Dread Empire - All Darkness Met Part 2

TWO: Mocker

These things sometimes begin subtly. For Mocker it started when a dream came true.

Dream would become nightmare before week's end.

He had an invitation to Castle Krief. He. Mocker. The fat little brown man whose family lived in abject poverty in a Vorgreberg slum, who, himself, scrabbled for pennies on the fringes of the law. The invitation had so delighted him that he actually had swallowed his pride and allowed his friend the Marshall to loan him money.

He arrived at the Palace gate grinning from one plump brown ear to the other, his invitation clutched in one hand, his wife in the other.

"Self, am convinced old friend Bear gone soft behind eyes, absolute," he told Nepanthe. "Inviting worst of worse, self. Not so, wife of same, cert.i.tude. Hai!

Maybeso, high places lonely. Pacificity like cancer, eating silent, sapping manhood.

Calls in old friend of former time, hoping rejuvenation of spirit."

He had been all mouth since the invitation had come, though, briefly, he had been suicidally down. The Marshall of all Kavelin inviting somebody like him to the Victory Day celebrations? A mockery. It was some cruel joke....

"Quit bubbling and bouncing," his wife murmured. "Want them to think you're some drunken street rowdy?"

"Heart's Desire. Doe's Eyes. Is truth, absolute. Am same. Have wounds to prove same. Scars. Count them...."

She laughed. And thought, I'll give Bragi a hug that'll break his ribs.

It seemed ages since they had been this happy, an eon since laughter had tickled her tonsils and burst past her lips against any ability to control.

Fate hadn't been kind to them. Nothing Mocker tried worked. Or, if it did, he would suffer paroxysms of optimism, begin gambling, sure he'd make a killing, and would lose everything.

Yet they had their love. They never lost that, even when luck turned its worst.

Inside the tiny, triangular cosmos described by them and their son, an approach to perfection remained.

Physically, the years had treated Nepanthe well. Though forty-one, she still looked to be in her early thirties. The terrible cruelty of her poverty had ravaged her spirit more than her flesh.

Mocker was another tale. Most of his scars had been laid on by the fists and knives of enemies. He was indomitable, forever certain of his high destiny.

The guard at the Palace gate was a soldier of the new national army. The Marshall had been building it since his victory at Baxendala. The sentry was a polite young man of Wesson ancestry who needed convincing that at least one of them wasn't a party crasher.

"Where's your carriage?" he asked. "Everyone comes in a carriage."

"Not all of us can afford them. But my husband was one of the heroes of the war."

Nepanthe did Mocker's talking when clarity was essential. "Isn't the invitation valid?""Yes. All right. He can go in. But who are you?" The woman before him as tall and pale and cool. Almost regal.

Nepanthe had, for this evening, summoned all the aristocratic bearing that had been hers before she had been stricken by love for the madman she had married.... Oh, it seemed ages ago, now.

"His wife. I said he was my husband."

The soldier had all a Kaveliner's ethnic consciousness. His surprise showed.

"Should we produce marriage papers? Or would you rather he went and brought the Marshall to vouch for me?" Her voice was edged with sarcasm that cut like razors. She could make of words lethal weapons.

Mocker just stood there grinning, shuffling restlessly.

The Marshall did have strange friends. The soldier had been with the Guard long enough to have seen several stranger than these. He capitulated. He was only a trooper.

He didn't get paid to think. Somebody would throw them out if they didn't belong.

And, in the opinion locked behind his teeth, they pleased him more than some of the carriage riders he had admitted earlier. Some of those were men whose throats he would have cut gladly. Those two from Hammad al Nakir.... They were amba.s.sadors of a nation which cheerfully would have devoured his little homeland.

They had more trouble at the citadel door, but the Marshall had foreseen it. His aide appeared, vouchsafed their entry.

It grated a little, but Nepanthe held her tongue.

Once, if briefly, she had been mistress of a kingdom where Kavelin would have made but a modest province.

Mocker didn't notice. "Dove's Breast. Behold. Inside of Royal Palace. And am invited. Self. Asked in. In time past, have been to several, dragged in bechained, or breaked-broked- whatever word is for self-instigated entry for purpose of burglary, or even invited round to back-alley door to discuss deed of dastardness desired done by denizen of same. Invited? As honored guest? Never."

The Marshall's aide, Gjerdrum Eanredson, laughed, slapped the fat man's shoulder.

"You just don't change, do you? Six, seven years it's been. You've got a little grey there, and maybe more tummy, but I don't see a whit's difference in the man inside." He eyed Nepanthe. There was, briefly, that in his eye which said he appreciated what he saw.

"But you've changed, Gjerdrum," she said, and the lilt of her voice told him his thoughts had been divined. "What happened to that shy boy of eighteen?"

Gjerdrum's gaze flicked to Mocker, who was bemused by the opulence of his surroundings, to the deep plunge of her bodice, to her eyes. Without thinking he wet his lips with his tongue and, red-faced, stammered, "I guess he growed up...."

She couldn't resist teasing him, flirting. As he guided them to the great hall she asked leading questions about his marital status and which of the court ladies were his mistresses. She had him thoroughly fl.u.s.tered when they arrived.

Nepanthe held this moment in deep dread. She had even tried to beg off. But now a thrill coursed through her. She was glad she had come. She pulled a handful of long straight black hair forward so it tumbled down her bare skin, drawing the eye and accenting her cleavage.

For a while she felt nineteen again.The next person she recognized was the Marshall's wife, Elana, who was waiting near the door. For an instant Nepanthe was afraid. This woman, who once had been her best friend, might not be pleased to see her.

But, "Nepanthe!" The red-haired woman engulfed her in an embrace that banished all misgivings.

Elana loosed her and repeated the display with Mocker. "G.o.d, Nepanthe, you look good. How do you do it? You haven't aged a second."

"Skilled artificer, self, magician of renown, having at hand secret of beauty of women of fallen Escalon, most beautiful of all time before fall, retaining light of teenage years into fifth decade, provide potations supreme against ravishes-ravages?-of Time," Mocker announced solemnly-then burst into laughter. He hugged Elana back, cunningly grasping a handful of derriere, then skipped round her in a mad, whirling little dance.

"It's him," Elana remarked. "For a minute I didn't recognize him. He had his mouth shut. Come on. Come on. Bragi will be so glad to see you again."

Time hadn't used Elana cruelly either. Only a few grey wisps threaded her coppery hair, and, despite having borne many children, her figure remained reasonably trim.

Nepanthe remarked on it.

"True artifice, that," Elana confessed. "None of your hedge-wizard mumbo jumbo.

These clothes-they come all the way from Sacuescu. The Queen's father sends them with hers. He has hopes for his next visit." She winked. "They push me up here, flatten me here, firm me up back there. I'm a mess undressed." Though she tried valiantly to conceal it, Elana's words expressed a faint bitterness.

"Time is great enemy of all," Mocker observed. "Greatest evil of all. Devours all beauty. Destroys all hope." In his words, too, there was attar of wormwood. "Is Eater, Beast That Lies Waiting. Ultimate Destroyer." He told the famous riddle.

There were people all around them now, n.o.bles of Kavelin, Colonels of the Army and Mercenaries' Guild, and representatives from the diplomatic community. Merriment infested the hall. Men who were deadly enemies the rest of the year shared in the celebration as though they were dear friends-because they had shared hards.h.i.+p under the shadow of the wings of Death that day long ago when they had set aside their contentiousness and presented a common front to the Dread Empire-and had defeated the invincible.

There were beautiful women there, too, women the like of which Mocker knew only in dreams. Of all the evidences of wealth and power they impressed him most.

"Scandalous" he declared. "Absolute. Desolation overtakes. Decadence descends.

Sybariticism succeeds. O Sin, thy Name is Woman.... Self, will strive bravely, but fear containment of opinion will be impossible of provision. May rise to speechify same, castrating-no, castigating-a.s.sembly for wicked life. Shame!" He leered at a sleek, long- haired blonde who, simply by existing, turned his spine to jelly. Then he faced his wife, grinning. "Remember pa.s.sage in Wizards of Ilkazar, in list of sins of same? Be great fundament for speech, eh? No?"

Nepanthe smiled and shook her head. "I don't think this's the place. Or the time.

They might think you're serious."

"Money here. Look. Self, being talker of first water, spins web of words. In this a.s.semblage famous law of averages declares must exist one case of fool headedness.

Probably twenty-three. Hai! More. Why not? Think big. Self, being student primus of way of spider, pounce. Ensnare very gently, unlike spider, and, also unlike same, drain very slow."Elana, too, shook her head. "Hasn't changed a bit. Not at all. Nepanthe, you've got to tell me all about it. What have you been doing? How's Ethrian? Do you know how much trouble it was to find you? Valther used half his spies. Had them looking everywhere. And there you were in the Siluro quarter all the time. Why didn't you keep in touch?"

At that moment the Marshall, Bragi Ragnarson, spied them. He spared Nepanthe an answer.

"Mocker!" he thundered, startling half the hall into silence. He abandoned the lords he had been attending. "Yah! Lard Bottom!" He threw a haymaker. The fat man ducked and responded with a blur of a kick that swept the big man's feet from beneath him.

Absolute silence gripped the hall. Nearly three hundred men, plus servants and women, stared.

Mocker extended a hand. And shook his head as he helped the Marshall rise. "Self, must confess to one puzzlement. One only, and small. But is persistent as buzzing of mosquito."

"What's that?" Ragnarson, standing six-five, towered over the fat man.

"This one tiny quandary. Friend Bear, ever clumsy, unable to defend self from one- armed child of three, is ever chosen by great ones to defend same from foes of mighty competence. Is poser. Sorcery? Emboggles mind of self."

"Could be. But you've got to admit I'm lucky."

"Truth told." He said it sourly, and didn't expand. Luck, Mocker believed, was his nemesis. The spiteful hag had taken a dislike to him the moment of his birth.... But his day was coming. The good fortune was piling up. When it broke loose....

In truth, luck had less to do with his misfortunes than did compulsive gambling and an ironhard refusal to make his way up any socially acceptable means.

This crude little brown man, from the worst slum of the Siluro ghetto, had had more fortunes rush through his fingers than most of the lords present. Once he had actually laid hands on the fabled treasure of Ilkazar.

He wouldn't invest. He refused. Someday, he knew, the dice would fall his way.

The fat man's old friend, with whom, in younger days, he had enjoyed adventures that would've frightened their present companions bald, guided him onto the raised platform from which his approach had been spotted. Mocker began shaking. A moment's clowning, down there, was embarra.s.sing enough. But to be dragged before the mult.i.tudes....

He barely noticed the half dozen men who shared the dais with the Marshall. One eyed him as would a man who spotted someone he thinks he recognizes after decades.

"Quiet!" Ragnarson called. "A little quiet here!"

While the amused-to-disgusted chatter died, Mocker considered his friend's apparel.

So rich. Fur-edged cape. Blouse of silk. Hose that must cost more than he scrounged in a month.... He remembered when this man had worn bearskins.

Once silence gained a hold, Ragnarson announced, "Ladies and gentlemen, I want to introduce somebody. A man I tracked down at considerable inconvenience and expense because he's the critical element that has been missing from our Victory Day celebrations. He was one of the unspoken heroes who guided us up the road to Baxendala,one of the men whose quiet pain and sacrifice made victory possible." Ragnarson held Mocker's hand high. "Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the world's foremost authority."

Puzzled, the amba.s.sador from Altea asked, "Authority on what?"

Ragnarson grinned, punched Mocker's arm. "Everything."

Mocker had never been one to remain embarra.s.sed long. Especially by public acclaim. He had forever been his own greatest booster. But here, because he had a predisposition to expect it, he suspected he was being mocked. He flashed his friend a look of appeal.

Which, despite years of separation, Ragnarson read. Softly, he replied, "No. I didn't bring you here for that. This's a homecoming. A debut. Here's an audience.

Take them."

The wicked old grin seared the fat man's face. He turned to the crowd, fearing them no more. They would be his toys.

Boldly, insolently, he examined the people nearest the dais. The merry mayhem in his eyes sparkled so that each of them recognized it. Most perked to a higher level of gaiety ere he spoke a word.

He founded the speech on the pa.s.sage from the epic, and spoke with such joy, such laughter edging his voice, that hardly anyone resented being roasted.

The years had taught him something. He was no longer indiscreet. Though his tongue rolled inspiredly, in a high, mad babble that made the chandeliers rattle with the responding laughter, he retained sufficient command of his inspiration that, while he accused men of every dark deed under the sun, he never indicted anyone for something whispered to be true.

In the Siluro quarter, where dwelt the quiet little men who performed the drudgework of civil service and the mercantile establishments, there were a few secrets about the mighty.

He finished with a prophecy not unlike that of the poet. Punctuation, h.e.l.lfire and brimstone.

And envoi, "Choice is clear. Recant. Renounce high living. Shed sybaritic ways.

Place all burden of sin on one able to bear up under curse of same." He paused to meet eyes, including those of the sleek blonde twice. Then, softly, seriously, "Self, would volunteer for job."

Bragi slapped his back. People who remembered Mocker now, from the war, came to greet him and, if possible, swap a few lies about the old days. Others, including that svelte blonde, came to praise his performance.

Mocker was disappointed by the blonde. There was a message in her eyes, and nothing he could do.

"Oh, my," he muttered. "That this obesity should live to see day...." But he wasn't distraught. This was his happiest evening in a decade. He wallowed in it, savoring every instant.

But he didn't stop observing. He soon concluded that there were skunks in paradise. The millennium hadn't arrived.

Three hard men in fighting leathers stood in the shadows behind the dais. He knew them as well as he knew Ragnarson. Haaken Blackfang, Bragi's foster brother, a bear of aman, a deadly fighter, bigger than his brother. Reskird Kildragon, another relic of the old days, and another grim fighter, who sprang like a wolf when Bragi commanded. And Rolf Preshka, that steel-eyed Iwa Skolovdan whose enmity meant certain death, whose devotion to Bragi's wife bordered on the morbid, and should have been a danger to her husband-except that Preshka was almost as devoted to him.

And, yes, there were more of the old comrades, in the out-of-the-ways, the shadows and alcoves of balconies and doors. Turran of Ravenkrak, Nepanthe's brother, white of hair now but none the less deadly. And their brother Valther, impetuous with blade and heart, possessed of a mind as convolute as that of a G.o.d. Jarl Ahring. Dahl Haas.

Thorn Altenkirk. They were all there, the old, cold ones who had survived, who had been the real heroes of the civil war. And among them were a few new faces, men he knew would be as devoted to their commander-otherwise they would be on the dance floor with the peac.o.c.ks.

All was not well.

He had known that since climbing to the dais. Two of the occupants of seats of honor were envoys from Hammad al Nakir. From their oldest enemy, El Murid. From that hungry giant of a nation directly south of Kavelin, behind the Kapenrung Mountains. It had taken the combined might of a dozen kingdoms to contain that fanatic religious state in the two-decades-gone, half-forgotten dust-up remembered as the El Murid Wars.