The Quest of Kadji

The age is dark—the world Is old—

The Gods are dead or gone away!

But what care we? For I am told

A man can die but once, they say!

—Road Song of the Kozanga Nomads

i. On the Great Plains

FOR THREE days and three nights the great clan of warriors had ridden without pause or rest across the worldwide plains of the whispering grasses, and in all that time no habitation of men had they seen.

But now, toward evening, one of the advance scouts turned back and rode like the very wind itself to the forefront of the weary and battle-stained legion. He rode up to the place where a tall bearded man, wrapped in a voluminous ishlak of striped red and black wool, bestrode a superb white stallion.

The scout swept his steed to a halt, hard wrists tightening on the reins, and sung himself from the saddle in a whirl of dust. He stood waiting for the grizzled leader of the war-stained host to ride up to where he stood, and when the white stallion neared, be seized its silver-studded bridle, snatched off his tall hat of red felt, and bowed his dark head.

“What is it, O Jorad? The foe, surely, are not before us, as they are close behind?”

“Nay, Lord—huts! A village; and—a well,” said the scout.

The greybeard looked ahead, keen eyes narrowing, but the Great Plains ahead were dark with gathering dusk and even his eagle’s gaze could not penetrate the limitless distances.

“How far, O Jorad?”

“An hour—two at the most, jemadar, Peasants. No horsemen, no fortifications, and the Dragon Banner”— here the young scout grimaced as if the phrase had a bad taste in his mouth, and spat in the dust at his feet— “the Dragon Banner flies neither from chieftain’s post, nor lookout’s nest, nor from atop the god house.”

The bearded leader of the host grunted and frowned thoughtfully. To rest … even if for a little time … to dismount and to permit the stiffness to drain from taut and weary muscles … to ease chafed limbs and to forget for a time the endless rhythm of pounding hooves throbbing like drumbeats over the endless stretches of the plains … it was a delicious thought, and the promise was most tempting.

But was it wise? No man could say how close upon their heels followed the victorious and arrogant foe. It might well be that the pursuing enemy had given up and turned back days or hours since; it might also be that the legion had long since outdistanced the enemy, and could afford some hours of rest.

And it might also be that the village ahead, seemingly peaceful, was—a trap.

He sighed wearily, but from within; outwardly, no weariness or weakness or slightest sign of indecision was permitted to be visible in the stern, stiff mask of his face. And in the midst of his own exhaustion and suffering, and the perplexity of the present danger, and worryings about the hazards of the unknown future, he calmly and judiciously appraised their chances.

As if he read the mind of the jemadar, the young scout, Jorad, spoke up.

“Lord—I do not think it is a trap. The village, lies alone in the empty plain. There is no place where the troops of the foe might hide.”

The tall bearded man mused silently. He sat erect in the great saddle, stiff and tall as a spear, for all the pain of his wound. For three days since, when he and his men had been broken before the assault of the Rashemba knights at the battle of Agburz River, he had taken a lancehead in the shoulder. His sword arm was numb and useless, and despite the herbs bound to the wound, blood still trickled down his arm to splatter the tall dry grasses whereover they rode. The pain was very great, but his face was hard as iron and by no tremor in his voice nor wavering in his posture nor sign in his face did Zarouk, jemadar or Lord Chief of the fighting Kozanga Nomads betray the agony that tormented him.

“Very well; we shall make camp there. Surely we have put many leagues between the brethren and the accursed Rashemba by now. And the sword-brothers must rest. Ride thou ahead, O Jorad, and tell the villagers the Kozanga are coming—and that our needs are great!”

The young warrior grinned, white teeth flashing in the dusty mask of his face. Village camp meant hot meat and wine and a soft bed—Hai-yaa! Gods! Almost had young Jorad forgotten the taste of wine and the feel of a bed beneath his weary bones!

He ducked his head, clapped the red felt cap back on his long black locks and turned to mount and ride when the jemadar spoke sharply, calling him back.

“And tell them, O Jorad, that we be the fighting Kozanga—true sons of the Great Plains—and no foreign dogs of Rashemba. We shall pay in red gold and white silver for food and drink and fodder. The Kozanga honor will take nothing at swordpoint from the people of the plains. Tell them that!”

The scout grinned and bobbed his dark head again.

“Aye, Lord!” Then he was off like the wind and the bearded Zarouk gazed after him wistfully. An, to be young and strong again, to fight all day and drink all night, and still be fresh to fight again the morrow! But he was old, old and grey, and his heart’s blood was ebbing from him drop by drop through the red hole torn by the treacherous lancehead of a foreign dog of a Rashemba. Long had he led the clan of warriors; now, his days as jemadar were nearly at their end. Could he but live to shepherd the sword-brothers into the black mountains of Maroosh, where no man could follow, then could he rest content.

His wistful gaze hardened. His jaw muscles tightened under the crisp, iron-grey beard. Rest? Not while one man lived—the thrice-damned and god-accursed false princeling who had betrayed them to his foreign dog-friends …

Under his breath the gaunt old jemadar breathed five words—and whether it be a curse or a prayer, what man could say?

“Death to the Dragon Emperor!”

ii. The Axe of Thom-Ra

THE VILLAGE was a miserable cluster of log huts huddled together amidst the plain around an open square of beaten earth that the spring rains would turn to a sea of mud. But this was the beginning of winter, and although the snows had not yet come the earth was hard and dry and bare.

At the center of the bare space rose the village well. To the eastern side, rose the go-mak, the hut of the village chief. No less than the others of the small village, it was a squalid hovel, but taller than the rest and chinked with hard-packed clay. A feather-crested spear was thrust deep in the earth before its door. The red and gold feathers of the crest were old and tattered, faded and grey. Many generations had passed since the Ushamtar warriors who had come from the grasslands of the south to settle all this land had planted the proud war spear there as a rallying point. But the villagers were Ushamtar still, and they stood tall and proud and silent, with grave faces and keen eyes, arms folded on their chests, as the weary Nomad warriors entered the village with sundown.

By twos and threes the fighting Kozanga rode in, black moving shapes in the gathering gloom. The village chief had bade his wives build a great fire in the open space, and by its flickering red light the villagers could see the marks of battle on the torn and blood-stained ishlaks of the mounted men. Spired steel helms were dented; round leather-on-wicker shields were broken and battered; slim throwing spears were splintered. And many there were who did not ride but lay moaning ha carts dragged behind the main body of the clan host, men with ravaged faces and haunted eyes, wrapped in filthy bandages.

The village women threw their hands up, clucking amongst themselves at the sight of the wounded warriors. And even before the Lord of the warrior legion had exchanged greetings with the village chief, they vanished into huts and reappeared with pots and jars of strong wine and basins of steaming water and packets of dried herbs and fresh bandages, torn perhaps from their voluminous underskirts, wherewith to treat the injured warriors.

Zarouk drew his great white stallion up before the go-mak of the chief with a flourish. With his left hand—for his right would serve him no more—he threw back the folds of his great ishlak and laid bare to the sight of men the glitter of the great hooked axe of cold steel he wore strapped to his girdle.

“Hai-yaa! The Peace of the Gods be with you, O Ushamtar!” he cried.

The village chieftain bowed low, touching the earth with the fingers of his right hand. “The fortune of Heaven ride with you, O Kozanga,” he replied gravely.

For a moment they looked at each other thoughtfully, each fully conscious of the drama of the moment and each determined to uphold the honor and courtesy of their respective peoples. The villager was an old man, bony-shanked and bald of pate, his lean and leathery face seamed and wizened with the years. But his dark eyes were sharp and keen and watchful, and he stood proudly, his gaunt shoulders wrapped in a fringed kuruz of fine white cloth.

“Of your courtesy,” the Lord said, “I require food and drink and a place to rest for my sword-brethren, and for our horses, fodder and shelter from the wolves and the night cold.”

“All these shall be yours,” the villager said. Zarouk paused, hesitant. Then, because honor demanded truth in full, he added:

“But I must declare that the Dragon Emperor of golden Khôr has named us rogues, outlaws and renegades, and set upon us his dogs, the foreign mercenaries of Rashemba, who may yet be to this hour on our trail. If you feel that our presence will bring danger upon your village, I say, speak out, and we will ride on …”

The face of the old chieftain did not change. Pride in his ancient blood and age-old heritage held him stiff with dignity.

He said; “I bow me in the shadow of the Lord of the Dragon Throne—a thousand years to his name!—I and my fathers have bowed to his shadow and we are his men. But, also, we are Ushamtar, and the great Kozanga warriors are our brethren from the days of old. I would spit on my grandfathers’ bones, were I to deny hospitality to the sir-brethren of the Chayyim Kozanga… .”

The harsh lips of the jemadar, drawn thin and tight with weariness and suffering, twitched. But he said no word. With his left hand he drew the sacred Axe of Thom-Ra, the holy totem of the Kozanga, borne by a thousand jemadars of his race since Time’s Dawn, and set it to his lips.

“The Peace be upon you all,” he said, and permitted his captains to ease him down from the saddle, for he was too weak to dismount.

iii. Kozanga Vengeance!

FOR ONE night and no longer did the exhausted and beaten Nomads rest in the village of the Ushamtar. They ate and drank hugely, paying with red gold for the hospitality of their hosts, as was the ancient custom. Then, having seen their blown and weary horses fed, watered, rubbed down and in safe shelter—and then only—did the proud Kozanga sleep. Like dead men they slept, but woke with first light of dawn to move on. Ahead of them, many leagues across the endless plains of whispering grass, lay the black mountains. Impassable to any man but a Kozanga were those tall and mighty mountains of black stone—an impregnable fortress of dark stone, hewn by the very hands of the Gods at the dim, forgotten beginning of things.

The secret passage through that wall of black rock was the hereditary secret of the Kozanga sword-brethren, for ages ago the fathers of the Nomad warrior clan had first raised the red-and-black war standard of their legion behind those mountains, on the banks of Chaya, the Sacred River. For thousands of years the Sons of the Chayyim Kozanga had passed that secret down the generations. Could they but reach that frowning rampart of black stone in the land of Maroosh, they would be safe—aye, and let the pursuing Rashemba knights yap like dogs at a closed gate! There, in the hidden valleys and the secret places of the mountains, the heroes of the conquered and broken legion could rest, heal their wounds, hone their blades, to ride again another day.

Aye! To ride straight to the tall gates of golden Khôr that had sold them to the, foreign dogs! All of the Empire of the Dragon would feel that cold kiss of steel and taste the sour wine of fear when the mighty Kozanga brethren rode on the trail of vengeance! That the old jemadar swore, deep in his soul.

With first light he summoned to the hut wherein he lay his grandson, Kadji. He watched with proud eyes as the tall youth, wrapped in a flowing’ ishlak of tribal red and black, his blond locks flying free in the frosty air, rode up in a thunder of hooves before the hut and swung from the saddle to kneel in the dirt before his grandsire.

The grizzled Lord smiled slightly, and set one mighty hand on the boy’s head, lifting his face. Like a young hawk, Kadji raised bright, fierce eyes to meet his gaze. Blue as heaven and bright as sword steel were those clear young eyes, fearless and keen. The face of the youth was fair, but not soft: strong and lean, tanned to the hue of old leather by sun and wind, with lips that smiled and laughed, but he had the strong square jaw of his fathers and the bright gold mane of his mother. Kadji he was named, which was “Red Hawk” in the tongue of the Great Plains. And like a hunting hawk could he hurtle across the measureless leagues of whispering grass, astride his black Feridoon pony.

A fine hunter was the boy, and a fierce swordsman, for all his young years. His steady nerve and bold daring and bright, mischievous ways had made him beloved among the sword-brethren of the Kozanga. And Zarouk knew, deep in his heart, that when he could no longer lead the charge, the elder brothers of the legion would pass the name of jemadar to Kadji the Red Hawk… .

“The Lord summoned me?” the boy demanded. Old Zarouk nodded.

“With full dawn, the sword-brethren ride, O Kadji! In the valleys of black rock, in the hidden places, there shall we rest. Beside the sacred banks of Mother Chaya shall we renew our strength, to rise and ride again and sweep the streets of traitorous Khôr with our bright swords. The dog-hearted knights of Rashemba shall we drive back to their foul kennels in the west, and they shall learn to tremble at the name of the Kozanga vengeance—aye, even they, who laugh now at the name!”

The boy nodded, eyes blazing. Unconsciously, he fell into the chanting, ceremonial rhythm of Zarouk’s words.

“Hai-yaa, jemadar! Mother Chaya shall wash clean the wounds of her children of the plains, and Father Sky shall echo again to the thunder of our hooves, when the Kozanga ride to vengeance! We shall ride to the foot of the Dragon Throne and take our honor back at swordpoint from the hands of the Great Father, aye, from the hands of Holy Yakthodah shall we receive our honor!”

“Nay!”

Zarouk spoke like a great war trumpet and the boy Kadji blinked at the word.

“Speak, Lord!” he begged.

The eyes of Zarouk burned into the face of the boy.

“The sword-brothers shall ride into the hidden fastnesses of the black mountains, aye, and mayhap the Red Tents shall rise again on the shores of Mother Chaya, but Kadji the Red Hawk shall not ride thither. Neither shall we take our honor back from the hands of Yakthodah the Holy Dragon Emperor—not while the world lasts!”

The boy did not understand his grandsire’s words. His lips trembled and his blue eyes questioned, but he waited without asking. Zarouk drew a deep breath. How to phrase it—how to lay the great task on these young shoulders?

“Listen to my words, O Kadji! Thou knowest that when the Dragon Emperor, Azakour, third of that name, died twenty years since, all of the Dragon Empire was thrown into turmoil and confusion for lack of a true-born heir?”

“Aye, Lord.”

“For unto the Lord Azakour Third were but two sons born: the eldest, Hodaky, was sickly and died young, and the youngest, Yakthodah, died whilst on his foreign travels to the court of the High Prince of Rashemba. The Dragon Throne empty, with no living heir, no man knew who should wear the White Crown and rule sovereign over all the plains. And the noble lords, the kugars, the fat landowners, even they our old oppressors, traitorous and ambitious and cunning, they whom the Old Emperor had put down and banished—came they not riding back, to try their power one against the other, that the strongest of them, all should seize the Khahidûr and take the name of Emperor? And was not all of the Empire of the Dragon torn asunder with civil war?”

“Aye, Lord!”

“Then came the miracle! Out of westerly Rashemba came word that the Prince Yakthodah lived! That assassins of the banished kugars had sought his life, but slew another thinking it was he—while the True Prince fled into hiding under a name not his. You were a child when this word first came to the plains. Like the wind of spring it was, and our hearts flowered with joy at its coming. And thence into the Empire rode the Prince, with a mighty host of the chivalry of Rashemba by his side, to drive out the usurpation of the kugars and to claim his holy father’s throne. Did not the great Kozanga raise the war standard and ride by his side? Did not the sword-brothers of the Chayyim Kozanga break the kugars at the Hills of Yush? Did not I, Zarouk, stand in the Hall of Halls and see the True Prince crowned as Dragon Emperor? Did not he name me ‘brother’ and ‘friend’ before all men?”

“I swear that all these things are true,” the boy said solemnly.

The old warrior heaved a sigh.

“Aiii, for the sword-brethren! For dark days came upon us soon after! The Dragon was not the man his father was! The wealth of his ancestors he squandered for gauds and baubles! The gold of Khôr he spent on jugglers and astrologers and magicians! Did he not spend his days in frivolity and his nights in gaming, drinking and revel? Did he not build his Dragon Guard—not from the sword-brothers of the plains—but from among the dog-knights of Rashemba? Did not he take as his Empress the foreign woman—the very daughter of the High Prince Bayazin who had lent him an army to whelm the kugars? And did he not, once the coffers were empty, welcome back the same kugars he had broken and banished—they and their gold? Did he not trade them Kozanga land for their gold? Did he not turn against us of the Kozanga, to curry favor with the kugars … did he not, at the last, outlaw and banish us, forbidding that a Chayyim Kozanga should enter the gates of golden Khôr? And then, as we rode from his lands with dignity, did he not loose upon our heels the dogs of Rashemba, to ambush and slaughter us? Which he would have done, had not the Gods warned us in time with the Omen of the Wolves …”

Kadji bent his head and beat his chest.

“Lord jemadar, alas, all these things are true!”

“Very well! Now, hearken thou, O Red Hawk, O son of my own son. In the darkness of night the War Prince of the Gods came to me in my dream and spake unto me, saying, behold, O Elder Brother of the Kozanga, the man that sits in the chair of Azakour is not the son of his blood, but a vile and cunning impostor!”

iv. The Red Hawk Rides

NOON FOUND the boy Kadji half a league from the village whereat the legion had slept the night before. Alone, mounted on his favorite Feridoon pony, the youth had retraced the path the Nomads had taken in their flight from the lances of Rashemba. Now the boy reined to a halt atop the brow of a low hill to scan the horizon. Were the knights of Prince Bayazin still on the track of the brethren, or had the dogs turned back to the Dragon City—back to golden Khôr where a foul deceiver ruled from the holy chair of a thousand Emperors? The boy cursed and spat at the thought.

The clear skies of noon shone down with a fierce light on the measureless plains below. Cold and frosty was the wind, with the touch of winter in it, but the sun burned hot and bright. Searching the horizon, Kadji found no trace of mounted warriors. No trail of dust rose to mark their wake, no burnished helm or shield caught, and mirrored the brilliant noon. He decided to rest, to eat and drink, before riding on to continue the mighty mission the jemadar had laid upon his shoulders.

And, truly, the Quest laid upon him was a great one.

The War Prince of the Gods, even the same Divine Thom-Ra who had given the holy Axe to Kozang of Chaya, the father of his people, in ancient times, had declared the Dragon Emperor a cunning thief of crowns. No child of the dead Emperor was he, but a sly Perushka bastard—born to a tavern slut of Perushk and fathered by a renegade kugar lordling. With incredible boldness and guile the impostor, whose real name the God said was Shamad, had somehow convinced the monarch of Rashemba, Bayazin the High Prince, that his claim to the throne was true—and a war-weary land, torn by civil strife and yearning for the peaceful central rule of a Holy Dragon Emperor again, had welcomed the liar with open gates! Kadji ground his teeth at the thought.

Kozanga honor demanded that a high born warrior of the sword-brethren avenge both the insult to the Dragon Throne and the outrage against the Nomad legion by the death of this Shamed. The double deed had been bestowed upon the boy Kadji. His hand would wield the blade that cut the throat of Shamad the Pretender.

And the God-Axe itself would be that blade. For, lo, the sacred Axe of the Chayyim Kozanga hung glittering at Kadji’s girdle!

The boy’s heart was filled with grim purpose … but he was a boy, and not yet fully come to manhood. Hence, like all boys, he dreamed of high heroic deeds—of winning the applause of the sword-brothers with some glorious deed, some mighty accomplishment. And what higher deed than this could even Kadji have dreamed of? Thus in his young heart exultation beat high, and he thrilled in anticipation of the days to come.

As he sat cross-legged in the grass at the foot of the hill, chewing on dried meat and dates and sucking sour wine from a goatskin bag, he dreamed of the thing. Resplendent in his Kozanga ishlak of red and black stripes, the Axe naked in his strong right hand, he would stride fearlessly through the whispering ranks of fat, greasy-faced kugar lordlings. Straight up to the foot of the Dragon Throne he would. stride with bold steps, head high, looking neither to the right nor the left. There, at the foot of the great dais, he would confront Shamad the Impostor and declare his crimes in the name of the Most High Gods—the cry of Kozanga vengeance ringing on his lips, he would lift the ancient Axe—and the head of the false Dragon would roll in black and stinking gore at his feet, while the Dragon City thundered, as with one voice, the name of Kadji—Red Hawk of the Kozanga Nomads!

It was a beautiful dream, and sucking wine from the skin bag, the boy warrior of the Plains vowed he would make it come true. Aye, the Axe of Thom-Ra would drink the blood of Shamad even if Kadji had to follow the cowardly traitor to the very Edge of the World itself … aye, to the very gates of bright Ithombar, king city of the Immortals, whose purple towers rose on the world’s remotest rim!

It was to be very many months before Kadji could know how prophetic was that vow… .

HE SLEPT that night upon the bosom of the Great Plains, using his saddle for a pillow as did Kozanga warriors. And with dawn he rode on, and thus for two days he retraced the flight of the Nomad legion until at last he was come to the bloody shores of the Agburz. Here, six days before, the honor of the Kozanga Nomads had been trampled before the pounding hooves of the Rashemba chivalry. He rested beside the river, thinking of the battle. Old Thugar had fallen in the onslaught, Thugar, who had taught him to use the great bow of the plains; aye, and clever, mocking Korak, his boyhood friend; and Horem, too, and that great horseman, Gomar of the White Lance . , . how many of the great hero-brethren had fallen before the ponderous stallions of the mailed knights of western Rashemba!

Kneeling in the trodden dust, the Red Hawk swore before his savage Gods the sword-brethren should not have died in vain.

He kissed the blade of the sacred Axe in token of his vow and rose and rode on, and his heart was filled with grim purpose. But now he must ride with very great care, scanning the world around from every hillcrest or elevation. It would seem that the dog-knights of Rashemba had turned back in truth from their pursuit of the clan legion, for he saw no sign of them as he retraced, day after day, the flight of the sword-brothers. But here, on the far shore of the Agburz, he was in the country held by the foe, and well might they have left guardposts or watch parties behind to warn against the return of the Chayyim Kozanga Nomads. So he rode carefully, muffled in his cloak, taking advantage of every bit of cover the landscape might afford. He followed the winding path of dry gullies; he picked his way through the stand of trees, using the bushy underbrush to hide him from any watchful eye; and thus he passed many leagues unseen by any man.

v. The Gates of Nabdoor

IT WAS some days later that Kadji, Red Hawk of the Chayyim Kozanga, came within sight of Nabdoor.

The small traders’ town lay below him, for now he was among the Barren Hills, and the settlement lay below on the banks of the Babdar, a small river that wandered out of the north and down whose meandering stream came flatboats from the northern farms bearing goods to market. Here at this spot the river from the north met with the great caravan routes that crisscrossed the plains from east to west: hence a permanent village of tradesmen, artisans, caravan lords and merchant princelings had grown up in olden time.

Now it might well be that the Rasbemba, turning back from the Field of Agburz to return to the heartlands of the Dragon Emperor, might have paused at Nabdoor-town. At very least, it seemed likely they had left a garrison to ward and hold this outpost of golden Khôr. Therefore the boy Kadji tethered his pony to dry brush below and wriggled on his belly to the hillcrest, from which high vantage he could gaze down and see the streets and ways of Nabdoor spread out below him like a living map. He searched with keen and thoughtful eyes and saw that his worst fears were realized; for while the main body of the Rashemba host had departed from these parts, a garrison did indeed hold the gate and walls of the town.

Kadji crawled down from the hillcrest to where his pony waited patiently and huddled in his robes, munched dry provisions, while he thought out his strategy. The pony nosed him and he dug a handful of dry meal from the saddlebags and let it eat from the palm of his hand, chuckling as the moist, bristled lips moved over his hand.

“What shall we do, eh, Haral?” he murmured, stroking the velvet nose of the pony. “Of course, we could circle Nabdoor without entering it, and continue on into the north … but if we so do, little Haral, we shall both go with empty bellies many a day, for there is little left in the bags for you to feed upon, and naught at all for me.”

The pony whickered softly and shoved his shoulder with its nose, as if to say “Let’s go down and dare it.”

At length Kadji made up his mind. His pony was of Feridoon breed, unlike the proud war stallions of the sword-brothers; and he himself, with his blond locks and blue eyes—a rarity in the Nomad clan-brethren—could pass for an Ushamtar of the plains. And he had cleverly bethought him of the time when perchance he might need to hide his Kozanga identity behind some manner of disguise; thus he bore with him in the saddle pack garments purchased from the go-mak of the Ushamtar village whereat they had paused to rest that night.

On sudden impulse the boy rose and threw off the red felt hat and striped ishlak robes, which would mark him to all eyes as a warrior of the Chayyim Kozanga.

Nude save for a linen clout wound about his loins, the boy stooped and bathed in the cold waters of the Babdar, which, like a mirror, caught and held the image of his lean brown young body, broad-shouldered, smooth-chested, narrow-hipped, and long and rangy in the legs. He bent, grinning, and scooped cold water up in cupped palms, slashing it in his face, shivering at the bite of the chill Water as it dribbled down his naked breast and thighs.

When he had cleansed himself, he opened the saddle pack and took out fresh garments, which he drew on over his shivering nakedness.

In a few moments he wore the fringed kuruz, the high-strapped leggings, the broad girdle and belied cap of a lordless Free Sword of the Ushamtar. The Ushamtar warriors had taken no part in the battle between the foreign Rashemba knights and the sword-brothers of the Kozanga; no curse of banishment or outlawry lay on their heads; thus, in the guise of a wandering Ushamtar mercenary, Kadji could ride where he wished without fear. He hoped!

Mounting his Feridoon pony, he rode boldly down to the gates of Nabdoor.

The town, which was not large, was ringed about in the embrace of a wall of rough fieldstone covered with cream and white stucco. It had two gates fashioned of heavy wood, and up to the nearer of these rode Kadji. As a boy might, he had concocted a long and very complicated story to account for his presence here. It included a false name and a full genealogy, and much incidental and anecdotal material. But to the vast disgust of Kadji, the knights of the Rashemba garrison did not even question him. Huge and red-faced and surly, they looked down at him from the height of the wall, saw him for a Ushamtar mercenary, and gestured him through the gate with but a grunted word. He felt somehow cheated: but it was just as well. His tongue might betray him for a Kozanga. He had not the guttural accents of a true born Ushamtar, although he had not thought of this.

He rode in, finding narrow cobbled streets and ramshackle houses and sheds dominated by huge warehouses of the merchant lords. At length he found an inn. And he found also a girl.

vi. The Perushka

KADJI HAD rented a place in the stables of the inn for his pony and was striding the streets bound for the nearest bazaar when he saw her.

She was gloriously fair, slim and strong and no older than he, if as old. Her hair was a banner of dark red flame and her eyes, large and bold and startling in her clear tanned face, were smoky amber flaked with fiery gold. She had proud young breasts and a free-swinging stride that reminded him of the wild Kozanga girls; like them, she wore high boots and tight leggings which displayed the slim clean lines of her long legs.

It puzzled him as to what she might be. No daughter of the merchant lords or princely artisans of Nabdoor would walk alone in the streets, for the townsmen were fiercely protective of their women and kept them behind walls; when, as seldom chanced, they were permitted abroad in the two town streets, they went heavily veiled and in giggling groups guarded by eunuchs. Not so, the flamehaired girl with eyes of smoky gold. She walked as freely as if she had no master—and no father, either. He was baffled, intrigued, and also—attracted.

While he shopped at the booths of the bazaar, selecting dried meats and preserved fruits and black bread and an oiled sack of red wine for his long ride to the north, he eyed her. She might be, he guessed, a Perushka—a gypsy—for she wore the loose flapping aftar of that people, and the gaudy kerchief about her brows, and the gold bangles at earlobe and throat and wrist. But she did not have the roguish swagger, the bold flirtatious eye, the flaunting walk, which marked the Perushka women.

And there was one thing else.

By her side paced a gigantic plains-wolf, grey as smoke, with eyes of lambent golden fire. The bazaar-folk gave it and its mistress a wide berth, he noticed, and indeed it was a strange thing, and almost unheard of, for the wolf was as tame as a great dog. And yet it was purebred plains-wolf, untainted in blood with town-dog strain, for often had Kadji seen the terrible wolf-packs of the Great Plains, and had fought them betimes, when harsh winter made them fierce mankillers.

She was an enigma, and as he went to sleep that night in a cramped loft atop the inn, the mystery of the girl and the beauty of her filled his thoughts and floated in his dreams.

WHEN HE rose with dawn from his narrow pallet, it was to shiver in the cold raw breeze. The harsh bleak light of morning flooded the little loft and through the one small window, shielded with a carven uthrab screen of pierced wood, he could see the grey light on stucco domes and low-roofed houses, and a clouded wintry sky beyond to the World’s Edge.

He broke his morning fast in the tavern of the inn, before a roaring scarlet fire, while a cheerful inn-girl with red cheeks and thick braids and a very dirty apron clattered pots and pans noisily. When he went to the stables to say good morning to Haral, his boots crunched on frozen mud crusted with a very light fall of snow. The cold season was upon the world, and henceforth the going would be hard and difficult.

The black pony was happy to see him, stamped restively and nudged him with its velvet nose while he gentled the steed with soft loving words and wove his fingers through its long unshorn mane. Today he must finish the last of his purchases and depart. He thought of the amber-eyed Perushka girl with her flaming hair: soon she would only be a fading memory to him, a bright-haired wraith. For once he left the streets of Nabdoor-town behind in his travels, he would never see her again.

He growled at himself, as a boy will: why all this accursed mooning over a pretty girl glimpsed in passing amid the streets of this nameless and unimportant little, town? He was glooming over her like a love-struck poet, but he was no poet but a warrior; a man, and on a mighty mission of honor and vengeance! He had no time to dream about pretty girls; he should be meditating on blood and fire and steel… .

Yet somehow he could not drive her from his mind. And as he strode about the snowy streets, buying provisions for his pony, his thoughts returned again and again to the slim, proud, lovely girl with eyes of smoky amber and hair like a scarlet banner tossed on fiery winds, and on the great wolf that went ever at her side.

Almost he thought to see her again today, but no, she was nowhere to be seen, and Kadji did not care to ask too many questions of the boothkeepers in the bazaar. For here and there about the square strode burly knights of the Rashemba in their glittering longshirts of chain mail, horned helmets of sparkling steel on their Straw-colored hair, their heavy red faces impassive, and cold grey eyes roving everywhere, alert and suspicious. To ask, questions might mean to draw attention to himself; therefore Kadji asked no one about the flame-haired girl.

He kept his month shut and his face blankly incurious. He bought his goods with a minimum of talking, and he kept as far away from the towering horned knights as he could, without seeming to do so. And under his fringed kuruz the God-Axe, the Axe of Thom-Ra, lay bound against his beating heart. The sacred “Fortune” of the Chayyim Kozanga Nomads rode with him … and the razory edge of the holy steel thirsted to drink deep of the vile blood of the dog-knights of Rashemba,

vii. The Road North

ERE THE sun star Kylix had ascended to the zenith of noon, Kadji had finished purchasing his provisions. He settled his debt to the innkeeper, paid for stabling his pony, mounted and rode forth from Nabdoor. The sleepy Rashemba knights merely waved him through the gates without a word of query; still and all, the Red Hawk did not breathe freely until he had left the shadow of the walls of Nabdoor-town far behind.

Ahead of him, grim and bleak under the grey wintry sky, the endless plains of whispering grasses stretched north and ever north to the gates of golden Khôr and the fulfillment of his mighty Quest. He turned his pony onto the caravan road to Khôr and rode with a blithe heart and a merry song on his lips under the lowering sky.

The air was crisp and clear and cold, and the wind which sprang up with late afternoon had a sharp biting edge like a steel knife, but he pulled his fringed cloak more closely about him and rode on. It was a small joy to the youth to know that every hour brought him nearer to his goal; that with every league he rode he drew closer to the Dragon Throne, and to the dreamed-of confrontation with the shrinking and cowardly black-heart that sat in the sacred chair and wore the false name of Holy Yakthodah, and to the epic moment of glory when through his hands the Axe of Thom-Ra would strike down the Usurper on the high seat of his power, amidst the fat greedy kugars and the venal and cunning Rashemba knights.

What would happen after that proud and splendid moment, the boy Kadji could not envision. His dream stopped with the fall of Shamad the False … what would happen thereafter, Kadji could not guess. Doubtless he would die himself in the very next moment, cut down by the enraged knights of Prince Bayazin of Rashemba …

Perhaps. Very likely.

At any rate, he somehow did not see himself riding this same road south again, through the Barren Hills and the streets of Nabdoor, fording the level waters of the Babdar, and thence south across the Great Plains to the black mountains within whose hidden and secret heart his lordly grandfather Zarouk awaited his coming.

THE RED HAWK rode north as sunset filled the west with flame and rode on under bright stars as the first of the Seven Moons arose to fill the skies with silvern light.

He slept that night beside a flickering fire in the grasses and rose with first dawn to ride on. North and ever north.

And as he rode, Kadji the Red Hawk of the Chayyim Kozanga did not guess or dream that his feet were set upon the first leagues of a journey that would take him across the measureless face of the world to its legended and unknown very Edge, and to a strange and marvelous destiny before the gates of shining Ithombar the City of the Immortals.

Nor that his name would live in song ten thousand years.