The Tritonian Ring and Other Pasudian Tales Read online

  As Vakar, withdrawing his point from the tall man, half-turned to face his remaining assailant, that one skipped back out of reach before Vakar could get set for a blow. The tall man dropped his sword, clutched at his throat, gave a gurgling cough, and began to sink to the floor. The man whom Vakar had first wounded was hobbling towards the door, but now the unhurt man turned, knocked the wounded one aside, and dashed out.

  Vakar leaped over the body on the floor and made for the wounded man, meaning to finish him with a quick thrust. The wounded man had been knocked down by the one who fled and was now just getting up, crying: "Quarter!"

  The man's mask had come off in the fracas, and just before he sent the blade home Vakar jerked to a halt at the sight of a familiar face. A closer look showed that the man was Abeggu of Tokalet, the foreign friend of Thiegos at the rowdy supper-party at the palace.

  "Lyr's barnacles!" cried Vakar, holding his sword poised. "What are you doing here? It will take uncommon eloquence to talk yourself out of this!"

  The man stammered in his thick accent: "Th-thiegos told me I w-was to help thwart a plot against the queen. He never—never told me you were involved, and when I found out, it was too late to ask for explanations."

  "Thiegos?" said Vakar, and bent to jerk the scarf from the face of the dead man.

  Sure enough, the corpse was that of Thiegos, Queen Porfia's paramour.

  Prince Vakar whistled. Either Thiegos had been in on the serpent-throne scheme, or had been smitten with jealousy of Vakar Zhu because of the latter's attention to the queen and had gathered a couple of friends to do the traveller in. Luckily they had not known that Vakar wore a helmet under his cowl, or he would have been choosing his next incarnation by now.

  He looked at his wounded arm. The bloodstain was still spreading and the arm was hard to move. The hut was empty; Charsela must have pushed Porfia out the back door.

  "Well," said Vakar, "this is the first time a man has tried to kill me because of my singing! What else do you know of this attentat?"

  "N-nothing, sir. I am ashamed to admit that when the snake came to life I fled with the rest. Thiegos and I went to my lodgings near the palace to drink a skin of wine to steady our nerves and collect our wits. Then Thiegos left me to return to the palace. A little later, just as I was going to sleep, he came back with another man, saying for me to come quickly with my sword." Abeggu gulped.

  "Go on."

  "I—I do not know how to use the thing properly, as we Gamphasants are a peaceful people. I bought it merely as an ornament. When we entered here they pushed me forward to take the first shock; a fine friend he was! This is all most confusing and unethical; I hope the people back in Tokalet never hear of it. Was there in sooth a plot against the queen?"

  "Not unless your friend Thiegos was hatching one. I am probably foolish to let you go, but I cannot butcher one who comes from the rim of the world to seek philosophy. Go, but if you cross my path again ..."

  Vakar made a jabbing motion, and Abeggu, still bent over with pain, hurried out.

  Vakar looked out the door after him, but except for the wounded Gamphasant nobody was in sight. If any neighbors had heard the clash of arms they had prudently kept their curiosity in check.

  Should he go back to the palace? Much as he liked Porfia, he was not sure that when she learned that he had slain her lover she would not, in a transport of emotion, have him dispatched out of hand. She might regret the action later, but that would not help him if his head were already rotting on a spike on the palace wall.

  No, a quick departure would be more prudent. He took a last look at the corpse, recovered his dagger, and hurried out in his turn.

  Down at the waterfront of Sederado he found the Dyra with Fual asleep with his back against the mast and his broadsword in his hand. Fual awoke and scrambled up as Vakar approached, saying:

  "I hope it's all right about those men who came aboard the ship during the day, my lord. They pawed all through the cargo, saying they were sent by the queen, and there were too many for me to stop. I don't think they stole much."

  "It's all right," said Vakar. "We're putting to sea at once. Help me tie up this arm and cast off."

  "You're hurt, sir?" Fual hurried to fetch one of the cleaner rags for a bandage. The cut proved about three inches long but not deep.

  Vakar silenced the valet's questions, and presently they were laboriously rowing the Dyra out into the seaway. They got their ropes fouled up in hoisting the sail, and the ship took some water before they got her straightened out to eastward, with Vakar steering as best he could with one arm and Fual bailing water out of the hold with a dipper. Vakar said:

  "I didn't see Qasigan's black galley at its place on the waterfront. Has it gone?"

  "Yes, sir. Earlier in the night a party appeared on the wharf and boarded the black ship in haste. I recognized the ape-man by his stature even in the dark. There was some delay while the captain sent men ashore to drag his rowers out of the stews, and then they pushed off and disappeared out into the bay. What happened at the palace?"

  Vakar briefed Fual on their situation, adding: "If I remember the teaching old Ryn beat into me as a boy, we pass another one or two of these islands and come to the mainland of Euskeria. What do they speak there?"

  "Euskerian, sir; a complicated tongue, though I know a few words from the time I spent in Gadaira waiting to be sold."

  "There should be a law compelling all men to speak the same language, as the myths say they once did. Too bad we couldn't have cut off Sret's head and kept it alive to interpret for us, as the head of Brang was kept in the legend. Teach me what you know of Euskerian."

  During the rest of the night Vakar's arm bothered him so that he got little sleep. The next day the Ogugian coast faded away to port, and later another great island loomed up ahead. They coasted along this until, towards evening, Vakar noticed an unpleasantly hazy look in the sky and an ominous increase in the size of the swells that marched down upon them from astern. He said:

  "If this were Lorsk, I should guess a storm were brewing."

  "Then, sir, shouldn't we run into some sheltered cove until it blows over?"

  "I daresay, save that being so green at seafaring we should doubtless run our little ship upon the rocks."

  The night passed like the previous one except that Vakar suffered a touch of seasickness from the continuous pitching. His arm ached worse than ever, though he changed the bandage and cleaned the wound. The wind backed to the south so that it was all they could do to keep the Dyra from being blown on to the dark shore to port.

  With the coming of a gray dawn, Fual glanced astern and cried: "Sir, look around! It's the black galley!"

  Vakar froze. A galley was crawling upon their wake like a giant insect, a small square sail swaying upon its mast and its oars rising and falling irregularly in the swells. Vakar hoped that it was not Qasigan's ship, but as the minutes passed and the galley neared he saw that Fual had been right. He could even make out the figure of Nji the ape-man in the bow. He assumed that their intentions were hostile, and presently the ape-man confirmed his guess by producing a bow twice normal size and sending a huge arrow streaking across the swells, to plunk into the water a few feet away. Qasigan and the little Yok were standing in the bow with Nji.

  "They mean us to stop, sir," said Fual.

  "I know that, fool!" fumed Vakar, straining his eyes towards the ever-nearing galley.

  He wondered how they had traced him. This must be that strong magic spoken of by Charsela. Was Qasigan then the author of the bizarre episode of the serpent throne?

  Why should this strange man try to hound Vakar Zhu to his death? Who would benefit by his removal? His brother, perhaps. Who else? He, Vakar, was trying to thwart the impending aggression of the Gorgons against Lorsk by seeing the thing that the gods most feared. Therefore either the gods, or the Gorgons, or both, might be after him.

  "Sir," said Fual, "if a mighty magician pursues us, shouldn't we give up now,
before we inflame him further by our futile efforts to flee?"

  "You rabbit! The chase was hardly begun, and I know he couldn't cast a deadly spell at this distance, from a tossing deck, in this stormy weather. A spell requires quiet and solitude."

  "I'm still afraid, sir," mumbled Fual. "Do something to save me!"

  Vakar muttered a curse upon his servant's timidity and searched his memory for what he had heard of the Gorgons. It was said that their wizards had the power to freeze anybody within a few paces into a rigid paralysis, by some means called a "medusa," though Vakar did not know what a medusa was. In dealing with Gorgons, then, the thing to do was to keep away from them. As for the gods ...

  Vakar rolled an eye towards the lowering sky and shook a fist. If it's war you want, he thought, you shall have it!

  At that instant thunder rolled, away to the north. The wind, which had veered back to the west, blew harder. Rain began to slant across the deck.

  A voice came thinly across the waves: "Prince Vakar! Heave to!"

  Vakar called to Fual: "Come back here and take cover!"

  Vakar himself crouched down in the lee of the single high step up to the poop, holding the steering-lever at arm's length. In this position he was shielded by the sheer of the high stern.

  Another arrow whipped by, close enough for its screech to be heard over the roar of the wind, and drove its bone point into the deck. Vakar said:

  "So long as we keep down they can't reach us—"

  "Beg pardon, sir!" said Fual, who had snatched a look aft. "They're drawing abreast!"

  "Oh." If they did that, the pair on the Dyra would no longer be protected, and Qasigan could have them either shot down or sunk by ramming. As Qasigan had called Vakar "Prince," the man had evidently not been fooled by Vakar's denial.

  Vakar took a look around, shielding his eyes from the rain with his hand. Sure enough, the dark nose of the pursuing ship was creeping up to the Dyra's port quarter.

  Vakar felt of his sword. He had no illusions of being able to leap aboard the galley and clean it out single handed, even with Fual's dubious help. For though he downed one or two sailors, he could hardly dompt the weapons of the rest, the ape-man's club, and Qasigan's Gorgonian magic all at the same time.

  Closer came the bow of the galley, its bronze ram-spur bursting clear of the water each time the ship pitched. Vakar shifted his steering-lever a little to starboard, sending the Dyra plunging off to southward, away from the shore, though at that angle the merchantman heeled dangerously with a horrible combination of pitch and roll. The galley swung its stem to starboard to follow.

  The wind waxed further and the rain became an opaque level-blowing mass, mixed with spray from the wave-tops. The Dyra rolled her port rail under and dipped the corner of her sail into the crests. Vakar was sure mat she would capsize.

  "Help me!" he shouted, and he and Fual strained at the steering-lever until the ship swung back on a straight downwind course. The mast-stays thrummed and the slender yards whipped dangerously, but at least the ship stayed on an even keel.

  Vakar said: "You may let go ... Take another look for the galley."

  Fual tried but reported back: "I can't, my lord."

  "Can't what?"

  "Can't see. It's like thrusting your face into a waterfall."

  Vakar fared no better. Clinging to the yoke they held the ship on her course, though Vakar expected momentarily to hear the galley's ram crunch through their stern. When the squall abated, Vakar left the helm to take another look.

  There was no galley.

  Vakar's heart leaped up with the thought that their pursuers had swamped and drowned. But another look showed the big black craft still afloat in the distance and making for shore. Peculiar bursts of spray rising up from the galley's deck puzzled Vakar until he realized that they were caused by the sailors of the galley bailing for dear life.

  Fual asked: "Why did they leave us?"

  "Couldn't take the blow. With her low freeboard the galley is even less suited to rough water than we are, and her skipper decided to call it quits and He up in a cove."

  "The gods be praised! It's like in that poem when your hero Vrir was best on all sides, and—how does it go, sir?"

  Vakar declaimed:

  "Down to the deck livid with lightnings,

  Scaly and seaweed-clad, Lyr thrust his trident.

  Where the spear struck rose there a rufous

  Ring-fence of fire, helping the hero ..."

  The galley became invisible with rain, distance, and the loom of the shore. Vakar held his course, the ache in his right arm running through him. In wrestling with the helm he had started his wound bleeding again. Soaked and wretched, he wondered if even the forlorn chance of saving Lorsk from the Gorgons was worth his present misery.

  Wind and rain continued all day, though never with the severity of that first squall that had all but sunk both the Dyra and her pursuer. The wind moderated but veered to the north so that Vakar had to hold the ship at an uncomfortable angle to the wind to avoid being swept south out to sea. During the night he got only a few nightmarish moments of sleep and faced the dawn feeling feverish and light-headed. His arm hurt so that every time it was touched or jarred he had to set his teeth to keep from yelling.

  The rain petered out and the wind turned colder. The cloud-cover thinned until Vakar had an occasional glimpse of the sun. He took a good look around the horizon—and stopped, his jaw sagging in horror. A couple of miles aft the galley's small sail swayed upon its mast.

  Vakar was overwhelmed with despair. With Qasigan's magical powers tracking him down, how could he ever shake off the fellow? He was in no condition to stand and fight.

  He pulled himself wearily together. Somewhere over the horizon ahead lay the mainland, and from what he had heard it also projected eastward to the South of him in the peninsula of Dzen. Therefore if he angled off to the right, the way the wind was now blowing, he should fetch up against the mainland. He would be taking a terrific chance, for out of sight of land an overcast that hid sun and stars would leave him utterly lost, and if the wind swung round to the east he would be blown out to sea without knowing it. On the other hand the ship would sail faster and with less of this torturous rolling ...

  Vakar pulled his steering-lever to the left so that the Dyra swung to starboard. The galley followed.

  As the hours passed, the island sank out of sight and the galley drew closer, though the water was still too rough for the latter to use her oars efficiently.

  "Ah me!" said Fual. "We shall never see our homes and friends again, for this time we are truly lost."

  "Shut up!" said Vakar. Fual wept quietly.

  In the afternoon another coast appeared ahead. As they drew nearer, Vakar saw a wooded hilly region with a hint of towering blue mountains in the distance. He wondered if this were the Atlantean range of sinister repute. Behind him the galley was almost within bow-shot again.

  "What do you plan now, sir?" said Fual.

  Vakar shook his head. "I don't know; I seem no longer able to think."

  "Let me feel your forehead," said Fual, and then: "No wonder! You're a sick man, my lord. I must get you ashore and put a cow-dung poultice on that wound to draw out the poison—"

  "If I can get ashore I'll take a chance on the wound."

  Close came the shore and closer came the galley. Fual cried:

  "Breakers ahead! We shall be wrecked!"

  "I know it. Get our gear together and prepare to leap off the bow when we touch."

  "Too late! They'll ram us before we can reach the beach!"

  "Do as I say!" roared Vakar, straining his eyes ahead.

  A glance back showed that the galley was overhauling them faster than they were nearing the strand. Vakar gripped his steering-lever as if he could thus squeeze an extra knot out of the Dyra.

  Behind, the galley gained; Vakar heard the coxswain exhorting his rowers. Ahead a line of rocks showed between waves, a score of paces short of the be
ach. As the combers toppled over they struck these rocks and sent up great fountains of spray, then continued on to the beach with diminished force. If he could guide the little ship between these*rocks they might escape, but if he struck one they would drown like mice ...

  Crash! Vakar staggered as the galley's bow struck the stern of the Dyra. Fual tumbled to the deck, then rolled over and sat up with a despairing shriek. Under the whistle of the wind, the roar of the breakers, and the shouts of the men on the galley, Vakar fancied he heard the gurgle of water rushing into the Dyra.

  He recovered his balance and looked ahead. They were headed straight for one of the needles of rock. Vakar heaved on the yoke to swerve the Dyra, which heeled and scrapped past the obstacle with timbers groaning and crackling. The change in the slope of the deck told Vakar that the ship was settling by the stern. The galley had withdrawn its beak and was backing water furiously to keep off the rocks.