So I stood there, waiting for the next move in this charade.
No one moved.
No one stirred.
I looked hard at the king. His right hand was half lifted in the sign to begin. That hand did not move, did not waver, did not tremble. The old wise man’s mouth was half open. That mouth neither opened nor closed. Susheeng’s hand turned at the wrist and fondled a golden brooch upon her breast. Nothing moved.
So I knew.
Not a sound rose from the mass of courtiers in the bright reception chamber, not a person moved. I shuffled my feet and turned around, nastily, to face the tall double doors. Now, I said to myself, now what does she want?
Zena Iztar walked in through the opened double doors and past the lines of petrified people. She looked, as always, supremely imposing. She wore her crimson and scarlet and golden robes, with a narrow green sash, and the jewels flamed from her to drown in magnificence the suddenly tawdry splendor of King Genod’s glittering reception chamber.
She halted a little way off from me. She shook her head.
'Dray Prescot!'
'What do you want, Zena Iztar?'
'I seek to know what you do here.'
'It is obvious.'
'Not to me, not to the Star Lords, not to the Savanti.'
'Then are they — and you — of little wit.'
That calm face, imperious, proud, beautiful yes, all those things, but also maternal and wise and sorrowing, did not smile. Again she shook her head and the jewels of her headdress flashed and sparkled. 'If we used our wits, as you suggest, we might believe you did an evil thing here.'
'Of course it’s evil!'
A tiny line dinted between her eyebrows.
I said, 'We have met three times, Madam Ivanovna, Zena Iztar. Do you not yet understand I am an evil man?'
'Yet were you chosen by the Savanti and after they cast you off, by the Everoinye, the Star Lords.'
'That was not of my seeking.'
'Yet were you chosen.'
I wasn’t fool enough to ask why I had been chosen. The Savanti, those superhuman men of Aphrasoe, the Swinging City, selected many men from Earth and subjected them to a test and so, accepting them, trained them to become Savapim and go forth upon Kregen to uphold the dignity of apims, of Homo sapiens. I had been found wanting and so had been kicked out of paradise. I had fought and worked and created my own paradise upon Kregen. All I held dear lay with my Delia. The Star Lords used me when they willed for their own ends. The reasons behind the selection of myself were obvious; the ramifications of the conflicting desires of others were the causes of the way my life had gone upon Kregen. I had no stupid delusions that I was in any way special, destined for a great and glittering fate in this world four hundred light-years from Earth.
'I warned you, Pur Dray,' said Zena Iztar, 'that you would not be allowed to leave the Eye of the World.'
'I am no longer Pur Dray.'
'That is sooth. But I would like you to become Pur Dray again, once more to take up your rightful place as a member of the Krozairs of Zy.'
'I’m finished with all that!'
'You will never leave the inner sea until you do.'
All along, all during the time of my boasting and planning, when I had ridden to Magdag, when I had taken the argenter, all the time, I must have known — had known — that I could not leave the Eye of the World. Those vast and implacable forces operating outside of the time and space I knew held me fast caught. Until what they desired occurred I must remain here, a free man within the confines of the inner sea, but imprisoned here as I had been imprisoned on my own Earth.
'The Krozairs of Zy mean nothing to me now. I am Apushniad. Had you forgotten?'
'I do not forget important things so lightly.'
'It’s not important! Not any longer!' I was shouting. 'I have put the Krozairs behind me, cast them off, shed them as a snake sheds a skin. There are other places of Kregen I hold more dear.' She bent her gaze upon me. 'As a snake, you said. .'
'Well, then? I am evil, so a snake will serve. Although I detest the things, even though they live according to their natures.'
'The man of your Earth called Shakespeare had a word for your conduct now, Pur Dray.'
'He had a word for everything.'
'And I have a word for you. You are held here. When you are once more a Krozair of Zy, then perchance you may return to your Valka-'
'And Delia?'
She put one long white finger to her lips. Those lips, red and soft, parted and I caught the gleam of white teeth. She cared for herself, this Zena Iztar. 'You know your wife. You know her mettle. She is safe, as happy as she will ever be without you — poor soul! — yet will she risk all to find you again.'
'And you condemn her to that!'
She was very brisk about that. 'I condemn no one to anything. Men and women have suffered since the beginning and, assuredly, will suffer until the end.'
'You told me I would face a choice, a hard choice-'
'Not this petty business, serious though it may be.' She brushed my words aside. 'The choice will come later. Also, I said that even Grodno might play a part, that stranger things have happened.'
'I remember. That was the first time, in my chambers in London, before the seance-'
'And when I saw you for the second time, by the banks of the Grand Canal, I warned you afresh. You have a part to play. I would you would play it with all your heart.'
'When I am parted from Delia, that I cannot do.'
'I see that, and I believe it. Then I say this to you: you must pursue the path with every part of you that you can. Put as much of yourself into your struggle as you can possibly spend. I know whereof I speak. I salute you as Pur Dray.'
I nodded my head at the thrones. 'And if Susheeng recognizes me?'
'I do not think the — the princess Susheeng will know you. For her the Eye of the World revolves about the king. And she will not wish the king to know she once abased herself to you and that you spurned her.'
'Aye. She didn’t relish that, by Vox!'
'But you did?'
I flicked up my evil old eyes to glare at her. 'Sharp, Madam Zena Iztar! No, I do not think I relished seeing a silly hulu make a fool of herself. I do not think I took pleasure from that. But had I done so, I could have understood myself passing well.'
'I have no more to say to you now.'
I knew that in a moment she would walk off and the silent, motionless people all about would wake to life and the ceremony would proceed. Already the Chulik Chuktar, he who held my shortsword, had the piece of red cloth extended, still and unmoving. There were very many things I wished to ask this woman, and every time she sidestepped them and we got into an argument. I said, 'Not the Star Lords, not the Savanti, then who, Zena Iztar?'
She saw my eyes and looked where I looked and saw the scrap of red cloth in the fingers of the Chuktar.
'They will make you-'
'Yes, I know.'
'And it will mean nothing?'
'Nothing.'
'Remember what I have said. Your only way out. Remember.'
