Norton, Andre - Brother To Shadows

Zurzal, having equipped himself with a drink also— which as mysteriously appeared as had the verjuice in a wall space after the Zacathan had pressed some buttons— seated himself opposite his only partly willing guest.

"You say you are not oathed."

"I cannot be—there is no Master who will coswear with me."

Jofre had dropped his pack by the door. It would be ready to hand when he left.

"You are issha—is there any way that you can retreat from that?"

Jofre stiffened. What games did the alien want to play? Surely fortune had not been that good to him that he could find employment so easily, even for a short time.

"I am issha."

"I know something of the Shadow Brothers," the Zacathan continued. "It is part of the nature of my race to learn all we can about the ways and customs of others. It is true that your services are always contracted for through a Lair Master. How much power has this Shagga priest of yours?"

Jofre considered. "In oathing the Masters alone control us. The Shagga sometimes serve as special eyes and ears, they are advisors to the Masters—"

"The Masters can overrule them then?"

"Twice in our history it has been so. But to those who disputed with the Shagga misfortune came later—they were assha lost."

"As was your Master," Zurzal pointed out. "Could it be that he was a target then for Shagga ill will?"

Jofre swallowed. "He did not listen to advice he thought was too conservative, too lacking in a desire to learn new."

"So he therefore became one of the Elder Shadows."

"How do you know what—" Jofre flared.

"I told you, I would learn all that I can. There is talk in the old city of the Brothers, perhaps some of it rumor only; but even in rumor there is a core of truth. Think, Night wanderer, your Master was not a second voice for Shagga and he is now gone. Just as you have been hunted forth from the fellowship. You are freed by the very one who would condemn you, the Shagga. You have no Master save yourself. Therefore as a self-master you may be oathed."

Jofre swallowed. Dimly perhaps he had known a little of this but some back-looking part of him had not allowed him to put it so frankly.

"You want an oathed issha?" he asked now, trying to read the alien's face, which provided no features he could interpret after any pattern which he knew.

Zurzal took a long drink from his glass. "After tonight do you not think that I need a bodyguard? For a while I am not even a whole man." He set down the drink and his hand went to the sealing of his suit. With a quick jerk he had it open to the waist and back from his left shoulder and arm. For there was an arm there—or the beginning of one—a length of bone and flesh and a child-size hand.

"One of the attributes of my people," he informed Jofre. "We can regrow a lost limb but the process takes time and it is time I do not have right now. Therefore, I need aid."

"There are surely off-worlders who are guards—like those below—"

"They are not oathed men. You see, I know your customs, issha-trained. With an oathed man out of the Shadows I need have no fear of any treachery or carelessness. I lost this," he moved the small arm, "because I could not be ever on guard. I need you, Night wanderer. I offer you oathed status."

There was a pause and then the Zacathan continued. "What I wish to do here on Asborgan is only a beginning. Oath with me and it will mean the stars. You or any other in your place must have such a warning."

The stars—then what the Master had thought was true. On other worlds there were doubtless the same feuds, the same intrigues, the same covert wars for power that the lords here played. And this Zacathan had already suffered maiming—which meant—

"You have a blood feud?" Jofre asked—such he could understand and be prepared to undertake.

"Not as those of Asborgan see it. But that is not discounting any danger, and such lies ahead. You are out set from your Brothern; in a manner of speaking I am also. But that I shall discuss only under oath. What is your word—?"

Jofre's right hand closed about his dagger and he drew that one long weapon left him. Holding it now between both of his palms, he went to one knee before the Zacathan.

The scaled fingers came to meet his instantly and the dagger was drawn from the sheath of flesh in which he held it.

"By the Great Oath"—so this off-worlder DID know enough of the Brothern to follow the form—"I call you out of the Shadows and into my service until my purpose is achieved or life is ended." Zurzal reversed the dagger awkwardly with his single hand and managed to press his forefinger down on its point. Dark blood welled in a thick bead and he smeared it on the dagger and held it out for Jofre to once more clasp double-handed so that that smear of blood was imprinted on his own flesh.

"I am bound—" he said shortly, making no move to wipe that mark from his hands as he returned his weapon to his girdle.

"So done. The hour grows late. Have you eaten, sworn man? Drink up, for I have much to talk of now and time itself is snapping at my heels."

"I have not eaten." Jofre's hold left a faint bloodstain on the drinking vessel. "But if time is limited, that is of no importance."

The Zacathan's long jaws opened in what must have been a smile. "I assure you I am not so blind to the needs of any employee. As it happens, I myself have not eaten." He crossed back to the opening in the wall from which he had taken the drinks. A button brought up light in a square and Jofre saw marks in a series cross that.

Then the Zacathan busied himself with the lower line of buttons before that light square was gone. "They do vespar well here," he said, "it is considered, of course, in this setting a novelty. And there are some other things I think you will find to your taste. We are not too unlike in our eating habits, we two peoples."

As quickly as he had gone to one wall so now he turned to another and set fingers in a ridge to open another door.

"This is the fresher," he said, "and here," he had found another doorhold and opened that also, light streaming up even as the portal went back, "are sleeping quarters. Settle in while we wait to be served."

Jofre merely glanced into the sleeping room. There were two bed places which looked to be as luxuriously soft as a district lord might aspire to. But the fresher drew him most.

Austere and barren to city eyes as the Lair might be, it was always meticulous clean and cleanliness was part of issha training. This tiled chamber did not resemble the bathing place he had always known but it promised a relief.

The Zacathan had opened another door within that place of ease to display a cubicle and now he indicated various small levers jutting from its inner wall.

"Hot steam or water as you wish, cold, soap power spray, and air-drying hose. Make yourself free—"

Then he was gone. Jofre rummaged in his bundle and brought out much creased but clean underdrawers, and shirt. But before he tried the amenities of that strange room he made a careful inspection. There was no entrance save that through which he had come and there was certainly no place where there could be a place of concealment. Not that he had any fears of this being a trap—he was oathed and, therefore, as tied to Zurzal now as if he were one of the Zacathan's scaled kin.

It took him a little time to master what the fresher had to offer and inwardly he marveled. No Lair Master could hope for such luxury as this and he savored the feeling of cleanliness afterwards; almost he wished he did not have to rewear his travel-stained outer clothing. But he made very sure that the stone he had found at Qaw-en-itter was again well secured in the wrapping of his sash girdle.

Zurzal was waiting in the outer room beside a larger table to which were drawn up two of the tall seats, these not so encushioned as the others. On the table itself were set out covered bowls and platters and two plates. By the side of each of those there was an array of knives and spoons and some odd-looking cutlery which ended in a set of points and which Jofre could not identify.