The Wazir and the Witch coaaod-7 Read online

  The Wazir and the Witch

  ( Chronicles of an Age of Darkness - 7 )

  Hugh Cook

  Hugh Cook

  The Wazir and the Witch

  CHAPTER ONE

  Begin at the beginning.

  Bolfrigalaskaptiko.

  A curse word?

  No, it is not a curse word, though it comes within a couple of syllables of being obscene in the extreme.

  Bolfrigalaskaptiko.

  Is this perhaps a dish of fried seagull livers mixed with a touch of basilisk gall and served with side helpings of baked yams and diamond-shaped segments of dried jelly-fish?

  A good guess.

  But wrong.

  For tolfrigdalakaptiko is the word which denotes the above-mentioned dish of seagull livers, and the mystery which here confronts us is bolfrigalaskaptiko.

  Give up?

  Very well.

  All will now be revealed, and your education will thus be made complete.

  Take down your atlas and open it to a map of the continent of Yestron. Run your finger down the western coast of that continent until you reach the equator. Here you will find the huge lagoon known as Manamalargo. What vast and slovenly river of fever fogs and predatory crocodiles empties itself into this lagoon? Why, the River Ka, of course. And what is the city of marshlands and malaria which lies just upstream from the estuary of that river?

  Look!

  If the atlas you are using is worth the price you paid for it, your finger will now be resting upon a blob (or at least a flyspeck) which is labelled ‘Bolfrigalaskaptiko’.

  Thus the mystery is solved.

  Bolfrigalaskaptiko is a city.

  A city which lies upon the River Ka.

  A city just upstream from the great lagoon of Manamalargo.

  A city on the western coast of the continent of Yestron, that sprawling land mass which has for so long been dominated by the Izdimir Empire.

  Now this has been learnt, it can all be forgotten, for the history which this text deals with has nothing whatsoever to do with the great lagoon of Manamalargo, the city of stilts and sewage canals known as Bolfrigalaskaptiko, or with the River Ka. Manamalargo, Ka and Bolfrigalaskaptiko are equally irrelevant to the action which follows, for this tome deals not with the history of Yestron but with Untunchilamon.

  And Untunchilamon, as your atlas will doubtless reveal, is far from Bolfrigalaskaptiko; it lies in the deeps of Moana, many horizons from the furthest shore, and is but a piece of rock beset on all sides by the rolling seas. A piece of rock? A considerable piece of rock, for Untunchilamon measures its length in leagues by the hundreds. Untunchilamon, then, is an island marooned in the middle of the ocean, a great many leagues from the nearest continental mass.

  It is to Untunchilamon that this tale must go, and there remain until the intricacies of a political crisis upon that island have been properly explicated, together with the tragedies, betrayals, murders, killings, manoeuvres, heartbreaks, traumas, loves and loyalties so richly entangled in the web of that crisis.

  Yet Bolfrigalaskaptiko remains an excellent place to start, even though we have already agreed that this city and its attendant geography may be conveniently forgotten. For it is here that an important meeting takes place. A meeting? Yes. A meeting between a heart specialist and a young man.

  The heart specialist?

  His name will not be given here, for he is of the Ola caste which is unique to the city of Bolfrigalaskaptiko; and, as any standard text of ethnology will tell you, names of male members of that caste never run to fewer than seven thousand syllables. Furthermore, it is considered culturally offensive to give such names in any abbreviated form, and were this text to take such a liberty it would doubtless be prosecuted; so, bearing in mind the length of the name, the limitations of paper and patience, and the sensitivities involved, it is best that the good doctor remain anonymous.

  As for the patient?

  The patient declares himself to be Jean Froissart, a name which at once identifies him as a child of Wen Endex. The patient gives his age as thirty-two, which is correct; therefore, while he thinks of himself as being young, he has already attained a maturity which beardless striplings and their giggling and newly nubile mates would look upon as being close to antiquity.

  The patient complains of sharp stabbing pains, sometimes in the region of his heart, sometimes in his arms or shoulders. At times he also experiences a vicious pain which makes it impossible to breathe except shallowly. He fears himself to be in danger of a heart attack, which is why he has presented himself to this medical specialist of the inordinately long (and hence ungiveable) name.

  The good Doctor Anonymous takes a detailed case history then declares that the young man known to him as Jean Froissart is suffering from symptoms of anxiety rather than cardiac delinquency. As for the stabbing pains which sometimes force this fearful patient to breathe as shallowly as possible, why, these are most unlikely to be connected with the heart.

  Doctor Anonymous puts it this way:

  ‘The lungs exist within a sac known to medical science as the plad’dnog’k’qara. This sac has two layers. There is an outside layer, which medical science in its genius has chosen to call the outer layer. Then there is an inside layer, the name of which you can guess for yourself.’

  Doctor Anonymous smiles, then sits back in his creaking chair of mangrove wood as if all has already been explained. His office shakes alarmingly as a punt collides with one of the struts which hold it clear of the sewage canal over which it is built; the monkey breeder who shares the premises gives vent to strident vituperation.

  ‘And?’ says Jean Froissart.

  ‘It is simple,’ says Doctor Anonymous, rubbing his hands together.

  He is endeavouring to help his patient to discover the truth for himself.

  But Froissart is in no mood for discovery. He is oppressed by the suffocating heat of Bolfrigalaskaptiko, the stench of rotten dogs and decayed sewage, the furious chatter of half a thousand caged monkeys and the persistent ministrations of the flies which he no longer bothers to brush from his face. With some disappointment, Doctor Anonymous accepts that his patient lacks an inclination to intellectual endeavour; the good doctor therefore proceeds with his lecture.

  ‘It is simple, as I have said already,’ says Doctor Anonymous, once more rubbing his hands together. ‘As you breathe, so the inner and outer layers of the plad’dnog’k’qara rub against each other. Sometimes, for reasons unknown to us, they stick together. This occasions pain upon breathing. Hence your symptoms.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ says the patient reluctantly. ‘But surely my other symptoms are…’

  Froissart pauses.

  Hesitates.

  ‘Trust me,’ says Doctor Anonymous. ‘In some patients, some of the symptoms you complain of are associated with angina or impending myocardial infarction. However, my careful elucidation of your own personal medical history assures me that in your case these symptoms indicate nothing but anxiety. However, if it would set your mind at rest, I will give you a clearance test.’

  ‘A clearance test?’

  ‘Yes,’ said t)octor Anonymous, beaming. ‘It is a seven-day test. On the first day, you join the crew of a galley. From dawn to dusk you row upstream against the flow of the River Ka. On the second day, the swelter bath. On the third day, exposure to controlled doses of medicinal alcohol. The forced march comes on the fourth day, the fifth is spent in the smoke chamber, the wrestling match follows on the sixth, then we finish with the sledgehammer test on the seventh.’

  On receiving this intelligence, Froissart finds that it is too hot to indulge in anything as athletic as a shudder. So he contents himself by a
sking:

  ‘Is there not some… some element of danger in this test?’

  ‘Oh yes, oh yes indeed,’ says Doctor Anonymous, beaming all the more. ‘The mortality rate can run as high as fifty per cent. But for those who survive, the clearance test is infinitely reassuring. Their health is certified and assured. I believe you would pass this test, young man, and pass with honours. In any case — consider! If my diagnosis is incorrect, is not a swift death infinitely preferable to a long life as an invalid? One way or another, the clearance test will put your mind at rest.’ Jean Froissart declined to participate in the clearance test, but thanks the good Doctor Anonymous, pays the good Doctor Anonymous, then hails a water taxi and sets off for his ship. On the way, the taxi sinks, miring its young passenger in the sludge of a foul and pestilential sewage canal. Hence Froissart is both foul-tempered and foul-smelling by the time he reaches the brig which is to take him to Untunchilamon.

  Aboard that ship is the man who has recently (and briefly) acted as the wazir of Manamalargo. This is Manthandros Trasilika, who expects to depart from Bolfrigalaskaptiko without futher delay. Already he has thrice practised a speech in which he announces himself as the rightful wazir of Injiltaprajura. In this speech, a speech which the orator plans to make as soon as he sets foot upon the island of Untunchilamon, he denounces Justina Thrug as a witch. Yes. He denounces Justina Thrug as a witch. And proclaims that justice demands her immediate death.

  But the first trouble which will befall Justina Thrug will come not from Manthandros Trasilika but from the Inland Revenue Department of the island of Untunchilamon.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Mention of the Inland Revenue Department may lead some people to think this will be a horror story.

  Certainly, horror and the Inland Revenue walk hand in hand. This you must admit. For, unless you were born blind or live with your eyes shut, you must have seen the headless corpses hanging by their heels outside the offices of your local taxation department; and, unless you have gone deaf or habitually stuff your ears with beeswax, you must on occasion hear the screams of the damned issuing from that grim building as the auditors go about their work.

  However — and here the sensitive will doubtless breathe a sigh of relief — as little as possible will be said of the activities of the Inland Revenue Department. Furthermore, even were the affairs of that department to be explicated in full, nothing too hideous would appear in these pages.

  You may find this claim startling, for the Inland Revenue Department of Untunchilamon is in many places synonymous with horror.

  Untunchilamon: island of Norbik the Auditor!

  Untunchilamon: island of Max the Inquisitor!

  Untunchilamon: island of blood!

  If your reaction is as above, doubtless the person to blame is Greven Jing. While Jing is doubtless a horror writer of exceptional talent, his treatment of certain historical events is far from accurate. Take for example his book The Bothopody, which purports to be a history of Injiltaprajura’s Inland Revenue Department. Despite Jing’s claim that ‘this is a true story’, The Bothopody is a book which has little more than a random relationship to the truth.

  True, Norbik the Auditor lived and worked on Untunchilamon, and did extract teeth in the manner described by Jing; and those extractions were every bit as painful as Jing would have us believe. It is equally true that Max the Inquisitor used to shark people in the lagoon for the pure pleasure of it; and the number of tax defaulters thus disposed of cannot be fewer than two and a half thousands.

  Even so, The Bothopody is a work of fiction rather than a work of fact.

  For Norbik the Auditor worked for the tax department during the reign of Wazir Sin, he who was overthrown by Lonstantine Thrug; and the end of Sin’s wazirate saw the end of Norbik himself. On the other hand, Max the Inquisitor did not land on Untunchilamon until some time after the reign of the Empress Justina. It follows that the activities of these two men are separated (as far as Injiltaprajura is concerned) by a good seven years and more of peace and reason, yet Jing has written thus:

  ‘Trob the Lobble stared in horror as Norbik the Auditor fastened him to the table with the razor-sharp spikes of his steely gaze. There was an inhuman gleam of rabid lust in Norbik’s drug-crazed eyes. Merely to look into those eyes was unendurable torture. They spoke of the fiendish brutality of which only an accountant is capable. Trob the Lobble spat out another piece of his tongue. He tried to scream. He could not.

  ‘He was close to death. The heat of Injiltaprajura clogged his arteries and sweated through his bones. Malarial fevers shook his shuddering limbs. The drums, the drums, the pulsing drums of Untunchilamon throbbed in his skull like the pulse of hell itself. He wanted to die. But he could not. He was cursed with the constitution of a shark. After ten days of torture, he was still far, far away from the blessed release of death.

  ‘The sound of the devilish drumming intensified as the door opened. In through the door came Max the Inquisitor. Max carried a wooden bucket in his hands. Steam rose from the bucket, which was full of boiling water. Max smiled a gloating smile, raised the bucket on high, then began to empty its contents over Trob the Lobble’s bleeding face. Outside, the drummers screamed in manic glee.’

  To the above one may object on many grounds. As has been stated already, it is false to history, since Norbik the Auditor and Max the Inquisitor never worked together on Untunchilamon. It is also unfair to accountants. Jing implies that accountants are the most inhuman monsters known to civilization, whereas in fact this description is rightly applied to lawyers.

  Furthermore, the ‘drumming’ cult was not known to Norbik the Auditor, who died roughly seven years before that cult came into existence; and it had ceased entirely by the time Max the Inquisitor came to power. The ‘drumming’ cult obsessed the adolescents of Injiltaprajura for a very short time, that being the final days of the rule of the Empress Justina.

  Let it be recognized, then, that the horrors of life on Untunchilamon have been grossly exaggerated by certain mercenary fabulists who have distorted history in the interests of personal profit; and, furthermore, that the ‘fiendish’ and ‘diabolical’ nature of the short-lived drumming cult is entirely the creation of such fabulists.

  It is true that ‘drummers’ and ‘drumming’ existed. That is to say, young people sat around in groups and drummed the sun from dawn to dusk. Sometimes they also drummed right through undokondra and bardardor-nootha as well, only ceasing their activities when exhaustion set in. It is true that some of these ‘drummers’ also engaged on occasion in sexual intercourse, but such behaviour is not unknown even in those cultures where not a single drum is to be heard from one sunbirth to another.

  It is also true that more than one ‘drummer’ committed suicide. Which has led the eminent psychologist Yumbert Qipty to assert that the beating of drums is itself a dehumanizing process which, by a complicated process of auto-hypnosis, encourages a person to self-destruct.

  Qipty’s thesis has been seized upon, and enlarged, and exaggerated, by writers such as Greven Jing. Qipty’s thesis (whether in its original form or that elaboration of it which has been created by Jing) has won popularity because it is so reassuring.

  Reasssuring?

  Yes!

  To contrast externalized sources of horror with the sane and sensible values of a putative ‘normality’ — and such a process is the essence of the analytical science espoused by Qipty and the fables created by Jing — is infinitely reassuring. For it allows us to indulge ourselves in a totally irrational delusion: namely, that such a ‘normality’ exists at all.

  The great attraction of Qipty’s theories, and of Jing’s drummers, demons, rabid flying fish, killer worms and blood-sucking ghosts is that (always) the horror is generated by ‘the other’; by the abnormal presence, or influence, or trend; by something trespassing on the safe, kind, loving and lovable world of the ‘normal’.

  In fact, the ‘normality’ which is posited by Qipty and Jing a
like does not exist. Never has existed. Never will exist.

  In proof of this, we need make no mention of the horrors of a world ruled by the threat of war; we need say nothing of the starvation which squalors in the backstreets behind prosperity’s mansions; we need make no mention of mortality, that great doom which threatens one and all with ultimate oblivion; we need say nothing of the cold wastelands between the stars and the heat-death of the universe which promises the destruction of all the works of man and woman alike.

  We need make no mention of any of the above, for those who are alert to reality have realized the true horrors of everyday reality already; and it is a waste of time trying to convince the worshippers of ‘normality’ of the emptiness of their beliefs.

  So, while ‘drumming’ truly existed on Untunchilamon, and while ‘drummers’ sometimes committed suicide, the realist will surely not join the eminent Yumbert Qipty in thinking the mere beating of drums to be the cause of adolescent self-destruction.

  Rather, the realist will recognize that the world is a much harsher place than the self-deluded followers of the ‘normality’ cult would have us believe. Realists will recognize that it is very tough being an adolescent, and the problems of this age of life sometimes compound themselves to the point of causing suicide.

  While it is difficult to be an adolescent, this fact is often obscured by another fact: namely, that it is exceptionally difficult (few things could be harder) to be a mature adult trying to deal with the insolence, foolishness, insensitivity and unconscious selfishness of children who are between the ages of thirteen and twenty-three. In despair, adults often seek a simple answer for the monstrous behaviour of such children, and find it comforting to pretend that it is abnormal, and to blame it on some simple external source of horror such as a ‘cult’.

  But the fact is that every younger generation is destined to be a trial to the older generation. Thus it has always been, and always will be, though it is denied by professional myth-makers like Yumbert Qipty, he with his much-loved concept of ‘normality’. Qipty would have us believe that children ‘at the age of the blood’s turmoil’ (as the poet puts it) can be sane, rational, loving and law-abiding human beings. Qipty declares that in a ‘normal’ world, the young are polite, and considerate, and clean the dirt from beneath their fingernails without being told, abjure alcohol and other strong drugs, and unflinchingly cleave to truth, justice and the imperial way.