by J. D. Moyer
“Curious, maybe?” That seemed a natural reaction to Jana.
“Maybe,” said Sperancia, getting up to clear the table. “Maybe that’s all it was.”
Chapter Three
Tem Ganzorig-Espersson was nervous. It had been three years since he’d last set foot in Happdal, in the Harz mountains of what had once been Germany. The village where his father had been born, and where his parents had met and fallen in love. The village where he’d lived the first nine years of his life.
But he was also excited to see his uncle and aunt, Farbror Trond and Tante Katja. And his grumpy, fierce grandmother, Farmor Elke, who somehow defied age and weakness. What did they all think of him, of his decision to live on the Stanford? Did they feel forsaken and resentful? He knew that Farmor resented his mother, Car-En, for stealing her favorite son away, but over the years his mother and grandmother had reached an uneasy truce. Farbror Trond – now Jarl Trond – always seemed happy to see him, and was too busy with his own large family, the smithy, and his duties as jarl to spend time nursing old hurts. As for Tante Katja, she mostly kept her emotions hidden. She hadn’t always been that way; he remembered her as playful and expressive when he’d been a child. But her experience with Raekae – the slaver who had taken possession of her body with a centuries-old technology – had scarred and changed her.
He had something important to discuss with his aunt. Something he’d seen, and was worried about. She, of all people, might know what to do.
He navigated the hovershuttle carefully over the dense green canopy. The craft had layers of redundant safety mechanisms, but he was alone. Reckless maneuvers could get him in serious trouble.
Maggie, curious about Happdal, had offered to come with him. He’d tried to scare her off with tales of his fearsome grandmother, of meals of rare venison and sour berries, of the complete lack of plumbing and hot water. His scare tactics hadn’t worked, but Maggie had sensed the truth – that their relationship was too new for her to meet his extended family. It would be stressful for him to be with her and his Happdal kin at the same time. She’d let him off easy, gracefully, without forcing the issue. And he knew that she wouldn’t hold it against him. He loved her for that, for her emotional generosity.
He landed the hovershuttle in the clearing a few kilometers north of Happdal near the natural Three Stones formation. The walk would do him good, give him time to stretch his legs and acclimate his mind. As he followed the old path, he recognized landmarks: familiar boulders and gnarled trees that were far older than himself. His emotions came in waves, and he did nothing to control them. There was nobody around, no reason not to shed a tear or laugh aloud as the urge struck him. He felt a poignant nostalgia as he heard the cry of a lynx, and an echo of fear as he neared the spot where he and his mother had been captured by Svein, jarl of Kaldbrek. For weeks he’d been pressed into servitude by the cruel smith Völund, not knowing the fate of his mother. His father had rescued them both, killing Völund in the process. And that had been only one of his life-changing adventures that year. It was a miracle he’d survived his childhood.
He was dressed in simple, drab clothes – nothing bright or colorful so he would not stand out in Happdal. But the synthetic, intelligent fabrics were anything but simple; they regulated his temperature, monitored his biosigns, and were near impossible to tear or pierce. He had his godsteel knife, Squid Cutter, that Farbror Trond had given him as a child. It was his only possession from that time. What had happened to his clothes, when he’d come aboard the Stanford? He couldn’t remember. They’d probably burned the filthy garments.
His parents were still on the ringship. They visited Happdal as well, every few years. At first they’d all come every year, but the visits had become less frequent since he’d grown up. This was his first trip on his own – another reason he felt nervous. Everyone was always delighted to see Esper Ariksson, his handsome, charismatic father. And his mother had lived in Happdal long enough to make her own friends. And so had he, but for some reason he felt insecure.
As he neared the village his thoughts returned to Bosa and the strange old woman Sperancia. When he’d first seen her, the black lace visible beneath her skin had reminded him of Tante Katja, before her body had reabsorbed the synthetic material. But nothing else about Sperancia had matched Katja’s recounting of being possessed by Raekae.
Tem had joined the Sardinia delegation as a representative of the Stanford’s Repopulation Council. Gradually, over the past twenty years, Repop’s Non-Interventionism policy (which his mother had so famously violated) had shifted to the ‘Three R’s’: Responsible Repopulation and Reclamation. Tem had his doubts about the new approach, even though he thought Director Balasubramanian, its progenitor, was well-intentioned.
Responsible made sense; responsibility was a core value of the ringstation citizens, and everyone on Repop took their job seriously. The planet was giving human beings a second chance, and it was of paramount importance to not screw up this time.
Repopulation was obvious; that was the point of the council. But when Repop had been founded, no one had known there were many existing communities on Earth – possibly hundreds – each with its distinct culture, with varying degrees of technological sophistication. For centuries the Ringstation Coalition had discussed repopulating Earth as if the planet were a blank slate, home to abundant flora and fauna but scant human life. But that was no longer the case. Repopulation would include contact, integration, and politics.
Reclamation was the R that made Tem the most uneasy. There was the environmental sense of the word, in terms of restoring ecologically damaged areas. He had no problem with that; there were still dozens of nuclear waste and power sites that needed containment, city ruins and ancient industrial sites that had to be decontaminated, and so forth. To a great extent the planet had cleaned itself over the centuries – especially the oceans – and much of civilization’s remnants were buried under ice fields or covered in dense forests or jungles, completely inaccessible. But there was still work to be done.
But there was another sense of the word, definitely intentional. Human beings were in the process of reclaiming the planet as the still-dominant species. Earth had had a break from humanity’s hordes, from global consumer culture, from cargo ships and planes that belched pollution into the atmosphere, from billions of hungry mouths that stripped the ocean of life and the soil of minerals, from sprawl and blight that crowded out other animals and even insects. That break, dated from the massive Campi Flegrei eruption that had triggered the planet’s cooling phase and the ultimate unraveling of global civilization, had lasted nearly four centuries. Now their ancestral home was teeming with life, mostly pristine, with most of humanity’s sins and transgressions either faded by time or buried by ice or trees.
But would they make the same mistakes all over again?
Not only was there the question of repeating past environmental mistakes. There was also the question of who, exactly, would be doing the repopulating, under what terms, and how Earth’s current inhabitants would fare during that process. There was no central plan, no constitution, no guiding set of values beyond the Ringstation Coalition’s grandly worded but unenforceable charters. It was up to each community to govern themselves as they saw fit. There was nothing to prevent the rise of despots and tyrants, nothing to prevent a repeat of Earth’s bitter history.
Adding to this uncertainty was the return of the Michelangelo. Tem had heard stories, growing up, of a ringship inhabited by artists gone mad, isolated in the outer solar system, paranoid and armed to the teeth. Now the Michelangelo was back in geosynchronous equatorial orbit, only a few thousand kilometers away from the Stanford, right over Lake Victoria in eastern Africa. But ignoring all hails.
He’d descended into Happdal’s flat basin. Passing fields of wheat and rye, he waved to a farmer. The man gave him a long look but finally waved back. There was no watch or guards, which Tem t
ook as a good sign; relations with Kaldbrek, the neighboring village, were still peaceful. There’d been no trouble since Saga had replaced Svein as jarl, many years ago. Though Svein was still alive, which meant that trouble could easily return.
He was nearing Farfar Jense’s smithy, but saw no smoke, nor heard any hammer clanging. The last time he’d seen Jense, his uncle’s father had been griping about his aches and pains. A pit of worry formed in Tem’s stomach as he considered that Jense might have died, just as Farfar Arik – his biological paternal grandfather – had passed away. Fortunately, Esper had been with Arik at the time. Those that knew Jarl Arik insisted that the old man had clung to life by a thread, for months, until all his children could be at his bedside. Tem wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if Jense died before he could say goodbye. He owed the old smith so much, in terms of the man he’d become….
So it was a relief when he saw Jense arguing with Lars in the middle of the road. He couldn’t yet hear what they were saying, but Lars, who had one wooden leg, was swaying precariously, shaking a finger in Jense’s face. The old smith kept batting Jense’s finger away, but Lars’s finger kept returning, getting close to Jense’s thick mustache each time.
“Fuck you, you old pumpkin fucker,” Lars was yelling in Norse. “I paid you for those hinges months ago.”
“You paid me for the nails, and you shorted me,” Jense said, his voice short on patience. “How could you have paid me for the hinges when they weren’t yet done?”
Lars looked confused. “I paid you in advance.”
“You did no such thing, though the next time you need my services you will pay me in advance. You’re not getting those hinges until you bring me the boar hides, as agreed. Or you can pay me in silver like everyone else.”
Lars hawked and spat on the ground, probably intending the spittle to land near Jense’s feet. But a thick glob of mucus landed squarely on Jense’s boot. Lars looked up just in time to see Jense’s fist closing in on his face.
Tem sprinted to close the distance, but by the time he reached them the old men were scuffling in the dirt. Tem grabbed Jense by his leather smock and heaved, but failed to pull the huge man off of poor Lars, who was getting the worse of the exchange. Lars was laughing uproariously through a mouthful of blood.
“Farfar, get off of him! You know you can’t hurt him.”
Lars had a genetic mutation that prevented him from feeling any pain. It made him an eager fighter and an adventurous hunter, but both activities had resulted in numerous injuries over the years.
Jense looked at him, first in anger, then with the shock of recognition. He released Lars and stood to embrace Tem. His farfar smelled of smoke, iron, and sweat – comforting smells.
“Look who’s here! This reminds me of when I pulled you off Hennik, years ago, when you were beating him to a pulp in this very spot.”
“I remember,” Tem said. Though it had been Hennik beating him, not the other way around. He wondered what else had been lost in Jense’s memory.
“Look at you,” said Jense, cupping Tem’s face with both hands. “What a beautiful man you are. The best of your father and mother’s features. But you look like a woman, with your long hair and bare face. Aren’t you old enough to grow a beard? Or is there something in your mother’s blood that prevents that?”
Tem laughed. He was quite sure that he didn’t look like a woman, and he knew there was no use in trying to explain to the old smith that there was nothing wrong with a man looking like a woman in the first place, if he happened to or wanted to. “I don’t look good with a beard, Farfar. I tried it once, but my all friends said my face looked dirty.”
“Hello, Tem!” said Lars from the ground. Tem reached down to help him up, and Jense helped as well, anger forgotten. “I’ll let the two of you catch up.” Lars left them, swaying unevenly and perhaps drunkenly, but making good ground toward the center of town, where he would surely spread news of Tem’s arrival.
“You’re too old to be fighting, Farfar. But you look well. I’m glad to see you.”
“I’m not well. Every joint aches. I have a year left at best. It’s time for me to join Arik and Bjorn in Valhalla.”
“Not for a long time, I think. Why don’t you come to the Stanford for a rejuv?”
“How much would that cost me? My weight in silver?”
“It would cost nothing but the lice in your hair.”
“I don’t have lice, you little squirrel – I wash and comb my hair every month!” Jense punched Tem playfully in the chest, causing him to stagger back and nearly fall. The man was a solid brick of muscle. Like Farbror Trond, Jense’s body produced almost no myostatin. Many of Happdal’s residents harbored wildstrains, remnants of genetic engineering mods from the Corporate Age.
Jense wrapped a brawny arm around Tem’s shoulder and ushered him into Happdal. It was hard not to feel like a ten-year-old bellows boy again, being held by his bearlike farfar. His uncle and father had different fathers – Jense and the late Arik respectively – and thus Jense was not his real grandfather. But he had grown up in Trond and Jense’s smithy, back when the two smiths had worked under a single roof, and he loved both men as fiercely as he loved his own parents.
Elke’s house was their first stop. His grandmother looked at him without smiling, and he felt a stab of fear, as most did in her presence. But she hugged him long and tight, without saying a word, and he was reassured that her love for him was stronger than any resentment.
“You haven’t aged, Farmor.”
“Of course I have. Come, sit and have something to eat, and some öl.” Elke’s hair had gone completely gray, and the lines in her hard face were deeper, but otherwise she looked the same as she had twenty years ago, beautiful and formidable.
Elke brought out pickled vegetables, smoked trout, hazelnut cakes, and öl for everyone. Lars had delivered news of Tem’s arrival quickly and enthusiastically, and within minutes Elke’s house was packed with visitors, all wanting to touch and talk to Tem. He surrendered to the process, already feeling a buzz from the öl, and tried to shake the rust off of his Norse. Soon his mouth hurt from smiling and forming words that he had not uttered for years, round vowels and lingering consonants. He felt happy and drunk and loved.
But where was Trond? Was his uncle not eager to see him? And where was Tante Katja? He needed to tell her about Sperancia, about his suspicions….
“Where are my aunt and uncle, Farmor? Are they too angry with you to set foot in their childhood home?”
Elke took a puff on her pipe. “You know Katja doesn’t like crowds. You can find her with her nose in an old book, as usual. And Trond is meeting with Saga, at his home, discussing Summer Trade.”
“He’s a good jarl, your uncle,” said Lars. “The best in the Five Valleys. We’ve had peace with Kaldbrek for years.”
“That’s thanks to Saga as well,” Elke pointed out.
“Two smiths as jarls,” Jense added. “Smiths are sensible people.”
“How is Saga?” Tem asked. He had a complicated history with Kaldbrek’s jarl.
“Can she make a decent sword yet?” Lars asked. There was still dried blood in his beard from his fight with Jense, now mixed with pickle juice.
“She’s getting better,” Jense said. “What about you, Tem? Are you forging steel on the ringship? Esper told me they have furnaces as hot as the sun.”
“I haven’t for a long time.” As a child he’d dreamed of being a smith. More than that, he’d known, deep in his bones, that he would spend his life in the smithy, exhausting and strengthening his arms with thousands of hammer blows each day. And yet here he was, a diplomat. He had studied and experimented with metallurgy on the Stanford, and Jense was right – he had access to materials and resources that would seem miraculous or magical to the village folk. But he’d yet to forge a decent sword.
The floor shoo
k. A huge man had burst through the door. The giant towered over everyone and looked directly at Tem. What Tem saw was an impossibility: his uncle Trond, but as a young man again, without a single gray hair in his thick red beard.
But of course it wasn’t Trond. It was Sigurd, Trond’s firstborn son, now a full-grown man. Last time he’d visited Happdal, Sigurd had had his full height, but not his breadth nor his thick beard.
“Cousin!” Sigurd shouted, quite unnecessarily, as everyone had gone quiet. “Tell me everything that has happened on your ship since I last saw you, and start from the beginning.”
It was late by the time Elke, unwilling to tap an additional barrel of öl, had kicked everyone out of her house. Jense had disappeared, and Tem vaguely wondered if he was asleep in Elke’s bed, and what everyone else might think of that. But if Jense and Elke had rekindled their old love, what business was that of anyone else? Arik was long dead.
Tem followed Sigurd in the dark toward Trond’s house, stumbling frequently. The night was clear but the moon was new, and only dim starlight and ringlight illuminated the path. And he was drunk, far drunker than it was even possible to get on the Stanford.
“What’s that sound?” he asked Sigurd in slurred Norse. “A smith’s hammer? Is someone working at this hour?”
“Sometimes Father works when he cannot sleep. His mind does not rest as easily as it did when he was young. Every worry of every person in Happdal, he carries with him. Your father is lucky not to be jarl.”
“It’s what Elke wanted for him.”
“I know,” Sigurd said, without a trace of anger. Everyone knew that Esper was Elke’s favorite – it was just a simple fact.
“Can I go visit him?”
Sigurd laughed. “You don’t need my permission. This is still your village, cousin. Do as you like. If you get lost coming home, just knock on any door – they’ll take in Esper’s son and feed you in the morning.”