Empire of Avarice (80 page)

“Do you think we’ll get into trouble, ‘Gan?” Kerrin
asked, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“What, for losing that guard?” Argan chuckled. “Mother
will fuss but she’s a bit of an old fuss pot, really.”

Kerrin looked at his friend in shock. “You can’t say
that about her – she’s the empress!”

“Aw, phooey!” Argan said. “She’s my mother and far too
fussy over me. She thinks I’ll break a leg or something when I’m out of her
sight. She’s turned into a mother fowl, clucking over everything.” He folded
his elbows and flapped them against his side. “Bwaak, bwaak!”

Kerrin half choked on his crumbs with laughter. Argan
slapped his back, much like he’d seen some adults do to people when they
coughed on a drink or food. Kerrin stopped, red-faced, but still giggling. “You’re
sooo funny, ‘Gan. You’re not like a prince.”

“Why not? I am a prince!”

“Well, princes aren’t supposed to be funny, are they?”

“I don’t know, I’ve only seen Jorqel and that was before
he was a prince. Oh, and Fantor-Face.”

Kerrin looked at his friend in surprise. “Who? What? Who’s
a fantor-face?”

“Oh, Istan. Always eating.”

“Fantor-face?” and Kerrin dissolved into another bout of
laughter, holding his stomach. He doubled up and Argan looked on, smiling,
until Kerrin raised his head again. Tears were flowing down his cheeks. “Fantor-face,”
he whispered between laughs. “That’s so funny!”

Argan shrugged. It was just a name he’d thought up. “That’s
what I always think of him as.”

“Well it’s really funny. Fantor Face.” Kerrin chuckled
some more, then wiped the tears from his face.

Argan stuck his hands in his pockets. There were crumbs
in one of them and he flicked them out into the gutter. “I can’t see how
Fantor-Face will ever be a proper prince. He’s supposed to be a leader of the
people. That’s what mother and father tell me I have to be. How can you be a
leader if you’re always in a bad mood and stuffing your face all the time?”

Kerrin thought on that for a moment. “I don’t know. Maybe
he’ll be the prince of the kitchen?”

Argan smiled at that. “He can stay there and stuff
himself and leave being a proper prince to Jorqel and me!”

“And Elas Pelgion,” Kerrin added.

“Oh. Is he going to be a prince?” Argan asked in
surprise.

“Don’t you know that? My father said because he’s
marrying the princess then that’ll make him a prince.”

“Oh.” Argan’s face clouded. “That means he could become
emperor one day. He’s too serious.”

Kerrin looked down at his lap. “Father says an emperor
has to be serious.”

“But Jorqel is going to be emperor! Everyone knows
that!”

Kerrin nodded. “But after Jorqel – will you be emperor? I
think you ought to be!”

Argan breathed out hard, his face turned up towards the
sky, allowing the droplets of rain to patter onto his skin. “Being emperor is
very hard. Everyone wants you at the same time. Lots of people want to kill you
because they want to be emperor. You have to make lots of desisss- “ he worked
slowly through the word, “de-sicions. Decisions. They all have to be the right
ones, too. You have to be very clever. I’m not so clever as father or Jorqel.”

Kerrin put has hand on Argan’s arm. “You are, too. When
you grow up you’ll be just as clever, I bet you will. And I’ll be your bestest
bodyguard.”

Argan smiled wanly, then shut his eyes and relaxed
against the wall behind him. “Being a prince is hard enough what with
remembering to be good and polite and everything. I’m not allowed to go where I
want, too. It’s poo.”

“So? I can’t go where I want either. Father’s always
telling me I must be on my best behaviour especially around you and your
family. He thinks I might be sent away from the palace if I don’t behave!”

“That’s bigger poo. I won’t let them send you away. Anyway,
we behave the same so if they send you away they’ll have to send me too. So
there.”

Kerrin grinned shyly. “You’d stop them sending me away?”

“Of course! You’re my best friend! These silly people
are too serious.”

The two boys smiled and clasped hands for a moment. After
a short while Argan sighed and brushed the rain from his jacket. “Well, best
get back before mother starts clucking like a mother fowl again. Bwaak bwaak!”

Kerrin giggled and followed Argan back up the sloping
roof and down the other side towards the ladder. Argan turned round and slowly
began climbing down towards the ground. But the ladder was old and rotting and
as the prince put a foot on one of the rungs, ten from the ground, it suddenly
snapped.

Argan grabbed the sides of the ladder in a reflex action
but the rain had made the slick wood even slipperier, and his grip broke with
his weight being transferred to his hands. Argan shrieked in fright as he
plunged twelve feet to the grassed over surface, striking the ground with a
sickening blow, crumpling into a heap. Kerrin yelled in fright and horror and remained
stuck on the ladder above the break, screaming for help, peering at the silent
and still form of his friend.

The seas heaved and tossed, white-topped spray flying
off the surface into the chill air, soaking the lone ship rolling and pitching
close to the black, rocky shore. The captain wrestled with the steering oar,
bracing his legs on the madly dancing deck, cursing the insane decision to sail
in late winter. He cursed the Koros for contracting him, he cursed the gods for
throwing the seasonal storm at him, he cursed the lone silent figure standing
by himself close to the rail, peering at the rocks being exposed and then
hidden by the rising and falling waves, and he cursed himself for being
stupidly greedy and taking a lucrative job.

The coast of Romos along the south-eastern shore was
well known to all sailors for being hostile and dangerous. Rocks had sent the
unwary to watery graves for centuries and only fools sailed close to Romos. Double
fools sailed close in winter. Triple fools did so when the storms came. The
captain peered ahead through the rain and spray, squinting his eyes. Two
lookouts were tied to the prow, one on each bow, watching the seas ahead, ready
to scream out a warning of any danger that presented itself.

The ship was a single-masted fishing vessel, light,
manoeuvrable, and had a crew of eight. The seas around Romos were too dangerous
these days thanks to the pirates that operated out of the only port along its
hazardous coasts, and the prospect of sending a Koros spy ashore to help end
the curse of the pirates was one too good to pass up, especially when it had
been accompanied by gold. But now, when faced with the imminent prospect of
being dashed into little pieces against the fang-toothed sentinels guarding the
Romos shoreline, such decisions seemed insane.

The passenger finally moved. At his feet on the deck lay
a small circular object, attached to him by a rope. In one smooth movement the
man had pulled the object up onto his back, climbed the rail on the starboard
side and stepped over the side into the heaving water. The sound of him hitting
the waves was lost in the storm; the wind whistling through the mast rigging
and the waves writhing like some maddened animal drowned any noise out.

Relieved of his passenger, the captain hauled with
relief on the steering oar and pointed his ship away from the vicious black objects
thirty paces away. The tide was running from astern so it was not driving his
ship onto the rocks, and the wind was coming from ahead, almost cancelling each
other out. The captain wanted to be away from Romos as soon as possible. Not
only was the shore dangerous, but the possibility that pirates could spot him
at any time added to his apprehension. With some relief he began to put distance
between the shore and himself.

The passenger clung to the netting that surrounded the
circular shape he had brought with him; lighter than water it floated high on
the surface, giving him buoyancy. The only problem was to guide himself through
the rocks and onto the shore. He’d studied the rocks and cliffs for some time
before spotting a place that could allow him to land in relative safety. He now
kicked his feet hard, dragging himself and his float towards the gap in the
jagged line. Beyond it, about three men’s height in distance, stood the solid
black shelf of the foot of the cliff the seas pounded themselves relentlessly
against.

The sea was trying to push him beyond the gap but the
man kicked hard and pushed the float, a round mass made of the cured flesh of
aquatic mammals and strengthened with the porous bark of a particular tree that
grew in Lodria, into the gap. Immediately the force of the tide lessened and
now he only had to contend with the ebb and flow of the waves that pushed their
way through and up against the shelf.

His feet struck a hard, solid object and he realised he
had found the sea bed, shelving steeply up from the depths. If it followed the
angle of the cliffs looming blackly above him, then it would go down far in
only a short distance from the shoreline. Staggering to his feet with some
difficulty, he pulled the float after him against the sucking of the dying wave
as it retreated, and threw himself onto the shelf, standing half the height of
a man above the water. The next wave came in, reaching the shelf and it enabled
him to haul the float onto the black rock surface.

The shelf was uneven but flat enough to be able to sit
down on, and fell back half of his height to where the cliff began to rise up
in fractured, jagged shapes to the top, out of sight in the rain and gloom of
the poor light offered by the storm. The man produced a sharp and wicked
looking knife from his belt, a specially made belt of hard leather he’d paid
for in the backstreets of Niake, and slashed apart the netting on the float,
then sought out the seam on the float itself.

A flash of lightning lit up the area and the man,
identifiable as Kiros Louk, flinched and cursed. It served to do two things;
one, it ruined his eyesight, and two, it may reveal him to anyone looking on. Not
that anyone would be looking on in this weather, but he could do without it.

The rolling thunder accompanied him slicing open the
float along the seam. Slowly it flopped open, the air hissing out, and it
deflated onto the rock shelf, leaving a lumpy interior. Kiros cut the float
open along a new surface, opening out the interior, revealing the contents he
had put there before the voyage had begun from Efsia, to the north of Slenna.

As he began pulling his equipment from the now ruined
float, his mind cast itself back a few sevendays when prince Jorqel had
summoned him to his half-built quarters in the newly rising castle keep high
above the churned up soil and mud of the outer edges of Slenna.

As usual, Kiros Louk had arrived unannounced, suddenly
appearing as if my magic in Jorqel’s quarters, much to the irritation of the
Prince. “I wish you’d enter by the normal method, Louk!”

Kiros had chuckled briefly before settling down in the
guest chair, opposite Jorqel. “Then I would not test your security, which, if I
may be so bold, is at its usual appalling slackness. One of these days the one
who gets into your quarters will not be one who wishes to work for you, but
against you, and then you may never become emperor.”

Jorqel had frowned, tapping the desk top with his quill.
“I’ll have a word with Gavan about that. But now you’re here, down to
business.”

“At least you get to the point quickly. That’s
admirable.”

“The sooner you leave the better. It’s not good for my
reputation to be seen in the company of a spy.” Jorqel had rummaged about his
desk and come up with a rolled-up parchment. He had passed it to Kiros. “Your
new task.”

Kiros had unrolled it, looked at it, then had turned it
the other way up. It was of an island, roughly rectangular in size, with
mountains denoted to the east, a port on the northern side and a large town on
the southern shore. To the south of the island the shoreline of a bigger tract
of land could be seen. “Romos,” Kiros had said.

“Indeed. Now as you probably are aware, Romos passed
from imperial control only a few years ago. Until then it was a vital link in
seaborne trade between Zipria and the heart of Kastania, and also the island of
Cratia to the east. But, with the general chaos of the civil wars spreading everywhere,
Romos was taken by pirates and has been their base ever since.”

“Pirates who were formerly imperial sailors, disaffected
by the mess made of things by the ruling houses in recent times.”

Jorqel had nodded. “I’m keen to restore Romos to
Kastanian rule but I first need to know how strong the pirates are, how many of
them there are, whether the populace would support us or them and what their
defences are.”

Kiros had nodded in understanding. “I’ll need a few days
to gather equipment for such a task, and gold to cover my expenses and fee. I’ll
also need transport. Don’t expect me to swim or row all the way there myself!”

Jorqel had grunted. “Already arranged. A fishing vessel
awaits you in Efsia. It sails in five days’ time. It’s supposed to be there for
repairs but it won’t be able to stay there too long before people get
suspicious and I don’t want anyone getting ideas about checking it over. The
fewer people who know about this job the better. I’ve no idea whether the
pirates have agents in Efsia or not.”

“And what about getting you this information? Do you
have someone passing by conveniently?”

Jorqel had shaken his head. “You are to remain
undercover on Romos for the rest of the winter and the spring. Sometime in the
summer a fire will burn on the Lodrian shore. Three nights after that a ship
will sail close to the southern shore east of the town, close to the mountains.
It will send a small boat out should it see a small signal beacon. You will
light that beacon and pass the courier the information.”

“And what password will there be?”

“Nicate,” Jorqel had said.

“Ah, the lady love soon to be your wife. Very apt.”

“You have sufficient?” Jorqel had snapped, piqued at the
mocking tone in Kiros’ voice.

“All but my fee and expenses. In advance.”

Jorqel had gruffly picked up a small leather bag and
tossed it to the spy who had caught it deftly and weighed it. “Seems the right
amount. My thanks, sire,” the spy said mockingly, then had got to his feet,
bowed ironically and once again had slipped out towards the window.

Kiros Louk’s mind returned to the present and the
examination of his equipment. An oilskin pack made from aquatic mammal skin in
which was a change of clothing, a rope, a tinderbox and fire lighting sundries,
a short sword, food, a waterskin, and a band made from animal skin to wear
under his clothing against his waist, containing pouches for papers, maps,
coinage and a myriad of other essential and secret items necessary to his
survival and profession.

He glanced up at the rock face above him and pursed his
lips. He could only go up. Fitting his backpack securely, he looked over the
rock wall and saw many fissures and ledges. It wouldn’t be difficult to go up
but the wind and rain made conditions dangerous. It may be easier to come down,
and not voluntarily!

Shrugging, he began paying out the end of the rope that
had a padded hook on it and began to swing it, each swing bigger than the one
before, until it was whirling about his head. He gave it one huge swing and
released it, sending it arcing up at the rock face. It struck, but bounced off
and came plunging back down, narrowly missing him. Undeterred, he repeated the
action and this time the hook snared on a ledge and he pulled it tight, wedging
it securely. That done, he began climbing, grunting with effort, and made good
speed. All he had to do was to walk up the rock wall, using the projections and
edges as grip for his iron shod boots.

Getting to the ledge the hook was embedded in was the
most hazardous bit, but he used his feet as purchase and flopped onto the wet
ledge, sweating despite the cold and rain. He had to stand as there wasn’t
enough space to sit, and repeated the rope action. This time it sailed over the
top of the cliff and caught fast.

A few moments later he was on top of the cliff, lying
gratefully on the grass and vowing never to go on another such mission. The
full beauty of the scene of the sea below him was lost to his eyes. He was more
interested in finding shelter. Now he was on the island he needed to dry off. The
mountains rose all around him and the space he was in was some sort of valley
hemmed in on three sides and open only to the sea.

The wind was chill and his clothes were wet. He needed
to dry off and sleep. He trudged up the slope through the damp grass, noting it
was short and therefore cropped, probably by wild wool beasts, or maybe even
domesticated ones. Perhaps there were herders’ shelters in the vicinity. He
looked carefully around at the top of the slope. Ahead rose a sheer wall of
rock, climbing dizzily up to some high crag lost in the low clouds.

He was more interested in what lay left. In that
direction the town of Romos that gave its name to the island stood. There was a
narrow defile in between two jagged pillars of rock and he made his way through
it, finding the path uneven but useable. It probably was an animal track. He
saw droppings and was pleased for it meant the possibility of catching fresh
food. The defile opened out to a hillside and the land fell away to a wide
valley that vanished into the distance. At the bottom he could dimly see a
watercourse, riddled with rocks and stones. To the left of where he stood there
were fissures and holes in the mountainside and he made his way over to them,
checking a few but they were too small. Eventually he found one he could slide
into and get out of the rain, and he opened his pack and laid out a blanket.

The opening, for it wasn’t really big enough to call it
a cave, had little in the way of detritus to make a fire, and as it was too wet
outside, he contented himself with changing his clothes and lying under the
blanket and using his body heat to dry his wet clothes, putting them around his
body.

He lay awake for a while, listening to the wind and
rain, and occasionally shaking with the cold, and thought on his mission with a
detached, professional mind. He didn’t think on the past, for to him it was
gone and of no importance. He had no home, no family, and no ties to any place.
For him, there was only the present and the immediate future, in the form of
his current job. His mind was totally devoted to what he was doing, and he only
lived for the mission he was being paid for. The money he got from his
assignments he spent except for a small amount that he set aside for
emergencies.