“He stands before you, O King,” said Janchan of Phaolon.
The Temple rose on the opposite side of the city from the palace enclosure. The streets were packed with carousing citizens, and every wineshop and alehouse and pleasure garden was crowded with celebrants on this Festival night. Janchan found it difficult to find a zaiph for public hire, but eventually he haled one, paid its driver and, settling back in the rear saddle, let himself be flown across Ardha to where the squat Temple reared its height among lesser structures.
Tipping the driver liberally, and affecting a drunken stagger, Janchan drew the gaudy festival cape closely about him and lurched up the steps and into the central nave. Coils of incense floated on the air; votive lamps glowed like burning eyes through the gloom; the vast dome above echoed to the shuffle of many feet, the drone of priests, the mumbled prayers of hundreds of worshipers.
He worked his way around the subsidiary shrines which lay beyond the central nave, separated from the main hall by an arcade of ornate columns. Eventually he found one devoted to the Spider God that was dark and deserted. Without a moment’s hesitation he whisked off his bright cape and tucked it beneath the black jerkin it had concealed. Then he drew the cowl tight about his features, pulled black gloves on his hands, and jumped up, clinging to the interstices of the further wall. He began to climb it, hand over hand.
It was not such a difficult feat as it sounds. The marble was pierced in ten thousand places in an elaborate fretwork that was like stone lace. Slipping through to the other side of the fretwork wall he began to ascend the outer surface of the enormous dome. There was very little danger of being seen, for the worshipers who thronged the cathedral-like nave beneath his heels were rapt on their devotions, and he would be hard to see, a crawling shadow in the dim gloom above their heads.
By the time he had ascended to the height of the third story, he crawled out along a spar of stone and descended the body of an enormous mythological caryatid, coming to the floor of a corridor. This part of the Temple, the King’s councillors had told him, was private. Somewhere in this story or the one above he was most likely to find the winged creature locked away.
And the Princess Niamh as well… but Akhmim knew nothing of his hopes in that direction. For Janchan had boldly planned to accomplish the freeing of two captives this night, not one!
The corridor was empty. It was also poorly lit, only a few fat tapers were surmounted by wavering flames, and these were too few and too far apart to do little more than merely alleviate the darkness. He slunk down the corridor on stealthy feet, using his mind to call telepathically to Zarqa.
When Onqqua had vocalized his plan to free the Kalood, and Akhmim had wondered aloud where they might find a loyal man unknown to the Temple Faction, Janchan had volunteered his services on the spur of the moment. At first the councillors were incredulous; then they realized that since he had only been in the service of Unggor for some twelve days, no one was likely to have even noticed his very existence as of yet. Akhmim, eyeing him shrewdly, demanded why a foreigner new to Ardha should so willingly volunteer for so dangerous a mission, since his loyalties were new and untested. Janchan had replied, with seeming candor, that he could hope for no better way to come to the favorable attention of the highest men in the realm than by succeeding in this task. He managed to get across the impression that he was an unscrupulous and ambitious young soldier-of-fortune, who meant to rise in the ranks as rapidly and as high as possible, and didn’t fear to risk his skin in the ascent.
It was really this last point that won Akhmim’s approval for the scheme. The Tyrant, an ambitious man of few scruples, admired these same qualities in others; or, at least, could understand them, as he shared the same himself.
And so it was arranged. Raiment was chosen for him, money laid out, archivists roused from slumber to unroll maps of the Temple precincts for his quick scrutiny. He determined to attempt the deed that very night. To delay the attempt even another hour meant to stand idly by while the balance of power dipped ever more in Arjala’s favor.
Akhmim liked that idea, too. With dawn, as his people stirred with aching heads and fuzzy tongues after the excesses of the night, they would rise to find his royal proclamation of Arjala’s misconception of the heavenly decree blazoned on every wall and placard…
Suddenly, Janchan froze motionlessly.
A sound of muffled sobbing came to him from beyond the door at which he had paused. Janchan knew that Zarqa was unequipped with vocal apparatus; yet there was desperation in that muffled weeping. On impulse he put his eye against the grating and peered within.
And saw Niamh the Fair, the long-sought Princess of Phaolon!
Chapter 19
WHEN COMRADES MEET
The door was a heavily carved and ornamented slab of wood—but it was barred from the outside! It was the work of an instant to slide back the bar, open the door, and slip within, closing it behind him.
Sprawled on a silken divan, Niamh glanced up suddenly. Her enormous and brilliant eyes widened with astonishment at the sight of this grim, black-clad phantom which had materialized out of the gloom. Then it raised black-clad hands to strip away the cloth that hid its features from her. And, to her utter amazement, they were the features of a man well known to her.
“Is is—can it be—?” she faltered.
The lithe young swordsman cast himself at her feet.
“It is Janchan of the Ptolnim who kneels at your feet, my Princess! Your servant—and your slave.”
The girl was dazed, like one who wakens from sleep, yet is unsure as to whether she still dreams.
“Prince Janchan… here?” she murmured in bewilderment.
“But one of the many of your court, my Princess, who have vowed themselves to unending quest until you are set free and returned to your throne unharmed,” he said.
She raised slim wrists to press back her floating, silvery hair.
“But… how have you come here, into the very citadel of my enemies?”
“My Princess—there is no time for questions now, and even less for answers! We must quickly leave this place, before my presence is discovered. Have you a cloak and hood to hide yourself?”
She gestured toward a wardrobe across the dim-lit room, saying there might be one within. He sprang to his feet and searched through its contents swiftly, drawing out a long, night-blue narjeeb which he bade her don, and quickly.
“I search for yet a second captive, who may be somewhere hereabouts,” he said tersely. “Know you aught of a winged, gold-skinned man—”
“Do you mean the Kalood whom Arjala calls her amphashand?”
“The very same,” Janchan said, grinning with relief. “Where is he held?”
The princess indicated a room on the story above. Janchan thought swiftly; to attempt to gain the upper story with the princess at his side might prove dangerous, and her presence an encumbrance to him if he should have to fight a guard. Perhaps it would be better to leave her here, bolting the door as before, and return to bear her to safety once Zarqa was freed. In swift, curt phrases he appraised her of his plan, and she agreed, tossing the voluminous narjeeb aside so it could be donned instantly at need.
“Does your chamber always go unguarded?” he asked. She answered that two guards stood at her door night and day, and that if they were missing tonight, it must be that Festival services must be overcrowded this night of all nights, drawing them to temporary duties elsewhere.
“And what of the Lord Chong?” he asked. “Was he captured with you, and is he imprisoned nearby?”