Melyobar seemed hardly aware of their presence. He was on his hands and knees, sifting through documents and blueprints. Several weighty tomes with metal hasps lay open about him. He wore his familiar agitated demeanour. His prematurely greying hair was askew, his sweat-sheened cheeks flushed.
A short bout of discreet throat-clearing made his visitors’ presence known. The Prince lifted his head and blinked at them. A degree of recognition dawned and he got up, clutching the back of a chair to steady himself, as though he were a much older man. They refrained from assisting, unsure of his reaction if they laid hands on him, and instead waited with heads bowed.
On his feet, puffing, the Prince said, ‘I’m glad you dropped by,’ as if this wasn’t a long-standing regular audience.
‘The honour is all ours, your Highness,’ Talgorian responded tactfully. He discreetly nudged Bastorran, who mumbled a similar platitude.
‘There are weighty issues to be pondered,’ Melyobar declared.
‘Indeed there are,’ Talgorian agreed, hopeful of a rational exchange for once.
‘Do you know,’ the Prince confided, ‘two or three days ago I thought I had him.’
‘Who?’ Bastorran asked before Talgorian could stop him.
Melyobar looked affronted. ‘Who? Death, naturally. Who else?’
‘Oh. Yes. Of course, Highness.’
‘It was in a village my troopers came across in the… south somewhere, I think,’ Melyobar related. ‘The peasants were harbouring him, I’m
sure
of it. Not that I was there myself, obviously. I’m no fool! But would they give him up? Would they hell! He’d coached them in falsehood. Lies come to him as naturally as truth. More so. He’s had greater trade with lies.’ He glazed into some kind of reverie.
‘What happened, Majesty?’ Talgorian gently prompted.
‘Happened? They persisted in their refusal to surrender him, that’s what. Claimed they knew nothing about him. The sneaks! So I sent an order that had them put to him.’
His visitors were puzzled. ‘Sir?’ Bastorran queried.
‘I had them put to him. You see? Put them to
Death
. See? Eh?’ He laughed at his little joke.
They politely echoed his mirth with puny chuckles and thin smiles.
‘He escaped me that time,’ the Prince went on more gravely, half to himself, ‘and it set me to thinking. Were my precautions sufficiently strong? Was simply running from him enough? Could I improve on my defences?’ His sickly chest swelled, he eyed them triumphantly. ‘Yes, I could!’ He moved to the covered object. Grasping a honey-coloured bell rope hanging alongside, he gave it a dramatic yank. The drape rose, lifted by a counterweight and slender wires.
A sizeable cage was revealed. It was robustly built, highly decorated and golden in colour. It may have
been
gold, as befitted the property of a royal personage. But Talgorian suspected it was iron overlaid with gold leaf. Its entrance stood open, the sturdy door held above by powerful spring hinges.
‘Well?’ the Prince demanded.
‘It’s… unbelievable,’ the Envoy whispered.
Bastorran concurred by nodding, but forgot to close his mouth.
‘It’s
strong
,’ Melyobar enthused, wrapping his fist around one of the bars. ‘Built by master craftsmen from the toughest materials. And it has spells to fortify it.’ He looked at them. ‘You can see its function, surely?’
A frozen moment slowly thawed.
Talgorian ventured, ‘My congratulations, sir. A remarkably ingenious hiding place.’
‘Yes, you’ll be unreachable in that, Highness,’ Bastorran said, following the other’s lead. ‘Perfectly safe.’
‘What?’
He frowned at them.
They waited, tongues leaden, expressions fixed.
‘For two supposedly intelligent men that’s…
asinine
!’ the Prince announced, staring. Then he laughed. It was a high-pitched mocking bray, almost good-natured. ‘It’s not for
me
, it’s for
him
!’ He snatched up a sheaf of papers and rolled them as he spoke. ‘Should Death catch up with me, despite all my efforts, he’ll be snared. It has a trip, see?’ He swatted at the cage with the rolled-up papers. The door instantly fell and snapped shut with an echoing clang. ‘Clever, eh?’
‘Very,’ Talgorian managed, lamely.
‘There’s just one problem.’
‘Your Highness?’
‘What do you think I should bait it with?’
11
Dulian Karr said, ‘I’ll tell you what really happened.’
Reeth, Kutch and the patrician bumped along in Domex’s covered wagon. It was pulled by a pair of dappled grey carthorses, with Caldason at the reins. Kutch sat next to him and Karr rode behind in the body of the wagon, his back against a heap of folded sacks. They had travelled through the night, avoiding main roads, heading south towards Valdarr. Now dawn was brightening the sky and they had fallen to discussing Bhealfa’s rulers.
‘Go on,’ Kutch urged, eager for gossip.
‘Many stories have been told about King Narbetton’s fate,’ Karr reminded them, taking up the thread with a hint of relish. ‘The official version is that he perished during the chaos when Gath Tampoor drove Rintarah from this island and made it their own, about twenty years ago. Some say he died in the fire that destroyed the old palace. Others that he sacrificed his life heroically, leading a desperate defence against the invading forces. Or took poison, in despair at his kingdom passing from the hands of one occupier to another. They’re all lies. Even his state funeral was a sham.’
Caldason glanced round at him. ‘You’re saying he’s still alive?’
‘Yes… and no. As they withdrew, Rintarahian sorcerers subjected Narbetton to some kind of magical assault. A parting shot, you might say, on a par with polluting wells and sowing the fields with salt. It could have been this that tilted the mind of his only son, Melyobar. Anyway, whatever they did, it left the King in a kind of unconscious state. A condition neither living nor dead, and one in which he apparently never ages. Whether the Rintarahians intended to do this, or if it was a bungled assassination, nobody knows.’
‘You ever heard of such a thing, Kutch?’ Caldason asked.
The boy looked surprised at having his opinion solicited, and not a little pleased. ‘Oh. Well, yes, in a way. There are somnambulist spells, of course, and certain glamours that can put their subjects into trances. But the ones I know about sound mild compared to this, and they can be broken by any able practitioner.’
‘This one can’t,’ Karr replied, ‘for all the grand sorcerers in Melyobar’s service. Though rumour suggests the Prince may not be as distressed about it as you might think. After all, his father’s resuscitation would rob him of his power; and there’s reason to believe he never had much liking for the old man anyway. But it’s a measure of Melyobar’s befuddlement that he’s refused to adopt the title of King. Maybe he expects his father to recover. Who can say?’
‘Do you know where Narbetton is now?’
‘No one does for sure, but the betting has to be somewhere in Melyobar’s absurd travelling palace.’
‘How do you know all this?’ Caldason said.
Karr smiled. ‘Just a perk of belonging to the political classes. The story’s quite well known throughout the administration.’
‘Laying the facts before the people might make Rintarah even less popular with Bhealfans. Wouldn’t that suit our present masters?’
‘Yes, but it would also have everyone asking why Gath Tampoor hasn’t released the King from his plight.’
‘Why haven’t they?’
‘Perhaps they can’t, even with all the powerful magic an empire has at its command. Or it could be that it suits them better to deal with Narbetton’s mad, pliable son. Though as the Prince grows more unpredictable that might not last forever. They’ve certainly benefited from the years of secret legal wrangling over the constitutional implications.’
Kutch had been listening intently. ‘The kind of magic you’re talking about would have been elementary for the Founders. There are even scholars who say the Dreamtime itself was actually a great spell, an enchantment that turned reality into a kind of illusion, in which everything was malleable. It’s thought the Founders could make whatever they wanted just…