would be Queen Thyllis’ way.
So I stared up at her and pushed myself upright from the guards, plunking my chained fists on my hips. She saw my face. She did not flinch back, but — and I admit now I enjoyed it — her eyebrows drew down as though in sudden pain, and her teeth bit so hard she drew blood from that ripe lip.
“You stupid onker,” I said. “Queen Thyllis. Vallia has thrown out these rasts, and now you plot with them. They are failures, and so are you. Your evil Empire of Hamal is doomed. Vallia will crush you like a fly.”
I was not too happy with the fustian this time. It had not boomed and rolled out. It did not convince me. Thyllis was offended, but she was not convinced either.
“So you are the Prince Majister of Vallia!”
“Aye!”
“And you think I shall ransom you? Demand a huge sum from that evil Emperor, so you can sail home to plot against me?”
“You can try to extract ransom from the Emperor, if you wish. You’ll waste your time. If you want ransom-”
“Ah, but, Dray Prescot! I shall not ransom you!”
In my heart I knew she would never let me out of her clutches for ransom. I wondered what the Emperor, that dread ruler who was Delia’s father, would do if he had this woman, this Queen Thyllis, penned in his dungeons in his capital city of Vondium.
She threw a sweetmeat to one of her jiklos; it lifted its maw and caught the fragment out of the air, chomped once, and the piece was gone. It wore gold necklaces, I noticed, but the bands around the creature’s neck and the attached chains were of solid steel.
“Shall I feed you to my jiklos?”
I didn’t bother to reply.
At my back the great hall was packed with courtiers, soldiers, guards, and the petty clients from the lands owing allegiance to the Empire of Hamal. They made a gorgeous picture of barbaric magnificence. The Queen would not be hurried. She wanted to make the most of her bur of triumph.
“Would you fight in the Jikhorkdun?”
I was tempted to say “Put a sword in my fist and see!” But I ignored her. Her personal bodyguard, stalwart apims clad in the beautiful mesh link mail manufactured in some of the old countries bordering the Shrouded Sea, stood lined out on either side of the throne. Feathers and golden ornaments made them popinjays, but they could fight well enough, I knew. The Chail Sheom, lovely and yet pathetic in their scraps of sensil, glowed with beauty in chains along the steps. The zhantil-skin pelts reminded me of the magnificent wild animals slain to provide a touch of grandeur to the surroundings of this evil woman.
“Answer me, nulsh! Is it the Jikhorkdun?”
“I do not care,” I said at last. “Hamal is finished, whatever you do to me.”
