Lord Valentine's Castle

"No, my lord," he said crisply.

"Let go, Elidath."

"If it costs me my head, Valentine, I will not let you go in there. Stand aside."

"Elidath!"

Valentine glanced toward Ermanar. But he found no support there. "The Mount freezes, my lord, while you delay us," Ermanar said.

"I will not allow—"

"Stand aside!" Elidath commanded.

"I am Coronal, Elidath."

"And I am responsible for your safety. You may direct the offensive from the outside, my lord. But there are enemy soldiers in there, desperate men, defending the last place of power the usurper controls. Let one sharp-eyed sniper see you, and all our struggle has been in vain. Will you stand aside, Valentine, or must I commit treason on your body to push you out of the way?"

Fuming, Valentine yielded, and watched in anger and frustration as Elidath and a band of picked warriors slipped past him into the i

"My lord?" A messenger from the other direction, breathless, came ru

Valentine hovered at the entrance to the vault. "What is it?" he snapped.

"My lord, I am sent by Duke Nascimonte. We have found Dominin Barjazid barricaded in the Ki

Valentine nodded. Better that than standing about idly here. To an aide-de-camp he said, "Tell Elidath I’m going back up. He has full authority to reach the weather-machines any way he can."

But Valentine was only a short distance up the passageways when Gorzval’s aide arrived, to say that the usurper was rumored to be in the Pinitor Court. And a few minutes later came word from Lisamon Hultin, that she was pursuing him swiftly down a spiraling passageway leading to Lord Siminave’s reflecting-pool.

In the main concourse Valentine found Deliamber, watching the action with a look of bemused fascination. Telling the Vroon of the conflicting reports, he asked, "Can he be in all three places?"

"None, more likely," the wizard replied. "Unless there are three of him. Which I doubt, though I feel his presence in this place, dark and strong."

"In any particular area?"

"Hard to tell. Your enemy’s vitality is such that he radiates himself from every stone of the Castle, and the echoes confuse me. But I will not be confused much longer, I think."

"Lord Valentine?"

A new messenger — and a familiar face, deep coarse brows meeting in the center, a jutting chin, an easy confident smile. Another unit of the vanished past fitting itself back into place, for this man was Tunigorn, second closest of all Valentine’s boyhood friends, now one of the high ministers of the realm, and now looking at the stranger before him with bright penetrating eyes, as if trying to find the Valentine behind the strangeness. Shanamir was with him.

"Tunigorn!" Valentine cried.

"My lord! Elidath said you were altered, but I had no idea—"

"Am I too strange to you with this face?"

Tunigorn smiled. "It will take some getting used to, my lord. But that can come in time. I bring you good news."

"Seeing you again is good news enough."

"But I bring you better. The traitor has been found."

"I have been told already three times in half an hour that he is in three different places."

"I know nothing of those reports. We have him."

"Where?"

"Barricaded in the i

"Good news indeed!" To Deliamber Valentine said, "Do your wizardries confirm any of this?"

Deliamber’s tentacles stirred. "I feel a sour, malign presence in that lofty building."

"The imperial chambers," said Valentine. "Good." He turned to Shanamir and said, "Send out the word to Sleet, Carabella, Zalzan Kavol, Lisamon Hultin. I want them with me as we close in."

"Yes, my lord!" The boy’s eyes gleamed with excitement.

Tunigorn said, "Who are those people you named?"

"Companions of my wanderings, old friend. In my time of exile they became very dear to me."

"Then they will be dear to me as well, my lord. Whoever they may be, those who love you are those I love." Tunigorn drew his cloak close about him. "But what of this chill? When will it begin to lift? I heard from Elidath that the weather-machines—"

"Yes."

"And can they be repaired?"

"Elidath has gone to them. Who knows what damage the Barjazid has done? But have faith in Elidath." Valentine looked toward the i

—14—

THE MOMENT OF FINAL RECKONING with Dominin Barjazid was close at hand now. Valentine moved swiftly, onward and inward and upward through all the familiar wonderful places.

This vaulted building was the archive of Lord Prestimion, where that great Coronal had assembled a museum of the history of Majipoor. Valentine smiled at the thought of installing his juggling clubs alongside the sword of Lord Stiamot and the jewel-studded cape of Lord Confalume. There, rising in amazing swoops, was the slender, fragile-looking watchtower built by Lord Arioc, a strange construction indeed, giving indication perhaps of the greater strangeness that Arioc would perpetrate when he moved on to the Pontificate. That, a double atrium with an elevated pool in its center, was the chapel of Lord Ki

Through a seemingly endless maze of hallways and staircases and galleries and tu

"It will not be long now, my lord," Shanamir said.

"Not soon enough to please me."

"How will you punish him, my lord?"

Valentine glanced at the boy. "Punish? Punish? What punishment can there be for what he’s done? A whipping? Three days on stajja-crusts? Might as well punish the Steiche for having jostled us on the rocks."

Shanamir looked puzzled. "No punishment at all?"

"Not as you understand punishment, no."

"Turn him loose to do more mischief?"

"Not that either," said Valentine. "But first we must catch him, and then we can talk about what to do with him."