Sorcerers of Majipoor

  Seeing his father this wearied, Korsibar’s heart went out to him. The Coronal, he knew, had every reason to be weary, and not just from the exertions of these sorceries. For the past forty-three years, a span of time unimaginable to Korsibar, the Coronal Lord Confalume had had the task of reigning over this giant planet. To be sure, he reigned in the name of the Pontifex, and it was the Pontifex in whom all ultimate responsibility for decision was vested. But the Pontifex lived hidden away in the secrecy and security of the Labyrinth. It was the Coronal who had to remain endessly on public display, holding open court at the Castle atop the Mount, and going forth into the world as well, every six or eight years, to fulfill the custom of the grand processional by which the Coronal presented himself in person in every major city of all three continents.

  In making the grand processional it was the junior monarch’s task to convey himself beyond the Fifty Cities of the Mount, and onward across the sea to distant Zimroel and its great metropolis of Ni-moya, and grim Piliplok of the terrifyingly straight streets, and Khyntor and Dulorn and flowery Til-omon and Pidruid and all those other faraway places whose existence was barely more than legendary to Korsibar; displaying himself to the multitudes as the living symbol of the system that had governed this gigantic world since the dawn of its historic period so many thousands of years before. Small wonder Lord Confalume looked tired. He had lived long enough to have made the grand processional not once but five times. He had carried all of Majipoor on his shoulders for some years longer than four full decades.

  Korsibar stood a long time waiting, and said nothing. And waited some more. And still the Coronal busied himself with his sorcery-things, as though he had forgotten Korsibar was there. And Korsibar waited.

  And went on waiting. When the Coronal required one to wait, one waited, and did not question the waiting. Even if he were one’s own father.

  After a long while Lord Confalume looked up at last, and blinked a couple of times at Korsibar as though he were surprised to see him in the room. Then the Coronal said, with no preamble, “You amazed me more than a little this morning, Korsibar. I never imagined you’d have the slightest objection to starting the games early.”

  “I confess some amazement at your amazement, Father. Do you perceive me as such a shallow thing? Do you look on me as having no sense whatever of proper conduct?”

  “Have I ever given you reason to think so?”

  “You give me no reason to think otherwise. All my adult life I’ve simply been left free to amuse myself, like some oversized child. Am I invited to sit in on councils? Am I given high responsibilities and duties? No. No. What I’m given is a happy life of leisure and sport. —‘Here, Korsibar how do you like this fine sword? This saddle, this bow of Khyntor workmanship? —These fiery-tempered racing-mounts have just been sent to us from the breeders at Marraitis, Korsibar: take your pick, boy, the best is none too good for you. —Where will you hunt this season, Korsibar? In the northern marches, perhaps, or will it be in the jungles of Pulidandra?’ And so it has been, Father, all my life.”

  The Coronal’s tired face seemed to sag into an even deeper weariness as Korsibar’s verbal barrage went on and on.

  “That was the life you wanted for yourself,” he said, when the prince had subsided. “Or so I believed.”

  “And indeed I did. But what other kind of life could I have chosen to have?”

  “You could have been whatever you pleased. You had the finest of princely educations, boy.”

  “A fine education, yes! And for what purpose, Father? I can name a hundred Pontifexes from Dvorn to Vildivar, all in the proper order, and then name fifty more. I’ve studied the codes of the law, the Decretals and the Synods and the Balances and all the rest of that I can draw you maps of Zimroel and Alhanroel and put all the cities in their proper locations. I know the pathways of the stars and I can quote you inspiring passages from all the best epic poets from Furvain to Auliasi. What of it? What good does any of it do me? Should I have written poetry myself? Should I have been a clerk? A philosopher, perhaps?”

  The Coronal’s eyelids fluttered and closed for a moment, and he pressed the tips of his fingers to his temples. Then he opened his eyes and stared balefully at his son, a hooded, rigorously patient look.

  “The Balances, you say. You’ve studied the Balances. If that’s so, then you understand the inner rhythms of our governmental structure and you know why you’ve been given swords and saddles and fine mounts instead of high public responsibilities. We have no hereditary monarchy here. You picked the wrong father, boy: for you alone, of all the princes of Castle Mount, there can never be any place in the government.”

  “Not even a seat on the Council?”

  “Not even that. One thing leads to another, they would say: put you on the Council and soon you’d want to act as Regent when I’m away from the Castle, or you would propose yourself as High Counsellor, or you’d even aspire to be made Coronal yourself when my turn arrives to move on to the Labyrinth. I would constantly be forced to defend myself against accusations of—”

  “Father?”

  “—no end of whispering and innuendo, or outright insurrection, even, if—”

  “Father, please.”

  Confalume halted in mid-flow, blinking. “Yes?”

  “I do understand all these things. I resigned myself long ago to the realities of my situation. Prestimion will be Coronal, not me: so be it I never expected to be Coronal, never. Nor wanted it, nor hoped for it. But let me bring you back to the point where this wrangling discussion started, if I may. I asked you whether you really believed I was so stupid that the only thing on my mind was the desire to escape the boredom of this miserable hole by getting on a mount and waving my sword around in some tournament, without a scrap of thought given to custom or tradition or propriety.”

  The Coronal made no immediate response. His eyes now grew dull with inattention; his face, which had become very grim, seemed to go entirely blank.

  At length he said, keeping his voice very low, “Do you resent it that Prestimion is going to become Coronal, Korsibar?”

  “Do I envy him, do you mean? Yes. He’ll be a king, and who would not envy the man who is to be king? But as for resenting that he will be Coronal in my place—no. No. That place was never mine to occupy. I know that. There are nine billion men on this planet, and I am the only one of whom it was known, from the moment of his birth, that he could never become Coronal.”

  “And does that make you bitter?”

  “Why do you keep asking me these things, Father? I understand the law. I yield my nonexistent claim on the throne gladly, unhesitatingly, unconditionally, to Prestimion. All I meant to assert before is that I believe that there’s more substance to me than I’m generally given credit for having, and I wish I could be allowed more responsibilities in the government. Or to be more accurate, be allowed some responsibilities at all.”

  Lord Confalume said, “What’s your opinion of Prestimion, actually?”

  Now it was Korsibar’s turn to pause awhile before speaking.

  “A clever man indeed,” he said cautiously. “Intelligent. Ambitious.”

  “Ambitious, yes. But capable?”

  “He must be. You’ve chosen him to succeed you.”

  “I know what my opinion of Prestimion is. I want to know yours.”

  “I admire him. His mind is quick, and for a small man he’s remarkably strong, and exceedingly agile besides. Good with a sword, better even with a bow.”

  “But do you like him?”

  “No.”

  “Honestly put, at any rate. Do you think he’ll make a good Coronal?”

  “I hope so.”

  “We all hope so, Korsibar. Do you think so?”

  Another pause. After that moment of deep fatigue, Lord Confalume’s eyes had regained their usual brightness; they searched Korsibar’s mercilessly.

  “Yes. Yes, I think he probably will.”

  “Probably, you say.”
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  “I’m no soothsayer, Father. I can only guess at what is to come.”

  “Indeed. —The Procurator, you know, thinks that you’re Prestimion’s sworn enemy.”

  A muscle throbbed in Korsibar’s cheek. “Is that what he’s told you?”

  “Not in so many words. I refer to his comment of a little while ago, upstairs, about your opposing the games because holding them was Prestimion’s idea.”

  “Dantirya Sambail is a dangerous troublemaker, Father.”

  “Agreed. But also a very shrewd man. Are you Prestimion’s sworn enemy?”

  “If I were, Father, would I tell you? But no. No. I’ve been frank with you about Prestimion. I think he’s a calculating and manipulative man, a cunning opportunist who can argue on either side of an issue with equal skill, and who has maneuvered himself up out of no position at all and now is about to attain the second highest rank on Majipoor. I find it hard to like men of that sort. But that isn’t to say that he doesn’t deserve the second highest rank on Majipoor. He understands the art of governing better than most. Certainly better than I. Prestimion will become Coronal, and so be it, and I will bow my knee to him like everyone else. —This is an ugly conversation, Father. Are these the things you called me here to talk about?”

  “Yes.”

  “And the conjuring you were doing when I came in? What was that?”

  The Coronal’s hands moved flutteringly among the devices on his desk. “An attempt, merely, to determine how much longer the Pontifex is likely to live.”

  Korsibar smiled. “Are you really so adept a sorcerer now, Father?”

  “Adept? No, that’s not a claim I’d make. But, like many others, I’ve made a study of the art. I keep measuring my skills against events as they unfold, to see whether I’ve actually mastered any knack of foretelling the future.”

  “And have you? You have the true oracular skill, do you think?” Korsibar thought of the reports of him that the sorcerers were said to have brought to his father, that strange prediction: He will shake the world. Perhaps it was the Coronal himself who had cast that rune, and now was staring at some singular destiny for his son that Korsibar himself had no way of seeing. “Can we put it to the test?” he asked, happy to see the subject of discussion changing. “Tell me your results, and we’ll see what comes to pass. What is the date that you arrived at for the end of Prankipin’s lingering?”

  “Not any precise one. I’m not that good: perhaps no one is. But it will come, I calculate, within the next nineteen days. Let us keep count, you and I, Korsibar.”

  “Nineteen days, or even less. And then finally all the waiting will be over, and we can have the ceremonies and Prestimion will be Coronal and you will be Pontifex, and we can all get out of this vile cistern of a place and back to the sweet air of Castle Mount. —All but you, Father,” Korsibar added in a softer voice.

  “All but me, yes. The Labyrinth will be my home now.”

  “And how do you feel about that, may I ask?”

  “I’ve had forty years to get myself used to the idea,” Lord Confalume said. “I am indifferent to it.”

  “Never to emerge into the light of day—never to see the Castle again—”

  The Coronal chuckled. “Oh, I can come forth now and then, if I feel like it. Prankipin did, you know. You were only a boy the last time he did: perhaps you’ve forgotten it. But the Pontifex isn’t compelled to stay belowground one hundred percent of the time.”

  “Still, I wouldn’t care for it even so much as one percent of the time. My stay here these weeks past has been quite enough for me.”

  Lord Confalume smiled. “Luckily for you, Korsibar, living here won’t ever be asked of you. The best part of not becoming Coronal is that you know you’ll never become Pontifex.”

  “I should be grateful, then.”

  “You should.”

  “And you feel you are ready to take up your new life down here, Father?”

  “Yes. Completely ready.”

  “You will be a great Pontifex,” said Korsibar. “As you were a great Coronal.”

  “I thank you for those words,” said Lord Confalume. He smiled; he stood. It was a tight, unreal smile, and the Coronal’s left hand, clenched at his side, was trembling perceptibly. Something was being left unsaid: something painful to the Coronal, something explosive.

  What did the Coronal know, what was it that the Coronal had refrained from telling him?

  You will shake the world.

  It had to have to do with that. But whatever Sanibak-Thastimoon had imagined that Lord Confalume might be going to say to him concerning that mysterious oracular uttering had not been mentioned.

  Nor would it be, now. Korsibar was aware that he had been dismissed. He made the formal starburst gesture before his father as Coronal; and then they embraced as father and son, and he turned to leave. He heard the Coronal once again puttering among the geomantic devices on his desk even before he stepped through the doorway.

  4

  SEPTACH MELAYN ENTERED the room known as the Melikand Chamber, a narrow curving hall in the imperial sector of the Labyrinth, adjacent to Prestimion’s suite of rooms, that had been set aside for the use of the companions of the Coronal-designate. Duke Svor and Gialaurys of Piliplok were already there. “Well,” said Septach Melayn as he came in, “I have a little news, at least. Three names have now emerged as candidates for Master of the Games: the Grand Admiral, the Procurator, and our little friend Svor. Or so I have it from one of the Pontifical lackeys.”

  “Who is a person whom you trust implicitly, I suppose?” Svor asked.

  “As much as I would trust my mother,” replied Septach Melayn. “Or yours, if I had ever had the pleasure of knowing her.” He drew his ornately embroidered cloak, dark blue silk lined with lashings of silver thread, tight about him, and paced with the catlike lazy grace that was his manner up and down the brightly burnished floor of smooth gray stone in quick, almost mincing steps. As he moved about, Svor and Gialaurys looked at him in their varying ways—Svor with wry amusement, Gialaurys with his usual melancholy suspicion of Septach Melayn’s elegance and flamboyance.

  They were oddly assorted men, these three dearest friends of the Coronal-designate. In no way did they resemble one another, neither in physique nor manner nor temperament. Septach Melayn was slim and lanky, with arms and legs so exorbitantly long that they seemed almost attenuated. His humor was volatile, his style delicate and witty. His skin was very fair and his eyes were a pale glittering blue; his golden hair tumbled in carefully constructed ringlets to his shoulders, in what was almost a girlish way and he affected a small pointed beard and a dandyish little mustache, a mere chiseled line of gold on his upper lip, that were the cause of much knightly amusement behind his back—though never to his face, for Septach Melayn was ever quick to challenge slights and was a relentless foe in any swordfight.

  Gialaurys, on the other hand, was a man of ponderous mass, not unusually tall, but extraordinarily thick through the chest and shoulders, with a flat, wide face that confronted the world with a look of the utmost steadiness, like a side of beef. His upper arms were the width of another man’s thighs; his fingers had the thickness of fat sausages; his dark hair was close-cropped and his face was clean-shaven except for bristly brown sideburns that descended in thick ominous stripes past his cheekbones.

  He too had a reputation as one to be treated with caution—not that he was a swordsman of Septach Melayn’s wicked skill, but so great was his physical strength that no opponent could withstand his anger. Gialaurys was dark and brooding in temperament, as befitted one whose foster kin in the unlovely city of Piliplok in Zimroel, the land of his birth, had been a family of bleak-spirited Skandars. Prestimion had met him in Piliplok on his one visit to the western continent, ten years earlier, and by some unpredictable affinity of opposites they had become fast friends at once.

  As for Svor, who held the title of Duke of Tolaghai but had no land or wealth to go with it, he was no
more than a speck beside the other two: a flimsy, frail little man of inconsequential size, swarthy almost to the point of blackness, as men born under the terrible sun of the southernmost continent often are, with an unruly tangle of dark hair and dark, mischievous eyes, and a dark, tangled soul. His nose was thin and sharp and sly, with a hook to it, and his mouth was too narrow for all his teeth, and a short tight beard rimmed his face, though he kept his upper lip shorn. No warrior was Svor, but a politician and schemer and avid lover of women, who dabbled somewhat in sorcery on the side.

  In years gone by he had been a companion of the young Korsibar—a kind of pet, in a way, or court jester, whom the big athletic prince liked to keep about him for amusement’s sake—but once Prestimion had begun to emerge as the probable next Coronal, Svor drifted ever so subtly in his direction, until by now he was a constant figure in Prestimion’s entourage. The shift of allegiance was a fact much remarked upon at the Castle—again, only in private—as an example of Svor’s well-known passion for self-aggrandizement and of his expedient looseness of loyalty.

  Utterly different though the three men might be from one another, a curious bond of mutual affection linked them all, and each in his way was devoted to the welfare and service of Prestimion. No one doubted that they would emerge as the high lords of the kingdom once Prestimion wore the starburst crown.

  Septach Melayn said, “If we speak up now in this business of who is to preside over the games, we might well be able to influence the choice. But does it matter to us?”

  “It matters to me,” said Gialaurys unhesitatingly, “and it should to you.” He spoke in the flat broad accent of eastern Zimroel that seemed so comical elsewhere, but not when it came from Gialaurys’s lips, and his voice was a deep gritty rumble that seemed to rise up out of the core of the world. “The Master of the Games determines the pairings. Are you willing to be sent into the field against a series of fools because the Master wishes to embarrass you with mismatches? I don’t want the Master using the games to play games of his own. And whenever there’s a close call in some contest, we want our own man to be the one who decides the fine points. Lives can depend on it.”