Samples from books that we have published under the Eartherean Press imprint.
This is another in a series from the second book in the 4-book series The Doom-Quest of Ara-Karn: The Divine Queen.
© 1982 by A. Adam Corby
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.
‘The Thunder-Clouds Close O’er’
WHEN MERSALINE FELL, then the corpses heaped the battlefield. Strong-armed barbarians swarmed in triumph up her once fair streets, to share out among themselves, at the chieftains’ overseeing, the last portions of her beggared wealth. In the distance above the city, thickly wooded and little-traversed hills rose up dull brown against the graying sky. There gathered in sullen packs the last of Mersaline’s defenders, ragged and wretched like once-pampered pet dogs returned to the state of wolves.
From over those hills and the dark horizon heavy clouds rolled over the emerald sky. Out of them a few drops of rain began fitfully to fall, drops of cool, clean water.
The rain was not enough to cleanse the blood-soaked fields, where shadowy figures roamed, picking clean the bodies of the dead. Others in small groups drove wagons and collected the naked corpses of the ravaged dead onto heaps of wood, to burn as well as fitful rain and bloated flesh would allow. The smoke rose curling with the wind and swept toward the city and the faraway South, raining cinders as it passed. The strength of Ara-Karn had passed this way, and left the land as lovely as his soul.
Urna-Val of the Vinkar tribe wiped with his kerchief the grime from his face, and cursed with sour humor the flies as they pestered him about his business. Now and then he would look upon the city and frown. ‘Pox-Face’ he had been called ever since a childhood illness had ravaged his features; and such as he was, could never get those women who might content him save by force or gold – far too much gold for a mere warrior of a lesser tribe. For himself, it would have been enough to lay only a few of the highborn ladies beneath his knees; but that was forbidden now, ever since Gerso. Gerso they had looted and raped and ravaged and burned until not even the rocky earth below her would have owned her. There had been a scene! But such pleasures were rare in life; and Urna-Val had to admit, he had never truly believed they could take that city until Ara-Karn had sundered the towering stone Gates across the pass. Some said he had done it with but a word. Urna-Val shrugged, holding the kerchief over his mouth as he burrowed among bloated limbs. Maybe he should have gone off with the Orns and Gen-Karn to Tezmon, as many of his fellow tribesmen had. Loot was said to be plentiful there. Here Gundoen, the Warlord’s general, ruled with a heavy hand, and had forbidden all looting save that little under the chieftains’ command; and none dared speak against Gundoen, the general, and father to Ara-Karn.
The clouds of smoke and ash drifted over the gray, ugly field, as the slaves burned the bodies of the civilized folk. Urna-Val wiped at his eyes again, spat through his tooth-gap, shouldered his near-empty sack, and went on farther afield of the city.
A suspicious glint attracted him to one of the larger piles. Pickings had been poor this pass, but what he saw now changed all of Urna-Val’s notions of luck: for there before him, almost buried beneath the rotting bodies, he saw a golden breastplate inlaid with silver and gems.
He grunted, looking casually about. The nearest of his fellows was a hundred paces off, and going farther.
Quickly he stooped and pushed the bodies from the pile. He came to the breastplate; but lying directly over it was the great neck of a huge warhorse. Urna-Val swore sourly. He could not hope to drag the horse away unaided, and calling to the others would mean sharing the gold or maybe a fight.
Then his features brightened: and drawing his notched sword and spreading his legs for balance, he began to hack at the carcass of the horse. It was hot and thirsty work, and he’d forgotten to bring a skin of wine; but if he went back for one now someone else might find the breastplate. At the thirty-fifth stroke, he severed the base of the massive neck. Using the truncheon of his sword, he levered the head down the side of the pile, revealing the golden breastplate. Scarcely did he dare look up, lest he see one of his too-curious comrades approaching. Taking out his long-knife, he began cutting free the leather straps that held the breastplate about the corpse.
Then he stopped cutting.
Hands were clutching at his throat: pressing, squeezing, choking him. With a sickening wrench in his belly he saw the corpse raised above him, the maddened eyes glaring directly into his, the dead hands twisting at his neck as if rolling up a sheaf of parchment very tight. Then all went red, then green, then black for Urna-Val of the Vinkar tribe.
§
‘GOOD-WAKING, Gold.’
‘Good-waking, Jade.’ And she kissed him full upon his opened mouth, relishing the taste of him, sweeter than Delba wine. ‘Again.’
‘Still not satisfied? You will be my death. But now it is late, and you will have to wait.’
She held his arm and pulled him back into the bed. ‘Again,’ she said. ‘It is the Queen’s command.’ He laughed, and touched her.
The great chamber was silent when Emsha entered, some time later. Quietly she stole to the side of the bed and gazed through the shimmering folds of the canopy. The Queen lay at an angle, her golden hair disheveled, her nakedness only partly covered by the rumpled sheets. A peaceful, childlike innocence had settled on her countenance, along with a slightly wicked smile: she peeked up at Emsha through a veil of golden curls. The old nurse looked down sternly at first, but after a moment softened. A noise entered at the high, narrow window of the awakening city; Emsha clucked her tongue, lighted the lamp by the bedside and threw open the canopy.
‘Come, majesty. It is late and the court is waiting.’
The Queen stirred languorously, closing her eyes. Her mouth moved sweetly. She smiled happily at her old nurse. ‘And Ennius?’
‘He is in his chambers in the palace where he belongs, two stories below: I sent him down with Silya. You will catch cold sleeping without a shift.’
‘Oh, I was kept warm enough.’
‘And were you troubled with dreams?’
‘I am far too exhausted now for dreams. What lies before us?’
‘The business of the state, for one. A messenger came with a scroll from the High Regent requesting your majesty’s presence.’
She shook the thick hair out of her eyes and, catlike, stretched her golden arms. ‘Send it back, Emsha. Whatever it is – and no doubt it is only more on these interminable trials – Dornan Ural can attend to it. What purpose does he serve if he does not relieve us of such tedium? What weather is it?’
‘Fine and warm, majesty.’
‘We shall spend our hours in the Garden then, out of these confining walls. Dismiss the court. We haven’t patience to deal with them now. This will be a private party.’
Emsha’s expression was blank as she bent to put on the satin slippers. ‘Yes, majesty.’
§
THE WEATHER was even as Emsha had said: fine and golden, warm and windless and dry; one of the last lovely spells of autumn before the rains of winter should come. The gardens always died so beautifully. Allissál reclined lazily upon a soft divan, drowsing in the kindly sun as she took her second meal. At her side, rigidly seated on the couch intended for the absent Chara Ilal, was Emsha, uncomfortable to be set so at ease before her mistress.
Allissál smiled. ‘And Ennius will be here?’
‘So he said, majesty. I informed him he was wanted, but he said it would have to wait. He is insolent, majesty.’
She laughed. ‘He only plays at lover’s games, Emsha. Surely you have known of such?’
‘Yes, he plays a great many games, majesty.’
‘Oh, Emsha, you are like some too-stern mother hen. Why do you dislike him so?’ The maidens brought forth the vessels with the second course, setting them before the couches.
‘He is a stranger, your majesty. And I do not like the way he looks at you when he thinks no one else can see.’
‘What way is that, pray?’
‘As if his gaze were a very smith’s flame to burn away the dross of your flesh.’
Again she laughed. ‘Well, that is one flame in which I have been smelted often enough!’
‘He does not love you, majesty.’
‘No,’ she agreed softly, her smile fading. She looked about her, at the pale banks of flowers, denuded of their blossoms. Some birds of passage flew slowly by the mountain, wary of gerlins. Faint sounds arose from the city below, but the branches of the lower groves obscured it from view. ‘Yet, Emsha—’ She fell silent again. ‘Emsha, you know something of these affairs, do you not?’
‘Not so very much, majesty. But they told me I was a pretty girl.’
‘It is a saying that bed-play is best when the couple are in love. Emsha, you are wise: is that a truth, or not?’
‘It is an old proverb, majesty. Yet I would say it is still a true one.’
She sighed, avoiding the old nurse’s eyes. ‘Yes, I believe it also. Yet Ennius does not love me, as you have said; nor do I love him. In the way I loved Tarendahardil, or Ampeánor, or Elnavis, I do not even approach loving him. Yet I want him, as I have wanted nothing else: as if I could have so much of him I would choke, and it still would be not enough. I do not even know him. There is a shadow across his heart, makes it unreadable to me: some part of what he has lost, a wildness, a cruelty about him … it only makes me want him all the more. When I see him I am blinded to all else. Yet Ampeánor I knew so well that nothing he ever did was a surprise to me. At times I even doubt his loyalty to Tarendahardil; then I meet him on my couch, and all doubts dissolve. We share such joys it is enough to excite the envy and hostility of dark God, but I do not care. O Emsha, what is happening to me? It is as if he holds some power over me even I do not understand. The North is all but lost, Ampeánor is missing, and my son is dead: how is it I can be so happy?’
The old nurse rose and gazed searchingly into her mistress’s eyes; then stooped and, tenderly, kissed her brow. ‘Dear child,’ she murmured. ‘He is a shadowed soul, your majesty. Yet for this I am grateful to him before all other living men: that he has rescued you from the misery of mourning. If your son is dead, should you also take the voyage? Once I had one dear to me, who was lost: and believe me, such happiness as this of yours is a blessing sent from Goddess. And for that I can tolerate him, and speak no further ill words regarding him. Perhaps it is only the dreadful loss of all his property and loved ones in Gerso that has made him so. And he may find such solace here, will soothe him and allow him to forget.’
‘Sweet Emsha,’ said the Queen, smiling, and wiping away the tears at the corners of her eyes, ‘you are the most generous and loving of friends. Ah, look, here he comes! Are my looks in order? What was the news of his fellow-countryman, the young Gerso nobleman recently come to court?’
‘By your command he has been summoned, and awaits in the Palace.’
‘And Ennius knows nothing of him yet? Good. Go to him now and send him to us after a space. This will be a pleasant surprise for them both, to meet another from their homeland here! Perhaps they will even be known to each other already!’
Emsha bobbed and departed the terrace by the lower path even as the Gerso Charan was entering from above, accompanied by two of the maidens.
He approached the presence and bowed with consummate grace, taking the proffered hand. Yet instead of lightly kissing the knuckles he turned it over and put his lips into the softness of her palm. His teeth caressed the swelling at the base of her thumb, then bit into it, sharply. She drew in her breath with a hiss at the pain, but for the slaves’ presence could not protest. When at last he released his teeth, she could see two rows of white indentations in the midst of the reddened flesh. He looked up at her, laughter and mockery and a touch of cruelty in his black-green eyes. ‘Greetings, your August Majesty.’
Gingerly she drew back the wounded hand, feeling a flood of arousal even underneath the pain. ‘You are late,’ she said. ‘Had anyone else so disregarded an Imperial summons we would have had him severely punished. Where were you?’
‘Attending to the foreign ambassadors with Qhelvin.’
‘Again? Have we not told you we are through with all that? All our schemings, and all a waste.’
‘You will change your mind, Gold,’ he said sadly.
‘You seem very sure of us, Jade. Why do you call me by that name?’
‘It is a private name, a name for just the two of us. “Allissál” is a name too many have the use of; and I will not refer to you as “Your August Majesty” in bed! And it suits you.’
‘Yet you say it so familiarly it is as if you have used it for years – with others, perhaps?’
‘That other name, “Jade,” comes to your lips easily enough. Can you not recall ever having used it before?’
‘To another? Well, and I never knew any other like you before, Ennius. Yet at times I would call Elnavis “the bronze prince.” I had such dreams for him.’ She fell silent for a space, then came to her feet. ‘Let us walk,’ she said. ‘Let us enjoy the Gardens while we still can.’ She gave him her arm and, unattended, they passed down among the lower levels. Above them the high, dark trees rose, sculpted by the gardeners into all manner of ingenious shapes, and breathing forth the thick aromas of their spices.
‘No death is immortal,’ he said when they had walked awhile. ‘There is a certain cult I know of, the Priests of Temaal; they dwell in the hills of Keldaroon. Have you ever heard of them?’ She shook her head. ‘Never? Nor of the hills of Keldaroon, either?’
‘No, but there are maps in the archives on which you could show it me.’
‘Never mind. Well, I shall tell you of their teachings, since you have never heard of them before. It is one of reincarnation, for reason that, if the dead live upon the far side of the world even as do we, then their lands would surely overflow with all the generations of the world. So – or so they say – even as we die and after final voyage take flesh in the land of the dead, so too do they in death voyage back here, to be incarnated yet again. Thus there is but a fixed number of people in the world, forever migrating from one side to the other. And the ironic jest behind it all is that no man remembers all his past lives, and so goes blithely to his death in hope of a blissful world of peace – when in fact he only resumes equal travails according to the blind will of Fortune; and is thus condemned to repeat the errors of his life over again, not once only but a hundredfold. So we all flit back and forth, content in all our little dreams, but going nowhere in the end.’
‘But what then of all our accomplishments?’ she interposed. ‘Surely you do not mean that great Elna could have been reborn as nothing but a ragged beggar after all he had been and done – or that the lords of this world could have been the thieving paupers of the other?’
‘It is very likely.’
‘Yet that is to make a nothingness – less, a mockery even, of me and all men, and of all the works of man.’
‘Of course. Such is the point of the doctrine. It is a good lesson for a monarch to learn.’
‘And do you think to give me lessons on how to be a monarch?’
‘Oh, certainly not,’ he mocked.
‘Then why did you mention it?’
He sighed. ‘Because when I saw you for the first time, it was as if I had known you before. Yet we had never met: you will agree? So perhaps we knew each other, were friends even, in some former life. Do you not feel something akin to this?’
‘No, nor do I like the doctrine of this cult. There is but one death for each of us, and never any coming back: such a thing is only of stories or the dreams of the idle. When I die, I hope I leave behind only what I have done in this life. I would not want to return. How could I return as anything greater than I am now; and what would await me if I did return? It rings of hopelessness and defeat. I could never believe in such a thing.’
‘As for me,’ he said coldly, ‘I could never believe in anything.’
They walked down the stately shadowed avenues in silence. She tried to draw him in more conversation, but he remained moodily quiet. Then she saw Emsha at the end of the walk, and brightened.
‘What?’ he asked.
But she only smiled impudently. ‘Wait, and it will please you more.’
The young man approached her, escorted by a pair of slave-maidens; prostrated himself before where she stood by the shadows of the sculpted trees. At her word he rose and looked to one side, and beheld Ennius emerging from the shadows.
Immediately the young Gerso’s face paled. He stared at Allissál, words choking in his throat, sweat beading on his brow; then he swung his gaze back to Ennius.
The Gerso chuckled and stepped beside the youth, clapping his hand upon his shoulder. Unthinkingly the young man recoiled at the touch.
‘Well met, my young friend,’ Ennius said amusedly. ‘It has been too long since we last saw each other, in our native city of Gerso. My congratulations on having found me again.’
The youth, staring at Ennius, seemed incapable of speech.
Allissál was disappointed; this was hardly the joyous reunion she had anticipated. ‘What,’ she remonstrated, ‘have you no word of greeting for your countryman? Charan Kandi, whatever is the matter with him?’
The young man found his tongue. ‘Charan Kandi?’
‘Yes,’ she said, irritated by his lack of breeding. ‘Ennius Kandi, Charan in Elsvar of Gerso. Surely you do not pretend you do not know him?’
‘Perhaps,’ offered Ennius, ‘he knows me by some other name. Well, young friend, is that the case? Have you any other name to speak?’
The boy looked at him, terrified. The sweat dripping from his brow collected briefly on his upper lip and fell into his opened mouth.
‘Well if you think deeds surpass words you are probably right.’ Ennius shrugged. ‘How well I remember our last meeting: the sack of Gerso, the flames, the smoke – Ara-Karn. Your family was most horribly butchered, do you not remember? I even had to find you a horse so that you might make good your escape. It reminds me. I have been keeping this for you.’
He drew forth the jade dagger with the strange, ritualistic design he always wore, and presented it to the youth hilt first. ‘I give it to you now, confident you will know what use it would be best put to.’
The young man stepped back, looking at the dagger as if it were some venomous serpent. Then, neither prostrating himself nor begging her leave, he turned and fled the Gardens.
‘What an odd fellow,’ she remarked. ‘He seemed actually frightened of you. Have you known him long?’
Ennius was idly considering the dagger. Abruptly he returned it to its sheath. ‘All my life, I had thought. He should not have run away like that.’ He frowned.
‘Shall I send after him and have him brought back?’
‘No, let him go. If he is worthy of aught, he will return to me of his own will.’
They walked down the avenue. She knew there was some mystery concerning the young Gerso, but did not ask him about it, knowing he would not answer her. She determined to summon the youth and put her own questions to him in privacy; but later, when she inquired, she discovered that the young exile had saddled horse and fled Tarendahardil within an hour of the audience.
They passed a bush pruned to simulate a rearing bandar, and she remembered the Garden-party, when she had passed this way with Dornan Ural. ‘You know, Jade,’ she said, drawing him closer to the bush, ‘I once saw the eldest daughter of the Chara Fillaloial doing something here I think would interest you…’
He was looking up the lane. ‘You have a visitor,’ he said.
She glanced up. Paling, she looked away into the bushes. There had been a shape there, tall like a man, dark against the sky, strangely familiar, like a ghost to haunt her. She broke away from Ennius and took a step or two away; looked back, and saw the figure there still, approaching her. A sudden stab of light between the trees illuminated it, granting it substance and reality. She stopped, staring.
‘Ampeánor?’ she whispered. She began to walk toward him, hesitantly at first, then with quickening pace. He too began to hurry: they were running when they collided, swimming in each other’s embrace.
‘Ampeánor!’ she cried, tears starting to her eyes as she held him tightly so that, if he were a ghost, he should not escape.
The familiar face broke into a smile. ‘Allissál,’ he said in that voice so sweet to her and so dearly missed. ‘I am home.’
She did not know whether to cry or burst out laughing. Thus they stayed, for some time.
‘I knew not whether to come straight up or send a message,’ he was saying into her ear. ‘Then, coming off the ship, I saw the Citadel and knew I could not wait. Though in truth,’ he chuckled, ‘I am still filthy from the voyage!’
Only now, she was thinking, did she realize how much he meant to her, and how much his absence had wounded her. So was she like one who has lived so many months in pain he forgets what health is; and waking one pass to find the pain suddenly gone, feels for joy a very god. She was whole again.
‘Even covered with filth your face is sweet to me,’ she said, kissing him again. He crushed her fiercely to him, kissing her in return so savagely she feared her lips would be bruised. It was just as she had always known it would be. She held him at arm’s length, examining him. He was dressed in motley rags, some like a fightingman’s and others like those of a sailor; his hair was long, and his arms were scarred. There was a scar along his left cheekbone and another over his right brow. His flesh was leaner, darker, harder: but still was he the Charan of Rukor, every bit. She laughed suddenly, and demanded to know his tale.
‘Well, then,’ he began, but then paused, his smile fading, his glance cast questioningly beyond her.
‘Oh, forgive me!’ she exclaimed. ‘The sudden joy of seeing you again has unnerved me. This is Charan Ennius Kandi of Gerso; he came to us with the news of Carftain’s fall, and since then joined our cause.’ She looked across to Ennius and their eyes locked for a moment. She flushed, and looked away. She had remembered what they had been on the verge of when Ampeánor had appeared.
‘Charan Kandi,’ Ampeánor was saying distantly. ‘Your name strikes me familiarly from somewhere. Yes, the exiles spoke of you. Were you not the man who held drunken debauch when Carftain fell?’
Ennius bowed, his lips in a slight thin smile, his green eyes sparkling. ‘The very same, my lord. Perhaps some pass I may hold an equally impressive fête for you here, and fill these halls with goodly drink.’
‘Oh, Ampeánor was never a man for parties,’ she said teasingly, stroking the brown arm playfully. ‘Were you, Ampeánor?’
His lips twisted sourly. ‘I prefer swords to dining shears.’
‘Then perhaps we could dally in swordplay some pass,’ Ennius said, in such lazy tones as Arstomenes himself might have used.
Ampeánor barked a short laugh. ‘We have quite a complicated code for duels here in Tarendahardil, sir. I never knew a Gerso who mastered them.’
Ennius’s smile did not fade at the grimness of the words. ‘I have been in a few duels in my life, minor matters really. But I never knew of any rules for swordplay.’
‘Without rules, where is the honor of the thing?’
The Gerso’s dark eyes widened amusedly. ‘Oh – honor!’
‘Ampeánor is the finest swordsman in all the Empire,’ said Allissál, disliking the intensity in the Charan of Rukor’s voice, and glad that he took her hint and altered the subject.
‘You arrived in Carftain just before she fell, I understand.’
Ennius nodded. ‘Before that Ancha, Eliorite, and of course Gerso. Noble ladies all of them, now no better than drabs.’
‘It seems no city can stand once you join her defense,’ Ampeánor said shortly. ‘I only hope you have not brought your ill luck to Tarendahardil.’
‘Such is my hope as well, my lord. Also, that you did not yourself acquire a similar strain of luck in Tezmon. Did he not take her with admirable swiftness?’ He had used a construction that made it sound as if he referred to a woman who had been seduced. Well, she thought, and he does not fully know Bordo even still.
Ampeánor looked at him sourly, as if suspecting that he himself were the butt of the Gerso’s jest. ‘I admit it was my fault that the city fell,’ he said unflinchingly. ‘I had not realized how effective was this thing they call a bow. With it the barbarian seems nigh unconquerable. Yet if I had had a troop of Rukorian lances with me I would have sustained her honor even so.’
‘I hear so much of these Rukorian veterans,’ said Ennius, stifling a brief yawn, ‘that I can scarce believe even Ara-Karn could stand a chance against them.’
‘He is only a barbarian, after all,’ she said.
‘Ah, yes,’ said the Gerso, looking still at Ampeánor. ‘That is what we Gersos said. Also the Anchai, the Eliorital, the Tezmonians and the Mersalinals, I believe?’
The Charan of Rukor turned to the Queen, studiously ignoring Ennius’s words. ‘Once we have the bow there will be no doubts to the outcome of the wars, my queen. And we shall have it, as soon as I arrange to bring to Gen-Karn such gold as will persuade him.’
‘Gen-Karn!’
‘Yes,’ replied Ampeánor, turning back to the Gerso. ‘Such is the name of the barbarian chieftain who conquered Tezmon, and with whom I have arranged pacts of alliance against Ara-Karn. Why, do you know him, Charan?’
Ennius’s smile returned. ‘I know the name of him. He was the barbarians’ king before Ara-Karn – yet I thought Ara-Karn remained their Warlord.’
‘He does.’ Ampeánor looked back at Allissál. ‘I thought he was Ara-Karn when I first saw him. A giant with a face out of a child’s shudder-dream, and of appearance very like that of Ara-Karn. Yet he seems to detest Ara-Karn even more than the exiles from Carftain did, and had broken from the main force of the barbarians when he captured Tezmon. When he learned I was your envoy, my queen, he treated me with every dignity and courtesy. He flatters himself that he is a kingly man and as cultured as a civilized man. He fears this Ara-Karn as much as he hates him: it’s that fear we must allay. Then we may use Tezmon even as we had planned.’
‘No doubt,’ said the Gerso ironically. ‘Yet if I may be given leave, your majesty, perhaps I should leave you. You and the High Charan must have much to discuss without the presence of an outlander.’ She nodded, not attempting to dissuade him.
‘What do you know of this man?’ Ampeánor asked her when they were again alone.
She walked down the avenue and sat in a chair of sculpted white marble set deep against the thick spice-bushes. ‘Only that he is an impoverished noble from the mountains north of Gerso. I thought he would make an able and dedicated agent. Why do you ask?’
‘There is something about him,’ he said, frowning. ‘I visited Gerso in my youth. This man’s features are not right, and his accent is like no Gerso’s I have ever heard. And there is what the Carftainian exiles told me … I do not trust him.’
She almost smiled, feeling the warmth branching in the lower reaches of her belly, like green stalks swelling in the sun. ‘I do. My lord, I would trust him even with my own honor!’
‘You do not know him,’ he insisted. ‘Shall I tell you what tale the Carftainians told me then, of the fall of their city? They returned from the battle, where they had held advantage of the field under a trusted general, ragged, bloodied, and cut to a third of their former strength. They burned their crops, drove the cattle into the city, and sealed themselves behind the walls. Some weeks they remained so, never engaging the barbarians, intending a long siege. They had stores of food and untaintable sources of water to last them more than a year. And so it went until this Gerso came among them.
‘Oh, he counseled them with cheerful words: of how the barbarians knew nothing of siege-craft and could never stand the idleness of a long siege; and how petty tribal enmities and quarrels over gold and captive women would have them falling on each other long before the walls of Carftain could be broken. Happily they received this man who spoke such words of hope. He had somehow managed to spirit away a fortune from Gerso, with which he purchased the use of a large palace and bought up all the stores of wine and herb in Carftain. Thus he held a great fête for them in anticipation of the long siege; and they boasted him of their defenses, and went to chambers with his hired artful women, filled with wine-sureness at his words. And when they woke, the barbarians held the city. Is this a man you would trust – even admitting him so far into the circle of our agents, Allissál? Still, it is you we all serve. Just be wary of him, I beg you, until he has proven his abilities several times to your satisfaction.’
She smiled within herself, scarcely listening to his words. She was leaned back in the sculptured seat half into the shadows, a subtle red smile playing in the corners of her sensual mouth. She arched her back slightly, pressing her hips more firmly against the contours of warming stone. Her mind drifted idly, until once more its center was there between her thighs. She could feel herself, with a delicious reluctance, surrendering to feelings of sheer animal indulgence.
She gazed into Ampeánor’s earnest devoted face from between slitted, heavily lashed eyes, feeling an urge to laugh. And what would you say about him, dearest Ampeánor, if I told you the truth about him? That he is my lover – even he! – and that he has done such things with and to me as would bring a blush to a harlot’s cheek? Would you be too shocked? The desire to tell him took her, to fling the words into his face. Then with a start she realized what it was she was thinking, and sat bolt-upright on the chair, coloring a little and thankful for the shadows.
‘Yes, of course,’ she said, her expression doubtful. ‘Yet Ampeánor, let us not quarrel now. This should be a time for rejoicing your deliverance.’
‘The task before us is more vital. We should meet with Qhelvin and the others as soon as possible, to fashion new plans now that the North is lost so early.’
‘So early … Ampeánor, does it not seem to you that the barbarians are more of a threat now than they were even in Elna’s time?’
‘Yes. But it is the bow that makes them so.’
‘And you really believe this weapon to be the solution to the wars?’
He nodded. ‘We can counter them to some extent, but in the end there will be no help but that we must either capture, buy or copy them. Had we only archers on the walls of Tezmon, she would be unconquered still; and perhaps poor Elnavis would also be alive. I grieve your loss, Allissál – all our loss. He was a godlike youth. I am sorry I was not present to comfort you after his last rites.’
‘You could not help it. How much gold does this Gen-Karn desire?’
‘As much as he can get: as much as all the wealthy men in the world possess: as much as is hid within the bowels of the earth. But he’ll settle for less, I think. If we can but inflame his hatred of Ara-Karn enough, he might even come to pay us. Allissál, when I was in Gerso I heard talk of the old prophecy that the barbarians might rise again. Yet there they said the barbarians were too divided, tribe against tribe, to attack in force: no tribe would allow a man from a rival tribe to rise to such prominence that he could unify the entire far North. Well, somehow Ara-Karn has done this thing; yet it must be a tenuous unity. If we can but get this Gen-Karn to war openly upon his fellows their whole alliance will dissolve. Still we have every chance to win the wars.’ He paused, looking at the dark earth beneath the trees, and frowned. ‘Yet this Gen-Karn is no more than a murderous savage, a man utterly devoid of honor,’ he mused. ‘I saw a scene there – I will not affront your majesty with the details… Can we join with such a one without ourselves sinking to his level?’
‘Of course we shall deal with him,’ she answered. ‘These are matters of grand design and policy, Ampeánor. Future generations will not ask how we came to conquer, so long as we do so. And to think of Dornan Ural so busy with his sewer-trials!’
She stood up, leading him down the avenue briskly. ‘It is an opportunity we cannot afford to pass by. Oh, Ampeánor, your presence has rekindled all my old ambitions! I had thought them dead with Elnavis, but they have returned. I am the last of Elna’s line – the last of the Monarchs in Tarendahardil – it is too great a trust to betray. Does Ara-Karn believe I have given over all ambition for mere pleasure? It shall not be so. We shall prove him wrong, Ampeánor, you and I, as it was before.’
She came to a halt upon the viewing platform at the far end of the Gardens, on the outer walls of the Citadel. Beneath her sandals the walls of the mountain, immeasurate, unclimbable, steep as man-made pinnacles fell away in breathless beauty. Distantly below was spread the lower, cloud-patched city, and the far-reaching triangle of the Citadel’s immense shadow. The chill of winter tinctured the air, and the few clouds about them were violet with that cold. The Queen shivered slightly and put her arm about Ampeánor’s waist.
‘Soon,’ she said confidently, ‘the barbarian will be forced by this weather to halt his bold advances. And when Spring comes, then he will see! We shall yet live to see the cloudbreak of an age of new glory for this City of ours, the savage hordes scattered to the snows of the far North, and Ara-Karn lying broken beneath us!’
§
ABOVE THEM, in the upper reaches of the Palace, the Gerso entered his chambers. There his servant awaited him.
‘To ship, Kuln-Holn,’ he ordered simply. ‘There are fresh tidings of the wars. Gen-Karn openly defies the rule of Ara-Karn. Go thither, and learn all you may; then return with speed, for winter is fast approaching.’
Kuln-Holn bowed. ‘This should not have been, lord, had you followed our customs.’
‘Very likely. Now I have other things to occupy my mind.’
The servant gathered his belongings and, accepting a small pouch of coins, left the chambers. Within the hour he had found a merchantman, and was sailing for one of the few unconquered ports on the Vesquial coast.
The master did not turn when the servant took his leave. He was standing at the balcony looking down over the dark byways of the lower Gardens far below. There he could see the tiny, vulnerable shapes of two persons, a man in rags and a golden woman, as they stood upon the edge of the abyss. The master smiled, and leaned back against the pillar, so that his face fell once more into shadow.
