Helliconia Summer

XIX Oldorando

The suns blazed down out of a cloudless sky, flattening the veldt with their combined light.

King JandolAnganol, Eagle of Borlien, enjoyed being in the wilderness again. His way of enjoyment was not every man’s. It consisted mainly of hard marches interspersed with short rests. This was not to the taste of the C’Sarr’s pleasure-loving envoy, Alam Esomberr.

The king and his force, with attendant ecclesiastics, approached Oldorando from the south along one of the old Pilgrim’s Ways, which led on through Oldorando to Holy Pannoval.

Oldorando stood at the crossroads of Campannlat. The migratory route of the phagors and the various ucts of the Madis ran east and west close by the city. The old salt road meandered north into the Quzints and Lake Dorzin. To the west lay Kace—slatternly Kace, home of cutthroats, craftsmen, vagabonds, and villains; to the south lay Borlien—friendly Borlien, home of more villains.

JandolAnganol was approaching a country at war, like his own, with barbarians. That war between Oldorando and Kace had broken out because of the ineffectiveness of King Sayren Stund as much as the nastiness of the Kaci.

Faced with the collapse of the Second Army, JandolAnganol had made what was widely regarded as a cowardly peace with the hill clans of Kace, sending them valuable tributes of grain and veronikane in order to seal the armistice.

To the Kaci, peace was relative; they were long accustomed to internecine struggles. They simply hung their crossbows on the back of the hut door and resumed their traditional occupations. These included hunting, blood feuds, potting—they made excellent pottery which they traded with the Madi for rugs—stealing, mining precious stones, and goading their scrawny womenfolk into working harder. But the war with Borlien, sporadic though it had been, instilled in the clans a new sense of unity.

Failing by some chance to quarrel during their extensive victory celebrations—when JandolAnganol’s grain tribute was converted into something more potable—the leading clans of Kace accepted as their universal suzerain a powerful brute called Skrumppabowr. As a kind of goodwill gesture on his election, Skrumppabowr had all the Oldorandans living on Kaci land slaughtered, or ‘staked’ as the local term was.

Skrumppabowr’s next move was to repair the damage done by war to irrigation terraces and to villages in the southeast. To this end, he encouraged ancipitals to come in to Kace from Randonan, Quain, and Oldorando. In exchange for their labour, he guaranteed the phagors freedom from the drumbles racking Oldorando. Being heathen, the Kaci clans saw no reason to persecute the phagors as long as they behaved themselves and never looked at Kaci women.

JandolAnganol heard of these events with pleasure. They confirmed his sense of himself as a diplomat. The Takers were less pleased. The Takers were the militants of the Holy Pannovalan Empire, with highly placed connections within the See of Pannoval itself. Kilandar IX, so it was rumoured, had been a Taker himself in his young days.

A mounted arm of Takers, striking out from Oldorando City, made a daring raid on Akace, the squalid mountain settlement which served as a capital, and slaughtered over a thousand newly arrived phagors overnight, together with a few Kaci.

This success proved less than a victory. On their way home, the Takers, rendered careless by the outcome of their raid, were ambushed by Lord Skrumppabowr’s clans and slaughtered in their turn, many in sadistic ways. Only one Taker returned to Oldorando, more dead than alive, to tell the tale. A thin bamboo rod had been driven through his body from his anus; the sharp end protruded from behind the clavicle of his right shoulder. He had been staked.

Reports of this outrage reached King Sayren Stund. He declared a holy war on the barbarians and set a price on Skrumppabowr’s head. Blood had since been spilt on both sides, but mainly on the Oldorandan side. At the present time, half the Oldorandan army—in which no phagors were allowed to serve—was away making forced marches among the wilderness of shoatapraxi which abounded on Kace hillsides.

The king soon lost interest in the struggle. After the murder of his elder daughter, Simoda Tal, he retreated into the confines of his palace and was rarely seen. He bestirred himself when he heard of JandolAnganol’s approach, but then only at the concerted prompting of his advisors, his Madi queen, and his surviving daughter, Milua Tal.

“How are we to amuse this great king, Sayren, sweetest?” asked Queen Bathkaarnet-she, in her singing voice. “I am such a poor thing, a flower, and I am lame. A limp flower. Will you wish me to sing my songs of the Journey to him?”

“I don’t care for the man, personally. He’s without culture,” said her husband. “Jandol will bring his phagor guard, since he can’t afford to pay real soldiers. If we must endure the pestilential things in our capital, perhaps they’ll amuse us with their animal antics.”

Oldorando’s climate was hot and enervating. The eruption of Mount Rustyjonnik had opened up a chain of volcanic activity. A sulphurous pall often hung over the land. The flags which the king ordered to be put out to greet his Borlienese cousin hung limp in the airless atmosphere.

As for the King of Borlien, impatient energy possessed him. The march from Gravabagalinien had taken the best part of a tenner, first over the loess farmlands then across wild country. No pace was rapid enough for JandolAnganol. Only the First Phagorian Made no complaint.

Bad news continued to reach the column. Crop failure and famine were everywhere in his kingdom; evidence of that lay all around. The Second Army was not merely defeated: it was never going to reemerge from the jungles of Randonan. Such few men as came back slunk to their own homes, swearing they would never soldier again. The phagor battalions which had survived disappeared into the wilds.

From the capital, the news was no more encouraging, JandolAnganol’s ally, Archpriest BranzaBaginut, wrote that Matrassyl was in a state of ferment, with the barons threatening to take over and rule in the name of the scritina. It behoved the king to act positively, and as soon as possible.

He enjoyed being on the move, delighted in living off what game there was, rejoicing in the evening bivouac, and even tolerated days of brilliant sunshine, away from the coastal monsoons. It was as if he took pleasure from the ferment of emotions that filled him. His face became leaner, tenser, his waywardness more marked.

Alam Esomberr felt less enthusiastic. Brought up in his father’s house in the subterranean recesses of Pannoval, he was unhappy in the open and mutinous about the forced pace. The dandified envoy of the Holy C’Sarr called a halt at last, knowing he had the support of his weary retinue.

It was dimday, when fat, brilliant flowers opened among the lustreless grasses, inviting the attention of dusk-moths. A bird called, hammering at its two notes.

They had left the loess farmlands behind and were traversing a farmless moor which supported few villages. For shade, the envoy’s party retreated under an enormous denniss tree, whose leaves sighed in the breeze. The denniss sprouted many trunks, some young, some ancient, which propped themselves up languidly—like Esomberr himself—with gnarled elbows as they sprawled on the ground in all directions.

“What can drive you like this, Jandol?” Esomberr asked. “What are we hurrying for, except for hurrying’s abominable sake? To put it another way, what fate awaits you in Oldorando better than the one you revoked in Gravabagalinien?”

He eased his legs and looked up with his amused glance into the king’s countenance.

JandolAnganol squatted nearby, balancing on his toes. A faint smell of smoke came to his nostrils, and he searched the distance for its origin. He threw small pebbles at the earth.

A group of the king’s captains, the Royal Armourer, and others leant on their staffs, a short distance away. Some smoked veronikanes, one teased Yuli, prodding the creature with his staff.

“We must reach Oldorando as soon as possible.” He spoke as one who wants no argument, but Esomberr persisted.

“I’m eager to see that somewhat squalid city myself, if only to soak for a few millennia in one of their famous hot springs. That doesn’t mean I’m anxious to run all the way there. You’re a changed man since your Pannoval days, Jandol—not quite such fun, if I may say so…”

The king threw his pebbles more violently. “Borlien needs an alliance with Sayren Stund. That deuteroscopist who presented me with my three-faced timepiece, Bardol CaraBansity, said I had no business in Oldorando. A conviction seized me at that moment that I had to go there. My father supported me. His dying words to me were—as he lay dying in my arms—‘Go to Oldorando.’ Since that fool TolramKetinet allowed his army to be wiped out, I can only seek union with Oldorando. The fates of Borlien and Oldorando have always been linked.” He flung down a final stone with violence, as if to destroy all argument.

Esomberr said nothing. He plucked a grass blade to suck, suddenly self-conscious under the king’s stare.

After a moment JandolAnganol jumped up, to stand with his feet planted apart.

“Here stand I. While I press upon the earth, the energies of the earth surge up through my body. I am of the Borlienese soil. I am a natural force.”

He raised his arms, fingers tensed.

The phagors, armed with their matchlocks, lay about at a short distance, like shapeless cattle, looking over the plain. Some rooted under stones and found grubs or rickybacks, which they ate. Others stood without movement, beyond the occasional swing of the head or a flick of the ears to ward off flies. Winged things buzzed in the shade. Made uneasy, Esomberr sat up.

“I don’t understand what you mean, but do enjoy yourself.” His voice was dry.

The king scrutinized the horizon as he spoke. “An example for you, so that you understand well the kind of man I am. Although I may have rejected my Queen MyrdemInggala for whatever reason, nevertheless she remains mine. If I discovered that you, for instance, had dared to enter her bedchamber to consort with her while we were in Gravabagalinien, then, notwithstanding our friendship, I would kill you without compunction, and hang your eddre from this tree.”

Neither of them moved. Then Esomberr rose and stood with his back to one of the trunks of the denniss. His narrow handsome face had grown as pale as a dead leaf.

“I say, did it ever occur to you that those damned phagors of yours, well armed, with Sibornalese weapons, strike fear into ordinary chaps like me? That they will most likely meet with an ill reception in Sayren Stund’s capital, where a holy drumble is in progress? Are you ever afraid that you might… well, grow to be a bit like a phagor yourself?”

The king turned slowly, with an expression denoting total lack of interest in the question.

“Watch.”

He screwed his face into a mixture of grimace and grin, and snorted breath through his nose. He broke into a run, gathered himself, and leaped clear over one of the trunks of the tree, a full four feet above the ground. It was a perfect jump. He recovered himself, turned, and jumped the trunk in the opposite direction, with a force which carried him almost against Esomberr.

The king was half a head taller than the envoy. The latter, alarmed, reached for his sword, then stood without movement, tense against the king.

“I am twenty-five years of age, in fine condition, and fear neither man nor phagor. My secret is that I am capable of going with circumstances. Oldorando shall be my circumstance. I gain energy from the geometry of circumstance… Do not vex me, Alam Esomberr, or forget my words about the sanctity of what was once mine. I am one of your circumstances, and not vice versa.”

The envoy moved to one side, coughed as a reason for moving his hand from his sword hilt to his mouth, and managed a pale smile.

“You’re terribly fit, I see that. That’s tremendous. By the beholder, but I envy you. It’s a wretched nuisance that I and my little rabble of vicars aren’t in such fine trim. I’ve often thought that praying vitiates the muscles. Therefore, I must request that you proceed ahead with your party and your favoured species—at your breakneck pace—while we follow on behind at our own feeble pace, eh?”

JandolAnganol regarded him without change of expression. Then he gave a fierce grimace. “Very well. The country hereabouts is peaceful, but guard yourselves. Robbers have scant respect for vicars. Remember you carry my bill of divorcement.”

“Strive ever onwards, if you will. I shall deliver your bill to the C’Sarr in good time.” He gave a wave of his hand and left it dangling in front of him. The king did not take it.

Instead, JandolAnganol turned away without further word and whistled Yuli to his side. He called the gillot leader of the guard, Ghht-Mlark Chzarn. The ahuman columns formed up and marched away; the humans followed more informally. In a short while, Alam Esomberr, together with his followers, was left standing silent under the denniss tree. Then the figures were lost to JandolAnganol amid the shade. Soon the great tree itself was lost in the shimmering heat of the plain.

Two days later, the king halted his force only a few miles short of Oldorando. Wisps of smoke trailed across the rolling landscape.

He stood by one of the aged stone pillars which dotted the landscape. Impatient for the rear of the phagor column to catch up, JandolAnganol traced with one finger the worm design on the stone, a familiar pattern of two concentric circles with curving lines running from inner to outer circle. Just for a moment, he wondered what the pillar and its pattern could signify; but such enigmas—presumably never capable of resolution, any more than he expected to be told what long-dead king had erected the stones—occupied his mind only for a moment. His thoughts were all on what lay immediately ahead.

They had reached a region which was in fact a hinterland of the fabled city they were approaching.

Of that city, there was as yet no sign. The view comprised low rolling hills, the foothills of the foothills of the Quzint Mountains, running like an armoured spine over the continent. Ahead, sprawling across the ground, was one of the ucts, threading its way into the distance on either side.

The uct here formed a tawny rather than a green line, comprising few large trees, but many bushes and cyclads, entwined by gaudy mantle flowers, the seeds of which migrant tribes chewed as they progressed.

No road was as wide as this uct. Unlike a road, however, it was not to be travelled by humans. Despite the depredations of arang and fhlebiht, it had become impenetrable. The Madi tribes with their animals travelled along its edge. There, scattering seeds and droppings, the protognostics unthinkingly widened the uct. Year by year it spread, becoming a strip of forest.

Not that the strip was regular. Alien growths like a shoatapraxi, introduced as burrs on the coats of animals, had prospered in places where they could take advantage of favourable soil conditions and spread in thickets. The Madi skirted the new thickets, or else plunged through them leaving a trail later obliterated by further waves of aliens.

What was incidental became established. The uct served as a barrier. Butterflies and small animals found on one side of the barrier were not to be seen on the other. There were birds and rodents and a deadly golden snake which kept to the shelter of the uct and never ventured beyond its confines as they spread across the continent. Several kinds of Others lived their pranksome lives out in the uct.

Humans, too, recognized the existence of the uct by using it as a frontier. This uct marked the frontier between Northern Borlien and the land of Oldorando.

And that frontier was on fire.

A lava flow from a newly erupting volcano had set the uct ablaze. It had begun to burn along its length like a fusee.

Instruments on the Avernus were recording details of increasing volcanic activity on the world approaching periastron below. Data relayed to Earth concerning Mount Rustyjonnik showed that the material from the eruption rose to a height of 50 kilometres. The lower layers of this cloud were carried rapidly eastwards, circling the globe in 15 days. The material rising above 21 kilometres moved westwards with the prevailing flow of the lower stratosphere, to circle the globe in 60 days.

Similar readings were obtained for other eruptions. Dust clouds gathering in the stratosphere were about to double Helliconia’s albedo, reflecting the increasing heat of Freyr away from the surface. Thus the elements of the biosphere worked like an interrelated body or machine to preserve its vital processes.

During the decades when Freyr was closest to Helliconia, the planet would be shielded by acidic dust layers from its worst effects.

Nowhere was this dramatic homeostasis observed with more wonder and awe than on Earth.

On Helliconia, the forest fire was the end of the world for many frightened creatures. To a more detached view, it was a sign of the world’s determination to save itself and its freight of organic life.

JandolAnganol’s forces waited, tucked in a shallow valley. A pall of smoke to the east announced the approach of the fire. Numbers of hairy pigs and deer ran along the line of the uct westwards to safety. Herds of slower fhlebiht followed, setting up a massive bleating as they passed.

Families of Others went by, encouraging their young in a human fashion. They had dark fur and white faces. Some species were tailless. They swung deftly from branch to branch and were gone.

JandolAnganol rose and stood in a crouch to watch the game go by. The little runt Yuli leapt up sportively to join him. The phagors continued to rest impassively like cattle, chewing their day’s ration of porridge and pemmican.

To the east, Madis and their flocks were fleeing before the blaze. While some of their animals bolted for freedom or ran in terror into the thicket, the protognostics themselves remained obedient to custom and followed the line of the uct.

“Blind fools!” exclaimed JandolAnganol.

His quick mind devised a plan. Ordering up a section of phagorian guard, he set a trap into action. When the leading Madis came up, a rope draped with thorn-lianas from the thickets suddenly sprang into the air before them. They came to a confused halt, sheep, asokins, and dogs milling about their legs.

Their Madi faces were as innocuous as the faces of parrots or flowers. Foreheads and jaws receded, eyes and noses were prominent, giving them a permanent look of incredulity before the world. The males had bosses on foreheads and jaws. Their hair was glossy brown. They called to each other in despairing pigeon voices.

Out leaped the phagor section from its concealment. Each phagor closed in on the frightened Madis. Each caught three or four by their arms, arms burned red by the suns and powdered by the dust of the track. They came without fight. A gillot caught the bellwether, an asokin with a can thumping against its chest. The ewes stood meekly by.

Some Madis tried to run. JandolAnganol clubbed two with his fist, sending them sprawling. They lay crying in the dirt. But others were coming up from the rear all the while, and he let them go.

His party forced their way through the uct with their bag. The dense coats of the phagors rendered them immune to thorns. Driving their captives before them, they crossed over from Borlien to Oldorando. They were safely on their way when the fire passed through the strip, travelling at a brisk walking pace, leaving ashes behind it.

It was in this manner that the royal party arrived at the city of Oldorando, more resembling shepherds than royalty. Their protognostic prisoners were torn and bleeding from the uct thicket, as were many of the humans. The king himself was covered in dust.

There was about Oldorando something almost theatrical, perhaps because at its heart lay the gaudy stage on which worship of Akhanaba the ox-faced All-Powerful was at its most resplendent. True worship is solitary; when the religious gather together, they put on pageants for their gods.

Lying in the steamy centre of Campannlat, threaded by the River Valvoral which connected it with Matrassyl and—ultimately—the sea, Oldorando was a city of travellers. Mostly they came to worship or, if not to worship, to trade.

In the physical form of the city was commemorated the long existence of these opposed intentions. The Holyval sector of the city ran in a diagonal line from southwest to northeast, rising above the sprawl of commerce like a fretted cliff. Holyval included the Old City, with its quaint seven-storey towers, in which lived permanent religious communities. Here were the Academicians, a female order. Here, too, were pilgrims and beggars, as well as god’s scum, those who beat empty breasts. Here were courts of shadow and places of prayer sunk deep into the earth. Here too stood the Dom with its attendant monastries, and King Sayren Stund’s palace.

It was generally agreed—at least by those whose lives were enclosed by Holyval—that this sector of saintliness, this diagonal of decency, ran between sewers of worldly vices.

But set in Holyval’s pompous and fretted walls and forbidding ramparts were a variety of doors. Some were opened only on ceremonial occasions. Others allowed access to the Old City only for the privileged. Others admitted only women or only men (no phagors were permitted to sully Holyval). But others, and those among the most used, let even the most secular of persons to come and go as they would. Between the holy and the unholy, as between the living and the dead, was set a barrier which detained nobody from crossing it.

The unholy lived in less grand premises, although even here the rich had built their palaces along the broader boulevards. The wicked prospered, the good made their way through life as best they could. Of the city’s present population of eight hundred and ninety thousand humans, almost one hundred thousand were in religious orders, and served Akhanaba. At least as many were slaves, and served believer and unbeliever alike.

It was in keeping with the shows which Oldorando loved that two messengers clad in blue and gold should wait on JandolAnganol’s arrival at the south gate, with a coach in which to draw him to King Sayren Stund.

JandolAnganol refused the coach and, instead of taking the triumphal route along Wozen Avenue, paraded his dusty company into the Pauk. The Pauk was a comfortable, down-at-heel area of taverns and markets where there were traders who would buy both animals and protognostics.

“Madis don’t fetch much in Embruddock,” said one sturdy dealer, using the old country name for Oldorando. “We got enough of them and, like the Nondads, they don’t work well. Now your phagors would be a different question, but in this city I’m not allowed to trade in phagors.”

“I’m selling only the Madis and animals, man. Your price, or I’ll go elsewhere.”

When a sum had been agreed on, the Madis were sold into captivity and the animals to slaughter. The king retired in satisfaction. He was now better prepared to meet Sayren Stund. Before the transaction, he had not so much as a roon piece on him. Phagors dispatched to Matrassyl for gold had not returned.

Moving in military order, the First Phagorian proceeded up Wozen Avenue, where crowds had assembled to watch them. The crowds cheered JandolAnganol as he strode along with Yuli. He was popular with the rabble of Oldorando, despite his championship of the officially deplored ancipitals. The common people contrasted a lively, eager man favourably with their fat, idle, domestic breed of monarch. The common people did not know the queen of queens. The common people had sympathy for a king whose bride-to-be had been brutally murdered—even if that bride was only a Madi, or half-Madi.

Among the common people went the religious. The clerics were out with banners. RENOUNCE YOUR SINS. THE END OF THE WORLD IS NIGH. REPENT YE WHILE TIME IS. Here as in Borlien, the Pannovalan Church played on public fears in order to bring the independent-minded to heel.

The dusty progress continued. Past the ancient King Denniss Pyramid. Through the Wozen sector. Into the wide Loylbryden Square. On the far side of the square across a stream, Whistler Park. Facing on to square and park, the great Dom of Striving and the picturesque town palace of the king. In the centre of the square, a golden pavilion, in which was seated King Sayren Stund himself, waiting to greet his visitor.

Beside the king sat Queen Bathkaarnet-she, wearing a grey keedrant decorated with black roses, and an uncomfortable crown. Between their majesties on a smaller throne sat their one remaining daughter, Milua Tal. The three of them reposed in absurd dignity under an awning, while the rest of the court sweated in the sun. The heat buzzed with flies. A band played. The absence of soldiers was noticeable, but several elderly officers in resplendent uniforms marched slowly about. The civil guard kept the crowd in order along the perimeters of the square.

The Oldorandan court was known for its stifling formality. Sayren Stund had done his best to soften court etiquette on this occasion, but there remained a line of advisors and church dignitaries, many of them in flowing canonicals, drawn up severely as they waited to shake JandolAnganol’s hand and kiss his cheek.

The Eagle stood with his party of captains and his hunchbacked armourer, surveying them challengingly, the dust of his journey still about him.

“Your parade would do credit to a museum, Cousin Sayren,” he said.

Sayren Stund was dressed, as were his officers, in a severe black charfrul to express mourning. He levered himself out of his throne and came to JandolAnganol with arms extended. JandolAnganol made a bow, holding himself stiffly. Yuli stood a pace behind him, sticking his milt up alternate nostrils, otherwise motionless.

“Greetings in the name of the All-Powerful. The Court of Oldorando welcomes you in your peaceful and fraternal visit to our capital. May Akhanaba make the meeting fruitful.”

“Greetings in the name of the All-Powerful. I thank you for your fraternal reception. I come to offer my condolences and my grief at the death of your daughter, Simoda Tal, my bride-elect.”

As JandolAnganol spoke, his glance, under the line of his eyebrows, was ever active. He did not trust Sayren Stund. Stund paraded him along the ranks of dignitaries, and JandolAnganol allowed his hand to be shaken and his grimy cheek to be kissed.

He saw from Sayren Stund’s demeanour that the King of Oldorando bore him ill will. The knowledge was a torment. Everywhere was hatred in men’s hearts. The murder of Simoda Tal had left its stain, with which he now had to reckon.

After the parade, the queen approached, limping, her hand resting on Milua Tal’s arm. Bathkaarnet-she’s looks had faded, yet there was something in her expression, in the way she held her head—submissively yet perkily—which affected JandolAnganol. He recalled a remark of Sayren Stund’s which had once been reported to him—why had that lodged in his memory?—“Once you have lived with a Madi woman, you want no other.”

Both Bathkaarnet-she and her daughter had the captivating bird faces of their kind. Though Milua Tal’s blood had been diluted with a human stream, she presented an exotically dark, brilliant impression, with enormous eyes glowing on either side of her aquiline nose. When she was presented, she gazed direct at JandolAnganol, and gave him the Look of Acceptance. He thought briefly of SartoriIrvrash’s mating experiments; here if ever was a fertile cross-breeding.

He was pleased to gaze on this one bright face among so many dull ones, and said to her, “You much resemble the portrait I was sent of your sister. Indeed, you are even more beautiful.”

“Simoda and I were much alike, and much different, like all sisters,” Milua Tal replied. The music of her voice suggested to him many things, fires in the night, baby Tatro cooing in a cool room, pigeons in a wooden tower.

“Our poor Milua is overcome by the assassination of her sister, as we all are,” said the king, with a noise which incorporated the best features of a sigh and a belch. “We have agents out far and wide, pursuing the killer, the villain who posed as a Madi to gain entrance to the palace.”

“It was a cruel blow against us both.”

Another compendious sigh. “Well, Holy Council will be held next week, with a special memorial service for our departed daughter, which the Holy C’Sarr himself will bless with his presence. That will cheer us. You must stay with us for that event, Cousin, and be welcome. The C’Sarr will be delighted to greet such a valued member of his Community—and it would be to your advantage to pass time with him, as you will realize. Have you met His Holiness?”

“I know his envoy, Alam Esomberr. He will arrive shortly.”

“Ah. Yes. Hmm. Esomberr. A witty fellow.”

“And adventurous,” said JandolAnganol.

The band struck up. They proceeded across the square to the palace, and JandolAnganol found Milua Tal by his side. She looked up brightly at him, smiling. He asked her conspiratorially, “Are you prepared to tell me your age, ma’am, if I keep it a secret?”

“Oh, that’s one of the questions I hear most often,” she said, dismissively. “Together with ‘Do you like being a princess?’ Persons think me in advance of my age, and they must be right. The increased heat of the present period brings younger persons on, develops them in every way. I have dreamed the dreams of an adult for over a year. Did you ever dream you were in the powerful irresistible embrace of a fire god?”

He bent to her ear and said in a ferocious whisper, playfully, “Before I reveal to you if I am that very fire god, I shall have to answer my own question. I’d put you at no more than nine years old.”

“Nine years and five tenners,” she replied, “but it is emotions, not years, which count.”

The facade of the palace was long, and three storeys high, with massive polished columns of rajabaral rising through the marked horizontals of the upper storeys. The roof swept flamboyantly upwards, tiled with blue tiles made by Kaci potters. The palace had been first built over three hundred and fifty small years ago, after Oldorando was partially destroyed by phagor invasion; although its timbers had been renewed since, the original design was adhered to. Elaborately carved wooden screens, protected the unglazed windows. The doors were of the same type of carving, but veneered in silver, and backed by wooden panels. A tubular gong was struck within, the doors opened, and Sayren Stund led his guests inside.

There followed two days of banqueting and empty speeches. The hot water springs for which Oldorando was famous also played their part. A service of thanksgiving was held in the Dom, attended by many high-ranking dignitaries of the Church. The singing was magnificent, the costumes impressive, the darkness in the great underground vault all that Akhanaba could desire.

JandolAnganol prayed, sang, spoke, submitted to ceremony, and confided in no one.

All were uncertain of this strange man, all kept their eyes on him. And his eyes were on all. It was clear why some called him the Eagle.

He took care to see that the First Phagorian Guard was suitably housed. For a city that hated phagors, they were well provided for. Across the Loylbryden Square from the Dom was Whistler Park, an area of green entirely surrounded by the Valvoral or its tributaries. Here were preserved brassim trees. Here also was the Hour Whistler of continent-wide fame. This geyser blew with a shrill note at every hour, with the greatest accuracy. Days, weeks, tenners, years, centuries, went by; still the Hour Whistler blew. Some said the hour’s length, and the forty minutes which divided the hour, had been decided by this noise issuing from the earth.

An ancient seven-storey tower and some new pavilions stood on the margins of the park. The phagors were billeted in the pavilions. The four bridges into the park were guarded, by phagors on the inner and humans on the outer side, so that no one could get into the park to molest the ancipitals.

Crowds soon gathered to watch the ancipital soldiery across the water. These well-drilled, placid-seeming creatures were far different from the phagors of popular imagination, where they rode godlike on great rust-red steeds, travelling at godlike speeds to bring destruction among men. Those riders of the icy storm had little in common with the beasts marching dourly about the park.

As JandolAnganol left his cohorts to return to Sayren Stund, he noticed how restless they were. He spoke to Phagor-Major Chzarn, but could get from her only that the guard needed a while to settle into new quarters.

He assumed that the noise of the Hour Whistler caused them some irritation. Giving them words of reassurance, he left, the runt capering along at his side. A sulphurous volcano smell filled the air.

Milua Tal met him as he entered the silver gates of the palace. In the last two days he had grown increasingly fond of her volatile company, her cooing pigeon voice.

“Some of your friends have arrived. They say they’re holy, but everyone seems to be holy here. The chief of them doesn’t look holy. He’s too handsome to be holy. He looks naughty to me. Do you like naughty people, King Jandol?—because I think I’m rather naughty.”

He laughed.

“I think you are naughty. So are most people. Including some of the holy ones.”

“So it is necessary to be exceptionally naughty to stand out from the crowd?”

“That’s a reasonable deduction.”

“Is that why you stand out from the crowd?”

She slipped her hand into his, and he clasped it.

“There are other reasons. Being a fire god is one.”

“I find most people are terribly disappointing. Do you know, when my sister was murdered, we found her sitting upright in a chair, fully dressed. No blood visible. That was disappointing. I imagined pools of blood. I imagined people threw themselves all over the place when they were getting killed, as if they hated what was happening.”

JandolAnganol asked in a hard voice, “How was she killed?”

“Zygankes, stabbed right through the heart with a fuggie horn! Father says it was a fuggie horn. Right slap through her clothes and her heart.” She glanced suspiciously at Yuli, following his master, but Yuli had been dehorned.

“Were you frightened?”

She gave him a scornful look. “I never think about it. At all. Well, I think about her sitting upright, I suppose. Her eyes were still frozen open.”

They entered the tapestried reception hall. Milua Tal’s warning had served to alert JandolAnganol to the arrival of Alam Esomberr and his ‘little rabble of vicars’, as Esomberr had called them. They were surrounded by a crowd of Oldorandan grandees, from whom a bumble of polite regard arose.

The eagle eye of the king, penetrating to the rear of the chamber, observed another familiar figure who, as the king arrived, was being bustled out of a rear door. The figure turned to look back as he left the room and his gaze, despite all the heads in between, met JandolAnganol’s. Then he was gone, and the door closed behind him.

On the entry of the king, Esomberr broke courteously from his companions and came forward to make a bow to JandolAnganol, giving one of his mocking smiles.

“Here we are, as you see, Jandol, my somewhat ecclesiastical party and I. One twisted ankle, one case of food poisoning, one envoy longing for the fleshpots, otherwise all in good order. Travel-stained, of course, from a preposterously long walk across your domains…” They embraced formally.

“I’m glad you are preserved, Alam. You will find the fleshpots rather gloomy here, that’s my impression.”

Esomberr was eyeing the runt standing by the king’s side. He made playfully to pat Yuli, and then withdrew his hand. “You don’t bite, do you, thing?”

“I’m zivilized,” said Yuli.

Esomberr raised an eyebrow. “I don’t want to speak out of turn, Jandol, but will this rather stuffy crowd here, Sayren Stund and company, tolerate even a zivilized you-know-what in their midst? There’s a drumble on at present—to celebrate the death of your betrothed, I gather…”

“I’ve met no trouble yet—but the C’Sarr arrives soon. You had better get your fleshpotting in before then. By the way, I have just seen my ex-chancellor, SartoriIrvrash. Do you know anything about him?”

“Hmmm. Yes, yes, I do, sire.” Esomberr rubbed his elegant nose with a finger. “He and a Sibornalese lady came upon me and my rabble of vicars shortly after you and your phagorian infantry had trotted on ahead in your brisk, forceful manner. Both he and the Sibornalese lady were on hoxney-back. They journeyed the rest of the way with us.”

“What business has he in Oldorando?”

“Fleshpots?”

“Try again. What did he tell you?”

Alam Esomberr cast his eyes down to the floor as if seeking to recall an elusive memory. “Zygankes, travel does soften the mind… hm. Why, I really cannot say, sire. Perhaps you had best ask him yourself?”

“He had come from Gravabagalinien? Why was he there?”

“Sire, perhaps he wished to view the sea, as I’ve heard some men do before they die.”

“In that case, his wish could have been premonitory,” said JandolAnganol, with spirit. “You are not helpful this evening, Alam.”

“Forgive me. My legs are in such shape that my head is also affected. I may be more effectual after I have bathed and dined. Meanwhile, I assure you that I am no friend of your somewhat gaseous ex-chancellor.”

“Except that you both would rid the world of phagors.”

“So would most men if they had the courage to act. Phagors and fathers.”

They regarded each other. “We had better not get to the subject of courage,” said JandolAnganol, and walked away.

He plunged into a group where men in grand ornamental charfruls and exotic hairpieces were conversing with King Sayren Stund, interrupting them without apology. Sayren Stund looked flustered, but reluctantly asked his audience to leave him. A space was cleared about the two kings. Immediately, a lackey came forward with a silver tray, to present glasses of iced wine. JandolAnganol turned. Only half deliberately, he knocked the tray from the man’s hand.

“Tut-tut-tut,” said Sayren Stund. “No matter, it was an accident, I saw that. Plenty more wine. And more ice, as a matter of fact, delivered now by a lady captain, Immya Muntras. We must accustom ourselves to such innovations.”

“Brother king, never mind the niceties of conversation. You are sheltering here in your palace a man who was my chancellor, of whom I rid myself, a man I think my enemy, since he went over to the Sibornalese cause, by name SartoriIrvrash. What does he want here? Has he brought you some secret message from my ex-queen, as I fear?”

“The man you mention arrived here only twenty minutes ago, along with gentry of good character, such as Alam Esomberr. I agreed to give him shelter. He has a lady with him. I assure you they are not to be guests under this roof.”

“She is Sibornalese. I dismissed that man. I conclude that he cannot be here to do me any favours. Where will they lodge?”

“Dear Brother, I hardly think that is business of mine or yours. The dusk-moth must keep to the dusk, as we say.”

“Where will he stay? Are you protecting him? Be frank with me.”

Sayren Stund had been sitting on a high chair. He rose with dignity and said, “It grows heated in here. Let us take a walk in the garden before we become overheated.” He gestured to his wife to remain behind.

They progressed through the room amid a corridor of bows. Only the runt Yuli followed. The gardens were lit by flambeaux set in niches. Since almost as little air circulated as in the palace, the torches burned with a steady flame. A sulphurous smell hung about the neatly trimmed avenues.

“I do not wish to vex you, Brother Sayren,” JandolAnganol said. “But you understand that I have unknown enemies here. I perceived just by the look of SartoriIrvrash, by his expression, that he is now my enemy, come to make trouble for me. Do you deny that?”

Sayren Stund had taken better control of himself. He was corpulent and he wheezed as he walked. He said coolly, “You appreciate that the common people of Oldorando, or Embruddock, as some like to say, affecting the old mode, regard men of your country—this is not a prejudice I share, you understand—as barbarians. I cannot educate them out of the illusion, not even by stressing the religion we have in common.”

“How does this answer my question?”

“Dear, I’m out of breath. I think I have an allergy. May I ask you if you keep that fuggie following at heel simply to offend me and my queen?” He indicated Yuli with a contemptuous gesture.

It was the turn of JandolAnganol to be at a loss.

“He’s no more than—a pet hound. He follows me everywhere.”

“It’s an insult to bring that creature into this court. It should be housed on Whistler Island with the rest of the animals.”

“I tell you, it’s just a favourite hound. It sleeps outside my bedchamber door at night and will bark if there’s danger.”

Sayren Stund stopped walking, clasped his hands behind his back, and gazed intently into a bush.

“We should not quarrel, we both have our difficulties, I in Kace, you at home in Matrassyl, if the reports that reach me are to be trusted. But you cannot bring that creature into my court—the force of the opinion of the court is against it, whatever I personally may say.”

“Why did you not say this when I arrived, two days ago?”

A heavy sigh from the Oldorandan king. “You have had two days’ grace. Think of it like that. The Holy C’Sarr arrives shortly, as you know. The honour of receiving him means much, but is a grave responsibility. He will not tolerate the sight of a phagor. You are too difficult for us, Jandol. Since you have exhausted your purpose here, why do you not return to your capital tomorrow, with your troupe of animals?”

“Am I that unwelcome? You invited me to stay for the C’Sarr’s visit. What poison has SartoriIrvrash poured in your ear?”

“The occasion when the Holy C’Sarr is present must pass of peacefully. Perhaps the alliance with powerful Pannoval is more important to me than to you, since my kingdom is nearer. Frankly, fuggies and fuggy-lovers are not popular in this part of the world. If you have no purpose here, then I suggest we give you godspeed tomorrow.”

“If I have a purpose?”

Sayren Stund cleared his throat. “What purpose? We are both religious men, Jandol. Let us go and pray and be scourged together now, and part as friends and allies in the morning. Isn’t that best? Then your visit can be sweetly remembered. I will give you a boat with which you can sail rapidly down the Valvoral and be home in no time. Can you smell the flowering zaldal? Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“I see.” JandolAnganol folded his arms. “Very well, then, if that is as deep as your friendship and your religion go—we shall quit your presence on the morrow.”

“We shall sorrow to see you leave us. So will our queen and daughter.”

“I comply with your request, and poorly I think of it. In return, answer my question. Where is SartoriIrvrash?”

The King of Oldorando showed sudden spirit. “You have no right to think poorly of my request. Do you imagine my daughter would be dead today if you had not been espoused to her? It was a political killing—she had no personal enemies, poor girl. Then you come to my court with your filthy fuggies and expect to be made welcome.”

“Sayren, I say truly, I grieve for the death of Simoda Tal. If I found the murderer, I would know how to deal with him. Do not increase my sorrow by laying that evil at my door.”

Sayren Stund ventured to rest his hand upon the arm of his brother king.

“Do not worry yourself about—the man you mention, your ex-chancellor. We have given him a room in one of the monastic hostels which lie behind this palace and the Dom. You will not have to meet with him. And we will not part foes. That would not do.” He blew his nose. “Just be sure you leave Oldorando tomorrow.”

They made each other a bow. JandolAnganol went slowly up to his quarters in a wing of the palace. Yuli followed behind.

Indifferent tapestries hung on the walls here, the board floor was filthy. He knocked on his infantry major’s door. No answer came. On inspiration, he went along to Fard Fantil’s door and knocked. The Royal Armourer called to him to enter. The hunchback sat on his bed, polishing his boots; he jumped to his feet when he saw who entered. A phagor guard stood silent by the window, spear in hand.

JandolAnganol lost no time in coming to the point.

“You’re the very man I want. This is your native city, and you know local customs as I don’t. We leave here tomorrow—yes, it’s unexpected, but there’s no choice. We sail to Matrassyl.”

“Trouble, sire?”

Trouble.”

“He’s tricky, is the king.”

“I want to take SartoriIrvrash with me, prisoner. He’s here, in the city. I want you to find him, overpower him, smuggle him into these quarters. We can’t cut his throat—it would cause too much of a scandal. Get him here, unseen.”

Fard Fantil began to pace up and down the room, clutching his brow. “We can’t do such a thing. It’s impossible. The law won’t allow. What has he done?”

JandolAnganol smacked a fist into his palm. “I know that dangerous old crank’s way of thought. He has developed some mad piece of knowledge to discredit me. It will concern the phagors somehow. Before it gets out, I must have him safe, a prisoner. We leave with him tomorrow, shut in a chest. Nobody will know. He resides in one of the hostels behind this palace. Now, I rely on you, Fard Fantil, for I know you as a good man. Do this, and I will reward you, on my word.”

Still the armourer hesitated. “The law won’t allow.”

In a steely voice, the king said, “You have a phagor here in your chambers. I expressly forbid it. Except for my runt, all ancipitals were to be housed in Whistler Park. You merit a flogging for disobeying my orders—and a demotion.”

“He is my personal servant, sire.”

“Will you get SartoriIrvrash for me, as I request?”

With a sullen look, Fard Fantil agreed.

The king threw a bag of gold onto the bed. It was the money he had acquired in the market, two days previously.

“Good. Disguise yourself as a monk. Go at once. Take that pet of yours with you.”

When man and phagor had gone, JandolAnganol stood for a while in the dark room, thinking. Through the window, he could see YarapRombry’s Comet low in the northern sky. The sight of that bright smudge in the night brought a memory of his last encounter with his father’s gossie, and its prediction that he would meet one in Oldorando who would control his destiny. Was that a reference to SartoriIrvrash? His brain, like a darting glance, looked over other possibilities.

Satisfied that he had done all that might be done in a hostile place, he returned to his quarters, where Yuli had settled himself for sleep before the door as usual. The king gave him a pat as he climbed past.

By the bed, a tray of wine and ice had been placed. Perhaps it was Sayren Stund’s way of showing gratitude to a departing guest. Scowling, JandolAnganol drank off a full glass of the sweet wine, then hurled tray and pitcher into a corner.

Flinging off his clothes, he climbed in among the rugs and immediately slept. He always slept soundly. This night, his sleep was heavier than usual.

His dreams were many and confused. He was numerous things, and at last he was a fire god, paddling through golden fire. But the fire was less flame than liquid. He was a fire god of the sea, and MyrdemInggala was riding a dolphin just ahead of him. He struggled mightily. The sea clutched him.

At last he caught her. He held her tight. The gold was all about them. But the horror that had tagged along on the margins of the dream was moving in rapidly upon him.

MyrdemInggala was other than he thought. An immense weight and sickliness emanated from her body. He was crying as he wrestled with her. The gold ran about his throat and eyes. She felt like—

He broke from the dream into waking. For a moment, he scarcely dared open his eyes. He was in the bed in the Oldorandan palace. He was clutching something. He was trembling violently.

Almost against his wish, his eyes opened. Only the gold from the dream remained. It stained the rugs and silken pillows. It stained him.

Crying out, he sat up, flinging back the skins that covered him. Yuli lay close against him. The runt’s head had been severed. There was only the body. It was cold. Its copious golden blood had ceased to flow and lay congealing in a pool beneath the corpse, and beneath the king.

The king flung himself down on the bare floor, face to the tiles. He wept. The sobs rose from some inner recess and shook his whole stained body.

It was the custom in the Oldorandan court for a service to be held every morning at the tenth hour, in the Royal Chapel, which was under the palace. King Sayren Stund, to honour his guests, invited JandolAnganol each day to read—as was his custom—from the revered Testament of RayniLayan’. Much whispering and speculation filled the chapel on this morning, as the royal members of the faith gathered. Many doubted that the Borlienese king would appear.

The king came down the stairs from his chambers. He had washed himself over and over and dressed, not in a charfrul, but in knee-length tunic, boots, and light cloak. His face was of an extreme pallor. His hands shook. He walked deliberately, taking step by step, and was in control of himself.

As he descended the staircase, his armourer came at the run after him, and spoke.

“Sire, I had no response to my knock at your door earlier. Forgive me. I have the prisoner you named in my room, tied in the garderobe. I will watch him till the ship is ready. Tell me only what time I can smuggle him aboard.”

“Plans may be changed Fard Fantil.”

The king’s manner as much as his words alarmed the armourer. “Are you ill, sire?” Said with an ill-favoured glance upwards from under his brows.

“Go back to your room.” Without a backward look, the king continued to descend, down to the ground floor and down again to the Royal Chapel. He was the last to enter. The introit was playing on vrach and drums. All eyes turned upon him as he walked stiffly, like a boy on stilts, to mount into the box beside Sayren Stund. Only Stund remained gazing towards the altar, eyes blinking rapidly, as if unaware of anything amiss.

The royal box was set apart, in front of the congregation. It was an ornate affair, its carved sides decorated with silver. Six curving steps led up to it. Ranking just below it was a plainer box, reached by only one step, where Queen Bathkaarnet-she sat with her daughter.

JandolAnganol took his place beside the other king, staring ahead, and the service proceeded. Only after the long hymn of praise to Akhanaba did Sayren Stund turn and gesture to JandolAnganol, just as he had done on previous days, to read a part of the Testament.

With slow pace, JandolAnganol descended the six steps, walked across the black and red tiles to the lectern, turned, and faced the congregation. Absolute silence fell. His face was as white as parchment.

He confronted their massed stoney regard. He read curiosity, covert smiles, hatred. Nowhere did he detect sympathy, except on the face of the nine-year-old girl, who shrank down beside her mother. She, he observed, as he directed his full regard at her, mustered the old Madi Look of Acceptance, as she had when first they met.

He spoke. His voice sounded surprisingly feeble but, after a faltering start, gathered strength.

“I wish to say—that is, Your Royal Highnesses, Nobles All, I would say—you must excuse me if I do not read, but instead take this opportunity to address you direct in this holy place, where the All-Powerful hears every word, and looks into every heart.

“I know he must look into your hearts and see how much you wish me well. Just as much as I wish you well. My kingdom is a great and rich one. Yet I have left it to come here almost alone—almost alone. We all are in quest of peace for our peoples. That quest has long been mine, and my father’s before me. My life’s quest is for the prosperity of Borlien. So I have sworn.

“And there is a more personal quest. I am without that thing which a man most desires, even above his service to his country. I lack a queen.

“The stone I set rolling half a year ago still rolls. My resolve was then to marry the House of Stund’s daughter; that intention I shall now carry out.”

He paused as if himself alarmed by what he was about to say. Every eye in the chapel lit on his face to search out the story of his life inscribed there.

“It is therefore not only in response to what His Royal Highness, King Sayren Stund, has done that I announce here, before the throne of one who is above all earthly power, that I—King JandolAnganol of the House of Anganol—intend to unite the nations of Borlien and Oldorando in a blood bond. I mean to take in marriage as soon as is possible the prized and beloved daughter of His Majesty, Princess Milua Tal Stund. The solemnization of our nuptials will take place, Akhanaba willing, in my capital city of Matrassyl, since I am desired to leave for there today.”

Many in the congregation jumped up, in order to see how Sayren Stund responded to this astonishing news. When JandolAnganol ceased speaking, they became like statues under his chill gaze, and again there was absolute silence in the chapel.

Sayren Stund had slipped gradually from his seat and could no longer be seen. The tableau was broken by a cry from Milua Tal, who recovered fast from her initial surprise and rushed across the floor to clasp JandolAnganol.

“I will stand by you,” she said, “and perform as your nuptial wife in all things.”