The Vallian Cycle

Chapter two-3

“You two. Brothers. Twins. Names?”

They swallowed, alike as twins, alike as twins ought to be and so often are not.

“Please, your honor, I am Tarbil the Brown.”

“And, if it pleases your worship, I am Tarbil the Gray.”

“It pleases me, Tarbils both,” I said. “I saw. And I heard. Why did you attend this meeting tonight?”

Both spoke at once, then Tarbil the Gray yielded to Tarbil the Brown. “Our lives are poor, your honor. We thought there might be a little... fun.”

“I would like to know why you did not shout for Chyyan with the rest.”

“These people, your honor, would bring back slavery.”

“Ah!” I said, understanding. I looked at the mob. “And that sweaty one whom you dragged back. He was your master?”

“Aye, your honor. We were slaves from childhood until the High Kov said all slaves must go free.”

He looked at me under his eyebrows, his head ducked, this stalwart, muscled, hardy fisherman. He would go out in his little dory all night with a light, spearing fish. He was whipcord tough. Now he swallowed and shuffled his feet and wet his lips. “And, your honor, you are really him? You really are, your honor, you really are the new High Kov, Dray Prescot?”

“Yes.”

I did not add, as I might unthinkingly have done once upon a time: “For my sins.”

That was true enough, Zair knew. But they would have misunderstood, believing the words rather than the oblique thought behind them, an altogether too common failing, and a false word could have spread. I was hated enough in Veliadrin as it was.

Both brothers began the full incline until I stopped them, somewhat roughly, with a word, and then bade them stand up like men.

“There is no slavery in any place where the people look to me,” I told them, trying not to give the impression of smugness or of righteousness. That never wears with simple folk. “You who once were slave are now free. It is your right. And I would thank you for your help.”

I did not, there and then, in view of some of the murderous looks bestowed on the Tarbil brothers, give them a gold piece each, or a ring or any other trifle. That would come later, when I confided the details to Panshi, my Great Chamberlain. He had remained at his post in the palace fortress of Esser Rarioch overlooking the bay and my capital city of Valkanium in Valka. And it would be no trifle. The Tarbil brothers would be useful.

Yes, I own it. Already I was thinking how they would fit into my schemes to free all the slaves of Vallia.

The Tarbils bobbed again and then drew back. They were given plenty of room. I looked questioningly at Roybin.

“They will be safe, my Prince. I believe you have put such a fright into these folk they will be quiet for a space, to the glory of Opaz and the Invisible Twins.”

Oby and Balass were busy picking up the scattered weapons dropped by the black-feathered masichieri. They knew my ways. I did not give the Tarbils a rapier or a thraxter. Giving a man a weapon he does not know how to use is no act of friendship, and is a good way of getting him killed. But Roybin, who would stay in his home town of Autonne for a space, would see to the Tarbils before they were brought to Valka for the greater work.

I lifted my voice so all could hear.

“And we have more work to do.” I spoke to the fisherfolk of Autonne. “Go to your homes. Ponder on what you have seen. Remember that the spirit of the Invisible Twins made manifest in the heavens above us is a beneficent spirit; but remember also that Opaz will strike down the wrongdoer. Put away from your thoughts this evil creed of Chyyanism. It is a fallacy to dream that each one of us may have exactly what he wants in this life, all at the same time, without effort. You must work, I must work. You will say I am your High Kov, and so I am and may be. The burdens laid on me are different from those laid on you, but they chafe no less harshly. But if any one of you wishes to take that task upon himself he knows the ways, both in law as elsewhere, and I warn you, he will grieve mightily.”

Yes, all right. I know that was double-edged. I damned well meant it to be double-edged.

On Kregen land and wealth and titles are for the taking, but only by due process of law after the battle, despite a forest of dead bodies. I was legally the High Kov of Veliadrin. I could give the title to whosoever I wished, obtaining the emperor’s agreement. Anyone could fight me for it and, if he won, have the emperor ratify his success if he could. That battle might be harder than the preceding one. A man might marry into lands and wealth and, perhaps, into a title. The system is not the same as those obtaining on this Earth. On Kregen it is far more what a man is and what he does that makes a man, and not what a man is born into.

As for women — the whole gorgeous world of Kregen is their oyster.

The famblys shuffled out, still dazed, and some, as I was very well aware, still resentful. We desperadoes were left in the deserted hall, with the shattered gallery and the stink of ancient fish and the four-winged black idol of the Chyyan.

Turko bent and picked up a parrying-stick. He turned it over in his hands, weighing it, studying it. “A klattar,” he said.

I recalled how in Mungul Sidrath Turko had bent and picked up a shield.

Roybin coughed and began to say, “I will arrange for everything to be cleared up here,” when Oby let out a strangled screech that snapped us all about to glare at him.

“Dray! My Prince, look!”

We all stared where his rigid finger pointed.

The black idol against the rich cloths glowered down somberly upon us, the four wings black and seeming to span the heavens. And the idol’s eyes glowed! Twin pits of emerald fire, they shone down with an eerie, baleful flame of malefic evil.