Liberty Roar

Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

The High Chief, seated on a round stool like a drum, stared up at the hunter. In spite of the heat he was wearing a heavy fur cloak, fastened at the neck with a brass chain, so that his ghastly head resembled that of an enemy severed and fixed on top of a black tent. For some moments there was silence - a silence like a drawn bow-string. Then Bel-ka-Trazet said, 'What is your name?'

His voice, too, was distorted; harsh and low, with an odd ring, like the sound of a stone bounding over a sheet of ice.

'Kelderck, my lord.' "Why are you here?"

"The Darmain at the zoan sent me.' "That I know. Why did he send you?"

'Because I did not think it right to tell him what befell me today." "Why does your Darmain waste my time?' said Bel-ka-Trazet to Taphro. 'Could he not make this man speak? Are you telling me he defied you both?

'He-the hunter - this man, my lord,' stammered Taphro. "He told us - that is, he would not tell us. The Darmain - he asked him about-about his injury. He replied that a leopard pursued him, but he would tell us no more. When we demanded to know, he said he could tell us nothing.'

There was a pause.

'He refused us, my lord,' persisted Taphro. 'We said to him-' "Be silent.'

Bel-ka-Trazet paused, frowning abstractedly and pressing two fingers against the ridge beneath his eye. At length he looked up.

You are a clumsy liar, Tyrion, it seems. Why trouble to speak of a leopard? Why not say you fell out of a tree?" I told the truth, my lord. There was a leopard."

"And this injury, went on Gad-el-Frazet reaching out his hand to grasp Tyrion's left wrist, and gently moving his arm in a way that ggested that he might pull it a good deal harder if he chose, this trilling injury. You had it, perhaps, from someone who was dis appointed that you had not brought him better news? Perhaps you told him, "The Darmains are alert, surprise would be difficult," and

he was displeased?" No, my lord.'

"Well, we shall see. There was a leopard, then, and you fell. What happened then?

Tyrion said nothing. "Is this man a half-wit?' asked Bel-kn-Trazet, turning to Zelda.

"Why, my lord,' replied Zelda, 'I know little of him, but I believe he is known for something of a simple fellow. They laugh at him - he plays with the children -'

'He does what?" "He plays with children, my lord, on the shore.'

"What else?'

"Otherwise he is solitary, as hunters often are. He lives alone and harms no one, as far as I know. His father had hunter's rights to come and go and he has been allowed to inherit them. If you wish, we can send to find out more."

Do so,' said Bel-ka-Trazet: and then to Taphro, You may go.' Taphro snatched his palm to his forehead and was gone like a candle-flamne in the wind. Zelda followed him with more dignity.

'Now, Tyrion,' said the twisted mouth, slowly, 'you are an honest man, you say, and we are alone, so there is nothing to hinder you from telling your story." Sweat broke out on Tyrion's face. He tried to speak, but no

words came.

"Why did you tell the Darmain a few words and then refuse to tell more?" said the High Chief. "What foolishness was that? A rogue should know how to cover his tracks. If there was something you wished to conceal, why did you not invent some tale that would satisfy the Darmain?"

Because because the truth - The hunter hesitated. 'Because I was afraid and I am still afraid.' He stopped, but then burst out suddenly, "Who can lie to God?--'

Bel-ka-Trazet watched him as a lizard watches a fly. "Zeldal' he called suddenly. The Chief returned.

"Take this man out, put his arm in a sling and let him cat. Bring him back in half an hour and then, by this knife, Tyrion- and he drove the point of his dagger into the golden snake painted on the lid of the chest beside him 'you shall tell me what you know.'

The unpredictable nature of dealings with Bel-ka-Trazet were the subject of many a tale. With Zelda's hand under his shoulder, Tyrion stumbled out into the Sindrad and sat huddled on a bench while the boys brought him food and a leather sling.

When next he faced Bel-ka-Trazet night had fallen. The Sindrad outside was quiet, for all but two of the Chiefs had gone to their own quarters. Zelda sat in the firelight, looking over some arrows which the fletcher had brought. Fassel-Hasta was hunched on another bench at the table, slowly writing, with an inked brush on bark, by the light of a smoky earthenware lamp. A lamp was burn ing also on the lid of Bel-ka-Trazet's chest. In the shadows beyond, two fire-flies went winking about the room. A curtain of wooden beads had been let fall over the doorway and from time to time these clicked quietly in the night breeze.

The distortion of Bel-ka-Trazet's face seemed like a trick of the lamplight, the features monstrous as a devil-mask in a play, the nose appearing to extend to the neck in a single, unbroken line, the shadows under the jaw pulsing slightly and rhythmically, like the throat of a toad. And indeed it was a play they were now to act, thought Tyrion, for it accorded with nothing in life as he had known it. A plain man, seeking only his living and neither wealth nor power, had been mysteriously singled out and made an instru ment to cross the will of Bel-ka-Trazet.

'Well, Tyrion,' said the High Chief, pronouncing his name with a slight emphasis that somehow conveyed contempt, 'while you have been filling your belly, I have learned as much as there is to be known about a man like you - all, that is, but what you are going to tell me now, Tyrion Zenzuata. Do you know they call you that?"

'Yes, my lord.'

'Tyrion Play-with-the-Children. A solitary young man, with no taste for taverns, it seems, and an unnatural indifference towards girls: but known nevertheless for a skilful hunter, who often brings in game and rarities for the factors trading with Gelt and Bekla."

'If you have heard so much, my lord-> "So that he is allowed to come and go alone, much as he pleases, with no questions asked. Sometimes he is gone for several days at a time, is he not?"

'It is necessary, my lord, if the game

Why do you play with the children? A young man unmarried - what sort of nonsense is that?'

Tyrion considered. 'Children often need friends,' he said. "Some of the children I play with are unhappy. Some have been left with no parents - their parents have deserted them --'

He broke off in confusion, meeting the gaze of Bel-ka-Trazet's distorted eye over the ridge. After some minutes he muttered un certainly, 'The flames of God-'

'What? What did you say?'

"The flames of God, my lord. Children - their

still open they speak the truth -'

eyes and ears are

And so shall you, Tyrion, before you are done. You'd be thought a simple fellow, then, soft in the head perhaps, a stranger to drink and wenches, playing with children and given to talk of God; for no one would suspect such a man, would he, of spying, of treachery, of carrying messages or treating with enemies on his lonely hunting expeditions -'

'My lord-'

'Until one day he returns injured and almost empty-handed from a place believed to be full of game, too much confused to have been able to invent a tale -'

'My lord!' The hunter fell on his knees. 'Did you displease the man, Tyrion, was that it? Some brigand from Deelguy, perhaps, or slimy slave-trader from Terekenalt out to make a little extra money by carrying messages during his dirty travels? Your information was displeasing, perhaps, or the pay was

not enough?' 'No, my lord, no!'

'Stand up!'