Танит Ли: Anackire

The girl did not want to leave him, either through opportunism or lust, or a mixture of both. He had her again, now with scant courtesy, and then pushed her out. Affronted, she donned her flimsy clothing and went.

Kesarh lay on the bed, looking up at the domed ceiling of the chamber.

Noises of carouse and sometimes glints of feverish light came in through the window, from the town, although it would be dawn in less than two hours. He pondered how much mess the ships’ soldiery would have made by sunup. It would be obvious, of course, that his own personal guard was not responsible. Tjis in any event was a flea-bite on the earth.

They had intended to send word of victory at once to Istris. He had made them wait.

A sudden lantern or torch caught the straight and naked length of the ceremonial sword leaning against the wall.

Kesarh took note of it. It was a little more than half the height of a tall man, himself, and heavy, meant only for show. Tonight he had let it be carried into the provincial feast, along with his banner of the Salamander. That was the only value of such weaponry. That and to be masked by illusion and gimcrack jugglers’ play as a snake.

Sleep was beginning to come, now he was sated, sleep deadening the dull rage, the dull searching after some lost thing that kept his mind restless though his limbs were lax. And Val Nardia, how did she fare tonight, Zastis the rose of desire scorching her flesh under the sheet—

The light of the stray torch flickered on the sword blade.

He could remember seeing no women after all on the sinking pirate biremes. Dressed as men, perhaps, disguised by that and smoke, or dead or stupefied below, their hypothetical screeches mingled with the shrieks of the men.

He dismissed the idle thought. His mind was quieting now.

The sword went on flickering the light. Through his half-closed lids, Kesarh seemed to see the metal growing fluid, rippling, running like a river down the wall. . . . He turned on his belly and slept.

What woke him was the gentle touch of a hand about his ankle. He was alert, totally and at once, and as totally his self-discipline kept him utterly still, quiescent, as if yet unaware.

Had the girl come back? No. The touch was not the girl’s—some assassin, then. How? The window was barred by a lattice. Number Nine, the man at the door—Rem—just possibly disloyal, or careless and dead despite the whip—

The gentle touch uncoiled from Kesarh’s ankle. It began to flow upward along the muscle of his calf, the back of his thigh.

Suddenly he knew what it was. An assassin maybe, but not human. The sweat broke out over every inch of him, that he could not control, and the weighty treacly length of the creature paused again, perhaps tasting his sweat, his fear. For he was afraid of this. He had the intuitive Vis aversion to such beasts, nor was it irrational. From the size, neither small nor large, of what he felt so sensitively upon him, the snake was most likely venomous.

It had reached his lower back now, shifting smooth as milk across one buttock, the cleft at the base of the spine.

Kesarh clenched his teeth across his tongue, holding his body down to the bed with an appalling strength that must not even be felt in the shiver of a sinew.

It lay against his spine, rising and falling with his breath, quickened a little, but not much. At any instant it might strike at him. Even if he were motionless, some abrupt noise from the town—

It moved again.

Now it had found his hair, wandered briefly, slipped to his left shoulder.

The closer a bite to the throat or skull the more deadly. The snake seemed to consider. His face was turned to the other shoulder, away from it. It touched his arm, almost a caress. Then swam down the arm, the rope of its body against his side.

The snake had reached his hand. He was so conscious of it now he realized when it lifted its head, and he was already involuntarily and unavoidably tensed for the spring that would take him from the bed if the fangs shut in his flesh. A knife to the wound, then fire to cauterize—And then the snake laid its head across his hand and ceased to stir.

He waited. Waited. The snake did not change its position. He felt the stasis in it, as if it might lie there forever, or rather until disturbed.

Kesarh pushed fear from his mind. He measured the attitude of the snake, explored without eyes, by sense alone, the angle of the flat head against his fingers, the upturned sleeper’s palm, open to it, cradling it now. There would be one second only—

In a single convulsive movement, Kesarh squeezed closed his fist, an iron vise about the skull of the snake.

The tail spurted into immediate spasms, lashing and thrashing against his side, his chest and loins as he threw himself from the bed. But the clamp of his strong fighter’s palm kept the deadly jaws bound shut. He could see it now, the seizure of prismatic scales faded by darkness.

Kesarh raised his arm and flung the thing from him hard against the wall, the whole length of it, the head coming free and next moment meeting the plaster. Then as it fell back stunned on the flagged floor he had his sword from beside the bed and brought the metal edge down across the snake’s middle.

The weapon was blunt from killing Zakorians, but it carved through most of the snake. It lay dead, spasming still but harmless, at his feet.

The door crashed open and the soldier called Rem, his own sword drawn, sprang into the chamber, framed by the light of candles in the corridor.

Kesarh recalled he had cried out, one loud hoarse cry, as he severed the snake.

“My lord—”

Kesarh picked the snake up across his sword, bloody and broken and contorting, and showed it to Rem.

“One dancer too many,” said Kesarh. “Bring in one of those candles and light these. Shut the door when you get in, or Am Tjis will come prancing to see what’s wrong.”

Rem did as he was told, came back with a candle and shut the door.

By the glow of the newly lighted wax, he could see the ceremonial sword had gone from its place against the wall. Kesarh had slung the dead snake down where the sword had been.

“Witchcraft,” said Kesarh. His tone was light and clever. “If I’m to credit such things. Can it be Ashara-Anackire practices against me, leading me to think all this while her serpent was a blade? Never trust a woman.” Kesarh sat on the bed. “But then you wouldn’t, would you, Number Nine.” Rem looked at him. Kesarh shrugged. “You went to a female person who is your mother after you were lashed. If you haven’t an affectionate woman for your bed at this season you’re either diseased, deformed, a Lowlander, or prefer boys.”

“Or my woman dislikes nursing.”

Kesarh said nothing. He reached for the wine jug and drank directly from it. It had beer in it tonight. A reaction was setting in all over him, his finely controlled body now rigidly trembling. That was like the cry. He ignored it.

“You ran in here like a kalinx to defend me, Number Nine. Suppose you’d found me in the grip of four well-armed men? Or did you merely think I was in a Zastis dream?”

Rem said nothing.

“I think I can trust you,” said Kesarh. “Of course, I’ll have you killed if I find I can’t. And I would find out, my Rem.”

“I’m sure you would, my lord.”

“However this happened, this gambit with the snake, someone was at the root of it. Someone—maybe Suthamun himself.”

“Or an heir, jealous of your sudden fame. His brothers. Prince Jornil.”

“That’s astute. But then, I should have died in battle with the pirates, shouldn’t I? This was a provision if I did not.”

“You sent no victory messenger to Istris,” Rem said.

“Quite. I may send one now. News of my victory, and my . . . nearness to death from snake-bite. I mean to take refuge from any further hopeful assassins. A very safe refuge, but a place where I’ll be allowed one companion only, and where besides I’ll need some sincerity—Ever milked snake-poison, Rem?”