“Hikai!” they shrilled. “Hai, Hikai!”
It was quite a night.
And that night was less than a third over.
“What!” I shouted at Kimche as Abanch took his inordinate length into the ring to shout our triumph.
“Not over!”
“We were the first contest of the night. There are two more to come.” He saw my face. “We are not involved-”
“Thank Pandrite for that!” Then I glowered at the backs of the Khamorros as they trailed away up the aisle between the seats. “All the same, I was just getting the blood flowing nicely and freely… Perhaps it is a pity, after all.”
“But the third contest will be fought by Jimstye Gaptooth’s people — some he has in reserve, these who will have recovered.”
I glowered. I felt the old blood climbing up inside my head and I ground down on that scarlet rage.
“I can’t wait all damned night to see this cramph!”
“There he is, just come in, and passing strange it is, too, that he was not here to see his men in action.”
Kimche nodded his bald yellow Chulik head. I looked where he indicated. Jimstye Gaptooth — well, yes, his two front teeth were missing. He lowered himself to a padded seat at the front reserved for principals. He wore sumptuous clothes of blue and ivory, with much gold lace. He was bulky and fatter than he ought to be, with a full-fleshed face that concentrated into a single crimson scowl. At his side sat a man who took my closer attention.
I knew this man — I had never seen him in my life before, but I knew him. He wore gray leathers all over his body, except his head, and his face was very pale, with dark hair cropped short. His mouth, a mere thin gash, his sharp nose — and his eyes! Dark, piercing, intent, concentrating on all he saw with the power of an incisive instinct — revealed him to me. Revealed him as clearly as the rapier and main gauche he wore in the bravo-fighter’s unmistakable fashion.
A bravo-fighter from the enclave city of Zenicce.
By his colors of gray and blue, worn discreetly, I knew him to belong to the noble House of Klaiton. I had no quarrel with that House. My own House, the House of Strombor, had more than once assisted in an insurance loss for young Nalgre Stahleker, Prince of the House of Klaiton, and his seductive wife, Nashta. So what was a bravo-fighter of Zenicce doing sitting next to a professional wrestling owner in South Pandahem?
Kimche told me, and my face darkened.
“And the story is true, Jak. This swordsman, Miklasu, eloped with the Princess Nashta. He was the house champion. The prince did not seek him, so we are told, because he said if his wife wished to go she would go, and if she did not she would return.”
“And?”
“She chose to return. And her ship sank off the coast of Segesthes in a great storm, sent, it was said, by one of the Sea Lords, Notor Shorthush of the Waves. So Miklasu hires his sword and, it was said, he told his cronies he was well quit of the woman.”
I had known Princess Nashta. Her seductiveness had destroyed her, that and the weakness of her will. And I felt for Prince Nalgre, even though I could not guess at the real reasons why his wife should leave him. Perhaps Quergey the Murgey would know, for all reports spoke well of Nalgre. Delia had said he was a fine young man. Of such puzzles is the world constructed.
“So we must wait until the end of the contests,” said Kimche.
“No,” I said. “I do not think so.”
Whatever Jak the Sturr might do in these circumstances was one thing; but I knew what Jak the Drang would do — aye, and Dray Prescot!
The changing rooms yielded my clothes. The other wrestlers were clearing their things out. We went outside, under the stars and the fuzzy pink light of the Maiden with the Many Smiles. I had brought the kalider taken from Trylon Nath Orscop. With this naked in my hand I prowled around the outside of the marquee. The others, led by Kimche, followed.
“What, Jak-?”
“I can’t lollygag about all night,” I said.
The first guy rope parted under the keen steel.
I went around the marquee methodically, slicing the guy ropes asunder. The marquee began to sag. By the time I had reached three-quarters of the way the roof billowed in. The roars of excitement within changed to yells of alarm. The marquee billowed like a collapsing dermiflon, speared on the field of battle. It rippled and sagged and flapped, and the rest of the ropes parted. The whole lot collapsed.
‘There,” I said, standing up with the dagger in my fist. “Now perhaps that rast will come out!”
Chapter fourteen
Like fish struggling upstream, the audience battled their way out beneath the collapsing folds of cloth. The uproar was just as prodigious as a sensible man would expect. By the fuzzy pink light of the Maiden with the Many Smiles we stared on that heaving scene. I stuffed the kalider away and moved across the boardwalk where mud lay in thick cakes from heedless boots.
“Watch for the rast! Spread around the marquee.”
“This is not in the plan, Jak!” Kimche looked wild, gesticulating, his bald yellow head glistening in streaks of mingled color in the moons’ light.
“But it will get him out, Kimche. We need to ask him, do we not?”
“Aye. Aye, Jak, that we do.”
No one could believe the marquee had fallen of itself and the first conjectures, expressed with many oaths, took the view that some god or spirit inimical to Beng Drudoj Flying Alsh had wrecked the bouts out of spite. Some very watchable fights started between the pirates and the steelworkers, and drew admiring crowds. No doubt Beng Drudoj Grip and Fall took pleasure from this substitute entertainment. The light of torches splashed the scene with vivid color. The smell and mood of the crowds thickened. The wrestlers from the Golden Prychan spread out and pretty soon Sly Nath the Trivet came arunning, pointing. His eye was beginning to look magnificent. We followed him and saw a group of men staggering out from the folds of fallen cloth. They staggered up amid much blasphemy. The guards had come running up; but the marquee was fallen and they couldn’t put it up again. The wrestling was abandoned for the night. The cut guy ropes were found, and the blasphemies mounted against the night sky. Sly Nath, eye and all, was chuckling away to himself.
Well, yes, it was funny, too, if you thought about it…
We followed Jimstye Gaptooth and the bravo-fighter Miklasu, as they went off with their people. I would not have been surprised if they stayed at an inn called The Black Neemu; but its name was The Wristy Grip, which showed how proud they were of their wrestlers.
“I,” said Fat Lorgan, “do not have my club with the nail in its head with me.”
“I think, Jak,” said Kimche, after due consideration, “that I would like to have a sword. A Khamorro can break the bones of a swordsman, that is well known; but if the swordsman is very good, an unarmed man has no chance. It is a matter of relative skills.”
I well knew that Kimche would have the skills of the sword, being a Chulik.
“I only want to talk to this Gaptooth, not fight his army of khamsters.”
“But the two will of necessity go together.”
“May Drig take the fellow!” I am used to going ahunting alone. I said, briskly, “Do you return to the Golden Prychan and fetch what weapons you have, and mine, also. I shall sniff around a little. Something May Turn Up.” Shades of Quienyin!
The fairground formed a pulsing bubble of light and noise in the moonlit night. The Wristy Grip reached up three imposing stories, and many windows were illuminated, and the sounds of revelry within indicated a good night was being enjoyed.