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So, of course, the danger rose in my mind and mocked me.
I had borne at least three names in Hamal that could identify me, clean or dirty, bearded or
clean-shaven: Chaadur. Bagor ti Hemlad. Amak Hamun Farthytu.
Well, I was Hamun now and had no wish at all to be Bagor ti Hemlad again, for he had run afoul of
Queen Thyllis and for a time had been her plaything. That cramph of a King Doghamrei had attempted to
have Bagor slain by setting him alight and dumping him out of a Hamalese skyship down onto the decks
of a galleon of Vallia. One galleon had burned. This crazy onker Bagor, with his trousers on fire had
wrecked the two Hamalese skyships in a midair collision, and then had taken passage aboard the other
galleon to further adventures.[4]
All this I knew. My rear still itched when I thought of that fight and my trousers burning.
As for Chaadur, it was wrongly said that he had slain the Kovneva Esme, when he had in reality merely
set that despicable woman  for whom one could only feel a tiny pang of pity  in silver chains, as she
had kept her own girls in chains that galled them. The Kov her husband had raged after Chaadur, who
had been a gul working in the voller manufactory of Sumbakir, run by Ornol ham Feoste, the Kov of
Apulad. I had never met Ornol ham Feoste in Ruathytu, for Sumbakir lay at a considerable distance, but
I had always been on the lookout for him  he would know Chaadur when he saw him.[5]
Also, a minor worry: those two rascals Avec and Ilter who had named Chaadur knew that Chaadur s
real name was Dray Prescot.
 Ruathytu looked pretty much as that sinful brawling city had always looked, except for a pervasive air of
dinginess, dustiness, a down-at-heels lethargy that, product of the war though it was, depressed me. We
were carried swiftly from the voller landing park to the north of the River Havilthytus in a procession of
zorca riders silent except for the clitter-clatter of polished hooves against the stones. The Queen allowed
only the most important people and super-urgent messengers to land on her palace island where the evil
pile of Hammabi el Lamma rose in spires, peaks, and turrets against the sky. The whole northern area of
Ruathytu through which we passed was given over to the soldiers barracks. There had once been a
merry little fire up there . . . another story. At the river we were ferried across to the palace island, the
boats thunking into the ocher flood. The rowers at the oars were being reminded that they were slaves by
the lashes in the hands of the whip-Deldars. I noticed there were far more diffs in Ruathytu now. The
Queen was spending the country s money prodigiously in hiring mercenaries. The emperor in Vallia was
having to dig deep, too, to counter all this.
There were few preliminaries at the palace before we were shuffled into line and ushered through into the
Hall of Notor Zan. This was not the impressive audience chamber in which I had encountered Queen
Thyllis before. That chamber had been dominated by the enormous crystal throne, the golden steps, the
golden-chained Chail Sheom, and, perhaps most of all, dominated by the somnolent but savagely vicious
forms of the jiklos, Manhounds of Faol used as throne-step pets. There also lay in that resplendent
high-ceiled chamber a hole in the marble floor beneath which grew a syatra, that leprous-white
man-eating plant.
It soon became clear that Queen Thyllis had no intention of thrusting these officers down to her pet
syatra.
The Hall of Notor Zan opened before us and we shuffled through to stand in a bunch on the left of the
tall balass doors. The whole chamber was robed in black. The ceiling was not very tall, as such things are
measured in palaces, and the room was out of proportion to the extent that its length was overly long to
its width. Black cloths cloaked the ceiling and black drapes covered the walls. Samphron-oil lamps shed
a clear, unwavering light. There were no windows. At the far end, sitting on a giant black basaltic throne,
the Queen clenched her arms on the fur coverings  a dramatic and dynamic picture of a woman/queen
worked up to a pitch of anger. There were no Chail Sheom in evidence here for the grim work ahead,
but three manhounds dozed on the black and shining steps. I sniffed. Incense burned, and incense is
calculated to make a man throw up.
The Queen s guard stood to either hand beside the throne in close mesh mail. Marshals and
chamberlains, all dressed in sober black, fussed around, ready to open the proceedings.
And the Queen? Queen Thyllis? She sat erect and leaning a little forward, dressed all in black  as she
had been when I first saw her during that little folly, clutched in the grip of flutsmen. Her face blazed white
now, her green eyes diamonds to match the fire of Genodras. That rich red mouth of hers which could
firm instantly to killing hardness was set now like a trap, with a corner of her lip caught up between her
white pointed teeth.
She had never failed to make an impression, this Queen Thyllis, the Empress of Hamal.
The stillness held. I admit to feeling the effectiveness of the stage-setting. If I had been a Hamalese
officer laden with guilt for having lost a battle, no doubt I d have felt as sick as these poor devils around
me.
A marshal spoke to us after a while, a prickly, stupid little man, waving a sheet of paper. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]