He watched a death cart creak slowly through the streets not far from him. The yellow-garbed corpseburner paused at nearly every house and waited while a body was brought out and flung into the cart atop the others already sprawled there. Nizra had said that the Yellow Death, this time, was the worst in the memory of the Jedds, and it showed no sign of abating. Blade filed the fact away. It might be a lever he could use one day.
He watched the slow progress of the cart toward the city gates and the dirty smudge of fires from the charnel pits. His lips twitched in a wry smile. Nizra had gotten rid of the guards' bodies in a simple and highly efficient manner — by calling a death cart and having them flung into it and hidden by other bodies. No questions had been asked.
Blade thought of Ooma and, for a moment, experienced a tenderness and a sudden rush of sexual desire. He pushed both out of his mind. Ooma was safe with her aunts and the fat Mok, and so she must remain for now. When the time was right, if it ever was, he would send for her. Or at least go to see her. He did not think that she would come seeking him. Fear of the plague would keep her out of the city. Not that the Yellow Death did not stalk the countryside as well. It did, but the chances of catching it were less in open country than in the crowded and dirty city.
Blade continued to stare out the window. The cart had reached the gates now and was passing out of his view. Blade tugged at his ear and frowned. Rats were unknown in Jedd. He had not seen one and neither Ooma nor Mok had known what a rat was. And insofar as he knew there were no fleas in Jedd. He watched as a window opened down the street and a woman poured the contents of a clay pot down into the street. She drenched a passerby, and there was a great contention.
Blade stepped away from the window and closed it. There was the answer. Human filth. Especially in the city. The Jedds wallowed in it and thought it nothing. Great reeking masses of human excreta clogged the streets and, over the stench of the corpse fires, the city smelled like one vast urinal. Through the closed window, from afar, came the sound of manic laughter as another unfortunate went into the final throes. Blade shrugged, but his spine I was cold. It was not a way for a man like himself to die. What was delaying the Wise One?
Nizra, once the bodies were disposed of and his plans made, had been in a tearing hurry to take a barge and get to the pavilion in the lake. He had minced no words with Blade.
«Time works against us. If the Jeddock dies before I can arrange matters, that she recognize you as the avatar spoken of in the Books, I cannot promise the future. All the captains of the palace wish power and each plots against the others. They are in unity only against me. Thus far I have managed to keep them divided and weak, but when the old lady dies it will be another story. Then will come the showdown. We need each other, Blade.»
So Blade waited, pacing the little room impatiently. He had promised Nizra that he would not venture out and indeed had no wish to do so. Still he was beset by anxiety— the terrible pain might return at any moment and Lord L snatch him back before his task was done. Or he might catch the Yellow Death and die laughing in torment. Or Nizra might suffer a change of mind and betray him, have him slain out of hand. With all these doubts to plague him, it was little wonder that Blade was in a foul mood when at last Nizra came into the room. By the slant of sun through the window, it was well past midday.
«You were long enough,» Blade said roughly. «How does it prosper?»
Nizra fingered his chain of office and nodded, his huge head bobbing like a balloon on a string. «Well enough. I told my story of the vision and she believed. Or seemed to. She is always in and out of coma and it is hard to know how much she hears and understands. And she is very close to death. Are you ready? There is not a moment to lose. I had private speech with her, but the captains are alert and prowling like lice on a corpse. If the Empress dies before we can get her blessing and recognition, Blade, we are likely to find ourselves in a chancy spot.»
Blade, as he left the house with Nizra and an escort, thought that he had cast his die and must now abide it, but that he might have chosen a better ally. One of the disgruntled captains, for instance — the one most likely to win out. But there had been no time, nor sufficient knowledge for that, and now he and Nizra were bound together for better or worse. For the time being.
They were barged out to the pavilion with great panoply. The music was, as always, sad and sweet and bitter with death, with now and then a lively passage in memory of youth and life. Blade, himself the target of many curious stares, was aware that men hated Nizra. It was evident in the sullen looks, the mutterings, the barely-concealed defiance. Again Blade felt unease. He was plunging farther and farther into a maze that might have no exit. And, being sponsored by the Wise One, he might very well inherit a whirlwind that he had not sown.
They docked at the pavilion and Nizra, taking second place, bowed Blade out of the barge with great obsequiousness. The play had begun.
The pavilion, a large floating platform anchored to the lake bottom, was covered with a high-ridged tent of bleached cloth. There were many small compartments and one spacious chamber where the old Empress lay like a mummy in an enormous bed. The musicians were invisible behind a cloth screen at one end of the chamber.
As they approached the death chamber, Nizra nudged Blade and indicated a little group of men clustered around the entrance. «The captains,» he whispered. «Like corpse-birds awaiting a meal. Five of them. Observe them well, Blade, without seeming to, for they are my enemies and also yours the moment you are pronounced avatar.»
Blade did not need to be told. There could be no mistaking the enmity of the five men who waited outside the double-draped entrance to the royal chamber. Blade, long skilled in such matters, read the situation at a glance. They were like five pages in a familiar book: hate, envy, greed, pride, arrogance, self-righteousness — and doubt. Doubt! Doubt about Blade himself, as to who and what he really was. In that doubt, Blade knew, lay his temporary respite and hope. Keep them guessing.
Nizra whispered again. «I must make you known to them, and now is as good a time as any. Play your part and do not appear surprised by anything I say. This is a time for boldness.»
Blade was a superb actor when he had to be and he needed to be one now. It was simple enough in essence. He was a superior being from a superior world and so he had only to play himself. He stiffened his back, raised his chin and stared with cold indifference as each captain was introduced in turn.
Nizra, with a mixture of humility and authority, fluttered his thin fingers from man to man: «Bucelus, Crofta, Holferne, Chardu — and Gath.»
Each captain inclined his head as his name was spoken. None but Gath offered his hand. The latter, when his turn came, stepped close to Blade and proffered his hand along with a steely glance from a pair of steady blue eyes. Blade took the hand and found that he had walked into a trap. This Gath was of slim build, though sturdy and wide-shouldered, and had enormous strength in his hands. His intent was apparent at once. His hand closed on that of Blade like a merciless steel vise and began to squeeze. His clear purpose was to make Blade cry out or even to sink to his knees and cry quits. The four other captains watched and Blade knew it had been prearranged. They were already testing the avatar who, so strangely and at such an opportune moment for Nizra, had fulfilled the promise of the Books of Birkbegn.