Hugh Cook - The Witchlord and the Weaponmaster

"You," said his Janjuladoola interpreter, poking him.

"Weren't you listening? Come on!"

On being poked, Guest at last bestirred himself, and allowed himself to be hurried into the next chamber, where the interpreter encouraged him to kneel. Guest was a little slow in reacting to the encouragement.

"I said kneel!" said the interpreter, who was starting to get flustered. "Now! Now! I say it again! Kneel! Kneel! Down on your knees!"

"Why?" said Guest. "Is this my execution?"

"It will be, if you don't find your manners, and fast. He's almost upon us!"

The interpreter's panic managed to communicate a sense of urgency to Guest, and so the Yarglat barbarian went down on his knees, and had no sooner got down on those frugally padded lumps of bone when Aldarch the Third entered upon the audience chamber.

Aldarch proved to be a small man of the Skin who increased his apparent height by wearing shoes with platform soles. It is traditional for the emperors of Yestron to walk on stilts, thus demonstrating their social superiority in an even more pronounced fashion. But Aldarch had been methodically tortured by his father while he was still a child, and the damage then done to his legs made it unwise for him to attempt any feats of stilt-walking as an adult.

Aldarch spoke; Guest's translator interpreted; and Guest, in conformity with the Mutilator's orders, seated himself in the visitor's well. This square-cut recess in the floor contained a stool padded with a goose-feather cushion, and when seated upon that cushion Guest found nothing but his head and shoulders above floor level. The Mutilator took his own seat upon a modest throne set back from the visitor's well, and the dignity of this throne set the Mutilator's knees at a height greater than that of Guest's head.

This cunning arrangement neatly indicated the social gap between Mutilator and prisoner, while making it virtually impossible for Guest to launch a surprise attack upon his captor.

"You have lately come from Untunchilamon, I hear," said

Aldarch the Third.

"It is so," said Guest.

"You know," said Aldarch, "I have heard that they were walking on stilts." Guest Gulkan, who did not know precisely how he was supposed to respond to this intelligence, assumed a grave demeanor.

"Well?" said Aldarch. "Is it true, or is it not? I have heard that the one called Pokrov was particularly noticeable for getting above himself."

"For getting above himself?" said Guest.

"For elevating himself above the height appropriate to his class!" said the translator to Guest. "For walking on stilts!"

"Well," said Guest, who was properly confused by now, "it may have happened. I can't say that it didn't."

"What does he say?" said Aldarch.

"My lord," said the translator to Aldarch, "He confesses that with his own eyes he saw such people as Pokrov walking on stilts."

"You saw," said Aldarch, "yet you made no move to stop it?"

This accusation was translated to Guest. The Yarglat barbarian was so ignorant of the customs of the civilized world that he had not yet absorbed the full import of this business of stilt-walking, yet even to such a limited soul as Guest Gulkan it was obvious that something of importance was at foot, so in puzzled confusion he responded to the Mutilator by saying:

"I, ah… as a foreigner, I…"

"He says, my lord," said the interpreter to Aldarch, "that as a poor and ignorant foreign-born barbarian he did not see it fit to interfere in the internal affairs of the Izdimir Empire, hence did not murder the stilt-walkers for their impertinence. He further says that he thought such acts of murder would be to you a pleasure, and he had no wish to cheat you of such pleasure."

"Well," said Aldarch, who was pleased to receive this news,

"that was well-spoken. Suppose we pause for a moment to indulge ourselves in a lesser pleasure?"

The interpreter not demurring, Al'three gave a command; a woman entered with a tray; and cups from this tray were served to Mutilator, interpreter and prisoner. The cups were of bone china and in them was the warmth of a greenish fluid which Guest Gulkan tentatively identified as tea.

"You are familiar with this drink?" said the Mutilator.

Aldarch the Third once again spoke through the interpreter, since Weaponmaster and Mutilator had no language in common. Guest Gulkan was no linguist, and hence had not the slightest competence in any truly scholarly language. He could make himself known as Ordhar, the command language of the armies of the Collosnon Empire; he could speak Eparget, the native tongue of the Yarglat; and apart from that he could only use Toxteth and the Galish Trading Tongue. The various barbarous and primitive languages which were at the command of Guest Gulkan's tongue were virtually useless in the heartland of the Izdimir Empire. As for the Mutilator, why, he was a scholar great in learning, but his wisdom was exclusively restricted to Janjuladoola, the infinitely subtle and fiendishly complicated language of Yestron's master race.

"The drink," said Guest, half-sure of its nature yet wary of committing himself to an error, "the drink is… ah, something from Chay, perhaps?"

"No," said the Mutilator. "It is jade tea. The jade tea of Obooloo, much sought after both here and in foreign parts." Guest did not think it healthy to be consuming hot drinks on such a sultry day, but drank without arguing about it.

"So," said Aldarch, when Guest had drunk. "You have been adventuring on Untunchilamon."

"I have," said Guest, who hoped they were not going to get back to the subject of stilts, because he could not in the least understand it. "Would you like to hear more of it?"

"My interrogators did their work well," said the Mutilator.

"And you have not been the only person to be interrogated.

Consequently, you have no secrets from me and mine."Guest wondered if this meant that Thayer Levant had been caught and questioned. But he did not dare to ask. Simply to ask that question would be to betray Levant, who – if he was still at liberty – might still be trying to make his way back to Obooloo and escape to Dalar ken Halvar by way of the Door of the Bondsmans Guild. In any case, the Mutilator was still speaking.

"We know what you did in Injiltaprajura," said the Mutilator.

"We know it in detail. Likewise, we know what you did earlier in this city of mine. You raided the Temple of Blood, and your father lies there yet, sheltered in a time pod to which we have no access."Guest's interpreter had a little difficulty placing the words "time pod" into the Toxteth tongue, but did the trick by calling it "the egg which does not change". Upon puzzling out the meaning of this phrase, Guest remembered the time pod, and remembered the day of the raid, and the ring of ever-ice which had fallen to the oily waters of the innermost sanctum of the Temple of Blood. He deduced that the ring had not been found.

Since the whereabouts of the ring had not been betrayed, this meant – surely – that the demon in the Temple of Blood had kept silent about it. So the demon Ungular Scarth was Guest's ally! This thought heartened the Weaponmaster greatly.

"It is true," said Guest, "that I came to the Temple. There is a Great God held prisoner in the Temple, a – "

"A demon," said Aldarch. "There are two things in the Temple, and both are demons. Both are old, old things, and dangerous. One is too big to move. The other – only a fool would seek its liberation. The high priestess of the Temple is Anaconda Stogirov.

She is – she is my friend. My only friend. She tells me much, and she has told me all about those demons."

"Then," said Guest, carefully, "I congratulate you on the possession of such a knowledgeable friend."

"Anaconda Stogirov has also confirmed to me the nature of the cornucopia, that device which features so largely in legend. Do you know of the cornucopia?"