When the Green Star Calls

Chapter 21 WINGED HORROR

In these events I did not, of course, partake. I knew utterly nothing of them at the time, and it was not until very much later that I heard enough of the separate adventures of Zarqa and Janchan to reconstruct them; which reconstruction I have recorded here, so that these chronicles will be as complete and perfect as my poor skill can make them.

On that night when Prince Janchan left us to venture alone into the Yellow City, I lay awake, staring into the darkness, bitterly bemoaning my fate. That it should be by the hand of another that my beloved princess should be set free was intolerable to me and I viewed the notion with loathing.

At length I rose and silently dressed myself in warriors’ trappings and gathered up my gear, borrowing certain of the instruments which Zarqa had purloined from the Scarlet Pylon, and filling my pouch with the precious coins we had taken from the coffers of Sarchimus. Then I crept out of the tent of leaves into the darkness where the gaunt and faithful Kalood lay sleeping soundly on his pallet.

I could not endure the thought that it should be another who should rescue the woman I loved from peril, and not I myself. Prince Janchan was my tried and loyal friend, and a man of honor and chivalry, but I came close to hating him there in the secret watches of the night. That he should perform brave and gallant deeds before the admiring eyes of Niamh the Fair made me quiver with impotent fury.

I told myself that it was unfair to expect him to go forward alone into danger, that one other should stand beside him to make the fight more equal. Now I laugh grimly at my pathetic and foolish attempts to pretend I crept from the camp from noble and altruistic motives. By such ignoble means does the human heart delude itself, feeding on lies; for it was a lover’s jealousy alone that goaded me into the night—jealousy that another should win the admiration and thanks of the woman I loved.

I began to descend the slope of the branch. I know now that I should have left behind a note for Zarqa to find at dawn, when he roused and came to waken me and found me gone. I try to pretend that it was only because I lacked writing implements that I did not leave a note for him; but the answer is, quite simply, that my mind was a seething maelstrom of jealous fantasies and I never once thought of it.

It is at night that the terrible predators of the Green Star World emerge from nest and lair to hunt their prey. So, of course, I got into serious trouble before I had been gone from the camp more than half an hour.

I was striding down a small branchlet toward the crotch of the great tree when I stumbled into a small, grim drama.

An immense monster bee was slaying a grub.

The bee was the size of a full-grown bull, and many times as dangerous. Its glittering oval wings were like sheets of veined opal and its furred body glistened with an oily sheen. The grub was a huge soft sluglike thing and the stinger of the bee had run it through the belly. It bled copiously, red gore splattering the branch in every direction, and despite the gaping wound it yet lived and clung to the stinger which transfixed it, flopping and squirming slowly.

At my approach, the monster bee turned upon me a glittering and soulless gaze. Eyes like immense, faceted jet beads stared as if seeking to ascertain if my approach indicated danger. The dim, small intellect behind the glistening helm of horny black chitin doubtless assumed I meant to rob it of the fat grub that was intended for its nocturnal meal. I, of course, desired only to pass and continue on my way.

However, the branch was rounded here, and fell away in a giddy curve to either side of where the enormous insect squatted above its prey. I could not easily pass to either side, without danger of falling from the branch. So I stood there, waiting for the bee to bear away its dinner.

That was, it proved, exactly the wrong thing to have done under the circumstances. For my motionless presence roused vague suspicions of my harmlessness in the minuscule intellect of the predator. It turned from the dying grub to face me on the branch, its stalked and many-jointed limbs scissoring as it wheeled about. I saw the honey-sacs on its rear limbs as it changed position, and knew that this must be none other than one of the creatures Zarqa had referred to as a zzumalak.

Then it hurled itself upon me with blurring speed.

The zzumalak flashed at me like a charging tiger, and for a fatal fraction of a second I was too surprised to move or even flinch.

Dry, clawed mandibles seized me up, coarse-bristled forelimbs brushing against my bare thighs. In the next second my sword was out and I was fighting for my very life, there in the dense gloom, on the insecure footing of a blood-splattered and perilously narrow branch.

The deadly sting was a tapering needle of black horn thrice the length of my arm. It stabbed at me with blindingly swift, convulsive thrusts. Karn’s muscles and reflexes were those of a trained hunter, but he knew little of the formal art of fencing. But my mind was that of a trained swordsman, and I remembered much of the skill that had been instinctive to me when I dwelt in the body of Kyr Chong. So we were not unevenly matched.

It was an eerie duel, there on the high, swaying branch, amid the leafy darkness—man against monster bee—sword against sting. I parried every stroke with desperate skill, using every trick of the art of fencing I knew. Again and again my agile point slid past the monster’s guard and my blade sank deep into its curving flanks or thick-furred belly. But the zzumalak seemed utterly insensitive to pain and did not tire or slow, although the oily ooze that was its vital fluid leaked slowly from many puncture-wounds.

I had hacked away two of its clutching limbs, but one great claw still clutched me, caught in the leather straps of my trappings. Thus it was that when the zzumalok rose suddenly into the air on drumming wings, I went with it.

I was lucky, though. Dangerous as my position had now become, it could easily have been worse. Those sharp claws could have been sunk deep in my belly…

As the zzumalak rose into the air the dying grub wriggled over the incline of the branchlet and fell. Thus it was that with dawn when Zarqa came searching for some trace of me, he found only the blood shed by the grub, but no grub, and formed the natural assumption that the gore was my own.

Either from the burden of my weight or from some internal injury my blade had caused, the zzumalak wavered drunkenly in its flight. Wings of sheeted opal drummed unsteadily, falteringly, and the monster bee hurtled across the span between the tree whereon we had battled and its neighbor. This, by a lucky chance, was the tree in which the city of Ardha was built; but it might easily have been another.

The winged horror tipped, staggering in its flight, and began to lose altitude. I clung to the forelimb whose claws were caught in my harness, lest the wounded brute should release its grasp on me and I should fall into the abyss.

The wind whistled about me, whirling my cloak and tugging at my hair. The sickening depths of the abyss below swung giddily. The lamps of Ardha were nearer now.

My position was incalculably dangerous. I clung desperately with one hand to the bristled, horny limb of the injured zzumalak, my other hand still clenching the hilt of my sword, which I dared not lose.

At any instant the flying predator might falter in its flight and fall, bearing me with it to a horrible doom in the unthinkable abyss miles below.

Or it might well soar on past Ardha, carrying me countless leagues away from the Yellow City which was my goal.

And there was absolutely nothing I could do to alter the situation to the slightest degree in my favor. I could, I suppose, have thrust my blade deep into the thorax of the flying thing from beneath, hoping to strike a vulnerable organ. But that, of course, would merely precipitate me into the abyss.

The lights of Ardha were below me now. I glimpsed torchlit processions streaming through the boulevards of the city, and lantern-lit gardens, and the lighted windows of the mansions and palaces. The zzumalak flew an erratic, meandering course across the breadth of the metropolis, wavering drunkenly in its flight.

My one-handed grip on its foreleg was loosening as my hand wearied. Risking much, I released my grip in order to hold my scabbard steady while I sheathed my sword, which would bree both hands for the task of clinging ahold of my unpredictable steed.

And then the zzumalak dropped me and I fell like a stone.

Chapter 22 BLACK MASKS IN THE NIGHT

Perhaps I cried out as I fell; I have no idea, for, if I did, the wind whipped the cry from my lips.

The instinct that bids a doomed man cling to life is a powerful one. For I reached out desperately with both arms to catch some obstacle and break my fall.

To my own amazement I caught hold of a slender shaft of wood.

At the time I had no idea of what it was. Now, looking back on my memories of that terrible, endless moment of falling through space, I think it must have been one of the long, slim flagstaffs that thrust from the rooftops of Ardhanese buildings and from which heraldic banners are suspended.

My hands struck it—slipped—and clung. The pole bent nearly double, and then broke away under my hurtling weight. And again I fell, but slower now, for the momentary impediment had broken the impetus of my fall.

Then I caromed into a vast, curved panel of fabric that must have been some sort of an awning. The strong cloth boomed under the impact of my fall, then tore free from its frame. But it, too, had served to partially break my fall.

And the next instant I struck a sheet of ice-cold water and lost my senses. Seconds later I rose to the surface, stunned, half-drowned, but somehow alive and in one piece. Groggily, I struck out for the marble lip of the pool, and dragged myself over, to flop onto the thick cushion of a flower-bed. I lay there while the world spun dizzily around me, then I levered myself up on one elbow and vomited out the water I had swallowed. I must have swallowed half the pool, at least; I hope the keeping of goldfish was not an Ardhanese custom!

Then, somewhat recovered, I got unsteadily to my feet and looked around me in the gloom.

I stood amid a formal, rooftop garden on one of the tiers of a princely mansion. Unfamiliar miniature trees rose about me; flower-beds lay underfoot, and patches of grassy sward, and meandering walks strewn with chips of fragrant wood instead of gravel.

Colored paper lanterns swung overhead, suspended in long garlands hung from tree to tree. By their dim, multicolored illumination I could see the gleam of marble fountains and alabaster statuary. Ornamental gazebos rose amid trimmed hedges and grotesquely shaped topiary trees. Benches of glimmering crystal stood here and there upon the velvet lawn. It was most obvious that the zzumalak had dropped me into the roof garden of some noble’s mansion, for such an aerial pleasance denoted wealth and luxury.

And that implied the presence of guards. Any intruder caught stealing about the roof gardens by night would assuredly be thought a thief or an assassin. I had best leave at once, I thought. Thus far my precipitous descent into the garden pool had gone unnoticed. But my luck would not last forever. Keeping well to the shadows and avoiding where possible, the glowing paper lanterns that bobbed and swayed overhead, I prowled in search of a way out of here.

A flight of marble stairs caught my eye, the glimmer of light on its glossy balustrade. I headed toward it, through the scented trees. It led to a higher level, another rooftop, no doubt; perhaps from there I could jump or climb to the roof of an adjoining building. But how I was to get down to the street level without risking discovery by descending within one of these buildings I had no idea. Cursing the Ardhanese for their lack of fire escapes, I went swiftly up the stair to the higher level and found myself on a huge balcony faced with long glassed windows like French doors. Drapes were drawn before these windows, but the rooms beyond were brilliantly lit.

With my heart in my mouth and my drawn sword in my hand, I crossed the length of the balcony and found myself at the head of a second stair, identical in every respect to the one by which I had ascended. It led down to the roof garden again. I turned and looked up. The roof of this building was about twenty-five feet above me. The exterior of the building was of carved stone, worked into frowning masks and mythological figures which afforded an easy purchase for my hands and feet. Sheathing my blade again, I reached up, seized the shoulders of a stone caryatid, and began to climb.

I had come from the pool soaked and dripping, my dark cloak a soggy mass, my boots squelching underfoot. The dry air, the night wind, and my brisk exertions were rapidly drying me. So I scaled the wall with little difficulty, levered myself up over the roof-ledge, and found myself among a forest of chimneys and skylights. By now I was thoroughly lost, and further from the street level than when I had hauled myself out of that pool; but at least I was still undiscovered.

Not for long, however.

Four masked figures stepped from behind a tall chimney and pointed their daggers at me in ghostly silence.

I froze. There wasn’t much else I could do, for I stood on the edge of the roof and my footing was precarious. So, cursing inwardly, I let them take my blade.

Whatever they were, they were obviously not guards, for their features were concealed behind visors of black silk, through whose slits their eyes glittered warily. They wore close-fitting garments, also of black, supple gloves, and light, voluminous capes of black silken stuff. They ran gloved hands over me swiftly and lightly, found my purse, and detached it from my girdle.

One of the masked men loosened the drawstring and poured the contents of the purse into his cupped palm. Precious metals sparkled in the distant lamplight, as the coins we had taken from the coffers of Sarchimus, with which I had stuffed my purse, poured from the pouch.

The masked man smiled—almost, I thought, approvingly.

“Unusual to find a clever thief in one so young,” he said dryly. He poured the coins back it into my pouch which he then tucked away in a pocket on the inner lining of his cloak.

“Take him,” he said, and they were upon me.

The masked men fought in complete silence and mastered me in a trice. Their clever hands knew the location of the nerve centers of my body, and I suffered excruciating pain for an instant; in the next, my limbs were numb and paralyzed.

Thongs tightened about my wrists; they drew my ankles together and lashed them tight. Then a peculiar harness was drawn about my torso, with a long silken cord attached to it. I was too dazed at the swiftness of all this to wonder at this cord, but in the next instant it became clear to me.

For they pushed me off the roof!

And, for the second time in the same hour, I hurtled down to smash against the street below

But not quite! For the line attached to the harness drew taut. It checked my fall, crushing the air from my lungs. And I bounced and spun a few feet above the paven way, dangling at the end of the silken line.

I had fallen into a narrow, crooked, unlit alleyway. Now more masked men in black garments and cloaks melted out of the gloom to swarm about me. A knife flashed as one of them cut through the line. Strong arms caught me as the line loosened, easing me to the cobbles.

From where I lay on my back, staring up, I saw the masked men swinging lithely down the line from the roof above. In a few moments they landed lightly on the cobbles. The leader uttered a curt command. His men scooped me up and one sturdy rogue tossed me over his broad shoulders. They melted back into the shadows and moved silently and swiftly as the wind through unbroken darkness to an unknown destination.

What they wanted of me I did not know. Nor could I conjecture what my fate would be at their hands. But one thing I did know; and the knowledge was disquieting.

I had thought them thieves—as they had thought me.

But they were not thieves.

They were assassins!

Assassination is a peculiarly Laonese institution, and on the Green Star World they have raised the craft to the level of the fine arts. Clever, cunning men, trained in the disciplines of stealth and silence and secret murder, more than one of the jewel-box cities of this strange and wondrous planet has fallen beneath the dominance of the black-masked men.

In Phaolon, I knew, their guild had been broken generations before, and they had been driven forth. But here in Ardha, as I now surmised and would soon learn for certain, the Assassins’ Guild was a third power, and close in wealth and strength and influence to Temple and Throne.

My heart beat low. From the frying pan to the fire! From the clutches of one of the monstrous predators of the forest, I had fallen into the hands of the most dangerous and feared and murderous men in the world. And what they wanted of me I could not even guess…

Our rush through darkness bad been silent and swift. We came to a halt before a massive wall of ancient stonework that soared out of sight overhead. One black-cloaked man bent forward and touched a hidden spring. A portion of the wall sank soundlessly into the ground, and a black opening gaped.

The leader of the band looked at me.

“Vial number two,” he said quietly.

A black-gloved hand bore a small glass tube to my face and crushed it beneath my nose. I inhaled a pungent fluid that filled my head with piercing and aromatic vapors.

Then, in single file, stepping silently as cats, the Assassins vanished one by one into the black opening in the wall.

The burly-shouldered rogue bore me within as well.

But by then I knew nothing of my surroundings, nor of what occurred from that moment.

For the fluid in the vial had done its work, and I was unconscious.

Chapter 23 THE HOUSE OF GURJAN TOR

Perhaps an hour later I awoke in a barren, poorly-lighted room. I awoke instantly, coming from deepest slumber to full wakefulness without passing through the transitional phases. I felt perfectly comfortable, with no signs of headache or nausea or any other side effects of the drug. I smiled grimly; the Assassins of Ardha were remarkably adept in the pharmaceutical arts.

I rose to my feet from the pallet upon which I had awakened and looked about the room. The ceiling was raftered, with bare plaster between the rafters; the walls were wood paneling laid over what seemed to be solid stone. At least, thumping my balled fist at various places here and there on the walls, selected at random, I found no difference in sound that might suggest the presence of a secret panel.

Which was quite odd, for the room had neither windows nor door, and I had no idea how I had been brought in here, nor how my captors had left the room.

The floor was bare wood, inlaid with elaborate parquetry; this was the only note of ostentatious ornament about the chamber, which was otherwise quite Spartan in its rigorous simplicity. There were no hangings on the walls, no carpets on the floors, and no furnishings of any kind, save for the simple pallet in the corner, and a low sitting-bench, and a small wooden taboret which bore a single candle in a crystal dish.

There was, however, a jug of water, a cup of polished horn which was filled with a clear red wine, and a plate containing coarse brown bread and pickled meats. I was quite famished by this time—it must have been early morning by now—so I ate hungrily, and quenched my thirst.

The Assassins had taken nothing from me except my weapons. So I still bore over my shoulder a coil of the Live Rope we had carried off from the tower of Sarchimus, the vial of Liquid Flame, and my personal gear.

Even my purse had been returned to me, still filled with coins. The Assassins, it would seem, were no thieves.

The mystery of the doorless room intrigued me; search as I might, however, I could find no secret panel in the walls, nor were there any signs of a trap visible in the ceiling.

To pass the time I exercised, working up a good sweat. At length I rested from my exertions, drank some water, and finally, from sheer boredom as much as anything, stretched out on the pallet and napped.

Something awoke me an indiscernible period of time later. I lay without moving, lifting my lids a fraction of an inch, peering about me in the dimness. The candle had almost burned down, and the wick was guttering, old wax fuming, giving off a vile, greasy stench.

My skin prickled and uneasiness went through me. I cannot say how I knew it, but I felt inwardly certain that someone was watching me from a place of concealment. I lay still, my breast rising and falling with my breathing, feigning slumber. The pressure of invisible eyes were upon me; it was an uncanny sensation.

Suddenly a faint creaking sound came to my ears. Slitting my eyes, I peered at my feet. A square portion of the parquetry wherewith the floor was inlaid sank out of sight, and a man in black clambered lithely up from the opening.

So that’s how they worked the trick! The secret entrance to my cell was not in either ceiling or walls, but in the floor. And that explained as well the unusually ornamental floor decoration, for the complex patterns of inlaid, subtly contrasting woods, concealed the edges of the hidden trap.

The man stood motionlessly, watching me for a long moment. He was a small man, stunted, with bowed legs. Beneath his black silken visor, his face was long-jawed, knobby, and remarkably ugly. I recognized him as one of the men in the band that had captured me on the rooftop, for there was no concealing those bowed legs.

Then he came over to the pallet and shook me by one bare shoulder. I pretended to come awake with a great start and stared up at him with an assumed expression of bewilderment.

He chuckled.

“Frightened you, lad? Naught to fear… yet, at any rate.” His voice was hoarse—I had later to learn his fondness for strong, unwatered wine—and he had an indescribable accent I can only describe as the Laonese equivalent of Cockney.

I jumped to my feet.

“What do you want with me?”

“Well, first of all, your name,” he said, seating himself on my little bench. I gave it.

“Karn… ‘tis not an Ardhan name,” he said, rolling the name on his tongue as if tasting it. I acknowledged that it was not.

“Be you a member of the Thieves’ Guild, then?” he asked, naming a small competitor of his own Guild, with which a certain contention existed for control of the criminal underworld in the city. I told him that I was not.

“Who is your master?”

“I have none.”

“Your parents, then?”

“No parents, either.”

He rubbed a long, big-knuckled hand along his knobby jaw.

“Do you know where you are?”

“I assume this to be the headquarters of the Assassins’ Guild,” I said.

He nodded. Then; “This is the house of Gurjan Tor,” he said impressively.

“And who might Gurjan Tor be?” I asked indifferently.

“He is the chief of the Guild and the most celebrated of all Assassins,” he said.

“Well, if he’s that important, what does he want with a mere boy?” I asked bluntly.

He grinned cheerfully, displaying a remarkable set of broken and decayed teeth.

“A reasonable question, lad; aye, reasonable. And I’ll say this by way of answer; he just might have a purpose for a lad as young as you who has the guts and the wits to rob the Ispycian Palace alone and unaided, carrying off a fistful of rare and precious antique coins…”

I said nothing. This was the first inkling I had gained that the coins from the coffers of Sarchimus were more than common legal tender.

The bowlegged little man shook his head admiringly.

“Yes, I’ll hand it to you, lad, it showed a clear head and good sense. Most lads would be too inexperienced, or too afeared, or both, to spot the value of them coins. Why, they’d try to lug off a man’s-weight of tapestry or an abrium statuette, and would trip over their own feet in getting away. But, no, you picked the most valuable items of their size and compactness—next best things to gems, which would be locked in the vaults, anyway. For which reason, it’s Gurjan Tor himself would see you now, so come along…”

Without further ado the comical little man led me down through the floor and into a maze of tunnels from which we soon emerged into dim-lit and unadorned corridors.

As I followed him, I speculated on my fate. Perhaps I might get out of this alive, after all!

And I thanked my lucky stars I had paused to fill my pouch with coins…

The house of the Assassins was a dark, empty, gloomy place, filled with shadows and whispers and unseen eyes. My guide led me into a rather large room, as Spartan and devoid of decorations as the one in which I had awakened, save for a large divan in its exact center.

It was immense, this divan, and thickly strewn with glittering silks, luxurious furs, and many plump pillows. Thereupon reclined the fattest man I have ever seen. He must have weighed five hundred pounds if he weighed an ounce, and his obesity was repulsive and almost frightening, like a deformity. He was stark naked to boot, with a sumptuous velvet robe thrown casually about him, and through its front his vast paunch and wobbling, womanish breasts gleamed with an oily dew. It was perfume, I realized as I approached his silken nest. He was literally soaked in the stuff, and it was all I could do to breathe.

Amid this tangled bed of furs and jeweled silks and fat pillows, Gurjan Tor squatted like a bloated and obscene toad. From a low taboret of precious metals he was gobbling tidbits of wine-soaked meat. His little slitted eyes watched me, cold and shrewd and calculating, as I made the required obeisance. But neither then nor at any point during the interview did he for a moment cease slobbering over the greasy meats.

He was completely bald, his yellow moon-face inscrutable, save for the eyes. They were black as ink, and cold as ice. And they seemed to look through me to the very roots of my soul.

In few, terse words the bowlegged little man who had fetched me reported on his questioning of me. What he had to say seemed to please Gurjan Tor, for he smiled. Still stuffing his mouth with juicy gobbets, he inquired of me in a soft, high-pitched, almost feminine voice of my expertise in the use of certain weapons, of my experience in the several arts of stealth, and of my origin.

I told him what I truthfully could; and, as for my nonexistent career in thievery, I made up what details I could invent which sounded plausible.

Again, my answers seemed to please him.

“You speak with the accents of Phaolon,” he observed shrewdly, “yet claim birth among the forest barbarians; how is that?”

I was already perspiring, and this did not help my equanimity any, as you might imagine. For one thing I had never actually realized the Laonese spoke with regional accents.

I shrugged, attempting to appear unruffled. “My parents may have come from that city, for all I know,” I said. “Many are they whom the monarchs of the various cities have driven into exile among the forest-wandering tribesmen…”

“True enough,” he said in his high, sweet voice. Then, addressing the bowlegged man, who had doffed his visor upon entering the room in what was obviously accepted social custom among the Assassins, he said;

“Klygon, I am pleased. This youth shall be enlisted among the novices at once, and placed in training for Project Three. See to it.”

We backed from the Presence. The fat man did not deign to notice, having turned his full attention to a tray of sweets.

Chapter 24 I LEARN THE ARTS OF STEALTH

And thus I became an Assassin. Or a novice in training, at any rate. And my friend, mentor, master, and comrade was to be none other than Klygon the Sly, as he was called. For, as Master of the Novices, it was his task to teach and train the young apprentices of the Guild in the secret arts.

Klygon was a hard man not to like. His humor was sly and infectious, and his enthusiasm for assassinry—or whatever you might wish to call it—was that of a master artisan for his craft. The ugly, comical little man was an unsparing taskmaster, true, but he was wise and witty, generous and loyal. I grew fond of him.

I grew also to become a trained and experienced Assassin, and in less time than it seemed possible. I had been selected for one particular task—the mysterious “Project Three” of which Gurjan Tor had spoken—and my every waking moment for the next twelve days was devoted to the acquisition of the skills I should require for this task.

We rose at dawn and for two hours before breakfast Klygon drilled us in the formal and informal arts of swordplay. The formal arts consisted of those of the courtly duello; you might call it the art of fence. As I sorely lacked instruction in this science—so indispensable to one who desires to continue living in a world filled with ferocious monsters and no less savage human adversaries—I soaked up everything Klygon could teach me with great interest. As for what I have termed the informal arts of swordplay, these were the dirty tricks of rough-and-tumble street-fighting, the skills of the gutter.

After breakfast, as if we were not already aching from sore muscles, we exercised in a huge vaulted cellar-like chamber. Here Klygon taught us how to fall and tumble and roll and bounce back up, how to scale ropes, run on ladders, use line and grapnel, climb surfaces so smooth that even the nimblest monkey might find it difficult to seek a toehold. We learned also how to tread as soundlessly as a cat; first on a bare floor full of creaking boards, then on a darkened stair littered with pots and pans, and finally on a bed of crisp, dry leaves. No Mohawk on the warpath could slink through the forest aisles as silently as I, when I completed this phase of my training.

Normally, I was given to understand, the pace of Klygon’s tutelage was more leisurely. In my case the pace was accelerated almost beyond human endurance, and all because of the impending Project Three, whose hour was rapidly approaching.

I began to pick up bits and pieces of information, which I fitted together one by one. In the first place, I learned that there was much more to being an Assassin than just learning how to kill silently and swiftly. Of a certainty the Assassins of Ardha killed political opponents on commission; but they also dealt in kidnapping, in blackmail, and in the theft and sale of secrets.

There is probably no need for me to say, that, in the matter of becoming a novice of the Assassins, I had no choice; in fact, my wishes were not even consulted. The decision was that of Gurjan Tor alone. It was either accept and make the best of it, or die in any one of a number of less-than-pleasant ways. For once you have entered the house of Gurjan Tor, and have been admitted to the secret circle of the Assassins, there is no leaving it, save as a member of the Guild, or feet forward, as the saying goes. So I perforce became an Assassin.

The political situation here in Ardha was singularly complex, I learned. For years a three-way power-struggle between Throne, Temple, and Guild had all but rent the kingdom asunder into sharply divided factions.

Some time ago, when the Tyrant delivered his ultimatum of marriage or war at the court of Niamh the Fair, he had held the central position of power. But the failure of that attempt, and his subsequent failure to either bring Phaolon to its knees or mount an army of invasion, had considerably wakened his grasp on the reins of power. The failure to launch an invasion, I now learned, was due simply to a lack of funds.

Seeing the power of the Throne Faction eclipsed, Holy Arjala the Goddess Incarnate had made her bold strike for power. Yielding the Temple revenues for one year to Gurjan Tor had won her the temporary allegiance of the Guild to her side; and thus the balance of power tipped from Throne to Temple. It was Arjala’s ultimate ambition to share the throne of Akhmim, thus uniting the power of both factions into a single cause. This had been done, incidentally, in Phaolon much earlier; in the reign of Niamh’s father, Throne and Temple had aligned in marriage, and my beloved princess was herself considered the Goddess Incarnate in her realm, as well as queen thereof. But the Phaolonians represent a higher and more sophisticated level of civilization than the backward and warlike race of Ardha; in Phaolon, the national religion was a social custom, to which lip service was paid, but it exerted little power and little authority over the minds of the citizenry; not so in Ardha.

Of this new alignment of power in Ardha, Gurjan Tor was wary. The Goddess has bought his allegiance, but not, it would seem, for long. I think the cunning leader of the Assassins feared, and not without good reason, that once Arjala and Akhmim had united their factions, they would turn upon the Guild and destroy it, thus eliminating the only potential disruptive factor in their midst.

In other words, the old double-cross was coming.

But Gurjan Tor planned to get there first.

The days crept by slowly, and I chafed to see valuable time elude me. For all I knew, every hour brought Prince Janchan nearer to his goal of rescuing the Princess of Phaolon. And he was free to act at will, to come and go as he pleased, with no restraints on his movements (insofar as I knew), while I was a prisoner of the Assassins.

It was infuriating. But, frankly, Klygon kept me so busy from dawn to dark, that I really had little opportunity to consider these matters. All day I trained in the wearisome arts of stealth; at night I crept into my bed bone-weary from sheer exhaustion, and my slumbers were deep and without dreams.

As yet I neither knew nor suspected anything of the nature of the mysterious Project Three for which I had been selected. When I inquired of Klygon concerning it, the bowlegged little man looked uncomfortable and muttered something or other to the effect that I would know in due time.

“But I want to know now,” I complained.

“Be a good lad,” he advised, “and it’d be wise if you troubled yourself naught about it.”

“But why is it being kept a secret from me?” I demanded.

He shrugged, and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.

” ‘Tis the will of Gurjan Tor that the scheme be kept secret, lad. And you’d be better to learn now that no one goes against the will of Gurjan Tor! Not if he wants to keep on breathing, he don’t…”

So I held my peace and applied myself to my training, but kept my eyes and ears open all the same. The days passed slowly and I prospered in my studies. Klygon, who regarded his craft with the affection and enthusiasm and dedication a connoisseur feels for his favorite art, shook his head admiringly at my progress as I displayed my newly-acquired skills before him.

“Aye, lad, you do me proud; and I doubt not that even Gurjan Tor would think you a real credit to your teacher!”

But he still wouldn’t tell me what it was all about.

The Flower Boat Festival neared. This annual day and night of carnival was celebrated with great festivities by the folk of Ardha. And it occurred to me more than once, as the deadline for the termination of my training grew nearer and it could be seen that it was obviously planned to coincide with the great national festival, that on such a night a deed of stealth would have the greatest possible chance of success. With the boulevards and avenues thronged with celebrants, every wineshop and pleasure garden filled with citizens, the guardsmen would have their hands full and their work cut out for them.

This had also occurred to Gurjan Tor.

Festival day dawned. I saw nothing of the day-long processions, the flower-barges drawn by matched teams of zaiphs or dhua; locked away in the secret citadel of the Guild, I did not even know of Arjala’s magnificent coup as she sprung the existence of her bewinged and celestial captive, Zarqa the Kalood, on an astounded populace and a completely confounded Akhmim. But word of this reached the central room where Gurjan Tor squatted like some bloated and obscene toad in his silken nest. And Klygon and I were again summoned into the Presence.

On this occasion the half-naked fat man was gorging on slivers of pickled fishmeat as we entered the bare and gloomy chamber and rendered him our obeisance.

With a silver skewer he indicated a wall-chart.

“The boy must be ready tonight,” he squeaked in his high-pitched, feminine voice. “And an hour earlier than planned. Matters have changed, perhaps for the better. Yonder chart shows the inner structure of the Temple; the red crossmark indicates the position of a room on one of the upper tiers. In that room is a certain prisoner, whom you will slay. The red dotted line indicates the route you will follow to and from the target chamber. Memorize the plan well.”

I did so, having been trained in the arts of memory as well as murder. Not that I intended murdering anyone for Gurjan Tor, of course. Once free of this building, I would go about my own business, and the lords of The World Above have pity on the souls of any Assassins who tried to get in my way!

“The second red cross on the higher level indicates the chamber wherein a second prisoner is immured. This prisoner, too, you will slay. The weapon of choice for both deeds is the needle-stiletto in whose use Klygon informs me you have been trained to excellence. On this occasion, a mere scratch will suffice, for the blade has been steeped in phuol-venom.”

“And who are these two prisoners I am to murder, if I may ask?” I inquired, greatly daring.

Gurjan Tor studied me thoughtfully for a few moments, then shrugged fat quivering shoulders.

“No reason why you should not know,” he said. “The second prisoner is a strange winged golden-skinned male creature with violet eyes whom the archpriestess is passing off on a deluded and superstitious populace as a blessed amphashand.”

I reeled. Then Gurjan Tor dropped a second bombshell.

“The first prisoner is Niamh the Fair, regnant Princess of Phaolon, whom Arjala holds as a means of controlling Akhmim.”

And then he dropped the third.

“Klygon will accompany you on this mission to see that you do not stray from the appointed task. If you do, he will kill you… “

Chapter 25 PROJECT THREE

My mind in a whirl, I followed Klygon from the room and went with him to the floor where the novices were housed and trained.

Now the full scheme had been made known to me, I understood the thinking of Gurjan Tor in all its insidious complexity. Arjala’s hold over the Tyrant of Ardha lay in her possession of Niamh. With Niamh slain in the Temple itself, a new breech would widen between the two factions. Moreover, Gurjan Tor’s agents would doubtless spread it about that Arjala had ordered the Princess of Phaolon murdered, which would further enrage Akhmim and might cause considerable resentment among the citizenry to boot, since Niamh was a valuable captive worth an enormous ransom.

As for Zarqa, I had at this time no idea how he had come to fall into Arjala ‘s toils, but the chief of the Assassins had said something about her passing him off as one of the mythical winged messengers from the Laonese heaven, so his murder would probably be considered the ultimate limit in sacrilege.

So it turned out that Project Three actually fitted in with my own most earnest wishes to a remarkable degree! The Assassins would somehow get me into the Temple, thus affording me the perfect opportunity to free the woman I loved and my sad-eyed Kalood friend, as well. It could not have been more ideal for my purposes if I had designed the scheme myself.

That my ugly little mentor and friend Klygon would accompany me on this mission was the only element in the plan I regretted. I had become enormously fond of the homely, humorous little man in the days just past, and I had no desire to injure his standing with his chief—and certainly no wish to kill him. But I could hardly permit this sentiment to stand in the way of the safety of the woman I loved. No, Klygon would be gotten out of the way, somehow.

We napped, rose, bathed, feasted lightly, and armed ourselves for the fulfillment of Project Three. For the first and, I hoped, the last time, I donned the skintight black raiment of the Assassins. I slung the coil of Live Rope around my shoulders, hid the vial of Liquid Flame in the purse at my girdle, and clipped the scabbards which held the poisoned stiletto and a slender, well-balanced long sword to the warriors’ harness of black leather straps I had donned over my Assassins’ raiment. As I settled the customary black silk visor over my face, I reflected on the events to come. It was going to be quite a night!

But just what kind of a night, I had no slightest inkling.

The house of Gurjan Tor rose on the outskirts of Ardha, in a dingy and furtive quarter of the city, given over to crooked alleys, grimy wineshops, slums, and hovels.

We ascended by curving ramps to the roof of the building. There rose covered pens in which zaiphs and dhua were tethered. For our purpose, Klygon had selected two especially trained zaiphs. I have elsewhere in these chronicles had occasion to describe the peculiar flying steeds used by the Laonese in lieu of horses. They resemble nothing so much as mailed and glittering dragonflies grown to the size of Percherons. Because of their sparkling, transparent wings and glistening armor-like chitin, you might think them an odd choice for a night mission of the greatest stealth and secrecy, since the slightest glimmer of reflection could easily betray our position to watchful guards. Well, the astute Klygon had anticipated this, and the twin zaiphs he had chosen for our steeds had been painted on their horny parts with a dull, nonreflecting tarry substance. As for heir oval, elongated, glassy wings, these had been dulled and darkened with sooty powder.

We mounted the saddles strapped about the upper thorax of our winged steeds. I gathered the reins in my hand as the zaiph-keepers strapped us in against danger of falling. There came the humming thunder of beating wings. The enormous insects rose from the roof, circled the house of Gurjan Tor once, and they soared off through the night sky in the direction of the Temple precinct.

We did not permit our zaiphs to perch on the Temple roof, for here the Temple Guards kept their own zaiphs penned and the usual keepers were doubtless about; we could hardly have landed without protection. Instead, we guided our mounts to the level above that described by Gurjan Tor as the apartment in which Zarqa the Kalood was imprisoned. Then the zaiphs hovered on throbbing vans while Klygon and I unstrapped ourselves from the saddles and climbed out onto the face of the building. The ornamental sculpture wherewith the Laonese customarily adorn their buildings, sometimes to the point of excess, naturally afforded us a variety of hand-and footholds. Thus neither Klygon nor I found it particularly difficult to climb down the outer wall to a ledge whereon we could stand erect.

As we slithered down the wall toward the ledge, I reflected wryly yet again on the fortunate fact that the Laonese do not suffer from the fear of heights; for what I was then engaged in doing—creeping down the sheer face of a building hundreds of feet above the pavement, clinging by my fingers and toes alone—would have petrified most Earthmen with utter terror.

We gained the ledge in safety and I secured one end of my Live Rope about a heavy caryatid and let the line dangle down to the window of Niamh’s suite.

As I did so I heard a muffled explosion, followed by a shrill cry of fear.

I climbed over the ledge on my belly and seized hold of the line, thinking nothing in particular about the sounds I had heard. Just then my thoughts were filled with the problem of Klygon and how to rid myself of his presence without having to kill him. I was also preoccupied with the problem of clambering down the line, for the Live Rope we had taken from Sarchimus’ tower was slick and glassy and not easy to get a grip on.

Then a ruddy light steamed through the window below my heels and I heard the crackle of flames!

I didn’t have the slightest idea what was going on in Niamh’s suite, but it was obvious some kind of accident had occurred and the possibility that my beloved was in danger spurred me to new feats of agility.

I clambered further down the line toward her window, through which flames now crackled.

Above me on the edge, Klygon knelt, steadying the line.

And then there occurred the most incredible and unexpected sequence of events imaginable. So swiftly did it happen that it was over in seconds, and there was a dreamlike unreality about it all.

As I clung to the line, descending toward Niamh’s window, but still some yards above it, invisible in my black cloak and garments against view from below, something came hurtling out of the night to hover before the window which was my goal.

It was the skysled, with Zarqa mounted upon it!

The sled came to a stop before the window and the gaunt Kalood reached across the sill to touch someone on the shoulder, and I heard a woman scream.

A fraction of a second later the arms of a stalwart young man appeared, lifting the slim body of a girl out onto the sled.

The girl was Niamh!

A moment later, the young man—Prince Janchan—appeared in the window bearing an unconscious woman of remarkable and vivid beauty. From the gemmed coronet and breastplates and girdle she wore, I was certain she could be none other than Arjala herself.

He lifted her into the waiting arms of Zarqa, who deposited her beside Niamh in the rear of the sled.

Then he sprang from the inferno the room had swiftly become and clambered upon the sled himself.

And, so swiftly had all of this taken place, that still I hung there, clinging to the line, frozen with shock, unable to speak or move or even to cry out.

And in the very next instant the sled swung away, bearing left, and flashed from sight.

I hung there helplessly, as Zarqa the Kalood and Prince Janchan flew to safety, bearing away Niamh the Fair—leaving me behind, dangling far above the street, at the mercy of the Assassins, in the city of my enemies in which I no longer had one single friend!