Robert Silverberg - The Mountains of Majipoor

It would be an extremely long time, Harpirias suspected, before the wild Metamorphs of the mountains returned to trouble King Toikella’s people again.

He walked over to Korinaam and rested his hand lightly on the Shapeshifter’s thin shoulder.

"You did very well," Harpirias said quietly. "You were magnificent. Perfect. If the mountain-guide business ever falls off, you could set up shop as a sorcerer and make a fortune."

Korinaam only shrugged.

"Are you very tired?" Harpirias asked.

"What do you think?" His voice carried a freight of anger and embarrassment and, above all else, a deadly, numbing weariness.

"Rest, then. Rest as long as you like. But first tell the king that I’ve done what I promised. That his enemies have run away, that the war is over. It’s safe for him to send his men across the canyon to set free those hajbaraks."

When the details of the treaty had been worked out at last, one of Harpinas’s Ghayrog soldiers, who fancied himself something of a calligrapher, inscribed its text in duplicate on broad scrolls of bleached leather that Ivla Yevikenik had provided. It was very fine leather, almost of the quality of parchment. Although the treaty was in fact extremely concise, a mere six clauses, the job of lettering it out took three full days, much to Harpirias’s annoyance. That seemed an inordinate time to waste on such a frill. But the Ghayrog was quite particular about his craft.

"And what good will all this pretty lettering do, anyway?" Harpirias demanded of Korinaam when the finished copies were at last brought to him. "The king can’t read a single word of Majipoori. What’s written here isn’t going to seem any more important to him than bird-scratchings in the snow. Shouldn’t we at least have drawn up a copy of it in Othinor also?"

He.

"There is no written Othinor language," Kormaam observed, a trifle smugly.

"None at all?"

"Have you seen many books in your wanderings through the village, prince?"

Harpirias flushed. "Even so — a treaty that can’t be read by one of the signatories — doesn’t that seem awfully unilateral to you, Kormaam?"

The Shapeshifter gave Harpirias what might have been a malicious look. He had recovered much of his aplomb in the time that had passed since his performance in the high country; but some residue of resentment for what Harpirias had forced him to do unmistakably remained.

"Ah, prince, have no fear! The king will admire and respect the copy that we give him! He’ll hang it on his throne-room wall and stroke it fondly from time to time, and why should it matter whether he can read it or not? All that really concerns you — is it not so? — is getting the hostages back; and that much has been agreed upon. Once you have them and have left this place behind you, what further value does the treaty have, to you or to the king?"

"To me, none. But presumably it has some for the king. It gives him, after all, the thing he most wishes, which is protection for the people of this valley against further incursions by the forces of the government of Majipoor."

"Yes. That is surely true." Korinaam laughed harshly.

"What bold soul would dare defy the sacred clauses of this treaty? If at some time in years to come a future Coronal should be so venturesome as to send an army in here, why, whoever occupies Toikella’s throne at that time will simply need to take the treaty down from the wall and wave it in the face of the commanding officer of the invading force, and that officer will immediately order his troops to withdraw! Is that not so, prince? For that has always been the way the people of Majipoor treat those who have less power than they. Tell me, prince: is that not so?"

Harpirias let the Shapeshifter’s heavy sarcasm pass. Undoubtedly Korinaam had his own Piurivar axes to grind; but Harpirias had no desire to fight Lord Stiamot’s war all over again ten thousand years later. Whatever unpleasantnesses the human settlers of Majipoor had imposed on Korinaam’s ancestors long ago were ancient history now, and had been atoned for, insofar as atonement for the taking of a world was possible at all, by the reconciliation of the races that had begun in the time of Valentine Pontifex. Whatever grievances Korinaam persisted in holding were no affair of Harpirias’s. Finishing this business with the Othinor was all that interested him now.

He studied the parchment. It was, he had to admit, very nicely lettered indeed. As for the text, he was quite proud of it: crisp in style, efficient and straightforward in setting forth the obligations of the respective signatory parties. No ambiguities or equivocations so far as he could tell, nothing that could be misconstrued or misinterpreted. The Coronal Lord of Majipoor agreed to respect the sovereignty of His Royal Highness the King of the Othinor, and to avoid any further unwanted incursions upon his domain, the king’s domain being defined as beginning at such-and-such a parallel of north latitude on the continent of Zimroel and extending to the planetary pole, et cetera, et cetera. For his part, His Highness the King of the Othinor undertook immediately to release from custody the nine paleontologists who had accidentally intruded upon the sovereign territory of the Kingdom of the Othinor, and to return to them such scientific specimens as they had collected, et cetera, et cetera.

Nothing was said about continued paleontological research in this area. The king almost certainly would have boggled at that, considering that the main thing he wanted from this treaty was a promise that he would never be troubled by contact with Majipoori citizens again. The scientists, once they were freed, could always petition the Coronal to negotiate an agreement with Toikella permitting them to resume their exploration in Othinor territory. But Harpirias hoped that some ambassador other than himself would be the one who got the job of negotiating that agreement.

Nor was there any clause covering repatriation to the civilzed parts of Majipoor of the children that had been born of Majipoor fathers and Othinor mothers. Best not to touch on hat subject at all, Harpirias thought, though he did feel some private discomfort about it. The children would be Othinor, and that was that.

" ‘And so,’ " he read, coming to the bottom of the sheet, " ‘we the Coronal Lord Ambinole herewith dignify our approval and solemnly make our royal pledge—’ "

Harpirias looked up from his reading.

"Wait a minute," he said. "The way it’s worded here, the signature of the Coronal himself is called for. That’s not what I—"

"I asked the Ghayrog to make a slight change," said Korinaam blandly.

"You did what?"

"King Toikella has never grasped the fact that you are merely an ambassador. He continues to believe that he has been host to the person of Lord Ambinole."

"But I told you a thousand times to let him know that—"

"I appreciate your concern, prince. Nevertheless, at this point the primary object, is it not, is to maintain the cooperation of the king until the hostages are freed and we have safely withdrawn from his territory? At this stage of things the king can only react badly to the revelation of your true identity. Even now, with the treaty completely negotiated and ready for signing, such a revelation might have explosive effects."

"I’ll give him explosive effects!" Harpirias exclaimed. "He’s seen what our energy-throwers can do. If he refuses to release those men, after all the talking that’s gone on here—"

"You can order your soldiers to do great damage, oh, yes, certainly. But I remind you that the hostages remain in his custody to this moment. If he has them put to death, even while your troops are demonstrating the power of their energy-throwers — what have you accomplished then, prince? Sign the document with the name of Lord Ambinole, I implore you."