a spy of Ilbamoth could enter Gangflec, trafficked by ship and caravan over wastes of water and sand; and as a slave the spy could learn when and how Gangflec meant to wage war on his homeland; but as a slave by what means could he convey the intelligence to his kin? For five years now Gangflec had been sealed against the world, returning all ambassadors
and accepting through its borders only trade-goods and slaves who were destined to die there. It was undoubtedly preparing an attack on its neighbor, but Ilbamoth could not afford a standing army, and would anyhow have needed two to guard both possible invasion routes. The month of invasion had to be known, and the route, and both at least a half-year in advance; and as a slave within Gangflec a spy of Ilbamoth could learn month and route with time to spare; but as a slave by what means could he convey the intelligence to his kin?
This was the question that had occupied the greatest minds in the kingdom, and baffled them all. A bird could carry the news
, but the bird would have to be Ilbamoth-born and therefore carried with the spy. How then could he conceal and fed the creature aboard the slave-ship and on the slave-caravan, let alone in the quarters he occupied in Gangflec? There was not a chance in a myriad myriad of success, and even if Ilbamoth sent a myriad myriad spies
bird-equipped, the first discovery would alert Gangflec to the scheme and ensure that the remaining spies would soon be found.
Nevertheless, in the absence of a better, the scheme was adopted and Ilbamoth prepared to despatch a hundred bird-spies into the horrors and uncertainties of the Gangfleckean slave-trade. Then, from a most unexpected quarter, a better scheme was proposed: an apprentice assistant under-gardener at the palace managed, after many rebuffs, to obtain an interview with a deputy vice-chamberlain on the palace staff
, at which he proposed a scheme that for ingenuity, ease of concealment, and surety of success surpassed all those previously examined. It soon reached the ears of the king, and he ordered that it be enacted. The under-gardener was rewarded with promotion and a concubine of greater youth and quality than one of his years and lowly origins might ordinarly have expected, and the hundred spies were re-briefed and sent forth.
Three years passed, and Gangflec invaded by the second and less-expected route: the gorge of the river Wvu. But her forces were smashed in long-prepared ambush, and smashed so comprehensively that the king of Ilbamoth, seizing his opportunity, turned defence into attack and crossed the border into Gangflec. Within a week he had seized her capital and her royal family
against barely token resistance. The defeated king, on the eve of his execution, craved an audience with his conqueror, who granted it and motioned his petitioner out onto the terrace of the palace when he heard what it was the Gangfleckean wished to know.
“The red flowers here,” he said, sweeping an arm out over the palace-gardens, which blazed with the regal scarlet
of a magnificent display of mraqqa-blooms, “they are not native to your land, haë?”
When the interpreter had conveyed these words to the defeated king, whose wrists were bound with silver chains, the latter nodded, with a frown of slowly dawning comprehension.
“And last year they were yellow, and the year before, and the year before that, were they not?”
Again the defeated king nodded.
“Then that is how we knew when and by what route you would invade. The mraqqa – thus is their true name, though doubtless thou hast somewhat different – was introduced by my spies when they came to you as slaves three years ago. They carried the fine grey seeds of its three varieties in the lining of their garments, proof against the most suspicious search, and some found work in your gardens while others watched for preparations of war. That first year, no preparations were seen and my spies grew yellow mraqqa in your gardens, easily persuading their overseers of its worth.
Again the following year they grew the yellow, and the following too. Then preparations for war were seen, and the route wormed out, and now they grew red mraqqa, to carry the word to Ilbamoth.”
But now the defeated king shook his head, and stated that he still did not see the means, so the king of Ilbamoth ordered a spray of mraqqa brought to them, which he shook before the eyes of the defeated king, releasing a haze of scarlet pollen.
“Your kingdom was defeated by dust, my lord,” he said. “The dust of these male mraqqa, flying down-wind across the leagues to Ilbamoth, where it set the seed of the female mraqqa that awaited it. Those seeds, force-grown by the skill of my own gardeners
, told us whether the invasion was in train and by what route it would come. Yellow blooms signaled no invasion, blue an invasion by the desert, and red an invasion by the gorge of the river Wvu.
Now do you understand, my lord? Dust thou wast, and dust thou shalt be, and by dust thou wert defeated.”
And the Gangfleckean king bowed his head, acknowledging the ingenuity of the scheme and the justice of his defeat and coming execution.