The Man of Gold t-2 Read online

  There were probably further clues that Harsan had overlooked, but even if these led to Lord Sarku as blatantly as a Sakbe road leads to a city gate, how would his superiors know of the machinations of this Skull-Prince?

  He suspected that very few within the hierarchy of the Lord Sarku, Master of Worms, would be aware of what had transpired tonight either.

  There was still another pebble in the porridge. Suppose that the priests of Thumis made all the right deductions; there was still that accursed message which Kurrune had had in his hand. Had not Hele’a said that it pointed toward some other player in this ugly game? Who?

  He resolutely refused to think of Eyil.

  What, then, was to be gained through resistance? A little time, not enough to be of use. Harsan almost groaned aloud. AH of his being cried out against meek surrender to this arrogant, white-painted Prince of demons and bones! Nevertheless, Harsan’s training in priestly logic led him through the maze to the one inescapable conclusion: there was nothing to be had, in the end, by refusing Dhich’une’s demands. Between Vridekka and the Legion of Ketl, they would squeeze it all out of him as the vintners pressed Mash-fruil to make brandy.

  His thoughts went round again to Prince Dhich’une’s arguments. A Prince of the Empire could clearly claim legal jurisdiction over the artifacts. He could be overruled, of course, by orders from Avanthar. But, in the name of Belkhanu’s Seventh Isle, how long would THAT take? Even if the priesthood of Thumis went howling like Zrne-beasts to the Great Council of the Temples, to the governor, to the Emperor himself, it would likely be days- nay, months-before any action might be taken. The Prince would have the Man of Gold, and Harsan’s skull would be picked clean by the river fish before anyone would come to the Tolek Kana Pits to inquire.

  Even as he thought of this, Harsan cursed himself for a moral coward. A person must base his life upon “noble action”; thus thundered the epics, the books of admonitions, and the age-old traditions of Tsolyani society. The soldier, the official, the priest- even those who sacrificed lives each day to grim Vimuhla or Chiteng-behaved as they did because of a belief in their principles and a willingness to stand up for them. Anything else was “ignoble”: weakness, sophistry, self-deception, indolence, or downright cowardice. “An honest tyrant is better than a hypocritical altruist, ” as it said in the Pandects of Psankunel the Knower. Perhaps it was the strangely powerful imperative contained in the Globe of Instruction; perhaps it was something within Harsan himself. Yet he knew instinctively that such as Prince Dhich’une must not-must never-attain the secrets of the Man of Gold.

  Were the others who sought the Man of Gold really any better? a niggling little thought asked. The greedy priesthoods? The squabbling political factions? The other Imperial heirs who jockeyed for power and waited for their aging father to pass on to the Isles? No matter. This was not a choice between one Rertyu and another, fighting over the same bone. This lay between Harsan and himself. He made up his mind.

  He would resist.

  Eventually torchlight bathed the chamber once more. The Prince had returned.

  “What, then, have you thought, Priest Harsan?” Prince Dhich’une asked amicably.

  Harsan licked dry lips. “I–I can tell you nothing more, mighty Prince.”

  The Prince sighed and made a sign. “Alas for the courage of youth. Vridekka!”

  Two men of the Legion of Ketl took hold of him and bound his wrists to the metal link once more, this time over his head so that he lay upon his back on the coarse wooden table. The mind-seer leaned over him and stood gazing down into his face. The rheumy eyes loomed larger and larger beneath their scraggly brows.

  Dizziness-

  “Great Prince, I see within his mind. But he cannot speak. Just below the surface there is a defence like a buckler of iron.”

  “Circumvent it.”

  “I shall try, my Lord. If I can discover where the Man of Gold lies, it may be possible to trick his unconscious mind into still further admissions.”

  Harsan hung in emptiness. Vertigo seized him for there was no up and no down in this place. Whichever way he turned two huge eyes confronted him, driving out all else, becoming the one, the all, the beginning, and the end of being…

  A voice called from a great distance. “Harsan,” it cried, “think not of the Man of Gold! You have concealed it well, Harsan, and you are successful.” Relief flooded over him. “There is no need to fear; all is as it should be.” Were those eyes before him, or the two moons of Tekumel?

  “Harsan,” the voice called again, “Harsan, priest of Thumis! Have you ever been to the city of Ch’ochi? Have you seen Ch’ochi, Harsan?”

  He was mildly surprised to hear his own voice replying, as though from some cavern lost at the bottom of the sea.

  “No. Never…”

  “Tumissa,” the voice persisted, “do you like Tumissa?” “Yes. I pas sed by it when I came to Bey Sii.”

  “Jakalla?”

  “The great port city… I have never seen it.”

  The list went on interminably. Within the egg of emptiness Harsan first became bored, then tired. The two voices prattled on somewhere far away.

  “And Purdimal?” The strange voice asked, “What of Purdimal?”

  “An old city, in the north… The swamps there…”

  A veil dropped over the two staring eyes. Harsan’s universe shook and went swooping off into darkness. He knew no more.

  Vridekka approached the dais. “Mighty Prince, the blockage lies here, in connection with Purdimal. When I mentioned the other cities his mind was as open and limpid as a summer blossom, but when I spoke of Purdimal it snapped shut, and there was the buckler of iron.”

  “So.” Prince Dhich’une rubbed his bone-painted chin. “It is as I expected. The ancients lied when they set up guideposts pointing to Ch’ochi-or else the shrine at Ch’ochi may have been the place of the Man of Gold during the days of its use, and later it was taken to Purdimal. What know you of Purdimal, Vridekka?”

  The mind-seer came close and whispered.

  “Your musty tomes may have the answer. You may be right. I, too, have seen references to her, the Goddess of the Pale Bone, She Who Must Not be Named Aloud. If this Man of Gold is hers-or connected to her-then we have too little information. A citation here, a hint there

  …”

  “Ignorance is danger in this affair, mighty Prince. We know that worship of this goddess was banned, her shrines razed as if they had never been, her minions slain and scattered and driven from the very face of Tekumel. Worse than the Ssu and the Hliiss, who hate us more than-”

  “But the power! The power! More than the world has seen in all the generations since the Time of the Gods! Now if the Man of Gold be a servitor of hers…!”

  “Then we may well wreak our own doom, mighty Prince. My sources suggest that to loose her upon the world again may rock the very foundations of both Stability and Change! Not one of the Priest Pavar’s twenty deities she! Instead, she is said to be as much anathema to Hrii’ii, Lord of Darkness, as she is to Hnalla, Lord of Light.”

  Prince Dhich’une seemed not to hear. “Another thought, Vridekka: why, think you, does the Baron of Yan Kor find such fascination in these Llyani relics? It cannot be their power alone, great though that may be. Scores of devices exist from the ages before the Time of Darkness, and from the Latter Times that followed. The vaults and treasuries of the Five Empires are stuffed full of such bric-a-brac. Only if the Man of Gold were urgent for his schemes would he take so much interest. He must own another piece of the puzzle. His ‘Weapon Without Answer’-?” “The Man of Gold may be an aid to it-or a hindrance?”

  “If it be designed to assist the Baron’s black box, then we can withhold it from him, or mayhap make him pay more dearly for it than he wishes. And if it be an instrument made to combat his ‘Weapon,’ then-then we may not have to give Khirgar and the north over to his blind vengeance after all. Indeed, the tree may be felled so as to crush Yan Kor and no
t us.”

  “Is it wise-?” the old man began.

  “ ‘To plough stones is foolish when fertile fields lie at hand.’ ” An earth-hued hand crept out of the brown sleeve, thumb touching index fingertip. “We know that the Man of Gold lies-or lay-at Purdimal.” Thumb to middle finger. “There was the last stronghold of those who served the Goddess of the Pale Bone.” Thumb to ring finger. “The Man of Gold is therefore likely to be some device of hers, or an ally.” The thumb moved to the little finger. “And since the Baron Aid is interested, we guess that either he needs this instrument, or dreads its coming forth-more probably the latter, judging by his comportment at our last council. Either way we stand to win the throw, if only we can come upon this Man of Gold!”

  “As you say, mighty Prince.” Vridekka drew himself up, his voice yet filled with doubt. “And now?”

  “Awaken the priest. His cooperation is more necessary than ever.”

  Harsan blinked. No time had passed. But here was the skull face of the Prince gazing down at him from a hand’s breadth away.

  “You have aided us much, priest. You have our thanks.” The toneless voice held no hint of irony. “We know that your Man of Gold is in Purdimal-” the rigid mouth sketched a smile at Harsan’s appalled look, “-and we have learned that it is bound to one who cannot be named aloud. Whisper the name in his ear, Vridekka.”

  Harsan heard, and felt defeat empty him as a slave does a wateijug. They had it all. He had done what he could. Still, it had been so easy for them, like a Daichu — leaf trying to stand against the chill of autumn!

  “Now you have only to guide us to it,” the Prince continued smoothly. “This is your only course. Once the Man of Gold is within my hand, I shall use it to bring our enemies, the Yan Koryani-and all who would oppose our Imperium-to their knees. Through it, we shall have her whom I shall not name to serve us-”

  Harsan’s heart gave a great leap inside him. Then the Prince really did not know!

  “The Man of Gold-serves the-the goddess?” he managed. Vridekka cursed and scuttled around to pluck at Prince Dhich’une’s arm. “Lord Prince! He suspects' He realises that we have only a part of the riddle. I see it in his mind. The Man of Gold is not her servant but must instead be her deadliest foe! He knows this, and his mind has gone shut against us!”

  “Then do as you did before! Use your arts!”

  “My probing tells me when something is or is not so. Whenever I touch upon the ancients’ Mind-Bar I sense it. But this is not enough. He must aid us willingly. Otherwise we shall waste endless time badgering each step of the road from him! And there will assuredly be pitfalls that he will know and employ to frustrate us. My Lord-”

  “You can accomplish no more?”

  The bony shoulders rose high, helplessly. “Yes, yes, but it will be long-and dangerous. Others will have time to array themselves against us.”

  “Then I see no other path. Bring in the girl.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Two of the brown-armoured soldiers of the Legion of Ketl escorted Eyil into the chamber. Hele’a went to her and drew away her cloak. Others dragged something forth from the shadows: a narrow wooden trestle with wide-splayed legs, angled so that one end was higher than the other. On this they laid her upon her back, made her ankles fast at the lower end on either side so that she straddled the thing, and then bound her wrists down to links on the upper legs similarly. She made no protest but permitted the troopers to handle her as though she were a sack of Dmz-grain. All the while she gazed steadily at Prince Dhich’une. She seemed not to see Harsan.

  “Eyil!” Harsan cried, “Eyil-!”

  She turned her her head toward him, her black tresses falling away from her face. Her eyes were underscored with dark circles of weeping. He could not read her expression: fear, shame, remorse-a mixture of all three?

  “Mighty Prince,” he called, “Prince Dhich’une! The Lady Eyil hiVriyen has no part in this matter. She knows nothing of the Llyani relics!”

  The still features looked upon him. “Possibly. However, we would have you aid us, priest. You know my power already; yet you refuse me. One more lesson appears to be needed to make you zealous in my cause.”

  Harsan attempted to lie. “The Lady is of no real concern to me, mighty Prince-a girl with whom I made liaison upon the road…”

  “Not so. Vridekka sees into your heart as easily as a maiden gazes into a mirror. Hele’a? The silver box.”

  The ugly little Ghatoni stood by the trestle upon which Eyil lay. He extracted something from a little casket, no bigger than his thumb.

  It was tiny, mottled brown and crimson. It wriggled in his fingers.

  Eyil gasped. Even from where Harsan lay he could see that the whites of her eyes showed all round, and her face had taken on a waxy pallor.

  “One of the servitors of the Worm Lord,” Hele’a announced. He bent and placed the little worm upon the satiny golden skin of Eyil’s abdomen, just above the darkness between her thighs. “It seeks a home, a dark, warm place where it may eat and grow fat…”

  Harsan’s resolve crumbled. “I will tell you, mighty Prince- all-whatever I know!” He tried to say more but found that again his tongue would not move, and his lips refused to form the words.

  “Tell on, then,” Dhich’une said implacably.

  He struggled. All that the Globe of Instruction had contained lay like spring flood waters behind the dam of his lips. But the accursed dam would not break! He strove until the cords stood out in his neck, his teeth grated upon one another, and breath choked in his nostrils. He could utter no word related to what the Skull-Prince sought.

  “You see, you are still obstinate,” Prince Dhich’une chided gently.

  “Oh, my Lord-I try-”

  Eyil strained her head forward to watch the little red-brown worm crawling upon her belly. It left a thin trail of viscous slime.

  She spoke for the first time. “Give them what they seek, Harsan,” she pleaded. Her voice sounded somehow artificial, brittle and false.

  The hideous worm threw back its sightless sucker-ringed mouth and then curved forward to touch her skin. There could have been little pain, but the horror and apprehension must have been great indeed. Eyil choked and then shrieked. “Tell them, Harsan, tell them! It will kill me!” The sincerity of terror now rang in her words.

  “Not there, not yet,” Hele’a said, prodding the worm’s questing head away with his finger. A spot of bright red stained her abdomen where the obscene little mouth had caressed her. Eyil writhed upon the trestle, but the creature did not fall away. It continued its slow progress down over her belly.

  Words, pleas, prayers, imprecations whirled through Harsan’s mind. With the Mind-seer beside him, he knew he could not lie. He opened his mouth and promises poured forth: he would serve as the Prince commanded, whatever the task!

  All at once there was another violent onrush within his brain. The chamber faded, and he fell shrieking through emptiness again, dizzy, nauseous with vertigo. His thoughts, memories, yearnings-all were ransacked and pillaged by a callous, skillful plunderer: Vridekka! He could no longer hear Eyil’s pleas nor feel the agony in his own wrists as he jerked and tore at his bonds. Pictures arose unbidden before his eyes: the patient Pe Choi tutors of his forest childhood; the sprawling bulk of the Monastery of the Sapient Eye, the crumpled Inner Range drowsing green and gold behind it; Zaren at work upon one of his devices; the warm, reassuring gleam of the great golden image of Lord Thumis within its sanctuary; Eyil asleep in his arms upon the velvet cushions of her litter; the priest at Hauma (what was his name?); Chtik p’Qwe and Kerektu hiKhanmu deep in argument. Then a clear vision of a jagged, leaning black tower, wave-wrack pale around its sea-ringed skirts, where fangs of dark grey stone reached hungrily out into the crashing foam of a lead-hued ocean. Then a ritual of some sort: men and women-and others- doing incomprehensible and obscene things to one another, a tangled mass of limbs and nude, coppery bodies. The white metal sphere, the hi
deous Thunru’u, Hele’a’s weazened features merging with the skull-visage of Prince Dhich’une-and-and- then-nothing…

  Blank.

  Vridekka bowed toward the dais. “He will cooperate with us now. I can get no further details-the shield remains intact-yet his willingness to save the girl is clear. I know this priest’s life as though I had spent all my years within his skin.”

  “Remove the Worm of Death before it enters her,” the Prince commanded. “We shall require her again later when this lesson grows dim in the young man’s memory.” Hele’a hastened to recapture the tiny creature.

  “There is one matter, mighty Lord.” The Mind-seer approached the dais and muttered.

  Prince Dhich’une’s head snapped back as though he had been struck.

  “Return the priest to his senses. Quickly!”

  Harsan floated muzzily up into consciousness. He found himself looking towards Eyil. She seemed dazed but unharmed. The Worm of Death was gone, and her face told him that it had not been allowed to bore within. Her limbs were glazed with perspiration, and she trembled yet with remembered terror, tears of mingled fear and relief staining her cheeks. Harsan became aware of Prince Dhich’une leaning over him, a white-faced phantom in the dancing torchlight and shadow.

  “I will serve you, mighty Prince…’’He could say no more.

  “Indeed, you shall serve me,” the Prince responded in a strangely altered tone, “but I now must know one thing more.” He bent very close and whispered, “Tell me, priest, when did you ever see the great black citadel of Ke’er?”

  “What?” This made no sense whatever.