The Temples Of Ayocan

Chapter 16

Natrila kept her part of the bargain as well as she could, and Blade kept his as well as he could. It was easy for him not to tell Isgon. It was less easy for him to meet Natrila's demands for lovemaking. Not impossible-Blade had never failed that way yet. He suspected that when he did, it would be wise to take him off missions into Dimension X. In each new dimension his life or at least his success seemed to depend at least once on satisfying a sex-hungry woman. But he also hoped that his virility would last much longer than his career as a traveler into Dimension X.

Natrila's newly awakened appetites were large, and her desire to get more and learn more was enormous. Blade was kept busy when she visited him. In return, she kept him fairly well posted on the doings inside the temple. Not as well as he had hoped, because Natrila did not move around much. Nor did her father tell her very much. And of course she could hardly ask anything of the other priests, even the most trustworthy ones. But Blade learned that Isgon was rapidly pushing his plans forward. The ranks of the Death-Vowed were swelling steadily. Messages flowed regularly back and forth among the various temple mounds in Gonsara. The ones outside Dafar would have an important job- to do when the day came-that of creating spectacular diversions. And a small net of sympathizers in key places was being built up in Dafar itself. Were they really sympathizers, or merely men lusting after power and gold? Blade did not know, nor did he care at this point. One who served the cult of Ayocan was an enemy.

Even without Natrila's information it would have been obvious that Isgon was getting impatient. The second set of Holy Warriors was now in training, which gave a total force of close to a hundred men. But Isgon was continuously after Blade to start the third and even fourth groups training. Visions of Holy Warriors obedient to his orders marching by the hundreds and thousands through Gonsara were beginning to dance in the priest's head. Blade found it increasingly hard to convince him that it would be several months at least before as many as a thousand Holy Warriors were fit to tackle King Thambral's troops.

Twenty days passed, during which time Natrila came to Blade's chamber seven times. On the twenty-first evening, she came for the eighth time. And this time she brought some startling and even alarming news.

«An Elder Brother is coming to this House all the way from the Supreme House in Tzakalan. It is said he is planning to inquire into the affairs of the servants of Ayocan here in Gonsara. It is also said he will bring seventy or more Holy Warriors of his own, the pick of those from the Supreme House.»

This was a time for Blade to once more pretend to be a devoted and faithful servant of mighty Ayocan. «What can he hope to find in such an inquiry? We have done not the smallest thing to displease Ayocan. And why seventy Holy Warriors? Does he think to replace those we have trained here? Seventy Holy Warriors will not be enough to even seize Thambral's palace, let alone bring Ayocan to power in Gonsara.»

Blade was more worried than he could afford to show. Did this sudden mission from Tzakalan mean that the cult of Ayocan was on his trail again? Or perhaps they were on Isgon's trail? Either meant trouble for Blade, but the second also meant trouble within the ranks of the cult. Blade could hardly think of a more appealing sight than the Holy Warriors of two different factions of the cult fighting it out in the main temple mound in Gonsara. He knew that his own men would certainly fight any attempt to disarm them unless both he and Isgon ordered them to submit. And certainly Blade was never going to give that order.

Four days later at about dinner time, word came of the Elder Brother's arrival. Blade picked the fifty best fighters from his Holy Warriors and led them to the uppermost levels of the temple mound. He and Isgon did not want the new priest's Holy Warriors penetrating any deeper than necessary into the temple mound. If it came to a fight, the closer to the surface the better. And for Blade himself, the closer to the surface he was, the faster he could get out, if necessary.

Blade distributed the men around the chambers and corridors and squatted on his haunches to wait. Within a few minutes a rumble floated down the stairs from the surface above. The sound of voices and the clank of weapons reached Blade. A troop of forty-odd Holy Warriors filled the stairs and lined up on either side of the door. Although they were disguised as porters and other manual laborers, their bearing gave them away, as did the swords and axes now worn openly on their belts. Next came the sound of sandaled feet briskly descending the stairs. Finally a small figure in yellow-orange robes stepped into sight.

It was Pterin.

As Blade stepped forward to greet Pterin, he recognized the man. He stiffened and stopped so abruptly that he nearly lost his balance and sprawled forward on his face at Pterin's feet. But he managed to stay upright, staring at the priest, searching for any sign of recognition on the thin face.

For the moment, there was none. Instead Pterin turned to Isgon and glowered at him while another troop of Holy Warriors filed down the stairs. By the time they had all reached the bottom, the chamber was packed almost solid with warriors and priests. The only open space was a small circle around the two Elder Brothers. Blade also noticed that a solid mass of Pterin's Holy Warriors stood between him and the foot of the stairs.

Now Pterin stepped up to Isgon and said coldly, «A strange greeting, Isgon. Whence come these men in the garb of the Holy Warriors of mighty Ayocan? I thought King Thambral had forbidden you such.»

Isgon's hands fluttered nervously. Pterin's manner and the threatening force of tough fighters he had brought with him had the other priest much on edge. «They are being trained for me, in secret, by this warrior.» He pointed at Blade, and motioned him forward, into the open circle. Reluctantly, Blade stepped forward. Under the circumstances the last thing he wanted was to be singled out for Pterin's attention.

Pterin's eyes swung toward Blade again. Their eyes met and locked, Blade once more searching for the slightest sign that Pterin saw through his disguise. Once more, he did not find it. And once more he still did not drop his alertness.

Isgon was explaining how Blade had come into the service of Ayocan. «-and after he slew four of the Death-Vowed with his bare hands, I knew that he was a warrior we should not, could not, let escape us. Certainly not when he offered the promise of our being able to train our own Holy Warriors here in Gonsara, and-«

«Perhaps,» said Pterin icily. «But you had no permission from the Supreme Brother to admit this man, who might be anyone.» Blade stiffened.

«But when he can train Holy Warriors-«

«For which you also have no permission from the Supreme Brother! What seek you here, Isgon? A private army of your own? What the House of Ayocan shall do in Gonsara is decided by the Supreme Brother, my ambitious friend. Not by you.»

Isgon threw Blade a glance, appealing to him to order the local Holy Warriors into action. Blade shook his head.

That was a bad idea at any time, and particularly now, with Pterin's forces united and obviously alert.

Blade's shaking his head drew Pterin's eyes back toward him. «And who is this man you have admitted to the House of Ayocan? What has he to recommend him, besides his ability to help you break the laws of the Brotherhood?»

«I have already told you that-«

«I care not if he converted ten thousand of King Thambral's subjects to the worship of mighty Ayocan! He has been admitted to a House of Ayocan without proper testing and rituals. And you even permit him to wear a beard. That is to fly in the face of Ayocan. And Ayocan shall not be displeased.» Pterin turned to his Holy Warriors and jerked a thumb at Blade. «Seize him, bind him, and shave him. His beard at least shall no longer pollute this house. After that I-«

Pterin never finished the sentence. Blade's arm snapped up, and his spear point gashed in the lamplight. Then the arm snapped forward, and the spear plunged into Pterin's chest. The priest's head jerked up, and his eyes met Blade's. «It you-«he gasped. Then he choked on the blood welling up in his throat, reeled, and fell back ward onto the floor.

Isgon and both groups of Holy Warriors stood in amazed shock for a moment. It was as if the spear that had killed Pterin had paralyzed all of them. In that moment Blade moved.

His axe and sword sprang into his hands. Brandishing both, he charged the warriors blocking his path to the stairway. The first two did not even have time to draw their swords, nor did Blade bother to use his weapons on them. He ploughed into them like a charging bull, hurling the two smaller men aside by sheer physical impact, smashing them to the floor.

Four more warriors stood between him and the stairs. One of them broke and ran from the spectacle of Blade coming at him. Blade let that man go. He had enough to do with the other three. His axe sang through the air and crunched into the first man's shoulder, disabling his sword arm. A kick to the same man's kneecap sent him to the floor, gasping with pain and obviously out of the fight.

But the other two had their swords out now. Blade had to ward off a down-cut from the one to the right as he swung his axe toward the left. The first man's sword clanged off Blade's guard, while at the same moment Blade's axe chopped into the second man's neck. The man's head did not fly off, but it lolled hideously. Blood spurted over Blade, and for a horrible moment he thought he was going to lose his grip on his sword.

But he held onto it, feinted at his last opponent's head, then swung over and down to slash into the warrior's thigh. It was not a killing wound. But the warrior reeled out of Blade's path, and the stairway was open. Bloody axe and bloody sword waving, Blade tore up the stairs, taking them two and three at a time.

He barely felt or saw the stone under his feet. It was a small miracle that he reached the top without falling. But he did, and before there were any sounds of pursuit from below. The whole battle had taken thirty seconds at most. The mass of stunned and amazed warriors below would only be recovering from the shock and getting ready to follow Blade.

Several of Blade's men were on guard duty in the hut at the top of the temple mound. They had their swords already drawn when he came tearing up the stairs, no doubt alerted by the uproar from below. They stared at Blade as he darted toward the door. One of them raised a spear. Another asked, «Master, what is-?» But before he could complete the question, the door slid open. Several of Pterin's disguised Holy Warriors ran in, swords also drawn.

But Blade was not caught by surprise. He shouted «Treason! Blasphemy!» over his shoulder. Then he grabbed one of the staring temple guards and shoved him hard into the path of the oncoming Holy Warriors. The wretched man screamed as three swords chopped into him. But his dying strength kept him on his feet, so that he plunged among the Holy Warriors. He and they went down with shouts and clatters of falling weapons and waving arms and legs. Blade leaped high, sailing clear over the tangle of bodies. He cut at an exposed head as he went, and landed outside in the cool darkness.

There were other Holy Warriors still on guard outside, but Blade caught these by surprise. Before they could recover from that surprise, Blade had chopped down the only one who stood in his path. Before the others could close around Blade, he was out on the slope of the mound. The moon rode high over Dafar, brightly illuminating the slope. The stone was dry, and the footing was good. Blade thrust his sword into its scabbard, hung his axe on his belt, and settled down to run.

As he hit his stride, Holy Warriors from inside the mound began pouring out. They were shouting and waving their arms. In the bright moonlight Blade could see blood on some of them. There had been a fight down below, that was obvious. But more and more Holy Warriors kept pouring out into the open. A few, braver or angrier than the rest, started down the mound after Blade. For the moment, he had a safe lead. But he went down the side of the slope at a dead run, the wind whistling in his ears and his feet thudding on the stone.

He looked back again when he reached ground level. The Holy Warriors were coming after him now as fast as they could run. One at least came down the mound too fast. Blade saw him stumble and go rolling down the stone, arms and legs flying doll-like. But some of the others were coming down just as fast and staying on their feet. And now Blade saw that some of his pursuers were carrying spears. He would have to keep a longer lead than he had expected. One lucky hit or even a bad graze could slow him down enough to finish him.

Where should he run? He wished now that he had spent more time exploring Dafar before entering the temple mound. But at least there had been maps in the temple mound. He knew that he was less than a mile from the edge of the built-up area of Dafar, where it spread out into the open country beyond. He did not know that country, but neither would Pterin's goon squads. With reasonable luck he would also find the people on his side, and against his pursuers. He turned toward the east, toward the open countryside, and once more settled down to run.

As Blade and his pursuers raced up the moonlit streets, he was able to keep a good twenty yards between him and them without effort. He would have liked to widen the gap still more. Twenty yards was too easy a spearcast, even for men perhaps not used to the weapon. But for the moment there were more than twenty of the Holy Warriors tearing along after him, too many to risk fighting when they could see him coming and get ready to face him. When some of them started dropping out, however. .

The chase continued in deadly silence. The Holy Warriors had no wish to arouse a hostile people from their sleep. And Blade had even less wish to involve innocent people in a fight with the Holy Warriors of Ayocan. But, on the other hand, if they met a troop of King Thambral's soldiers. .

They met none, and the chase continued in lonely silence. Only the thud of feet on the dirty stones of the street and the heaving breathing of hard-running men broke that silence. Blade risked another look behind him. A few of the Holy Warriors had dropped out or back, but a good fifteen were still coming on hard. Pterin must indeed have picked the very best of all the Holy Warriors of Chiribu's temples to follow him on his mission.

What would happen to the Gonsaran temple mounds, now that Pterin was dead? In particular, what would happen to Isgon and Natrila for sheltering Blade? With Pterin dead, there might be no one of rank superior to Isgon. The Gonsaran Elder Brother would then once more be ruler in his own House. On the other hand, there might be another Elder Brother among Pterin's followers, ready to deal with Isgon and Natrila. How he would deal with them was not a pleasant thought.

But there was another equally unpleasant thought, one that Blade could not shake off. If Isgon survived and regained control of the Gonsaran temples, he would not be out of danger. Another Elder Brother could always descend on him, with an even larger force of disguised Holy Warriors and perhaps Death-Vowed. Isgon's only hope for survival would be to launch his Death-Vowed against the rulers of Gonsara as soon as he could. With Gonsara thrown into chaos by his efforts, he would have a strong card to play if any protests or threats came down on his head.

And if Isgon fell? Whoever succeeded him would have an equal need for a swift success. He would have to knit the shaken and divided Gonsaran temple mounds together again into a fighting unit. Such a man would be just as likely as Isgon to order out the Death-Vowed.

Blade had planned to flee into the country and remain there for a time. Within a week or two the hunt for him would die out, and he could safely return to Dafar and find means of passing what he had learned on to King Thambral. But now he would have no time. He would have to get to King Thambral as fast as possible and warn him.

All this ran through Blade's mind in a few seconds, without slowing down his pounding feet. Now he once more tried to recall the maps of Dafar. The High Palace of the Kings lay not far from the river, on the northern edge of the city. For the moment, Blade was running almost directly away from it. Could he turn about and cut back across Dafar toward the palace? Not without a fight with the dozen-odd men who were still on his trail.

As he looked back toward them, the moonlight sparked on a raised spearhead. Then the spear flashed through the air toward Blade. He cut sharply to the right. The spear sailed past him. Blade heard the wsssh it made cutting through the air and the clank its bronze point made on the stones. A moment later another spear sailed toward him, and again he had to shift sideways. Again the spear missed, but this time bits of stone gouged up by its point hit Blade in the leg. If he turned back toward the river, he would be giving his enemies a chance to cut him off, more than a chance to put at least one spear through him. And one would be enough.

But not far from the edge of the city the map had shown a second royal palace. The Summer Palace of the Queen, the map had called it. Blade remembered that, and he also remembered what King Hurakun had said about the current Queen of Gonsara. Young, Hurakun had told him, and susceptible to being influenced. A good person for Blade to start with, now that he had a tale to tell. Even if the queen herself were not at the Summer Palace, certainly he could find a sanctuary there, and an opportunity to quickly get word to King Thambral.

The Summer Palace was barely half a mile away, almost due south from where Blade was now. He would still have to turn and risk being cut off. He threw another look backward. There were still ten or eleven men after him, at least half a dozen of them with spears.

Blade took the first corner he came to at a dead run, swinging to the right without missing a step. The new street sloped upward slightly. Blade hoped that would slow his pursuers more than it would him. But he could not help realizing that his own breath was beginning to come short, his legs starting to ache, and his eyes to sting from the sweat pouring down into them.

His pursuers made the turn and flung themselves after him. One of them also flung a spear, and this time Blade felt the disturbed air of its passage on his skin. An inch closer, and the spear would have hit him. He forced his legs to move faster, and saw the gap between him and his pursuers open up a little. Not much, but enough so that the next two spearcasts came nowhere near him.

The slope was getting steeper now, and the houses on either side of the street were larger and more luxurious. Once Blade saw a head stuck out of a bronze-decorated gatehouse as he pounded past. Then the owner of the head saw Blade's pursuers, and hastily withdrew.

Still steeper, still higher, and now the branches of tall trees trailed over the street. Twigs and leaves flogged Blade's face as he ran, and he felt his eyes water and small cuts open on his skin. The blood ran freely out onto his sweat-slick cheeks and mixed with his perspiration. For a moment he had to slow down. The men behind him promptly gained several yards. Another spear whistled toward him. The trailing branches dragged it to a stop in midair and it clattered onto the stone well behind Blade. Then he was out from under the trees and in the open street again.

As the men behind him struggled through the trees, Blade caught sight of a high gray wall less than a hundred yards ahead, closing off the end of the street. Most of the stone was heavily overgrown with climbing vines. But on one clear patch Blade saw the red-ox badge of the ruling house of Gonsara. The sight put extra strength into his legs. He was halfway to the wall before the men behind him burst out from under the trees.

Another spear smacked into the stone behind him just as he reached the wall and leaped at the vines. For a sickening moment he felt them sag and tear under his weight. Was he going to be able to climb them after all? Then his hands gripped the heavier stalks, and he began pulling himself monkeylike up the wall.

Behind him the sound of pounding feet died, as his pursuers stopped. Blade turned, and saw that four of them still carried spears. He turned back and began to climb faster. As long as he was on the wall he was a slow-moving, all but helpless target.

But the wall was nearly thirty feet high. Long before Blade could reach the top the men behind began throwing their spears. He was halfway up when one smacked against the wall inches from his neck. And he was two-thirds of the way up when a second gashed his thigh. He bit back a gasp and continued climbing. A third spear sailed past him as he reached the top of the wall and rolled himself up onto the flat vine-grown stones there.

He looked quickly at the wound. By good luck it was only a shallow flesh wound, from which the blood oozed slowly. It would handicap him in a fight or a run, but it would not kill him. Then he looked down the inside of the wall-and swallowed.

At the foot of the wall a wide moat of scummy water lapped at the moss-grown stones. In the water Blade could see silvery dartings and leapings, and once a fish leaped entirely clear of the water. It was one of the tiny carnivores from the river. Even if he hadn't recognized it, he would have known what lurked in the water. The bare and bleached skeletons of animals-cats, dogs, goats — and men lay half-submerged in the shallow water along the inner side of the moat.

The moat was at least ten feet wide. And on the inner side was a thorny hedge, another ten feet wide and at least ten feet high. Blade looked down into the street again. The men were still there, and now they had been joined by half a dozen more. The newcomers all carried spears. Getting back down the outside of the wall was hopeless. He would be skewered like a butterfly on a pin before he was halfway down.

Climb down inside, then. No, jump. He would have to clear the moat-falling among the fish would be certain death. The thorns at least would not kill him. Blade rolled over toward the inner edge of the wall, keeping as flat against the stone as he could. Even so, the motion must have attracted attention from outside. Still another spear flashed past him, clearing the wall and the moat, falling into the hedge with a crackle of branches. Blade hoped that wouldn't alert sentries inside. All he needed was to be skewered by other spears as he tried to untangle himself from the hedge.

Now he was on the inner edge of the wall. He took a deep breath and rose to a crouch. Again the motion attracted attention, again a spear flew at him. This one laid open the back of his left hand, making him wince. His luck was about to run out. Another deep breath. He braced himself, gritting his teeth at the pain from his gashed thigh. Then arms and legs uncoiled in a single mighty snap of muscles, and he was flying through the air.

He was falling as he flew, and the black scummy waters of the moat were coming up at him fast. For a moment he felt a chill certainty that he was going to land in the water among the fish. Then the water was no longer under him, and it was the thorn bushes that were coming up fast. They came up very fast, and then they rose around him and he landed with a terrific crash of branches.

The springy branches sagged and bent under Blade's weight, and the thorns slashed and pricked at his skin. The impact of his landing carried him almost down to the ground, the thorns gashing his skin every inch of the way. He ended up spread-eagled in the bushes, so thoroughly tangled in the branches and the creepers that he could barely move.

As his head cleared, he realized that he was near the inner edge of the bushes. He realized that small insects were already beginning to whine around him, attracted by the blood and sweat on his skin. And he realized with another shock that a tall figure stood on the grass just inside the hedge. Eyes gleamed in its face; eyes fixed on him.