‘I do not know. What are you?’
‘A mage. A traveller here.’
‘A mage? Ah — a manipulator of interdimensional leakage.’
A what? Pon-lor wondered.
‘The flavour of your art is oddly familiar to me. Why should this be? I must examine you.’
A bulge swelled the side of the towering white-argent pillar. A mountain of puissance descended towards him — enough to scatter his atoms.
Pon-lor snapped away. His chest swelled reflexively, drawing in a panicked breath. He opened his eyes expecting a firestorm about him, the trees drifting away in motes of soot. His palms tingled with sweat and his heart was pounding as if he’d just completed a full course of muscle isolation.
All was quiet. Heng-lon glanced back to him from where he sat poking at the fire, his spear across his lap. It was night. A light rain had begun. They were not alone; someone was approaching. A large party. He sensed them but the kid hadn’t yet. Presently, the lad sprang to his feet, spear levelled in both hands. He jerked the iron point left and right. It trembled in the firelight. The youth backed up until he stood level with Pon-lor. He drew a short-bladed knife from his sash.
Not so stupid after all, then, if his plan is to release me to help in any possible fight to come.
But it was a grinning Thet-mun who emerged from the dark. The firelight glimmered from his teeth and eyes. He looked immensely pleased and went straight to their heaped gear. ‘Where’s the palm wine?’ he demanded. ‘Ha! Here’s my beauty.’ He lifted a skin and took a long pull, wiped his mouth.
‘We have them, turtle-boy! Got them both. You should’ve seen it. It was laughable. They walked right in. Ha!’ He raised the skin and poured another stream into his mouth.
Heng-lon — turtle-boy, apparently — laughed as well, though he obviously had no idea why.
The rest of the bandit crew now came tumbling in from the dark. All were grinning and snorting laughs. Two carried a roped body between them that they threw down next to Pon-lor. A girl, or rather a young woman. She was unconscious.
By the Founders! Was this the witch? Could they have really …
Jak arrived to snatch the skin of palm wine from Thet-mun’s hand. He leaned over Pon-lor, took a sip, then stood staring down at him for some time. Finally, he pulled an exaggerated moue of disappointment. ‘You high and mighties. Look at you. Useless.’ He straightened to peer about, spread his arms wide. ‘I beat you! Me! A lowly cast-out nobody you sneered at! Well … look at you now!’
‘Coming!’ one of the bandits shouted from the jungle.
Coming? What could they …
Heavy measured steps sounded over the pattering of raindrops. They came from beyond the cover of thick wide leaves. Pon-lor straightened where he sat. They’ve done it! Brought it to me! Time to end this ridiculous charade.
A heavy curved blade flashed before his vision to press against his neck. Myint’s head rested on his shoulder from behind. ‘Don’t try anything, sweetie.’ And she blew a kiss into his ear.
Pon-lor let his shoulders drop. Why do I keep underestimating these wretches?
Jak snapped his fingers, gesturing. A spear was thrown to him and he spun it to rest its keen bright iron point against the unconscious woman’s side. The stand of tall ferns shook, tossing raindrops everywhere, then was thrust aside and an armoured giant strode through, a wide bright yataghan blade outstretched before it.
‘Hold!’ Jak called. ‘Or I thrust through your mistress.’
To Pon-lor’s utter astonishment the yakshaka froze.
‘Sheathe your weapon.’
The soldier complied.
Pon-lor stared, dumbfounded. How was this possible? How was its conditioning overcome? He had to discover how. This simply had to be reported to the ruling Circle of Masters.
Jak was nodding to himself and he shot Pon-lor a quick triumphant glance to make certain he was taking this in. ‘Your mistress will be under guard constantly. Someone will always be within sword’s reach. So behave.’ He pointed to a tree on the far side of the encampment. ‘Sit.’
The armoured giant’s helm turned aside as it regarded the tree. Then it lumbered heavily to the spot and put its back to the trunk to stand glittering in the shadows, arms crossed.
Jak shrugged. ‘Good enough.’ He looked to Pon-lor, jerked his head to the yakshaka. ‘I couldn’t believe it understood me.’ He frowned, lowered his voice. ‘Is there a man in there?’ Then, realizing, he waved the question aside.
‘What about you, sweetmeat?’ Myint breathed into his ear. ‘You gonna behave?’
Pon-lor gave a long slow nod. Yes, he would. At least until he had questioned this witch.
‘Aw.’ Myint pouted her disappointment. It was an awful twisting of her features, given her disfigured lip. She slit the gag, managing to slice his cheek and ear at the same time. ‘Sorry,’ she dropped, not sorry at all, as she walked away.
Pon-lor felt the warm blood drip down his neck while he sat cross-legged, staring straight ahead at the shadowed figure across the camp where the firelight winked and flashed from its mosaic inlay. Perhaps it was only his impression, but it seemed the creature dropped its helmed head as if unable to meet his gaze.
The next day Pon-lor was awake before everyone, as usual. He waited for the woman to rouse. Through the night the bandits had been trading off watches, keeping someone always close. Now it was Myint’s turn and she hauled the woman up and marched her off — perhaps to see to her morning toilet.
Pon-lor was disappointed by what he saw. She was just a local girl; a peasant from any one of their villages. For a time he’d played with the possibility that she was some sort of agent for Ardata and that by capturing her he could learn secrets of the Witch-Queen’s court in fabled Jakal Viharn. Now, however, he had to wrestle with the mystery of how this peasant could possibly have suborned a yakshaka soldier. The most likely answer was that she had not; that this soldier was flawed and had somehow fixated upon her. She probably had no idea why this thing was following her around, and had become terrified and run off.
Or had been run off by her terrified fellow villagers.
As the bandits broke camp Pon-lor sat, still tied up, and wondered why Jak had brought her back. If she really was an agent of Ardata then he ought to have killed her right away. That would have been the safest course. Like him, then, Jak must have realized that she was no servant of the Witch-Queen. She was merely his convenient guarantor of the yakshaka’s cooperation. Clearly, then, once Jak had delivered his prize, he would still have her for his revenge.
Very greedy is this Kenjak Ashevajak, the Bandit Lord.
And clearly it was about time to end this investigation. A word or two with the girl should settle things one way or the other and then he would be free to collect their wayward property for examination and dissection back in Anditi Pura. This particular soldier must possess some flaw that had allowed it to shake off its immediate orders. But there was no way it would be able to resist the deep-conditioned key command words that lay at the foundation of its reconstructed consciousness.
Pon-lor broke off his musing as he became aware of someone’s steady regard. He turned to see the villager, the young woman, frozen at the edge of camp, staring at him with ferocious intensity. He gave her a small nod that said: yes indeed, I am a Thaumaturg. Then he raised his brows to say: don’t you think we ought to have a chat?
Her reaction surprised him. Instead of deflating, terrified, she raised her chin and waved him off with the back of a hand as if to answer: I will accept no aid from a filthy wretch such as yourself.
Whence came such regal poise? Then he glanced to the silent waiting yakshaka and shook his head in sad regret. Ah, child, just because you may command such a thing for the moment does not mean you have conquered the world.