“Mahendrasmot is well known. The fairground attracts people from far away. And, Dray, as you saw, the Khamorros were not high khams.”
“And you?”
He repeated what I had heard from our comrades of their shattering surprise when they had been sorcerously hurled back to their homelands. Turko had begun to work his way back to Vallia and had bogged down here, out of cash, and taking the fairground job to earn his passage money on. At this time there was no real volume of trade between Pandahem under Yantong and our sections of Vallia, apart from smuggling. He would have landed in an inhospitable section of Vallia, and he told me how concerned he had become at the rumors and stories out of Vallia.
He was avid for news. I told him of the changed circumstances in the island empire, how the old emperor was dead, and of how I had been fetched to be the new. I said we must all act as our consciences dictated, and there were new men in the world, and Vallia was most miserably divided up and many of her people cruelly mistreated by Yantong and his minions, by riffraff, flutsmen, aragorn, and by the Hamalese.
“There are stern battles ahead, Turko-”
“And I shall be there, with my shield.”
“It is in my mind to make you-” And then I stopped myself. I had been going to say I would create Turko a kov, that exalted rank similar to that of duke, as a preparation for broaching the subject of Korero. I saw that as contemptible.
I said, “I have fought in a few battles since we parted, Turko. I have a fine Kildoi to guard my back with his shields. You will meet Korero the Shield.”
His eyebrows lifted and he half-turned. Then, in stony silence, he walked on up the jungly path. Andrinos and Saenci were laughing. The suns burned down.
I ploughed on, my throat on fire. “Since you will have no truck with steel and edged weapons, in which you have my admiration, I think it right-”
Then he said, “So you are casting me off?”
“My Val!” I said. “Sink me! Of course not! You are a fambly to think it, let alone say it!”
“So what is in your mind for me, then, Dray? Or should I call you emperor, majister-?”
“Do you wish to try a few falls, dom? Listen, and shut that black-fanged winespout!”
Then he laughed. “You are the same, at any rate, thanks be to Morro the Muscle!”
“Seg and Inch are both kovs of Vallia. I see no reason why you should not be a kov also. I shall arrange this. And, as a kov-”
“You can get rid of me and my shield at your back in the day of battle?”
“Not so. Oh, no! When we fight the Hamalese, as we must, and the clansmen, and the riffraff tearing the heart out of our country, I shall count on you, Kov Turko, to be in the thick of it, as usual.”
He kicked a jungly frond that tendriled across the path.
“And, being a kov, and high and mighty some of them are, as we both know-” He stopped speaking then and scowled.
We walked for a space in silence.
Khamorros have reflexes as quick as thought. Turko’s hand whipped out and his fist cupped a sparkling fat, blue insect. It was harmless. It buzzed in the prison of Turko’s fingers for a space; then he opened his hand and the fly buzzed free.
“Yes,” he said. “Seg is a kov and Seg is damned unhappy with his kovnate. Oh, Thelda loves it-” He saw my face. “What? Is Thelda dead? What has chanced with Seg?”
Very firmly, I lied to him. “Thelda is reported dead, seeing no one has seen her in Vondium since we were all parted. Seg is getting over it.” As I spoke I realized these were not lies, for Seg’s wife, Thelda, although not dead but very happily married to Lol Polisto in all ignorance that her real husband was not dead, was generally regarded as being dead. Seg thought so. I cleared my throat. “Seg is unhappy, yes… But that does not mean you will be.”
“It does not. If I am to be a kov I would like to take over Seg’s kovnate of Falinur. They are a bunch of rogues who deserve to be brought into a better understanding of life.”
I was astounded. Then it was my turn to laugh. “I have spoken to Seg about his kovnate. He remains a kov. But, Turko, you have the lands and the titles and are the Kov of Falinur.”
“Right,” he said, and I did not miss the ring in his voice. “I thank you for this, majister. There will be changes. And the first will be to alter that damned miserable ocher and umber checkerboard schturval.[4]
Those colors for your kovnate clothes and symbols are depressing. I shall border each square with a nice thick line of cheerful red.”
“Quidang!” I said, and thus mocked him in turn.
He was filled with a bubbling confidence, which both amazed and heartened me. I had been totally unsure how he would take to the idea that he was no longer to stand at my back in battle with his shield. I had wondered how he would receive the comical notion that he should be a kov, with titles and estates and cities owing allegiance to him. He seemed to be thriving on the latter idea, and I, shrewdly I suppose, surmised he had not given up on the former and would seek to stand with me in battle as always. Korero would have to be handled, too…
So, as we found the hidden voller and all climbed aboard, I felt that the future for the midlands of Vallia looked brighter than it had for seasons.
We took off and soared away, heading for the islands of Vallia and what was left of my empire. And, at the thought, I suddenly felt a coldness, and stupidly longed to be down the Moder with all the Monsters and menace… By the Black Chunkrah! A few footling fun and games around passages and secret doors and ghoulish weirdies seemed then to be children’s pastimes beside the job facing me in Vallia and all of Paz. Again and again I had tried to throw off the yoke, and always some stupidity in my own nature forced me to resume the burden. The single decisive fact impelling me to go on was simply this: that I had been called on, chosen, fetched by the people of Vallia to lead them in their way of life and their struggle for freedom.
My comrades were individual people, with strong characters and minds of their own. If, sometimes, it sounds as though I ordered them about willy-nilly, this is not so. Each one was a personality, a real living, breathing person, and if I fail to bring them vividly alive to you in these tapes, then the lack is mine, the loss yours, for, by Zair, they are a bonny bunch!
Now Turko said to me, “I see you fly due west. So you do not intend to chance the mountains?”
I shook my head.
“This voller may not let us down as those cranky rubbish heaps from Hamal so often do. But the mountains offer a risk we do not have to accept.” I looked at him. “Anyway, I’ve a mind to fly over Rahartdrin.”
I had told him how we had lost contact with so many of the outlying provinces and islands. Rahartdrin, the large island off the southwest of Vallia, was the kovnate of the Lady Katrin Rashumin. As a friend of Delia’s, her welfare concerned me. No news had come out of that part of the empire, and all our spies had either reported failure or had not returned.
Turning north off the west coast of Pandahem, we soared on over the southern reaches of the Hobolings and struck out across the Sea of Opaz. The whole distance was above seven hundred dwaburs and we estimated should take us the best part of three days, as the flier was not of the fast variety. We took turns to conn the helm and stand by the levers, Saenci catered splendidly, and we bustled through the skies of Kregen in fine style.
The strategic concept of having to stop for fuel, and have coaling stations conveniently scattered across the world, was one with which I was at that time unfamiliar. Vittles and water were the limiting factors in a journey time. The silver boxes, the vaol and paol, with their mix of minerals and gas, upheld us and drove us on, so there was no need to make any halts.