“Do you think Korsibar will have no guards nearby?” Prestimion said. His voice was very mild; he was more amused than angered by Gialaurys’s suggestion, outrageous though it was. “I cut him down, and the next moment my body lies next to his on the throne-room floor. It will have been a very short reign for me. But I know you mean this as loving counsel, Gialaurys. You want me to be Coronal, I think, even more than I want it myself.”
“What will you do, then, when you come before Korsibar?” asked Svor.
Prestimion said, frowning, “I have no clear plan yet. What would you suggest for me, any of you, short of hiding daggers in my bosom?”
“Best not to go at all,” said Septach Melayn. “Failing that, to do much listening and little speaking, and when he makes you the offer, to say that you need time to consider it, that you must speak with your mother the Lady Therissa first, and see if you are needed more urgently at your Muldemar estate than here.”
“Good. That buys me a little time, but only a little.”
“I wish I had some shrewder thing devised for you,” Septach Melayn said.
“As do I.”
“This audience, you say, is in the throne-room?” Svor asked. “Not the Coronal’s office?”
“The throne-room, yes,” Prestimion said.
Svor’s expression darkened. He turned a little, so that he was staring out the window instead of looking at Prestimion. “I see trouble in this. He fears you; the royal office, grand as it is, evidently isn’t grand enough for him for this meeting; he wants all the majesty of the throne-room surrounding him when he addresses you. Which is a sign of weakness in his soul. An enemy whose soul is weak but who nevertheless has great power at his command is more deadly than a strong one. He’ll strike out of fear, like a cornered snake. Take care, Prestimion.”
“Yes. That I surely will.” He threw open the door of his great wardrobe closet and studied the array of garments within. “The next great problem, gentlemen: shall I dress in something rich and grand, as befits a high prince summoned before a Coronal? Or will it trouble him if I do, and shall I dress more modestly, like the humble vassal he no doubt would like me to be, which will put him at his ease?” Prestimion laughed. “And yet I don’t want him to take me too lightly. Perhaps the middle range is best, in this as in all other things.”
He chose, in the end, simple but costly clothing, a white silken tunic that looked more like cotton, and gray hose of the same deceptive material, and an ordinary red cape cunningly worked around its borders—but only therewith figures in cloth of gold, and plain leather buskins. At the last moment he drew forth the green stone amulet of Thalnap Zelifor, the corymbor on the golden chain, and slipped it around his neck.
Gialaurys and Septach Melayn accompanied him as far as the Inner Castle, leaving him at the entrance to the throne-room precinct itself. Duke Svor, having a prior meeting with a lady of Duke Kanteverel’s following—for that was a great thing with Svor, the attention he paid to ladies, and they to him—did not go with them.
Korsibar was ensconced most magnificently atop the Confalume Throne when Prestimion entered. He wore a grand robe of rich scarlet velvet over his Coronal’s colors of green and white, and the starburst crown gleamed on his brow with the brilliance of the new star in the heavens that had signaled his advent, and he held himself sternly upright in his seat to accentuate the grandeur of his powerful form. About his throat was the Vildivar Necklace, its golden links ablaze with sapphire and ruby and topaz, and his belt of black serpent-skin was studded with tourmalines and blue quartz, and on his finger was the massive fiery ring that had been Lord Moazlimon’s, a great diamond set round with jasper and onyx. It was exactly as Svor had said it would be, Prestimion thought. Korsibar, uncertain of himself within that kingly exterior of his, had opted for the full theatricality of his position in some fevered hope of maintaining an advantage over him thereby.
Well, he was impressive, that much had to be granted. And of course the throne itself was the most majestic possible setting for a king. Prestimion, looking at it now, felt a fresh pang of anguish and loss, knowing that this was to have been his. The massive slab of black opal, that great mahogany pedestal, the silver pillars, the golden canopy, the glister of the gems encrusting the ceiling-beams, the tapestries, the shining floor, everything: Confalume must have poured the wealth of five provinces into this room.
Building it, all unknowingly, for his own son. His own son.
Korsibar said, “Come closer, Prestimion. The echoes in here are very bad if you stand so far away.”
Prestimion advanced another couple of steps. There was no one in the room other than he and Korsibar, though an ample body of guards stood just outside. The enthroned Korsibar loomed far above him. Prestimion had to look up, up, up, to meet his eyes.
“Well, Prestimion—” Korsibar began.
And stopped again. For Prestimion had not knelt, Prestimion had not made the starburst, Prestimion had not shown in any way that he was in the presence of his king.
Take care, Prestimion, Svor had advised.
Yes. Yes. But in this moment of confrontation Prestimion felt a terrible paralysis coming over him, and at the same time fury rising like a red column within his frozen body.
He could not kneel to this man.
He could not make the starburst.
This was the first time he had been alone with Korsibar since before that awful day when Korsibar had stolen the crown. Then they had been friends, more or less, two carefree young princes of the Castle; but now one was a king and one was not, one sat high up on a throne of black opal with a crown on his head and a robe of scarlet velvet on his shoulders, and the other stood humbly below him in a simple tunic and buskins. The immense wrongness of all that now took possession of Prestimion here in the overwhelming grandeur of Lord Confalume’s throne-room. He struggled fiercely to maintain his self-control. But he felt himself losing the struggle.
Korsibar said, “I know how difficult this must be for you, Prestimion.”
“Yes.” Very tightly.
“You should say, ‘Yes, my lord.’”
Prestimion moistened his lips. “I know that I should.”
“Say it, then.”
“Korsibar—”
“Lord Korsibar.”
“Can you really know how hard this is for me? As you sit there on the throne, with the jewelry of past kings all over you and the crown resting on your brow—”
“I am the Coronal Lord, Prestimion.”
“You have the throne, yes. You wear the crown.”
Color came into Korsibar’s swarthy face. This is going all wrong, Prestimion thought. He was heading for the brink of an abyss, and there was no calling himself back. Unconsciously his hand stole to the Vroonish amulet at his breast, and he rubbed up and down along its cool green surface until he realized what he was doing, and then he took his hand away.
“Please, Prestimion. A Coronal shouldn’t say ‘please,’ but there it is. I want us to be friends. I want you to hold high power in the land, to sit in the Council with me and offer all that you have to offer, which is considerable. But there are certain formalities that have to be observed.”
“Your father said ‘please’ to me too, when I went to him in the Labyrinth to ask him if he meant to allow your taking of the crown to stand. ‘Please, Prestimion,’ he said, and began to weep. So now I’ve heard that word from a Coronal and a Pontifex too. If indeed you are a Coronal, Korsibar.”
Korsibar sucked his breath in sharply.
“Prestimion—this is very dangerous, Prestimion—”
“Yes.”
He was over the brink now. There was no returning from it: he must plunge all the way.
“I was warned against doing this,” said Korsibar. “Nevertheless, I felt I owed you a place on the Council. It’s yours if you want it, still. But you must tell me that you recognize me as Coronal, and show me that you do.”
“No,” Prestimion said, staring steadily
and coldly upward at the man on the throne.
“No?”
“This is too much to ask of me.”
“It is essential, Prestimion. Or there will be a terrible breach between us.”
“Creating a breach was not what I meant to do, I think, when I decided to come here today. I had no wish to thwart you. But actually seeing you on the throne changes everything for me: it allows me no other choice but to say what I have said. I’ll take that Council seat, Korsibar, if you are still willing to give it to me, for I think it would be best that you and I work together to avoid chaos in the world, and it is not my desire to be the one who brings that chaos down upon us.”
“Which gives me great pleasure to hear.”
“I am not done,” said Prestimion inexorably. “You should know that I will take that Council seat with the understanding that it’s an interim Council, the Council of an unlawful regime, which is operating only until the present constitutional situation is made regular. I tell you, Korsibar, that I regard the world as having no legitimate Coronal at this time.”
There. The words had been said. It was like throwing a gauntlet. Going back was impossible now.
Korsibar stared. A vein stood out in high relief on his forehead, as though his skull were about to explode. His face was bright with heat. It had taken on a deeper scarlet hue than that of his robe.
For a moment he appeared unable to speak.
Then, in a dark, congested voice: “Will you not retreat from that statement, Prestimion?”
Prestimion, looking up unwaveringly at him, made no response.
Korsibar nodded grimly. Into the dread silence came a grunt from him as of a great pent-up force being released, and then the sharp sound of Korsibar clapping his hands a single time; and as the echoing vibrations of that clap went forth, a squadron of guardsmen rushed into the room. They had been waiting and ready, Prestimion realized, in some hidden chamber. Korsibar, livid, rose to his full height and pointed to him, and cried in a voice like thunder, “Here is a traitor! Arrest him! Take him to the Castle vaults!”
Septach Melayn was in his chambers, feinting at shadows with his rapier to keep his eye sharp and his balance pure, as he was wont to do for at least an hour every day, when Gialaurys came bursting in without announcement, crying, “Prestimion’s taken! He’s chained up in one of Lord Sangamor’s tunnels!”
“What’s this? What?” Septach Melayn sheathed his weapon and bounded across the room, catching up the loose front of Gialaurys’s doublet in his fist and thrusting his face into that of the other man. “Taken? How? Why?”
“He had the audience with Korsibar, and it went badly. Angry words were spoken. And then Korsibar called for his guardsmen and had Prestimion carried off to be arraigned for high treason. I have this from Serithorn’s nephew Akbalik, who was waiting in the antechamber to speak with Korsibar and heard the whole thing.”
“Taken,” said Septach Melayn again, in wonder. “Who would think that that hollow fool Korsibar could ever find the courage? No, I withdraw that, he has foolishness aplenty, but no dearth of bravery in him either. A bad thing it is, too, to have great courage without overmuch wisdom to temper it.” As he spoke he moved busily around the room, collecting some weapons, a few garments, other stray possessions, and thrusting them into a sack. “What madness this thing is! It’s the two-headed wizard that put him up to it, or perhaps Farquanor, who has enough evil guile in his soul to fill three heads,” he said. And a moment afterward: “Well, then, we must flee this place, you and I.”
“And leave Prestimion hanging in chains?” said Gialaurys in a tone of disbelief. “Surely not.”
“Do you imagine that you and I by ourselves can fight our way to his side and bring about his release?” Septach Melayn asked, laughing. “The two of us against all the Castle? It would be the wildest sort of folly.”
“But if we raised an outcry and a protest, and won the support of such as Oljebbin and Serithorn—”
“We’d never get the chance. There’s room in those dungeons for plenty more beyond Prestimion, my friend, and at this moment places are probably cleared for both of us. We’ll be able to do him little service if we’re hanging there beside him.”
“Would they dare?”
“Even Korsibar’s shrewd enough to know that doing a thing by halves is a certain way to fail at it. He’s tried already to have you killed right in front of everyone, or have you forgotten that? And now he’s made his move against Prestimion: how can he let us remain free? He’ll want to put us all away in one swoop.” Septach Melayn gave the heavyset man an impatient shove. “Come, Gialaurys, come! We need to be outside. From there we can work to win support for him, and freedom. Move that great bulk of yours, and let’s be on our way while we still have the chance.”
“Yes. Perhaps we should. Where to, though?”
“Ah,” Septach Melayn said, for that was a question he had not yet asked of himself. But after only an instant’s thought he said, “Muldemar, and Prestimion’s mother and brothers. They have to be told what’s happened; and after that there’ll be time to decide what to do next.” He shook his head angrily. “What a reversal and change of fortune this is, that he who should be sitting on the high throne is hurled into the deep vaults instead!”
“And Svor?” asked Gialaurys. “What of him?”
Septach Melayn made a wry face. “He’s off with one of his whores, some Bailemoona woman Kanteverel gave him. Who knows where he’s gone with her? We can’t spare the time to search from bedroom to bedroom all over the Castle. I’ll leave word for him of what’s taken place: it’s the best that we can do for him. What do you say to that?”
“You have my agreement on it. Svor will have to look after himself.”
“Go to your rooms, then, gather whatever things you’ll be taking with you. We should leave the Castle by the Gossif side, down the Spurifon parapet—you know the one I mean?—and out the old road that leads toward Huine. Going out Dizimaule way’s too risky: that’s where they’ll set up the roadblock first. But if the Divine’s with us they won’t even think of the Gossif side until after we’re gone.”
“A good plan. I’ll meet you in fifteen minutes by Kanaba Stairs, which go down behind the old parade-grounds.”
“Ten.”
“Ten, then.”
“And if I’m not there when you arrive, make your way out of the Castle on your own and head for Muldemar without me. I’ll do the same if you’re late. We dare not wait for each other.” A warm flash of comradely love came into Septach Melayn’s eyes, and he grasped Gialaurys’s tree trunk of an arm with his, gripping it from the great swelling muscle, and the other hand clasping Gialaurys for a moment about the back and shoulders. Then they hastened into the hallway.
All was clear out there. Gialaurys ran off toward the right, where his chambers lay, and Septach Melayn went the other way, out into the open space that was the Kryphon Cloister, which led to the tumbledown remains of Balas Bastion, with a maze of pathways beyond it that would take him around to the northern side of the Castle.
Septach Melayn’s expectation was that the very hugeness and intricacy of the Castle would work in his favor. He had no doubt now that guards were already out looking for him, and for Svor and Gialaurys also; but first they had to find him, and he was in motion through the almost infinite passageways and underpasses and crosswalks of the great building, so that their only hope was to stumble upon him by chance somewhere between his chambers and whichever exit from the Castle he chose to take. There were many of those, though most were rarely used. Septach Melayn knew the Castle well, and was quick-minded as well as quick on his feet. He moved steadily forward. Now and again he saw groups of guardsmen in the distance, but they did not seem to see him and perhaps did not even yet know that he was being sought, and in any case it was always possible to find some alternative route that took him toward his goal.
All went well, though his path was somewhat more circuitous than the one he ha
d originally planned to take, on account of the deviations made necessary by these glimpses he had of guardsmen ahead. He sprinted easily and swiftly through a courtyard whose name he had forgotten, where a host of headless eroded marble statues bearing the stains of five thousand years had been piled in a sad heap, and over a bridge that he thought was called Lady Thiin’s Overpass, and down a spiraling brick-edged rampart to the Tower of Trumpets, which led to the staircase that would put him on the Castle’s outer face.
There, to his great annoyance, he encountered four men in the colors of the Coronal’s guard, who arrayed themselves at the head of the stairs as though they meant to block his way. That did indeed seem to be their intention. Their stance was a distinctly unfriendly one.
“Put up your weapons and let me pass,” he told them without a moment’s pause. “I have no time to waste in talk.”
“And where are you going in such a hurry?” asked one, who had on a captain’s helmet.
“No time, either, to answer questions. Step aside: you will regret it if you hinder me. I am Septach Melayn.”
“We know your name. You are the very one we seek,” said the captain, though he looked glum enough about it, and the man who stood beside the captain seemed downright dejected at the thought of doing battle with so famous a swordsman as Septach Melayn. “Come with us peacefully. By order of the Coronal Lord Korsibar you are herewith—”
“You have had your warning,” said Septach Melayn, and drew.
His arm was still warm from the rapier practice of a little while before, and more than ready. He parried a wide wobbly thrust from the captain as though it were a child’s, and put the point of his sword into the man’s cheek, then pivoted and sliced down into another guardsman’s shoulder on his backsweep, and took three fingers from a third with one quick flick of his hand, all of it accomplished in his lazy-looking way, which seemed so effortless and easy. The fourth guardsman was armed with a small gray metal device, an energy-thrower, which he tried desperately to aim and fire. But he must never have been faced with the need to use the thing before. His attempts to operate the activator catch were hampered by the violent shaking of his entire arm. Septach Melayn severed it at the wrist and stepped around him as the man began to set up the uncomprehending wailing that usually followed upon such events.