Mountains of Majipoor by Robert Silverberg

Author:Robert Silverberg [Silverberg, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Science Fiction, Fantasy, General
ISBN: 9780553573275
Publisher: Spectra
Published: 1996-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

“He thinks you are his lordship. It is too late to tell him anything else.

He has too much pride invested in having the Coronal of Majipoor as a suppliant in his village. If we tell him at this late hour that we've allowed 167

The Mountains of Majipoor

by Robert Silverberg

him to deceive himself about who you really are up till now, he'll kill us both out of hand. Believe me, prince.”

“But that would be an act of war! His lordship's government would send an army in here and carry him away into prison for the rest of his life.”

“He has no idea of the strength of his lordship's government,” Korinaam said. “As you know, he believes that his lordship is a tribal chieftain who is no more important or powerful than he is himself, and that no invader could possibly mount a successful assault on this village. Of course he would find out eventually that he is wrong. But you and I would still be dead.”

Hopeless. Hopeless. Harpirias saw that he was totally boxed in by Korinaam's steadfast refusal to speak the truth to the king and the king's own ill-informed assumptions.

He retreated to his room in the guest-house to ponder the situation.

168

The Mountains of Majipoor

by Robert Silverberg

It was wild folly to have let Korinaam sustain this witless

misunderstanding this long. And what a tangle it had become now! To be forced to go on and on with this nonsensical humbuggery, on pain of death, pretending that he was indeed the anointed master of Castle Mount—and to be asked, of all things, to provide the king with an heir in whose veins the royal blood of Majipoor would be combined with that of the Othinor chieftain—

But certainly it was a high crime against the realm to pose as a Coronal. Regardless of the explanations he could give for having undertaken such an imposture, he knew that it was unthinkable to attempt it. And yet—and yet—

Lord Harpirias, Coronal of Majipoor!

He could pretend to it if there was a good reason for doing so, could he not? For the sake of the mission? Conduct himself as though he were king? Stalk around this icy realm of misery as though he were indeed the 169

The Mountains of Majipoor

by Robert Silverberg

master of Castle Mount, as though it was he who held the royal seat upon the glorious Confalume Throne, he who wore the starburst crown? How would Toikella ever know it was not so?

No. No. This was vacuous nonsense.

He could no more imagine himself to be Coronal than he could imagine himself old. He was Harpirias of Muldemar, a young man of the

Prestimion line, a minor prince of the Castle Mount aristocracy. He wanted to go on being Harpirias of Muldemar. He was satisfied with that. He had no ambitions beyond that. To masquerade, even here, even for a moment, even out of supposed diplomatic necessity, as the lord of the world would be a grotesque blasphemy.

He knew he must correct the foolishness into which Korinaam had thrust him before it proceeded any further.

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