Helliconia Summer - Brian W. Aldiss [410]
XVIII
Visitors from the Deep
Anyone advancing on Gravabagalinien could see from a distance the wooden palace which was the queen’s refuge. It stood without compromise, like a toy left on a beach.
Legend said that Gravabagalinien was haunted. That at some distant time in the past a fortress had stood in place of the flimsy palace. That it had been entirely destroyed in a great battle.
But nobody knew who fought there, or for what reason. Only that many had died, and had been buried in shallow graves where they fell. Their shades, far from their proper land-octaves, were still reputed to haunt the spot.
Certainly, another tragedy was now being acted out on the old unhallowed ground. For the time had come round when King JandolAnganol arrived in two ships with his men and phagors, and with Esomberr and CaraBansity, to divorce his queen.
And Queen MyrdemInggala had descended the stairs and had submitted to the divorce. And wine had been brought, and much mischief had been permitted. And Alam Esomberr, the envoy of the C’Sarr, had made his way into the ex-queen’s chamber only a few hours after he had conducted the ceremony of divorcement. And then had come the announcement that Simoda Tal had been slain in far Oldorando. And this sore news had been delivered to the king as the first rays of eastern Batalix painted yellow the peeling outer walls of the palace.
And now an inevitability could be discerned in the affairs of men and phagors, as events drew towards a climax in which even the chief participants would be swept helplessly along like comets plunging into darkness.
JandolAnganol’s voice was low with sorrow as he tore the hairs from his beard and head, crying to Akhanaba.
‘Thy servant falls before thee, O Great One. Thou hast visited sorrow upon me. Thou hast caused my armies to go down in defeat. Thou hast caused my son to forsake me. Thou hast caused me to divorce my beloved queen, MyrdemInggala. Thou hast caused my intended bride to be assassinated … What more must I suffer for Thy sake?
‘Let not my people suffer. Accept my suffering, O Great Lord, as a sufficient sacrifice for my people.’
As he rose and put on his tunic, the pallid-chopped AbstrogAthenat said casually, ‘It’s true that the army has lost Randonan. But all civilised countries are surrounded by barbaric ones, and are defeated when their armies invade them. We should go, not with the sword, but with the word of God.’
‘Crusades are in the province of Pannoval, not a poor country like ours, Vicar.’ Adjusting his tunic over his wounds, he felt in his pocket the three-faced timepiece he had taken from CaraBansity in Ottassol. Now as then, he felt it to be an object of ill omen.
AbstrogAthenat bowed, holding the whip behind him. ‘At least we might please the All-Powerful by being more human, and shunning the inhuman.’
In sudden anger, JandolAnganol struck out with his left hand and caught the vicar across the cheek with his knuckles.
‘You keep to God’s affairs and leave worldly matters to me.’
He knew what the man meant. His reference had been to purging phagors from Borlien.
Leaving his tunic open, feeling its fabric absorb the blood of his latest scourging, JandolAnganol climbed from the subterranean chapel to the ground floor of the wooden palace. Yuli jumped up to welcome him.
His head throbbed as if he were going blind. He patted the little phagor and sank his fingers into its thick pelage.
Shadows still lay long outside the palace. He scarcely knew how to face the morning: only yesterday he had arrived at Gravabagalinien and – in the presence of the envoy of the Holy C’Sarr, Alam Esomberr – he had divorced his fair queen.
The palace was shuttered as it had been the day previously. Now men lay everywhere in the