Well, things turned deadly -- but
that possibility was part of the deal." Ravna glanced at Greenstalk. She had
been silent so far, not even rustling at her mate. Her fronds were tightly
held against her central stalk. Maybe -- "Listen, there are other reasons
besides contract obligation. The Perversion is more powerful than anyone
thought. It killed a Power today. And it's operating in the Middle
Beyond.... The Riders have a long history, Blueshell, longer than most
races' entire existence. The Perversion may be strong enough to put an end
to all of that."
Greenstalk rolled toward her and opened slightly. "You -- you really
think we might find something on that ship at the Bottom, something that
could harm a Power among Powers?"
Ravna paused. "Yes. And Old One himself thought so, just before he
died."
Blueshell wrapped even tighter around himself, twisting. In anguish?
"My Lady, we are traders. We have lived long and traveled far ... and
survived by minding our own business. No matter what romantics may think,
traders do not go on quests. What you ask ... is impossible, mere Beyonders
seeking to subvert a Power."
Yet that was a risk you signed for. But Ravna didn't say it aloud.
Perhaps Greenstalk did: her fronds rustled, and Blueshell scrinched even
more. Greenstalk was silent for a second, then she did something funny with
her axles, bumping free of the stickem. Her wheels spun on nothing as she
floated through a slow arc, till she was upside down, her fronds reaching
down to brush Blueshell's. They rattled back and forth for almost five
minutes. Blueshell slowly untwisted, the fronds relaxing and patting back at
his mate.
Finally he said. "Very well.... One quest. But mark you! Never
another."
.Delete this paragraph to shift page flush
PART II
CHAPTER 17
Spring came wet and cold, and excruciatingly slow. It had been raining
the last eight days. How Johanna wished for something else, even the dark of
winter back again.
She slogged across mud that had been moss. It was midday; the gloomy
light would last another three hours. Scarbutt claimed that without the
overcast, they would be seeing a bit of direct sunlight nowadays. Sometimes
she wondered if she would ever see the sun again.
The castle's great yard was on a hillside. Mud and sullen snow spread
down the hill, piled against the wooden buildings. Last summer there had
been a glorious view from here. And in the winter, the aurora had spilled
green and blue across the snow, glinted on the frozen harbor, and outlined
the far hills against the sky. Now: The rain was a close mist; she couldn't
even see the city beyond the walls. The clouds were a low and ragged ceiling
above her head. She knew there were guards on the stone walls of the castle
curtain, but today they must be huddled behind watch slits. Not a single
animal, not a single pack was visible. The Tines' world was an empty place
compared to Straum -- but not like the High Lab either. High Lab was a
airless rock orbiting a red dwarf. The Tines' world was alive, moving;
sometimes it looked as beautiful and friendly as a holiday resort on Straum.
Indeed, Johanna realized that it was kindlier than most worlds the human
race had settled -- certainly a gentler world than Nyjora, and perhaps as
nice as Old Earth.
Johanna had reached her bungalow. She paused for a second under its
outcurving walls and looked across the courtyard. Yes, it looked a little
like medieval Nyjora. But the stories from the Age of Princesses hadn't
conveyed the implacable power in such a world: The rain went on for as far
as she could see. Without decent technology, even a cold rain could be a
deadly thing. So could the wind. And the sea was not something for an
afternoon's fun sailing; she thought of surging hillocks of coldness,
puckered with rain ... going on and on. Even the forests around the town
were threatening. It was easy to wander into them, but there were no radio
finders, no refresh stalls disguised as tree trunks. Once lost, you would
simply die. Nyjoran fairy tales had a special meaning for her now: no great
imagination was needed to invent the elementals of wind and rain and sea.
This was the pretech experience, that even if you had no enemies the world
itself could kill you.
And she did have plenty of enemies. Johanna pulled open the tiny door
and went inside.
A pack of Tines was sitting around the fire. It scrambled to its feet
and helped Johanna out of her rainjacket. She didn't shrink from the
fine-toothed muzzles anymore. This was one of her usual helpers; she could
almost think of the jaws as hands, deftly pulling the oilskin jacket down
her arms and hanging it near the fire.
Johanna chucked her boots and pants, and accepted the quilted wrap that
the pack "handed" her.
"Dinner. Now," she said to the pack.
"Okay."
Johanna settled on a pillow by the fire pit. In fact the Tines were
more primitive than the humans on Nyjora: The Tines' world was not a fallen
colony. They didn't even have legend to guide them. Sanitation was a
sometime thing. Before Woodcarver, Tinish doctors bled their
patients/victims.... She knew now that she was living in the Tines'
equivalent of a luxury apartment. The deep-polished wood was not a normal
thing. The designs painted on the pillars and walls were the result of many
hours' labor.
Johanna rested her chin on her hands and stared into the flames. She
was vaguely aware of the pack prancing around the pit, hanging pots over the
fire. This one spoke very little Samnorsk; it wasn't in on Woodcarver's
dataset project. Many weeks ago, Scarbutt had asked to move in here -- what
better way to speed the learning process? Johanna shivered at the memory.
She knew the scarred one was just a single member, that the pack that killed
Dad had itself died. Johanna understood, but every time she saw "Peregrine",
she saw her father's murderer sitting fat and happy, thinking to hide itself
behind its three smaller fellows. Johanna smiled into the flames,
remembering the whack she had landed on Scarbutt when he made the
suggestion. She'd lost control, but it had been worth it. No one else
suggested that "friends" should share this house with her. Most evenings
they left her alone. And some nights ... Dad and Mom seemed so near, maybe
just outside, waiting for her to notice. Even though she had seen them die,
something inside her refused to let them go.
Cooking smells slipped past the familiar daydream. Tonight it was meat
and beans, with something like onions. Surprise. The stuff smelled good; if
there had been any variety, she would have enjoyed it. But Johanna hadn't
seen fresh fruit in sixty days. Salted meat and veggies were the only winter
fare. If Jefri were here, he'd throw a fit. It was months past since the
word came from Woodcarver's spies up north: Jefri had died in the ambush....
Johanna was getting over it, she really was. And in some ways, being all
alone made things ... simpler.
The pack put a plate of meat and beans before her, along with a kind of
knife. Oh, well. Johanna grabbed the crooked hilt (bent sideways to be held
by Tinish jaws) and dug in.
She was almost finished when there was a polite scratching at the door.
Her servant gobbled something. The visitor replied, then said in rather good
Samnorsk (and a voice that was eerily like her own), "Hello there, my name
is Scriber. I would like a small talk, okay?"
One of the servant's turned to look at her; the rest were watching the
door. Scriber was the one she thought of as Pompous Clown. He'd been with
Scarbutt at the ambush, but he was such a fool that she scarcely felt
threatened by him.
"Okay," she said, starting toward the door. Her servant (guard) grabbed
crossbows in its jaws, and all five members snaked up the staircase to the
loft; there wasn't space for more than one pack down here.
The cold and wet blew into the room along with her visitor. Johanna
retreated to the other side of the fire while Scriber took off his rain
slickers. The pack members shook themselves the way dogs do, a noisy,
amusing sight -- and you didn't want to be near when it happened.
Finally Scriber sauntered over to the fire pit. Under the slickers he
wore jackets with the usual stirrups and the open spaces behind the
shoulders and at the haunches. But Scriber's appeared to be padded above the
shoulders to make his members look heavier than they really were. One of him
sniffed at her plate, while the other heads looked this way and that ... but
never directly at her.
Johanna looked down at the pack. She still had trouble talking to more
than one face; usually she picked on whichever was looking back at her.
"Well? What did you come to talk about?"
One of the heads finally looked at her. It licked its lips. "Okay. Yes.
I thought to see how do you do? I mean ..." gobble. Her servant answered
from upstairs, probably reporting what kind of mood she was in. Scriber
straightened up. Four of his six heads looked at Johanna. His other two
members paced back and forth, as if contemplating something important. "Look
here. You are the only human I know, but I have always been a big student of
character. I know you are not happy here -- "
Pompous Clown was also master of the obvious.
"-- and I understand. But we do the best to help you. We are not the
bad people who killed your parents and brother."
Johanna put a hand on the low ceiling and leaned forward. You're all
thugs; you just happen to have the same enemies I do. "I know that, and I am
cooperating. You'd still be playing the dataset's kindermode if it weren't
for me. I've shown you the reading courses; if you guys have any brains,
you'll have gunpowder by summer." The Oliphaunt was an heirloom toy, a
huggable favorite thing she should have outgrown years ago. But there was
history in it -- stories of the queens and princesses of the Dark Ages, and
how they had struggled to triumph over the jungles, to rebuild the cities
and then the spaceships. Half-hidden on obscure reference paths there were
also hard numbers, the history of technology. Gunpowder was one of the
easiest things. When the weather cleared up, there would be some prospecting
expeditions; Woodcarver had known about sulfur, but didn't have quantities
in town. Making cannon would be harder. But then.... "Then your enemies will
be killed. Your people are getting what they want from me. So what's your
complaint?"
"Complaint?" Pompous Clown's heads bobbed up and down in alternation.
Such distributed gestures seemed to be the equivalent of facial expressions,
though Johanna hadn't figured many of them out. This one might mean
embarrassment. "I have no complaint. You are helping us, I know. But, but
..." Three of his members were pacing around now. "It's just that I see more
than most people, perhaps a little like Woodcarver did in oldendays. I am a
-- I've seen your word for it -- a 'dilettante'. You know, a person who
studies all things and who is talented at everything. I am only thirty years
old, but I have read almost every book in the world, and -- " the heads
bowed, perhaps in shyness? "-- I'm even planning to write one, perhaps the
true story of your adventure."
Johanna found herself smiling. Most often she saw the Tines as
barbarian strangers, inhuman in spirit as well as form. But if she closed
her eyes, she could almost imagine that Scriber was a fellow Straumer. Mom
had a few friends just as brainless and innocently self-convinced as this
one, men and women with a hundred grandiose projects that would never ever
amount to anything. Back on Straum, they had been boring perils that she
avoided. Now ... well, Scriber's foolishness was almost like being back home
again.
"You're here to study me for your book?"
More alternating nods. "Well, yes. And also, I wanted to talk to you
about my other plans. I've always been something of an inventor, you see. I
know that doesn't mean much now. It seems that everything that can be
invented is already in Dataset. I've seen many of my best ideas there." He
sighed, or made the sound of a sigh. Now he was imitating one of the pop
science voices in the dataset. Sound was the easiest thing for the Tines; it
could be darn confusing.
"In any case, I was just wondering how to improve some of those ideas
-- " four of Scriber's members bellied down on the bench by the fire pit; it
looked like he was settling in for a long conversation. His other two walked
around the pit to give her a stack of paper threaded with brass hoops. While
one on the other side of the fire continued to talk, the two carefully
turned the pages and pointed at where she should look.
Well, he did have plenty of ideas: Tethered birds to hoist flying
boats, giant lenses that would concentrate the sun's light on enemies and
set them afire. From some of the pictures, it appeared he thought the
atmosphere extended beyond the moon. Scriber explained each idea in numbing
detail, pointing at the drawings and patting her hands enthusiastically. "So
you see the possibilities? My unique slant combined with the proven
inventions in Dataset. Who knows where it could lead?"
Johanna giggled, overcome by the vision of Scriber's giant birds
hauling kilometer-wide lenses to the moon. He seemed to take the sound for
approval.
"Yes! It's brilliant, okay? My latest idea, I never would have thought
it except for Dataset. This 'radio', it projects sound very far and fast,
okay? Why not combine it with the power of our Tinish thoughts? A pack could
think as one even spread across hundreds of, um, kilometers."
Now that almost made sense! But if gunpowder took months to make --
even given the exact formula -- how many decades would it be before the
packs had radio? Scriber was an immense fountain of half-baked ideas. She
let his words wash over her for more than an hour. It was insanity, but less
alien than most of what she had endured this last year.
Finally he seemed to run down; there were longer pauses and he asked
her opinion more often. Finally he said, "Well, that was certainly fun,
okay?"
"Unh, yes, fascinating."
"I knew you would like it. You're just like my people, I really think.
You're not all angry, not all the time...."
"Just what do you mean by that?" Johanna pushed a soft muzzle away and
stood. The dogthing rocked back on its haunches to look up at her.
"I, well ... you have much to hate, I know. But you seem so angry at us
all the time, and we're the ones who are trying to help you! After the day
work you stay here, you don't want to talk with people -- though now I see
that was our fault. You wanted us to come here but were too proud to say it.
I have these insights into character, you see. My friend, the one you call
Scarbutt: he is truly a nice fellow. I know I can tell you that honestly,
and that as my new friend you will believe. He would very much like to come
to visit you, too.... urk."
Johanna walked slowly around the fire pit, forcing the two members to
back away from her. All of Scriber was looking up at her now, the necks
arching around one another, the eyes wide.
"I'm not like you. I don't need your talk, or your stupid ideas." She
threw Scriber's notebook into the pit. Scriber leaped to the fire's edge,
desperately reached for the burning notes. He pulled most of them back and
clutched them to his chests.
Johanna kept walking toward him, kicking at his legs. Scriber
retreated, backing and sprawling. "Stupid, dirty, butchers. I'm not like
you." She slapped her hand on a ceiling beam. "Humans don't like to live
like animals. We don't adopt killers. You tell Scarbutt, you tell him. If he
ever comes by for a friendly chat, I-I'll smash in his head; I'll smash in
all of them!"
Scriber was backed into the wall now. His heads turned wildly this way
and that. He was making plenty of noise. Some of it was Samnorsk, but too
high-pitched to understand. One of his mouths found the door pole. He pushed
open the door, and all six members raced into the twilight, their rain
slickers forgotten.
Johanna knelt and stuck her head through the doorway. The air was a
wind-driven mist. In an instant, her face was so cold and wet that she
couldn't feel the tears. Scriber was six shadows in the darkening grayness,
shadows that raced down the hillside, sometimes tumbling in their haste. In
a second he was gone. There was nothing but the vague forms of nearby
cabins, and the yellow light that spilled out around her from the fire.
Strange. Right after the ambush, she had felt terror. The Tines had
been unstoppable killers. Then, on the boat, when she smashed Scarbutt ...
it had been so wonderful: the whole pack collapsed, and suddenly she knew
that she could fight back, that she could break their bones. She didn't have
to be at their mercy.... Tonight she had learned something more. Even
without touching them, she could hurt them. Some of them, anyway. Her
dislike alone had undone Pompous Clown.
Johanna backed into the smoky warmth and shut the door. She should feel
triumph.
.Delete this paragraph to shift page flush
-=*=-
CHAPTER 18
Scriber Jaqueramaphan didn't tell anyone about his meeting with the
Two-Legs. Of course, Vendacious's guard had overheard everything. The fellow
might not speak much Samnorsk, but he had surely gotten the drift of the
argument. People would hear about it eventually.
He moped around the castle for a few days, spent a number of hours
hunched over the remains of his notebook, trying to recreate the diagrams.
It would be a a while before he attended any more sessions with Dataset,
especially when Johanna was around. Scriber knew he seemed brash to the
outside world, but in fact it had taken a lot of courage to walk in on
Johanna like that. He knew his ideas had genius, but all his life
unimaginative people had been telling him otherwise.
In most ways Scriber was a very fortunate person. He had been born a
fission pack in Rangathir, at the eastern edge of the Republic. His parent
had been a wealthy merchant. Jaqueramaphan had some of his parent's traits,
but the dull patience necessary for day-to-day business work had been lost
to him. His sibling pack more than retained that faculty; the family
business grew, and -- in the first years -- his sib didn't begrudge Scriber
his share of the wealth. From his earliest days, Scriber had been an
intellectual. He read everything: natural history, biography, brood kenning.
In the end he had the largest library in Rangathir, more than two hundred
books.
Even then Scriber had tremendous ideas, insights which -- if properly
executed -- would have made them the wealthiest merchants in all the eastern
provinces. Alas, bad luck and his sib's lack of imagination had doomed his
early ideas. In the end, his sib bought out the business, and Jaqueramaphan
moved to the Capital. It was all for the best. By this time Scriber had
fleshed himself out to six members; he needed to see more of the world.
Besides ... there were five thousand books in the library there, the
experience of all history and all the world! His own notebooks became a
library in themselves. Yet still the packs at the university had no time for
him. His outline for a summation of natural history was rejected by all the
stationers, though he paid to have small parts of it published. It was clear
that success in the world of action was necessary before his ideas could get
the attention they deserved, hence his spy mission; Parliament itself would
thank him when he returned with the secrets of Flenser's Hidden Island.
That was almost a year ago. What had happened since -- with the flying
house and Johanna and Dataset -- went beyond his wildest dreams (and Scriber
granted that those dreams were already pretty extreme). The library in
Dataset contained millions of books. With Johanna to help him polish his
ideas, they would sweep Flenserism from the face of the world. They would
regain her flying house. Not even the sky would be a limit.
So to have her throw it all back at him ... it made him wonder about
himself. Maybe she was just mad at him for trying to explain Peregrine. She
would like Peregrine if she let herself; he was sure of it. But then again
... maybe his ideas just weren't that good, at least by comparison with
humans'.
That thought left him pretty low. But he finished redrawing the
diagrams, and even got some new ideas. Maybe he should get some more
silkpaper.
Peregrine stopped by and persuaded him to go into town.
Jaqueramaphan had made up a dozen explanations why he wasn't
participating in the sessions with Johanna anymore. He tried out two or
three as he and Peregrine descended Castle Street toward the harbor.
After a minute or two, his friend turned a head back. "It's okay,
Scriber. When you feel like it, we'd like to have you back."
Scriber had always been a very good judge of attitude; in particular,
he could tell when he was being patronized. He must have scowled a little,
because Peregrine went on. "I mean it. Even Woodcarver has been asking about
you. She likes your ideas."
Comforting lies or not, Scriber brightened. "Really?" The Woodcarver of
today was a sad case, but the Woodcarver of the history books was one of
Jaqueramaphan's great heroes. "No one's mad at me?"
"Well, Vendacious is a bit peeved. Being responsible for the Two-Legs'
safety makes him very nervous. But you only tried something we've all wanted
to do."
"Yeah." Even if there had been no Dataset, even if Johanna Olsndot had
not come from the stars, she would still be the most fascinating creature in
the world: a pack-equivalent mind in a single body. You could walk right up
to her, you could touch her, without the least confusion. It was frightening
at first, but all of them quickly felt the attraction. For packs, closeness
had always meant mindlessness -- whether for sex or battle. Imagine being
able to sit by the fire with a friend and carry on an intelligent
conversation! Woodcarver had a theory that the Two-Legs' civilization might
be innately more effective than any Packish one, that collaboration was so
easy for humans that they learned and built much faster than packs could.
The only problem with that theory was Johanna Olsndot. If Johanna was a
normal human, it is was a surprise that the race could cooperate on
anything. Sometimes she was friendly -- usually in the sessions with
Woodcarver. She seemed to realize that Woodcarver was frail and failing.
More often she was patronizing, sarcastic, and seemed to think the best they
could do for her insulting.... And sometimes she was like last night. "How
goes it with Dataset?" he asked after a moment.
Peregrine shrugged. "About like before. Both Woodcarver and I can read
Samnorsk pretty well now. Johanna has taught us -- me via Woodcarver, I
should say -- how to use most of Dataset's powers. There's so much there
that will change the world. But for now we have to concentrate on making
gunpowder and cannons. It's that, the actual doing, that's going slow."
Scriber nodded knowingly. That had been the central problem in his life
too.
"Anyway, if we can do all that by midsummer, maybe we can face
Flenser's army and recapture the flying house before next winter." Peregrine
made a grin that stretched from face to face. "And then, my friend, Johanna
can call her people for rescue ... and we'll have all our lives to study the
outsiders. I may pilgrimage to worlds around other stars."
It was an idea they had talked of before. Peregrine had thought of it
even before Scriber.
They turned off Castle Street onto Edgerow. Scriber was feeling more
enthusiastic about visiting the stationer's; there must be some way he could
help. He looked around with an interest that had been lacking the last few
days. Woodcarvers was a fair-sized city, almost as big as Rangathir -- maybe
twenty thousand packs lived within its walls and in the homes immediately
around. This day was a bit colder than the last few, but it wasn't raining.
A cold, clean wind swept the market street, carrying faint smells of mildew
and sewage, of spices and fresh-sawn wood. Dark clouds hung low, misting the
hills around the harbor. Spring was definitely in the air. Scriber kicked
playfully at the slush along the curb.
Peregrine led them to a side street. The place was jammed, strangers
getting as close as seven or eight yards. The stalls at the stationer's were
even worse. The felt dividers weren't that thick, and there seemed to be
more interest in literature at Woodcarvers than any place Scriber had ever
been. He could hardly hear himself think as he haggled with the stationer.
The merchant sat on a raised platform with thick padding; he wasn't much
bothered by the racket. Scriber kept his heads close together, concentrating
on the prices and the product. From his past life, he was pretty good at
this sort of thing.
Eventually he got his paper, and at a decent price.
"Let's go back on Packweal," he said. That was the long way, through
the center of the market. When he was in a good mood, Scriber rather liked
crowds; he was a great student of people. Woodcarvers was not as
cosmopolitan as some cities by the Long Lakes, but there were traders from
all over. He saw several packs wearing the bonnets of a tropic collective.
At one intersection a redjackets from East Home was chatting cozily with a
labormaster.
When packs came this close, and in these numbers, the world seemed to
teeter on the edge of a choir. Each person hung near to himself, trying to
keep his own thoughts intact. It was hard to walk without stumbling over
your own feet. And sometimes the background thought sounds would surge, a
moment where several packs would somehow synchronize. Your consciousness
wavered and for an instant you were one with many, a superpack that might be
a god. Jaqueramaphan shivered. That was the essential attraction of the
Tropics. The crowds there were mobs, vast group minds as stupid as they were
ecstatic. If the stories were true, some of the southern cities were nonstop
orgies.
They had roamed the marketplace almost an hour when it hit him. Scriber
shook his heads abruptly. He turned and walked in lockstep off Packweal, and
up a side street. Peregrine followed, "Is the crowd too much?" he asked.
"I just had an idea," said Scriber. That wasn't unusual in a close
crowd, but this was a very interesting idea.... He said nothing more for
several minutes. The side street climbed steeply, then jinked back and forth
across Castle Hill. The upslope side was lined with burghers' homes. On the
harbor side, they were looking out over the steep tile roofs of houses on
the next switchback down. These were large homes, elegant with rosemaling.
Only a few had shops on the street.
Scriber slowed down and spread out enough that he wasn't stepping on
himself. He saw now that he'd been quite wrong in trying to contribute
creative expertise to Johanna. There was simply too much invention in
Dataset. But they still needed him, Johanna most of all. The problem was,
they didn't know it yet. Finally he said to Peregrine, "Haven't you wondered
that the Flenserists haven't attacked the city? You and I embarrassed the
Lords of Hidden Island more than ever in their history. We hold the keys to
their total defeat." Johanna and Dataset.
Peregrine hesitated. "Hmm. I assumed their army wasn't up to it. I
should think if they were, they'd have knocked over Woodcarvers long
before."
"Perhaps, but at great cost. Now the cost is worth it." He gave
Peregrine a serious look. "No, I think there's another reason.... They have
the flying house, but they have no idea how to use it. They want Johanna
back alive -- almost as much as they want to kill all of us."
Peregrine made a bitter sound. "If Steel hadn't been so eager to
massacre everything on two legs, he could have had all sorts of help."
"True, and the Flenserists must know that. I'll bet they've always had
spies among the townspeople here, but now more than ever. Did you see all
the East Home packs?" East Home was a hotbed of Flenser sentiment. Even
before the Movement, they had been a hard folk, routinely sacrificing pups
that didn't meet their brood standards.
"One anyway. Talking to a labormaster."
"Right. Who knows what's coming in disguised as special purpose packs?
I'd bet my life they're planning to kidnap Johanna. If they guess what we're
planning with her, they may just try to kill her. Don't you see? We must
alert Woodcarver and Vendacious, organize the people to watch for spies."
"You noticed all this on one walk through Packweal?" There was wonder
or disbelief in his voice, Scriber couldn't tell which.
"Well, um, no. The inspiration wasn't anything so direct. But it stands
to reason, don't you think?"
They walked in silence for several minutes. Up here the wind was
stronger, and the view more spectacular. Where there wasn't the sea, forest
spread endless gray and green. Everything was very peaceful ... because this
was a game of stealth. Fortunately Scriber had a talent for such games.
After all, hadn't it been the very Political Police of the Republic who
commissioned him to survey Hidden Island? It had taken him several tendays
of patient persuasion, but in the end they had been enthusiastic. Anything
you can discover we would be most happy to review. Those were their exact
words.
Peregrine waffled around the road, seemingly very taken aback by
Scriber's suggestion. Finally he said, "I think there is ... something you
should know, something that must remain an absolute secret."
"Upon my soul! Peregrine, I do not blab secrets." Scriber was a little
hurt -- at the lack of trust, and also that the other might have discovered
something he had not. The second should not bother him. He had guessed that
Peregrine and Woodcarver were into each other. No telling what she might
have confided, or what might have leaked across.
"Okay.... You've tripped onto something that should not be noised
about. You know Vendacious is in charge of Woodcarvers security?"
"Of course." That was implicit in the office of Lord Chamberlain. "And
considering the number of outsiders wandering around, I can't say he's doing
a very good job."
"In fact, he's doing a marvelously effective job. Vendacious has agents
right at the top at Hidden Island -- one step removed from Lord Steel
himself."
Scriber felt his eyes widening.
"Yes, you understand what that means. Through Vendacious, Woodcarver
knows for a certainty everything their high council plans. With clever
misinformation, we can lead the Flenserists around like froghens at a
thinning. Next to Johanna herself, this may be Woodcarver's greatest
advantage."
"I -- " I had no idea. "So the incompetent local security is just a
cover."
"Not exactly. It's supposed to look solid and intelligent, but with
just enough exploitable weakness so the Movement will postpone a frontal
attack in favor of espionage." He smiled. "I think Vendacious will be very
taken aback to hear your critique."
Scriber gave a weak laugh. He was flattered and boggled at the same
time. Vendacious must count as the greatest spymaster of the age -- yet he,
Scriber Jaqueramaphan, had almost seen through him. Scriber was mostly quiet
the rest of the way back to the castle, but his mind was racing. Peregrine
was more right than he knew; secrecy was vital. Unnecessary discussion --
even between old friends -- must be avoided. Yes! He would offer his
services to Vendacious. His new role might keep him in the background, but
it was where he could make the greatest contribution. And eventually even
Johanna would see how helpful he could be.
-=*=-
Down the well of the night. Even when Ravna wasn't looking out the
windows, that was the image in her mind. Relay was far off the galactic
disk. The OOB was descending toward that disk -- and ever deeper into
slowness.
But they had escaped. The OOB was crippled, but they had left Relay at
almost fifty light-years per hour. Each hour they were lower in the Beyond
and the computation time for the microjumps increased, and their
pseudovelocity declined. Nevertheless, they were making progress. They were
deep into the Middle of the Beyond now. And there was no sign of pursuit,
thank goodness. Whatever had brought the Blight to Relay, it had not been
specific knowledge of the OOB.
Hope. Ravna felt it growing in her. The ship's medical automation
claimed that Pham Nuwen could be saved, that there was brain activity. The
terrible wounds in his back had been Old One's implants, organic machinery
that had made Pham close-linked to Relay's local network -- and thence to
the Power above. And when that Power died somehow the gear in Pham became a
putrescent ruin. So Pham the person should still exist. Pray he still
exists. The surgeon thought it would be three days before his back was
healed enough to attempt resuscitation.
In the meantime.... Ravna was learning more about the apocalypse that
had swept over her. Every twenty hours, Greenstalk and Blueshell jigged the
ship sideways a few light-years, into some major trunk line of the Known Net
to soak up the News. It was a common practice on any voyage of more than a
few days; an easy way for merchants and travelers to keep track of events
that might affect their success at voyage's end.
According to the News (that is, according to the vast majority of the
opinions expressed), the fall of Relay was complete. Oh, Grondr. Oh Egravan
and Sarale. Are you dead or owned now?
Parts of the Known Net were temporarily out of contact; some of the
extra-galactic links might not be replaced for years. For the first time in
millennia, a Power was known to have been murdered. There were tens of
thousands of claims about the motive for the attack and tens of thousands of
predictions about what would happen next. Ravna had the ship filter the
avalanche, trying to distill the essence of the speculations.
The one coming from Straumli Realm itself made as much sense as any:
the Perversion's thralls gloated solemnly about the new era, the marriage of
a Transcendent being with races of the Beyond. If Relay could be destroyed
-- if a Power could be murdered -- then nothing could stop the spread of
victory.
Some senders thought that Relay was the ancestral target of whatever
had perverted Straumli Realm. Maybe the attack was just the tail end of some
long ago war, a misbegotten tragedy for the descendants of forgotten races.
If so, then the thralls at Straumli Realm might just wither away and the
original human culture there reappear.
A number of items suggested that the attack had been aimed at stealing
Relay's archives, but only one or two claimed that the Blight sought to
recover an artifact, or prevent the Relayers from recovering one. Those
assertions came from chronic theorizers, the sort of civilizations that get
surcharged by newsgroup automation. Nevertheless, Ravna looked through those
messages carefully. None of them suggested an artifact in the Low Beyond; if
anything, they claimed the Blight was searching for something in the High
Beyond or Low Transcend.
There was network traffic coming out of the Blight. The high protocol
messages were ignored by all but the suicidal, and no one was getting paid
to forward any of it. Yet horror and curiosity spread some of the messages
far. There was the Blighter "video": almost four hundred seconds of
pan-sensual data with no compression. That incredibly expensive message
might be the most-forwarded hog in all Net history. Blueshell held the OOB
on the trunk path for nearly two days to receive the whole thing.
The Perversion's thralls all appeared to be human. About half the news
items coming out of the Realm were video evocations, though none this long;
all showed human speakers. Ravna watched the big one again and again: She
even recognized the speaker. Øvn Nilsndot had been Straumli Realm's
champion trael runner. He had no title now, and probably no name. Nilsndot
spoke from an office that might have been a garden. If Ravna stepped to the
side of the image, she could see over his shoulder to ground level. The city
there looked like the Straumli Main of record. Years ago, Ravna and her
sister had dreamed about that city, the heart of mankind's adventure into
the Transcend. The central square had been a replica of the Field of
Princesses on Nyjora, and the immigration advertising claimed that no matter
how far the Straumers went, the fountain in the Field would always flow,
would always show their loyalty to humankind's beginnings.
There was no fountain now, and Ravna felt deadness behind Nilsndot's
gaze. "This one speaks as the Power that Helps," said the erstwhile hero. "I
want all to see what I can do for even a third-rate civilization. Look upon
my Helping...." The viewpoint swung skywards. It was sunset, and the ranked
agrav structures hung against the light, megameter upon megameter. It was a
more grandiose use of the agrav material than Ravna had ever seen, even on
the Docks. Certainly no world in the Middle Beyond could ever afford to
import the material in such quantities. "What you see above me is just the
work barracks for the construction that I will soon begin in the Straumli
system. When complete, five star systems will be a single habitat, their
planets and excess stellar mass distributed to support life and technology
as never before seen at these depths -- and as rarely seen in the Transcend
itself." The view returned to Nilsndot, a single human, mouthpiece for a
god. "Some of you may rebel against idea of dedicating yourselves to me. In
the long run it does not matter. The symbiosis of my Power with the hands of
races in the Beyond is more than any can resist. But I speak now to diminish
your fear. What you see in Straumli Realm is as much a joy as a wonder.
Never again will races in the Beyond be left behind by transcendence. Those
who join me -- and all will join eventually -- will be part of the Power.
You will have access to imports from across the Top and Lower Transcend. You
will reproduce beyond the limits your own technology could sustain. You will
absorb all that oppose me. You will bring the new stability."
The third or fourth time she watched the item, Ravna tried to ignore
the words, concentrate on Nilsndot's expression, comparing it to speeches
she had in her personal dataset. There was a difference; it wasn't her
imagination. The creature she watched was soul-dead. Somehow, the Blight
didn't care that that was obvious ... maybe it wasn't obvious except to
human viewers, and they were a vanishingly small fraction of the audience.
The viewpoint closed in on Nilsndot's ordinary dark face, his ordinary
violet eyes:
"Some of you may wonder how all this is possible, and why billions of
years of anarchy have passed without such help from a Power. The answer is
... complex. Like many sensible developments, this one has a high threshold.
On one side of that threshold, the development appears impossibly unlikely;
on the other, inevitable. The symbiosis of the Helping depends on efficient,
high-bandwidth communication between myself and the beings I Help. Creatures
such as the one now speaking my words must respond as quickly and faithfully
as a hand or a mouth. Their eyes and ears must report across light-years.
This has been hard to achieve -- especially since the system must
essentially be in place before it can function. But, now that the symbiosis
exists, progress will come much faster. Almost any race can be modified to
receive Help."
Almost any race can be modified. The words came from a familiar face,
and in Ravna's birth language ... but the origin was monstrously far away.
There was plenty of analysis. A whole news group had been formed:
Threat of the Blight was spawned from Threats Group, Homo Sapiens Interest
Group, and Close-Coupled Automation. These days it was busier than any five
other groups. In this part of the galaxy, a significant fraction of all
message traffic belonged to the new group. More bits were sent analyzing
poor Øvn Nilsndot's mouthing than had been in the original. Judging
from the flames and contradictions, the signal-to-noise ratio was very low:
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Acquileron->Triskweline, SjK units
From: Khurvark University [Claimed to be habitat-based university in
the Middle Beyond]
Subject: Blighter Video
Summary: The message shows fraud
Distribution:
War Trackers Interest Group, Where are they now Interest Group, Threat of the Blight
Date: 7.06 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
It's obvious that this "Helper" is a fraud. We've researched the matter
carefully. Though he is not named, the speaker is a high official in the
former Straumli regime. Now why -- if the "Helper" simply runs the humans as
teleoperated robots -- why is the earlier social structure preserved? The
answer should be clear to any idiot: The Helper does not have the power to
teleoperate large numbers of sentients. Evidently, the Fall of Straumli
Realm consisted of taking over key elements in that civilization's power
structure. It's business as usual for the rest of the race. Our conclusion:
this Helper Symbiosis is just another messianic religion, another screwball
empire excusing its excesses and attempting to trick those it cannot
directly coerce. Don't be fooled!
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Optima->Acquileron->Triskweline, SjK units
From: Society for Rational Investigation [Probably a single system in
Middle Beyond, 5700 light-years antispinward of Sjandra Kei]
Subject: Blighter Video thread, Khurvark University 1
Key phrases: [Probable obscenity] waste of our valuable time
Distribution:
Society for Rational Network Management, Threat of the Blight
Date: 7.91 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
Who is a fool? [probable obscenity] [probable obscenity] Idiots who
don't follow all the threads in developing news should not waste my precious
ears with their [clear obscenity] garbage. So you think the "Helper
Symbiosis" is a fraud of Straumli Realm? And what do you think caused the
fall of Relay? In case your head is totally stuck up your rear [ <--
probable insult], there was a Power allied with Relay. That Power is now
dead. You think maybe it just committed suicide? Look it up, Flat Head [
<-- probable insult]. No Power has ever fallen to anything from the
Beyond. The Blight is something new and interesting. I think it's time that
[obscenity] jerks like Khurvark University stick to the noise groups, and
let the rest of us have some intelligent discussion.
And some messages were patent nonsense. One thing about the Net: the
multiple, automatic translations often disguised the fundamental alienness
of participants. Behind the chatty, colloquial postings, there were faraway
realms, so misted by distance and difference that communication was
impossible -- even though it might take a while to realize the fact. For
instance:
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Arbwyth->Trade24->Cherguelen->Triskweline, SjK
units
From: Twirlip of the Mists [Perhaps an organization of cloud fliers in
a single jovian system. Very sparse priors.]
Subject: Blighter Video thread
Key phrases: Hexapodia as the key insight
Distribution:
Threat of the Blight
Date: 8.68 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
I haven't had a chance to see the famous video from Straumli Realm,
except as an evocation. (My only gateway onto the Net is very expensive.) Is
it true that humans have six legs? I wasn't sure from the evocation. If
these humans have three pairs of legs, then I think there is an easy
explanation for --
Hexapodia? Six legs? Three pairs of legs? Probably none of these
translations was close to what the bewildered creature of Twirlip had in its
mind. Ravna didn't read any more of that posting.
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Triskweline, SjK units
From: Hanse [No references prior to the Fall of Relay. No probable
source. This is someone being very cautious]
Subject: Blighter Video thread, Khurvark University 1
Distribution:
War Trackers Interest Group, Threat of the Blight
Date: 8.68 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
Khurvark University thinks the Blight is a fraud because elements of
the former regime have survived on Straum. There is another explanation.
Suppose the Blight is indeed a Power, and that its claims of effective
symbiosis are generally true. That means that the creature being "Helped" is
no more than a remotely controlled device, his brain simply a local
processor supporting the communication. Would you want to be helped like
that? My question isn't completely rhetorical; the readership is wide enough
that there may be some of you who would answer "yes". However, the vast
majority of naturally evolved, sentient beings would be revolted by the
notion. Surely the Blight knows this. My guess is that the Blight is not a
fraud -- but that the notion of surviving culture in Straumli Realm is.
Subtly, the Blight wanted to convey the impression that only some are
directly enslaved, that cultures as a whole will survive. Combine that with
Blight's claim that not all races can be teleoperated. We're left with the
subtext that immense riches are available to races that associate themselves
with this Power, yet the biological and intellectual imperatives of these
races will still be satisfied.
So, the question remains. Just how complete is the Blight's control
over conquered races? I don't know. There may not be any self-aware minds
left in the Blight's Beyond, only billions of teleoperated devices. One
thing is clear: The Blight needs something from us that it cannot yet take.
And so it went. Tens of thousands of messages, hundreds of points of
view. It was not called the Net of a Million Lies for nothing. Ravna talked
with Blueshell and Greenstalk about it every day, trying to put it together,
trying to decide which interpretation to believe.
The Riders knew humans well, but even they weren't sure of the deadness
in Øvn Nilsndot's face. And Greenstalk knew humans well enough to see
that there was no answer that would comfort Ravna. She rolled back and forth
in front of the News window, finally reached a frond out to touch the human.
"Perhaps Sir Pham can say, once he is well."
Blueshell was bustling, clinical. "If you're right, that means that
somehow the Blight doesn't care what humans and those close to humans know.
In a way that makes sense, but ..." His voder buzzed absentmindedly for a
moment. "I mistrust this message. Four hundred seconds of broad-band, so
rich that it gives full-sense imagery for many different races. That's an
enormous amount of information, and no compression whatsoever.... Maybe it's
sweetened bait, forwarded by us poor Beyonders back to our every nest." That
suspicion had been in the News too. But there were no obvious patterns in
the message, and nothing that talked to network automation. Such subtle
poison might work at the Top of the Beyond, but not down here. And that left
a simpler explanation, one that would make perfect sense even on Nyjora or
Old Earth: the video masked a message to agents already in place.
-=*=-
Vendacious was well-known to the people of Woodcarvers -- but for
mostly the wrong reasons. He was about a century old, the fusion offspring
of Woodcarver on two of his strategists. In his early decades, Vendacious
had managed the city's wood mills. Along the way he devised some clever
improvements on the waterwheel. Vendacious had had his own romantic
entanglements -- mostly with politicians and speech-makers. More and more,
his replacement members inclined him toward public life. For the last thirty
years he had been one of the strongest voices on Woodcarvers Council; for
the last ten, Lord Chamberlain. In both roles, he had stood for the guilds
and for fair trade. There were rumors that if Woodcarver should ever
abdicate or wholly die, Vendacious would be the next Lord of Council. Many
thought that might be the best that could be made of such a disaster --
though Vendacious's pompous speeches were already the bane of the Council.
That was the public's view of Vendacious. Anyone who understood the
ways of security would also guess that the chamberlain managed Woodcarver's
spies. No doubt he had dozens of informants in the mills and on the docks.
But now Scriber knew that even that was just a cover. Imagine -- having
agents in the Flenser inner circle, knowing the Flenser plans, their fears,
their weaknesses, and being able to manipulate them! Vendacious was simply
incredible. Ruefully, Scriber must acknowledge the other's stark genius.
And yet ... this knowledge did not guarantee victory. Not all the
Flenser schemes could be directly managed from the top. Some of the enemy's
low-level operations might proceed unknown and quite successfully ... and it
would only take a single arrow to totally kill Johanna Olsndot.
Here was where Scriber Jaqueramaphan could prove his value.
He asked to move into the castle curtain, on the third floor. No
problem getting permission; his new quarters were smaller, the walls rudely
quilted. A single arrow loop gave an uninspired view across the castle
grounds. For Scriber's new purpose, the room was perfect. Over the next few
days, he took to lurking in the promenades. The main walls were laced with
tunnels, fifteen inches wide by thirty tall. Scriber could get almost
anywhere in the curtain without being seen from outside. He padded single
file from one tunnel to the next, emerging for a few moments on a rampart to
flit from merlon to embrasure to merlon, a head poking out here, a head
poking out there.
Of course he ran into guards, but Jaqueramaphan was cleared to be in
the walls ... and he had studied the guards' routine. They knew he was
around, but Scriber was confident they had no idea of the extent of his
effort. It was hard, cold work, but worth the effort. Scriber's great goal
in life was to do something spectacular and valuable. The problem was, most
of his ideas were so deep that other packs -- even people he respected
immensely -- didn't understand. That had been the problem with Johanna.
Well, after a few more days he could go to Vendacious and then....
As he peeked around corners and through arrow slots, two of Scriber's
members huddled down, taking notes. After ten days, he had enough to impress
even Vendacious.
Vendacious's official residence was surrounded by rooms for assistants
and guards. It was not the place to make a secret offer. Besides, Scriber
had had bad luck with the direct approach before. You could wait days for an
appointment, and the more patient you were, the more you followed the rules,
the more the bureaucrats considered you a nonentity.
But Vendacious was sometimes alone. There was this turret on the old
wall, on the forest side of the castle.... Late on the eleventh day of his
investigation, Scriber stationed himself on that turret and waited. An hour
passed. The wind eased. Heavy fog washed in from the harbor. It oozed up the
old wall like slow-moving sea foam. Everything became very, very quiet --
the way it always does in a thick fog. Scriber nosed moodily around the
turret platform; it really was decrepit. The mortar crumbled under his
claws. It felt like you could pull some of the stones right out of the wall.
Damn. Maybe Vendacious was going to break the pattern and not come up here
today.
But Scriber waited another half hour ... and his patience paid off. He
heard the click of steel on the spiral stairs. There was no sound of
thought; it was just too foggy for that. A minute passed. The trapdoor
popped up and a head stuck through.
Even in the fog, Vendacious's surprise was a fierce hiss.
"Peace, sir! It is only I, loyal Jaqueramaphan."
The head came further out. "What would a loyal citizen be doing up
here?"
"Why, I am here to see you," Scriber said, laughing, "at this, your
secret office. Come on up, sir. With this fog, there is enough room for both
of us."
One after another, Vendacious's members hoisted themselves through the
trapdoor. Some barely made it, their knives and jewelry catching on the door
frame; Vendacious was not the slimmest of packs. The security chief ranged
himself along the far side of the turret, a posture that bespoke suspicion.
He was nothing like the pompous, patronizing pack of their public
encounters. Scriber grinned to himself. He certainly had the other's
attention.
"Well?" Vendacious said in a flat voice.
"Sir. I wish to offer my services. I believe that my very presence here
shows I can be of value to Woodcarver's security. Who but a talented
professional could have determined that you use this place as your secret
den?"
Vendacious seemed to untense a little. He smiled wryly. "Who indeed? I
come here precisely because this part of the old wall can't be seen from
anywhere in the castle. Here I can ... commune with the hills, and be free
of bureaucratic trivia."
Jaqueramaphan nodded. "I understand, sir. But you are wrong in one
detail." He pointed past the security chief. "You can't see it through all
this fog, but on the harbor side of the castle there is a single spot that
has a line of sight on your turret."
"So? Who could see much from -- ah, the eye-tools you brought from the
Republic!"
"Exactly." Scriber reached into a pocket and brought out a telescope.
"Even from across the yard, I could recognize you." The eye-tools could have
made Scriber famous. Woodcarver and Scrupilo had been enchanted by them.
Unfortunately, honesty had required to him to admit that he bought the
devices from an inventor in Rangathir. Never mind that it was he who
recognized the value of the invention, that it was he who used it to help
rescue Johanna. When they discovered that he did not know quite how the
lenses worked, they had accepted his gift of one ... and turned to their own
glass makers. Oh well, he was still the best eye-tool user in this part of
the world.
"It's not just you I've been watching, my lord. That's been the
smallest part of my investigation. Over the last ten days I've spent many
hours on the castle walks."
Vendacious's lips quirked. "Indeed."
"I daresay not many noticed me, and I was very careful that no one saw
me using the eye-tool. In any case," he pulled his book from another pocket,
"I've compiled extensive notes. I know who goes where and when during almost
all the hours of light. You can imagine the power of my technique during the
summer!" He set the book on the floor and slid it toward Vendacious. After a
moment, the other reached a member forward and dragged it toward himself. He
didn't seem very enthusiastic.
"Please understand, sir. I know that you tell Woodcarver what goes on
in the highest Flenser councils. Without your sources we would be helpless
against those lords, but -- "
"Who told you such things?"
Scriber gulped. Brazen it out. He grinned weakly. "No one had to tell
me. I'm a professional, like yourself; and I know how to keep a secret. But
think: there may be others of my ability within the castle, and some might
be traitors. You might never hear of them from your high-placed sources.
Think of the damage they could do. You need my help. With my approach, you
can keep track of everyone. I would be happy to train a corps of
investigators. We could even operate in the city, watching from the market
towers."
The security chief sidled around the parapet; he kicked idly at stones
in the rotted mortar. "The idea has its attractions. Mind you, I think we
have all Flenser's agents identified; we feed them well ... with lies. It's
interesting to hear the lies come back from our sources up there." He
laughed shortly, and glanced over the parapet, thinking. "But you're right.
If we are missing anyone with access to the Two-legs or Dataset ... it could
be disastrous." He turned more heads at Scriber. "You've got a deal. I can
get you four or five people to, ah, train in your methods."
Scriber couldn't control his expression; he almost bounced in
enthusiasm, all eyes on Vendacious. "You won't regret this, sir!"
Vendacious shrugged. "Probably not. Now, how many others have you told
about your investigation? We'll want to bring them in, swear them to
secrecy."
Scriber drew himself up. "My Lord! I told you that I am a professional.
I have kept this completely to myself, waiting for this conversation."
Vendacious smiled and relaxed to an almost genial posture. "Excellent.
Then we can begin."
Maybe it was Vendacious's voice -- a trifle too loud -- or maybe it was
some small sound behind him. Whatever the reason, Scriber turned a head from
the other and saw swift shadows coming over the forest side of the parapet.
Too late he heard the attacker's mind noise.
Arrows hissed, and fire burned through his Phan's throat. He gagged,
but kept himself together and raced around the turret toward Vendacious.
"Help me!" The scream was a waste of speech. Scriber knew, even before the
other drew his knives and backed away.
Vendacious stood clear as his assassin jumped into Scriber's midst.
Rational thought dimmed in a frenzy of noise and slashing pain. Tell
Peregrine! Tell Johanna! The butchering continued for timeless instants and
then --
Part of him was drowning in sticky red. Part of him was blinded.
Jaquerama's thought came in ragged fragments. At least one of him was dead:
Phan lay beheaded in a spreading pool of blood. It steamed in the cold air.
Pain and cold and ... drowning, choking ... tell Johanna.
The assassin and his boss had retreated from him. Vendacious. Security
chief. Traitor-in-chief. Tell Johanna. They stood quietly ... watching him
bleed to death. Too prissy to mess their thoughts with his. They'd wait.
They'd wait ... till his mind noise dimmed, then finish the job.
Quiet. So quiet. The killers' distant thoughts. Sounds of gagging,
moaning. No one would ever know....
Almost all gone. Ja stared dumbly at the two strange packs. One came
toward him, steel claws on its feet, blades in its mouth. No! Ja jumped up,
slipping and skidding on the wet. The pack lunged, but Ja was already
standing on the parapet. He leaped backwards and fell and fell...
... and shattered on rocks far below. Ja pulled himself away from the
wall. There was pain across his back, then numbness. Where am I? Where am I?
Fog everywhere. High above him there were muttering voices. Memories of
knives and tines floated in his small mind, all jumbled. Tell Johanna! He
remembered ... something ... from before. A hidden trail through deep brush.
If he went that way far enough, he would find Johanna.
Ja dragged himself slowly up the path. Something was wrong with his
rear legs; he couldn't feel them. Tell Johanna.
.Delete this paragraph to shift page flush
-=*=-
CHAPTER 19
Johanna coughed; things just seemed to go from bad to worse around
here. She'd had a sore throat and sniffles the last three days. She didn't
know whether to be frightened or not. Diseases were an everyday thing in
medieval times. Yeah, and lots of people died of them, too! She wiped her
nose and tried to concentrate on what Woodcarver was saying.
"Scrupilo has already made some gunpowder. It works just as Dataset
predicted. Unfortunately, he nearly lost a member trying to use it in a
wooden cannon. If we can't make cannon, I'm afraid -- "
A week ago, Woodcarver wouldn't have been welcome here; all their
meetings had been down in the castle halls. But then Johanna got sick -- it
was a "cold", she was sure -- and hadn't felt like running around out of
doors. Besides, Scriber's visit had kind of ... shamed her. Some of the
packs were decent enough. She had decided to try and get along with
Woodcarver -- and Pompous Clown too, if he'd ever come around again. As long
as creatures like Scarbutt stayed out of her way.... Johanna leaned a little
closer to the fire and waved away Woodcarver's objections; sometimes this
pack seemed like her eldest grandmother. "Assume we can make them. We have
lots of time till summer. Tell Scrupilo to study the dataset more carefully,
and quit trying shortcuts. The question is, how to use them to rescue my
star ship."
Woodcarver brightened. The drooler broke off wiping its muzzle to join
the others in a head bob. "I've talked about this with Peregr -- with
several people, especially Vendacious. Ordinarily, getting an army to Hidden
Island would be a terrible problem. Going by sea is fast, but there are some
deadly choke points along way. Going through the forest is slow, and the
other side would have plenty of warning. But great good luck: Vendacious has
found some safe trails. We may be able to sneak -- "
Someone was scratching at the door.
Woodcarver cocked a pair of heads. "That's strange," she said.
"Why?" Johanna asked absently. She hiked the quilt around her shoulders
and stood. Two of Woodcarver went with her to the door.
Johanna opened the door and looked into the fog. Suddenly Woodcarver
was talking loudly, all gobble. Their visitor had retreated. Something was
strange, and for an instant she couldn't figure what it was. This was the
first time she had seen a dogthing all by itself. The point barely
registered when most of Woodcarver spilled past her, out the doorway. Then
Johanna's servant, up in the loft, began screaming. The sound jabbed pain
through Johanna's ears.
The lone Tine twisted awkwardly on its rear and tried to drag itself
away, but Woodcarver had it surrounded. She shouted something and the
screeching in the loft stopped. There was the thump of paws on wooden
stairs, and the servant bounded into the open, its crossbows cocked. From
down the hill, she heard the rattle of weapons as guards raced toward them.
Johanna ran to Woodcarver, ready to add her fists to any defense. But
the pack was nuzzling the stranger, licking its neck. After a moment,
Woodcarver caught the Tine by its jacket. "Help me carry him inside, Johanna
please."
The girl lifted the Tine's flanks. The fur was damp with mist ... and
sticky with blood.
Then they were through the doorway and laying the member on a pillow by
the fire. The creature was making that breathy whistling, the sound of
ultimate pain. It looked up at her, its eyes so wide she could see the white
all around. For an instant she thought it was terrified of her, but when she
stepped back, it just made the sound louder and stretched its neck toward
her. She knelt beside the pillow. It lay its muzzle on her hand.
"W-what is it?" She looked back along its body, past the padded jacket.
The Tine's haunches were twisted at an odd angle, one legged dangling near
the fire.
"Don't you know -- " began Woodcarver. "This is part of Jaqueramaphan."
She pushed a nose under the dangling leg, and raised it onto the pillow.
There was loud talk between the guards and Johanna's servant. Through
the door she saw members holding torches; they rested their forepaws on
their fellows shoulders, and held the lights high. No one tried to come in;
there'd be no room.
Johanna looked back at the injured Tine. Scriber? Then she recognized
the jacket. The creature looked back at her, still wheezing its pain. "Can't
you get a doctor!"
Woodcarver was all around her. She answered, "I am a doctor, Johanna."
She nodded at the dataset and continued softly, "At least, what passes for
one here."
Johanna wiped blood from the creature's neck. More kept oozing. "Well,
can you save him?"
"This fragment maybe, but -- " One of Woodcarver went to the door and
talked to the packs beyond. "My people are searching for the rest of him....
I think he is mostly murdered, Johanna. If there were others ... well, even
fragments stick together."
"Has he said anything?" It was another voice, speaking Samnorsk.
Scarbutt. His big ugly snout was stuck through the doorway.
"No," said Woodcarver. "And his mind noise is a complete jumble."
"Let me listen to him," said Scarbutt.
"You stay back, you!" Johanna's voice was a scream; the creature in her
arms twitched.
"Johanna! This is Scriber's friend. Let him help." As the Scarbutt pack
sidled into the room, Woodcarver climbed into the loft, giving him room.
Johanna eased her arm from under the injured Tine and moved aside,
ending up at the doorway herself. There were lots more packs outside than
she had imagined, and they were standing closer than she had ever seen.
Their torches glowed like soft fluorescents in the foggy dark.
Her gaze snapped back to the fire pit. "I'm watching you!"
Scarbutt's members clustered around the pillow. The big one lay its
head next to the injured Tine's. For a moment the Tine continued its breathy
whistling. Scarbutt gobbled at it. The reply was a steady warbling, almost
beautiful. From up in the loft, Woodcarver said something. She and Scarbutt
talked back and forth.
"Well?" said Johanna.
"Ja -- the fragment -- is not a 'talker'," came Woodcarver's voice.
"Worse," said Scarbutt. "For now at least, I can't match his mind
sounds. I'm not getting sense or image from him; I can't tell who murdered
Scriber."
Johanna stepped back into the room, and walked slowly to the pillow.
Scarbutt moved aside, but did not leave the wounded Tine. She knelt between
two of him and petted the long, bloodied neck. "Will Ja" -- she spoke the
sound as best she could -- "live?"
Scarbutt ran three noses down the length of the body. They pressed
gently at the wounds. Ja twisted and whistled ... except when Scarbutt
pressed his haunches. "I don't know. Most of this blood is just splatter,
probably from the other members. But his spine is broken. Even if the
fragment lives, he'll have only two usable legs."
Johanna thought for a moment, trying to see things from a Tinish
perspective. She didn't like the view. It might not make sense, but to her,
this "Ja" was still Scriber -- at least in potential. To Scarbutt, the
creature was a fragment, an organ from a fresh corpse. A damaged one at
that. She looked at Scarbutt, at the big, killer member. "So what does your
kind do with such ... garbage?"
Three of his heads turned toward her, and she could see his hackles
rise. His synthetic voice became high-pitched and staccato. "Scriber was a
good friend. We could build a two-wheel cart for Ja's rear; he'd be able to
move around some. The hard part will be finding a pack for him. You know
we're looking for other fragments; we may be able to patch something up. If
not ... well, I have only four members. I will try to adopt him." As he
spoke one head patted the wounded member. "I'm not sure it will work.
Scriber was not a loose-souled person, not in any way a pilgrim. And right
now, I don't match him at all."
Johanna slumped back. Scarbutt wasn't responsible for everything that
went wrong in the universe.
"Woodcarver has excellent brood kenners. Maybe some other match can be
found. But understand ... it's hard for adult members to remerge, especially
non-talkers. Single fragments like Ja often die of their own accord; they
just stop eating. Or sometimes.... Go down to the harbor sometime, look at
the workers. You'll see some big packs there ... but with the minds of
idiots. They can't hold together; the smallest problem and they run in all
directions. That's how the unlucky repacks end...." Scarbutt's voice traded
back and forth between two of his members, and dribbled into silence. All
his heads turned to Ja. The member had closed his eyes. Sleeping? He was
still breathing, but it sounded kind of burbly.
Johanna looked across the room at the trapdoor to the loft. Woodcarver
had stuck a single head down through the hole. The upside-down face looked
back at Johanna. Another time, her appearance would have been comical.
"Unless a miracle happens, Scriber died today. Understand that, Johanna. But
if the fragment lives, even a short time, we'll likely find the murderer."
"How, if he can't communicate?"
"Yes, but he can still show us. I've ordered Vendacious's men to
confine the staff to quarters. When Ja is calmer, we'll march every pack in
the castle past him. The fragment certainly remembers what happened to
Scriber, and wants to tell us. If any of the killers are our own people,
he'll see them."
"And he'll make a fuss." Just like a dog.
"Right. So the main thing is to provide him with security right now ...
and hope our doctors can save him."
They found the rest of Scriber a couple of hours later, on a turret of
the old wall. Vendacious said it looked like one or two packs had come out
of the forest and climbed the turret, perhaps in an attempt to see onto the
grounds. It had all the markings of an incompetent, first-time probe:
nothing of value could be seen from that turret, even on a clear day. But
for Scriber it had been fatally bad luck. Apparently he had surprised the
intruders. Five of his members had been variously arrowed, hacked,
decapitated. The sixth -- Ja -- had broken his back on the sloping stonework
at the base of the wall. Johanna walked out to the turret the next day. Even
from the ground she could see brownish stains on the parapet. She was glad
she couldn't go to the top.
Ja died during the night, though not from any further enemy action; he
was under Vendacious's protection the whole time.
Johanna went the next few days without saying much. At night she cried
a little. God damn their "doctoring". A broken back they could diagnose, but
hidden injuries, internal bleeding -- of such they were completely ignorant.
Apparently, Woodcarver was famous for her theory that the heart pumped the
blood around the body. Give her another thousand years and maybe she could
do better than a butcher!
For a while she hated them all: Scarbutt for all the old reasons,
Woodcarver for her ignorance, Vendacious for letting Flenserists get so
close to the castle ... and Johanna Olsndot for rejecting Scriber when he
had tried to be a friend.
What would Scriber say now? He had wanted her to trust them. He said
that Scarbutt and the others were good people. One night, about a week
later, she came close to making peace with herself. She was lying on her
pallet, the quilt heavy and warm upon her. The designs painted on the walls
glimmered dim in the emberlight. All right, Scriber. For you ... I will
trust them.
.Delete this paragraph to shift page flush
CHAPTER 20
Pham Nuwen remembered almost nothing of the first days after dying,
after the pain of the Old One's ending. Ghostly figures, anonymous words.
Someone said he'd been kept alive in the ship's surgeon. He remembered none
of it. Why they kept the body breathing was a mystery and an affront.
Eventually the animal reflexes had revived. The body began breathing of its
own accord. The eyes opened. No brain damage, Greenstalk(?) said, a full
recovery. The husk that had been a living being spoke no contradiction.
What was left of Pham Nuwen spent a lot of time on the OOB's bridge.
From before, the ship reminded him of a fat sowbug. The bugs had been common
in the straw laid across the floor of the Great Hall of this father's castle
on Canberra. The little kids had played with them. The critters didn't have
real legs, just a dozen feathery spines sticking out from a chitinous
thorax. No matter how you tumbled them, those spines/antennas would twitch
the bug around and it would scuttle on its way, unmindful that it might be
upside down from before. Yes, the OOB's ultradrive spines looked a lot like
a sowbug's, though not as articulate. And the body itself was fat and sleek,
slightly narrowed in the middle.
So Pham Nuwen had ended inside of a sowbug. How fitting for a dead man.
And now he sat on the bridge. The woman brought him here often; she
seemed to know it should fascinate him. The walls were displays, better than
he had ever seen in merchantman days. When the windows looked out the ship's
exterior cameras, the view was as good as from any crystal-canopy bridge in
the Qeng Ho fleet.
It was like something out of the crudest fantasy -- or a graphics
simulation. If he sat long enough, he could actually see the stars move in
the sky. The ship was doing about ten hyperjumps per second: jump, recompute
and jump again. In this part of The Beyond they could go a thousandth of a
light-year on each jump -- farther, but then the recompute time would be
substantially worse. At ten per second that added up to more than thirty
light-years per hour. The jumps themselves were imperceptible to human
senses, and between the jumps the were in free fall, carrying the same
intrinsic velocity they'd had on departing Relay. So there was none of the
doppler shifting of relativistic flight; the stars were as pure as seen from
some desert sky, or in low-speed transit. Without any fuss, they simply slid
across the sky, the closer ones the faster. In half an hour he went farther
than he had in half a century with the Qeng Ho.
Greenstalk drifted onto the bridge one day, began changing the windows.
As usual she spoke to Pham as she did so, chatting almost as if there were a
real person here to listen:
"See. The center window is an ultrawave map of the region directly
behind us." Greenstalk waved a tendril over the controls. The multicolored
pictures appeared on the other walls. "Similarly for the other five points
of direction."
The words were noise in Pham's ears, understood but of no interest. The
Rider paused, then continued with something like the futile persistence of
the Ravna woman.
"When ships make a jump ... when they reenter, there's a kind of an
ultrawave splash. I'm checking if we're being followed."
Colors on the windows all around, even in front of Pham's eyes. There
were smooth gradations, no bright spots, no linear features.
"I know, I know," she said, making up both sides of the conversation.
"The ship's analyzers are still massaging the data. But if anyone's pacing
us closer than one hundred light-years, we'll see them. And if they're
farther than that -- well, then they probably can't detect us."
It doesn't matter. Pham almost shut the question out of his mind. But
there were no stars to look at; he stared at the glowing colors and actually
thought about the problem. Thought. A joke: no one Down Here ever really
thought about anything. Perhaps ten thousand starships had escaped the Fall
of Relay. Most likely, the Enemy had not cataloged those departures. The
attack on Relay had been a minor adjunct to the murder of Old One. Most
likely, the OOB had escaped unnoticed. Why should the Enemy care where the
last of Old One's memories might be hiding? Why should it care about where
their little ship might be bound?
A tremor passed through his body; animal reflex, surely.
Panic was slowly rising in Ravna Bergsndot, every day a little
stronger. It was not any particular disaster, just the slow dying of hope.
She tried to be near Pham Nuwen part of every day, to talk to him, to hold
his hand. He never responded, not even -- except perhaps by accident -- to
look at her. Greenstalk tried too. Alien though Greenstalk was, the Pham of
before had seemed truly attracted to the Riders. He was off all medical
support now, but he might as well have been a vegetable.
And all the while their descent was slowing, always a little worse than
what Blueshell had predicted.
And when she turned to the News ... in some ways that was the most
horrifying of all. The "death race" theory was getting popular. More and
more, there were folk who seemed to think that the human race was spreading
the Blight:
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Baeloresk->Triskweline, SjK units
From: Alliance for the Defense [Claimed cooperative of five
polyspecific empires in the Beyond below Straumli Realm. No record of
existence before the Fall of the Realm.]
Subject: Blighter Video thread
Distribution:
Threat of the Blight, War Trackers Interest Group, Homo Sapiens Interest Group Date: 17.95 days since Fall of Relay Text of message:
So far we've processed half a million messages about this creature's
video, and read a goodly fraction of them. Most of you are missing the
point. The principle of the "Helper's" operation is clear. This is a
Transcendent Power using ultralight communication to operate through a race
in the Beyond. It would be fairly easy to do in the Transcend -- there are a
number of stories about thralls of Powers there. But for such communication
to be effective within the Beyond, truly extensive design changes must be
made in the minds of the controlled race. It could not have happened
naturally, and it can not be quickly done to new races -- no matter what the
Blight says.
We've watched the Homo Sapiens interest group since the first
appearance of the Blight. Where is this "Earth" the humans claim to be from?
"Half way around the galaxy," they say, and deep in the Slow Zone. Even
their proximate origin, Nyjora, is conveniently in the Slowness. We see an
alternative theory: Sometime, maybe further back than the last consistent
archives, there was a battle between Powers. The blueprint for this "human
race" was written, complete with communication interfaces. Long after the
original contestants and their stories had vanished, this race happened to
get in position where it could Transcend. And that Transcending was
tailor-made, too, re-establishing the Power that had set the trap to begin
with.
We're not sure of the details, but a scenario such as this is
inevitable. What we must do is also clear. Straumli Realm is at the heart of
the Blight, obviously beyond all attack. But there are other human colonies.
We ask the Net to help in identifying all of them. We ourselves are not a
large civilization, but we would be happy to coordinate the information
gathering, and the military action that is required to prevent the Blight's
spread in the Middle Beyond.
For nearly seventeen weeks, we've been calling for action. Had you
listened in the beginning, a concerted strike might have been sufficient to
destroy the Straumli Realm. Isn't the Fall of Relay enough to wake you up?
Friends, if we act together we still have a chance.
Death to vermin.
The bastards even played on humanity's foundling nature. Foundling
races were rare, but scarcely unknown. Now these Death-to-Vermin creatures
were turning the Miracle of Nyjora into something deadly evil.
Death to Vermin were the only ones to call for pogroms, but even
respected posters were saying things that indirectly might support such
action:
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Triskweline, SjK units
From: Sandor Arbitration Intelligence at the Zoo [A known military
corporation of the High Beyond. If this is a masquerade, somebody is living
dangerously.]
Subject: Blighter Video thread, Hanse subthread
Key phrases: limits on the Blight; the Blight is searching something
Distribution:
Threat of the Blight, Close-coupled Automation Interest Group, War Trackers Interest Group
Date: 11.94 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
The Blight admits that it is a Power that tele-operates sophonts in the
Beyond. But consider how difficult it is to have a close- coupled automation
with time lags of more than a few milliseconds. The Known Net is a perfect
illustration of this: Lags range between five milliseconds for systems that
are a couple of light-years apart -- to (at least) several hundred seconds
when messages must pass through intermediate nodes. This, combined with the
low bandwidth available across interstellar distances, makes the Known Net a
loose forum for the exchange of information and lies. And these restrictions
are inherent in the nature of the Beyond, part of the same restrictions that
make it impossible for the Powers to exist down here.
We conclude that even the Blight can't attain close-coupled control
except in the High Beyond. At the Top, the Blight's sophont agents are
literally its limbs. In the Middle Beyond, we believe mental "possession" is
possible but that considerable preprocessing must be done in the controlled
mind. Furthermore, considerable external equipment (the bulky items
characteristic of those depths) is needed to support the communication.
Direct, millisecond-by-millisecond, control is normally impractical in the
Middle Beyond. Combat at this level would involve hierarchical control.
Long-term operations would also use intimidation, fraud, and traitors.
These are the threats that you of the Middle and Low Beyond should
recognize.
These are the Blight's tools in the Middle and Low Beyond, and what you
should guard against for the immediate future. We don't see imperial
takeovers; there's no profit [sustenance] in it. Even the destruction of
Relay was probably just a byplay to the murder it was simultaneously
committing in the Transcend. The greatest tragedies will continue to be at
the Top and in the Low Transcend. But we know that the Blight is searching
for something; it has attacked at great distances where major archives were
the target. Beware of traitors and spies.
Even some of humanity's supporters sent a chill through Ravna:
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Triskweline, SjK units
From: Hanse
Subject: Blighter Video thread, Alliance for the Defense subthread
Key phrases: Death Race Theory
Distribution:
Threat of the Blight, War Trackers Interest Group, Homo Sapiens Interest Group
Date: 18.29 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
I have obtained specimens from the human worlds in our volume. Detailed
analysis is available in the Homo sapiens interest group archive. My
conclusions: previous (but less intensive) analysis of human phys/psych is
correct. The race has no built-in structures to support remote control.
Experiments with living subjects showed no special inclination toward
submission. I found little or no evidence of artificial optimization. (There
was evidence of DNA surgery to improve disease resistance: drift timing
dated the hackwork at two thousand years Before Present. The blood of
Straumli Realm subjects carried an optigens, Thirault [a cheap medical
recipe that can be tailored across a wide mammalian range].) This race -- as
represented by our specimens -- looks like something that arrived from the
Slow Zone quite recently, probably from a single origin world.
Has anyone done such retesting on more distant human worlds?
Crypto: 0
As received by: OOB shipboard ad hoc
Language path: Baeloresk->Triskweline, SjK units
From: Alliance for the Defense [Claimed cooperative of five
polyspecific empires in the Beyond below Straumli Realm. No record of
existence before the Fall of the Realm.]
Subject: Blighter Video thread, Hanse 1
Distribution:
Threat of the Blight, War Trackers Interest Group, Homo Sapiens Interest Group
Date: 19.43 days since Fall of Relay
Text of message:
Who is this "Hanse?" It makes objective, tough-sounding noises about
testing human specimens, but it keeps its own nature secret. Don't be fooled
by humans telling you about themselves! In fact, we have no way of testing
the creatures that dwell in Straumli Realm; their protector will see to
that.
Death to vermin.
And there was a little boy trapped at the bottom of the well. Some
days, no communication was possible. Other days, when the OOB antenna swarm
was tuned in exactly the right direction and when the vagaries of the zone
favored it -- then Ravna could hear his ship. Even then the signal was so
faint, so distorted, that the effective transmission rate was just a few
bits per second.
Jefri and his problems might be only the smallest footnote to the story
of the Blight (less than that, since no one knew of him), but to Ravna
Bergsndot these conversations were the only bright thing in her life just
now.
The kid was very lonely, but less so now, she thought. She learned
about his friend Amdi, about the stern Tyrathect and the heroic Mr. Steel
and the proud Tines. Ravna smiled to herself, at herself. The walls of her
cabin displayed a flat mural of jungle. Deep in the drippy murk lay regular
shadows -- a castle built in the roots of a giant mangrove tree. The mural
was a famous one; the original had been an analog work from three thousand
years ago. It showed life at an even further remove, during the Dark Ages on
Nyjora. She and Lynne had spent much of their childhood imagining that they
were transported to such a time. Little Jefri was trapped in the real thing.
Woodcarver's butchers were no interstellar threat, but they were a deadly
horror to those around them. Thank goodness Jefri had not seen the killing.
This was a real medieval world. A tough and unforgiving place, even if
Jefri had fallen in with fair-minded people. And the Nyjoran comparison was
only vaguely appropriate. These Tines were pack minds; even old Grondr
'Kalir had been surprised at that.
All through Jefri's mail, Ravna could see the panic among Steel's
people:
Mister Steel asked me again if theres any way we can make our ship to
fly even a little. I dont know. We almost crashed, I think. We need guns.
That would save us, at least till you get here. They have bows and arrows
just like in Nyjoran days, but no guns. Hes asking me, can you teach us to
make guns?
Woodcarver's raiders would return, and this time in enough force to
overrun Steel's little kingdom. Back when they thought OOB's flight would be
only thirty or forty days, that had not seemed great a risk, but now ....
Ravna might arrive to find Woodcarver's murdering complete.
Oh Pham, dear Pham. If you ever really were, please come back now. Pham
Nuwen of medieval Canberra. Pham Nuwen, trader from the Slowness.... What
would someone such as you make of this? Hmm.
.Delete this paragraph to shift page flush
CHAPTER 21
Ravna knew that -- under his bluster -- Blueshell was at least as much
a worrier as she. Worse, he was a nitpicker. The next time Ravna asked him
about their progress, he retreated into technicalities.
Finally Ravna broke in, "Look. The kid is sitting on something that
just might blow the Blight sky high, and all he has are bows and arrows. How
the long will it be till we get down there, Blueshell?"
Blueshell rolled nervously back and forth across the ceiling. The
Skroderiders had reaction jets; they could maneuver in free fall more
adroitly than most humans. Instead they used stick-patches, and rolled
around on the walls. In a way, it was kind of cute. Just now, it was
irritating.
At least they could talk; she glanced across the bridge to where Pham
Nuwen sat facing the bridge's main display. As usual, all his attention was
fixed on the slowly moving stars. He was unshaven, his reddish beard bright
on his skin; his long hair floated snarled and uncombed. Physically he was
cured of his injuries. Ship's surgeon had even replaced the muscle mass that
Old One's communication equipment had usurped. Pham could dress and feed
himself now, but he still lived in a private dreamworld.
The two riders twittered at each other. It was Greenstalk who finally
answered her question: "Truly, we're not sure how long. The quality of the
Beyond changes as we descend. Each jump is taking us a fraction longer than
the one before."
"I know that. We're moving toward the Slow Zone. But the ship is
designed for that; it should be an easy matter to extrapolate the slowing."
Blueshell extended a tendril from ceiling to floor. He diddled with the
matte corrugations for a second and then his voder made a sound of human
embarrassment. "Ordinarily you would be correct, my lady Ravna. But this is
a special case.... For one thing, it appears that the zones themselves are
in flux."
"What?"
"It's not that unheard of. Small shifts are going on all the time.
That's a major purpose for bottom-lugger ships: to track the changes. We're
having the bad luck to run through the middle of the uncertainty."
Actually, Ravna had known that interface turbulence was high at the
Bottom below here. She just didn't think of it in grandiose terms like "zone
shifting"; she also hadn't realized it was serious enough to affect them
yet.
"Okay. How bad can it get then? How much can it slow us?"
"Oh my." Blueshell rolled to the far wall; he was standing on starry
sky now. "It would be nice to be a Low Skroderider. So many problems my high
calling brings me. I wish I could be deep in surf right now, thinking on
olden memories." Of other days in the surf.
Greenstalk carried on for him: "It's not 'the tide, how high can it
rise?' It's 'this storm, how bad can it get?' Right now it is worse than
anything in this region during the last thousand years. However, we have
been following the local news; most agree that the storm has peaked. If our
other problem gets no worse, we should arrive in about one hundred and
twenty days."
Our other problem. Ravna drifted to the center of the bridge and
strapped onto a saddle. "You're talking about the damage we took getting out
of Relay. The ultradrive spines, right? How are they holding up?"
"Quite well, apparently. We've not tried to jump faster than eighty
percent of design max. On the other hand, we lack good diagnostics. It's
conceivable that serious degradation might happen rather suddenly."
"Conceivable, but unlikely," put in Greenstalk.
Ravna nodded. Considering all their other problems, there was no point
in contemplating possibilities beyond their control. Back on Relay, this had
looked like a thirty or forty day trip. Now ... the boy in the well might
have to be brave for a long time yet, no matter how much she wished
otherwise. Hmm. Time for Plan B then. Time for what someone like Pham Nuwen
might suggest. She pushed off the floor and settled by Greenstalk. "Okay, so
the best we can plan on is one hundred and twenty days. If the Zone surge
gets worse or if we have to get repairs..." Get repairs where? That might be
only a delay, not an impossibility. The rebuilt OOB was supposed to be to
repairable even in the Low Beyond. "Maybe even two hundred days." She
glanced at Blueshell, but he didn't interrupt with his usual amendments and
qualifications. "You've both read the messages we're getting from the boy.
He says the locals are going to be overrun, probably in less than one
hundred days. Somehow, we have to help him ... before we actually arrive
there."
Greenstalk rattled her fronds in a way Ravna took for puzzlement.
She looked across the deck at Pham, and raised her voice a trifle. Hey
you, you should be an expert on this! "You Skroderiders may not recognize
it, but this is a problem that's been seen a million times in the Slow Zone:
civilizations are separated by years -- centuries -- of travel time. They
fall into dark ages. They become just as primitive as the pack creatures,
these 'Tines'. Then they get visited from outside. In a short time, they
have technology back again." Pham's head did not turn; he just looked out
across the starscape.
The Skroderiders rattled at each other, then:
"But how can that help us? Doesn't rebuilding a civilization take
dozens of years?"
"And besides, there's nothing to rebuild on the Tines' world. According
to the child, this is a race without antecedents. How long does it take to
found a civilization?"
Ravna waved a hand at the objections. Don't stop me, I'm on a roll.
"That's not the point. We are in communication with them. We have a good
general library on board. Original inventors don't know where they're going;
they're groping in the dark. Even the archaeologist/engineers of Nyjora had
to reinvent much. But we know everything about making airplanes and such; we
know hundreds of ways of going at it." Now faced with necessity, Ravna was
suddenly sure they could do it. "We can study all the development paths,
eliminate the dead ends. Even more, we can find the quickest way to go from
medieval to specific inventions, things that can beat whatever barbarians
are attacking Jefri's friends."
Ravna's speech tumbled to a stop. She stared, grinning, first at
Greenstalk and then at Blueshell. But a silent Skroderider is one of the
universe's more impassive audiences. It was hard even to tell if they were
looking at her. After a moment Greenstalk said, "Yes, I see. And rediscovery
being so common in the Slow Zone, most of this may already be worked out in
the ship's library."
That's when it happened: Pham turned from the window. He looked across
the deck at Ravna and the Riders. For the first time since Relay, he spoke.
Even more, the words weren't nonsense, though it took her a moment to
understand. "Guns and radios," he said.
"Ah ... yes." She looked back at him. Think of something to make him
say more. "Why those in particular?"
Pham Nuwen shrugged. "It worked on Canberra."
Then damn Blueshell started talking, something about doing a library
search. Pham stared at them for moment, his face expressionless. He turned
back to watch the stars, and the moment was lost.
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CHAPTER 22
"Pham?" He heard Ravna's voice just behind him. She had stayed on the
bridge after the Riders left, departing on whatever meaningless preparations
their meeting had ordained. He didn't reply, and after a moment she drifted
around and blocked his view of the stars. Almost automatically, he found
himself focussing on her face.
"Thank you for talking to us.... We need you more than ever."
He could still see lots of stars. They were all around her, slowly
moving. Ravna cocked her head, the way she did when she meant friendly
puzzlement. "We can help...."
He didn't answer. What had make him speak just now? Then: "You can't
help the dead," he said, vaguely surprised at his own speaking. Like eye
focussing, the speech must be a reflex.
"You're not dead. You're as alive as I am."
Then words tumbled from him; more than in all the days since Relay.
"True. The illusion of self-awareness. Happy automatons, running on trivial
programs. I'll bet you never guess. From the inside, how can you? From the
outside, from Old One's view -- " He looked away from her, dizzy with a
doubled vision.
Ravna drifted closer till her face was just centimeters from his. She
floated free, except for one foot tucked into the floor. "Dear Pham, you are
wrong. You've been at the Bottom, and at the Top, but never in between. ...
'The illusion of self-awareness'? That's a commonplace of any practical
philosophy in the Beyond. It has some beautiful consequences, and some scary
ones. All you know are the scary ones. Think: the illusion must apply just
as surely to the Powers."
"No. He could make devices like you and I."
"Being dead is a choice, Pham." She reached out to pass her hand down
his shoulder and arm. He had a typical 0-gee change of perspective; "down"
seemed to rotate sideways, and he was looking up at her. Suddenly he was
aware of his splotchy beard, his tangled hair floating all about. He looked
up at Ravna, remembering everything he'd thought about her. Back on Relay
she'd seemed bright; maybe not smarter than he, but as smart as most
competitors of the Qeng Ho. But there were other memories, how Old One had
seen her. As usual, His memories were overwhelming; about this one woman,
there was more insight than from all Pham's life experience. As usual, it
was mostly unintelligible. Even His emotions were hard to interpret. But ...
He had thought of Ravna a little like ... a favored dog. Old One could see
right through her. Ravna Bergsndot was a little manipulative; He had been
pleased/amused(?) by that fact. But behind her talk and argument, He'd seen
a great deal of ... "goodness" might be the human word. Old One had wished
her well. In the end, He had even tried to help. Insight flitted past him,
too fast to catch. Ravna was talking again:
"What happened to you is terrible enough, Pham, but it's happened to
others. I've read of cases. Even the Powers are not immortal. Sometimes they
fight among themselves, and someone gets killed. Sometimes, one commits
suicide. There's a star system, Gods' Doom it's called in the story: A
million years ago, it was in the Transcend. It was visited by a party of the
Powers. There was a Zone surge. Suddenly the system was twenty light-years
deep in the Beyond. That's about the biggest surge there is firm record of.
The Powers at Gods' Doom didn't have a chance. They all died, some to rot
and rusted ruin ... others to the level of mere human minds."
"W-what became of those?"
She hesitated, took one of his hands between hers. "You can look it up.
The point is, it happens. To the victims, it's the end of the world. But
from our si