“Nothing so obvious and mundane. This morning I learned that there might be a traitor of relatively high station among the Living.”
Meryel gasped.
“You’re not at risk. We seem to have identified him. He’s not in my organization. He’s in the old man’s.”
“You’re sure?”
“Not entirely. It’s under examination, you might say. We’ve set it up so the man will betray himself if he’s guilty. The ironic thing is, we found out on the very day he was to have been promoted to a level where he would know enough to pull the whole movement down. And we learned that he was suspect only because of a personal calamity that’s befallen him already.” Bel-Sidek decided not to go into that. “I almost feel sorry for the guy. Till yesterday everything was going perfectly for him. By tomorrow, probably, his whole world will have collapsed around him.”
“You have to leave again?”
“Yes. I may have that to attend to, and the old man has a policy meeting set. I could come back afterward. If you want me to.”
“So coy. So shy. So ingenuous. Of course. Now, I’ve had a feast laid on especially for you. Why don’t we see if we can’t do that justice before we fuss ourselves about lesser things?”
Bel-Sidek seldom ate well, unless at Meryel’s. “Let’s have at it, then.”
7
Aaron slid away, just leaving a hand lying upon Laella’s breast. Their mingled sweat began to dry. He shivered with a sudden chill.
It had not been very good. They were both too distracted. And having Stafa waken in the middle of it and jump on his back and yell, “Giddap, Dad!” was not something to ignite uncontrollable passion. Neither was having the yell alert the rest of the household to what was going on.
Mish was particularly intrigued by what happened between men and women in the dark. Her interest disconcerted him, and at times touched him with thoughts and temptations that left him aghast at what could happen inside a man’s mind. That left him so ashamed he could not face Laella for hours after he caught himself thinking them.
If she just wouldn’t try to spy!
Laella got Stafa back to sleep. She moved in next to him, whispered, “I think I should tell Reyha.”
“No. That would be too much of a burden for her. She’d end up calling him on it. Then how long would it take for him to find out where she got the idea?”
After a while, she said, “That could be dangerous, couldn’t it?”
“Scared men are desperate and desperate men are dangerous. And unpredictable. He might get the idea he could cover up.”
“Then why don’t you tell bel-Sidek? Everybody says he has something to do with the Living.”
“If he really does, then Reyha would be alone in the world.”
“Maybe they wouldn’t...”
They’d kill him, Laella. They’re hard men. They kill people every day for crimes less than Naszifs. For him it might be a very prolonged and unpleasant death.”
“Then there’s no way out, is there?”
“Not without choosing who gets hurt. And I don’t want that on my conscience.”
The old man watched bel-Sidek slip into the house, barely in time to get the stage set for the meeting. “Did you have an enjoyable dinner with our lady of the ships, Khadifa?”
“Yes sir. She was highly amused by what she called today’s preposterous circumstances. Meaning her sense of irony got fat because the Living completed its biggest weapons-smuggling operation ever virtually without risk because of Herodian arrogance. If the new governor and his escorts hadn’t bulled through the traffic waiting to enter the straits her ships would have come in first and we would have had to dodge and trick customs men all morning.”
“Perhaps one of those very weapons will cut the pig’s throat.”
“You know him, sir?”
“I remember his father. They say this Sullo is identical to the beast that sired him. Your man is being watched. If the letter he received doesn’t send him running to Bruda he’s innocent.”
“Yes sir. Did you eat, sir?”
“It can wait.”
“You have to develop some regular eating habits, sir.”
“I’m sure. Your mothering can wait, too. Answer the door.”
Bel-Sidek had not heard the discreet knock. He went to the door expecting to find King early as usual. Instead, Salom Edgit greeted him. Bel-Sidek stepped aside. Edgit came in very carefully. He looked awful. The news about Ortbal Sagdet must have given him no peace.
Edgit went to his usual place and settled. Though he was early he had nothing to say.
Hadribel arrived next. He exchanged looks and nods with the old man. Guided by bel-Sidek he took the place usually occupied by Sagdet. If Edgit noticed he showed no sign.
Then came King Dabdahd. He looked as ragged as Edgit. Then the fanatics, together again and looking smug about recent events.
The General surveyed the lot. “As stated previously, the khadifa of the Hahr is with us tonight.” He did not introduce Hadribel. He and bel-Sidek were the only ones supposed to know the names of everyone there-though, of course, everyone knew everyone. They had all been officers together in the same small army.
“New business. The arrival of a new civil governor. His advent appears to have confounded and exasperated our oppressors as much as it has surprised us. This intelligence should be of interest to you all: he has in his train a sorceress of modest talent named Annalaya. She hails from Petra or some such place on the Allurican coast, where they make so many minor witches. Does anyone have anything to tell us about the new governor?”
King said, “One of my men heard that Sullo refuses to stay in the Residence.” The Residence was the seat of the Herodian civil governors. Like Government House, it was in the acropolis, just a quarter mile away. Before the conquest it had been the main temple of Aram the Flame. “He wants a place in the hills east of the city. My man suspected him of a superstitious dread of a place where so many villains met their fate.”
“Keep an eye on that. Also under new business. Has anyone got any idea what Fa’tad is up to, invading the Shu labyrinth, other than tugging Cado’s mustache?”
Headshakes.
“Salom? You have resources among those who work in the Dartar compound. What do they have to tell us?”
“Nothing yet, sir. It’s too soon. But I’ll bet there’ll be nothing.
Fa’tad is close. So close he doesn’t tell his captains what he’s doing half the time. Sometimes he doesn’t know himself. Something catches his fancy, like a shiny coin fascinates a crow, and he plays with it. Sometimes he’s like a kid pulling the strings on a knit garment. He just wants to see what will happen.”
The old man ignored a pain that nipped at him like a malicious puppy. “We’ll table that. Anything else new? No? Old business, then. We continue to become less apparent among the people of Qushmarrah. We lull the oppressor with the thought that time and frustration are disarming us. We begin a phase less active toward Herod but more attentive toward Qushmarrah.”
He winced. The pain was particularly persistent. “Sometime soon an event will transpire which will make possible a serious attempt to reclaim our heritage. I have no control over when. It could be as soon as next week or as distant as six months from now. But the result will be very much in the hands of the movement to exploit. Comes that day we will launch the general uprising some of our brothers find so attractive.
“Your orders are these: reduce conflict with the oppressor and our own people. Expend the energies of your people in identifying the widest possible body of sympathizers. When the day comes we will be able to arm hundreds beyond our own number. I would prefer to offer those arms to men of known persuasion. The first hours, while the news spreads and the oppressor responds, will be critical. We must confuse and unbalance the enemy well enough and long enough for the insurrection to generalize. There will come a point where Cado and Fa’tad will not be able to cope.”
Why am I making t
his speech? They had heard it till they were sick. “I am repeating myself. I apologize. The message is this. We are gathering our strength against an indefinite someday no longer. The date itself is not fixed but it is not likely to be more than six months away. You must prepare for it, and at the same time create the illusion that it is farther away than ever. One final word. You will tell no one the day is coming. No one. No exceptions. No excuses. He who speaks, and whoever hears him, will immediately join the former khadifa of the Hahr. Silence is that important to me. Do you understand?”
He did not get a chance to force acknowledgments. Someone knocked at the door, and yelled. Irritated, the old man waved at bel-Sidek, then gestured the others into the bedroom.
Bel-Sidek opened the door a crack and mumbled with someone. He closed up, came to the old man. “A boy, about ten, with this. For you, I assume.”
The General looked at the folded paper with the sparrow on the outside. “Open it. Place it so I can read it.” He willed his eyes to work well enough.
His correspondent had taken his disabilities into account. The message was written in large block print. He grunted and read it again, then found the shape he recognized as bel-Sidek. “Khadifa, you were right. Your man is visiting Government House right now.” He offered the message to bel-Sidek. “Handle it as you see fit.”
Bel-Sidek read the message twice himself, then remained contemplative for several minutes. It meant a great deal more than an enemy agent reaching a place of high trust within the movement. It could mean that all the guilt of those who had failed at Dak-es-Souetta, and the search for atonement and redemption implicit in their commitment to the movement, was moot, if not a prideful arrogance of false guilt. Had Qushmarrah fallen because an apprentice metalworker of no breeding or standing whatsoever had lost his nerve during the course of something that wasn’t even a battle?
No. True or not, it wouldn’t do. Too many great men and great families had too much emotion invested in the legends already in place. It had to stay quiet. But, even so, it had to be handled. The simple and final way would be to get rid of the man. But why discard a perfectly usable tool just because it had caused you injury? Why not retain it and use it with a little more caution?
“The khadifa of the Hahr has not yet assumed his new nor broken with his old district. If he could dip into that and loan me a dozen reliable soldiers who can be counted on to forget tonight’s doings before tomorrow’s dawn?”
Hadribel stared at him, almost smirking. “You want to borrow some men? Or are you practicing for a speech to the Senate?”
“I need men.” He controlled his embarrassment and the anger that stalked behind it.
Hadribel looked at the old man. “Sir?”
“Right away, Khadifa. Time may be critical.”
“Yes sir.”
Hadribel waited for bel-Sidek at the door. After hesitating a moment, waiting for something more from the General, bel-Sidek went outside. In a moment he was laboring to keep pace with Hadribel.
The new khadifa of the Hahr pretended an epiphany. “Oh. I’m sorry. How is your leg?”
“It’s been troublesome lately. But I’ve had to do a lot more getting around than I’m used to.” Imply that he had done so because of his special relationship with the old man.
Hadribel forbore any expression of sympathy. “What’s going on? I take it the old man knows all about it.”
“He does.”
“Big secret, eh?”
“Yes. Isn’t everything?”
“You need me along on whatever this is?”
“That might not be wise. You’d figure it out. The old man thinks too many people know already. Meaning one more than him.”
Hadribel laughed. “He does have that way about him.” He went serious. “Honestly, how is he doing? Looked like he was having trouble tonight.”
“He isn’t getting any better. He won’t slow down and let himself get better,” bel-Sidek admitted. Then he lied, “On the other hand, he does seem to have stabilized.”
“I worry. And I’m sure others do, too. If something happens suddenly, his passion for secrecy will leave us all in the dark.”
“He claims he’s made arrangements. How good I couldn’t say. I live with him and don’t know what he’s doing most of the time.”
“What’s this big event he was talking about?”
That’s one of the things I don’t know. He throws me out of the house when he even wants to think about it. You ask too many questions. That isn’t a habit he encourages.”
Hadribel accepted the rebuke sullenly. Bel-Sidek did not care. This was not a man whose good opinion concerned him. Politics. You had to get along with, mix with, people you wouldn’t speak to in a lifetime otherwise.
He waited in the street while Hadribel and his sons assembled the crew he wanted. It took them only fifteen minutes. The Shu organization was efficiently managed.
Bel-Sidek took the men away from the Shu before he explained that they were going to capture a Herodian agent who would be coming out of Government House before long. He did not identify the spy. He told them the man was not to be harmed if at all possible.
“He should leave the door on the east side. He’ll want to get out of sight quickly so he’ll head for one of the streets that begin right across the plaza.” He quizzed the men to make sure they knew the area. Most knew it as well as he did, which was all part of being a member of the movement. Knowledge was a weapon, too.
“You’ll spread out, then, and let him get off the plaza. Then you’ll herd him toward me. I’m sure you all know the drill. We’ve done it before. You don’t have to get close enough for him to see you. He just has to know you’re there and you’re moving toward him.”
Usually the tactic was employed when the Living did not want the hunters recognized afterward. This time bel-Sidek hoped to keep his quarry anonymous. Naszif would not survive long if he was recognized. These men did not concern themselves with the niceties of strategy or policy. For them traitor and dead were synonymous.
Hoping he was not too late, bel-Sidek dispersed his troops and began the wait.
On the harbor side the fog was drawing its mask over Qushmarrah. There on the east face of the hill the air was getting hazy, the haze catching a weird greenish tint from the just risen nail paring of a moon.
As he slipped out of Government House, Naszif, the son of bel-Abek, was in as fine a mood as ever he’d known. It had been a day of days; almost enough to counterbalance the misery of the day before. First, the promotion. Third in the Living in the Shu. And the rumor was, that was as good as being second because the khadifa of the Shu was reputed to be some pre-conquest lord who had gone into a coma years ago but was of such high family they dared not put him aside.
At last he had attained a position of power and influence-and, more important, of access. He would know what was going on inside the organization. He would know who was who. He would sit in on policy, planning, and strategy sessions.
Colonel Bruda and General Cado were as excited as he was. A long-ago investment had begun to pay dividends. They had doubled his good fortune immediately by promoting him to vice-colonel in the Herodian army. His being able to confirm the probability that Ortbal Sagdet had been khadifa of the Hahr had pleased General Cado, too.
He felt the forty gold double sudets that represented his promotion bonus. He smiled. He could now afford to get his family out of the Shu. But his mission prevented his doing so. Maybe a second household? Would his several masters accept that?
His mood darkened when he thought of Zouki. His family had been gutted...
He was too excited to pay proper attention to his surroundings, too thrilled to heed the old specter of guilt that had haunted him since that night at the Seven Towers. He did not feel the weight of fear that so often perched upon his shoulders. He missed completely the first couple of moves made by the men stalking him.
The scrape of a foot in the stillness, the flash of a garment in m
otion caught from the corner of his eye, and stark terror usurped his joy. It did not take a minute to understand what was happening. He had helped ran Herodians when he was a ground-level man.
He fought the panic. Panic was the enemy’s ally. If he refused to let it control him he might find a way out. Up to a rooftop. Down into a basement. They could not cover everything. He tried to remember how some victims had gotten away back when he was on the other end.
Then he realized that they must know who they were running. They had been waiting for him. They knew he had gone inside. The promotion... A ploy to send him scurrying to Cado, to betray himself?
Then it would not matter if he evaded them. They would catch him at home. They might tell Reyha...
He did panic then.
He ran.
All he could think of was getting back to General Cado. The Herodians took care of their own.
The soldiers of the Living were good. There came a moment when he was standing in the street, uncertain which way to go. A block behind, four vague shapes walked his way. Three men waited in each mouth of a cross street. Nothing lay ahead but haze lighted greenly by the moon. He went the direction they wanted him to go. And as he started a man stepped into his path, a limping silhouette. A man he knew.
“You can stop running now, Naszif. You have nowhere to go. Come. Walk with me. Quietly. Unless you’d rather I let those others know who you are.”
“No! By Aram, don’t.” He giggled. How long since he had sworn by Aram and meant it? If secretly, he had adopted Herod, faceless god and all.
He was a vice-colonel, damn it. They would not murder him. They would ransom him. Trade him for somebody. He wished he had told Cado he thought the man Hadribel was going to take over in the Hahr instead of saving that for later. The Living would trade him and more to get a khadifa back.
“Come. Let’s walk.” The voice was harder now. “We’ll go to my house and talk.”
“Your father...”
“Is a harmless old man. He’s nearly blind, and his hearing is what you would expect of someone his age. And he’s dying. He’s much too preoccupied with that to care about you.”