Star of Gypsies

The crater is a great round hole that goes straight down to the boiling magma that lies at the heart of Xamur. Around its jagged rim lie broad concentric rings of old worn black lava, dozens of them, hurled to the surface long ago by the fierce power of ancient eruptions. They form a sort of natural amphitheater, grim and bleak and lifeless. You can walk down to the lowest ring-if you dare-and see wild red shafts of flame spearing through smoky gray clouds, and hear monstrous forces belching and rumbling in the depths. Wisps of sulfuric miasma constantly come drifting up, staining the sky and all the surrounding countryside a bright vomitous yellow.

A hateful ugly place, yes.

But I had lived so close to it for so many years that I no longer could feel any hatred for it. I no longer saw the ugliness. Call it perverse if you like, but the sight of the Idradin had come to be something I found heartening and inspiring. I drew from it a sense of the raw strength of the forces it contained. Which are the forces of creation itself. We live on the surfaces of our planets. There are suns within them.

We gathered on the ninth circle of the crater, far enough away so that the stinking gases would not choke us, close enough to feel the warmth and the deep rumblings. Some-Biznaga, Jacinto, Damiano-seemed repelled and nauseated by the place. Chorian seemed almost frightened. Polarca was tense and taut, and kept glancing back over his shoulder.

As though he expected an eruption any minute. Even Valerian looked a little worried, and he wasn't even actually there. But there was nothing but serenity on the faces of Bibi Savina and Thivt; Ammagante appeared indifferent; and Syluise, to my surprise, looked ecstatic. She stood with her arms flung wide and her head thrown back. She was glowing with a supreme radiance against the somber backdrop of the crater's dark fumes. I felt crazy with love for her, seeing her like that. Like a schoolboy. At my age. I knew it was insane. The crater has that effect on me sometimes. So does Syluise.

I said, scanning their faces one by one, "All right, the business at hand. My son Shandor seems to have set himself up on Galgala as the king. This is absolutely not legitimate and something had goddamned well better be done about it. Will one of you tell me how a miserable thing like this was ever allowed to happen in the first place?"

Silence from all quarters. And some squirming and wiggling. "According to you, Damiano, he called the great kris together and compelled the krisatora to elect him. Is that actually what happened?"

Nods. Shrugs. From Bibi Savina a flat blank stare.

"Jesu Cretchuno Adam and Eve, can't any of you speak? Explain to me how the krisatora can be forced to take such an action. The krisatora when they are in session have power over any Rom, even the king. Not the other way around. Who were they, these krisatora? Nine puppy dogs? Nine robots? Did he threaten them? With what? How can an election under duress be considered valid even for a minute?"

Biznaga said, "There is no record of what took place at the kris, Yakoub. Except that Shandor called the krisatora together and when they emerged from the hall of judgment he was the king."

I looked toward Damiano. "You told me he forced them." "That's what I assume."

"Who were these krisatora?" I asked.

"You know them all," Damiano said. "The same who were in office when you were king. Bidshika, Djordji, Stevo le Yankosko, Milosh-" I cut him off in mid-list. "They should have known better. The son of a king has never been king before. And with the old king still alive, too. Oh, the bastard, the bloody bastard! He walked in there and told them what to do, and they did it, and nobody dared say a word against it. Even you. You all just smiled and nodded and let it happen."

"And you take no responsibility at all?" Valerian said. "Me?"

"You, Yakoub. But for you none of this would have happened. You set the whole thing up, didn't you? Who told you to abdicate in the first place?"

"I had my reasons." "I bet you did."

"You think my abdication was a whim? You think it was just some cockeyed impulse that took hold of me? Do you? Do you? Don't you think that I had a plan, that I was acting in accordance with my long-range strategy, when I walked out of Galgala?"

They were all looking at each other. Suddenly I realized what they must be thinking. The old man has taken leave of his senses, is what they were thinking. I saw now that they might have been thinking that for quite some time.

I glared at them.

"You bastards, have you been humoring me?" "Humoring you how?" asked Polarca.

"You think I'm crazy, don't you?"

"Did I ever say a thing like that, Yakoub?"

"You didn't say it, no," I agreed. "But you've been thinking it. Haven't you, Polarca?"

"Absolutely not. "Valerian?" "Crazy? You?"

"Damiano? Biznaga? Come on, You Pigs, put up your hands! Everyone who thinks Yakoub is somewhere around the far bend into senility, wave your goddamned hand in the air!"

No hands went up. Their faces didn't show a flicker of emotion. Did I have them cowed? Or were they determined to go on hiding what they thought of me, no matter what?

The crater roared and gargled. There was the sound of colossal masses of rock moving about somewhere deep within it. A plume of yellow smoke came burping up to the surface and spread a rank rotten stink everywhere, like the fart of a giant. No one reacted. No one moved. They were staring at me like a bunch of robots and there was no way I could read what was behind their eyes.