Helliconia Summer

VI Diplomats Bearing Gifts

King JandolAnganol eventually returned from Oldorando to his queen. Four weeks passed. He ceased to limp. Yet the incident of the Cosgatt was not lost. It was midwinter’s day, and diplomats from Pannoval were expected in Matrassyl.

A dead heat lay over the Borlienese capital, enshrouding the palace on the hill which overlooked the city. The outer walls of the palace shimmered, as if they were a mirage that could be walked through. Centuries ago, in the winter of the Great Year, midwinter’s day had been celebrated in earnest; now it was otherwise. People were too hot to care.

The native courtiers idled in their chambers. The Sibornalese ambassador added ice to his wine and dreamed of the cool women of his home country. Arriving diplomats, loaded with baggage and bribes, sweated under their ceremonial robes and collapsed on couches once the official welcome was over.

The Chancellor of Borlien, SartoriIrvrash went to his musty room and smoked a veronikane, concealing his anger from the king.

This occasion would lead to ill things. He had not arranged it. The king had not consulted him.

Being a solitary man, SartoriIrvrash conducted a solitary kind of diplomacy. His inward belief was that Borlien should not be drawn further into the orbit of powerful Pannoval by an alliance with it or with Oldorando. The three countries were already united by a common religion which SartoriIrvrash, as a scholar, did not share.

There had been centuries when Borlien was dominated by Oldorando. The chancellor did not want to see them return. He understood better than most how backward Borlien was; but falling under Pannoval’s power would not cure that backwardness. The king thought otherwise, and his religious advisors encouraged him so to think.

The chancellor had introduced strict laws into Matrassyl to govern the comings and goings of foreigners. Perhaps his solitariness included a touch of xenophobia; for he banned Madis from the city, while no foreign diplomat was allowed to enjoy sexual intercourse with a Matrassylan woman, on pain of death. He would have introduced laws against phagors had not the king flatly intervened.

SartoriIrvrash sighed. He desired only to pursue his studies. He detested the way power had been thrust upon him; in consequence, he became a tyrant in petty ways, hoping to steel himself to be bold when the stakes were high. Uncomfortable wielding the power he had, he wished for total power.

Then they would not be in this present dangerous situation, where fifty or more foreigners could lord it in the palace as they liked. He knew with cold certainty that the king intended to bring in change and that a drama was in store which would affect the reasonable tenor of his life. His wife had called him unfeeling. SartoriIrvrash knew it was truer to say that his emotions centred round his work.

He hunched his shoulders in a characteristic way; possibly the habit made him look more formidable than he was. His thirty-seven years—thirty-seven years and five tenners, in the precise way the Campannlatians measured age—had told on him, wrinkling his face round his nose and whiskers to make him resemble an intelligent vole.

“You love your king and your fellow men,” he instructed himself, and left the refuge of his chambers.

Like many similar strongholds, the palace was an accumulation of old and new. There had been forts in the caves under the Matrassyl rock during the last great winter. It grew or shrank, became stronghold or pleasure dome, according to the fortunes of Borlien.

The distinguished personages from Pannoval were disturbed by Matrassyl, where phagors were allowed to walk in the street without molestation—and without causing molestation. In consequence they found fault with JandolAnganol’s palace. They called it provincial.

JandolAnganol, in the years when fortune was less against him and his marriage to MyrdemInggala still new, had brought in the best provincial architects, builders, and artists to patch the ravages of time. Particular care had been lavished on the queen’s quarters.

Although the general atmosphere of the palace tended towards the military, there was none of the stifling etiquette which marked the Oldorandan and Pannovalan courts. And in places, some kind of higher culture flourished. The apartments of Chancellor SartoriIrvrash, in particular, provided a rat’s nest of arts and learning.

The chancellor moved grudgingly on his way to consult with the king. To his mind came thoughts which were pleasanter than affairs of state. Only the previous day he had solved a problem which had long puzzled him, an antiquarian problem. Truth and lies were more easily distinguished in the past than the present.

The queen approached him, wearing one of her flame-red gowns, accompanied by her brother and the Princess Tatro, who ran and clutched his leg. The chancellor bowed. Despite his absorption he saw by the queen’s expression that she too was anxious about the diplomatic visit.

“You will have business with Pannoval today,” she said.

“I have to consort with a set of pompous asses, and all the while my history is not getting written.” Then he caught himself and laughed sharply. “My pardon, ma’am, I meant to say merely that I do not reckon Prince Taynth Indredd of Pannoval a great friend of Borlien…”

She sometimes had a slow way of smiling as if she was reluctant to be amused, which started at her eyes, included her nose, and then worked about the curves of her lips.

“We’d agree on that. Borlien lacks great friends at present.”

“Admit it, Rushven, your history will never be finished,” said YeferalOboral, the queen’s brother, using an old nickname. “It simply gives you an excuse to sleep all afternoon.”

The chancellor sighed; the queen’s brother had not his sister’s brains. He said severely, “If you stopped kicking your heels about the court, you could set up an expedition and sail around the world. How that would add to our knowledge!”

“I wish that Robayday had done some such thing,” said MyrdemInggala. “Who knows where the lad is now?”

SartoriIrvrash was not going to waste sympathy on the queen’s son. “I made one new discovery yesterday,” he said. “Do you wish to hear of it or not? Will I bore you? Will the mere sound of such botherations of knowledge cause you to jump from the ramparts?”

The queen laughed her silvery laugh and held his hand. “Come, Yef and I are no dolts. What’s the discovery? Is the world getting colder?”

Ignoring this facetiousness, SartoriIrvrash asked, frowning, “What colour is a hoxney?”

“I know that,” cried the young princess. They’re brown. Everyone knows hoxneys are brown.”

Grunting, SartoriIrvrash lifted her up into his arms. “And what colour were hoxneys yesterday?”

“Brown, of course.”

“And the day before that?”

“Brown, you silly Rushven.”

“Correct, you wise little princess. But if that is the case, then why are hoxneys depicted as being striped in two brilliant colours in the illuminations in ancient chronicles?”

He had to answer his own question. “That is what I asked my friend Bardol CaraBansity down in Ottassol. He flayed a hoxney and examined its skin. And what has he discovered? Why, that a hoxney is not a brown animal as we all believe. It is a brown-striped animal, with brown stripes on a brown background.”

Tatro laughed. “You’re teasing us. If it’s brown and brown, then it’s brown, isn’t it?”

“Yes and no. The lie of the coat shows that a hoxney is not a plain brown animal. It consists of brown stripes. What possible point could there be to that?

“Well, I have hit upon the answer, and you will see how clever I am. Hoxneys were once striped in brilliant stripes, just as the chronicles show. When was that? Why, in the spring of the Great Year, when suitable grazing was available again. Then the hoxneys needed to multiply as rapidly as possible. So they put on their most brilliant sexual display. Nowadays, centuries later, hoxneys are well established everywhere. They don’t need to breed exponentially, so mating display is out. The stripes are dulled down to neutral brown—until the spring of the next Great Year calls them out again.”

The queen made a moue. “If there is another Great Year spring, and we don’t all tumble into Freyr.”

SartoriIrvrash clapped his hands pettishly together. “But don’t you see, this—this adaptive geometry of the hoxneian species is a guarantee that we don’t tumble into Freyr—that it comes near every great summer, and then again recedes?”

“We’re not hoxneys,” said YeferalOboral, gesturing dismissively.

“Your Majesty,” said the chancellor, addressing himself earnestly to the queen, “my discovery also shows that old manuscripts can often be trusted more than we think. You know the king your husband and I are at odds. Intercede for me, I pray. Let a ship be commissioned. Let me be allowed two years away from my duties to sail about the world, collecting manuscripts. Let me make Borlien a centre of learning, as it once was in the days of YarapRombry of Keevasien. Now my wife is dead, there’s little to keep me here, except your fair presence.”

A shadow passed over her face.

“There is a crisis in the king, I feel it. His wound has healed in his flesh but not in his mind. Leave your thought with me, Rushven, and let it wait until this anxious meeting with the Pannovalans is over. I fear what is in store.”

The queen smiled at the old man with considerable warmth. She easily endured his irritability, for she understood its source. He was not entirely good—indeed, she considered some of his experiments pure wickedness, especially the experiment in which his wife was killed. But who was entirely good? SartoriIrvrash’s relationship with the king was a difficult one, and she often tried, as now, to protect him from JandolAnganol’s anger.

Endeavouring to deliver him from his own blindness, she added gently, “Since the incident in the Cosgatt, I have to be careful with his majesty.”

Tatro tugged SartoriIrvrash’s whiskers. “You mustn’t go sailing at your age, Rushven.”

He set her down on the ground and saluted her. “We may all have to make unexpected journeys before we are finished, my dear little Tatro.”

As on most mornings, MyrdemInggala and her brother walked along the western ramparts of the palace and gazed out over the city. This morning, the mists that little winter usually brought were absent. The city lay clear below them.

The ancient stronghold stood on a cliff looming over the town, in a deep curve of the Takissa. Slightly towards the north, the Valvoral gleamed where it joined the greater river. Tatro never tired of looking down at the people in the streets or on the river craft.

The infant princess extended a finger towards the wharfs and cried, “Look, ice coming, Moth!”

A fore- and aft-rigged sloop was moored by the quayside. Its hatches had recently been opened, for steam poured forth into the air. Carts were drawn up alongside the ship, and blocks of finest Lordryardry ice gleamed for a moment in the sun as they were swung from the hold into the waiting vehicles. As ever, the delivery was on time, and the palace with its guests would be awaiting it.

The ice carts would come rumbling up the castle road, winding as the road wound, with four oxen straining at the shafts, to gain the fortress which stood out like a ship of stone from its cliffs.

Tatro wanted to stand and watch the ice carts come all the way up the hill, but the queen was short of patience this morning. She stood slightly apart from her child, looking about her with an abstracted air.

JandolAnganol had come at dawn and embraced her. She sensed that he was uneasy. Pannoval loomed. To make matters worse, bad news was coming from the Second Army in Randonan. It was always bad news from Randonan.

“You can listen to the day’s discussion from the private gallery,” he said, “if it won’t bore you. Pray for me, Cune.”

“I always pray for you. The All-Powerful will be with you.”

He shook his head patiently. “Why isn’t life simple? Why doesn’t the faith make it simple?” His hand went to the long scar on his leg.

“We’re safe while we’re here together, Jan.”

He kissed her. “I should be with my army. Then we’d see some victories. TolramKetinet is useless as a general.”

There’s nothing between the general and me, she thought—yet he knows there is…

He had left her. As soon as he was gone, she felt gloomy. A chill had fallen over him of late. Her own position was threatened. Without thinking, she linked her arm through her brother’s as they stood on the ramparts.

Princess Tatro was calling, pointing to servants she recognized wending their way up the hill to the palace.

Less than twenty years earlier, a covered way had been built up the hillside to the walls. Under its protection, an army had advanced on the besieged fortress. Using gunpowder charges, it blew an entrance into the palace grounds. A bloody battle was fought.

The inhabitants were defeated. All were put to the sword, men and women, phagors and peasants. All except the baron who had held the palace.

The baron disguised himself and—binding his wife, children and immediate servants—led them to safety through the breached wall. Bellowing to the enemy to get out of his way, he had successfully bluffed a path to freedom with his mock prisoners. Thus his daughter escaped death.

This Baron RantanOboral was the queen’s father. His deed became renowned. But the fact was that he could never regain his former power.

The man who won the fortress—which was described, like all fortresses before they fall, as impregnable—was the warlike grandfather of JandolAnganol. This redoubtable old warrior was then busy unifying eastern Borlien, and making its frontiers safe. RantanOboral was the last warlord of the area to fall to his armies.

Those armies were largely a thing of the past, and MyrdemInggala, by marrying JandolAnganol and securing some future for her family, had come to live in her father’s old citadel.

Parts of it were still ruinous. Some sections had been rebuilt in JandolAnganol’s father’s reign. Other grand rebuilding schemes, hastily started, slowly crumbled in the heat. Piles of stone formed a prominent part of the fortress landscape. MyrdemInggala loved this extravagant semi-ruin, but the past hung heavy over its battlements.

She made her way, clutching Tatro’s hand, to a rear building with a small colonnade. These were her quarters. A featureless red sandstone wall was surmounted by whimsical pavilions built in white marble. Behind the wall were her gardens and a private reservoir, where she liked to swim. In the middle of the reservoir was an artificial islet, on which stood a slender temple dedicated to Akhanaba. There the king and queen had often made love in the early days of their marriage.

After saying good-bye to her brother, the queen walked up her stairs and along a passage. This passage, open to the breeze, overlooked the garden where JandolAnganol’s father, VarpalAnganol, had once raced dogs and flown multi-coloured birds. Some of the birds remained in their cotes—Roba had fed them every morning before he ran away. Now Mai TolramKetinet fed them.

MyrdemInggala was conscious of an oppressive fear. The sight of the birds merely vexed her. She left a maid to play with Tatro in the passage, and went to a door at the far end which she unlocked with a key hidden among the folds of her skirt. A guard saluted her as she passed through. Her footsteps, light as they were, rang on the tiled floor. She came to an alcove by a window, across which drapes had been drawn, and seated herself on a divan. Before her was an ornate trellis. Through this she could watch without being observed from the other side.

From this vantage point, she could see over a large council chamber. Sun streamed in through latticed windows. None of the dignitaries had yet arrived. Only the king was there, with his phagor runt, the runt that had been a constant companion ever since the Battle of the Cosgatt.

Yuli stood no higher than the king’s chest. Its coat was white and still tipped with the red tassels of its early years. It skipped and pirouetted and opened its ugly mouth as the king held out a hand for it. The king was laughing and snapping his fingers.

“Good boy, good boy,” he said.

“Yezz, I good boy,” said Yuli.

Laughing, the king embraced it, lifting it off the ground.

The queen shrank back. Fear seized her. As she lay back, the wicker chair beneath her creaked. She hid her eyes. If he knew she was there, he made no attempt to call.

My wild boar, my dear wild boar, she called silently. What has become of you? Her mother had been gifted with strange powers: the queen thought, Something awful is going to overwhelm this court and our lives…

When she dared look again, the visiting dignitaries were entering, chatting among themselves and making themselves comfortable. Cushions and rugs were scattered everywhere. Slaves, females and scantily clad, were busily providing coloured drinks.

JandolAnganol walked among them in his princely way and then flung himself down on a canopied divan. SartoriIrvrash entered, nodding sober greetings, and stationed himself behind the king’s divan, lighting a veronikane as he did so. The runt Yuli settled on a cushion, panting and yawning.

“You are strangers in our court,” said the queen aloud, peeping through her trellis. “You are strangers in our lives.”

Near JandolAnganol sat a group of local dignitaries, including the mayor of Matrassyl, who was also head of the scritina, JandolAnganol’s vicar, his Royal Armourer, and one or two army men. One of the military was, by his insignia, a captain of phagors but, out of deference to the visitors, no phagor was present, except for the king’s pet.

Among the foreign group, most conspicuous were the Sibornalese. The ambassador to Borlien, Io Pasharatid, was from Uskut. He and his wife sat tall and grey and distant from each other. Some said that they had quarrelled, some that Sibornalese were simply like that. The fact remained that the two, who had lived at the court for more than nine tenners—they were due to complete their first year in another three weeks—rarely smiled or exchanged a glance.

“You I fear, Pasharatid, you ghost,” said the queen.

Pannoval had sent a prince. The choice had been carefully made. Pannoval was the most powerful nation among the seventeen countries of Campannlat, its ambitions restrained only by the war it had constantly to wage against Sibornal on its northern front. Its religion dominated the continent. At present, Pannoval courted Borlien, which already paid levies in grain and church taxes; but the courtship was that between an elderly dowager and an upstart lad, and what the lad was sent was a minor prince.

Minor he might be, but Prince Taynth Indredd was a portly personage, making up in bulk what he lacked in significance. He was distantly related to the Oldorandan royal family. Nobody greatly liked Taynth Indredd, but a diplomat in Pannoval had sent him as chief advisor an ageing priest, Guaddl Ulbobeg, known to be a friend of JandolAnganol since the days when the king had served his priestly term in the monasteries of Pannoval.

“You men with clever tongues,” sighed the queen, anxious behind her lattice.

JandolAnganol was speaking now in a modest tone. He remained seated. His voice ran fast, like his gaze. He was in effect giving a report on the state of his kingdom to his visitors.

“All of Borlien is now peaceful within its borders. There are some brigands, but they are not important. Our armies are committed in the Western Wars. They drain our lifeblood. On our eastern borders, too, we are threatened by dangerous invaders, Unndreid the Hammer and the cruel Darvlish the Skull.”

He looked about him challengingly. It was his shame that he had received a wound from such an unimportant adversary as Darvlish.

“As Freyr draws nearer, we suffer from drought. Famine is everywhere. You must not expect Borlien to fight elsewhere. We are a country large in extent, poor in produce.”

“Come, cousin, you are too modest,” said Taynth Indredd. “Everyone knows from childhood that your southern loess plain forms the richest land on the continent.”

“Richness lies not in land but in land properly farmed,” replied JandolAnganol. “Such is the pressure on our borders that we must press peasants into the armies, and let women and children work the farms.”

“Then you certainly need our help, cousin,” said Taynth Indredd, looking about for the applause he felt his point merited.

Io Pasharatid said, “If a farmer has a lame hoxney, will a wild kaidaw assist him?”

This remark was ignored. There were those who said that Sibornal should not have been present at this meeting.

In the manner of one making everything clear, Taynth Indredd said, “Cousin, you press us for assistance at a time when every nation is in trouble. The riches our grandfathers enjoyed are gone, while our fields burn and our fruits shrivel. And I must speak frankly and say that there is an unresolved quarrel between us. That we greatly hope to resolve, and must resolve if there is to be unanimity between us.”

A silence fell.

Perhaps Taynth Indredd feared to continue.

JandolAnganol jumped to his feet, a look of anger on his dark features.

The little runt, Yuli scrambled up alertly, as if to do whatever his master might bid.

“I went to Sayren Stund in Oldorando to ask for help only against common enemies. Here you gather like vultures! You confront me in my own court. What is this quarrel you dream up between us? Tell me.”

Taynth Indredd and his advisor, Guaddl Ulbobeg, conferred. It was the latter, the friend of the king’s, who answered him. He rose, bowed, and pointed to Yuli.

“It’s no dream, Your Majesty. Our concern is real, and so is that creature you bring here amongst us. From the most ancient times, human kind and phagor kind have been enemies. No truce is possible between beings so different. The Holy Pannovalan Empire has declared holy crusades and drumbles against these odious creatures, with a view to ridding the world of them. Yet your majesty gives them shelter within his borders.”

He spoke almost apologetically, his gaze downcast, so as to rob his words of force. His master restored the force by shouting, “You expect aid from us, coz, when you harbour these vermin by the million? They overran Campannlat once before, and will again, given the opportunity you provide.”

JandolAnganol confronted his visitors, hands on hips.

“I will have no one from outside my borders interfere with my interior policies. I listen to my scritina and my scritina does not complain. Yes, I welcome ancipitals to Borlien. A truce is possible with them. They farm infertile land that our people will not touch. They do humble work that slaves shrink from. They fight for no pay. My treasury is empty—you misers from Pannoval may not understand that, but it means I can afford only an army of phagors.

“They get their reward in marginal land. Moreover, they do not turn and run in the face of danger! You may say that that is because they are too stupid. To which I reply, that I prefer a phagor to a peasant any day. As long as I am King of Borlien, the phagors have my protection.”

“You mean, we believe, Your Majesty, that the phagors have your protection as long as MyrdemInggala is Queen of Borlien.” These words were spoken by one of Taynth Indredd’s vicars, a thin man whose bones were draped in a black woollen charfrul. Again, tension filled the court. Following up his advantage, the vicar continued, “It was the queen, with her well-known tenderness towards any living thing, and her father, the warlord RantanOboral—whom your majesty’s grandfather dispossessed of this very palace not twenty years back—who began this degrading alliance with the ancipitals, which you have maintained.”

Guaddl Ulbobeg rose and bowed to Taynth Undredd. “Sire, I object to the trend this meeting is taking. We are not here to vilify the Queen of Borlien, but to offer aid to the king.”

But JandolAnganol, as if weary, had sat down. The vicar had sought out his vulnerable spot: that his claim to the throne was recent and his consort the daughter of a minor baron.

With a sympathetic glance at his lord, SartoriIrvrash rose to face the Pannovalan visitors.

“As his majesty’s chancellor, I find myself amazed—yet it’s an amazement blunted somewhat by custom—to discover such prejudice, I might even say animosity, among members of the same great Holy Pannovalan Empire. I, as you may understand, am an atheist, and therefore observe detachedly the antics of your Church. Where is the charity you preach? Do you aid his majesty by trying to undermine the position of the queen?

“I am grown to the withered end of life, but I tell you, Illustrious Prince Taynth Indredd, that I have as great a hatred of phagors as you. But they are a factor of life we must live with, as you in Pannoval live with your constant hostilities against Sibornal. Would you wipe out all Sibornalese as you would wipe out all phagors? Is it not killing itself that is wrong? Doesn’t your Akhanaba preach that?

“Since we are speaking frankly, then I will say that there has long been belief in Borlien that if Pannoval were not engaged in fighting Sibornalese colonists along a wide front to the north, then it would be invading us to the south, as you now attempt to dominate us with your ideologies. For that reason, we are grateful to the Sibornalese.”

As the chancellor stooped to confer with JandolAnganol, the Sibornalese ambassador rose and said, “Since the progressive nations of Sibornal so rarely receive anything but condemnation from the Empire, I wish to record my astonished gratitude for that speech.”

Taynth Indredd, ignoring this sarcastic interjection, said in the direction of SartoriIrvrash, “You are so much at the withered end that you mistake the reality of the situation. Pannoval serves as a bastion between you and southward incursions of the warlike Sibornalese. As a self-proclaimed student of history, you should know that those same Sibornalese never cease—generation after generation—from trying to quit their loathesome northern continent and take over ours.”

Whatever the truth of this last assertion, it was true that the Pannovalans were as offended to find Sibornalese as phagors in the council room. But even Taynth Indredd knew that the real bastion between Sibornal and Borlien was geographical: the sharp spines of the Quzint Mountains and the great corridor between the Quzints and Mordriat called Hazziz which at this period was a scorching desert.

JandolAnganol and SartoriIrvrash had been conferring. The chancellor now spoke again.

“Our pleasant guests bring up the subject of the warlike Sibornalese. Before we enter into further botheration and insults, we should proceed to the heart of the matter. My lord King JandolAnganol was lately grievously wounded in defending his realm, so much that his life hung by a thread. He praises Akhanaba for his deliverance, while I praise the herbs my surgeon applied to the wound. I have here the cause of the injury.”

He called forth the Royal Armourer, a small and savagely moustached man dressed in leather who stumped into the centre of the room and then produced a leaden ball, which he held up between thumb and forefinger of a gloved hand. In a formal voice, he announced, “This is a shot. It was dug from out his majesty’s leg with a surgeon’s knife. It caused great injury. It was fired from a piece of hand artillery called a matchlock.”

“Thank you,” said SartoriIrvrash, dismissing the man. “We recognize that Sibornal is greatly progressive. The matchlock is evidence of that progress. We understand that matchlocks are now being made in Sibornal in great numbers, and that there is a later development, by name a wheel lock, which will spread greater devastation. I would advise the Holy Pannovalan Empire to show genuine unity in the face of this new development. Let me assure you, this innovation is more to be feared than Unndreid the Hammer himself.

“I must furthermore advise you that our agents report that the tribes which invaded the Cosgatt were supplied with these weapons not from Sibornal itself, as might be expected, but from a Sibornalese source in Matrassyl.”

At this statement, all eyes in the court turned to the Sibornalese ambassador. It happened that Io Pasharatid was just refreshing himself with an iced drink. He paused with the glass halfway to his mouth, a look of distress on his face.

His wife, Dienu Pasharatid, reclined on cushions nearby. She rose now, a tall and graceful woman, thin, greyish in cast, severe in appearance.

“If you statesmen wonder why in my country you are called the Savage Continent, look no further than this latest lie of magnitude. Who would be to blame for such arms trading? Why should my husband be always mistrusted?”

SartoriIrvrash pulled his whiskers, so that his face was tugged into an involuntary smile. “Why do you mention your husband in connection with this incident, Madame Dienu? No one else did. I didn’t.”

JandolAnganol rose again. “Two of our agents, posing as Driat tribesmen, went into the lower bazaar and bought one of these new inventions. I propose a demonstration of what this weapon can do, so that you will be in no doubt that we have entered a new era in warfare. Perhaps then you will see my need to retain phagors in my army and my realms.”

Addressing himself directly to the Pannovalan prince, he said, “If your refinement will allow you to tolerate the presence of ancipitals in the room…”

The diplomats sat up and stared apprehensively at the king.

He clapped his hands. A leather-clad captain from his cortege went to a passage and called an order. Two dehorned phagors marched smartly into the room. They had been standing motionless in the shadows. Their white pelages picked up the light as they passed by the windows. One of them carried a long matchlock before him. A passage was cleared across the middle of the chamber as he set it down and crouched beside it to prepare for firing.

The hand-artillery piece had a six-foot iron barrel and a stock of polished wood. Both barrel and stock were bound at intervals with silver wire. Near the muzzle was a folding tripod of sturdy design with two clawed feet. The phagor packed powder into the mechanism from a horn carried at his belt, and used a ramrod to tamp a round lead ball down the barrel. He settled himself and lit a fuse. The captain of phagors stood over him to see that all was performed properly.

Meanwhile, the second phagor had moved to the other end of the chamber and stood near the wall, looking forward and twitching an ear. Any humans lolling about on cushions had rapidly cleared a wide space for him.

The first phagor squinted along the barrel, using the tripod to support the muzzle. The fuse spluttered. There was a terrific explosion and a puff of smoke.

The other phagor staggered. A yellow stain appeared high up on its chest, where its intestines were situated. It said something, clutching the spot where the shot had entered its body. Then it fell dead, collapsing with a thud on the floor.

As smoke and smell filled the council hall, the diplomats began to cough. Panic took them. They jumped up, tugging their charfruls, and ran into the open. JandolAnganol and his chancellor were left standing alone.

After the morning’s demonstration of fire power, of which the queen had been a secret onlooker, she went and hid herself in her quarters.

She hated the calculations that power entailed. She knew that the Pannoval contingent, led by the odious Prince Taynth Indredd, were not aiming their remarks against Sibornal, for it was taken for granted that Sibornal was a permanent enemy; that relationship, sour though it was, was well understood. JandolAnganol was the target of their talk, for they wished to bind him closer to them. And in consequence she—who had power over him—was also their target.

MyrdemInggala lunched with her ladies. JandolAnganol, by the laws of courtesy, lunched with his guests. Guaddl Ulbobeg earned black looks from his master by pausing at the king’s place and saying, in a low voice, “Your demonstration was dramatic, but hardly effective. For our northern armies are having increasingly to fight against Sibornalese forces armed with those very matchlocks. However, the art of their manufacture can be learnt, as you will see tomorrow. Beware, my friend, for the prince will force a hard bargain on you.”

After her lunch, scarcely tasted, the queen went alone to her quarters and sat at her favourite window, on the cushioned seat built round its bay. She thought of the odious Prince Taynth Indredd, who resembled a frog. She knew that he was related to the equally disgusting King of Oldorando, Sayren Stund, whose wife was a Madi. Surely even phagors were preferable to these scheming royalties!

From her window, she looked across her garden to the tiled reservoir where she swam. On the far side of the reservoir, a tall wall rose, hiding her beauty from prying eyes, and in the bottom of the wall, just above water level, was a small iron grille. The grille formed the window to a dungeon. There, JandolAnganol’s father, the deposed King VarpalAnganol, was imprisoned, and had been since shortly after the queen’s marriage. In the reservoir were golden carp, visible from where she sat. Like her, like VarpalAnganol, they were prisoners here.

A knock came at her door. A servant opened it, to announce that the queen’s brother awaited her pleasure.

YeferalOboral was lolling against the rail at her balcony. They both knew that JandolAnganol would long since have killed him, but for the queen.

Her brother was not a handsome man; all the beauty in the line had been bestowed in superabundance on MyrdemInggala. His features were meagre, his expression sour. He was brave, obedient, patient; otherwise his qualities were few. He never carried himself well, as did the king, as if to emphasize that he intended to cut no figure in life. Yet he served JandolAnganol without protest, and was devoted to a sister whose life he held so much more dear than his own. She loved him for his ordinariness.

“You were not at the meeting.”

“It wasn’t for the likes of me.”

“It was horrible.”

“I heard so. For some reason, Io Pasharatid is upset. He’s generally so cool, like a block of Lordryardry ice. Yet the guards say he has a woman in town—imagine! If so, he runs a great risk.”

MyrdemInggala showed her teeth in a smile. “I detest the way he looks at me. If he has a woman, so much the better!”

They laughed. For a short while, they lingered, talking of cheerful things. Their father, the old baron, was in the country now, complaining of the heat and too old to be reckoned a danger to the state. He had recently taken up fishing, as a cool pursuit.

The courtyard bell rang. They looked down to see JandolAnganol enter the court, closely followed by a guard carrying a red silk umbrella over his head. The phagor runt was close to him, as ever. He called to his queen.

“Will you come down, Cune? Our guests must be entertained during a lull in our discussions. You will delight them more than ever I could.”

She left her brother and went down to join him under the sunshade. He took her arm with formal courtesy. She thought he looked weary, though the fabric of the umbrella reflected a flush like fever on his cheeks.

“Are you coming to a treaty with Pannoval and Oldorando which will ease the pressures of war?” she asked timidly.

“The beholder knows what we’re coming to,” he said abruptly. “We must keep on terms with the devils, and placate them, otherwise they’ll take advantage of our temporary weakness and invade us. They’re as full of cunning as they are of fake holiness.” He sighed.

“The time will come when you and I will be hunting and enjoying life again, as of old,” she said, squeezing his arm. She would not rebuke him for inviting his guests.

Ignoring her pious hope, he burst out angrily, “SartoriIrvrash spoke unwisely this morning, admitting his atheism. I must get rid of him. Taynth holds it against me that my chancellor is not a member of the Church.”

“Prince Taynth also spoke against me. Will you get rid of me because I am not to his liking?” Her eyes flashed angrily as she spoke, though she tried to keep lightness in her tone. But he replied sullenly, “You know, and the scritina knows, that the coffers are empty. We may be driven to much we have no heart for.”

She drew her hand sharply from his arm.

The visitors, together with their concubines and servants, were grouped in a green courtyard, under colonnades. Wild beasts were being paraded; a group of jugglers was entertaining with its paltry tricks. JandolAnganol steered his queen among the emissaries. She noted how the countenances of the men lit up as she spoke to them. I must still be of some value to Jan, she thought.

An old Thribriatan tribesman in elaborate braffista headgear was parading two gorilloid Others on chains. The creatures attracted several onlookers. Away from their arboreal habitat, their behaviour was uncouth. They most resembled—so one of the courtiers said—two drunken courtiers.

The froglike Prince Taynth Indredd was standing under a yellow sunshade, being fanned and smoking a veronikane as he watched the Others perform some limited tricks. Beside him, laughing uproariously at the captives, was a stiff girl of some eleven years and six tenners.

“Aren’t they funny, Unk?” she said to the prince. “They’re quite like people, except for all that fur.”

The Thribriatan, hearing this, touched his braffista and said to the prince, “You like see me make Others fight each other?”

The prince humorously produced a silver coin in the palm of his hand.

This if you’ll make them rumbo each other.”

Everyone laughed. The girl screamed with humour. “Unkie, how rude you are! Would they really?”

Mournfully polite, the tribesman said, “These beasts have no khmir like humans. Only every tenner make love, do rumbo. Is more easy make fight.”

Shaking his head and laughing, the prince retained his coin. It was as he turned away that MyrdemInggala addressed him. His small companion drifted off, suddenly bored. She was dressed as an adult, and her cheeks were rouged.

When the queen decently could, she left JandolAnganol and Taynth Indredd talking, and crossed to the fountain to speak with the girl. The latter was staring moodily into the water.

“Are you looking for fish?”

“No, thank you. We have much bigger fish than that at home in Oldorando.” She indicated their size in a childlike way, using her hands.

“I see. I’ve just been talking to your father, the prince.”

The girl looked up at her interrogator for the first time, with an expression of contempt. Her face astonished MyrdemInggala, so strange was it, with huge eyes fringed by abnormally long lashes, and a nose like the beak of a little parakeet. By the beholder, thought the queen, this is a half-Madi child! What a funny little thing! I must be nice to it.

It was saying, “Zygankes! Taynth my father! He’s not my father. Whatever made you think that? He’s only a distant cousin by marriage. I wouldn’t have him for a father—he’s too fat.” As if to strike a pleasanter note, the girl said, “In truth, this is the first time I have been allowed to travel away from Oldorando without my father. My women are with me, of course, but it’s terribly boring here, isn’t it? Do you have to live here?”

She squinted as she peered up at the queen. A characteristic in her face made her look at once pretty and stupid.

“You know what? You look quite attractive, for an old person.”

Keeping a serious face, the queen said, “I have a nice cool reservoir, sheltered from view. Would you like a swim? Is that permitted?”

The girl considered. “I can do what I like, of course, but I don’t think a swim would be ladylike just now. I am a princess, after all. That always has to be considered.”

“Really? Do you mind telling me your name?”

“Zygankes, it is primitive in Borlien! I thought everyone knew my name. I am the Princess Simoda Tal, and my father is the King of Oldorando. I suppose you’ve heard of Oldorando?”

The queen laughed. Feeling sorry for the child, she said, “Well, if you’ve come all the way from Oldorando I think you deserve a swim.”

“I’ll swim when I please, thank you,” said the young lady.

And when the young lady pleased was next morning at dawn. She found her way to the queen’s quarters and woke her. MyrdemInggala was more amused than vexed. She roused Tatro and they went down with Simoda Tal to the reservoir, accompanied only by their maids, who bore towels, and a phagor guard. The child dismissed the phagors, saying that they disgusted her.

A chill light lay across the scene, but the water was more than tepid. Once, in JandolAnganol’s father’s time, carts of snow and ice had been brought from the mountains to cool the reservoirs, but considerations of manpower and the stirrings of Mordriat tribes had terminated such luxuries.

Although no windows but her own faced over the reservoir, the queen always swam in a filmy garment which covered her pale body, Simoda Tal had no such reservations. She threw off her garments to reveal a stocky little body prinked with dark hairs, which stood out like pine trees on snowy hillsides.

“Oh, I love you, you’re beautiful!” she exclaimed to the queen, rushing up as soon as she was naked and embracing the older woman. MyrdemInggala was unable to respond freely. She felt something inappropriate in the embrace. Tatro screamed.

The young girl swam and surface-dived close to the queen, repeatedly opening her legs as she performed in the water, as if eager to assure MyrdemInggala that she was fully adult where it was most important to be.

At the same time, SartoriIrvrash was being wakened from his couch by an officer of the court. The guards had reported that the Sibornalese ambassador, Io Pasharatid, had left on hoxneyback, alone, an hour before Freyr-dawn.

“His wife, Dienu?”

“She is still in her quarters, sir. She is reported to be upset.”

“Upset? What does that mean? The woman’s intelligent. I can’t say I like her, but she’s intelligent. Botheration… And there are so many fools… Here, help me out of bed, will you?”

He drew a gown round his shoulders and roused the slave woman who had served as his housekeeper since his wife died. He admired the Sibornalese. He had estimated that at this time of the Great Year there were possibly fifty million humans living in the seventeen countries of Campannlat; those countries could not agree with each other.

Wars were endemic. Empires rose and fell. There was never peace.

In Sibornal, cold Sibornal, things fell out differently. In the seven countries of Sibornal lived an estimated twenty-five million humans. Those seven nations formed a strong alliance. Campannlat was incomparably richer than the northern continent, yet perpetual squabbles between its nations meant that little was achieved—except religions which thrived on desperation. This was why SartoriIrvrash hated the job of chancellor. He had a contempt for most of the men he worked for.

The chancellor had paid bribes, and knew as a result that Prince Taynth Indredd had brought to the palace a chest of weapons—the very weapons discussed yesterday. Clearly, they were designed as bargaining power, but what the bargain would be remained to be seen.

It was not improbable that the Sibornalese ambassador had also gained news of the chest of matchlocks. That could account for his hasty departure. He would be heading north, towards Hazziz and the nearest Sibornalese settlements. He should be brought back.

SartoriIrvrash sipped a mug of pellamountain tea which the slave woman brought and turned to the waiting officer.

“I made a fabulous discovery yesterday regarding hoxneys, which influences the history of the world—a remarkable discovery! But who took account of it?” He shook his bald head. “Learning means nothing, intrigue is everything. So I have to bestir myself at dawn to capture some fool riding north… What a botheration it is! Now. Who’s a good hoxneyman near at hand? One we can trust, if such exists. I know. The queen’s brother, YeferalOboral. Fetch him, will you? In his boots.”

When YeferalOboral appeared, SartoriIrvrash explained the situation.

“Fetch this madman Pasharatid back. Ride hard and you’ll catch him up. Tell him—something. Let me think. Yes, tell him that the king has decided to make no commitment to Oldorando and Pannoval. Instead, he wishes to sign a treaty with Sibornal. Sibornal has a fleet of ships. Tell him we will offer them anchorage in Ottassol.”

“What would Sibornalese ships be doing so far from home?” YeferalOboral asked.

“Leave him to decide that. Just persuade him to return here.”

“Why do you want him back?”

SartoriIrvrash squeezed his hands together. “Guilt. That’s why the scerm has left so suddenly. I mean to find out exactly what he has done. There’s always more than arm up a Sibornalese sleeve. Now please go, and no more questions.”

YeferalOboral rode north through the city, through its streets which were even then crowded with early risers, and through the fields beyond. He rode steadily, trotting and walking his hoxney by turns.

He came to a bridge across the Mar, where that river flowed into the Takissa. A small fort stood, guarding the bridge. He stopped and changed to a fresh hoxney.

After another hour’s riding, when the heat was becoming intense, he stopped by a stream and drank. There were fresh hoxney-shoe prints by the water, which he hoped were those of Pasharatid’s mount.

He continued north. The country became less fertile. Habitation was scarce. The thordotter blew, parching throats, drying skins.

Giant boulders were strewn about the landscape. A century or so ago, this region had been popular with hermits, who built small churches beside or on top of the boulders. One or two old men could still be seen, but the intense heat had driven most of them away. Phagors worked patches of earth under the boulders; brilliant butterflies fluttered about their legs.

Behind one of the boulders, Io Pasharatid stood waiting for his pursuer. His mount was exhausted. Pasharatid expected capture and was surprised when he saw a solitary rider approaching. There was no accounting for the foolishness of the Campannlatians.

He loaded his matchlock, set it in position and awaited the right moment to apply his fire. His pursuer was approaching at a steady pace, riding among the boulders and taking no particular care.

Pasharatid lit the fuse, tucked the butt into his shoulder, narrowed his eyes, and aimed the gun. He hated using these beastly weapons. They were for barbarians.

Not every firing was a success. This one was. There was a loud explosion, the bullet flew to its mark. YeferalOboral was blown off his mount with a hole in his chest. He crawled into the shadow of a boulder and died.

The Sibornalese ambassador caught the hoxney and continued his journey north.

It must be said: there were no riches in King JandolAnganol’s court to rival the riches of the courts friendly to him in Oldorando and in Pannoval City. In those more favoured centres of civilization, treasures of all kinds had accumulated; scholars were protected, and the church itself—though this was truer of Pannoval—encouraged learning and the arts to a limited extent. But Pannoval had the advantage of a ruling dynasty which, encouraging a proselytizing religion, made for stability.

Almost every week, ships unloaded on to Matrassyl’s harbour cargoes of spices, drugs, hides, animals’ teeth, lapis lazuli, scented woods, and rare birds. But of these treasures, few reached the palace. For JandolAnganol was an upstart king, in the eyes of the world and possibly in his own eyes. He boasted of his grandfather’s enlightened rule, but in truth his grandfather had been little better than a successful warlord—one of many who disputed Borlienese territory—who had had the wit to band phagors into formidable armies under human captaincy and so subdue his enemies.

Not all those enemies had been killed. One of the most striking ‘reforms’ of JandolAnganol’s father’s reign was to appoint a parliament, or scritina; the scritina represented the people and advised the king. It was based on an Oldorandan model. VarpalAnganol had formed the membership of the scritina from two categories of men, from the leaders of guilds and corps, such as the Ironmakers Corps, who had traditional power in the land, and from defeated warlords or their families, thus giving them the chance to air their grievances and him a way of deflating their wrath. Much of the cargo unloaded at Matrassyl went to paying this disaffected body of men.

When the young JandolAnganol deposed and imprisoned his father, he had sought to abolish the scritina. The scritina had refused to be abolished. It met regularly and continued to harass the king and to make its own members rich. Its leader, BudadRembitim, was also mayor of Matrassyl.

The scritina called an extraordinary meeting. It would certainly demand a fresh attempt to subdue Randonan and stronger defences against the warlike tribes of Mordriat, who were no more than two or three days gallop from their homes. The king would have to answer them and commit himself to a definite line of action.

The king presented himself before the scritina that afternoon, when his distinguished visitors were taking a siesta. He left his runt behind and sank into his throne in grim silence.

After the difficulties of the morning, another set of difficulties. His gaze went round the wooden council chamber as if seeking them out.

Several members of the old families rose to speak. Most of them harped on a fresh theme and a stale one. The stale one was the emptiness of the exchequer. The fresh one was the inconvenient report from the Western Wars that the frontier city of Keevasien had been sacked. Randonanese units had crossed the Kacol River and stormed the city.

This led to complaints that General Hanra TolramKetinet was too young, too unskilled, to command the army. Every complaint was a criticism of the king. JandolAnganol listened impatiently, drumming his fingers on the arm of his throne. He recalled again the wretched days of his boyhood, after his mother had died. His father had beaten and neglected him. He had hidden in cellars from his father’s servants, and vowed to himself that, when he was grown up, he would let nobody stand in the way of his happiness.

After he was wounded in the Cosgatt, after he had managed to find his way back to the capital, he lay in the state of weakness which recalled to his mind the past he wished to shut away. Again he was powerless. It was then he had observed the handsome young captain, TolramKetinet, smile at MyrdemInggala, and receive an answering smile.

As soon as he had managed to crawl from his bed, he promoted TolramKetinet to general, and sent him off to the Western Wars. There were men in the scritina who believed—with good reason—that their sons were much more deserving of promotion. Every setback in the stubborn jungles to the west reinforced their belief, and their anger with the king. He knew he needed a victory of some kind very soon. For that he found himself forced to turn to Pannoval.

The next morning, before meeting formally again with the diplomats, JandolAnganol went early to see Prince Taynth Indredd in his suite. He left Yuli outside, where the runt settled down comfortably, sprawling like a dog by the door. This was the king’s concession to a man he disliked.

Prince Taynth Indredd was breakfasting off a gout cooked in oatmeal, served with tropical fruits. He listened, nodding assent, to what JandolAnganol had to say.

He remarked, with seeming irrelevance, “I hear that your son has disappeared?”

“Robay loves the desert. The climate suits him. He often departs, and is away for weeks at a time.”

“It’s not the proper training for a king. Kings must be educated. RobaydayAnganol should attend a monastery, as you did, and as I did. Instead, he’s joined the protognostics, so I hear.”

“I can look after my own son. I require no advice.”

“Monastery is good for you. Teaches you that there are things you have to do, even if you don’t like them. Bad things loom in the future. Pannoval has survived the long winters. The long summers are more difficult… My deuteroscopists and astronomers report bad things of the future. Of course, it’s their trade, you might say.”

He paused and lit a veronikane, making a performance of it, breathing out the smoke luxuriously, sweeping the cloud away with languorous gestures.

“Yes, the old religions of Pannoval spoke truth when they warned that bad things came from the sky. Akhanaba’s origins were as a stone. You know that?”

He rose and waddled over to the window, where he climbed up on the sill and looked out. His large behind stuck out in JandolAnganol’s direction.

The latter said nothing, waiting for Taynth Indredd to commit himself.

The deuteroscopists say that Helliconia and our attendant sun, Batalix, are being drawn nearer to Freyr every small year. For the next few generations—eighty-three years, to be precise—we move ever nearer to it. After that, if celestial geometries prove correct, we draw slowly away again. So the next generations are the testing ones. Advantage will go increasingly to the polar continents of Hespagorat and Sibornal. For us in the tropics, conditions will become steadily worse.”

“Borlien can survive. It’s cooler along the south coast. Ottassol is a cool city—below ground, much like Pannoval.”

Taynth Indredd turned his froglike face over one shoulder in order to inspect JandolAnganol.

“There’s a plan, you see, coz… I know you have little affection for me, but I’d prefer you to hear it from me than have it from your friend, my old holy advisor, Guaddl Ulbobeg. Borlien will be all right at nearpoint, as you say. So will Pannoval, safe in its mountains. Oldorando will suffer most. And both your country and mine need to see Oldorando remain intact, or it will fall to barbarians. Do you suppose you could accommodate the Oldorandan court, Sayren Stund and his like—in Ottassol?”

The question was so startling that JandolAnganol was for once at a loss for words.

“That would be for my successor to say…”

The Prince of Pannoval changed his tone of voice, and the subject.

“Coz, take some fresh air at the window with me. See, there below is my charge, Simoda Tal, eleven years and six tenners old, daughter of the Oldorandan line, her ancestry traceable back to the Lords Den ruling Old Embruddock in the chill times.”

The girl, thinking herself unobserved, skipped in the courtyard below, dried her hair in a desultory fashion, and whirled her towel about her head now and again.

“Why does she make the journey with you, Taynth?”

“Because I wished you to see her. A pleasant girl, is she not?”

“Pleasing enough.”

“Young, it’s true, but, from certain signs I have had, of a quite lascivious nature.”

JandolAnganol felt a trap was about to spring. He withdrew his head and began to pace the room. Taynth Indredd turned about and settled himself comfortably on the ledge, blowing out smoke.

“Cousin, we wish to see the member states of the Holy Pannoval Empire draw ever closer. We must protect ourselves against bad times—not only now but to come. In Pannoval, we have always had Akhanaba’s gift of foresight. That is why we wish you to marry this pretty young princess, Simoda Tal.”

The blood sank from JandolAnganol’s face. Straightening himself, he said, “You know I am already married—and to whom I am married.”

“Face some unpleasant facts, coz. The present queen is the daughter of a brigand. She is not a fit match for you. The marriage degrades you and your country, which demands a better status. Married to Simoda Tal, though, yours would be a force to be reckoned with.”

“It cannot be done. In any case, the mother of that girl down there is a Madi. Isn’t that so?”

Taynth Indredd shrugged. “Are Madis worse than the phagors you dote on? Listen, coz, we want this new match to go through as smoothly as possible. No hostility, only mutual help. In eighty-three more years, Oldorando will be aflame from one end to the other, with temperatures near to one hundred and fifty degrees, according to calculation. Oldorandans will have to move southwards. Form a dynastic marriage now, and they will be in your power then. They will be poor relations begging at your door. All Borlien-Oldorando will be yours—or your grandson’s at least. It is a chance never to be missed. Now let’s have some more fruit. The squaanej are excellent.”

“It cannot be done.”

“It can. The Holy C’Sarr is prepared to annul your present marriage by a special bill.”

JandolAnganol raised a hand as if to strike the prince.

He retained the hand at the level of his eyes and said, “My present marriage is my past marriage and my future one. If we need this dynastic marriage, then I will marry off Robayday to your Simoda. It would make an equal match.”

The prince leaned forward and pointed a finger at JandolAnganol. “Certainly not. Forget the suggestion. That boy is crazy. His grandma was the wild Shannana.”

The Eagle’s eyes flashed. “He’s not crazy. A little wild.”

“He should have attended a monastery, as you did and I did. Your religion must tell you that your son is inadmissible as a suitor. You must make the sacrifice, if you choose to regard it as such. You will be rewarded for any sense of loss by our considerable aid. When we have your consent, we shall present you with a chest full of the new weaponry, together with all necessary priming. More chests will follow. You can train gunners for use against Darvlish the Skull as well as the Randonanese tribes. You will gain every advantage.”

“And what will Pannoval gain?” JandolAnganol asked bitterly.

“Stability, coz, stability. Over the next unstable period. The Sibornalese are not going to grow less powerful as Freyr nears.”

He nibbled at one of the purple squaanej.

JandolAnganol stood rooted where he was, looking away from the prince.

“I am already married to a woman I love. I will not put MyrdemInggala aside.”

The prince laughed. “Love! Zygankes, as Simoda Tal would say! Kings cannot afford to think in such terms. You must put your country first. For Borlien’s sake, marry Simoda Tal, unify, stabilize…”

“And if I don’t?”

Taking his time, Taynth Indredd selected another squaanej from the bowl.

“In that case, you will be wiped from the field of play, won’t you?”

JandolAnganol knocked the fruit from his hand. It rolled across the floor and stopped against the wall.

“I have my religious convictions. It would go against those convictions to put my queen aside. And there are those in your Church who would support me.”

“You don’t mean poor old Ulbobeg?”

Although the prince’s hand shook, he bent and selected another fruit.

“First of all, find some pretext to send her away somewhere. Get her out of the court. Send her to the coast. Then think about all the advantages which will accrue when you do as we wish you to do. I must return to Pannoval at the end of the week—with the news that you will make a dynastic marriage which the Holy C’Sarr himself will bless.”

The day continued difficult for JandolAnganol. During the morning’s meeting, while Taynth Indredd sat silent on his frog-throne, Guaddl Ulbobeg expounded the plan for the new marriage. This time, it was set out in diplomatic terms. When this action was taken, then those benefits would accrue. Great C’Sarr Kilandar IX, Father Supreme of the Church of Akhanaba, would approve both a bill of divorcement and the second marriage.

Wisely, nothing was said about what might or might not accrue in eighty-three years. Most diplomacy was concerned with getting through the next five years.

The royal household gave a luncheon for the guests, over which Queen MyrdemInggala presided, the king sitting at her side without eating, his little phagor waiting behind him. High-ranking members of the Borlienese scritina were also present.

A wealth of roasted crane, fish, pig, and swan was consumed.

After the banquet, Prince Taynth Indredd made his reply. Pretending to reciprocate for the feast, he had his bodyguard give a demonstration of the capabilities of the new matchlocks. Three mountain lions were brought in chains into one of the inner courtyards and despatched.

While the smoke was still clearing, the weapons were given to JandolAnganol. They were presented almost contemptuously, as if his assent to the Pannovalan demands was taken for granted.

The reason for the demonstration was clear. The scritina would demand that the king get more matchlocks from Pannoval to fight the various wars. And Pannoval would supply them—at a price.

No sooner was this ceremony concluded than two traders entered the palace grounds, bringing with them a body sewn into a sack, lashed to the back of an ancient kaidaw. The sack was opened. YeferalOboral’s body rolled out, with part of its chest and shoulder blown away. It was a tormented king who stalked into his chancellor’s chambers that evening. Batalix was setting among roll after roll of cloud, on which Freyr’s light intermittently shone. The warm western glow lit the dull corners of the room.

SartoriIrvrash rose from the long cluttered table at which he was sitting and bowed to the king. He was wrestling with his ‘Alphabet of History and Nature’. All about lay ancient sources and modern reports, at which the king’s quick eye glared dismissively.

“What decision should I give Taynth Indredd?” demanded the king.

“May I speak clearly, Your Majesty?”

“Speak.” The king flung himself untidily into a chair, and the runt stood behind it so as to avoid SartoriIrvrash’s gaze.

SartoriIrvrash bowed his head so that the king could see only his expressionless bald pate. “Your Majesty, your first duty lies not to yourself but to your country. So says the ancient Law of Kings. The plan of Pannoval to cement our present good relations with Oldorando by a dynastic marriage is workable. It will render your throne more secure, its tenure less open to question. It will guarantee that in future we may turn to Pannoval for aid.

“I think in particular of aid in the form of grain, as well as weapons. They have great fields in their more temperate north, towards the Pannoval Sea. This year, our harvest is poor, and will become yet poorer as the heat increases. Whereas our Royal Armourer can presumably imitate the Sibornalese matchlocks.

There is, therefore, everything to be said for your making the match with Simoda Tal of Oldorando, despite her scanty years—everything but one thing. Queen MyrdemInggala. Our present queen is a good and holy woman, and the condition of love prospers between the two of you. If you sever that love, you will suffer harm as a result.”

“Perhaps I can come to love Simoda Tal.”

“Perhaps you can, Your Majesty.” SartoriIrvrash turned to look out of his small window at the sunsets. “But with that love will go the bitter thread of hate. You will never find another woman like the queen; or, if you do, that woman will not bear the name of Simoda Tal.”

“Love’s not important,” said JandolAnganol, beginning to pace the floor. “Survival’s more important. So says the prince. Perhaps he’s right. In any case, what advice are you giving me? Are you saying yes or no?”

The chancellor tugged at his whiskers. “The phagor question is another botheration. Did the prince bring it up this morning?”

“He said nothing on that subject this morning.”

“He will. The people for whom he speaks will. Just as soon as a deal is made.”

“So, your advice, Chancellor? Should I say yes to Pannoval or no?”

The chancellor kept his eye on the litter of papers on his table, and sank down on the bench. His hand fluttered a parchment, causing it to rustle like old leaves.

“You tax me, sire, on a crucial matter, a matter where the needs of the heart run into confrontation with the demands of the state. It’s not for me to say yes or no… Is this not a religious matter, best taken to your vicar?”

JandolAnganol struck his fist on the table. “All matters are religious, but in this particular matter I must turn to my chancellor. That you reverence the present queen is a quality for which I respect you, Rushven. Nevertheless, put that consideration apart and deliver me your judgment. Should I set her aside and make this dynastic marriage, in order to safeguard the future of our country? Answer.”

In the chancellor’s mind lay the knowledge that he must not be responsible for the king’s decision. Otherwise, he would be made a scapegoat later; he knew the king’s volatile disposition, dreaded his rages. He saw many arguments for the coalition between Borlien and Oldorando; to have peace between the two traditionally hostile neighbours would benefit all; in that union, if it was wisely handled—as he could handle it—would be a bulwark against Pannoval as well as against the ever thrusting continent of the north, Sibornal.

On the other hand, he felt as much loyalty to the person of the queen as he did to the king. In his egocentric way, he loved MyrdemInggala like a daughter, especially since his wife had been killed in such horrible circumstances. Her beauty was before him every day to warm his scholarly old heart. He had but to lift a finger, to say vigorously, “You must stand by the woman you love—that is the greatest alliance you can make… ,” but, peeping up at the stormy face of his king, his courage failed him. There was his great lifelong project, his book, to be defended.

The question was too large for any but the king himself to answer.

“Your majesty will have a nose bleed if you become overexcited. I pray, drink some wine…”

“By the beholder, you are all that is worst in men, a very grave of help!”

The old man hunched his shoulders further into his patterned charfrul and shook his head.

“As your advisor, my duty in such a difficult personal matter is to formulate the problem clearly for you. You it is who must decide what resolution is best, Majesty, for you of all people must live with that decision. There are two ways of looking at the problem you face.”

JandolAnganol made towards the door and then stopped. He confronted the older man down the length of the room.

“Why should I have to suffer? Why should not kings be exempt from the common lot? If I did this thing demanded of me, should I be a saint or a devil?”

“That only you will know, sire.”

“You care nothing, do you—nothing about me or the kingdom, only for that miserable dead past you work over all day.”

The chancellor gripped his trembling hands between his knees.

“We may care, Your Majesty, and yet be unable to do anything. I put it to you that this problem which confronts us is a result of the deteriorating climate. As it happens, I’m studying at present an old chronicle of the time of another king, by name AozroOnden, who was lord of a very different Oldorando almost four centuries ago. The chronicle refers to AozroOnden’s slaying of two brothers who had between them ruled the known world.”

“I know the legend. What of it? Am I threatening to kill anyone at present?”

“This pleasant story, set in an historical record, is typical of the thinking of those primitive times. Perhaps we are not meant to take the story literally. It is an allegory of man’s responsibility for the death of the two good seasons, represented as two good men, and his causing the cold winters and burning summers which now afflict us. We all suffer from that primal guilt. You cannot act without feeling guilt. That is all I say.”

The king let out a growl. “You old bookworm, it’s love that tears me apart, not guilt!”

He went out, banging the door behind him. He was not going to admit to his chancellor that he did feel guilt. He loved the queen; yet by some perverse streak in him he longed to be free, and the realization tortured him.

She was the queen of queens. All Borlien loved her, as they did not love him. And a further turn of that particular screw: he knew she deserved their love. Perhaps she took it too much for granted that he loved her… Perhaps she had too much power over him…

And that bastion of her body, ripe as corn sheaves, the soft seas of her hair, the ointments of her loins, the dazzlement of her gaze, the wholeness with which she smiled… But what would it be like to rip into the pubescent body of that pretentious semi-Madi princess? A different thing entirely…

His tortuous thoughts, winding this way and that, were penned in among the intricacies of the palace. The palace had accumulated almost by accident. Courts had been filled in by buildings and servants’ quarters improvized from ruins. The grand and the sordid lay side by side. The privileged who lived here above the city suffered almost as many inconveniences as those in the city.

One token of inconvenience lay in the grotesque arrangements on the skyline, now visible outlined against the darkening cloud overhead. The air in the valley lay stifling upon the city, like a cat indifferently sprawled upon a dying mouse. Canvas sails, wooden vanes, and little copper windmills had been perched high on air stacks, in order to drag a breath of freshness down to those who suffered in chambers below. This orchestra of semaphoric bids for relief creaked above the king’s head as he walked through his maze. He looked up once, as if attracted by a chorus of doom.

No one else was about, except sentries. They stood at every turn, and most of them were phagors. Weapon bearing, marching, or rigidly on guard, they might have been the sole possessors of the castle and its secrets.

JandolAnganol saluted them absently as he went through the gathering shadows. There was one person to whom he could go for advice. It might be advice of a villainous order, but it would be given. The person who gave it was himself one of the secrets of the castle. His father.

As he drew nearer to an innermost part of the palace where his father was confined, more sentries stiffened at his approach, as if by some potent regal quality he could freeze them with his presence. Bats fluttered from nooks in the stonework, hens scattered underfoot; but the place was strangely silent, dwelling on the king’s dilemma.

He made for a rear staircase protected by a thick door. A phagor stood there, his high military caste denoted by the fact that he had retained his horns.

“I will enter.”

Without a word, the phagor produced a key and unlocked the door, pushing it wide with his foot. The king descended, walking slowly with a hand on the iron rail. The gloom was thick, and thickened as the stair curved down. At the bottom was an anteroom where another guard stood before another locked door. This also was opened to the king.

He came into the damp set of chambers reserved for his father.

Even in his self-absorption, he felt the chill and the damp. A ghost of remorse moved in his harneys.

VarpalAnganol sat in the end room of three, wrapped in a blanket, gazing into a log fire smouldering in a grate. A grille high in one wall let in the last of daylight. The old man looked up, blinking, and made a slapping noise with his lips, as if moistening his mouth preparatory to speech, but he said nothing.

“Father. It’s I. Have you no lamp?”

“I was just trying to calculate what year it was.”

“It’s 381, winter.” It was some weeks since he had set eyes on his father. The old man had aged considerably, and would soon be one with the gossies.

He got himself to the standing position, supporting himself with an arm of the chair.

“Do you want to sit down, my boy? There’s only the one chair. This place is not very well furnished. It will do me good to stand for a while.”

“Sit down, Father. I want to talk to you.”

“Have they found your son—what’s his name? Roba? Have they found Roba?”

“He’s crazy, even the foreigners know it.”

“You see, he liked the desert as a child. I took him there, and his mother. The wide sky…”

“Father, I am thinking of divorcing Cune. There are state reasons.”

“Oh, well, you could lock her up with me. I like Cune, nice woman. Of course, we’d need another chair…”

“Father, I want some advice. I want to talk to you.” The old man sank down on the chair. JandolAnganol crossed in front of him and squatted facing him, back to the feeble fire. “I want to ask you about—love, whatever love is. Are you attending? Everyone is supposed to love. The highest and the lowest. I love the All-Powerful Akhanaba and perform my worship every day; I am one of his representatives here on earth. I also love MyrdemInggala, above all women who ever breathed. You know that I have killed men I thought looked lustfully upon her.”

A pause followed while his father gathered his thoughts.

“You’re a good swordsman, that I never denied.” The old man tittered.

“Didn’t a poet say Love is like Death? I love Akhanaba and I love Cune, yes. Yet under that love—I often ask myself—under that love, isn’t there a vein of hatred? Should there be? Does every man feel as I do?”

The old man said nothing.

“When I was a child, how you beat me! You punished me by locking me out. Once you locked me down here in this very cellar, remember? And yet I loved you, loved you without question. The fatal innocent love of a boy for his father. How is it I can love nobody else without that poison of hate leaking in?”

The old man wriggled in the chair as his son spoke, as if possessed of an incurable itch.

“There’s no end to it,” he said. “No end at all… We cannot tell where one emotion ends and the next begins. Your trouble’s not hate but guilt. That’s what you feel—guilt, Jan. I feel it, all men feel it. It’s an inherited misery bred in the bone, for which Akha punishes us with cold and heat. Women don’t seem to feel it the way men do. Men control women, but who’s to control men? Hate’s not bad at all. I like hate, I’ve always enjoyed hate. It keeps you warm at nights…

“Listen, when I was young, lad, I hated almost everyone. I hated you because you wouldn’t do as you were told. But guilt—guilt’s a different matter, guilt makes you miserable. Hate cheers you up, makes you forget guilt.”

“Love?”

The old man sighed, blowing his bad breath into the dank atmosphere. It was so dark that his son could not see his face, only the gap in it.

“Dogs love their masters, that I do know. I had a dog once, a wonderful dog, white with a brown face, eyes like a Madi. He used to lie beside me on my bed. I loved that dog. What was his name?”

JandolAnganol stood up. “Is that the only love you’ve ever felt? Love for some scumbering hound?”

“I don’t remember loving anyone else… Anyway, you are going to have a divorcement of MyrdemInggala, and you want an excuse so that you don’t feel so guilty about it, eh?”

“Is that what I said?”

“When? I don’t remember. What time is it, do you reckon? You must announce that she and YeferalOboral, that brother of hers, plotted to murder the Sibornalese ambassador, and that’s how her brother was killed. A conspiracy. There’s a perfect excuse. And then when you put her away, you will please Sibornal as well as Pannoval and Oldorando.”

JandolAnganol clutched his forehead. “Father—how did you learn of YeferalOboral’s death? His body was brought back only an hour ago.”

“You see, son, if you keep very still, as I have to with my stiff joints, everything comes to you. I have more time… There is another possibility…”

“What’s that?”

“You can just have her disappear in the darkness one night. Never seen again. Now that the brother’s gone, there’s no one interested enough to make a real fuss. Is her old father still alive?”

“No. I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t even dream of doing it.”

“Of course you would…” He panted a little by way of laughter. “But my conspiracy idea is a good way, eh?”

The king went to stand under the window. Waves of light floated on the domed brick ceiling of the prison. Outside was the queen’s reservoir. His sorrow accumulated like water. How treacherous this old man still was…

“Good? Full of guile and taking advantage of circumstances, yes. I see clearly where I had my character from.”

He hammered on the door for release.

After the cellars, the evening world appeared bathed in light. He took a side door and emerged by the reservoir, where a flight of steps led down to the water. Once a boat had been moored there; he remembered playing in it as a boy; now it had disintegrated and sunk.

The sky was the hue of stale cheese, flecked with wisps of grey cloud. On the far side of the pool, like a cliff, rose the queen’s quarters, its elegant outlines black against the sky. A light burned dimly in one window. Perhaps his beautiful wife was there, preparing for her bed. He could go and beg her forgiveness. He could lose himself in her beauty.

Instead, unpremeditatedly, he jumped forward into the reservoir.

He held his hands together above his head as if he were falling from a building. Air belched out from his clothes. The water grew dark rapidly as he sank.

“Let me never rise,” he said.

The water was deep and cold and black. He welcomed terror, trying to embrace the mud at the bottom. Bubbles streamed from his nose.

The processes of life commanded by the All-Powerful would not allow him to escape into the avenues of death. Despite his struggles, he found himself drifting upward again. As he surfaced, gasping, the queen’s light went out.