Perilous Seas (48 page)

God
of Fools!

Running,
running, he kept running. Hills were steep, and stairs were steeper. Not like
home, where both were coveredopen here, but steep and winding.

Lith’rian
... The Evil take him. Must have known it! “Let me by, please! “

Too
close to call, that’s how he’d put it. Maybe. Maybe. Just romantic?
Just keep running. Sweat romantic, smell romantic? Dodge round corners . . .
Push past donkeys, keep on running. Sword kept bouncing, people looking. Royal
wedding, flags and banners. Inosolan getting married? Inosolan leave her
homeland? Didn’t sound like Inosolan!

God
of Fools, he should have waited, just a moment. Should have stayed for just a
moment, stayed to tell the other two. Then they’d both have started
running, running up the hill like him. He could run a great deal faster; the
way he ran would surely kill them, they would burst their hearts for sure.
Trouble was, he should have told them, told them he was going to Inos, not just
dashed off like a crazy, leaving them to mind the boat. Sword kept bouncing,
people looking. No one else was armed at all. If he didn’t get to Inos;
then he’d quickly be arrested, and the others wouldn’t know.
Gathmor, Darad couldn’t help him, even so he should have told them; maybe
now they’d come to find him-and that wouldn’t help at all. He’d
be dead by then for certain and that wouldn’t help at all.

“Let
me by, please! “

Worst
of all was indecision just what could he hope to do? Even if he got to Inos,
what in heaven could he do? Tell her maybe that he loved her, put it into words
just once? If that was all, he’d better hurry-get there while she still
was single, even if she was engaged. Talk of love to married women likely made
their men enraged.

Royal
wedding in the palace, palace at the very crest. Palace didn’t show on
farsight! Sorceress was there for certain, hidden in that palace-blank. If a
man climbed in a window, then the guards would surely kill him-all intruders in
a palace were most surely put to death.

What
a warren! It kept winding. Steeper, steeper grew the stairs. Heart was
straining, breath was labored, and it didn’t feel romantic. If he hadn’t
had his farsight, he’d have never found a way.

Now
the palace loomed above him, but the gate was leagues ahead, and the scrimmage
in the forecourt was the local population, being feasted by the sultan in a
wedding celebrationthere were thousands in the courtyard at the wedding
jubilee. So the gates were being guarded, extra-guarded from the crowd. If a
stranger with a saber tried to enter by the forecourt, then the guards would
want to argue and provide some entertainment for the wedding jubilee.

The
wall that ran beside him ... it was high but it was old, and the mortar in the
stonework had been weathered very deep. A criminal like Thinal could just
scramble up the stonework, could just clamber like a fly; and an adept could do
anything that anyone could do.

Stop!

Heart
... lungs ... legs shaking ... head swimming ...

Don’t
know ... what’s on other side ... was that a whinny?

What
have I got to lose?

The
trumpets blared. Through the white mist of lace, Inos watched the great doors
swing open before her. With one hand resting on the well-padded arm of Prince
Gutturaz, she floated forward very slowly, mindful always of the stumpy legs of
the tiny trainbearers behind her ... mindful also of icebergs drifting through
the pack, visible sometimes from the castle windows in Krasnegar. Never again.

She
entered the Great Hall. She had not seen-had not even heard mention of-the
Great Hall until the rehearsals began. She would believe anyone who told her it
was the largest covered space in Pandemia.

Head
up. No need to smile. No one could see.

On
either hand stood the massed commonfolk worthies of Arakkaran in their finest
finery; up ahead were the princes, from very young to very old, in green. The
young outnumbered the old. All held their eyes forward, not turning around to
gape at her. There was nothing to see but an iceberg.

The
sun’s sharp glare stabbed in through windows high overhead, to be
diverted by filigree of marble and reflected from rib and pier and slab until
it floated down upon the congregation like a mist of milk. All men. Kade would
be on the platform, being official mother of the bride, and a side section had
been reserved for Azak’s sisters, few of whom Inos had ever met. Women
played little part in even domestic -affairs here, and the marriage of a sultan
was not a domestic affair, it was state business. Kar had explained that. By
rights this should be a political marriage-Azak should be wedding the daughter
of some neighbor state, to cement an alliance. He was breaking a tradition and
taking a risk by marrying an outsider, a homeless nobody. The official
proclamation had named her as a queen, but who had been deceived?

Citherns
and other instruments of torment twanged and whined faintly in an alien dirge
... walk slowly ...

Behind
her, distant already, the great doors thumped shut with a reverberating impact
like the end of the world, like the final reckoning of the Good and the
Evil-The End! It rolled from arch to arch and pillar to pillar, raining echoes,
fading away above the distant dais that was her destination.

Ahead
of her white marble stretched, flat as a frozen canal, all the way to that dais
where the rest of the wedding party waited. Back and center was the throne, and
on the throne sat Rasha, victorious. She was even wearing royal green, although
a very dark, lustrous green. Already Inos could see the hot red eyes above the
filmy yashmak, the circlet of emeralds and pearls that was Rasha’s only
ornamentation, the crimson nails idly picking at the arms of the throne. She
was girt in her illusions of youth and beauty. Inos had those, also, and by
right.

Zarkian
custom made one strange concession to womanhood, or motherhood-at weddings a
woman presided from the throne. Had Azak’s grandfather’s wife been
alive, she would have sat there until her replacement was installed. There
being no true sultana at present, that throne should by rights stay empty until
Azak led his bride to it at the end of the ceremony. But Rasha had insisted and
Azak had consented without dispute. Her triumph complete, an ancient strumpet
sat upon the throne of Arakkaran. What bitter satisfaction did it give her?

At
least she had not tried to claim the royal sash, which still glittered green
across the sultan’s chest, and now he came in from one side; to stand and
wait for his approaching bride. Tall and fierce and handsome, showing his eagle
profile. Dear Azak?

Poor
Azak! His long humiliation was over now, surely? He had served his seven days
and nights of penance. Rasha would bait and harry him no more. Or would she?
Inos had no guarantee of that; she had heard no promise. Must she share her
husband with the twisted old harlot as well as with all the sonbreeding women
of his harem?

And
tonight? What sort of replacement would Inos be? She had offered prayers that
she would not disappoint him on his wedding night. She wanted to please him.
She must trust himhe was certainly experienced.

He
was handsome and virile and royal; and loved her. What more could a maiden’s
dreams require? This was a much richer land than Krasnegar. The God had
promised her a happy ending.

She
was almost at the steps. There was the iman, ancient and inclined to spray
spittle. There was the ever-smiling, baby-face Kar, best man and vigilant
bodyguard. There was young Prince Quarazak, proudly holding a green cushion,
tall for his age. On the cushion lay the slender golden necklace that
symbolized marriage in Zark. Inos had made a halfhearted effort to substitute a
ring, Imperial style, but in Zark they preferred a necklace. Kade had been very
upset when she heard of the necklace. Inos had tried to make a joke of it,
claiming that a chain was merely less subtle than a ring, but they both meant much
the same.

The
whole Zarkian ceremony was less subtle. She mounted the two steps to the dais.
She turned to face Azak, and Gutturaz steadied her as she knelt on the waiting
cushion, awkward in her massive gown.

The
music died and was buried in the sea-sound of the audience being seated.

The
iman tottered forward, clutching a book. Azak advanced a few paces, flanked by
Kar and shiny-eyed little Quarazak. He couldn’t see her face, but surely
he could give her a smile? Kar was smiling.

It
was amazing the sultan could move under all the jewels encrusting him. Even the
fabulous emerald sash was dulled by their glory. He was absolute monarch of a
rich kingdom.

And
Inos was a nobody. She had explained that over and over to Kade.

Silence
settled like the dust of the ages. Coughing and rustling faded. The last chair
leg scraped harshly and alone.

The
iman cleared his throat. He began.

Azak’s
responses rang out like the royal edicts they were. He promised many things:
care, protection. Love.

Then
it was her turn. Inos tried to make her voice carry, but she tried also not to
shout.

She
promised everything.

And
Quarazak held out the cushion so the iman could bless the chain. He offered it
then to his father and Azak reached for it, every link gleaming in the evening
sunlight.

It
slid out of reach again as the boy turned slightly to glance at the distant
doors, puzzled. Then Azak heard what younger ears had heard first and looked
that way, also. Kar ... turbans in the audience were twisting around. A strange
noise outside the hall?

Faint
but coming closer? Shouting? Thuds? Swords?

Azak
turned his head to look at Rasha, and Rasha was frowning above the green gauze
silk of her yashmak.

Rasha
sprang to her feet. Then the doors opened.

The
ornate bar shattered in a cloud of flying splinters. The doors were hurled
open, blasted open as if struck by a tidal wave or a thunderbolt. They flew
back on their hinges and their impact with the walls battered every ear a
second time. Echoes rolled unending.

The
golden chain slid unnoticed from the cushion to the floor. Every eye was turned
on the tumult in the entrance.

And
in through the doorway came ... the hindquarters of an enormous black horse.

Out
of the West.

O,
young Lochinvar is come out of the West,

Through
all the wide Border his steed was the best;

And,
save his good broadsword, he weapon had none,

He
rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone.

So
faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,

There
never was knight like the young Lochinvar.

Scott,
Lochinvar

Tumult, And Shouting

For
a long, breathless moment the whole congregation was frozen in place, from
Rasha and Azak down to the tiniest princeling, fascinated spectators of the
battle raging in the doorway.

If
that horse was not Evil himself, it was one of his brothers, yet the man on his
back was handling him with the precision of an artist’s brush-Azak
himself could not control a mount like that. Whole cohorts of family men were
striking and slashing at the intruder, but man and horse together held them
off. The rider’s sword danced like a silver mist, first on one side, then
the other. Blades clamoring in unbroken carillon; the stallion whirled and
clattered on slippery marble, but his hooves and teeth and bulk were part of
the fight, and if he really was Evil, then the family men would be treating him
with much greater care than they were trying to extend to the stranger.

The
audience leaped to its feet in a crash of falling chairs, and those nearest the
doors began to push away.

One
guard stopped a full rear kick, and reacted much as the doors had. A chakram
whined through the air like a deadly sunbeam, but the intended victim flicked
it aside with his sword, parried a thrust on his right, slashed down an
assailant on his left, deflected a lance. Bodies lay in disarray outside the
room and were starting to pile up inside, as well. Another man screamed and
dropped his sword, then toppled over, even as the horse slammed into two more,
spilling them aside. The rider ducked a second chakram, and airborne death
flashed across the hall over the heads of hundreds of people. Horseshoes
screeched on marble ...

“Hold!”
Rasha’s voice rang out with the power of a bugle. The battle stopped. The
spectators froze again. So did the combatants.

Cautiously
the rider backed his horse out from the petrified forest of his assailants.
Satisfied that they were no longer dangerous, he turned the stallion and let
him prance forward, highstepping up the aisle. His passage dragged a ripple
through the congregation, as heads turned to watch-Inos could see only faces
beyond him, only turbans in front. More faces emerged from behind pillars.

The
newcomer slid his sword back into its scabbard still bloody; he pulled an arm
across his forehead.

The
horse was indeed Evil, greatest of the midnight stallions that only Azak might
ride, the pride of the royal stables. He was shivering and foaming, rolling
eyes and baring teeth. His hooves clicked and skittered on the slippery stone,
yet the shabbylooking rider had him in perfect control. He reached the space
before the dais. Now all the audience was behind him, all faces.

Inos
did not even dare look at Azak to see how he was reacting to this sacrilege,
and she was staring in growing disbelief at the intruder. This was sorcery.

Then
she saw that Evil bore no harness, no saddle. Bareback! She had only ever known
one man whoNot again!