Anderson, Poul - Novel 18 Read online

  “Oh, I grew up being looked on as a monkey from the wilds. I’m used to it. Anybody else is welcome to claim yesteryear for his, if tomorrow be mine. I think the Arvannethans and I get along pretty well, same as do they and the Northfolk, who have no pretensions to culture either. But the Northfolk and the parvenu Barommians are going to fight. And as for the Arvannethans and Rahfdians—”

  His hand shot forth to grasp the old man’s staff. He shook it very slightly. “Yurussun,” he said, “I honor you ... maybe the more, when at last you’ve shown some warmth in your blood. I need your help, academic knowledge and governmental experience both. But you’ll give them to me the way I want, or I’ll find somebody else. We are not truly equal. Never forget: the Emperor wears Rahfdian robes and quotes Rahfdian classics and is high priest of the Rahfdian God; but he remains a grandson of Skeyrad, who’ll hearken to a clan chief from Haamandur before a prince from Nafs.”

  The scholar dropped composure across himself like a visor. “Captain General,” he said low, “the Fourth Lesser Precept of Tola states; ‘When a seed of anger falls, water it not nor warm it, but bare it to heaven and depart.’ Let us go our separate ways to our separate tasks, and each tonight meditate on how the other serves the Glorious Throne as honestly as human frailty permits. Then tomorrow evening let us dine privately together.”

  “That would be well, Imperial Voice,” Sidfr agreed with less restraint. They exchanged bows. Yurussun shuffled out.

  Sidfr spent a while more by the window. Rainfall came in a rush. Murk flashed and banged. Am I ashamed? he wondered. Sometimes one like him holds up a mirror which my brashest words cannot fog. One like Nedayin—

  His junior wife was frail and timid. Her dowry and the alliance with a noble Rahfdian house were useful to him but not necessary. Yet in her presence he often felt as he did at court functions, taught how to behave but not bred to it. With Ang in Haamandur he knew ease, laughter, frank lust—No. Not really. Her world was the uplands, the gossip and songs and sagas of herders; in Zangazeng, though it was a small town, she longed for their tents. Therefore on his visits he soon wearied of her.... Concubines, whores, chance-met tusslemates had never been more than bodies.

  Startled: What in the Witch’s name got me thinking about that? Why this awe of the Empire, anyhow?

  His Rahfdian part replied, in Barommian words; Well, it is civilization. Arvanneth possesses older things, but they’re preserved the way a desert-dried mummy is. Age isn’t enough. There has to be life. And that abides in the Empire. Counterpoint: It was dying off, tom between war lords, till we Barommians brought our sharp medicine. Today—today Rahid owes us its life. Then why are we shy of it? Why these daydreams about becoming complete Rahldians? My father was wise, who gave me half my youth in school but half in Haamandur.

  Though since then I’ve never been wholehearted.

  Lightning seared, thunder bawled, rain blurred the glass and chill crept from it.

  Are the Seafolk? They have a civilization too, including better machines than ours. But they ’re a mad scramble of nations. Killimaraich in half of Orenstane, a dozen tributary kingdoms in the other half, a hundred or more independent islands and archipelagos, Omniscience alone knows how many separate races and mixes, hardly a thing holding them together except trade, and that apt to break in a quarrel. How lonely do men among them get?

  Sidfr lifted his head and cast out the self-pity which for an instant had brushed soggy fingers across him. They’re not truly civilized. A rabble. Never mind their engineering tricks. We ’ll take those over when we decide to. Here are my people. My people. An Empire of hardworking hardy peasants; merchants and artisans who know their places too; aristocrats bom and raised in a beautiful tradition; the Zabeths, the societies that organize lives and give everybody something close and beloved to belong to—all this, brought under the guardianship of disciplined warriors—my Empire is civilized in a way that yonder freebooters can never know.

  His musings had lasted a minute or two. He put them aside when a gongbeat requested admittance. “Enter,” he called. A boy belonging to the majordomo asked if Guildsman Ponsario en-Ostral should be ushered in according to his appointment. “Yes, yes,” Sidir growled. “But first I want light here.” Slaves who had been expecting this command scuttled in with tapers and kindled gas lamps whose reflectors turned the room mellow.

  Sidir kept his feet till they were gone and the door had opened for his next visitor and shut again. He didn’t know why the merchant had, this morning, sent an urgent request for audience. The reason must be valid. The effete gourmand that Ponsario showed the world was a mask. Sidir’s back and belly tautened slightly in anticipation of trouble. The feeling was quasi-pleasant. He was sick of misunderstandings, cross-conflicts, intrigues, formalities, delays. He and Ponsario had a plain common cause. They were as mutually alien as eagle and peccary; should need or advantage dictate, either would cheerfully flay the other; but meanwhile they came near being friends.

  The newcomer gave him the three bows due a prince, to which rank—long extinct in Arvanneth—Yurussun had decreed an Imperial viceroy was equivalent. He intoned in return, “The Captain General of the Divine Majesty receives you.” Solemn farces: for lack of which, or occasionally because of which, men died and nations burned.

  “At ease,” added Sidir. “Would you like refreshment, tea, coffee, chocolate?”

  “Thank you, sir, I’d prefer mulled wine, but since you don’t drink during working hours, I’ll settle for this, by your leave.” Ponsario took forth a rosewood cigar case. “Would you like one?” He demonstrated homage in camaraderie by using the second most deferential of the five second-person pronouns in his language.

  (Rahfdian was content with three.) “Freshly arrived from Mandano.”

  Sidfr shook his head. “Wasted on me.” He smoked a pipe, but with deliberate infrequency. A soldier was unwise if he got addicted to a scarce, expensive drug. He sat down, shank over thigh, and gestured that Ponsario might do likewise.

  The Guildsman squeezed into a chair. He was ridiculously fat. Short legs and flat face betrayed a tinge of swampman blood. Balding in middle age, he dyed hair and beard. Gold stars were painted on his nails. Furs sleekened his embroidered tunic. Gems glistened on his fingers. He made a production of clipping his cigar, snapping a coil-spring flint-and-steel lighter to a sulfur-tipped splint, lighting the tobacco and inhaling till blue fragrance awoke.

  “Well?” Sidfr demanded.

  “I know you’re busy, sir,” Ponsario commenced. “And truth to tell, I hesitated about whether to come straight here or approach a lower official—or nobody. The matter looks trivial on the surface, an incident, ditchwater dreary. And yet—” He dropped the stick in a porcelain ashtray held by a mahogany dragon. “Seafolk ships are sailing halfway ’round the globe from the Mother Ocean, more each year ... sailing to northeastern Tuocar and the islands of the Hurricane Sea. Why?”

  “For profit, I suppose, which you’d prefer to rake in yourself,” Sidfr said dryly.

  “Indeed, sir? Would normal merchant adventurers plod around Eflis or dare Damnation Straits? If nothing else, the two great countercurrents in the Rampant Ocean make for a number of icebergs right along the equator there. Why risk that crossing, not to mention time spent in passage? The Seafolk have more rewarding territory nearer home—besides the islands, the whole littoral of Owang along the Mother and Feline Oceans, the whole west coasts of Andalin and Tuocar where those aren’t under the Ice. What gain in faring beyond?”

  “Well, no doubt some expeditions are covertly subsidized,” answered Sidfr. “I don’t imagine the Seafolk generally, and Killimaraich in particular, like the prospect of Rahfd taking over all Andalin and then, maybe, expanding south into Tuocar. Apart from restricting their traffic, we’d become a power in the Mother Ocean ourselves.” An impatient hand chopped air. “We’ve been over this ground before, Ponsario. Why did you come today?”

  “Ah, yes, sir, yes, I am grown long-winde
d in my dotage.” The merchant gusted a sigh. “Well, then. Lately the Skonnamor, a freighter out of Eaching, docked at Newkeep, and my factor negotiated for part of the cargo. They had a mutineer confined aboard. Yesterday he escaped. The Watch threw out a net. Your Barommian commandant down there has done a grand job of reorganizing the Watch, grand. He dispatched a pair of fast riders to check northward, just in case the fugitive had headed that way. You see, the fellow’s said to be dangerous, and Lieutenant Mimorai didn’t want to neglect any chances. He was right. The men got report of a horse stolen from Lord Doligu, and later of its being found astray by the Lagoon. Also, a skiff disappeared from the ferry terminal at Nightshield Inn. And nobody found spoor of the chap in Newkeep, though that shouldn’t have been hard to do. Seems probable he made for Arvanneth itself, no?”

  “Gr’m. What of that?”

  “Not what I’d expect him to do, sir. Lieutenant Mimorai saw no special significance either. But my factor did. Being desirous of keeping Skonnamor’s captain happy, he’d used his connections to follow the reports of the Watchmen. When he learned this morning where the runaway had likeliest gone, he got permission to use the telegraph. Marvelous innovation you’ve got there, sir, marvelous. As soon as the military messenger brought me his words, I arranged this conference with you.”

  “Get to the point. Why?”

  “Please remember, sir, I’ve admitted my fears may be unwarranted. Insubordination is not uncommon on Killimaraichan merchantmen. Their commerce is expanding so fast, you see, they must engage whatever crews they can. Toughs from their own cities; natives of far-flung islands, mostly isolated and primitive, from Eoa to Almerik. Those foreigners get infected by the Killimaraichan individualism. But they don’t lose their foreignness on that account. Rather, they tend to exaggerate it, self-assertion, do you see? Friction develops on long, hard, dangerous voyages, tempers flare, fights erupt, officers who impose discipline and punishment become hated—and always the temptation is to form a cabal, seize the ship, depart for tropical waters, seek wealth on one’s own.”

  Sidfr resigned himself. Ponsario was embarked on a lecture, and that was that. Maybe it served a real purpose. He, the Barommian, had had little to do with Sea-folk. Rehearsing certain facts about them might help his thinking.

  The Guildsman blew a smoke ring. “This escaped mutineer, sir, Josserek Derrain his name is, he doesn’t fit such a pattern. My factor discussed him at length with the captain, whom my factor deems honest as far as this affair goes. Josserek was a good hand. Then suddenly he provoked a brawl. When the second mate intervened to restore order, Josserek attacked him, till overpowered by several men. Assault on a ship’s officer is a grave crime in Killimaraich. Nevertheless the second mate visited him a few times in his confinement, trying to gain his confidence and learn what had caused his lunatic behavior. At Newkeep, Josserek got a chance to knock the mate out and break free.

  “Now does it strike you as entirely plausible, sir, that a madman who, allegedly, has never been here before, would run for distant Arvanneth rather than nearby Newkeep, and succeed? On the other side of the coin, is it plausible that a sane man would go amok in the first place, or afterward seek the Lairs?” Ponsario squinted through the haze he had made. “Unless he had a plan from the beginning.”

  “Hunh,” Sidir grunted. “What does the second mate have to say?”

  “He says the blow he took left him weak, dazed, with gaps in his memory. I know no way to disprove that, short of carrying him off the ship and into a torture chamber. Which could have repercussions.”

  ‘Torture takes too long anyway, and the results are too unreliable,” Sidfr said. “Besides—you suggest this, m-m, this Josserek is an agent of the Seniory? Nonsense. What could he spy on? How could he report back?”

  “As for the second item, sir, haven’t you heard about wireless telegraphy? A recent Killimaraichan invention. We in the Guilds know little more than the fact that it exists. But surely a number of those, ah, explorers snooping around south of the Dolphin Gulf, surely they carry wireless telegraphs as well as cannon and catapults. An apparatus may have been smuggled into Arvanneth.”

  “Yes, I’ve heard.—Why, though? What in the name of the Nine Devils could a foreign agent do in the Lairs, besides get a knife in his gut?”

  Ponsario stroked his beard. “Sir, this incident crystallized a decision I’ve long had a-cook, to warn you of the possibility the Northfolk are more sophisticatedly aware of your intentions than is proper for barbarians.”

  “What has that to do—Oh, never mind. Go on.”

  The cigar end waxed and waned. “I admit indications are faint, much is hypothetical. The new order which the Empire brought has disrupted the old clandestine cooperation of Guilds and Brotherhoods. But I can still bribe or trick a bit of news from somebody in the Lairs. I’ve reason to believe that, about a year ago, a gang chief visited the Rogaviki . . . with what result is uncertain. Since Seafolk call at Newkeep several times annually, he could have contacted them too. Many Killimaraichan mercantile officers are naval reservists. Given ships here and there around the world, able to relay messages to Eaching, the Seniory could well send a man to use this liaison. It would be a mission whose probability of payoff was low, but whose risk was equally low, to everybody save the agent. And should there be a payoff ... well, Seafolk and Northfolk are natural allies against the Empire.”

  “But why an elaborate rigmarole about—Hai, yes.” Sidfr nodded. “Any Killimaraichan who entered Arvan- neth on shore leave, we’d keep an eye on, and if he vanished, we’d get suspicious. But a loose hotspur is nothing to us.”

  “The deception should have succeeded,” Ponsario said. “It was happenstance that I, almost the sole person likely to wonder, heard of the business. That ship could as well have brought spices from Innisla, or copra from Tolomo, or ornamental building material from the Coral Range of eastern Orenstane—” he rolled the list of merchandise lovingly off his tongue and seemed reluctant to stop at Sidfr’s frown—“or something else for which another Guild than mine has the lawful dealership. My esteemed competitors are too obsessed by their immediate interests in this time of upheaval, to think beyond, to reconstruct a pattern. . .. Well. Possibly the pattern is a fantasy of mine. But since I would sooner or later, in all events, have told you my suspicions concerning the Northfolk, and since this just might be an opportunity to confirm those—” He let his words trail off.

  And curry favor. Sidfr’s thought was not contemptuous. He no more despised a merchant for being a merchant than a dog for being a dog. “Perhaps,” he said. “Next tell me how. You know what scant results I’ve gotten from raiding the Lairs. A gaggle of wretches for the executioner’s table. Didn’t even close down Thieves’ Market, only made it movable. Where in that warren could your beast be?”

  “I can offer you a good guess, Captain General,” Ponsario said. “At the headquarters of—” Thunder trampled the name underfoot.

  CHAPTER 4

  A latch outside clicked back. The door opened. “Hold where you are,” said the man of the Lairs. He and his companion, two of the three who had captured Josserek at dawn, were skinny, pockmarked, scarred; but they walked like cats. Their tunics and sandals were of good quality, their hair and beards neat. Besides their knives, the first bore a pistol which must have been taken from an Imperial officer, or likelier his corpse. A firearm was too rare and valuable a thing for nearly all soldiers, let alone criminals. Evidently the head of the organization trusted this man. And evidently it had itself a certain standard.

  Carefully slow, Josserek turned from the window through whose bars he had been watching dusk seep in among rainspears. Unglazed, it let chill, humidity, alley stench into the bare and tiny room where he had spent this day. Lamplight from the hall threw shadows grotesque across clay floor and peeling plaster.

  “Why are you nervous?” he asked. His Arvannethan was fluent. “What trouble could I make if I wanted to?”

  “We may find that
out,” said the gunman. “Come along. In front of me.”

  Josserek obeyed. It thrilled in him that his wait might be at an end, his hunt begun. He felt no fear. His captors had treated him fairly well. They had disarmed him, of course, and locked him in here. But they explained that Casiru was absent, who must decide about him. Meanwhile they left him bread, cheese, water, a bucket, and his thoughts. As often before, he’d whiled away hours among memories. A shully like him had many colorful ones.

  Past the hall he entered a room which didn’t fit the mean exterior or filthy neighborhood of this house. A plush carpet caressed his feet, hangings of purple and red glowed between lamps, furnishings were elaborately carved wood with ivory and nacre inlays, a censer burned sandalwood. The man seated there had the taste to wear a somber-hued silken tunic and scant jewelry. Display wouldn’t have fitted a body marked by starvation early in life, dwarfish, rat-faced, well-nigh toothless. But between thin gray hair and thin gray beard, his eyes were luminous.

  The guards took chairs in comers. “Greeting,” said he in the middle. His voice rustled. “I am Casiru, vicechief of the Rattlebone Brotherhood. You—?”

  “Josserek Derrain, from Killimaraich.”

  “Ah, yes. Will you sit?”

  The big man did. The small man took from containers on a stand a cigarette and a smoldering punkstick to light it. He didn’t offer Josserek any. His gaze analyzed.

  The half-prisoner shifted about, crossing arms and legs. “Pardon my appearance,” he said. “And my smell.” His skin longed for a bath, a razor, a change of clothes. “First I was busy, then I was drydocked.”

  Casiru nodded. “Indeed. Will you tell me your story?”

  “I already told your men, but—Yes, sir. I shipped as an able-bodied seaman on Skonnamor, from Eaching to here by way of Fortress Cape, southern tip of Eflis, I mean. You know? While we watered there, I got in a fight over a local woman with a crewmate. Beat him flat. Afterward he and his cousins set out to make life hard for me, three black bastards from Iki. In the Hurricane Sea, things came to a head. I’d made ready. I was going to take them, finish them off or teach them a lesson, end the whole string of garbage. Rigdel Gairloch, second mate, tried to stop me. They claim I attacked him. Muck! He’d thrown a cord around my neck and was tightening it, and the last Ikian on his feet was dancing around, about to open me up. I had to break loose, and did. Gairloch got a little damaged. Then everybody jumped me.”