The Ashdan lass was in a sorry state after her flight from the Cabal House to Jod. Her face was shining with sweat, her bosoms heaving as she gasped for air. She tried to get up. She managed to get up. Then promptly bent double and was sick, for the force of her flight had overstressed her. Chegory, the very incarnation of concern, yelled for someone to bring water, then knelt beside the distressed young woman.
Water was brought; Olivia’s breathing eased; and, to Chegory’s relief, the Ashdan lass found herself capable of speech.
‘Justina,’ said Olivia.
‘She — she’s dead?’ said Chegory.
Olivia shook her head wordlessly. Chegory wiped a little vomit from her lower lip and served her some water in a clean-scraped coconut shell.
‘Don’t drink,’ he said. ‘Just swill and spit.’
Olivia obeyed. Then began to explain. She had been on her way to a jeweller’s shop on Lak Street to get a broken locket fixed. But she had got no further than the Cabal House when soldiers had gone past, dragging Justina with them.
‘Where were they taking her?’ said Chegory.
‘I–I don’t know,’ said Olivia. ‘But they went down Goldhammer Rise.’
Everyone knew what lay on Goldhammer Rise. Memories of the history of the Temple of Torture had been stirred to full and vigorous life by the recent renovations. Immediately a babble of blabbermouthed speculation broke out among the bystanders.
Even as they were speculating, another messenger came across the harbour bridge. This one was not running; instead, he was stumping along stolidly in the mounting heat of the day. He was a mechanic who worked on the Analytical Engine, and he brought grim tidings.
This was the first pronouncement which the mechanic made once he had the attention of the denizens of Jod:
‘Aldarch the Third has won the war.’
Did Chegory feel the day grow cold despite the heat of the sun? He did. Did his vision darken though the sky’s major luminary yet shone bright? It is a pity to answer in the affirmative, for such a response verges on cliche. However, his vision did thus darken. On reflection, we must acknowledge that humans demonstrate a strictly limited repertoire in the face of disaster. Upon deprivation of food, they hunger; when starved of water, they thirst; and when, after months of dread, a long-awaited disaster befalls them, they do for the most part greet such disaster with a stoic’s ataraxia, a drunkard’s braggadocio, a warrior’s defiance, a child’s hysterical panic or with a sudden descent into invalidism.
In the face of disaster, Chegory on this occasion tended to the invalidism school of reaction. But his constitution was sound and solid; and, besides, his concern for Olivia prevented him from indulging in a faintingfit.
So he pulled himself together and listened as the mechanic made all plain.
The mechanic (Joy Wax by name) had been finishing off a late breakfast in his favourite speakeasy when sailors had entered. These matalots had proved to be from the good ship Oktobdoj, and soon they had been drinking up large, earning free drinks with the remarkable tale they had to tell.
When Joy Wax had retailed that tale in turn, there was consternation all round. A new wazir on Untunchilamon! Justina arrested! Aldarch III victorious! Where would it all end?
‘I think, um, I think we’d better do something,’ said Chegory. ‘It’s like, Justina, she, they, they’ll chop her, that’s what I think. Unless we do something.’
‘Yes,’ said a much-recovered Olivia Qasaba. ‘We must rescue her.’
While Olivia had been given to understand that Chegory had been arrested, imprisoned and tortured at Justina’s behest, Chegory was nevertheless wont to opine that the Empress was essentially good. His loyalty was understandable. For it was the Family Thrug which had halted the pogrom against Chegory’s Ebrell Island breed; and an isolated aberrant incident was pardonable when set against the racial debt. Hence Olivia’s expressed loyalty to the Empress; this loyalty being no less than an aspect of Olivia’s love for Chegory himself.
While Olivia spoke with confidence, she failed to bend her audience to her point of view.
‘Rescue her?’ said Joy Wax in open derision. ‘Thrug is finished. That’s all there is to it. Al’three has won. We’ve a new wazir, the Empress already in his grip. Chegory’s right. It’s head-chopping time. Doubtless the Empress has greeted the widest grin already.’
However, the wizards Pelagius Zozimus and Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin were not so swift to write off Justina.
‘We must at least try to preserve the Empress,’ said Zozimus.
‘Indeed we must,’ agreed his cousin.
Their attitude owned nothing to altruism. The two wizards were sorely isolated on an island dominated by sorcerers, and hence hostile to wizards. Their allies were few. Few? Two! Keeping them company on Untunchilamon was a cut-throat by name of Thayer Levant and a barbarian called Guest Gulkan.
This little band of foreigners had come to Untunchilamon to seize a bauble known as the wishstone, a triakisoctahedron of obscure origin which was one of the minor ornaments of Justina’s treasury. They had failed. They now wished to leave Untunchilamon with at least their lives: something far easier to arrange if Justina remained on the throne.
‘Yet,’ said Sken-Pitilkin, ‘we lack the strength to win in war against the wonder-workers.’
‘Then,’ said Zozimus, ‘Shabble must help us.’
‘Shabble?’
‘Shabble! Send for Ivan Pokrov!’
Joy Wax was sent to fetch Pokrov, while other mechanics, servants and slaves were dispersed in other directions with different messages. Some were sent to warn selected Ebrell Islanders that a victorious Aldarch Three had sent a new wazir to Untunchilamon, and that a fresh pogrom might shortly begin. One was sent to summon a lawyer to the Temple of Torture to act for Justina (for they were ignorant of the fact that the redoubtable Dardanalti was already with the Empress). Others were sent to warn Theodora Thrug (Justina’s twin sister) and Troldot Turbothot (Theodora’s latest boyfriend) that it would be best if they went into hiding. ‘You must also go into hiding,’ said Olivia to Chegory. Reasonable advice, for Chegory was an Ebrell Islander, and hence a potential victim of pogrom. But Chegory demurred, saying he must first consult with the Crab. Hand in hand, Chegory and Olivia made their way to the cave where the eremitic dignitary dwelt that Chegory might receive orders from Jod’s true ruler.
Meanwhile Ivan Pokrov came hastening out of the Analytical Institute, and was soon deep in urgent discussion with Zozimus and Sken-Pitilkin.
‘Shabble would at this stage appear to be our only hope of rescuing Justina,’ said Zozimus.
‘What exactly do you know of the Shabble breed?’ said Pokrov.
‘I know,’ said Zozimus, ‘that Shabble can throw flame sufficient to disgrace a dragon. With that power on our side, all Untunchilamon will necessarily yield to us. Furthermore, I have heard it said that you have the power to command Shabble.’
‘Me?’ said the olive-skinned analytical engineer, doing his best to appear innocent.
But Zozimus was right.
Ivan Pokrov knew the secret of commanding Shabble.
There is no great mystery about Shabble or Shabble’s past. The free-floating ball which had made Injiltaprajura its playground was no more than an analytical engine left over from the days of the Golden Gulag. It drew its energies directly from a sun located in a different cosmos entirely, hence would have no trouble burning Injiltaprajura to the ground if the necessity arose. Against such a weapon, no wazir would be able to survive: not even if he had an army at his back.
Furthermore, Ivan Pokrov was an immortal survivor of the Golden Gulag, and knew the secret of commanding Shabble. Which, again, was very simple. Shabble lived in dread of being sent to a therapist. And Shabble could always be commanded against Shabble’s will by a threat of impending therapy. All Pokrov needed to say was this: