For many days after this I saw no one except the women, but eventually Oparr came. Since I had struck him, he had come to me, cringing a little with fear. To the fear—after the night of my first husband’s murder, when he had a brief power over me in taking me to Vazkor—was added a curious gloating little triumph. Now he both whined and exulted, one emotion or the other, in turn, getting the upper hand as he sensed my anger or weakness. He would be dangerous to me in distress, yet I dared not harm him, for I still feared Vazkor’s strength.
Now he bowed low, and informed me that I must go next day to the Temple and be worshipped there.
The people pined without their goddess.
I answered “Yes,” and sent him out, and thought in terrible frustration of the great power which was mine in the City, and yet how helpless it had made me. In my sleep I dreamed myself a giantess, crushing Ezlann in my hands, throwing her towers into the desert, where they broke, and ran like blood.
In a yellow dawn I rode there in the goddess’ chariot, behind me thirty black guards, ahead thirty other guards, on either side two black archers with silver skull faces. Everywhere, the phoenix badge of the Javhovor, but under it the wolf’s head. I do not remember the worship in the Temple, only the murmur and sea-sound of the chanting, and smells of heavy incense. Going back, the snow was thick in the streets. In the huge forecourt my driver reined the white mares. Men waited courteously for me to retire.
Slowly, with the goddess’ erect, stiff gait, I left the chariot, began to walk across the snow. Danger, all around me, and no help for it. Through the black doorway, along corridors with glassy floors. ...
Abruptly I was aware that someone was behind me, matching his speed to mine.
I turned. Three men had followed me, soft-foot as cats. Under the silver masks, I sensed a waiting. Had Vazkor sent them to remove me already? Yet it was the phoenix they wore, not the skull, and it was oddly reassuring, though it meant nothing now.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“We are the goddess’ new guard,” one said. He was taller than the rest.
“Vazkor’s men,” I said with a bitter emphasis.
The tall one said, “Now we are Vazkor’s. Before, we were the guard of Asren, Phoenix, Javhovor of Ezlann.”
I had never known before the name of my first husband. I started at it; spoken at this time by this man, it seemed as if I glimpsed him suddenly, alive and immediate.
I turned away and continued the walk to my apartments, yet my blood tingled. I was aware of a great difference, a sort of sea-change in the air. They moved behind me, and I felt no menace in their presence.
At the double doors, I halted again.
“You may enter,” I said.
I went through, and they followed me. The third guard pushed the doors closed, shutting us in.
There was a moment’s silence as I stood facing them across the beautiful room, and then they were kneeling, unmasked. I went to them, and raised the face of the tallest guard in my hand. Recognition. This man had knelt to me before, on the causeway outside Ezlann—not the captain. for Vazkor had disposed of him, but one of the arrogant, silver blond soldiers.
“I am Mazlek,” he said.
The name was familiar: She was dead—Mazlek killed her—I saw the blade go in through her leftbreast—
“Goddess,” Mazlek whispered. His eyes were wide on me, open, and coolly reverent.
“How did you escape from Vazkor?” I asked him.
“Easy. He did not know me, and I was Asren’s man.”
“A spy,” I said.
“Perhaps. I was Asren’s man. When death came for us because we had seen you, I slipped away. I’d expected it of Vazkor.”
“And so Asren Javhovor knew from you how I came to Ezlann.”
“Yes, goddess.”
I smiled a little at a mystery solved—for Asren, my husband, had never believed my god-head, only in my Power. Yet this soldier believed.
“And now you are my guard,” I said. I turned to the other two, a little smaller, both blond and very handsome—they might have been brothers. “Your names?”
“Slor,” one said.
“Dnarl,” the other said.
Even their voices were similar.
I motioned them to rise, and I saw now that Mazlek, their captain, was very tall indeed, and very strong, he who had killed me once in the moon-darkness.
“How long are you to watch me?”
“It will be easy at first, goddess, to prolong our stay. Later, perhaps, it will be necessary for you to declare us your honorary guard. In all, goddess, I have eighty men under me. Not a great many, but enough to save your holy person from immediate insult or assault.”
Again I smiled, involuntarily. I took his hand, and shook my head at him when he began at once to kneel.
I would be safe now. More, much more than physically safe.
It had been uneasy, that first time, in the green woods of Darak’s second camp, something that must be given a different name. This was an open thing, without dishonor.
I lay down early to sleep, before the day’s candle had quite smoked itself out over the snow wastes.
And beyond the doors my guard waited to protect me, Mazlek, Slor, and Dnarl, who had once been Maggur, the black giant, Giltt gold-earrings, and little Kel the archer.
8
Oparr came in the morning.
I received him, and sensing my mood, he cringed a little over his words.
“Vazkor Javhovor requests the goddess’ presence.”
“Why?”
“I am only the goddess’ priest. I do not know all things.”
“You are the worm in the woodpile, Oparr,” I said sweetly. “You worm in and out of things, and you learn a great deal.”
He hesitated, fidgeting, his black-gloved hands busy with his skirts. Then he said, “It is to do with the council at Za, goddess, I believe.”
Za, the central City of White Desert, was a vaguely known name to me. Of the council I had heard nothing, yet I wanted no further truck with the venomous priest. I rose, and he led me to Vazkor, and behind me walked eight men; Slor and his cohort.
He waited for me in the library, among Asren’s books and the beauty Asren had engendered there.
Oparr, Slor, the rest, were shut outside.
Vazkor was masked, and very still in his chair.
“Sit, goddess,” he said.
It was a small thing, but he made it sound like a command. I sat.
“So, we are to go to Za,” I said. “Why is that?”
There was a moment’s silence. He had not expected me to know anything about it. The last time he had seen me, at our formal marriage ceremony, I had been listless, malleable. Finally he rose. He went among Asren’s things as if he understood them, and had some right there. Stupidly, it angered me, but quickly he was back, and unrolling a parchment map before us on the polished table. The map was light brown in color, painted in black, and beautifully drawn with little superfluous drawings of ships and chariots and horses, farmers busy in fields, marching soldiery. To the north there was one single gash of sapphire, below the mountains, which was Aluthmis, the Water.
He set the onyx weights at each corner, and pointed things out to me. I scarcely heard him. I could only think of Asren’s hands unrolling, caressing the map. But abruptly I was aware of the Cities, set forth like a formation of stars, around which had been drawn the shape of some nebulous animal, such as might be described on an astrologer’s chart. Ezlann marked the head, and four others the body, and, stretched out behind, the last City tipped the tail.