Marune Alastor 933

"Two hours, Force? She used an urgent form of speech, and evidently wishes the benefit of your wisdom at once."

"I am suspicious of Singhalissa's immediacies," said Efraim. "Two hours will enable you to provide exactly proper garments for me, and for the Noble Matho Lorcas. Additionally, I have certain arrangements to make."

Agnois departed, puzzled and resentful. For the tenth time Efraim wondered as to the advisability of replacing him. With his special knowledge, Agnois was almost indispensable; but Agnois also was given to vacillation and at the mercy of the last personality with whom he had come into contact.

Efraim said to Lorcas: "You would like to attend an inhalation, I take it?"

"Of course. It will be an unforgettable experience - one among many, if I may say so."

"Then meet me in the Grand Parlor in two hours. Your quarters have been changed to the Jaher Tower, incidentally, I am transferring Singhalissa to those you now occupy." Efraim gri

"I doubt if you'll succeed," said Lorcas. "She knows tricks you've never thought of. If I were you I'd look in my bed for snakes before jumping under the covers."

"Yes," said Efraim. "No doubt you are right." He entered the castle, crossed the reception hall, passed along the Corridor of Ancestors, but instead of entering the Trophy Room, turned aside into a corridor paved with brown and white tiles, and so came to a chamber which served as office, bursary, and domestic headquarters. A bench by the side wall supported an ancient communicator.

Efraim closed and locked the door. He addressed himself to the communicator code-book, then pressed a set of discolored old buttons. The screen glowed with pale light, showing sudden jagged disks of carmine red as the summons sounded at the opposite end of the co

Three or four minutes passed. Efraim sat patiently. To expect a crisp response would have been unrealistic.

The screen glowed green, powdered into fugitive dots which reformed to display the visage of a pale old man with locks of lank white hair dangling past his ears. He peered at Efraim with a half-challenging, half-myopic glare and spoke in a rattling croak. "Who calls Gorgance Strang, and for what purpose?"

"I am Efraim, Kaiark of Scharrode. I wish to speak with your master the Kaiark."

"I will a

Another five minutes passed, then upon the screen appeared a massive copper-colored face from which hung a great beak of a nose and a deep pendulum of a chin. "Kaiark Efraim, you have returned to Scharrode. Why do you call me, when no such communication has occurred for a hundred years."

"I call you, Kaiark Gosso, for knowledge. While I was absent, mirk-men from Gorgetto entered Scharrode. During this raid the Kaiark Jochaim suffered death from a Gorget bolt, which burst open his back."

Gosso's eyes contracted to ice-blue slits. "So much may be fact. What then? We await your onslaught. Send over your mirk-men; we will impale them on ridgeline saplings. Marshal your noblemen, advance upon us with open faces. We will face you rank for rank and slaughter the best of Scharrode."

"I did not call to inquire the state of your emotions, Gosso. I am not interested in rhodomontade."

Gosso's voice became profoundly deep. "Why, then, have you called?"

"I find the circumstances of Kaiark Jochaim's death peculiar. In the melée of mirk-men and Scharde troops, he commanded from the rear. Did he turn his back to the flight? Unlikely. So then, who among your mirk-men killed the Scharde Kaiark?"

"No one has asserted such a triumph," rambled Gosso. "I made careful inquiry, to no avail."

"A provocative situation."

"From your point of view, indeed." Gosso's eyelids relaxed slightly; he moved back into his chair. "Where were you during the raid?"

"I was far away - at Numenes and the Co

Gosso's ropy mouth drew back to display his teeth, not a grin, so Efraim presently realized, but a grimace of reflection.

"What you say is true enough," said Gosso at last. "There are few old men either in Gorgetto or Scharrode. Still, everyone must die sooner or later, and if the warriors of Gorgetto are denied the raiding of Scharrode, how will I keep them occupied?"

"I have troubles of my own. No doubt you can find a way."

Gosso cocked his head to the side. "My warriors may protest such an insipid existence. The raids drain their energies, and life is easier for me."

Efraim said shortly: "You can notify those who question your authority that I am resolved to end the raids. I can offer honorable peace; or I can assemble all my forces and totally destroy Gorgetto. As I study the Pandects I see that this is within my capabilities, if at the cost of many lives. Most of these many lives will be Gorget, inasmuch as we command the heights with our sails. It appears to me that the first choice makes the fewest demands upon everybody."

Gosso gave a sardonic caw of laughter: "So it might appear. But never forget we have rejoiced in the slaughter of Schardes for a thousand years. In Gorgetto a boy does not become a man until he kills his Scharde. Still, you seem to be serious and I will consider the matter."

The Salon of Sherdas and Private Receptions occupied the third level of the squat Arjer Skyrd Tower. Instead of the modestly proportioned chamber Efraim had expected, he found a hall seventy feet long and forty feet wide, with a floor of black and white marble blocks. Six tall windows admitted floods of that curious olive-green light characteristic of umber passing into green rowan. Marble pilasters broke the wall into a series of bays, color-washed a pale russet. In each stood a massive urn three feet tall carved from black brown porphyry: the product of a cogence. The urns contained white sand and plumes of dry grass, without odor. A table ten feet wide and twenty feet long supported four etiquette screens. At each side of the table a chair had been placed.

Agnois hurried forward. "Your Force has arrived a trifle early; our arrangements, I fear to say, are incomplete."

"I came early intentionally." Efraim inspected the chamber, them the table. He asked in a soft voice: "The Kaiark Jochaim frequented this salon?"

"Indeed, Force, when the company was not numerous."

"Which place was reserved for him?"

"Yonder, Force, is the Kaiark's place." Agnois indicated the far side of the table.

Efraim, now accustomed to the unconscious signals which indicated Agnois' moods, eyed him attentively. "That is the chair used by Kaiark Jochaim? It is precisely like the others; they are identical."

Agnois hesitated. "These are the chairs ordered out by the Noble Singhalissa."

Efraim controlled his voice with an effort. "Did I not instruct you to disregard Singhalissa's orders?"

"I recall something of the sort, Force," said Agnois lamely, "but I tend to obey her by reflex, especially in small matters such as this."

"Do you consider this a small matter?"

Agnois grimaced and licked his lips. "I had not analyzed it along such lines."

"But the chair is not that chair customarily used by the Kaiark?"

"No, Your Force."

"In fact, it is a chair quite unsuitable to the dignity of a Kaiark - especially under the present conditions."

"I suppose that I must agree with you, Force."

"So again, Agnois, you have at worst conspired, at best cooperated, with Singhalissa in her attempts to make me a buffoon and so diminish my authority."