"You could at least have pleaded with Vilimir, or threatened him with some nameless supernatural doom. All you did was to squeak: 'Aye, aye, sir!' and let me be dragged off to my fate without a word of protest."
"But you escaped your doom!"
"No thanks to you. And now I suppose that, having learnt that Vilimir wanted you to go galloping over the steppe with him in his war with that other horde, you found it better for your health and comfort to slip away and continue your journey, eh?"
"Ah, no indeed, my dear son! I had to say what I did to befool the barbarian, so that I could escape and essay to reach you—"
Valdonius interrupted with a roar of laughter. "Your young man has grown an old head on his shoulders, Karadur!" he cried jovially. "Master Jorian, I think that shaft went close to the clout. Natheless, if an older if not wiser man may offer a word of advice, assume not that the motive you ascribe to a man, even if your guess be true, is the only one. For men's motives are commonly mixed, with self-interest jostling righteousness and fears mingled with hopes. What if the good Father Karadur allowed self-interest for the moment to overcome all other considerations? Has the same never befallen you? Besides, he is old and infirm, no puissant young hero like yourself. Therefore, the adamantine valor of a Ghish the Great or a Fusinian the Fox should not be expected of him."
"I'm no hero," growled Jorian. "I am only a simple craftsman who would like to settle down and earn a decent living. Natheless, I didn't run off and leave Karadur in the jungles and steppes we have lately traversed, although I could easily have done so. But what's done is done. What is the present state of affairs?"
Valdonius grinned. "Events have taken a most interesting turn. But, my good Jorian, I need hardly summon fell spirits from forbidden planes and unholy dimensions across nighted gulfs of space and time, to discern that you would fain have three things: a solid repast, a bath, and the ministrations of a barber. Is my speculation correct?"
"Eminently, sir. If my hair be allowed to grow any longer, I shall trip on it as I walk. As for the bath, your poor porter wellnigh swooned when he got a close whiff of me. But of all these desiderata, the meal stands foremost, or, I, too, shall swoon."
"How have you subsisted since your escape?"
"When a farmer had firewood to be chopped, I chopped for fodder, for myself and my horse. When he did not, having not the price of a patch for my breeches upon me, I stole one of his fowls. That's an art to which I devoted much study in training for my escape from Xylar. I thank you, fair one," he said as a pretty girl tendered him a goblet of wine and another brought in a hearty meal for him.
"Peradventure you will be known as Jorian the Fox for that accomplishment," said Valdonius with a chuckle.
"Or at least as Jorian the chicken thief."
"What befell you at the Tarxian frontier?"
Between ravenous bites, Jorian said: "I told them I was Maltho of Kortoli, seeking honest employment as a mercenary. They plainly didn't like my looks—or perhaps my smell, or my empty purse—but after some muttering and whispering they let me in on a thirty-day permit. The priest in command of the post tied this damned brassard upon me, as if I carried some fatal and contagious pox."
"From their point of view, you do," said Valdonius. "You bear in your head all sorts of unauthorized thoughts, which if not checked might spread amongst the general populace and imperil that delicate state of mindless acceptance of the True Faith, which the theocracy has so long and so earnestly striven to impose upon the Tarxian populace."
"I know; they made me promise not to discuss religious or philosophical matters with any Tarxian during my sojourn. I trust I have not already violated this injunction?"
"It matters not. For thrice a hundred years, the theocracy succeeded in sealing the borders to such subversive influences. Now, however, the country seethes with restlessness and discontent, for many of the priests have become mere cassocked lechers and grafters, and the benefits they have promised have not come to pass. Ideas have a way of leaking across frontiers despite walls and sentinels. Be reasonably discreet in your subversive utterances and you will have little to fear." •
"I wonder they let me in at all?"
"Belike they were impressed despite themselves by that aristocratic manner you learnt as king. They took you for a gentleman fallen upon hard times, who if kindly entreated might be useful to them."
"Which, in a sense, I suppose I am." Jorian finished his plate and sat back with a sigh of repletion. "Zevatas! that was good. There's no sauce like a ravenous appetite. And now, my learned colleagues, pray tell me: How fares the Kist of Avlen and the project concerning it?"
Valdonius chuckled. He seemed to be always laughing or chuckling or smiling, but Jorian found his mirth not especially kindly.
"Well, now," he said, "the Kist of Avlen—" (he pronounced it, "Aulen" in the northern manner) "—is safe and well-guarded in my cellar and shall remain there until you gentlemen have assisted me in a certain enterprise."
Jorian glanced at Karadur, who was shedding another tear. "Fool that I was!" said the Mulvanian. "If ever I survive past the Conclave, I will withdraw from all association with my colleagues and become a hermit, so rare is good faith among them."
"Now, now, old man," said Valdonius, "do not carry on so. After all, what I am doing for the magical profession here in Tarxia is quite as important as what my fellow Altruists propose to do in Metouro."
"And what is it that you would do here?" asked Jorian.
"Ere I go further, let me warn you that this discussion shall not go beyond the three of us, and I have ways of dealing with any who play me false. Karadur tells me you are a bit of a blabbermouth."
"Not when I have a real secret to keep. I will keep yours."
"Very well, then. Have you visited the temple of Gorgolor?"
"Nay; I've only glanced at it in passing on my way hither."
"Well, in this temple stands an altar, and beyond this altar rises a pedestal, and on this pedestal stands one of the wonders of the world."
"The smaragdine statue of Gorgolor? I've heard of it."
"Aye. This statue is in the form of a frog, carved from a single emerald—but this frog is the size of a lion or a bear. It is the largest emerald ever known to have existed, and its value may be greater than that of all the other jewels in the world together. The priests make much of the brilliant radiance of this statue, which they say will blind unbelievers who look upon it. But I have seen it often, and my eyesight is as sound as ever. When Gorgolor manifests himself on this plane, they say, he takes possession of the statue, and to the statue are the prayers of the theocrat and the rest of the hierarchy directed. Now, what think you would ensue if this statue vanished?"
Jorian peered out at Valdonius from under his heavy brows. "It would cause much scurry and flurry amongst the priesthood, I should think."
"That, my dear young man, is a magnificent understatement."
"Why make the statue disappear?"
"As you have gathered, many intelligent Tarxians are less than enchanted by the rule of the theocracy. Look at me, for example. The priests allow only a very limited practice of magic: nought but divination and sympathetic magic. No sorcery or necromancy, no matter how laudable their purposes or beneficial their results. And why? Because their theologians assert, on no scientific basis but solely from their convoluted casuistical reasoning, that any spirits so invoked are by definition evil entities opposed to the good god Gorgolor. Therefore, traffic with such beings is a damnable heresy, to be punished by stake and faggot. So I, who could mightily advance the supernatural sciences if permitted freedom of research, must confine my activities to such trivial pastimes as casting horoscopes and sending my spirit forth in trances to search for my clients' lost bangles.