Marune: Alastor 933 by Jack Vance

will lend dignity to the occasion.”
    “Very well, do as you like.”
    “The Kraike Singhalissa is now the head of the household?”
    “So I would suppose.”
    At a videophone as antiquated as the aircar, Lorcas put through a call.
    A footman in a black and scarlet uniform responded. “I speak for Benbuphar Strang. Please state your business.”
    “I want a few words with the Kraike Singhalissa,” said Lorcas. “I have important information to transmit.”
    “You must call at some other time. The Kraike is in consultation regarding the investiture.”
    “Investiture? Of whom?”
    “Of the new Kaiark.”
    “And who will this be?”
    “The present Kang Destian, who is next in order of succession.”
    “And when does the investiture occur?”
    “In one week’s time, when the present Kaiark is to be declared derelict.”
    Lorcas laughed. “Please inform the Kraike that the investiture may be canceled, since Kaiark Efraim is immediately returning to Scharrode.”
    The footman stared into the screen. “I cannot take responsibility for such an announcement.”
    Efraim stepped forward. “Do you recognize me?”
    “Ah, Force, 1 indeed I do!”
    “Deliver the message as you heard it from the Noble Matho Lorcas.”
    “Instantly, Force!” The footman inclined himself in a stiff bow, and faded in a dazzle of halations.
    The two returned to the aircar and clambered aboard. Without ceremony the pilot clamped the ports, opened the throttle and the ancient aircraft, creaking and vibrating, lurched up and away to the east.
    With the pilot, who identified himself as Tiber Flaussig, talking over his shoulder and ignoring both altimeter and the terrain below, the aircraft cleared the ridges of the First Scarp with a hundred yards to spare. As if by afterthought the pilot lifted the craft somewhat higher, although the land at once fell away a thousand feet to become an upland plain. A hundred sprawling lakes reflected the clouds; scour and deep-willow grew in isolated copses, with a gnarled catafalque tree here and there. Thirty miles east the Second Scarp thrust crags of naked rock up past the clouds. Flaussig, discussing certain outcrops below, declared them rich sources of such gems as tourmaline, peridot, topaz, and spinel - all protected from human exploitation by reason of Fwai-chi prejudice. “They claim this as one of their holy places, and so reads the treaty. They care no more for the jewels than for common stones; but they can smell a man from fifty miles away and lay on him their curse of a thousand itches, or a fiery bladder, or piebald skin. The area is now avoided.”
    Efraim pointed ahead to the looming scarp. “In a single minute we will all be crushed to pulp, unless you quickly raise this craft at least two thousand feet.”
    “Ah yes,” said Flaussig. “The scarp approaches, and we will give it due respect.” The aircar rose at a stomach-gripping rate, and from the engine box came a stuttering wheeze which caused Efraim to twist about in alarm. “Is this vehicle finally disintegrating?”
    Flaussig listened with a puzzled frown. “A mysterious sound certainly, one which I have not heard before. Still, were you as old as this vehicle, your viscera would also produce odd noises. Let us be tolerant of the aged.”
    As soon as the craft once more flew a level course the disturbing sounds dwindled into silence. Lorcas pointed ahead toward the Third Scarp, still fifty miles ahead. “Start now to ascend, in a gradual manner. The aircar is more likely to survive such treatment.”
    Flaussig acceded to the request, and the vehicle rose at a gradual angle to meet the prodigious bulk of the Third Scarp. Below passed a desolation of ridges, cols, chasms, and, rarely, a small forested valley. Flaussig waved his hand around the fearsome landscape. “Within the range of vision, around the whole of the cataclysmic tumble, live perhaps twenty fugitives: desperados, condemned criminals, and the like. Commit no