Glen Cook - Sung In Blood

The others did not understand. But Rider's face told them he had done something of which he was mildly ashamed.

A storm of sorceries exploded from Shai Khe's airship. Preacher dodged while Rider fended.

Chaz discharged his weapon. Its flaring bolt arced toward the pirate, but fell far short.

The air before Caracene sparkled. Shai Khe's face appeared. A whisper of a voice said, "Now you meet the true despair, Ride-Master." The face vanished.

Rider looked sad.

The air itself shuddered as if from godlike hammer strokes. The black cable connecting the sorcerer's airship with the promontory fattened till it was as thick as a big man's waist. Then the landward end broke loose.

A globule of a darkness like nonexistence whipped toward Shai Khe's vessel. The eye could not fix upon it.

It impacted upon the easterner's airship.

The pirate folded like a sausage bent over a knee. "Move back now!" Rider ordered. "Move fast!"

Preacher needed no encouragement.

Everyone, on both ships, knew what would happen. But it was a long time coming—as though mocking by delay.

Shai Khe's ship folded almost double before a skin crack appeared where the strain of folding was greatest.

A gas bladder burst.

And that was the pirate's doom.

The gas exploded on contacting the air. Billows of fire flung out of the airship. The fire penetrated another bladder, which exploded in turn. The airship settled toward the water. New fires continued erupting.

Waves of heat beat against Rider's airship.

Rider took control and pressed closer, following the easterner down. Below, the nearest surface ships scurried away.

Two flaming crewmen jumped from the pirate. Rider tried to reach for them, to buoy them up, but without the web could not respond fast enough.

Gobbets of flaming ship dropped away, splashed into the Bridge, set the sea aflame.

"Holy Zephod," Preacher finally gasped. "I never saw one blow before. What a sight."

They all watched in awe.

"What's that?" Chaz asked, as the dying monster of the air started the final hundred feet of its fall.

"Sounds like ... " Su-Cha frowned. "Sounds like somebody laughing."

The sound grew swiftly louder. And it was mad laughter.

Caracene made a startled, squeaky noise. Chaz whirled. He gasped. "Rider! You won't believe

... "

Rider turned. A vast, sparkling face was taking form between him and the woman. Flames enveloped and distorted it. It was laughing.

It glared at Rider. Its laughter became mocking. All-enveloping words filled the cabin. "You have won nothing, Ride-Master. Nothing. Even I am but a messenger." More laughter, rising toward the insane.

The phantom snapped out of existence.

The pirate airship hit the water. A last half dozen gas bladders erupted at once. A violent updraft staggered Rider's airship, sent it rising and whirling. He fought for control, finally got the vessel moving toward Shasesserre.

"What did he mean, he was only a messenger?" Chaz demanded. His question was for Rider but he was looking at Caracene.

"I'm not sure," Rider replied.

"Well, I don't like it."

"I'm not sure I do, either. In some ways this has been almost too easy a victory."

"Too easy?" Su-Cha squawked.

Chaz glared at Caracene. "Woman?"

But Caracene remained silent. She stood at a window now, staring back at the nest of fire and flock of smoke celebrating Shai Khe's destruction.

Neither Rider nor his men bragged up what had happened. But countless others had been in the affair. They talked. In fact, most of the City had become aware of the struggle before its conclusion. So when it became generally known that the threat from a great devil of a sorcerer out of the east had been overcome by Jehrke's son, there developed a general acclamation of the son as Protector in his father's stead.

King Belledon was not pleased.

Repercussions continued for some time, as the King purged or exiled the last of those who had conspired against Shasesserre.

Border situations that had threatened all along the empire's frontiers evaporated almost magically. The troublesome easternmost provinces fell into an abnormally peaceful state. Agents in those far lands said the report of Shai Khe's demise had paralyzed the eastern sorcerer's shadowed kingdom of terror. The great peril was at an end. The thing was done. Even King Belledon sent Rider his grudging gratitude and congratulations.

But the world was filled with illusions, and the greatest illusion of all was that of safety.

Not for the first time, Preacher asked, "What did Shai Khe mean when he said he was only a messenger?"

Rider had not forgotten that. He, Greystone, Spud, and Su-Cha all were scouring their sources and resources in an effort to prepare for possible troubles.

They unearthed no news of any value—not even a concrete indication that Shai Khe had been anything less than his own agent. They found only the faintest wisp of a rumor from the nethermost east about a cabal of which Shai Khe might have been a junior member. But that was only hearsay of a rumor of hearsay.

Chaz figured that in Caracene they had the next best thing to a primary source. "Press her," he told Rider, in private. "She knows a lot that she isn't telling."

Rider raised an eyebrow. It was an expressive querying gesture. Chaz reddened slightly. He had been paying elaborate public court to Caracene. And she seemed pleased by his attention.

"Not yet," Rider replied. "We're not under the sword. She has been a slave—and more. She needs time to rediscover the meaning and bounds of her freedom. She has to determine for herself if she has a moral obligation to speak or to remain silent. With Shai Khe gone, and with his hold upon her charred and sunken beneath the Bridge, I can see no reason to doubt that she will come around.

It will have far more meaning when it comes from the heart. Exercise your famous barbarian patience. Take her out on the town. Take her to the Little Circus. General Procopio is giving three days of games to celebrate his part in our success."

There had been some grumpiness over Procopio's having claimed so much. Rider, though, was pleased because the old officer was diverting attention from himself and his men.

"Take her out and buy her a western-style wardrobe. I do not know women well, but never heard of one whose morale could not be improved by a shopping spree. Especially when someone else is picking up the cost."

Chaz grumped, "I think she looks just fine wearing what she has."

"You would. Most of the time she's half-naked. But she can't wander the streets like that."

Chaz grumped some more, mostly because he had fixed notions of the way women shopped. He did not look forward to squiring Caracene around the courtiers of the City. But he went out and collected her.

He knew his duty. And there was a fine chance that doing it would earn him pleasant rewards.

General Procopio invited Rider's gang to share his personal box at the Little Circus—reluctantly, after Chaz accused him of ingratitude and glory-hogging. Since the public were well aware that the Protector's son—himself acclaimed Protector now—was primarily responsible for thwarting the danger to the City, a few bitter words could make of the Procopio Games the disaster of the social season. The general issued his invitation rather than risk humiliation.

Other than Chaz, only Greystone evinced much interest in attending. The scholar had worked out systems for betting on horse and chariot races and wanted to test them in the field. Su-Cha would have attended had he been allowed, but the law was adamant about forbidding his kind to attend sporting events, the outcome of which might be mystically jiggered. Too many bettors' money might be affected.