Helliconia Summer - Brian W. Aldiss [280]
Whatever the truth of this last assertion, it was true that the Pannovalans were as offended to find Sibornalese as phagors in the council room. But even Taynth Indredd knew that the real bastion between Sibornal and Borlien was geographical: the sharp spines of the Quzint Mountains and the great corridor between the Quzints and Mordriat called Hazziz, which at this period was a scorching desert.
JandolAnganol and SartoriIrvrash had been conferring. The chancellor now spoke again.
‘Our pleasant guests bring up the subject of the warlike Sibornalese. Before we enter into further botheration and insults, we should proceed to the heart of the matter. My lord King JandolAnganol was lately grievously wounded in defending his realm, so much that his life hung by a thread. He praises Akhanaba for his deliverance, while I praise the herbs my surgeons applied to the wound. I have here the cause of the injury.’
He called forth the Royal Armourer, a small and savagely moustached man dressed in leather who stumped into the centre of the room and then produced a leaden ball, which he held up between thumb and forefinger of a gloved hand. In a formal voice, he announced, ‘This is a shot. It was dug from out his majesty’s leg with a surgeon’s knife. It caused great injury. It was fired from a piece of hand artillery called a matchlock.’
‘Thank you,’ said SartoriIrvrash, dismissing the man. ‘We recognise that Sibornal is greatly progressive. The matchlock is evidence of that progress. We understand that matchlocks are now being made in Sibornal in great numbers, and that there is a later development, by name a wheel lock, which will spread greater devastation. I would advise the Holy Pannovalan Empire to show genuine unity in the face of this new development. Let me assure you, this innovation is more to be feared than Unndreid the Hammer himself.
‘I must furthermore advise you that our agents report that the tribes which invaded the Cosgatt were supplied with these weapons not from Sibornal itself, as might be expected, but from a Sibornalese source in Matrassyl.’
At this statement, all eyes in the court turned to the Sibornalese ambassador. It happened that Io Pasharatid was just refreshing himself with an iced drink. He paused with the glass halfway to his mouth, a look of distress on his face.
His wife, Dienu Pasharatid, reclined on cushions nearby. She rose now, a tall and graceful woman, thin, greyish in cast, severe in appearance.
‘If you statesmen wonder why in my country you are called the Savage Continent, look no further than this latest lie of magnitude. Who would be to blame for such arms trading? Why should my husband be always mistrusted?’
SartoriIrvrash pulled his whiskers, so that his face was tugged into an involuntary smile. ‘Why do you mention your husband in connection with this incident, Madame Dienu? No one else did. I didn’t.’
JandolAnganol rose again. ‘Two of our agents, posing as Driat tribesmen, went into the lower bazaar and bought one of these new inventions. I propose a demonstration of what this weapon can do, so that you will be in no doubt that we have entered a new era in warfare. Perhaps then you will see my need to retain phagors in my army and my realms.’
Addressing himself directly to the Pannovalan prince, he said, ‘If your refinement will allow you to tolerate the presence of ancipitals in the room …’
The diplomats sat up and stared apprehensively at the king.
He clapped his hands. A leather-clad captain from his cortege went to a passage and called an order. Two dehorned phagors marched smartly into the room. They had been standing motionless in the shadows. Their white pelages picked up the light as they passed by the windows. One of them carried a long