"Dumbcane, your majesty," hissed the vizar-in-waiting, clearly enjoying her revenge. "Another of the 'glops' we 'moonstruck ghouls' prepare, this from a grassy shoot found in the Land of the Lions. The dumbcane will paralyze your tongue for hours, rendering you mute."
Again Amenstar tried to protest, but despite straining until tendons bulged in her throat, she only mewed like a hungry kitten. Tears of anger, sorrow, and fright coursed down the princess's face. She couldn't offer a word in her own defense, though no one would listen anyway. Events in the royal compound unfolded at every hand, as if the city faced invasion by hordes of barbarians or dragons. Star grew dizzy watching all the activity.
The only calm person was the bakkal, who stood with arms folded across his breast while behind him a general held upright the silver and gold war axe. Samas gave the orders, Star's mother, the first sama, coordinating. Secretary-maids ran hither and thither. Family members were to assemble outside while many objects were packed into the cellars. Slaves and maids pulled down tapestries and lugged them down staircases. Carved and inlaid chests were stacked atop one another and ferried away. Marble statues and pots of blue faience were wrapped in exquisite rugs and wheeled on low barrows down ramps. Cedarwood boxes were packed with treasures: vases of crystalline flowers, misty-swirling dragon orbs, magic masks inlaid with eyes of lapis lazuli, necklaces of tiger teeth, brass rings, bracelets and anklets set with orange carnelian and purple amethyst. Even household items went into boxes: silver combs, platinum-framed mirrors, jeweled animal collars, gold dishes and goblets, ivory hairpins, and all were carried to the cellars. Why? Star wondered in a daze. Wouldn't the family need these everyday tools?
Soon, with a hundred guards marching before them, the bakkal and his four wives strode down the long corridors of the family mansion into the night. Star was dragged in the rear, her arms locked by two burly vizars, her royal presence guarded by four of her father's most brutal and fanatical guards, two men and two women who'd served the bakkal their whole lives. If ordered, Star knew, they'd execute even an eldest princess without a qualm. Never far away was the skinny, bald, and branded vizar-in-waiting.
Outside, gathered in torch- and lantern-light, milled a virtual parade of servants, drummers, trumpeters, fan-bearers, vizars, and other retainers; three hundred or more people shuffling into position for a procession. All Star's relatives were assembled. Her siblings and half siblings who still resided in Cursrah, almost a dozen, and more cousins were there. Many of their personal servants hovered behind them. Dozens of sturdy slaves lugged the choicest chests and boxes; tons of royal wealth.
The bakkal and first sama mounted a double-wide sedan chair and were hoisted atop the shoulders of sixteen slaves. They were trailed by more guards, advisors, vizars, and servants. Next were lifted the other three samas and more retainers. In respect for her rank, Star was hoisted into her personal sedan chair. Pinned by hard hands, her wrists and ankles were gently and unobtrusively tied to the chair's arms and legs with red velvet ropes. Unlike other royalty, Star was attended by no maids, and she wondered if they'd been dismissed or assigned elsewhere.
"Your maids were banished, samira." The vizar-in-waiting had seen Star's red-eyed searching and said, "Their lack of attention, allowing you to slip away, was condemned as treason, so they are not allowed to die on Cursrahn soil. All twelve were force-marched ten leagues into the southern desert. So they might never return, each woman was blinded and deafened, and they were abandoned to the jackals and lions."
Fresh tears stung Amenstar's eyes at this new instance of Cursrahn cruelty, even as she saw more. Cradled in the spidery hands of eight vizars, on red and blue pillows, lay pathetic bundles of fur and feathers. There lay Star's parrots, saluqis, her ocelot, and even the precious tressym, all with eyes glazed in death.
The vizar-in-waiting cooed like a snake, "Do not despair. The animals died gently, smothered with pillows. They'll be made mummies to serve you in the next life."
Star closed her eyes. She didn't want another life if, like this one, it dissolved into destruction and horror. A thunderous crash made her jump and open her eyes.
A huge cornice from the family mansion had fallen into the gardens that edged the main house. Straining against her bonds, Star peered upward. On the flat roof, torches gleamed. Teams of slaves plied pry bars and sledgehammers to loosen another cornice to crash alongside the first. Overseen by master masons and slave masters with whips, more blocks fell like meteors until the earth trembled underfoot.
To Star's puzzled look, the vizar lisped, "The royal mansion and its many wings housed the Bakkal of Cursrah, Descendent of Genies and Highest of Calim's Favored. Such a magnificent structure must never house lesser beings."
A rippling crash resounded, shaking the earth, and dust billowed out the front door. A huge section of roof had collapsed on the floor within. Star thought of her personal wing, her home since infancy, that she'd fled for the grasslands and adventure. She sorrowed, knowing she'd never see it again, as it was wiped from the face of the earth.
Where, Amenstar trembled to think, would the royal family live now?
Every royal person of Cursrah was assembled and in position. Without a backward glance at their ancestral home, the bakkal and sama signaled. At the front, musicians struck drums and blew trumpets. The music was a doleful, whining discord to a drumbeat as erratic as a failing heart. A dirge, thought Amenstar, a march for the dead.
Shuffling to the mournful music, the parade entered the main street leading from the family mansion to the Palace of the Phoenix. Star strained in her sedan to see strange lights. Around the city, in several spots, flames roared out of control. Mob noises of shouting and looting resounded.
Many citizens, seeing the bakkal's procession, flocked toward it. Cursrahns wept, moaned, prayed, and begged the bakkal for guidance. The ruler ignored them, staring straight ahead. His guards, the cream of Cursrah's heavy infantry, cleared the commoners with spear and halberd hafts. People ran up from all directions, swamping the streets, crying or supplicating, though a few cursed the bakkal and shook their fists.
As the crowds grew, the parade faltered. Ordered by the first sama, guards knocked citizens aside. Rhinaurs and manscorpions alongside the column howled people flat. Angry cries arose, and shrieks. Still the crowd surged like a single stupid animal. People near the procession tried to back away while others pushed from behind. Ordered on, guards began to stab. Blood fountained overhead and made the cobbles slick. A prolonged wail of terror and panic welled up. Citizens fell bleeding and were trampled underfoot. The half-human giants broke necks, arms, and spines, and pitched jittering bodies to the back of the crowd, who also took to screaming.
Gradually, the slow-witted mob realized the bakkal himself had unleashed the carnage. Cursrahns yelled in fear and confusion. Betrayed, devotion turned into disloyalty and reverence became hatred. Vile names and curses were hurled. The rulers in the procession didn't care, their faces wooden behind the wall of brutal guards. By sheer force, as the crowd surged and receded and died at the edges, the parade crept onto a bridge leading to the palace. Guards jammed behind, shoulder to shoulder, to block commoners from following. Deserted, the abused crowd jeered, shrieked, prayed to various gods, and wept.
Stunned, almost numb to the cruelty, Amenstar yet noted that the palace moat had run dry. By the flickering light of torches, she saw only a few greasy puddles. Otherwise the moat was choked with slime, mud, dying fish, and trash. Just before the parade passed into the palace, Amenstar looked up. More slaves with heavy tools waited along the roofline. Even the palace would be leveled, she thought bitterly. If her parents planned some ethereal future life, they'd have precious few buildings to house them.