THE MORNING OF THE TWENTY-SIXTH WAS OVERCAST, PREsaging another autumnal rain. The mouth of the Lyap was covered with small craft, plying back and forth like a swarm of water insects as they conveyed thousands of Irazis across the river to Zaktan.
Jorian and Karadur strolled up the street that led from the Zaktanian waterfront. The street ended at the edge of the temenos of the temple of Nubalyaga. Following the flow of the crowd, Jorian and Karadur proceeded around the temple grounds to the right. This brought them to the temple entrance at the eastern end of the temenos.
The temple was a huge structure of domes and spires. The silver plating of its tiles glowed softly under the gray sky. Flanking the entrance were two thirty-foot statues of Nubalyaga in the form of a beautiful naked woman. One statue showed her as bending a huge bow; the other, pouring water from a jar.
"The one on the left is chasing away the eclipse," said Karadur, "whilst the other controls the tides."
Jorian stopped to look. "That's funny," he said. "Last night I dreamt that a woman just like that sculptor's model appeared unto me."
"Oh? What did she?"
"She said something like: 'Beware the second crown, my son.' Since the dame was clad as you see those statues, and since I have been unwontedly virtuous since you and I parted in Metouro, I sought to make love to her; but she turned to smoke and vanished. Since I thought the dream but a manifestation of my bridled lusts, and since the words did not seem to make sense, I paid no special heed and have now forgotten the rest of the vision."
"Hm. One needs must be alert to such things, because the gods—ah —really do appear to mortals thus, as you well know."
"If the advice of this goddess be no better than that of that little green god, Tvasha, who advised us in Shven, I can do without it."
Since the temple stood on an elevation, the street leading eastwards from it sloped downwards. Down this street flowed a river of folk: Irazis, the men in kilts or trousers and their women in enveloping robes; foreigners from Fedirun and Novaria and even—sweating in their furs and heavy woolens—blond barbarians from distant Shven. Among the Irazi men, kilt-wearing partisans sported the red and white colors of their faction, while adherents of the Pants wore blue and gold.
"It gratifies me to hear that you are subduing the lusts of the flesh," said Karadur. "It is the requisite preliminary step towards moral perfection and spiritual enlightenment. Have you, then, adhered to some ascetic philosophy or cultus?"
"Nay; I merely felt that Estrildis would mislike it if she knew I'd been dipping my wick. That's love for you. If I ever get her back, I'll make up for lost time."
They came to the outer wall of the Hippodrome, where rows of stone arches, one atop another, supported the tiers of seats. The crowd divided and flowed around the structure to the entrances. Jorian said:
"Our passes admit us through Entrance Four. Which is that?"
'To the right," replied Karadur.
Hawkers of flags, toy chariots, handwritten programs, and food and drink mingled with the crowd, crying their wares. Jorian and Karadur found Entrance Four and were swept in with the tide. An usher saluted as he saw the royal passes and directed their holders to seats below the royal box, at the halfway mark on one side of the long, elliptical course.
Jorian and Karadur settled in their seats and opened their lunch. On their left, where seats were reserved for active members of the Pants, the stands were a mass of blue and gold. On their right, red and white likewise filled the stands in the bloc composed of Kilts. Members of the two blocs scowled at each other across the intervening strip reserved for noblemen and officials, where sat Jorian and Karadur. Now and then, an epithet was shouted above the general din.
Jorian was finishing his beer when a fanfare announced the king. All in the stands arose as Ishbahar waddled into his box and lowered himself into the gilded throne. When the audience had sat again, the king motioned to his crier, who produced a speaking trumpet. The king held up a sheet of reed paper and a reading glass. He began to read in his wheezy squeak, pausing between sentences so that the crier could bellow his words.
It was a dull little speech, what Jorian could understand of it: "… auspicious occasion… glorious nation… gallant contestants… good sportsmanship… may the best team win…"
As the king finished, a man arose from among the Pants and shouted: "When will Your Majesty bring the slayers of Sefer to book?"
The king replied through his crier: "Pray, good sir, do not bring up this question now. The time is inappropriate. We are pursuing the matter…" But the voice even of the leather-lunged crier was lost in the chant of "Justice! Justice!" that rose from the massed Pants. In their turn, the Kilts began shouting in rhythm: "Down! Quiet! Down! Quiet!"
"Who's Sefer?" asked Jorian.
"An official of the Pants, who was found slain. The Pants swear he was killed by a gang of Kilts; the Kilts deny all knowledge of it."
The shouts of the crier, together with a threatening move on the part of the squads of gleaming guardsmen in bronzen cuirasses and crested steel helmets, at length abated the shouts of the rival factionists.
"They are putting the tortoise race first," said Karadur, "to amuse the mob and take the factionists' minds—if that be the word I wish—off their feud."
At the starting post at one end of the course, Jorian sighted through his spyglass four huge tortoises. When they stood up on their thick, bowed legs, the tops of their shells were the height of a tall man from the ground. On the back of each tortoise was strapped a saddle, similar to a camel saddle. On each saddle sat a man in motley clown's costume.
At the blast of a trumpet, the four tortoises ambled forward. It took them a long time to reach the part of the track directly before Jorian. In the meantime, bets flew thick and fast.
As the tortoises plodded past at a slow walk, the crowd roared at the antics of the riders, of whom two wore the colors of the Kilts and two, those of the Pants. They reached out to thwack one another with slapsticks, turned somersaults off their mounts and bounded back on, and indulged in a hundred zany gambols.
Jorian: "I feel a certain kinship for the Kilts, even though I wear trews."
"How so, my son? Are you becoming aristocratical-minded?"
"Not at all. Their colors, red and white, are those of the flag of Xylar. The Xylarian war cry, in fact, was 'red and white!'" Jorian sighed. "Betimes I regret that those lackwits wouldn't let me show what a good king I could be."
The tortoises passed on around to the other side of the course. A single circuit constituted their race. The good humor of the crowd seemed to have been restored.
Next came a race between two teams of zebras. Then a detachment of the Royal Guard, their metal polished to mirrorlike surfaces, marched around the course to the tune of a military band, stopping from time to time to perform a brief precision drill with their spears.
Six camels, ridden by brown-robed Fediruni desert men, raced four laps around the course. Then a float bearing a gilded image of the god Ughroluk, drawn by white oxen and preceded by a hundred priests singing a mighty hymn, passed slowly around the course. Many in the crowd joined the priests in singing. The god, crowned with ostrich plumes dyed scarlet and gold and emerald, bore a silver thunderbolt in one hand and a golden sunbeam in the other.
A pair of King Ishbahar's elephants, draped in purple and gold, lumbered around the track, not seeming to hurry much despite the yells of their mahouts and the whacks of their goads. Then two teams of unicorns raced.
"Now come the horses," said Karadur. "Being the fleetest draft animals, their race will decide the day as between the Pants and the Kilts."
Tension grew. A trumpet peal sent the four teams off. As the four chariots—two blue and gold, two crimson and silver—thundered past, the roar from the blocks of factionists drowned out all other sounds.