Helliconia Summer - Brian W. Aldiss [462]
‘You had no orders.’ He could scarcely speak. ‘You’ve slain Akhanaba – the god made in your image.’
The creature before him with its deep scarlet eyes brought a three-fingered hand to its skull. ‘Orders have formed in our harneys. Make arrival from long time. Once, this place izz ancient Hrrm-Bhhrd Ydohk … Further sayance …’
‘You’ve slain the C’Sarr, Akhanaba … everything … everything …’ He could scarcely hear what the ancipital was saying, for Milua Tal was holding his hand and screaming at the top of her voice, ‘My moth, my moth, my poor mother!’
‘Hmn-Bhhrd Ydohk once ancient place of ancipital kind. Not give to Sons of Freyr.’
He failed to understand. He pushed against her spear, then drew his own sword. ‘Let me through, Major Chzarn, or I shall kill you.’
He knew how useless threats were. Chzarn merely said, without emotion, ‘Not go through, sir,’
‘You’re the fire god, Jan – command it die!’ As she parrot-screamed, she raked his flesh, but he did not move. Chzarn was intent on explaining something and wrestled with words before managing to say, ‘Ancient Hrrm-Bhhrd Ydohk good place, sir. Air-octaves make a song. Before Sons of Freyr any on Hrl-Ichor Yhar. In ancient time of T’Sehn-Hrr.’
‘It’s the present, the present! We live and die in present time, gillot!’ He tried to wind himself up to strike but was unable to do so, despite the screaming girl at his side. His will failed. The flames burned in the pupils of his narrowed eyes.
The phagor obstinately continued her explanation, as if she were an automaton.
‘Ancipitals here, sir, before Sons of Freyr. Before Freyr make bad light. Before T’Sehn-Hrr goance, sir. Old sins, sir.’
Or perhaps she just said ‘old things’. In the fury of the blaze, it was impossible to hear. With a roar, part of the palace roof collapsed and a column of fire rolled up into the night sky. Pillars crashed forward into the square.
The crowd cried in unison and stumbled back. Among the watchers was AbathVasidol; she clung to the arm of a gentleman from the Sibornalese embassy as everyone shrank from the heat.
‘The Holy C’Sarr … all destroyed,’ cried JandolAnganol in pain. Milua Tal hid her face in JandolAnganol’s side and wept. ‘All destroyed … all destroyed.’
He made no attempt to comfort the girl or to push her away. She was nothing to him. The flames devoured his spirit. In that holocaust were consumed his ambitions – the very ambitions the fire would fulfil. He could be master of Oldorando as well as Borlien, but in that ceaseless changing of things into their opposites, that chastising enantiodromia which made a god into a phagor, he no longer wished for that mastery.
His phagors had brought him a triumph, in which he saw clearly his defeat. His thoughts flew to MyrdemInggala: but his and her summer was over, and this great bonfire of his enemies was his autumn beacon.
‘All destroyed,’ he said aloud.
But a figure approached them, moving elegantly through the ranks of the First Phagorian, arriving almost at a saunter in time to remark, ‘Not quite all, I’m glad to say.’
Despite his attempt at customary nonchalance, Esomberr’s face was pale and he trembled visibly.
‘Since I’ve never worshipped the All-Powerful with any great degree of fervour, whether he’s man or phagor, I thought I would excuse myself from the C’Sarr’s lecture on the subject. Terribly fortunate as it proved. Let this be a lesson to you, Your Majesty, to go to church less frequently in future.’
Milua Tal looked up angrily to say, ‘Why don’t you run away? Both my parents are in there.’
Esomberr wagged a finger at her. ‘You must learn to ride with circumstances as your new husband claims to do. If your parents are perished – and there I suspect you have hit upon a profound truth – then may I be the first to congratulate you on becoming Queen of both Borlien and Oldorando.
‘I hope for some