The Quest of Kadji
- Автор: Картер Лин Спрэг
- Серия: Chronicles of Kylix #1
- Год: 1973
- Язык: английский
- Год: Five Star Paperback
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Quest of Kadji». Краткое содержание книги:
The explanation of the miraculous ease whereby they had passed the sentinels of the Khalldûr was simple. A dynasty had fallen in the first hours of dawn; and now, in the earliest hours of morning, a new regime was being put together. Hundreds of people were streaming in and out of the royal fortress, important kugar lords bound for council meetings, young lordlings, boys, messengers and the like, scurrying back and forth with screeds and notes, commands and memoranda. No individual with a proper pass could safely be stopped for questioning, for no guard could be certain—in this uneasy and disquiet time—whom he could offend with impunity. The most insignificant-looking fellow might by tomorrow wield terrifying powers of life and death over the remnants of an empire. Hence they passed through swiftly.
The immense pile of the ancient Khalidûr was murmurous with sound, whispering conversations in the corners, the footsteps of hurrying pages and message-bearers, the bustle of important lords. In the busy throng no one bothered even to notice the presence of two unfamiliar faces, here where so very much was new and where so many faces were those of strangers.
Hardly caring to risk stopping a passerby to ask him the way, Kadji and old Akthoob found their way through the shadowy and labyrinthine ways of the vast fortress by a combination of lucky accident and inspired guesswork. Without wasting too much of their time, they gained the entrance of the great Throne Hall at last.
For the rest of his life Kadji never forgot that moment. And yet, oddly enough, he could hardly remember the hall itself, one of the wonders of the world, with its soaring columns like a forest of stone trees, its stupendous dome, its glistening and mirrorlike pave of slick black marble. From the moment they stumbled upon their goal his attention was riveted on the thing that lay under a scarlet-and-gold cloth at the foot of the throne itself.
The throne—as for it, he spared hardly a glance at the glorious and immeasurably ancient seat of imperial power. True, it was fashioned entirely of pure and solid gold, and contained in itself the ransom of a province; true, the hand of some long-dead genius had lavished a lifetime of skill in the fashioning of it, for it was formed into the likeness of a coiled and glittering dragon whose arched wings rose enormous, and whose uplifted head was a snarling and terrible fanged mask of ferocity with eyes that glistened like orbs of flame. Two gigantical fire-rubies were those eyes, and their like the remainder of all this world could not afford. But Kadji saw it not, the Dragon Throne, for his eyes were fixed upon that which lay at its foot, on the lowest of the nine tiers of the dais whereupon the throne stood.
A young woman was bending over the covered body as the two entered the hall, and Kadji seized his companion’s arm and shoved the old Easterling wizard into the shadow of a column from which they could watch unobserved.
The woman drew back the torn tapestry a little as if to reassure herself that it was truly the dead Emperor who lay there. For a long moment she looked, ignored by the guards who stood about the throne with stolid and indifferent faces. Then she drew up the cloth again and turned away to make her way swiftly and purposefully out of the hall.
As she glided away her path took her directly into the glare of gold light from massed candles, and Kadji sucked in his breath with amazement and wonder. For it was—Thyra! The mystery girl he had glimpsed many days ago, disguised as a wandering Perushka lass, in the little village of Nabdoor—the girl he had seen but recently borne through the streets of kingly Khôr like a princess!
What was the secret of the flamehaired girl who so often crossed his path? The boy’s tanned face settled grimly: he must face one mystery at a time. And so he but watched helplessly as the strange young woman left the Throne. Hall and vanished from his view.
Then, with the nervous wizard at his heels, Kadji rapidly crossed the length of the hall and approached the throne and that which lay at its foot. The body was sprawled on the lowest step of the dais, and a rich tapestry had been hastily torn down to cover the dead thing. Kadji stepped nearer, despite Akthoob’s fearful admonitions; he shrugged off the restraining hand the little Easterling laid on his arm. He must make certain that this was in truth the body of the man all the world thought to be Yakthodah but be knew as Shamad the Impostor. He bent over it but he could not see its face because of the torn tapestry. Greatly daring, he reached out and drew aside one corner of the covering, exposing the head and breast of the corpse.
Akthoob turned pale as milk and gestured feebly, but Kadji ignored him and bent closer, straining to see in the dim wavering light of distant candles.
There were kugar mercenaries, stationed about the throne to guard the body, but they gazed stolidly ahead and paid Kadji no attention. It was naught to them who came to gaze upon or mock or revile the body of the Holy Emperor. In the general uncertainty of the times, they, like the sentinels at the gate, did not care to earn the enmity of any strange or unfamiliar person who might, ere long; turn out a man of power with a long memory.
So Kadji turned back the blood-stained tapestry and gazed without hindrance upon the face beneath.
It was cold and white as marble. In death, and death had robbed it of much of its beautiful perfection. The mouth was drawn in a frozen grimace of terror or outrage or surprise (who could say?) and the glazed, unseeing eyes stared up forever at the unknown face of the assassin.
Many knives had done the fearful deed—or perchance but one knife, striking many times. For the corpse bore frightful wounds in breast and shoulder, belly, throat, and side. It lay in a pool of drying blood, sticky and glutinous and vile.
Only one wound was visible on the face of Yakthodah, and that was in the cheek. Part of the lower face was slashed and gory, and Kadji noted without saying anything that the wound had obliterated that portion of the face that had borne the scarlet leaf-shaped birthmark he had noticed yesterday when he bad watched this man riding through the streets on his way to a night of revelry—
“Come; look,” he bade Akthoob.
The old wizard shuddered and rolled up his eyes but did not dare make too vocal a protest with the guards so near. He shuffled timorously over to where the Red Hawk stood and peered down with frightened eyes at the gory horror beneath the cloth.
“Is that Yakthodah?” the boy asked in a low whisper.
“Of course—who else should it be?”
“But is it? Look closely; you saw him yesterday as clearly as did I.”
Akthoob shuddered and turned away.
“Whoever he was yesterday, he is dead meat today … let us be gone from this accursed palace, young sir, I beg of you.”
“In a moment. Look again … look at his jaws,” he said.
“What of it? The Holy Emperor did not have time to shave before they … they … cannot we go now, while we yet have whole skins? What if the man be not shaved?”
“Nothing, perchance,” frowned Kadji. “But somehow it seems odd that his beard-stubble should be so long. Yestereve, when we saw him riding by, the Emperor was cleanly shaven … but this is no one night’s crop of whiskers … it looks like this man had not shaved in two days, perchance three… . Had the Emperor anyone in his court who resembled him?”
“Haii, gods, will you stand here talking when any moment we might be … well, and how should I know?” whimpered the wizard fretfully.
“Think,” Kadji insisted. “You were in the Khalidûr at least once ere now, were you not, to be interviewed by the Chancellor so that you might obtain permission ‘to perform before The court. Saw you anyone who resembled the Emperor?”