Caddoran

Chapter 2-2

However, illogical though it was that the people should willingly accept such folly in high places, the Moot Senators did exercise power over the land, albeit not as much as they imagined, and the Striker, in his privileged position as an ostensibly independent arbiter, exercised power over the Senators. And Krim in his turn, saw himself as exercising influence, if not power, over the Striker. Not that he involved himself in the squabbling of the innumerable and shifting factions that comprised the Moot. Like Striker Bowlott, he understood that while the Senators indulged in this, they would be less likely to turn their attention to anything else. Krim used his perceived power exclusively to enhance the esteem in which the office of Cushion Bearer should be held and, by the same token, to undermine the positions of his fellow officers, particularly the Most Noble Artisan.

As was his habit, he stood back and cast a professional eye over the seated Striker. Bowlott’s mean little eyes were as peevish as ever and his down-turned mouth had a particularly self-pitying look. While in genuine awe of the office, Krim really couldn’t stand the man. Perhaps it was because he was already agitated by concern about the destruction of his cushions by the intruding sunlight, but Krim felt something else stirring within him. His gaze drifted away from the sour spectacle in the chair to a cushion that lay on a shelf beneath the chair. This was a special cushion, the Blue Cushion. As with all the other cushions, one such was made for each new Striker. It was fashioned after the one with which Akharim had smothered Marab and was used ceremonially to menace each new Striker on his selection by the Shout of the Moot.

Assassin!

The increasingly unspoken portion of his title came to Krim so unexpectedly and with such force that it made him start. He disguised the movement by returning to his inspection of the Striker with a vague wave of his hands. However, this did not prevent a small flood of other thoughts bubbling out in the wake of the word.

What an odious little wretch Bowlott was. What a pity the title of Assassin was purely formal. Right now, he could just...

To his horror, Krim found his fingers curling as if to grip the edges of an imaginary Blue Cushion. Other resources rallied to rescue him from this bizarre interior onslaught and two violent high-pitched coughs shook him free.

They shook Striker Bowlott too. His eyes became almost round and he winced conspicuously at having someone else’s affliction so thoughtlessly imposed on his own deep and profound concerns. He sighed again.

Krim, unsteady, but now well away from the edge of the abyss which had so abruptly opened at his feet, clasped his hands and c****d his long thin head on one side to denote that he was in reality deep in concentration.

‘Ah, I see the problem,’ he said, the sound of his own voice further helping him back to normality. ‘I suspected as much when I saw you in the Hall.’

He knelt down and began to move the padded footstool which ensured that the Striker would not suffer the indignity of having his legs swinging freely. Though furniture rather than a cushion, and thus technically falling within the remit of the Moot’s Most Noble Assistant Artisan (Furniture), this stool had been deemed to be the responsibility of the Venerable and Honoured Cushion Bearer by a ruling of the twenty-third Striker, now enshrined in the Addendum to the Treatise.

‘I did not feel particularly uncomfortable,’ Bowlott said, venturing a little sternness to offset the fact that he quite enjoyed Krim’s fussy ministrations.

Krim became knowing. He straightened up so that, though still kneeling, he was almost face to face with the seated Striker.

‘It is because the conscientiousness of Strikers can lead to such neglect of their personal needs, that my office exists. It is my duty — my honour — to anticipate such matters. Should you actually feel uncomfortable, then I would indeed have failed.’

Bowlott nodded understandingly. Krim tapped the footstool, then drawing out a brass measuring rod from his Bag of Office, he lowered his face so that one cheek almost touched the floor. In this position, he began crawling around the footstool, placing the measuring rod at strategic points and mouthing measurements to himself. With his long limbs protruding, he looked like a great spider.

‘The burdens of office manifest themselves in many ways,’ he said. ‘In this instance, the repeated need for you to stand to gain order in the Hall has reduced the height of the stool, causing subtle signs of strain in your seated posture.’ He pursed his lips and nodded to himself as though approving this diagnosis, though his true assessment was that the damage was due to the fat little oaf paddling his feet in tantrums as he shrieked to make himself heard. Krim had seen it coming for weeks and it was concern for his workmanship rather than the Striker’s comfort that had prompted him to act.

‘I’ll have the stool re-upholstered before the next meeting. Now, if I may...’

There followed a routine but thorough check of all the cushions that supported the Striker. This was the pampering that Bowlott enjoyed.

Krim clucked and hummed to himself as he continued his inspection, gently moving the Striker’s head from side to side, and positioning his hands and arms.

‘Good, good, good,’ he concluded eventually.

He stepped back to admire his work, then, satisfied, and noting the Striker’s relaxed, if not drowsy condition, he saw the opening he had been waiting for.

‘But it occurs to me that there’s much to be said for such examinations being made regularly. Say perhaps, every twenty meetings, so that these little faults can be noted and corrected before they manifest themselves.’

Making the inspections a regular event in the calendar of the Moot would bring them within the purview of one of the several Outer Moot Sub-committees dealing with the activities of the Most Noble Artisan and his various assistants, and was, of course, like most matters involving change, out of the question. Krim knew this well enough, but he had made the suggestion purely so that he could drag the Most Noble Artisan into the ensuing conversation and thence discreetly complain about his neglected curtains and the depredations that would be wrought on his charges by the sun if they were not repaired. There were other, more formal ways of doing this but they were time-consuming, spectacularly ineffective even by Moot standards, and liable to bring him into direct conflict with the Most Noble Artisan, all of which enabled him to justify his disregard of them on the grounds of the desperate seriousness of what was going to happen. His action also chimed with another of the more raffish images of himself that he entertained from time to time. This portrayed him as the last great protector of the Moot, striking boldly with an unspecified, but revolutionary action of some kind which would rescue the Moot from an encroaching but equally unspecified danger and bring it back to its time-honoured way of acting in strict accordance with the Treatise.

Not that he was allowing himself such indulgence at the moment. Indeed, he began to feel uneasy about his impetuosity almost as soon as he had spoken. He braced himself for a reproachful diatribe on the subject.

But the remark seemingly went ignored.

‘Fretful times, Krim. Fretful times.’

Krim blinked. Bowlott had called him by name — he must be in a particularly relaxed mood today. This was the moment. He was searching for a suitable response when Bowlott continued. ‘This affair of Vashnar proclaiming the Death Cry against Hyrald and the others is causing great problems. The corridors are ringing with it. It’s going to interfere with the business of the Moot if it continues.’

In spite of himself, Krim gaped. For a moment even his concerns about the sunlight vanished. He had not expected this! Striker Bowlott concerning himself with matters outside Moot business.

Though not a gossip — indeed, he was a sink of silence — Krim listened a great deal and little that happened in the Moot Palace passed him by. He had heard about what Vashnar had done but paid no great heed to it. As a matter outside the Moot it was of little import. Besides, the Wardens were an odd lot — one of the more regrettable legacies of the Moot’s long history. As a body they were perhaps tolerable enough, but as individuals most of them were quite beyond the pale, showing — even revelling in — a complete disregard for the intricacies of the traditions and procedures of the Moot.

And now their antics had brought this about! The Striker driven to discussing them with an Officer of the Moot. Yet, he could not forbear a frisson of excitement as the image of himself as saviour of the Moot stirred contentedly deep within him — the Striker raising this matter with him!

Self-interest quickly reasserted itself. Starting from so unusual a topic, it should not be too difficult to direct the conversation back to Moot matters and thus his duties as Venerable and Honoured Cushion Bearer. Then it would be a simple matter to introduce the name of the Most Noble Artisan at some point...

He must be bold.

‘I’m unfamiliar with the details of the affair, Striker Bowlott. I tend not to listen to Corridor gossip. I have quite pressing problems here in the Cushion Repository.’ He turned and indicated the offending window. ‘The curtains, you see...’

‘Your discretion is well-known, Krim, and you’re not alone in being unfamiliar with the details.’ Bowlott tapped his hand on the arm of the chair agitatedly. ‘Everyone’s talking about it, but no one seems to know what’s actually happened.’

This was not what Krim had had in mind. His hand hovered in the general direction of the window for a moment, before he realized that he was going to have to pursue the Striker’s choice of topic until a better opportunity could be found to bring him back to matters of real moment.

‘Surely the Death Cry is not a Moot matter,’ he offered, laying heavy emphasis on the word Moot in an attempt to imply that the Striker should not be concerning himself with it.

‘All things are matters for the Moot, when the Moot so determines,’ Bowlott rebutted sternly, furrowing his brow so that his tiny eyes almost vanished.

Krim, crushed by this proclamation, bowed.

‘And the Moot may yet so determine if this affair continues to be a distracting subject of debate and gossip amongst its members.’ The eyes reappeared and Bowlott pressed back hard against the cushion that supported his head and shoulders. Recovering himself, Krim unfolded to his full height and nimbly made minor adjustments to the cushion.

Bowlott’s face relaxed. ‘Technically, you are correct. The Cry is one of the ancient and fundamental rights of the people, the protection of which is the Moot’s fundamental duty. However, there are times when to protect such a right, it becomes necessary to circumscribe... or even curtail it...’

Bowlott’s voice faded away as he made this last pronouncement. Krim was genuinely disturbed. He found himself gaping again. Although he had been too long ensconced in the Moot Palace even to envisage clearly what might happen, he remembered enough from his younger days to know that the Cry was a right particularly cherished by the public, and that to interfere with it would be to bring about open defiance of the Moot’s authority. And it was a basic, if unspoken, tenet of both Senators and the Moot’s officers alike that attracting the people’s attention to the activities of the Moot was a bad thing.

There was an uncomfortable silence. Even thinking about the people beyond the Moot unsettled Krim. Now he found himself assailed by the thought that faced with Bowlott’s remark, he should actually do something! But what? His mind began to spiral towards panic. Then he heard himself speaking.

‘I haven’t your deep understanding of such matters, Striker Bowlott. The Treatise. The Addenda. Ancient rights. But perhaps if...’ He hesitated. ‘If you were to... speak to Commander Vashnar... perhaps ask him why he proclaimed the Death Cry against Hyrald and the others... why...’

His voice faded as Bowlott turned to him, eyes glinting enigmatically out of the depths. Then, abruptly, he was out of the chair and pacing to and fro.

The Fitting Chair stood at the centre of a small circular arena, the lowest point of the Cushion Repository and a focus for the rows of tiered shelves. After traversing this a couple of times, Bowlott, hands clenched behind his back and head bowed, turned into one of the aisles that led up from it. After an unsteady start, Krim strode after him, swaying stiffly, long hands nervously fiddling with the brass measuring rod. What had prompted him to speak as he had? Such recklessness. Was he to be rebuked? Was perhaps the Striker going to make an impromptu inspection of his domain, in search of something that might be wanting, to sharpen further his rebuke? Krim’s hands began to shake. The sun glinted malevolently off the brass rod sending shards of mocking light into the dingiest reaches of the Repository.

The Striker stopped as he reached the top of the steps and turned to look over the arena as though he were facing the fully assembled Moot. Krim, some way below, stared up at him apprehensively.

Looking over Krim’s head at his invisible audience, Bowlott proclaimed, ‘Your skills are a great comfort to us, Venerable and Honoured Cushion Bearer.’

Us, Krim noted ecstatically. Not a rebuke, but a formal Striker’s commendation. A great honour, both to him and his office. He glowed under it, forgetting his recent concerns and quite forgetting his real opinion of the Striker.

Bowlott continued. ‘After long and taxing consideration of the relevant precedents, I have determined what must be done to resolve this matter. I shall speak to Commander Vashnar. I shall ask him why he has done what he has done.’

Krim bowed, flushed with delight. Such wisdom, he thought.