City of The Tiger (Novella) by John Brunner

Author:John Brunner [Brunner, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sci Fi & Fantasy Novella
Publisher: Science Fantasy magazine
Published: 1958-01-29T00:00:00+00:00

V

On the whole, Chu Lao behaved in a very restrained fashion. He decided (or affected to decide) that here he had no more than a case of a common soldier with ideas above his station, who had been sufficiently ungrateful regarding the favour done for him in the matter of the sword to come burgling.

Accordingly, he sent for the city guard, and delivered Hao Sen to them bound hand and foot and looking much the worse for his night’s experiences. Face down across the back of a camel he was brought to the gate of the city and there thrown into a cell built in the solid wall. A single barred window, far too small to afford anything but a glimpse of the outer world, was the only other opening beside the door.

A one-eyed man with muscles like a horse was his jailer, and sat on a low wooden bench beyond the door, staring unblinkingly at Hao Sen as though he was an unidentified germ in the field of a microscope. Hao Sen ignored him.

Plainly, he berated himself, he had been overconfident. Now he was in the tightest possible comer, with a choice of two alternatives. One was to attempt to escape by magic, in which case run the risk of overreaching himself and finding that someone else knew more about its laws in Tiger City than he could guess at. That, effectively, would finish him. The other choice was to wait until they executed him, and he fancied that least of all. He had been executed once before, on a much earlier trip and in entirely different surroundings, and it was not an experience he wanted to repeat.

Of course, it would apparently eliminate him, and perhaps make a second try simpler. But it would involve delay, and every day that passed was a serious waste of time. It would not be possible for him to come back at once after his execution; he would have to wait, or someone else would have to take his place and laboriously go through all the stages of investigation he had already performed. And that would be a blow to his vanity, too.

No, magic it would have to be. But he was sorely handicapped by the fact that everything had been taken from him except his clothing; even the pouch on his belt had been emptied. Without money or weapon, even assuming he did get free, he was going to be labouring under major disadvantages.

The one eye of his jailer stayed firmly fixed on him; he did not dare start right away. Disciplining his tumultuous mind as well as he could, he lay down on the palliasse in the cell and composed himself to an uneasy doze.

A question ran all the way through it: was it pure chance that Chu Lao should be the instrument of his downfall, or was the wizard indeed the most significant person in Tiger City?

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