The woman exclaimed and would have moved to his aid. But with one hand he waved her back, fighting to speak again.
"I leave you now the cloak of Ugana fur, the sword of the Lion, the crown of the great queen Balkis-Candace—"
Long ago those words had lost their meaning save as a ritual so sacred and old that Andas, without thinking, responded to them. That no one knew what a "lion" was or remembered a great queen Balkis-Candace did not matter. What did was that this man, wounded to his death, invoked something so sacred, so much a part of Andas's breeding, that he went to his knees and stretched forth both his empty hands. It was a gesture he had thought to make one day, but kneeling before the altar of Akmedu, and the man saying that to him would have been a tall and glorious figure in brilliant robes, the Emperor, an old man of his own house accepting him as heir.
The harper raised both hands, though they wavered and shook. And they fell rather than were placed on Andas's hands. They tried to grip Andas's fingers, but had no strength left. It was his hold that kept them linked.
"By the rite of the crown, the spear, the shield, the Lion, the—the—"
"The thorn." Andas supplied for the faltering voice. "By the water which freshens the desert, the clouds which veil the mountains, the will of Him who is not named by lesser beings, by all these, and the blood of my heart, the strength of my arms, the will of my spirit, the thoughts of my brain, so do I accept this burden and rise under it."
He spoke steadily, the harper watching him with feverish and demanding eyes, his lips shaping the words he did not say aloud as he followed the great oath with such intensity that it was plain the whole of his being was now centered on hearing Andas intone it to the end.
"Rise under it, to serve those who look to me for bread, for water, for life itself. So rest on me this burden until the end of that time written in the stars for me, when I shall go forth on the road that no man seeth. And this do I promise by the key, which I lay hand upon." He had dropped those lax hands and fumbled at the breast of the coverall. He drew out the talisman, and the fire seemed to leap higher at that moment, giving fiery life to what lay in his grasp.
The harper looked at it, and his face contorted into a painful smile.
"Well, oh well, have we wrought, Andas Kastor that was, Andas Kastor that will be! Emperor and lord, hold well the key—the key—"
Once more he fought for words, but this time he could no longer hold fast to the last wisp of strength. His eyes closed, and he fell forward, hunching over the harp. His hands tore at it in a last struggle, and in his frenzied grasp the strings broke with a horrible discord.
-12-
Shara put both fists to her mouth as if to stifle some cry. The Salariki spoke first.
"He is dead. But what did he ask of you?"
Andas still knelt, looking at the huddled body. He answered absently in Basic.
"He put upon me the Emperor's oath, passing to me rule and reign. Though if he had the right to do so—" He glanced about at the ruins. This was no housing for one with the right to pass the oath—which was done only in an atmosphere of great richness and ceremony.
Shara tugged at the body, drawing it back so that the harper's face could be seen. Since his driving will and spirit had departed from it, that face was now a mask of endurance and despair.
"Who was he?" Andas demanded.
"Emperor and lord." She did not look at him, but continued to pull at the flaccid body, straightening it.
"Of what? By the look of him he—"
"He fought when lesser men lay down and willed the coming of death. He believed and worked for that belief!" She came alive, on fire, facing him across the body, as if she had taken into her own wasted form the energy that had held a dying man to a fearsome task. "He was the only hope of the empire. And when he knew he had taken his death blow, he held off death that he might bring one to stand for him—"
"Stand for him? But how can I do that, woman, unless I know the whole of the tale?"
Though she appeared the poorest of desert nomads, yet this Shara spoke the pure court tongue. Also he was beginning to think she was much younger than she first appeared. What was she to the dead man? Wife, Second Lady? But at least she ought to make some sense now of what had happened to Andas.
She had taken off the piece of rough material she had wound about her shoulders as a shawl, straightening it out gently over the body, covering the face that was a mask of Andas's own.
"You are right. There is a time for mourning and the beat of drums, and a time when such must be forgotten. He knew he had but hours when he came hither, so upon me he laid the burden of remaining alive, of playing guide to the one who would come.
"This is a world twin to your own. I do not know why this is so. But it is true that those from your place have come among us from time to time. It seemed they could do this by chance but could not go back. The Magi Atabi worked to discover the secret. He made many experiments. The last was this—" She pointed to the harp with the now broken strings. "It was his belief that certain sounds could open the gate between. When he was an old man, a very old man, he came to court, to beg of the Emperor a chance to put his invention to the test.
"That was when Andas saw him. His tutor was a pupil of the Magi's and took Andas to meet him. And the old man, fearful of getting no notice from the authorities (which he did not), took much time and trouble to explain to Andas what he wished to do.
"But already the shadow reached over us. He had no listeners—save a prince who was a young boy."
She paused, and she no longer surveyed the shrouded body or Andas, but rather raised her eyes to the broken wall, rapt in some vision of her own. Andas spoke to her gently and as he might to an equal in rank.
"You speak of a shadow, lady?"
"Yes. And that shadow has a name—a foul name—one to be spat upon! Kidaya—Kidaya of the Silver Tongue!" Her wan face flushed darker. "Kidaya of the House of the Nahrads."
Andas started, and she must have noticed it.
"Do you know of her then? Is your world also so cursed?"
"Of Kidaya I have not heard. But the House of Nahrad, the Nameless people of the Old Woman—yes, I have heard of them. How came one of the cursed line to your court?"
"You might well ask. Ask it of those who sing the Bones. It was decreed after the rebellion of Ashanti that none of the Nameless were to come within one day's journey of the Emperor. Yet Kidaya came to lie in his bed, to eat from his marriage plate, though she did not wear the crown. Even a man bewitched can be kept from some crimes! He took her into the Flower Courts, but he dared give her no First Honors. And for that Kidaya made him pay, and this whole empire crumbled into what you see about you—ruin and decay.
"Faction was set against faction by her cunning, and one rebel after another arose. She laid memory spells on the Emperor, so he felt hatred toward those who served him most loyally. Houses fell, their heads and all their families slain. Even Andas's life was saved only by a trick—" She laid her hand on the covered body.
"When he was of an age to take shield, he was the only true-line heir. She had seen to that by her web-spinning. The Emperor was too old, too sunk in her dreams, to be reached by those who would still save him and the empire. But she—she did not grow old! The witchcraft of the Old Woman held, so that she grew in outward beauty and in evil power as the years passed.
"But she bore no son—openly. There was a story that in secret she mothered a daughter, dedicated to the Old Woman from the first drawing of her breath, and that daughter Kidaya determined would hold the key—"
At her words Andas's hold tightened upon the talisman. There was nothing to say that a woman could not rule in her own right. Twice over in the past had there been an empress who touched what he now carried. But that anyone tainted with the forbidden knowledge would so aspire—!
"When she thought she was strong enough to move, she wrought upon the Emperor until he turned his face from Andas. There was a silly plot unco
vered, so botched a matter that all knew it was but a sham to give the Emperor reason for decreeing the Second Punishment—"
Again she paused, and Andas drew a whistling breath. In his own world the Second Punishment existed only in the dark annals of long past history, though it could still be used by law against any of the royal clans who rebelled. Yet it had not been so for more than a hundred years. To what barbaric state had this twin world sunk that this punishment could be once more invoked against a man?
"But his eyes—" he protested. The dead man's face was hidden, but Andas was sure he had not been mistaken. Those eyes had been normal—he had not been blinded.
"He had friends still, ready to risk their lives and more than the true line not come to an end and that witch sit on the Triple Throne," Shara said. "But he played a game thereafter such as few men would have the strength to do, for he wore the mask of the Second Punishment, and no man knew that he had not lost his eyes. As a blinded prince he had no chance for the throne. She could contemptuously let him crawl into any hole he chose to hide shame and disgrace. But he lived and so won a small victory, since she would not send against him, blinded, such evil arts as the Old Woman's blood-sworn knew, such as had been turned against others. He was a nothing, a grain of dust she had swept aside and need not remember."
"But he was not blind," Andas said slowly. A blind prince, a cripple, one slack or injured of wits, could not stand as emperor—an easy way in the dark old days to sweep away a rival. But for a man to play blind so cunningly to save his life, that required such patience that he marveled at the thought of it.
"He was not blind. And he was young, very young, but his wits were old and his understanding great. He played his part very well. At first she kept him about the court, a warning and a threat to others. Also, I think, a symbol of her own triumph to please herself. But at last she discovered that pity does not die under disfavor, and she sent him to the Fortress of Kham. There she made her mistake."
"The mountaineers have never welcomed those of the Old Woman," Andas commented. Though that knowledge was of his world and not this, he saw Shara nod.
"Is that so with you as well as us? It is true. They had a spirit caller of unusual power, one sworn to peace and well versed in the inner life. He had made several miraculous cures—publicly. The commander of the fortress then was of the House of Hungang—"
"So he would be shield-up against all the Nameless." Again Andas interrupted. This was like viewing a half-remembered history tape.
"That is so. And the spirit caller wrought another cure—but on that day also the news of the Emperor's farewell flashed from the Triple Towers."
"So civil war followed? Did your Kidaya have enough of the lords to back her?"
"She had built well. Three-quarters or more of those making up the inner circle of the court were her men. She need only close her fist to crush them, as they well knew. Yes, she had backing, and there was war. But it would have been an even judgment between us had she not brought mercenaries from the stars. And they had such weapons as beat the loyal houses out into the hills like beasts. Since then all has gone wrong." Shara raised her hand and let it fall. "The mercenaries hold the center of the land. But they have had no further help from off-world since our raiding parties destroyed the call tower at Three Ports two years ago. They have already had to abandon many of their weapons for lack of ammunition or repairs.
"Also there was the choking death, and they died from it, more of them than us. It is even said that the choking death was one of their weapons that was misused, since it spread out of Zohair after they occupied it. There are other ills, though, that Kidaya has loosed—the night crawlers—"
Andas shivered. "But those are only legends—to frighten children. Sensible men—"
"Sensible men believed not—and died! What we prate of as superstition in the days of pride and safety may seem different in the dark when men hide from death. The night crawlers here are real. Then—then there was betrayal in our own small ranks!" Her voice, which had held so even and colorless, suddenly quavered. "My dear lord was so struck down. He knew that he had his death wound, though he held to life with both hands as long as he could that he might bring aid to those who had put their trust in him. For months he has sought the cache left by the Magi Atabi, hoping that in it might be some weapon strong enough to turn against the invaders now that they are weakened. But when he found it, then that secret enemy struck. I think that it was in the mind of that unknown one to take what my lord had found and use it to bargain with Kidaya.
"But my lord beat off the attack, losing in it all save me. And he would allow me only to bind his wounds and aid him here—with what he had found in the cache—for the Magi had left a writing, and my lord believed that with this strange harp he could summon from the other world one who was himself there. As he did! So he passed to your hands the power, the task—"
"But, my lady, this is not—I cannot—" For the first time Andas realized fully what he had done when, bemused by the ritual of the passing of rule, he had taken those oaths to a dying man. This quarrel was not his. He could not possibly take upon his shoulders the burden he understood so little. The first who met him would know him for an impostor.
"You are Andas, Emperor." She looked at him sternly. "I bear witness, as can this alien—whom you so foolishly brought with you—that you are. And with my swearing so, who would believe otherwise? You have his face."
"He has a scar. There is a difference," Andas was quick to point out.
"That scar was gained but a few days before the final attack in which he was wounded," she told him. "None living, save me now, knew he had it."
"And who are you that your voice will make or unmake an emperor?" Andas demanded.
He could see nothing about her that would give credence to the certainty with which she spoke—as if she held the power she allotted in her tale to Kidaya. She was a bone-thin woman with her hair in the tight, small braids of a nomad, wearing tattered sacks as a robe of honor.
"I am Shara, the Chosen of Emperor Andas." Her chin lifted, and there was about her a pride which was as illuminating at that moment as if she did indeed stand with her feet in the slippers of gold, the pearl diadem on her dusty head. "I am of the House of Brawa-Balkis. What say you to that, son of the House of Kastor?"
Kastor was a royal house, yes. But there were older clans with the right to provide a ruler at the Triple Towers, and of them all Balkis was the fabled, the legendary one. The last daughter of Balkis had chosen to unite with Brawa. But long ago that house had dwindled and disappeared in his own world. Chance could have kept it alive here, and Andas recognized a speaking of the Blood. No one would claim such heritage unless it was the truth.
He raised his hands in the formal gesture of one veiling his eyes before a sun-bright superior. "Hail, Blood of the Blood."
"Far away and long ago that." Her voice had lost that chill pride. "But here and now I am the Chosen. Do you think that my word concerning you will not be believed? You are Andas, Emperor. And he who lies here—he must be laid secretly with only the honors we can do him in our hearts, not even knowing where he lies."
But she was moving too fast for him. Andas got to his feet and, for the first time in many moments, remembered the Salariki. He turned to look for Yolyos and could just barely make out the alien's form as the other hunkered down some distance away, facing out into the rain and the night as if he were on guard. Andas went to him.
"You now have some knowledge of what this means." Yolyos greeted him with a statement rather than a question.
Andas repeated all Shara had told him.
"So he gave you the rule. And she says that you are now the Emperor and plans to hide his death and pass you off as him. You will do this?"
Andas had been dodging the need for a decision. Perhaps that was why he had listened to her story, tried to keep his mind on the past rather than the present or the future.
But one fact was ever before him.
Though he had not taken that oath in the temple or before the glitter of a court, he had given it. And all the conditioning of his life had set in one mold, that the Emperor had a duty of service. Once he had taken the oath, he was no longer so much a man as a symbol. Though that was cold and bleak, yet it was the position to which he had been born and bred.
Could he explain it so that Yolyos would understand? Andas sought to put it into words—only death now could dissolve his responsibility. He could not tell why he had been moved to answer the appeal, the determined will of that other Andas. But having done so, he was bound.
"And if you are not in truth this Andas, but an android?" Yolyos asked then as Andas stumbled through his explanation, finding his logic dwindle when he had to present it to an alien who could not understand long conditioning.
"I am Andas, Emperor, now!" He refused that other thought.
"This female tells you there is no going back. Can you believe her?"
"As she knows it, she is telling the truth. And the harp that seems to have brought us here, it is now broken."
"Conveniently, as far as they are concerned," Yolyos growled.
Andas was jolted out of his own concerns. He might be bound here, but what of the Salariki? He certainly had no duty pressed upon him by death and a ritual of words, and he would be wholly in exile.
"Perhaps there is other information kept by this Magi, to be found in the cache of which she spoke. We can—"
"Always hope?" Yolyos finished for him. "Yes. Also there is this. As you have found yourself so superseded in your time, perhaps I also have been long so. There has never come any good of counting the horns on a Kuay buck before one has shot it, nor the teeth of a gorp that escapes one's net. It is better to look to the foretrail than behind one. So we hide this emperor's body—then what?"