The Gods Awaken

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Leiria watched Coralean pace the room, big bearded head bent in concentration as he listened to Palimak explain what had happened at the meeting of the Council of Elders. She could hear quarrelsome voices outside, coming from the market place.

Normally, the disputes would be about the prices and quality of the goods being offered. But now-although the exact words weren't distinct-she knew the voices were lifted in heated debate about the future of the Kyranians in Syrapis.

Since Safar's return and Palimak's abdication of responsibility, politics had reared its head, showing its ugliest face. Everyone seemed to have their own strongly held opinions, with no views shared in common.

It was minority against minority and as a result the only rule was that of chaos.

When Palimak was done, the wily caravan master sighed deeply and shook his shaggy head. "Coralean is not a man who easily passes judgment on another," he rumbled. "But I must confess, young Timura, that all you have told me is deeply troubling to this weary old heart." He thumped the massive structure that was his chest.

Then he fixed Palimak with his fierce eyes. "But, my headstrong friend," he went on, "it is with the greatest regret that I must tell you that a grievous error has been made. And I fear it is you who have committed it, though it pains me to point out the mistake.

"You should never have allowed the Council to convene, young Palimak. Failing that, you should have used all your wiles to prevent the outcome of that meeting. I blame myself for not being here to advise you. But, alas, I was busy with those pirates who call themselves ship captains."

"But what the Elders suspect just happens to be true," Palimak replied, voice weary from lack of sleep.

"I did force my will on them before. I did use magic to make them see things my way. Not once, but many times."

He looked over at Leiria with sad eyes. "I even did it to you, Aunt Leiria," he said. "You would never have left Esmir if I hadn't cast a spell on you. You'd have waited there until the hells turned to ice before you abandoned my father to the Fates."

"I know that," Leiria replied. "And I can't say your actions don't bother me when I think on it. However, we now know Safar never would have showed up. The wait would have been futile."

"But he wasn't dead," Palimak said. "I was wrong."

"And he wasn't in Esmir, either, was he?" Leiria said. "It was in Syrapis that we found him. There's no doubt in my mind that if you hadn't forced us to come to Syrapis, inspired us to defeat Rhodes and the others and then led us into that horrible chamber, we never would have found him. Don't ask me how he got here. I'm no sorcerer, so I couldn't say."

Palimak smiled bitterly. "Well, I am a sorcerer," he said, "and I can't tell you, either."

He gestured at the immense coffin crammed into one side of the tower room that he used for his quarters.

"The first time I looked inside I saw the remains of a demon. There was no mistaking that corpse for anything but. Not just his looks, but the sheer size of him."

Palimak shook his head. "I've never seen a demon so large," he said. "Besides that, the demon looked exactly like the pictures and statues of Lord Asper. So that's who I think was in there. Not my father, but mummified remains of Asper."

Coralean stroked his beard. "You've said that the next time you looked Asper was gone and instead you found the ailing body of my dearest friend, Safar Timura: correct?"

"Just as you say," Palimak replied.

"A mystery indeed," the caravan master said. "One designed to confound even one such as Coralean. A man who has seen more things than most."

He turned to Leiria. "How is our Safar?" he asked. "Has his condition improved?"

She brushed away the sudden moisture in her eyes. "No, it hasn't," she said.

For three weeks, Leiria had helped Safar's mother and sisters nurse him. Spoonfeeding him broth, which he instinctively swallowed without ever regaining consciousness. Bathing the body she knew so well; except it was uniformly tanned from head to toe, which was most odd. It was as if he'd been naked under a hot sun for a long time. Also, other than what grew on his head, he was completely hairless. His face, his chest, his limbs, his groin.

Then, not long ago, he'd started to sprout a beard. But instead of coming in dark, like the hair on his head, it was golden. Since Safar had always kept his features smooth she'd shaved him, puzzling over the yellow hairs.

Also, his eyebrows and the hair on his head seemed lighter. Although that might have been from the sun that had toasted his skin. Stranger still, this morning, when she'd given him his sponge bath, she'd seen a little golden nest of hair beginning to form in his groin.

She'd wanted to ask his mother and sisters about it. But Leiria had never been Safar's wife, only his former lover, so she hadn't managed to summon the nerve to ask such an intimate question of the prudish Kyranian women.

"There's no need to mourn, my beautiful Captain," Coralean said. "Safar will be back with us in spirit as well as body soon enough." He tapped his head with a strong, thick finger. "Coralean knows it here." He thumped his chest. "And here."

"He's spoken a few times," Leiria said. "So that gives me hope. Except he always says the same thing."

She shook her head. "He keeps asking, a€?Where's Khysmet?a€™ I wish could answer him. I keep thinking-if I could suddenly produce Khysmet he'd recover. But of course, that's a hopeless task. The last time we saw Khysmet was with Safar in Caluz. My guess is that he was probably killed when Safar destroyed the Idol of Hadin."

She paused, reflecting on the enormous explosion they'd all witnessed from the distant shores of the Great Sea. She shuddered. "Nothing could have survived such a calamity," she said.

To her surprise Palimak said, "I'm not so sure of that. My father did." He paused, thinking. Then, "I told you what happened in Charize's chamber. How, when all seemed lost, what I thought was my father's ghost engaged those monsters. But it wasn't a ghost, was it? Because we later found my father alive in Asper's tomb."

"Yes, yes, but we were talking about the horse," the caravan master said, displaying rare impatience.

Palimak sighed. "The whole incident all seems like a terrible nightmare now. So I can't say for certain.

But it seemed to me that during the battle I heard Khysmet. You all know that trumpeting sound he made whenever there was a fight?"

Leiria and Coralean nodded. They remembered it very well. Especially Leiria. She couldn't count the number of times she'd followed that wild cry into always-victorious battle.

"Well, that's what I heard," Palimak said. "Or maybe it's what I wanted to hear. I can't say."

"Are you telling us there's more to this mystery?" the caravan master asked. "Poor Coralean's brain, agile as it is, has not been able to unravel the knot of Safar's sudden resurrection, much less these other things you suggest."

"If you did hear Khysmet," Leiria said, "where is he now? Where did he go?"

Palimak groaned in frustration. "I don't know," he said harshly. "But every day that goes by, I wonder if I didn't make a big mistake by not searching Hanadu for him, instead of leaving so quickly."

Always a woman of action, Leiria said, "Let's return to Hanadu and see. It's stupid sitting around here wondering about something we can't prove unless we go there in person. And if we do find Khysmet, maybe Safar will recover."

Angry shouts echoed from the market place. Coralean peered out and saw the Elder, Masura, haranguing the villagers. His words weren't distinct, but they were obviously causing a heated debate.

People were jabbing fingers at one another, defending whatever stand they had taken.

He turned back, face dark with displeasure. "Coralean is not the sort of man who usually advises delay,"

he said. "Direct action has always been his motto, as you both well know."

He jabbed a thumb at the window. "However, it's Coralean's considered opinion that this would not be a good time to undertake another expedition to Hanadu. There's too much discontent in our ranks. King Rhodes is no fool and would be certain to sniff out our weakness. Then we'd have another war on our hands."

He grimaced. "With so much disunity, Coralean fears that the outcome of such a war might not achieve the same happy result as before."

"I'm not sure we have anything to lose," Leiria said. "It's my guess that his spies have already informed his hairy majesty that we're at each other's throats."

"Possibly so," Coralean replied. "But to hear a thing from a spy is not the same as knowing it in your heart. Spies are notorious tellers of falsehoods. They lie for gold. Or they lie to please their master, telling him what they think he wants to hear.

"Sometimes spies do both. Fattening their purses and getting in their master's good graces at the same time. King Rhodes knows this, so he'll wait until he has absolute proof before he moves against us. And it is Coralean's view that it would be foolish for us to provide him with the proof he seeks. Let him labor for it. And if the gods are kind to us, our problems will resolved by then."

Palimak sighed. He felt like a child. Confronted by forces he didn't understand and certainly wanted no part of.

"If only my father would get well," he said. "He'd stop this squabbling. He'd know what to do!"

Coralean studied him. Then, "Although Safar has returned to us, it's still up to you, my young friend," he said. "You must act. We can't wait for your father's recovery. It saddens Coralean deeply to say this, but there's a chance Safar might never recover."

"But he has to!" Palimak moaned. "I can't force people against their wills any longer. I never liked doing it. And I don't want to start again."

Leiria fixed Palimak with a hard look. She said, "This is a rotten time, Palimak Timura, to develop a conscience."

"Our beautiful captain has hit the target in its tender center," Coralean said. "The troubles we are having now with the Council are nothing compared to the evils we will face very soon."

Palimak raised a questioning eyebrow. "What could be worse than this?"

"As you know, I've just returned from negotiations with our hired fleet," Coralean said.

"They want more money?" Palimak asked. "That's easy enough. We've plenty of gold and jewels in the treasury."

The caravan master snorted like a bull. "Of course they want more money," he said. "Mercenaries always want more money. It's in their greedy natures to wring the sponge dry, then press it again in case there's a speck of moisture left. But our new worries aren't on account of money. Coralean has had the distasteful task of dealing with such men many times during his long, illustrious career. Sea pirates, land pirates, they're all the same.

"I reasoned with them. Thumped the heads of a few captains. Slipped their lieutenants a little gold to foster insurrection. And eventually arrived at terms favorable to us."

Leiria eyed him. "So what's the problem?"

"Waterspouts," Coralean said.

Palimak and Leiria gaped at him. What in the blazes?

Coralean nodded. "Yes, indeed, my friends. Waterspouts," he continued. "'The biggest damned waterspouts in all creation,a€™ is how one captain put it. One of them appeared right off the coast of Hanadu. According to the captain, who swears he hadn't had a drink in a week-a lie, of course, but no matter-this particular waterspout was over a mile wide. And powerful! Strong enough to pull the biggest ship under. At least, that's what the captain said."

Coralean plucked a leather-covered flask from his belt and drank deeply of the wine it contained. He handed it to Palimak, who shook his head. Then to Leiria, who nodded absently and drank as deeply as the caravan master.

"I questioned a sampling of common seamen from the other ships," Coralean said, "and they confirmed the tale. As a point of fact, the spout forced the fleet to put out to sea for more than a week."

Coralean sighed. "Thank the gods Rhodes didn't know that, because there was a time when the blockade we have established along his coast did not exist."

"But now the fleet's back, right?" Palimak said. "So there's nothing to worry about."

"Oh, you couldn't be farther off the mark, young Timura," Coralean said. "The fleet's back. The blockade once more intact. But I fear-and more importantly those pirates fear-that new manifestations will occur.

Sailors are the most superstitious of men, as you well know.

"But it seems they have reason for their nervousness. For similar waterspouts have been reported in the seas between Syrapis and Esmir. There's news that a dozen fishing boats disappeared just off Caspan.

Sucked down by a waterspout, I'm told."

"But why should we worry?" Leiria wanted to know. "Waterspouts can't get us on land. And if the sea off Syrapis breaks out in them like plague rash, it doesn't matter if all the ships light out for deep water.

We might not be able to land at Hanadu, but neither can Rhodes send a raiding party to our shores. Who needs ships, if Nature Herself forms a blockade?"

But Palimak immediately understood what Coralean was getting at. Ghostly fingers chilled his spine.

"It's not King Rhodes he's worried about, Aunt Leiria," he said, his voice trembling. "Or, really even the waterspouts." Then, to Coralean. "Isn't that right?"

Again, the caravan master sighed heavily. "Indeed it is, son of my dearest friend," he said. "Safar predicted the end of the world long ago. He said the gods were asleep and no longer concerned themselves with human, or demon, affairs. I didn't believe him, at first.

"But look what has happened to Esmir! Despite his valiant efforts to destroy the machine at Caluz-plugging the magical breach between Hadin and Esmir-the poison has continued to spread. The seafarers tell me much of Esmir is now uninhabitable. That people are fleeing to the coast in tremendous numbers."

He pressed his hands against his temples, as if in pain. "It is my fear," he said, "that this poison will soon spread to Syrapis. And then what will we do? The waterspouts are quite possibly the first sign of such an occurrence."

Just then they heard a rooster crow. Surprised, for it was midday, they turned their eyes to the window.

Another cock joined in. Then another. Somewhere a donkey brayed and horses whinnied. Then all the dogs started to bark.

They looked at each other, wondering what was happening. Palimak opened his mouth to speak.

At that moment the earthquake struck!

There was no warning. The floor heaved under them. Coralean was flung against the window and nearly toppled out. Leiria snatched at him, pulling him back.

The floor heaved again. Leiria was hurled backward, still holding on to Coralean. They fell heavily to the ground. The massive stone fortress swayed like a fragile sailboat in a storm.

Palimak found himself lying on the floor, staring up at the ceiling as an enormous crack shot from one side of the room to the other. Stone shattered into sand and rained down on him, but he couldn't rise. It was as if a gigantic weight was holding him down. All he could do was shut his eyes against the falling debris.

He heard screams from the market place. Rock grinding against rock. Glass and clay jars bursting. Large objects hurled to the ground from great heights. Animals bawling in pain and fear.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, the earthquake ended.

Silence hung like thick velvet drapes. The atmosphere was filled with dust, sparkling in a wide burst of sunlight streaming through the enormous hole in the wall where the window had been.

Then the silence was broken by the sound of movement from across the room. Palimak and the others turned and gaped at the sagging door, which had been half-torn from its hinges.

A wild-eyed figure staggered through the doorway. It was Safar.

"It's Hadin!" he cried. "It wants me back!"

And he collapsed to the floor.