“Better come now.”
“No. First I see that the Sol-Belter gets offworld. Then I fix it so we can follow. Both will take time.”
“Can you bring that off, Claude?”
“Yes.” He straightened, and the look of the true Herrenmann was unmistakable. “It’s good to be alive again.”
Chapter 7
In the great courtyard of the Viceregal castle, the kzinti nobility of the Alpha Centauri system gathered to pay their last respects to Chuut-Riit. Stone and spiked iron walls surrounded the court; edged metal and orange fur crowded the wooden bier.
What was left of the body was wrapped in battle-banners atop a huge pile of logs, precious and aromatic woods stacked in open lattices. The pyre was hung with banners, honors awarded for past campaigns, the house emblems of nobles Chuut-Riit had killed in duels. Raaiitiro and buffalo had been slaughtered and heaped around the base, to add the blood-scent of victory. Other things lay tumbled amid logs and flesh: fine weapons, ornaments, heirlooms, the bodies of six household troopers who had volunteered to death-duel that they might accompany their lord into the mind of God. Around and around the great heap of treasure danced the warriors of Kzin, shuffling, leaping, twisting in midair to snap fangs at the sky and land on all fours. Clangor filled the air as they hammered the blades of four-foot swords on steel shields and screeched their defiance and their grief. Many had shaved portions of their pelts and thrown the braided hair upon the wood as well.
Traat-Admiral broke from the dance, stood, took the blade of his sword in both hands and gashed his face above the muzzle, then snapped it across one column-thick thigh. He cast the pieces onto the pyre; one edge lodged quivering in a log of sandalwood, and the hilt rang off an antique space helmet. The ginger smell of anger and the dark musk of pain were everywhere in the air.
“Arreeeeeawreeeeeee!” he wailed, throwing his head back and letting his mouth widen into the ninety-degree killing gape. “Arreeeeawreeeeee!”
Conservor and an acolyte thrust burning torches into his hands. He thrust them toward the sky and began to run around the pyre; the warriors and nobles parted to make a path for him, smashing steel on steel and screaming.
Once, twice, thrice he made the circuit of the courtyard. Then he halted once more by his starting point. Silence fell, broken only by the massed panting of the crowd.
“Warriors of the Patriarchy,” he shouted. “A Hero of Heroes is fallen. God the Hunter has taken the greatest of us. God has drunk of the blood of the Riit. Howl for God!”
A huge wailing screech lifted and slammed back from the distant walls of the courtyard.
“Chuut-Riit is fallen, sword in hand, fangs in his slayer’s throat. So should all Heroes fall. Howl for God!”
Another echoing screech.
“Chuut-Riit is fallen by kzinti claw, but the real slayers, the cowards who set son against sire and dared not face him in honest war, are the monkeys of Sol system. As his chosen successor, I pledge my blood for vengeance. Who is with me? Howl for God!”
This time the sound was a massed roar, an endless deep-toned belling snarl. He threw both torches into the resin-soaked wood, and it caught with a throaty pulsing bellow that matched the sound from a thousand carnivore throats. The kzinti began to dance once more, swaying and dipping their muzzles in unison to the ground, whirling, stamping forward. Others dragged out huge drums made from the bones and skins of monsters and leaped up to dance on them, and the rhythmic booming mixed with the chanting snarl of the crowd and the toning of the fire. A pillar of flame shot up into the darkening sky; Alpha Centauri was down, and Beta on the horizon cast steel-silver shadows across the wavering black-and-crimson of the pyre.
Farewell, my brother. Hunt ever well, he thought. Then he put loss from his mind; Chuut-Riit had indeed died as a Hero should, and there was his work to continue.
With a monumental effort, Traat-Admiral pulled himself free of the hypnotic cadence of the mourning dance. Long ago when chieftains had been mourned so, their followers had danced themselves into madness and then rushed out upon their enemies in an unstoppable berserker rage. Now they would simply continue until they dropped from exhaustion; already a few were clawing their faces or chests in frenzy, the blood-scent adding to the pull of the ritual. Come morning they would creep away, or drop into exhausted slumber, save for a few who would lie dead of overstrain. . . .
The new governor stalked through the throng; they ignored him, glaze-eyed. He passed between two of the huge drums, folding in his ears as the enormous sound hammered at him, echoing against his lungs and making the shearing teeth at the back of his mouth quiver painfully together. It was a relief when the great doors of the castle’s hall closed behind him, muffling the noise. A relief despite what awaited him around the dais.
Ktrodni-Stkaa. The noble had left the ceremony as soon as was decent, and had not so much as shaved a patch of fur in respect. Few of the other cushions gathered about the stone block table of the banqueting hall were occupied yet, but Ktrodni-Stkaa was there . . .
Disrespect, Traat-Admiral thought, hissing mentally. Disrespect for Chuut-Riit, whose waste litter he is not fit to shovel. Disrespect for the Patriarch, whose blood Chuut-Riit bore.
Stiff with anger, he stalked by the other kzin and threw himself down on the slightly higher block at the head of the table. Lying there, he beckoned Conservor to his side when the sage entered. Ktrodni-Stkaa had half-lifted lips from fangs when Traat-Admiral took the cushion of dominance; he rose to a crouch when the position of most honor was given to another. Traat-Admiral fixed his eyes on the other kzin’s, in a gesture of naked aggression, and maintained it until he reclined once more. On one elbow, the posture of dining rather than a prostration, but still not open resistance. That would be very foolish, here in the governor’s mansion. Traat-Admiral had already given out that he would keep the entire household on, with no loss in status; Ktrodni-Stkaa was a traditionalist of such proportions that he allowed no uncastrated male past the outer wall of his household. Chuut-Riit’s guard corps were anxious to keep their testicles, and his cadre of administrators and commanders their positions and privileges.
He sipped at hot tosho brandy mixed with dried zheeretki; the mixture was mildly intoxicating and relaxing, although not so much so as rolling in fresh zheeretki, of course. Others straggled in, many still panting. Wunderland was warmer than homeworld, and kzin did not sweat except through their tongues. The room filled with the low rumbles of confidential conversation and the lapping of thirsty warriors. Traat-Admiral waited until all twenty or so of the most important were seated: high officers, nobles of great estates—lands, factories, mines—and the chief continental administrators.
Warriors of the Viceregal guard brought in the first course of food for the funeral banquet: live zianya, closely bound and with tape over their muzzles, the delicious scent of their fear filling the feasting hall. One was placed in the blood gutter of the table before each pair of kzin. Even among the mightiest of the Alpha Centauri system, such a delicacy was not common, and wet black nostrils flared along the granite table. Zianya did not flourish in this ecology, and had to be delicately coaxed to reproduce. Demand always exceeded supply, although those from the central worlds said the local breed was not so savory as the range-reared product of Kzin itself.
“Greetings, warriors of the Patriarchy, hunters of the Great Pack,” Traat-Admiral said, raising himself on both hands and staring down at the assembled worthies. “We are met to feast in honor of Chuut-Riit, who hunts the savannahs of Paradise”—most of those present touched nose, although literal belief was a rarity these days—”and to consult on measures needful for the Hunt against the humans of Sol.”
“Hrraaahh, you are hasty,” Ktrodni-Stkaa said. Strict courtesy would have finished that with Dominant One, although technically this was a feast, where males were males and all were hunt-brothers. “There is the matter of who shall be governor after Chuut-Riit, honor to the Riit. The war against the humans has not gone well.”
A rumble of agreement at that; everyone here was anxious to forward the conquest of Earth. If nothing else, it would drain off a great many name-hungry younger kzintosh. And there was glory unending in such a thing, as well. Few were alive who had been among the Conquest Fleet that took Wunderland. Ktrodni-Stkaa’s grandfather had come with it.
So. It was a good time to strike, but also typical of Ktrodni-Stkaa, right after the burning.