In the Palace of the Khans Read online

  Nigel hesitated. He’d already got himself in deeper than he’d meant to, and the intensity of her gaze was unsettling. The child clung to her leg, staring at Nigel, sensing something was wrong.

  “Yes?” she said. “She did not want to come to Sodalka? Why is that?… Tell me, please. It is important.”

  “Well, er, I think maybe she was afraid your father-in-law might try to make her marry one of his sons.”

  “My father-in-law has one son only.”

  “Oh, but …”

  “You are right. This is what my father-in-law wishes. A man may take more than one wife in Dirzhan. We have an apartment in Singapore. He says the Khanazhana will be Mizhael’s chief wife and they will live in Dirzhan, and I will be his second wife and he will come sometimes to visit me in Singapore. I will not accept this. It is difficult for Mizhael. I cannot tell you …”

  “Oh … well … if it’s any help, Taeela—the Khanazhana—told me she isn’t going to marry him if she can possibly help it.”

  He watched her relax, but doubtfully. She managed a smile and picked the child up.

  “Now you had better rest before Alinu comes,” she said, rapping her knuckles against a small gong on the table by the door. “Darzha will show you your room. I don’t go through this door unveiled and unaccompanied. There is another door, and if I want to go out I put on boy’s clothes and use that and tell people I am my brother. It is ridiculous. Everyone knows who I am but they keep the pretence up because I’m a foreigner and one day Mizhael will marry a proper Dirzhani wife and I will go and live in Singapore and they will be rid of me.”

  She spoke with the same soft lisp as before, but with steadily increasing bitterness, paying no attention to the stout middle-aged woman who had appeared through another door and was standing watching them.

  “You must miss Singapore,” he said, because he had to say something.

  “Yes, of course. But I love him, you see. That’s what makes it so difficult.”

  She turned and spoke in what sounded like rather stumbling Dirzhani to the woman, who nodded, drew a key from the pocket of her house coat, unlocked the door and beckoned to Nigel.

  “See you,” he said to Lily-Jo. “Do you want me to tell Taeela about you?”

  She shrugged and turned away.

  Nigel’s room was a fair size, with a high ornamental ceiling and three narrow barred windows looking out at a blank wall. It was clean, and could once have been rather grand, but obviously hadn’t been decorated for years. There were a few strange-shaped bits of dark old furniture and a large old iron bed with brass knobs and something like an outsize pillow for a mattress.

  He was lying on this, painfully trying to ease his shoulder, which had stiffened horribly in its sling, when he heard a scratching at the door. It opened before he could call out and man wearing a brown and green shoulder-sash—the Baladzhin colours, presumably—came in with his shoulder-bag, followed by two veiled women. The older one wore opaque black-lensed spectacles and grasped the shoulder of the younger one as she moved; she too, Nigel realised, must be at least half blind, to judge by the thickness of her lenses.

  The man put the shoulder-bag down and asked Nigel a question.

  “I’m fine, thanks,” he said, waving his good hand to show what he meant. The man nodded and left.

  “Alinu. Veela,” said the younger woman, pointing first at her companion and then herself. “She my auntie. She make your shouldzha good.”

  “That’d be great,” said Nigel. “Do you want me to take my shirt off?”

  “Please to,” said Veela.

  She helped him ease it off, led Alinu to the bedside and guided her hands to his chest. They explored gently. He could feel the tips of the fingernails at the edges of the gently probing pads. It was as if a couple of crabs were scuttling around on him.

  Alinu withdrew her hands and Veela took over, feeling rather more hesitantly, while her aunt muttered in her ear. Teacher and pupil, he guessed. The family secrets being passed on. Then, in turn, they sniffed all over the left side of his chest. If they’d been dogs, he thought, they’d have been wagging their tails with excitement.

  “To turn,” said Veela, gesturing the motion. “I help?”

  “I can manage,” he said, and rolled himself awkwardly onto his front. They went through the whole process again and turned him back over.

  After a brief discussion Veela unslung her shoulder-bag and rootled around, eventually bringing out a small clay flask which she handed to Alinu. She then made him sit, rearranged his pillows to prop him up, laid him back, and placed her hands firmly either side of his head.

  “Not to move,” she said.

  Alinu groped her way forward and found his body. She checked the position of his nose, held the flask below it and removed the stopper.

  The reek leapt out like a tiger, fierce as pain. Instinctively he tried to jerk his head away, but Veela held it firm until Alinu stoppered the bottle and it was over. His head rang, his lungs gulped air, his eyes streamed.

  “Wha … Wha … Wha …?” he protested and tried to get up. Effortlessly Veela pushed him back. His muscles were jelly, his bones weightless. He seemed to have no strength at all. Both women laughed so cheerfully at his feebleness that he managed to smile dopily through his tears.

  They began to work together, Veela moving his arm to and fro according to Alinu’s instructions, while Alinu poked and squeezed and prodded. It should have been unbearably painful, and yes, the pain was there if he chose to think about it, but it was somewhere outside him. The only reality was the after-smell of that odour, which rapidly eased until he found himself dragging in great lungfuls of air and feeling enormously alive inside the weirdly enfeebled body. The women were still at their work when he fell asleep.

  He woke with a shock, unable to think where he was. The whole of the last three days could have been a dream.

  “How’s the shoulder,” said a voice.

  “Oh …? Ungh …?”

  “Knocked you out, did she?”

  He opened his eyes. Mizhael Baladzhin was at his bedside. The two women were gone. It was almost dark outside the window. Gingerly he shifted his arm an inch, and then several inches, feeling only a mild twinge where before there had been wincing pain. The flesh round the joint was sweetly tender to the touch, like a mild bruise, but that was all.

  “That’s amazing,” he said. “That stuff she made me smell …”

  “Gave you darm, did she? You’re honoured. Worth its weight in gold. Distilled from a fungus. You’ll feel two hundred percent for a few hours and then you’ll flake right out. Only the chosen women in her family know the recipe, and then it takes a hundred years to reach full potency.

  “Right, are you ready for a bit of a shock? I’m later than I said because I’ve been doing a search on the Balliol website. Can’t find any Riddles anywhere near the right age. On the other hand there’s a Nigel Ridgwell, ’82 to ’86, currently Her Majesty’s Ambassador to Dirzhan.”

  “Oh.”

  “Don’t worry—I’m not proposing to tell anyone about this. Lily-Jo, maybe. It’d be bound to get out, and we don’t want the Dirzh telling the Russians the British are interfering in our internal affairs. I doubt anyone except my dad has paid much attention to you so far—they were all too busy staring at the Khanazhana. But your father’s been on TV once or twice, and he’s an exotic figure here in Dirzhan. If you go swanning around with your blond hair and your blue eyes someone’s going to put two and two together.

  “I’ve brought you some clothes. They’re Lily-Jo’s, for when she has one of her outings—she tell you about that?—so they should about fit. Dad dines formal so you’ll be wearing a turban …”

  “Provided it isn’t a dahl. I’ve got some sun-glasses.”

  “Great. Can you do an American accent?”

  “Um. I’d make a mess of it. What I thought was, Dad’s here working on the dam project. He met the President and told him I was coming out and
the President asked if I could spend a bit of time with the Khanazhana to help with her English. I was doing that when he got shot and I escaped with her.”

  “That’s fine. Then not to bother with the sun-glasses. Yanks wear sun-glasses. Brits have blue eyes. Known facts in Dirzhan. I’ll give you five minutes to dress. I’ll do the turban for you.”

  He bustled out. Nigel stayed where he was, thinking with the dreamy clarity of the darm-trance about Mizhael Baladzhin. Lily-Jo and the Balliol website; Alinu and Darzha. A computer nerd and a Dirzhani princeling. One foot in the age of the internet, and the other still in the Middle Ages.

  Nigel liked him, liked the way he talked to him, not just friendly-adult, but as if there wasn’t any age gap at all. As if age simply didn’t matter. As if dishing the colonels had been a video game they were playing. “Dishing,” “swanning around,” weird. It could have been Nigel’s father talking …

  He pulled himself together and started to put on Lily-Jo’s clothes, dark brown baggy trousers, fastening at the ankles, and a knee-length embroidered jacket. There weren’t any buttons, just laces and loops to thread them through. He was sorting out the ankle fastenings when Mizhael came back.

  “How are you doing? I’ve found you some sandals might do. Let’s have a go at your turban. We can get your hair dyed tomorrow—it’ll wash out—so you won’t have to bother with this. There. Suits you. Lawrence of Dirzhan. Need a hand with your sling? Well done. Time to get down.”

  “Will Taeela be there?”

  “Up in the gallery with the ladies, I’m afraid. This is Sodalka, Nick. Tell you what—I’ll send a note up inviting her to come and meet Lily-Jo after. She can bring her bidzhaya. Ready? Let’s go.”

  Dinner was in a much smaller and less ornate version of the Great Hall at the palace, without the staircase, and arcaded across only one end, with the arches above filled with a pierced screen. The meal had already started when Mizhael and Nigel arrived. Nigel copied Mizhael as they halted at the entrance, placed their palms together and bowed to Chief Baladzhin, immediately opposite them. Still chewing vigorously, he raised a welcoming hand and waved it vaguely towards his right, then turned to listen to the chieftain seated on his left, who had continued speaking volubly throughout. Thirty or forty men were sitting around in a rough rectangle, some cross-legged on cushions on the floor, some half-lounging on thick-padded divans, one or two on ordinary upright chairs. The centre of the space was cluttered with low tables and tiered cake-stands carrying plates of typical Dirzhani finger-food. Attendants wandered around with dishes and pitchers. It looked more like a grand indoor picnic than a formal dinner.

  “Chap spouting at Dad is Ahkuvo Ahkhan,” muttered Mizhael as he led the way across the room. “Chief hot-head. Looks like we’re sitting next to Dad’s cousin Zhiordzhio—the guy with the foxy look. Speaks a bit of English. Crony of Ahkhan’s. Probably try and pump you about the Khanazhana.”

  “Honestly, I hardly know her,” said Nigel earnestly. “Her dad just got me in to talk to her about books and stuff. My dad warned me to keep off politics. Like I told you, I just happened to be there when there was this coup and I tagged along with her because I hadn’t got anywhere else to go.”

  Mizhael laughed.

  “You’ll do,” he said.

  Zhiordzhio Baladzhin was a haggard-looking elderly man with a slight squint in his bloodshot eyes. Thin lips smiled briefly in the tatty grey beard and he beckoned Nigel into the space beside him on the divan. Attendants appeared with food, and a drinks trolley. Mr Baladzhin didn’t wait for Nigel to choose.

  “Mizhtair … Uh. Is good you come to Dirzhan.”

  “I could have picked a better time, sir. It’s been pretty scary.”

  “Yes, yes. But you safe now in Sodalka. You hurting your arm?”

  “A man hit it with a gun. There were these two guys trying to rob us, but Rahdan—the Khanazhana’s bodyguard—he dealt with them. That was one of the scary bits.”

  Mr Baladzhin shrugged. It wasn’t what he wanted to talk about.

  “You are friend to the Khanazhana?” he said.

  “Not really, sir. I’ve visited her just a few times to help her with her English. My father met the President, you see, and he asked if …”

  Nigel spun the story out, speaking slowly and clearly, keeping it as boring as he could. He didn’t mention the visit to the hunting lodge. Mr Baladzhin nodded every now and then, but his eyes kept roving round the room. He didn’t say anything till Nigel got onto the Tribute of the Chieftains.

  “You see this? With you own eyes?” he said, looking directly at Nigel for the first time.

  “Yes, sir,” said Nigel. “I was up in the gallery …”

  No way could he keep the death of the President boring. He didn’t try. Mr Baladzhin listened intently.

  “Who did shot him?” he said suddenly. “You seeing who did shot him?”

  “No, sir. Everyone was cheering the Khanazhana coming down the stairs. I think the shots came from somewhere up in the gallery on my right. It might have been one of the guards. They weren’t the President’s usual lot.”

  “Dirzh,” said Mr Baladzhin, spitting the word out. “And the chievetans—what?”

  “I didn’t see then, sir. We were too busy running away and hiding. But later on we saw soldiers taking some of the chieftains away along with some other important people.”

  “Chievetans—how many?”

  “Oh, six? Seven, maybe.”

  “Seven. Seven Varaki chievetans go to this tribute. The Dirzh keep them for balukiri.”

  “Hostages?”

  “Hozhtadzhes. So. Where they taking them?”

  “Another room in the palace, I think. That’s all I saw, sir. The soldiers were hunting for the Khanazhana. We were hiding until we could get out.”

  Mr Baladzhin stared furiously at him for several seconds.

  “Dirzh!” he spat again, and turned to the man on his other side. Mizhael was now talking to the man on his right, so Nigel relaxed and settled down to eat what Mizhael had chosen for him. Taeela had asked him to think. Fat chance anyone would listen to him, but it was something to do.

  She was who and what she was, so you could rule out the sensible ambassador-type answers, peace deals with the murderers, power-sharing arrangements and so on. You could rule out the crazy ones too, Dirzh against Dirzh, cities reduced to smoking rubble, farms deserted, tens of thousands half-starving in refugee camps.

  Anyway, none of that was what she’d asked him. Fohdrahko had given her a map of the passages. She’d kept the vital keys. So how could she use them? It was a day-dream only, a shoot-’em-up video game without the kit.

  No, not a day-dream. A darm-dream. He felt he could remember every instant of their escape from the palace, every step through the passages, every rung of the shafts, every breath he had drawn, every beat of his heart …

  The trance was broken by Mizhael’s voice.

  “I guess you like Dirzhani food then. Want any more?”

  Nigel stared at his empty plate, vaguely aware of the series of tastes that had been in his mouth.

  “Uh … Oh, yes. I like it a lot. No, thanks. I’m fine.”

  “Sorry to desert you. You seemed to be managing OK with Uncle Zhiordzhio. Maybe I should’ve sat between you, but he’d’ve just talked across me. Tricky old boy. He thought he was all lined up to be chieftain, but the tribal seniors didn’t like the way he took it for granted and chose Dad instead. I reckon he’s trying to get us into a fight with the Dirzh, and if it works out—which it won’t—he’ll take the credit and if it doesn’t he’ll say it was all Dad’s fault and it’s time he took over. Tell him anything useful?”

  “I don’t think so. He was mainly interested in the hostages. The other Varaki chieftains.”

  “Yeah. It’s getting to look like that. We haven’t heard from them as far as I know. Those stupid bastards. They’re playing into Uncle Zhiordzhio’s hands. If they wanted to stir the Varaki up they c
ouldn’t have done better.

  “Trouble is, Nick, Dad listens to Uncle Zhiordzhio. Tell you the truth, Dad’s a bit of guvla. ‘Cushion’ in English, but in Dirzhani it’s used for the kind of guy who’s easy to persuade. Carries the impression of the last arse that sat on him, right? If we’re going to do anything to stop Uncle Zhiordzhio we’re going to have to come up a better suggestion damn soon. You said the Khanazhana had a plan.”

  “Well. Sort of. I haven’t told you how we got out of the palace. It’s full of secret passages. There was this old guy who looked after Taeela …”

  Mizhael listened intently, nibbling at the knuckle of his thumb, while Nigel told him, low-voiced, what had happened from the moment the shot was fired to their crossing the river. He didn’t smile or look away. When a servant came up and offered them more food he waved him away.

  Nigel finished and waited while Mizhael studied his nibbled thumb.

  “You’ve seen this map?” he said at last.

  “Only the outside. It looked really old but it should be pretty accurate. Fohdrahko wouldn’t have given it to Taeela if he thought it wasn’t any use.”

  “The guys who were after you got into part of the system. They may have explored it all by now.”

  “I don’t know. It isn’t easy. There’s a lot of booby traps. The eunuchs didn’t like outsiders using the passages.”

  Mizhael’s expression changed completely. He glanced sideways at Nigel like a teasing child and grinned.

  “Lily-Jo tell you why I make her come here when she’d much rather we stayed in Singapore?” he said. “I run a little company there, developing computer games. Some guy comes up with an idea for a game but he doesn’t know where to go with it, so he brings it to us and we work it up till we can try it on one of the big players. Right? Takes a lot of expensive kit to do it properly and you’ll be lucky if you get a bite one time in twenty, so it can be a while before you see a return on your money, if you ever do. Dad’s putting up the cash to get us started and keep us going till then, but part of the deal is I spend half the year here. I could leave Lily-Jo in Singapore, but she won’t have it and nor will I. You a games freak?”