The third Kapt in this comfortable withdrawing room where Drak chose to be at ease while he sorted out the problems confronting him wore an ornate uniform in which the amount of blue cloth contrasted strikingly with the clothes of the others. Kapt Nath Molim, the Trylon of Polnehm, had brought no army with him from his native land. He’d voyaged aboard an argenter from Lome. He came to request the queen for assistance in her country, where turmoil had raged rife for many seasons. Like Vallia, the island of Pandahem was struggling to resume normal life after the Times of Troubles.
Nath Molim had been shattered to discover the queen sorely wounded and near death.
The people still loyal to her even after her long absence overseas were growing disheartened. They understood why she had fled away from them; now the evil people who battened on the unhappy land threatened to overwhelm the last bastions of resistance. Nath Molim hoped that the queen’s great friendship with the imperial house of Vallia would produce men, arms and money for a great jikai to sweep their enemies out of Lome.
“I swear to you, majister,” he’d said to Drak, “as the Glorious Pandrite may judge me, that not one loyal soldier of Lome joined those armies from North Pandahem who attacked you here in Vallia. They came from Menaham, Tomboram and Iyam. Also, we have been much ravaged by the pirates from the Hoboling Islands who grow more daring every season.”
“I believe you, Trylon Molim,” said Drak, not yet on friendly enough terms to call the fellow Trylon
[13]
Nath.
Now, in this comfortable room, when Brytevax Thandor the Rock entered, Nath Molim fidgeted with impatience and the hope and desire he could persuade these Vallians to help him with men and treasure.
The detailed inspection carried out convinced Thandor the Rock that Alloran would in the near future have created a halfway decent Phalanx; he had not reached that stage yet. All the same, it was thankful that Thandor’s three Kerchuris had not had to fight the two of Alloran’s. The Rock valued his brumbytes...
Comments were made about the various armies and the conversation remained exquisitely polite. Drak was worried sick about Queen Lush; but he could still find a lurking amusement in the way in which these men waltzed around each other. This was a kind of watershed. Anything could happen. This Molim fellow, now. He was quite young, smart, with a sharpness to him, a cutting edge, a fellow out for Number One all the time. There was one elegant solution that Drak fancied his father might even enjoy.
“Trylon Molim,” he said, waiting for a pause in the conversation. “There are many paktuns awaiting repatriation. Many of them are from Pandahem. I think it possible I could convince the emperor and the Presidio to find the gold to pay them. They would fight for the queen in Lome and free the country for her. I do not promise, mind. But I believe this to be equitable.” He was about to add that he owed the queen a great deal; he did not.
“Majister! This is just the news I was hoping for.”
Kapt Logan Lakelmi, anxious to please, said: “Give me the word, jis, and I will take my army to Lome.”
“That must await the decision from Vondium.”
“Yes, jis.”
Drak wasn’t at all sure he relished the idea. It held murky possibilities for the future.
Through the sensible arrangement of the two armies for forage and supplies, the men were now spread out over a considerable area. Here in Rashumsmot lay only the bodyguard regiments with a few ancillaries for support. At least, Lakelmi’s plan would take care of his army... Alloran’s forces on the mainland, commanded by the Kataki Twins, had collapsed. They would provide strength for Kapt Lakelmi. As for the two Katakis, they had disappeared with their Whiptail followers.
Drak glanced over at the wall by the door where his great Krozair longsword hung. Why didn’t he just take all these decisions himself? His father had once told him in that gruff way: “You do not walk in my shadow, my lad, or ever will if I have any say in the matter.”
But it was damned hard not to feel that he did so walk in his father’s shadow all the time. His father was just so bloody good at everything — well, except being civil — and he had the yrium, that magical charismatic power that bound men and women to him, made them loyal and ever-ready to follow him to death and beyond. Drak did not feel he shared that power; Silda was in no doubt that he possessed the yrium.
Faintly through that door he heard a commotion with a lot of shouting and yelling. Almost immediately Nath the Strict hurried in.
“There is a Jikai Vuvushi who says she must see you, jis, at once. Most urgent. The lads hold her—”
“Send her in!”
When Nath the Strict ran out he saw the girl had in some miraculous way freed herself from the grips of the guards and was running fleetly toward the door. At her back the bows lifted, arrows nocked and the cruel iron barbs ready to rip into her flesh.
“Hold!” bellowed Nath. “The prince will see her!”
Mandi Volanta fairly hurled herself through the open door. She took in the room of high-ranking officers, spotted the Prince Majister, skidded to a halt before him.
“Majister!” she fairly screamed out. “They are killing Leone! Leone Starhammer! Queen Lush has given orders to have her killed! Please, majister — do something!”
“Quite right and proper, too,” spoke out Trylon Nath Molim into the abrupt hush. “The woman failed in her duty to protect the queen. Therefore she must die.”
“Out of my way!” snarled Drak, and leaped for the door. He raked down the longsword as he ran.
Shouted orders, the stamp of booted feet, all a rush and a scurry, and at the head of a parcel of his lads he was out in the roseate glow of the Maiden with the Many Smiles. Mandi Volanta was up with him, directing him, shrieking for the men to run, you hulus, run!
Incongruously in Drak’s brain, as he pelted on, the knowledge that the queen lived flamed. She had regained consciousness. And her first order had been to take vengeance on Leone, whom she blamed for her misfortune.
That, of course, was the way of the great ones of the world, of queens and empresses. It was not the way of the new Vallia.
His mother, the divine Empress Delia, would not countenance such an atrocity for an instant. But — that was the way of the world in which Queen Lush had been born and grown up and learned to understand and bend to her will...
Drak could not find it in his heart to blame the queen.
Sprawled in the entrance gate and across the courtyard and up the stairs, the bodies of Jikai Vuvushis scattered. There were men amongst them, too, corpses wearing predominantly blue clothes. These were people in the retinue of Trylon Nath Molim, clearly, ever ready to obey their queen. This handiwork was perfectly normal for a queen, everyone knew that.
Leone Starhammer and her girls had barricaded themselves in the top floor of the villa and they resisted stubbornly. The fight was a bloody business. Drak roared into action at the head of a mingled mob of his bodyguards, yelling out for the Lomians to lay down their weapons or be chopped without mercy.
The business was touch and go. A few cunning strokes from the Krozair longsword, a couple of lopped heads, and the Lomians understood. They heard what the prince shouted at them, and knew they must believe. If they did not — they were dead men.
As for Drak, he was perfectly prepared to slay all these Pandaheem. He valued Leone’s girls. The Lomians were from Pandahem and had been implacable enemies of Vallia from long before Drak had been born. There was no contest of loyalties.
The odd fact did not occur to him until they were clearing up that many of Leone’s Jikai Vuvushis were from Lome in Pandahem, too...
The smell of blood and the stink of fear were merely part of normal life after a fight. Leaving everything to be sorted out by his people, accompanied by a strong guard, Drak took himself off to see Queen Lushfymi.
He found her in the wide silken bed very much in command of herself, most of the acupuncture needles withdrawn, her face immaculately made-up, her hair a shining marvel. Those violet eyes were heavy with remembered pain. She sat up against silken pillows, and she smiled dazzlingly as he entered.
“Drak! How nice. I knew you would come to see me as soon as — but you are very quick! I have only just sent my tiring women away.”
Instantly, she had him at a disadvantage, as it were bent across her knee, his backbone about to sunder.
He swallowed.
“Queen — Lushfymi. About Leone—”
“Oh, her, the stupid woman. I reposed great confidence in her, Drak. I felt affection for her. But she failed me abysmally. Forget her. Tell me all the news—”
He did not, he told himself savagely, he did not feel like a small boy being chastised.
This woman understood power and the management of that inscrutable and overwhelming commodity. She would make such an empress. The fabled Queens of Pain of ancient Loh might tremble with envy.
When he told her that he had saved Leone Starhammer she became outraged. Her face took on a menacing look that would have struck terror into the purest of her subjects.
“You had no right to interfere with my justice!”
“Lushfymi, look, that was scarcely justice—”
“Of course it was! Does the workman keep a broken tool? Does a warrior retain a worthless sword?”
“It wasn’t Leone’s fault—”
“Oh! So it was my fault, was it?”
“No, of course not—”
“Perhaps we had best forget this, Drak. After all, I think we must come to a conclusion soon in our relationship and you do know in what fond regard I hold you.” She smoothed the silken sheet. “I am sure you thought you were acting for the best.”
“Yes—”
“So let us brush aside the silly woman. If Leone lives, then she is lucky for now. Nath Molim is most anxious for us to go to Lome and drive out all these awful villains preying on my country. Between us, we can do it.”
Feeling despicable, Drak took refuge in saying, “The decision must rest with the Presidio and the emperor.”
“Ever since he fell through the covering of my palanquin, Drak, I have felt an affection for your father.”
That wasn’t quite as Drak had heard the story from his mother; he let it pass without comment. Lushfymi was a formidable woman, a queen acting perfectly within her rights, and a force of personality and character able to deal with any and every aspect of running Vallia as empress.
Lushfymi, conscious of the power she held over Drak and yet frustratingly aware that the conclusion for which she hungered appeared as far away as ever, lay back on her pillows. She smiled, a wan yet brave little smile. She knew she was beautiful, not just because everyone told her so but because she could see the evidence in her mirror day by day.
“Drak, dear, I am very tired. I am so pleased to see you, but—”
“Of course.”
“Drak — kiss me before you go — please...”
He kissed her on the cheek and she turned her head so that her full soft lips met his. She knew all there was to know about kissing. Drak drew back, feeling the passion there. He managed a smile, and then turned and contrived to keep from stumbling as he made for the door.
By Zair! What an empress she would make! And what a wife! He could not mistake the naked passion blazing in her, and no matter how much of that was for the position of empress and how little for himself as a man, whatever she spared him would be more than enough for any man. No other woman had ever aroused so deep emotions within him, except for Silda, of course; but Silda was different.
The next day his mother, Silda, and her new stepmother, Queen Mab, flew in. They were closely followed by a second voller bringing Senator Naghan Strandar, a senior and highly valued member of the Presidio, from Vondium.
The welcomes were genuine and warm, the rejoicings great. Drak found Milsi to be delightful. She, for her part, saw at once that Silda had better marry Drak quickly. The man was a splendid person; but he needed a great deal of female instruction. With Lushfymi acting as the wounded heroine of a battle, for all that the fight had been but a skirmish, Silda’s light was being eclipsed.
Naghan Strandar brought the decision. Alloran was to be pardoned on account of sorcery, and to be restored as Kov of Kaldi. Drak was pleased.
During the next days the mercenaries, willing to go fight for Queen Lush if they were paid, prepared to embark for Lome. The town hummed with activity. During this time there were opportunities for enjoyment, dances, routs, balls and festive occasions. Lushfymi mended apace. Silda and Milsi got on famously. And the women scrupulously made no mention of the reason for their visit, were exquisitely polite to Queen Lush, oohing and aahing at her version of the battle in which she had been wounded.
Delia, sizing up Leone Starhammer, agreed to take the Jikai Vuvushi into her personal regiment. There was no chance that Leone could serve Queen Lush again, and every chance she’d die of the attempt if she made it.
The mercenaries sailed in the fleet gathered by Alloran in his attempt to conquer the islands. Naghan Strandar informed the Lomians that the Presidio had vetoed Kapt Lakelmi’s plan to take his remaining forces to Lome. He would go with Alloran back to Kaldi. The large island of Womox, off the west coast, had been recaptured by Delia’s Blue Mountain Boys. Vallia was being reunited. North Vallia remained to be brought back into the fold. But the Vallians were aware that they were being held in reserve against the horrendous invasions of the Shanks, fishmen from over the curve of the world, who would destroy all of Paz if they were not stopped.
News came in when the town lay quiet after all the excitements that Kovneva Katrin Rashumin had been in hiding with the wizards in their island of Fruningen. She was returning to her kovnate of Rahartdrin. Delia was overjoyed at the news, for Katrin was a trusted friend of standing. San Fraipur smiled, nodding, and said words to the effect that wizards of his home were not onkers.
One day Milsi said to her stepdaughter, “Silda, my dear, I really do think I must join your father in Balkan. He needs me up there.”
“Very well, Milsi.” Silda wasn’t going in for the mother style of address. “I understand. Give him my love.”