Helliconia Summer - Brian W. Aldiss [282]
‘You were not at the meeting.’
‘It wasn’t for the likes of me.’
‘It was horrible.’
‘I heard so. For some reason, Io Pasharatid is upset. He’s generally so cool, like a block of Lordryardry ice. Yet the guards say he has a woman in town – imagine! If so, he runs a great risk.’
MyrdemInggala showed her teeth in a smile. ‘I detest the way he looks at me. If he has a woman, so much the better!’
They laughed. For a short while, they lingered, talking of cheerful things. Their father, the old baron, was in the country now, complaining of the heat and too old to be reckoned a danger to the state. He had recently taken up fishing, as a cool pursuit.
The courtyard bell rang. They looked down to see JandolAnganol enter the court, closely followed by a guard carrying a red silk umbrella over his head. The phagor runt was close to him, as ever. He called to his queen.
‘Will you come down, Cune? Our guests must be entertained during a lull in our discussions. You will delight them more than ever I could.’
She left her brother and went down to join him under the sunshade. He took her arm with formal courtesy. She thought he looked weary, though the fabric of the umbrella reflected a flush like fever on his cheeks.
‘Are you coming to a treaty with Pannoval and Oldorando which will ease the pressures of war?’ she asked timidly.
‘The beholder knows what we’re coming to,’ he said abruptly. ‘We must keep on terms with the devils, and placate them, otherwise they’ll take advantage of our temporary weakness and invade us. They’re as full of cunning as they are of fake holiness.’ He sighed.
‘The time will come when you and I will be hunting and enjoying life again, as of old,’ she said, squeezing his arm. She would not rebuke him for inviting his guests.
Ignoring her pious hope, he burst out angrily, ‘SartoriIrvrash spoke unwisely this morning, admitting his atheism. I must get rid of him. Taynth holds it against me that my chancellor is not a member of the Church.’
‘Prince Taynth also spoke against me. Will you get rid of me because I am not to his liking?’ Her eyes flashed angrily as she spoke, though she tried to keep lightness in her tone. But he replied sullenly, ‘You know, and the scritina knows, that the coffers are empty. We may be driven to much we have no heart for.’
She drew her hand sharply from his arm.
The visitors, together with their concubines and servants, were grouped in a green courtyard, under colonnades. Wild beasts were being paraded; a group of jugglers was entertaining with its paltry tricks. JandolAnganol steered his queen among the emissaries. She noted how the countenances of the men lit up as she spoke to them. I must still be of some value to Jan, she thought.
An old Thribriatan tribesman in elaborate braffista headgear was parading two gorilloid Others on chains. The creatures attracted several onlookers. Away from their arboreal habitat, their behaviour was uncouth. They most resembled – so one of the courtiers said – two drunken courtiers.
The froglike Prince Taynth Indredd was standing under a yellow sunshade, being fanned and smoking a veronikane as he watched the Others perform some limited tricks. Beside him, laughing uproariously at the captives, was a stiff girl of some eleven years and six tenners.
‘Aren’t they funny, Unk?’ she said to the prince. ‘They’re quite like people, except for all the fur.’
The Thribriatan, hearing this, touched his braffista and said to the prince, ‘You like see me make Others fight each other?’
The prince humorously produced a silver coin in the palm of his hand.
‘This if you’ll make them rumbo each other.’
Everyone laughed. The girl screamed with humour. ‘Unkie, how rude you are! Would they really?’
Mournfully polite, the tribesman said, ‘These beasts have no khmir like humans. Only every tenner make love, do rumbo. Is more easy make fight.’
Shaking his head and laughing,