Lord Valentine's Castle

"My lord?"

A woman’s voice, cutting through his concentration just as he was slipping into trance.

The interruption was jarring and painful. Valentine spun around, ablaze with unaccustomed fury, so shaken by surprise that it was a moment before he could recognize the woman as Carabella, and she drew back from him, gasping, momentarily afraid.

"My lord—" she said in a tiny voice. "I didn’t know—"

He struggled to control himself. "What is it?"

"We — we have found a way to open a door."

Valentine closed his eyes and felt his rigid body going slack with relief. He smiled and drew her to him, and held her a moment, trembling as tension discharged itself in him. Then he said, "Take me there!"

Carabella led him down corridors rich with antique draperies and thick well-worn carpets. She moved with a sureness of direction surprising in one who had never walked these halls before. They came to a part of the imperial chambers that Valentine did not remember, a service access somewhere beyond the throne-room, a simple and humble place. Sleet, riding on Zalzan Kavol’s shoulders, had the upper half of his body poked deep within some transom, and was reaching down to perform delicate manipulations on the i

Sleet pulled his head out and looked around, dusty, grimy, wondrously pleased with himself. "It’s open, my lord."

"Well done!"

"We’ll go in and get him," Zalzan Kavol growled. "Do you want him in three pieces or five, my lord?"

"No," Valentine said. "I’ll go in. Alone."

"You, my lord?" Zalzan Kavol asked in an incredulous tone.

"Alone?" said Carabella.

Sleet, looking outraged, cried, "My lord, I forbid you—" and stopped, bewildered by the sacrilege of his own words.

Mildly Valentine said, "Have no fears for me. This is something I must do without help. Sleet, step aside. Zalzan Kavol — Carabella — stand back. I order you not to enter until you’re summoned."

They stared at one another in confusion. Carabella began to say something, faltered, closed her mouth. Sleet’s scar throbbed and blazed. Zalzan Kavol made odd rumbling sounds and swung his four arms impotently.

Valentine pulled open the door and strode through. He was in a vestibule of some kind, perhaps a kitchen passageway, nothing a Coronal was likely to be familiar with. He walked warily through it and emerged into a richly brocaded hall, which after a moment’s disorientation he recognized as the robing-room; beyond it was the Dekkeret Chapel, and that led to the judgment-hall of Lord Prestimion, a grand vaulted chamber with splendid windows of frosted glass and magnificent chandeliers manufactured by the finest craftsmen of Ni-moya. And beyond that was the throne-room, with the Confalume Throne of supreme grandeur dominating everything. Somewhere in that suite Valentine would find Dominin Barjazid.

He moved forward into the robing-room. It was empty, and looked as though no one had made use of it for months. The stone archway of the Dekkeret Chapel was uncurtained; Valentine peered through it, saw no one there, and continued through the short curving passage, decorated with brilliant mosaic ornaments in green and gold, that co

He drew in his breath deeply and laid hands on the judgment-hall door and flung it open.

At first he thought that that vast space also was empty. Only one of the great chandeliers was lit, and that one at the far end, casting but a dim glow. Valentine looked to left and right, down the rows of polished wooden benches, past the curtained alcoves in which dukes and princes were permitted to conceal themselves while judgment was passed upon them, toward the high seat of the Coronal—

And saw a figure in imperial robes standing in the shadows at the council-table below the high seat.

—15—

OF ALL THE STRANGENESSES of his time of exile, this was the most strange of all, to stand less than a hundred feet from one who wore what once had been his own visage. Twice before, Valentine had seen the false Coronal, on that day of festival in Pidruid, and he had felt soiled and drained of energy when he had looked upon him, without knowing why. But that was before he had regained his memory. Now, in the dimness, he beheld a tall, strong man, fierce-eyed, black-bearded, the Lord Valentine of old, princely in bearing, not at all cowering or gibbering or terrified, confronting him with cold calm menace. Was that how I looked? Valentine wondered. So bleak, so icy, so forbidding? He supposed that during all these months when Dominin Barjazid had been in possession of his body, the darkness of the usurper’s soul had leaked out through the face, and changed the Coronal’s cast of features to this morbid hateful expression. Valentine had grown used to his own amiable su

Dominin Barjazid said, "I made you pretty, didn’t I?"

"And made yourself less so," said Valentine cordially. "Why do you scowl, Dominin? That face was once better known for its smile."

"You smiled too much, Valentine. You were too easy, too mild, too light of soul to rule."

"Is that how you saw me?"

"I and many others. I understand you’ve become a wandering juggler these days."

Valentine nodded. "I needed a trade, after you took away the one I had. Juggling suited me."

"It would have," Barjazid said. His voice echoed in the long empty chamber. "You were always best at giving amusement to others. I invite you to return to juggling, Valentine. The seals of power are mine."

"The seals are yours, but not the power. Your guards have deserted you. The Castle is secure against you. Come, give yourself up, Dominin, and we will return you to your father’s land."

"What of the weather-machines, Valentine?"

"Those have been turned back on."

"A lie! A silly lie!" Barjazid whirled and threw open one of the tall arching windows. A blast of frigid air rushed in so swiftly that Valentine, at the other end of the room, could feel it almost at once. "The machines are guarded by the people I most trust," said Barjazid. "Not your people, but my own, that I brought from Suvrael. They will keep them off until the order comes from me to turn them on, and if all of Castle Mount turns black and perishes before that order comes, so be it, Valentine. So be it! Will you let that happen?"

"It will not happen."

"It will," said Barjazid, "if you remain in the Castle. Go. I grant you safe conduct down the Mount, and free passage to Zimroel. Juggle in the western towns, as you did a year ago, and forget this foolishness of claiming the throne. I am Lord Valentine the Coronal."

"Dominin—"

"Lord Valentine is my name! And you are the wandering juggler Valentine of Zimroel! Go, take up your trade."

Lightly Valentine said, "It’s a powerful temptation, Dominin. I enjoyed performing, perhaps more than anything I’ve done in my life. Nevertheless, destiny requires me to carry the burdens of government, regardless of my private wishes. Come, now." He took a step toward Barjazid, another, another. "Come with me, out to the antechamber, so we can show the knights of the Castle that this rebellion is over and the world returns to its true pattern."

"Stay back!"

"I mean no harm to you, Dominin. In a way I feel grateful to you, for some extraordinary experiences, things that would surely never have befallen me but for—"

"Back! Not another step!"

Valentine continued to advance. "And grateful, too, for ridding me of that a

"Not — another — step—"

Barely a dozen feet separated them now. Beside Dominin Barjazid was a table laden with the paraphernalia of the judgment-hall: three heavy brazen candlesticks, an imperial orb, and next to it a scepter. Uttering a strangled cry of rage, Barjazid seized a candlestick with both hands and hurled it savagely at Valentine’s head. But Valentine stepped deftly aside and with a neat snap of his hand caught the massive metal implement as it went by. Barjazid hurled another. Valentine caught that too.