The Hidden City

  ‘No. Same price as before.’

  ‘Ten times what you paid for the beer in the first place, I’ll wager.’

  ‘Oh, not quite that much. Where do you want me to set up?’

  ‘Same place as last time. I’ll pass the word, and they’ll start lining up.’

  ‘I want some guards this time, Mondra,’ Senga told him. ‘I don’t want another riot when the last cask runs dry the way there was last week.’

  ‘I’ll see to it. Save some for me.’

  The ox-cart clattered through the gate and into a wide street where most of the moss had been worn off the cobblestones. A great deal of work had clearly taken place here in Natayos in the past few years. The squared-off stones of the broken walls had been rather carelessly re-stacked and then shored up with peeled log braces. Long-vanished roofs had been replaced with crude thatching made of tree-limbs, providing nesting sites for raucous tropical birds, and here and there blackened piles of half-burned trees and bushes marked the places where indifferent workmen had attempted to dispose of the mountains of brush that had been cleared from the streets and houses. The men living here lounged idly in the streets. There were Elenes from Astel, Edom, and Daconia, as well as Arjunis and Cynesgans. They were a roughly dressed, unshaven lot who showed no signs that they even knew the meaning of the word ‘discipline’.

  ‘What price are you getting for this?’ Kalten asked, patting one of the beer barrels in the cart.

  ‘A penny a gill,’ Senga replied.

  ‘That’s outrageous!’

  ‘They don’t have to buy it,’ Senga shrugged. ‘Get the money before you start to pour. Don’t take promises.’

  ‘You’ve put my moral qualms to rest, Senga,’ Kalten laughed. ‘At that price, this is hardly honest.’

  ‘There’s that building I was telling you about.’

  Kalten tried to look casual as he turned to stare at the substantial-looking ruin. ‘They really don’t want anybody to look into that place,’ he said. ‘Those bars on the windows make it look like a jail.’

  ‘Not quite, Col. Those bars are there to keep people out, not in.’

  Kalten grunted, still staring intently at the building. The barred windows had panes of glass in them, cheap, cloudy glass that had been poorly installed. Drapes on the inside cut off any possibility of seeing anything or anyone who might be in there. There were guards at the door and other guards stationed at every corner. Kalten wanted to howl with frustration. The gentle girl who had become the center of his life was possibly no more than twenty yards away, but she might as well have been on the other side of the moon; and even if she were to look out through that clouded glass she would not recognize his altered features.

  Senga paid the guards in the square with beer, and then he and his friend got down to work. Scarpa’s rebels were rowdy, shouting and laughing, but they were generally in a good humor. They lined up in an orderly fashion and came to the rear of the cart two by two, where Senga and Kalten filled their containers with the amber beer. There were a few arguments about the capacity of the assorted tankards, jugs, and pails, but Senga’s word on the subject was final, and anyone who objected too loudly was sent back to the end of the line to think things over for an hour or so while he worked his way back to the front again.

  It was after the two entrepreneurs had drained the last barrel and sent the disappointed late-comers away that Kalten saw a familiar figure come weaving across the mossy square toward the ox-cart. Krager was not wearing well. His head was shaved and as pale as a fish-belly, and his dissipated face was eroded by decades of hard drinking. His clothing, though obviously expensive, was wrinkled and filthy. He shook continually with a palsied tremor that ran through him in waves.

  ‘I don’t suppose you brought any wine,’ he asked Senga hopefully.

  ‘Not much call for it,’ Senga told him, re-fastening the tail-gate of the cart. ‘Most of these fellows want beer.’

  ‘Do you know any place where you can get wine?’

  ‘I can ask around. What’s your preference?’

  ‘Arcian red, if you can find any.’

  Senga whistled. ‘That will cost you, my friend. I could probably chase down some of the local reds for you, but the imported stuff – that’s going to take a big bite out of your purse.’

  Krager smirked at him. ‘It’s no problem,’ he said in his slurred voice. ‘I’m what you might call independently wealthy at the moment. These local reds taste like pig-swill. I want real wine.’

  ‘It might take a while,’ Senga told him dubiously. ‘I’ve got contacts in Delo that might be able to find some for you, but Delo’s a long way off.’

  ‘When are you coming back?’

  ‘A couple of days. The brewery where I buy this slop’s running day and night, but I still can’t keep up.’

  ‘Bring me a couple of barrels of the local pig-swill then – enough to tide me over until you can find me some Arcian red.’

  ‘You can count on me,’ Senga assured him. He gave Krager a hard look. ‘I’ll need something in advance, though. I’ll have to buy the Arcian red before I can sell it to you. I’m doing fairly well, but I’m not that rich yet.’

  Krager fumbled for his purse.

  Kalten was suddenly gripped by an almost intolerable impatience. He was sure now that Alean was here. Krager’s presence virtually confirmed it. The prisoners were most likely being held in the building with barred windows. He absolutely had to get back to Narstil’s camp so that Bevier could pass the word on to Aphrael. If Xanetia could enter Natayos unseen, she could either penetrate the prison walls or reach into Krager’s wine-sodden mind to verify what was almost a certainty now. If all went well, it would be no more than a few days until he and Sparhawk were reunited with the women they loved. Then they could all come here and do unpleasant things to the people responsible.

  Vanion and Betuana reached Sarna late that afternoon, and the Atan Queen scarcely paused before setting out for the border.

  ‘It was ghastly, Sparhawk,’ Vanion said, leaning wearily back in his chair and putting his visored helmet on the table. ‘They’re like no soldiers I’ve ever seen before. They’re big, and they’re fast, and their hides are so tough that most of the time my sword just bounced off them. I don’t know where Klæl found them, but they’ve got yellow blood, and they made mincemeat out of my knights.’

  ‘Kring and Tikume ran into them as well, I guess,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘Anosian was trying to pass the word to Aphrael, but he garbled the spell so badly that she couldn’t make any sense out of it. She’s a little unhappy with Tynian. When he was gathering up the knights he brought back to Matherion, he accidentally picked every Pandion who has the least bit of skill with the spells. That’s why she can’t get any reports from Komier.’

  ‘We might have to send somebody to join him and handle communications – except that it’d take weeks for him to get there.’

  ‘Not if Aphrael takes him, it won’t,’ Sparhawk disagreed. ‘She carried me from Beresa to Sopal – almost a thousand miles – in about a half an hour.’

  ‘You’re not serious!’

  ‘You’ll love flying, Vanion.’

  ‘You’re carrying tales, Sparhawk.’

  They turned quickly.

  The Child Goddess was sitting in a chair at the far end of the room with her grass-stained little feet up on the table.

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,’ Sparhawk told her.

  ‘Would you prefer some kind of announcement, Sparhawk? Multitudes of spirits bawling hymns of praise to introduce me? It’s a little ostentatious, but I can arrange it.’

  ‘Just forget I said anything.’

  ‘I’ll do that. I had a chat with Anosian. He’s practicing now – very hard. Kring and Tikume ran across Klæl and his soldiers out in the desert, and they discovered something you gentlemen should know. I was right, Vanion. Klæl’s soldiers have bile in their veins instead of blood because they breathe with their livers, and that me
ans that the air where they come from isn’t anything like the air here – probably something like marsh-gas. There’s something in it that they need, and they can’t get it out of our air. The Peloi used their standard cut-and-run tactics, and after a little while those monsters started to collapse. Next time you come up against them, just turn around and run away. If they try to chase you, they’ll choke to death. Did Betuana leave?’

  ‘Yes, Divine One,’ Itagne replied.

  ‘Good. The quicker I can get Engessa to my island, the quicker I’ll have him back on his feet.’

  ‘I’ve been meaning to ask you about that,’ Sparhawk said. ‘You said that his brain’s been injured.’

  ‘Yes.’

  The brain’s very complicated, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yours aren’t quite as complex as ours, but they aren’t simple, by any means.’

  ‘And you can heal Engessa’s brain on your island?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘If you can fix a brain, you should be able to fix somebody’s heart. Why didn’t you just take Sephrenia to your island and heal her there? Why did you come to Beresa and try to steal Bhelliom?’

  ‘What’s this?’ Vanion exclaimed, coming to his feet.

  ‘Wonderful, Sparhawk,’ Aphrael said dryly. ‘I’m awed by your subtlety. She’s all right, Vanion. Bhelliom brought her back.’

  Vanion smashed his fist down on the table and then controlled himself with an obvious effort. ‘Would it inconvenience anybody to tell me what happened?’ he asked them in an icy voice.

  ‘We were in Dirgis,’ Aphrael shrugged. ‘Sephrenia was alone in the room, and Zalasta came in and stabbed her in the heart.’

  ‘Good God!’

  ‘She’s fine, Vanion. Bhelliom took care of it. She’s coming along very well. Xanetia’s with her.’

  Vanion started toward the door.

  ‘Oh, come back here,’ the Child Goddess told him. ‘As soon as I get Engessa to the island and deal with his injury, I’ll take you to Dirgis. She’s asleep now anyway, and you’ve seen her sleep before – lots of times.’

  Vanion flushed slightly and then looked a bit sheepish.

  ‘You still haven’t answered my question,’ Sparhawk said. If you can fix a brain, why can’t you fix a heart?’

  ‘Because I can shut a brain down to work on it, Sparhawk, ’ she replied in a long-suffering tone. ‘The heart has to keep on beating, and I can’t work on it while it’s jumping around like that.’

  ‘Oh, I guess that makes sense.’

  ‘Do you happen to know where I could find Zalasta?’ Vanion asked in a dreadful voice.

  ‘He’s probably gone back to Natayos,’ Aphrael replied.

  ‘After I visit Sephrenia, do you suppose you could take me there? I’d really like to have a talk with him.’

  ‘I get his heart,’ the Child Goddess said.

  Vanion gave her a strange look.

  ‘It’s an on-going joke,’ Sparhawk told him.

  ‘I’m not joking, Sparhawk,’ Aphrael said bleakly.

  ‘We can’t go to Natayos,’ Sparhawk said. ‘Ehlana might be there, and Scarpa will kill her if we come pounding on the gate. Besides, I think you’ll have to talk with Khwaj before you do anything to Zalasta.’

  ‘Khwaj?’ Vanion asked.

  ‘Tynian told Aphrael that Khwaj has his own plans for our Styric friend. He wants to set him on fire.’

  ‘I’ve got some more interesting ideas,’ Vanion said grimly.

  ‘I wouldn’t be so sure, my Lord. Khwaj wants to set Zalasta on fire, but he doesn’t want to burn him to death. He’s talking about an eternal flame – with Zalasta screaming in the middle of it – forever.’

  Vanion considered that. ‘What a merry idea,’ he said finally.

  ‘My lady,’ Alean whispered urgently, ‘come quickly. Zalasta’s returned.’

  Ehlana drew the linen head-cloth down over her forehead and joined her maid at the defective window. The wimple had been Alean’s idea. It fit snugly over the Queen’s ravaged scalp, and covered her throat and the underside of her chin as well. It was uncomfortable, but it concealed the horror Krager’s knife had made of her hair. She bent and looked out through the small triangular opening in the window.

  Zalasta’s gaunt face was twisted with grief, and his eyes were dead. Scarpa came hurrying up, his face eager. ‘Well?’ he demanded.

  ‘Go away, Scarpa,’ Zalasta told him.

  ‘I only wanted to be sure you were all right, Father,’ Scarpa replied with obvious insincerity. Scarpa had fashioned a crude crown for himself out of a serving-bowl made of hammered gold. He was evidently unaware of how absurd he looked with the lop-sided adornment perched on his shaved head.

  ‘Leave me!’ Zalasta thundered. ‘Get out of my sight!’

  ‘Is she dead?’ Scarpa ignored the dreadful threat implicit in his father’s voice.

  Zalasta’s face hardened. ‘Yes,’ he replied in a strangely neutral tone. ‘I drove my knife straight into her heart. I’m deciding right now whether or not I can live with what I’ve done. Please stay, Scarpa, by all means. This was your idea, after all. It was such a marvelous notion that I may want to reward you for it.’

  Scarpa backed away, his suddenly rational eyes now filled with fear.

  Zalasta barked two words in Styric and reached out his hand, his fingers curved like hooks. Scarpa clutched at his belly and screeched. His makeshift crown fell unnoticed as Zalasta implacably dragged him back.

  ‘You’re pathetically obvious, Scarpa,’ Zalasta grated, his face only inches from his son’s, ‘but your plan had one minor flaw. I may very well kill myself for what I did to Sephrenia, but I’ll kill you first – just as unpleasantly as I possibly can. I may just kill you anyway. I don’t really like you, Scarpa. I felt a certain responsibility for you, but that’s a word you wouldn’t understand.’ His eyes suddenly burned. ‘Your madness must be contagious, my son. I’m starting to lose my grip on sanity myself. You talked me into killing Sephrenia, and I loved her far more than I could ever love you.’ He unhooked his fingers. ‘Run away, Scarpa. Pick up your cheap toy crown and run. I’ll be able to find you when I decide to kill you.’

  Scarpa fled, but Ehlana did not see him leave. Her eyes were filled with tears, and she turned from the window with a grief-stricken wail.

  Chapter 15

  It was snowing in Sarna when Sparhawk woke the following morning, a thick, heavy snow that swirled and danced in the driving wind coming down out of the Atan mountains lying to the north. Sparhawk gazed sourly out of the window of his room in the barracks, then pulled on his clothes and went looking for the others.

  He found Itagne sitting by the stove in the war-room with a sheaf of documents in his lap. ‘Something important?’ he asked as he entered.

  ‘Hardly,’ Itagne replied. He made a face and put the papers away. ‘I made a serious blunder last spring before Oscagne uprooted me and sent me to Cynestra. I was teaching a class in foreign relations at the University, and I slipped and said the fatal words, “write a paper”. Now I’ve got a bale of these things to plough through.’ He shuddered.

  ‘Bad?’

  ‘Unbelievably so. Undergraduates should never be allowed to touch a quill-pen. So far I’ve encountered fifteen different versions of my own lecture notes – all couched in graceless, semi-literate prose.’

  ‘Where’s Vanion?’

  ‘He’s checking on his wounded. Have you seen Aphrael yet this morning?’

  Sparhawk shook his head. ‘She could be anywhere.’

  ‘Did she actually fly you here from Dirgis?’

  ‘Oh, yes – and up from Beresa before that. It’s an unusual experience, and it always starts with the same argument.’ Itagne gave him a questioning look.

  ‘She has to revert to her real form when she does it.’

  ‘Blazing light? Trailing clouds of glory, and all that?’

  ‘No, nothing like that. She always poses as a little girl, but that’s a sub
terfuge. Actually, she’s a young woman.’

  ‘What do you argue with her about?’

  ‘Whether or not she’s going to wear clothes. The Gods evidently don’t need them, and they haven’t quite grasped the concept of modesty yet. She’s a bit distracting when she first appears.’

  ‘I can imagine.’

  The door opened, and Vanion came in, brushing the snow off the shoulders of his cloak.

  ‘How are the men?’ Sparhawk asked him.

  ‘Not good,’ the Preceptor replied. I wish we’d known more about Klæl’s soldiers before we closed with them. I lost a lot of very good knights needlessly during that skirmish. If I’d had my wits about me, I’d have suspected something when they didn’t pursue us after we broke off our attack.’

  ‘How long were you engaged?’

  ‘It seemed like hours, but it was probably no longer than ten minutes.’

  ‘When you get to Samar, you might want to talk with Kring and Tikume. We should try to get some idea of just how long those soldiers can function in our air before they start to collapse.’

  Vanion nodded.

  There was really nothing for them to do, and the morning dragged sluggishly by.

  It was shortly before noon when Betuana, clad in close-fitting otterskin clothing, came running effortlessly out of the swirling snow. Her almost inhuman stamina was somehow unnerving. She seemed hardly winded and not even flushed as she entered the room where they waited. ‘Invigorating,’ she noted absently as she peeled off her outer garment. She took one lock of her night-dark hair and stretched it out to look critically at its sodden length. ‘Does anyone have a comb?’ she asked.

  They all started at the sound of a blaring trumpet fanfare from the other end of the room. They spun around and saw the Child Goddess. She was surrounded by a nimbus of pure light, she sat sedately in mid-air, and she was smiling sweetly at Sparhawk. ‘Is that sort of what you had in mind?’ she asked him.

  He cast his eyes upward. ‘Why me?’ he groaned. Then he looked at her smiling little face. ‘I give up, Aphrael,’ he said. ‘You win.’

  ‘Of course. I always win.’ She gently settled to the floor, and her light dimmed. ‘Come here, Betuana. Let me comb that out for you.’ She held out her hands, and a comb appeared in one and a brush in the other.