That wouldn’t worry me.
I started to tell her that she must run away with me, at once, back to Valka and then, probably, to Strombor.
“Yes! Oh, yes, Dray, my darling!”
No hesitation, no regrets for leaving the sumptuousness all about her, no thoughts of her life here in Vallia as the Princess Majestrix. If the Strom of Valka kidnapped her, then his head would be forfeit and never more would she be able to return to her home. Strombor, then. . But — no slightest hesitation. She agreed willingly, joyfully, eagerly. Oh, yes, there is no woman in two worlds like Delia of the Blue Mountains!
Everything within the palace of Vondium was — and still is — conducted with order and dignity. I felt the sense of impressiveness, even then, when my every thought was of abducting the Princess out of that palace.
We spent what really amounted to only a few murs together before that audience was over and I had to take my leave of the Princess Majestrix and return with the Emperor to the throne room. He had taken a shine to me. Later we took a meal together in a private apartment with a number of the high men of the realm. These men were strangers to me then, but how well I know them now! Some as good and loyal friends, others as bitter and deadly enemies. As they stride onto the stage of my story I will introduce them to you. But, as always, following my plan, I will speak only of people and places and things as they impacted on me at the time, when I met them, even though I knew of them before that. The first of these to whom you should be introduced called on me the very next day at my new lodgings. He was Nath Larghos, the Trylon of the Black Mountains. A Trylon is a rank intermediate between a Vad and a Strom. The Black Mountains extend northward of the Blue Mountains and, although neither so lofty nor extensive, are composed of a black basaltic rock rich in minerals. Eastward the Trylonate runs into farming and agricultural products.
Trylon Larghos came unannounced into the sunny upper chamber of The Rose of Valka where I sat at breakfast. The comfortable inn and posting house was run by Young Bargom, the son of Old Bargom, who had fled from Valka in the bad days. Naturally, he had changed the name of the inn to remind them of happier times back in Valka, their homeland.
“Strom Drak?” said Trylon Larghos, coming forward into the patch of mingled sunlight by the windows. I did not rise. I was in the act of placing rich yellow butter upon a chunk torn from a crisp Kregan loaf, and that is an important operation. I did look up. I saw Larghos then, and I can see him in my mind’s eye now. A big man running to fat, but with the muscles still supple and bulging on his arms and across his shoulders. He wore a Vallian tunic of leather, but instead of the decent buff, the leather had been dyed in a pattern of black and white. His sword hilt glittered with gems. His face, bearded and bewhiskered, contained a pair of close-set shrewd eyes, and his mouth was a rat-trap if ever I saw one. A man of whom to be wary. I summed him up instantly; dangerous, like a leem. Before I could answer he went on: “You astonish me, my dear Strom, that you are not occupying your villa here in Vondium.”
“The place has been deserted for many seasons.”
“So? I am sorry to hear it. I was pleased to make your acquaintance yesterday, with the Emperor. He seemed to find you genial company.”
The Emperor had been laughing a lot more, I recalled, when I took my leave. I did not offer Larghos a seat, but he sat down anyway. Maybe he thought that being a Trylon gave him the edge over a Strom. There had certainly been no desire in my actions or stories to charm the Emperor — quite the reverse
— but from the Trylon’s expression he was clearly accusing me of toadying to the Emperor. I wanted to correct that impression.
“Many men have done so. And many others have not.”
“I trust, by Opaz, that we shall get along together, Strom.”
Whatever he was after, he would get from me only what I chose to give. However, there seemed no point in antagonizing him just yet, despite that I didn’t like the look of him.
“Have you breakfasted, Trylon? Would you care to join me?”
He waved the suggestion away with a very white and plump beringed hand. I fancied, though, he could use a rapier.
“Thank you. I have. We are up early in Vondium.”
“Do you then not often visit the Black Mountains?”
If that was a nasty remark he didn’t react. “When I have to. The black rocks offend me. My life is here, in the capital, where politics are!”
We talked for a space until I had breakfasted and then he joined me in a cup of Kregan tea. He worked his way around to the purpose of his visit. He was a racter. The white and black would have told me that. I was an unknown. Oh, yes, he had heard of the panvals and what had happened in Valka, but that was in the past. Now we must face the new realities. The Emperor must have an heir who is not a willful girl; the racter candidate must be the one.
“And who is that, Trylon Larghos?”
He studied me a moment. I had sidestepped his more direct questions, but I had appeared to satisfy him that if the racters could offer me more than the panvals, then I was their man.
“Kov Vektor of Aduimbrev is the Emperor’s choice,” he said. He spoke with care. He wore leathers dyed black and white. He was a racter and flaunted that. The racters were a party, composed of many people from all walks of life — except, I thought with bitterness, those who walked the canal towpaths. They were a power in the Presidio. They had the strength to banish panvals on trumped-up charges, but there were still many panvals who wore the green and white colors. A man might choose to flaunt his color allegiance, as Larghos did. Or, as Pallan Eling, the minister responsible for the canals, did, wear merely a small black and white ribbon tucked into a buttonhole. I guessed Larghos’ servitors would wear sleeves banded black and white, and the colors of the Black Mountain -
appropriately enough black and purple — would appear elsewhere on their jerkins. The older a lineage the less colors in the insignia, in general. Some men, like Tobi ti Chelmsturm, with five colors to their name very often preferred the dignity of using merely two colors for their men, and these would be colors of their party. Humans and halflings, we share the same failings. I said, “I do not support Vektor in this.”
“Good. He is a weakling, a sop. You can smell him coming a dwabur downwind, like a woman’s hairdresser.”
“You have a candidate for the Princess Majestrix? Who is that, Trylon?”
He made up his mind. When he spoke the name I felt the blood rise and sing in my head.
“Vomanus of Vindelka.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I felt outraged, betrayed, soiled.
I spoke before I thought.
“I understood that Vomanus was — ineligible to marry the Princess!”
He stared at me narrowly, and lowered his cup. “Now where would you have heard that?”
Collecting my thoughts, I said, stumbling and bluffing my way through: “I am not certain — it seems it was a drunken evening, somewhere, men talking and boasting. But, clearly, it cannot be true.”
He leaned back, sizing me up afresh, but he neither confirmed nor denied what I had suggested. Back there in hated Magdag where I had intrigued and fought for my slaves and workers I had last seen Vomanus. I had sent him with a message to Delia. He had always treated me as a comrade, and although he was a young man whom I delighted to call “my lad,” there had been a mystery about him. He had said, once: “Just take it from me, Drak, my friend, Kovs are Kovs and Kovs to me.” No, he could never voluntarily seek Delia’s hand in marriage, not when he knew the passion that flames between the Princess and me. Then — he must consider me dead! Yes, that could be the only explanation. And then, of course, I felt the guilt and the remorse — emotions I always try to quell out of perversity -