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‘Not again,’ Talen groaned. ‘Doesn’t anybody on this continent have any imagination?’
‘What’s this?’ Vanion asked.
‘The one they call Sabre up in Astel wore the same kind of clothes, my Lord.’
‘Maybe this one’s different.’
‘I wouldn’t get my hopes up too high.’
The man on horseback rode into the firelight, dismounted, and pushed back his hat. He was a tall, gangly man with a long, pock-marked face and narrow eyes. He stepped up onto a tree-stump and stood waiting for the peasants to gather around him. ‘Hear me, my friends,’ he said in a loud, harsh voice. ‘I bring news.’
The half-drunk babble of the peasants faded.
‘Much has happened since last we met,’ the speaker continued. ‘You will recall that we had determined to make one last try to resolve our differences with the Tamuls by peaceful means.’
‘What choice did we have, Rebal?’ one of the peasants shouted. ‘Only madmen would attack the Atan garrison – no matter how just their cause.’
‘So that’s Rebal,’ Kalten whispered. ‘Not very impressive, is he?’
‘Our cause was made just by Incetes himself,’ Rebal was responding, ‘and Incetes is more than a match for the Atans.’
The mob murmured its agreement.
‘There is good news, my friends,’ Rebal declared. ‘Our emissaries have been successful. The Emperor himself has seen the justice of our cause!’
A ragged cheer went up.
‘I rejoice even as you,’ Rebal continued, ‘but a new peril, far more grave than the simple injustice of the corrupt Tamul administrators, has arisen. The Emperor, who is now our friend, has been taken prisoner by the accursed Church Knights! The evil Archprelate of the Church of Chyrellos has reached half-way around the world to seize our friend!’
‘Outrageous!’ a burly peasant in the crowd roared. ‘Monstrous!’
The rest of the peasants looked a bit confused, however.
‘He’s going too fast,’ Talen whispered critically.
‘What?’ Berit asked.
‘He’s changing course on them,’ Talen explained. ‘I’d guess that he’s been cursing the Tamuls for the last year or so – the same way Sabre was up in Astel. Now he wants to curse somebody else, but he’s got to uncurse the Tamuls first. Even a drunken peasant’s going to have some suspicions about the miraculous conversion of the Emperor. He made it all too fast – and too easy.’
‘Tell us, Rebal,’ the burly peasant shouted, ‘how was our friend, the Emperor, taken prisoner?’
‘Yes, tell us!’ another man on the far side of the crowd howled.
‘Planted henchmen,’ Talen sneered. ‘This Rebal’s about as subtle as a club in the face.’
‘It was clever, my friends,’ Rebal declared to the crowd, ‘very clever. The Church of Chyrellos is guided by the demons of Hell, and they are the masters of deceit. The Tamuls, who are now our friends, are heathens, and they do not understand the guile of the heretics of Chyrellos. All unsuspecting, they welcomed a delegation of Church officials, and among those foul heretics who journeyed to Matherion were Knights of the Church – the armored minions of Hell itself. Once in Matherion, they seized our dear friend and protector, Emperor Sarabian, and they now hold him prisoner in his own palace!’
‘Death to the Tamuls!’ a wheezy-voiced old man, far gone in drink, bawled.
One of the other peasants rapped him sharply across the back of the head with a cudgel, and the slightly out-of-date demonstrator sagged limply to the ground.
‘Crowd control,’ Talen sniffed. ‘Rebal doesn’t want people making any mistakes here.’
Other peasants, obviously more of Rebal’s planted henchmen, began to shout the correct slogan, ‘Death to the Church Knights!’ They brandished crude weapons and assorted agricultural implements as they bellowed, emphasizing their slogan and intimidating the still-confused.
‘The purpose of these monsters is all too clear,’ Rebal shouted over the tumult. ‘It is their plan to hold the Emperor as hostage to prevent the Atans from storming the palace. They will sit safe where they are until reinforcements arrive. And make no mistake, my friends, those reinforcements are even now gathering on the plains of Eosia. The armies of the heretics are on the march, and in the van there come the Church Knights!’
Horrified gasps ran through the ranks of the peasants.
‘On to Matherion!’ the fellow with the cudgel bellowed. ‘Free the Emperor!’
The crowd took up the shout.
Rebal held up one hand, ‘My blood burns as hotly as yours, my friends!’ he shouted. ‘But will we leave our homes and families to the mercies of the Knights of the Church? All of Eosia marches toward Matherion! And what stands between accursed Eosia and fire-domed Matherion? Edom, my friends! Our beloved homeland stands in the path of the heretic horde! What mercy can we expect from these savages? Who will defend our women from foul rape if we rush to the Emperor’s aid?’
Cries of chagrin ran through the crowd.
Rebal moved quickly at that point. ‘And yet, my friends,’ he rushed on, ‘our defense of our beloved homes may yet aid our friend, the Emperor. The beasts of Eosia come to destroy our faith and to slaughter the true believers. I know not what course you may take, but I pledge to you all that I will lay down my life for our beloved homeland and our holy faith! But in my dying, I will delay the Church Knights! That Spawn of Hell must pause to spill my blood, and their delay will give the Atans the time to rally! Thus may we defend our homes and aid our friend in one stroke!’
Sparhawk began to swear, half strangling to keep his voice down.
‘What’s your problem?’ Kalten asked.
‘We’ve just been blocked. If those idiots out there accept what Rebal’s telling them, the Church Knights are going to have to fight their way to Matherion foot by foot.’
They’re very quick to exploit a changing situation,’ Vanion agreed. ‘Too quick, perhaps. It’s almost a thousand leagues from here to Matherion. Either someone has a very good horse, or our mysterious friend out there’s breaking the rules again in order to get word out to the hinterlands of what happened after the coup was put down.’
Rebal was holding up his hands to quiet the shouting of the crowd. ‘Are you with me, my brothers?’ he called. ‘Will we defend our homes and our faith and help our friends, the Tamuls, at the same time?’
The mob howled its assent.
‘Let’s ask Incetes to help us!’ the man with the cudgel shouted.
‘Incetes!’ another bellowed. ‘Incetes! Call forth Incetes!’
‘Are you sure, my friends?’ Rebal asked, drawing himself up and pulling his dark cloak tightly around him.
‘Call him forth, Rebal! Raise Incetes! Let him tell us what to do!’
Rebal struck an exaggerated pose and raised both arms over his head. He began to speak, intoning guttural words in a hollow, booming voice.
‘Is that Styric?’ Kalten whispered to Sephrenia. ‘It doesn’t sound like Styric to me.’
‘It’s gibberish,’ she replied scornfully.
Kalten frowned. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever heard of them,’ he whispered. ‘What part of the world do the Gibbers come from?’
She stared at him, her face baffled.
‘Did I say it wrong?’ he asked. ‘Are they called the Gibberese, or maybe the Gibberenians? – the people who speak Gibberish, I mean.’
‘Oh, Kalten,’ she laughed softly. ‘I love you.’
‘What did I say?’
Rebal’s voice had risen to a near-shriek, and he brought both arms down sharply.
There was a sudden explosion in the middle of the bonfire, and a great cloud of smoke boiled out into the clearing.
‘Herken, Maisteres alle!’ a huge voice came out of the smoke. ‘Now hath the tyme for Werre ycom. Now, be me troth, shal alle trew Edomishmen on lyve to armes! Tak ye uppe the iren swerd; gird ye your limbes alle inne the iren haubergeon and the iren helm! Smyte ye the feendes foule, which beestes derk do sette hom and fey in deedly peril. Goe ye to bataile ferse to fend the feendes of the acurset Chirche of Chyrellos! Follwe! Follwe! Follwe me, as Godes hondys yeve ye force!’
‘Old High Elenic!’ Bevier exclaimed. ‘Nobody’s spoken that tongue in thousands of years!’
‘I’d follow him, whatever tongue it is,’ Ulath rumbled. ‘He makes a good speech.’
The smoke began to thin, and a huge, ox-shouldered man wearing ancient armor and holding a mighty two-handed sword above his head appeared at Rebal’s side. ‘Havok!’ he bellowed. ‘Havok and Werre!’
Chapter 5 (#ulink_0b0898d9-1c2b-5a49-8231-490195d9fe16)
‘They’ve all gone now,’ Berit reported when he and Talen returned to the camp concealed in the narrow ravine. ‘They spent a lot of time marching around in circles shouting slogans first, though.’
‘Then the beer ran out,’ Talen added dryly, ‘and the party broke up.’ He looked at Flute. ‘Are you sure this was supposed to be important?’ he asked her. ‘It was the most contrived hoax I’ve ever seen.’
She nodded stubbornly. ‘It was important,’ she insisted. ‘I don’t know why, but it was.’
‘How did they make that big flash and all the smoke?’ Kalten asked.
‘One of the fellows near the fire threw a handful of some kind of powder onto the coals,’ Khalad said, shrugging. ‘Everybody else was watching Rebal, so they didn’t see him when he did it.’
‘Where did the one in the armor come from?’ Ulath asked.
‘He was hiding in the crowd,’ Talen explained. ‘The whole thing was at about the same level as you’d find at a country fair – one that’s held a long way from the nearest town.’
‘The one who was pretending to be Incetes gave a fairly stirring speech, though,’ Ulath noted.
‘It certainly should have been,’ Bevier smiled. ‘It was written by Phalactes in the seventh century.’
‘Who was he?’ Talen asked.
‘Phalactes was the greatest playwright of antiquity. That stirring speech came directly from one of his tragedies, Etonicus. That fellow in the antique armor substituted a few words is all. The play’s a classic. It’s still performed at universities once in a while.’
‘You’re a whole library all by yourself, Bevier,’ Kalten told him. ‘Do you remember every single thing you’ve ever read – word for word?’
Bevier laughed. ‘I wish I could, my friend. Some of my classmates and I put on a performance of Etonicus when I was a student. I played the lead, so I had to memorize that speech. The poetry of Phalactes is really very stirring. He was a great artist – Arcian, naturally.’
‘I never liked him very much,’ Flute sniffed. ‘He was as ugly as sin; he smelled like an open cesspool; and he was a howling bigot.’
Bevier swallowed hard. ‘Please don’t do that, Aphrael,’ he said. ‘It’s very unsettling.’
‘What was the story about?’ Talen asked, his eyes suddenly eager.
‘Etonicus was supposed to be the ruler of a mythic kingdom somewhere in what’s now eastern Cammoria,’ Bevier replied. ‘The legend has it that he went to war with the Styrics over religion.’
‘What happened?’ Talen’s tone was almost hungry.
‘He came to a bad end,’ Bevier shrugged. ‘It’s a tragedy, after all.’
‘But …’
‘You can read it for yourself sometime, Talen,’ Vanion said firmly. ‘This isn’t the story hour.’
Talen’s face grew sulky.
‘I’d be willing to wager that you could paralyze our young friend here in mid-theft,’ Ulath chuckled. ‘All you’d have to do is say, “Once upon a time”, and he’d stop dead in his tracks.’
‘This throws a whole new light on what’s been happening here in Tamuli,’ Vanion mused. ‘Could this all be some vast hoax?’ He looked inquiringly at Flute.
She shook her head. ‘No, Vanion. There has been magic of varying levels in some of the things we’ve encountered.’
‘Some, perhaps, but not all, certainly. Was there any magic at all involved in what we saw tonight?’
‘Not a drop.’
‘Is that how you measure magic?’ Kalten asked curiously. ‘Does it come by the gallon?’
‘Like cheap wine, you mean?’ she suggested tartly.
‘Well, not exactly, but …’
‘This was very important,’ Sparhawk said. Thank you, Aphrael.’
‘I live but to serve.’ She smiled mockingly at him.
‘Stop that.’
‘You’ve missed me entirely, Sparhawk,’ Kalten said.
‘We’ve just found out that not everything that’s being reported back to Matherion is the result of real magic. There’s a fair amount of fraud mixed in as well. What does that suggest?’
‘The other side’s lazy.’ Kalten shrugged.
‘I’m not so sure,’ Ulath disagreed. ‘They’re not afraid to exert themselves when it’s important.’
‘Two,’ Sephrenia said. ‘Three at the most.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ Ulath said with a puzzled look.
‘Now do you see how exasperating that is, Ulath?’ she said to him. ‘This charade we watched here tonight rather strongly hints at the fact that there aren’t very many people who can really work spells on the other side. They’re spread out a bit thin, I’d say. What’s going on here in Edom – and probably in Astel and Daconia as well – is rather commonplace, so they don’t feel that they have to waste magic on it.’
