Chapter 11.

The castle Ladoman—a chalky white-walled fortress with squared-off buildings—rose out of a rare expanse of solid ground.  Encircling it, trees taller than the castle walls stirred gently in autumnal breezes. Wild rushes below them hissed against one another.

Within five steys in any direction, the land turned brown and treacherous, the watery earth stank of sulphur and tar. Lyrec knew this well—he had crossed it all. And he could not believe, when he topped the rise, that an oasis such as the castle could exist in this sodden land.

The owner of the castle, Ladomirus, was, at that moment, bathing in his lake on the far side of the castle. As lakes go, this one more closely resembled a private pond. However, King Ladomirus would not have it referred to as anything other than his lake. His enormous body bobbed, a soft pink island, not far from shore. To the people who stood on that shore attending him, he discoursed loudly about his past achievements—a list his attendants had heard enough times to memorize. The king had only a handful of credits to his name.

His bodyguard, Talenyecis, was among them. She was a fierce red-headed warrior, golden-tanned and freckled. Her head rested on a drawn-up knee that was braced against the stump on which she sat looking through slitted eyes at the king. The sunlight in her lashes turned the lake around him into bright fire. She contemplated him cooking in his own juices while she turned the spit on which he was impaled. It was not an unpleasant image and made her deaf to his annoyingly incessant registry of deeds.

On the bank between Talenyecis and Ladomirus sat the fat king’s current woman. As with the lake, “woman” was an inaccurate depiction of his concubine. The flaxen-haired child was fifteen, if one believed the child herself. More likely she was younger. The girl pulled at her wet tangle of hair and tried in vain to comb her fingers through it. Talenyecis abandoned broiling the king and concentrated on the concubine, taking in dispassionately the sinuous line of backbone beneath the white skin, a spatter of pimples on either side of the girl’s fleshy buttocks. The girl was otherwise clean, though, and safe, as had been all of Ladomirus’s concubines. Talenyecis always saw to that, just as she ensured that their physique was to her liking, for the king would inevitably discard the girl after a time and Talenyecis would inevitably take her.

She could see that the time was coming for this one. The girl had given up pretending to look as if she were listening to what the king said. He would have noticed that by now. Within a week or two this would irritate him to action and the girl would discover that he had a darker and more unpleasant side even than his sexual preferences. Talenyecis did not mind taking the scraps from Ladomirus’s table. He took one girl at a time and when he was done never went to her again. Talenyecis managed much more enduring relationships with those who liked her attention; from the cast-offs she had built up a substantial seraglio from which to select her own pleasures. She looked forward vaguely to the girl’s imminent punishment.

Gazing beyond the concubine, Talenyecis was the first to see two figures coming toward them from the south gate. She stood, gracefully for all her size, and snapped her fingers. Two male attendants, who had been ogling the naked concubine themselves, twitched at the sharp sound and jumped to attention. They looked to Talenyecis for orders.

“Get his cloak ready,” she said. “We have visitors.”

The attendants glanced at the people coming toward them. One was a soldier, striding forward through the tall grass with some effort. The other figure, taller and more slender than the soldier, wore a wide-brimmed hat that cast his face in shadow. Not far behind these two, the rushes shook as if a diminutive third party—a dwarf, perhaps—accompanied them. The attendants went about the business of unwrapping a heavy green robe that they were careful to keep above the ground.

Ladomirus continued to chatter away, oblivious to the changes around him. Then, as he did each time he proclaimed some essential and redundant point about himself, he glanced at the shore to assure himself that his audience was paying attention. He saw the robe held out and took notice of the approaching figures. His traveling gaze met that of Talenyecis, and he glowered at her for the small reproach she showed him by not announcing the arrivals. He rolled over and paddled back to shore, his buttocks rising and falling like the bleached humps of a sea-monster. The concubine paid no attention to any of this. She continued to work her hair into wet strands.

The fat king crawled out of the water and shook himself. He accepted the robe, and belted it. The attendants, their job done, released it. As the king strode forward, the embroidered hem dragged along the ground.

The soldier leading Lyrec had come to attention. Ladomirus looked Lyrec over, but spoke to the soldier. “What have we here?”

The soldier went to one knee with his head bowed, then stood. “Lord, this man wishes to join our cause.”

“A recruit. Ha!” He clapped his hands. “You see, Talenyecis, just as I said. They know a leader, these mercenaries. Word would get out, I told you, yes I did, and lead them all back to us. And it has done as I said.”

“Yes, you did, Lord,” adding to herself, On too many occasions. 

She studied the volunteer. He was studying her, too, and looking somewhat surprised, as if he recognized her from somewhere. She had seen comparable expressions many times before, and she hoped he would not prove to be like so many of the others who came here. Stupid, rough men with mud-soaked brains who had forced her again and again to establish her superiority as a fighter. Within the castle at this moment were men who wore a scar or lacked an ear on her account. This one, though, did not have that look about him. He seemed more intelligent and observant. A careful man. Talenyecis wished then that he had been dull and bellicose like the others—at least with them, once the initial conflict had concluded, she never had to worry. This man made her uneasy in the way he seemed to read the scene and know his place within it.

Her observation was not shared by Ladomirus. He waddled up to Lyrec and gripped his shoulders. Lyrec smiled back.

“Now that’s a rare thing,” said the fat king. “Good teeth. You find few good teeth around, heh?” His attendants nodded. “You must do well to stay so … clean, yes. And you look fed.”

“I get by.” That he neglected to add “Lord” to his answer went unnoticed by the king.

“You do, of course, of course. Or you’d be dead, in your line of work, heh? So, so. Your name is?”

“Lyrec.”

Ladomirus pulled at his numerous chins. “From Novalok, then.”

“No, from the south—outward bound from alien lands. I came up through Miria.” He silently thanked Grohd for the wealth of information the tavern keeper had kept locked in his head.

“Yes, I’d noted the accent of course.” All of the attendants nodded as if to say, “We knew that.” Ladomirus continued, “So, word of our needs—our intentions—has spread as far as that?” His blissful smile faded as he came to realize the implications of this. He turned to Talenyecis. “If they know in Miria, then we must assume word has reached Atlarma as well. What can we do?” His bodyguard continued to gaze thoughtfully at Lyrec. “Did you not hear me?” Ladomirus cried.

“Yes, m’lord,” she replied dutifully. “I was waiting for…Lyrec to enlighten us.”

Lyrec sensed that he’d been caught up in some high drama the essence of which was over his head.

“Well, traveler?” asked the king. “Our plans are known, are they?”

Lyrec stared at the bodyguard in an attempt to read her expression while he addressed the king. “Well, not to me, they aren’t,” he answered. “I came here as a result of a chance encounter with some of your men, who mentioned in passing that you were looking for…aid.”

“Ah? My own men are blathering on about this?”

“Oh, no—your soldier was most discreet.”

“Was he, then? What do you think of this, Talen, are we safe?”

Talenyecis hated the way Ladomirus had pared her name down to an informal construct. She glared at him. Safe? she thought. We’ll never be safe so long as you are king, you pompous whale. But she replied slowly, with selection. “If Dekür heard rumors he would undoubtedly reject the possibilities as ludicrous. However, if for some inexplicable reason he chose to acknowledge such rumors, we would notice his activity immediately, would we not?”

Before Ladomirus could reply, Lyrec said to him, “Excuse me, but you are referring to the king of Secamelan? De-koor?”

“King Dekür, yes.”

“Then you must be unaware that the king of Secamelan is slain.” 

The attendants eyed one another, but Ladomirus and Talenyecis continued staring inexpressively at him as if he had said nothing extraordinary. Then Ladomirus grabbed up the hem of his robe and waddled, increasing speed until he was running, toward the castle. Over his shoulder he called back, “Find him quarters, Talen!”

“Lyrec, come with me,” ordered Talenyecis. She struck off toward the south gate.

Lyrec asked the attendants, “Have I said something unfortunate?” They made no answer, but hurried to catch up with their king.

The concubine began to laugh.

*****

The stairwells of the castle were narrow—built at a time when the king had been much leaner and poorer. Ladomirus had to squeeze his bulk like a snail through some of the passages. This annoyed Borregad no end. He tried to pace the king but would catch up with him and then have to retreat into the shadows, waiting for the frantic wheezing to dwindle far enough away for him to give chase again, up another flight of steps, down another hallway.

He heard a sudden, inhuman shriek followed by a sharp curse, and the slap off footsteps again. Warily he rounded the corner and came face to face with a yellow cat, half his size, in flight for its life from the tree-trunk legs of the king. Already harried, when it confronted Borregad, the cat leaped straight into the air and danced back against the wall with its back arched. It hissed, and the fur stood up, seemingly doubling its size. Borregad responded by moving to the opposite side of the hall. He had neither time nor inclination for a skirmish. He wasn’t quite sure how all this feline business worked.

The cat maneuvered to block him and hissed again angrily. Its tail flicked, and it raised one paw as if it might swipe at him.

“Bugger off!” Borregad snarled.

The yellow cat stopped dead still, completely stupefied.

“You heard me. Scat!” 

The cat turned and fled.

Borregad hurried up yet another flight of steps. Why did wherever they were going have to be at the top of the castle? He could hear that Ladomirus had left the stairwell and was shuffling down the hall. But, upon emerging on that level, he was confronted by an empty corridor that branched in both directions, with a door at each end. He tried going left, watching for the green robe, listening for footsteps, finding nothing. Reaching the doorway, he took a look inside. The room was empty, a dark and musty chamber with three old, frayed and discolored tapestries on the walls. One circular window let in light; outside, an orange flag could be seen. Borregad’s whiskers twitched. There was dust in the air. He moved back, and the light fell across a different section of the floor, exposing an uneven line where the dust had been swept away by something dragging along the stones—the hem of Ladomirus’s robe.

Then he heard the voice.

Even distant and muffled as it was, the voice prickled the fur on his back. It crackled and sizzled in a way that recalled uncomfortably his passage between worlds.

Borregad crept into the musty room. He followed the dusted trail and the voice to one of the tapestries, and slipped behind it into a small chamber. The space was all in darkness, but a thread of light spilled in from under a curtain at the opposite end. The voice was disturbingly near now. It said, “What makes you think you may call me up every time you rattle with fear? The least little problem sets you to quivering.”

“The least problem?” It was Ladomirus who answered. “The death of Dekür is hardly a small thing. It changes the whole country over there. Why wasn’t I told? We could attack this minute, now, while they are without a leader. We could win, couldn’t we? Why was I not told?”

Borregad nudged his head beneath the curtain. Ladomirus’s back was to him and blocked his view of whoever shared the room with the fat king. But a brilliant white nimbus framed Ladomirus, cast it seemed by the speaker.

“Why?” the sizzling voice responded, and that simple word held unplumbed depths of rebuke. “Because you are a liar and a thief and a coward above all else, you expect these qualities to govern anyone with whom you deal. You assume everyone is as depraved as you. The honesty of any being, especially the particular honesty of a god, confounds you. And you might recall from time to time that I am a god, little fat man. We are not equals in anything. If you continue forgetting that, I shall quite likely melt you down for tallow.”

Borregad looked around for a better vantage, but the room was totally devoid of furnishings, offering him nothing. As he looked elsewhere, the brilliant white light suddenly fell across him. He pulled back, then cautiously poked his head out again.

In fear, Ladomirus had retreated a few steps. The source of the voice was revealed: a tall, silvery white figure, its eyes round and red as blood, its mouth as black as a cave.

Ladomirus stuttered, then said, “I meant no offense. Surely you know that because I am…what you say—” even in his terror, it cost his vanity dearly to admit it “—a coward. But Dekür has died, great god. You must have known.”

“It makes no difference to your plans at all. The country of Secamelan is not in chaos from this death. They have banded together against a common foe—an unknown foe, I should add. For you to draw attention to yourself too soon would argue that you were the one responsible for their king’s death. If I thought it important I would have told you. We will do as we’ve planned to do all along. Nothing is changed. The assassination of the foreign king will go on as discussed, and then with Secamelan too busily engaged in war with Findcarn we will walk into her unprotected border without a skirmish. Believe in that if you wish to win, and stop worrying about things which don’t concern you.”

Borregad retreated into the dark passage. He shivered at the thought of what he had to do next, but he had to be certain. Fearfully, he closed his eyes as Ladomirus began to speak again. The words faded to a buzz. Borregad directed his mental probe into the room with utmost wariness. From a distance he scrutinized the essence of the white being. In this nonphysical sphere the being appeared to be a shapeless area of immateriality, as if nothing existed there at all. He stretched the probe ahead delicately. Only the most tenuous tip of thought touched the emptiness.

Two blank white eyes opened upon him. The true form had appeared, its identity revealed with an intimacy that repulsed him.

Miradomon had not sensed that he was there. He delicately retracted the probe and, breathlessly afraid, pressed against the wall. His small heart thudded against his ribs. Those white eyes…

“What was that?” hissed the bright figure.

“What?”

“I sensed something—someone. Who followed you?”

“Chagri, n-no one. No one would dare, they know the consequences—”

“No matter, is it? It would afford them nothing. No mortal can influence my course. Our course.”

“Ours, yes, great Chagri.” The fat king laughed uneasily. “I do trust you, great Chagri, I do. You must know I do.”

“As evidenced by your actions this day. Do not call me trivially again, Ladomirus.”

The air shuddered, then exploded in thunder.

Borregad dared another look under the curtain. Ladomirus was placing a small silver globe on a black iron tripod. Borregad stared at the globe with grim satisfaction. If further proof had been necessary, there it was for all to see. The fat king came toward him, cheeks flushed, his face shiny with sweat. He shook drops of perspiration from the tips of his bejeweled fingers. He drew back the curtain. The passage was empty.

*****

“I want to kill him! Let me!” shouted the soldier with his arm in a sling. He brandished a dagger clumsily while attempting to stand, but Talenyecis pushed him down with a sharp blow to the shoulder.

“What problem have you with him, Fulpig?” she demanded to know. She hated Fulpig more than most of the others: he was, at any given time, either competing with her for dominance or striving ineptly to seduce her; often both at the same time. He was a brutish moron and his crippled arm had not surprised Talenyecis one bit. That the new recruit had been responsible for it raised her opinion of Lyrec, but made her distrust him more than ever before.

Fulpig spoke through his teeth. “You know what problem. He was to be dropped in a hole on the tors. They promised me…how did he get here?”

“Abo brought him in. Apparently, your orders were countermanded by someone wise enough to recognize a potential volunteer.”

“Abo? Where is he?”

She was growing tired of answering his questions, but told him. “In the next barrack, sleeping.” She hoped he would take this information and leave, but he grabbed onto her wrist and said, “Then come with me and ask him what happened. Ask him where the rest of the men who were with him are, why they didn’t come back, too? Ask him, you foul bi—”

She backhanded him across the mouth. “You do not learn, do you?” She poked a stiff finger into his wounded arm, making him wince. “Never give me an order. You’ve no rank that I didn’t grant you, Fulpig, and I will happily take it away with one flick of the wrist. If you have an argument with that man, then you fight him accordingly. You can do it now or when your arm heals—that’s entirely up to you. But no one else is to do your killing for you, and there’s to be no confrontation within the castle walls. If I even suspect you’ve involved yourself in something of that sort, I’ll dig out your bowels the way I’d scoop out a melon. And you’ll watch.”

Fulpig’s lips were pressed together so tightly by this point that all color had been drained from around them. Talenyecis stared him down and he ended the argument by climbing to his feet and marching out past her. At the door, he lingered, then faced Lyrec. “If I can’t have you, then I’ll take that fat little pig who runs the tavern. That is outside this castle and this land, and no one here can govern it.” His eyes flicked to Talenyecis. “No one.” Then he was gone.

Lyrec took two strides after him, but Talenyecis held out her hand. He explained, “Fulpig intends to kill a friend of mine. I have to stop it.”

“The same rule applies to you as to him. You’ll drive no arguments into conflict here. Around you are all mercenaries, some of them I would call insane; the best are barely controllable. I’m more inclined to side with you because I loathe that greasy bastard, but there’ll be no fights for you, either. Right now you’re assigned to this room and that bed in order to let Fulpig take his partner and his horse and go. Your friend will have to look after himself.” She walked over to him. “You’ve been out of this land a long time, I think. Here the weak are turned over like last year’s topsoil by the powerful. Actually, I’d thought that was universal.”

“It’s not—not where I come from.”

“And where is that?”

“A long way from here. So far that it seems the two places have nothing in common.”

“Except for you.” She leaned down and patted the tattered blanket beside him. “This is your bed. Anything you own goes beneath it. Any theft you report to me.” She looked around. “But there won’t be any thefts.”

“No?”

“The last one was over a month ago—a man who decided my rule didn’t apply to him and who liked someone else’s boots better than his own. You may have noticed him as you rode in—the beggar at the front gate with no hands?”

“I see.”

“So do the rest—daily. I don’t want them to forget his lesson.” She turned abruptly and started for the door, but hesitated before leaving. “I was wondering, Lyrec—Fulpig suggested that I ask Abo about the group who brought you into Ladoman. I believe they were supposed to kill you.”

“And?”

“And I know Abo well enough to know he hasn’t the mind for story-telling.”

“All right. They came and I went with them. They were very uncompromising about it.”

“And?” she asked, echoing his tone.

“We parted company along the way.” He said it so that the implications would not escape her. 

“I have this notion,” she said, “which began when I first set eyes on you, that you are very dangerous, and very careful about it. However, I find in spite of my presentiment that I trust you somehow. I think the danger you represent isn’t to me, but to Ladomirus, and I see by the look in your eye this is so. For which reason I’ll ignore what I know and satisfy myself for now merely by watching you. We may in the future prove of use to one another.”

When he said nothing, she left. 

One day, she thought, he might be useful to her, but that day had not yet come. Tomorrow she would send him out to Maribus Wood and let him ride a border patrol for a week or two. The less he knew of what went on in the castle, the more he would have to rely on her when and if a time serving their mutual interests arrived. She had never allowed anyone to stand on equal terms with her, and that wasn’t about to change. It was the reason she was still alive and not a whore or a peasant. This was no time to change her policy. To stand with men, she had to stand alone.