Hugh Cook - The Wazir and the Witch

‘I… I’m sorry,’ said Froissart.

Then he could no longer help himself. He broke down altogether. He wept, then smashed his head against the stones. Once, twice, thrice. Hammering his forehead against that obstinacy with full force. As if to fracture his skull.

‘A false priest,’ said Dardanalti. ‘I knew as much.’

‘No!’ said Trasilika.

But there was not one person in the room who doubted Jean Froissart’s guilt. He was an imposter. A fake. A blaspheming charlatan.

‘He — he’s mad,’ said Trasilika, speech starting to blunder as panic took grip.

‘Not mad,’ said the Empress Justina, speaking up from her torture table. ‘Not mad, but guilty. A false priest with a false wazir.’

Thus spoke Justina, effectively pronouncing Trasilika’s death sentence. For if Jean Froissart was a fraud, then Manthandros Trasilika must be a criminal imposter likewise.

‘He’s — it’s the voyage,’ said the heavyweight would-be wazir. ‘It’s, it’s the, the malaria, or rabies, the rat which bit, it bit, he’s blood, blood, he’s bleeding, he-’

Trasilika was babbling.

But Juliet Idaho was perfectly calm as he said to the Temple acolytes standing alongside of him:

‘Cut me loose.’

They obeyed. Knives they had. In moments they triced through his bonds, the neck-noose included. Then Juliet Idaho said to the nearest soldier:

‘Give me your weapon.’

Wordlessly, the soldier handed over his scimitar.

‘Stop him!’ said Trasilika in panic. ‘A blade, he’s got a blade, he’s going to-’

‘Foreign filth,’ hissed Dardanalti.

Trasilika rushed for the exit door. The acolytes met him, punched him, threw him back. He crashed into the torture table. Went down, but got to his feet again. Too late! For Juliet Idaho was already upon him. In that enclosed space, there was precious little room to manoeuvre. But there was room enough to swing a scimitar.

Trasilika’s head went bouncing to the floor. The headless body swayed. Sprayed the ceiling with blood. Then toppled. And Idaho was already moving, arm striking, blade plunging, steel ripping, fingers delving. Moments later, Juliet Idaho stood in triumph with a trophy in his fist. A beating heart. Jean Froissart’s heart.

‘Bravo,’ cried Justina faintly.

Then faint voice gave way to fainting fit.

And, at a nod from Tin Char, guards disarmed the still-panting Juliet Idaho.

‘Well,’ said Tin Char, wiping some of the much-splattered corpse blood from his face, ‘this is not a good start to the day. Nevertheless, we’ve profited from the experience. We know that Aldarch Three has victory in Yestron.’

‘We know no such thing,’ said Dardanalti, confronting probabilities with possibilities as a lawyer must. ‘Two liars we have for certain. Two shiploads of liars, possibly. But as for Al’three, why, he may be dead, and his enemies victorious.’

‘I’ll take a chance on that,’ said Tin Char, who doubted that a couple of frauds could have suborned two whole shiploads of sailors. ‘As Aldarch Three has triumphed in Talonsklavara, the time has come for the rule of the rightful to be restored to Untunchilamon. In the absence of any other appropriate candidates, I therefore declare myself wazir of Injiltaprajura.’

‘Master,’ said the one-eyed servant, venturing at last to speak again. ‘That’s what I came to tell you about. We have a new wazir.’

‘Yes,’ said Tin Char. ‘Me.’

‘But Master, there’s an Ebrell Islander in the courtyard outside. It’s got a sledge hammer. Guy, it’s called Guy, Chegory Guy. It’s got an Ashdan with it, a girl Qasaba. They-they-’

‘They what?’ said Tin Char. ‘They want to be a two-headed wazir? What madness is this?’

‘Not madness, master. Messages. They bring a message from the Hermit Crab. The Crab has declared itself the wazir of Injiltaprajura.’

Dui Tin Char gave a little moan. He remembered his last encounter with the Crab. Without laying so much as a claw upon Tin Char’s flesh, the Crab had exerted a Power which had wrenched Tin Char’s arms back further and further until both were dislocated.

‘Show them in,’ said Juliet Idaho decisively.

Two acolytes moved to obey.

In came a redskin, the heavily muscled Chegory Guy, with Olivia Qasaba beside him.

‘We’re here with a, a message,’ said Chegory, holding tight to his sledge hammer, his sole source of comfort and reassurance in this most difficult of situations.

‘Yes,’ said Olivia, in a firm though girlish voice. ‘The Crab brings pardons for those who obey. As long as… as…’

‘If it’s now,’ said Chegory. ‘Now that they obey, I mean. If they obey later, it’ll be too late.’

‘That’s right,’ said Olivia.

‘The Crab’s wazir,’ said Chegory. ‘Hence should command obedience. Yes, wazir, that’s what the Crab is. Wazir of Untunchilamon. And it orders, uh, the immediate release of the Empress Justina. Of course. And Juliet Idaho, Shanvil May, Pokrov and, uh, the wizard here.’ ‘Or else,’ said Olivia.

‘So get moving,’ said Chegory. ‘Zozimus, he’s the most important. The Crab is hungry. It wants its next meal. And fast. Oh, you’ve got centipedes! Good, we’ll take those. And, um, there was someone we had to, what was it?’

‘Bring along,’ said Olivia. ‘Tin Char, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes, that’s right,’ said Chegory. ‘Dui Tin Char. That’s you, isn’t it? Come along then. The Crab wants to see you.’

Dui Tin Char howled in anguish and then, reluctantly, submitted to the inevitable.

For the Crab was a Power which none on Untunchilamon durst disobey.

Naturally, there was consternation in Injiltaprajura when it was known that the Crab had declared itself wazir. But, in the days that followed, remarkably little changed. Decrees were published in the name of the Crab, saying that Justina Thrug should remain in the pink palace for the time being as its custodian; that religious freedom should prevail as before; and that all civil and uncivil servants were temporarily confirmed in their positions.

Thus consternation was soon replaced with disappointment; for the mob saw that there were to be no wholesale torturing or executions, no mass arrests or persecutions, no opportunities for looting and rampage; and a sense of anticlimax prevailed in the city.

Nevertheless, while there was no, major public drama in those days, there were private dramas in plenty, as there always are in any great city. And, turning our attention to one of those dramas, let us record the following:

This was the number: 011010100001.

And this was the demand:

One thousand dragons.

And the lever was a page of the Injiltaprajuradariski, The Secret History of Injiltaprajura, a work now gaining a certain underground fame on Untunchilamon.

Bro Drumel read the page through yet one more time. Was it really as dangerous as he had thought at first blush? He was inclined to think that it was.

So what was he to do?

Pay the thousand dragons?

He could. But doubtless there would be further demands to follow the first. For such was the nature of blackmail. So what was the alternative? Hunt down the blackmailer and kill him. Obviously. But much easier said than done. In fact, it might well prove impossible.

Bro Drumel, captain of Justina’s palace guard and Governor of Moremo Maximum Security Prison, began to work on his fingernails, easing the overgrowth of skin back from each moon in turn. While his skin was Janjuladoola grey, the fingernails themselves were a blood*flushed pink. Pink nails. White moons. He found them fascinating. And beautiful. Indeed, Bro Drumel had little eye for the sculptural masses which make up the body as a whole. What delighted him was the elegant finishing touches. Fingernails. Earlobes. Eyes.