The Golden Torc

by Julian May

  "Here's Nodonn," Nontusvel said softly. "He has ... brought someone with him."

  The King looked up and uttered a mild blasphemy. "I might have known who had that anthropologist stashed away! My boys combed the whole city and half of Aven and couldn't find hide nor hair of him."

  Nontusvel regarded her husband with sorrow. "But they found poor Ogmol, didn't they?"

  The royal beard sparked ominously. "You're an innocent, Nonnie. I was trying to save us all."

  The arrival of the Battlemaster inspired cheers from the thousands of feasters, and a single impudent nyaa. Nodonn made his duty to his parents with accustomed serenity and then took Bryan around to a prominent position in front of the High Table. The human scientist appeared dazed; an odd smile touched his lips and from time to time one of his hands strayed to his open collar, from which came a telltale golden gleam.

  "Noble battle-company!" intoned the storm-loud voice. The chain of silence was not needed. "We have suffered defeats in this Grand Combat ... and victories!"

  Plaudits and groans and not a few drunken curses.

  "The first round of the High Mêlée saw us faced with disaster when our gray-torc cavalry and charioteers faltered in the face of novel tactics from the Foe. The misfortune was compounded when the commanders of the gray levies, half-bloods and gold-torcs, as we know, failed to rally their troops according to the tenets of our ancient battle-religion."

  Catcalls and shouting of indignant denials, mingled with taunting epithets and a scattering of "Shame!"

  The Battlemaster held up one mailed fist. "Let those deny it who will! The ranks of humankind were shattered. And as a consequence we suffered grave setbacks. The blame, however, lies not with humanity, fellow warriors of the Tanu, but with ourselves!"

  The hubbub, which had been swelling in intensity, suddenly fell away to silence.

  "We have come to depend overmuch upon humanity in our Grand Combat. We have become lax and decadent as we adopted first their domesticated animals as battle-mounts, and then their very selves. Yes ... we adopted humanity. They fight our battles, they grow our food, they operate our mines and factories, they administer our commerce, they infiltrate our sacred guilds, they mingle their very blood and genes with our own! But that is not all. We are faced with the ultimate humiliation—and once again, we have brought it upon ourselves. For a human now aspires to our High Kingship!"

  In all the vast tent there was no sound. And then came the mighty bellow of Celadeyr, Lord of Afaliah: "And is this to our shame, Battlemaster? When Aiken Drum goes himself to meet the Foe, unarmed and unafraid, while certain Exalted Personages rest secure behind impregnable screens, dithering about antiquated tactics that no longer dismay the Firvulag—much less defeat them?"

  A thunderclap of mental and vocal shouting greeted this sally. Celadeyr added, "The Foe has consorted with humans. This is how Finiah fell. This is how their pikemen learned to devastate our cavalry. Shall we then return to the ancient ways you champion and all lose our heads—rejoicing that at least our honor is intact? Or shall we follow this golden youth, the chosen of Mayvar, and know victory?"

  This time the outcry made the very walls and ceiling of the pavilion billow and the cups and plates dance on the tables. The face of Apollo was apparently unmoved; but Nodonn was now glowing so furiously that those closest to the High Table fell back, shielding their eyes from the rose-gold glare.

  "I only wish to show you," the Battlemaster said, and now his voice was very soft in the reborn silence, "what the price of such a victory must be. You will see and hear what future lies ahead of us from the lips and mind of this human scientist, who enjoyed the highest reputation in his own Galactic Milieu. His survey of our relationship with humanity and the attendant stresses was commissioned by the Thagdal himself in the hope of confuting my own long-stated opposition to human assimilation. This scientist carried out his analysis freely, without prejudice. Many of you were interviewed by him or by his associate, our late Creative Brother Ogmol."

  Now Nodonn held high the book-plaque that had been Bryan's love-gift to Mercy.

  "Here is a copy of the survey he recently completed. He will explain it to you himself. He wore no golden torc while he worked—and he wears one tonight only so that you may examine his mind yourselves and see the truth of his statements. Because I compel him through the torc, he will carry out the survey's extrapolations in full, including the impact of humanity's use of the iron. Listen to what this man, Bryan Grenfell, says. It will not take long. And then return to the White Silver Plain for our night affray and think as you contend against the Firvulag! When dawn brings the final day of our Grand Combat, you may then choose which banner to follow until the end—that of your Battlemaster, or that of our true Foe."

  ***

  The marshgrass flats and the lotus beds of the Great Brackish Marsh were gone now, and mangrove jungles where the ibises and egrets and pelicans once nested were completely submerged. Only the highest islets still poked above the rising waters; here crazed animals fought one another in the dwindling space until they were drowned or pushed off to swim for their lives. The luckier of the refugees found sanctuary on the great dam of volcanic rubble; but it was necessary for them to keep climbing higher and higher up the clinkery slope as the water continued to rise. Once the summit had been attained, many of the animals were too weary and traumatized to go farther (and down the eastern flank of the dam it was all desert, anyway); and so they crouched there beneath the moon that lacked one day to fullness—the tusked water deer and the otters and the pygmy hippos and the aquatic hyraxes and the long-bodied felids and the rats and the turtles and the snakes and amphibians and a myriad other displaced creatures—not one showing aggression toward another, instincts of predators and prey alike dulled by the devastation of their world.

  The water rose higher. The weight of it thrust against the natural dam; water seeped into every crevice and percolated through the coarser strata of ash. Some found its way among the debris clogging the Long Fjord. When this reached the head of the narrow Southern Lagoon estuary, a thousand little jets of water squirted from the rubble-face.

  The water in the erstwhile Great Brackish Marsh was now more than eighty meters deep where once the flamingos had waded. For the first time in more than two million years it was possible for a fish to swim from the cliffs of southern Spain to the Morocco shore.

  9

  HE WAS SUMMONED again from the warm dark.

  Why oh why couldn't they simply leave him in peace? Leave him to savor the last of her alone? He had done the sun-god's bidding, explaining to the barbarians why the shutting of the time-gate was good, why the Tanu should wean themselves from their overdependence upon human technology.

  Ingenious, the way that the Battlemaster had twisted the statistics to his own ends; but of course he had to spare Mercy and the loyal hybrids. Pogroms were so wasteful and Apollo ever a prudent husband-man.

  But Bryan had justified it all, speaking through his golden torc. Poor Oggy had been so right about it being a boon to communication. (And so it was, provided you had angelic backing when it came to sloughing over the dicey bits without getting caught.) When the little lecture was finished, the mood of the crowd was turning away from Aiken Drum. Bryan wasn't surprised. Barbarians were a hot-headed and fickle lot, and this tribe was almost as mercurial as the Irish.

  Nodonn had taken him then to the place where Mercy waited. And she had shown him what he had been missing by not accepting the golden torc before. Even knowing that it was the end, that he would not survive the cave this time, he had gone freely to her, into the bright flight and the long fall.

  Free but never free of you with your wild wild eyes, Mercy. And will I love you till I die.

  "Come out of it, son. Help a little. I'm not the best redactor in the realm, but there's a few tricks left in the old man's bag. Come on, Bryan. You remember me."

  I die I did but die I see her passing by I die...

  "He's n
ot gonna stop free-wheeling until you zorch him in the stem, Craftsmaster."

  "You shut up, you damned male trollop. I pulled your marbles together, didn't I?...Come on Bryan. Open your eyes, son."

  A great round irascible face, hair and trailing mustaches of silvery gold, all backlighted by a yellow morning sky with strange streaky red clouds. He closed his eyes, willing the memory of her and her warm dark to return.

  But it would not, not yet. In an unsteady voice, Bryan said, "Hullo, Lord Aluteyn."

  "That's good!" An arm slipped around him, lifting. A glass of water, not very cold, was held to his mouth.

  "I'd rather be left alone," Bryan whispered. Oh, let me go down, down! But where was that sea unreflecting of stars?

  "No you don't son. Not yet."

  He peered out of the mind-cave resentfully. A crowd of people, looking very seedy, crouched all around him. Gold and silver and gray torcs and now all of them able to feel at his mind in the most disconcerting way. "Do stop that, all of you," he told them peevishly. "It's not decent when—when I'm—"

  "You're not quite ready to shuffle off, son. I've patched you up a little, as well as I could. Just tell us what happened at that conclave last night. What's Aiken Drum up to? There's something very odd going on. Since I'm deposed, I've had a block put on my metafaculties to restrict my range to the immediate vicinity. But I don't need my powers to feel the ground tremors and the changes in the local earth currents, and see those anomalous clouds. Has your young friend Aiken Drum been doing any fancy mucking-about with Aven's geology?"

  Now Bryan's eyes were fully open. He began to laugh, then trailed off in feeble coughing. The glass of water met his lips. "I should think ... Aiken Drum had quite enough on his plate already ... without conjuring up earthquakes." He sank back against the Craftsmaster's arm. A singular pang shot through him. What if he wasn't going to die?

  A contemptuous voice. Raimo? Yes, it was Raimo Hakkinen, that poor devil.

  "He's no help! Maybe we can get some fresh dope when the next batch of losers is tossed in here at sunset. Though what difference it makes to us—"

  "I thought I was beyond caring," the Craftsmaster said. "But I do care! I'm one of the First Comers, and I care! If there is a genuine danger, then I must give warning. My honor demands it!"

  The Raimo Hakkinen voice was muttering something scornful. Other voices, other thoughts, came sloshing in disorderly waves against Bryan's brain. A few persistent interlopers picked through the ruins like bored ghouls.

  "A really big earthquake might crack this thing so we could escape!" the Raimo voice said. Exclamations. Protests. And the probing. How many of them were there mauling him?

  "Mercy," he groaned aloud.

  Something like an arm of silver-and-green light swept all of the prying minds away from him and showed him how to put up the screen. He did. But when he turned to descend again he could not find the cave. His mind and voice howled, anguished, "Mercy!"

  Run search cry hunt the dark with the golden torc's horrible light driving it back whenever he spotted it afar off. She would not wait. She was gone. And he might not die.

  "Mercy," he whispered again, and woke to the compassionate gaze of the old Craftsmaster. After a long time, he asked, "Where is this place? What is it?"

  "It's called," Aluteyn said, "the Great Retort."

  ***

  Brede Shipspouse led the three humans along the deserted corridor deep within the secret wing of Redact House. They were free of their gray torcs, dressed in fresh clothing, and at a loss to know who she was or what she wanted of them.

  "My identity is unimportant," said the masked exotic, stopping in front of a closed door. "The only one who matters lies within, lost now in a reverie of self but soon perhaps to awaken."

  Brede's brown eyes fixed on Basil. "You are a man of action and ingenuity. In a few brief hours your talents will be called on. When the time comes, you will know what to do. All of the things you will need—including maps and many sophisticated devices confiscated from time-travelers—will be found stored in lockers inside this room."

  The headdress of the Shipspouse tilted far back as she addressed Chief Burke, and her eyes crinkled with humor at the big Native American's expression of suspicion. "You will organize and lead the survivors. It will be difficult, for there will be the Skin patients to care for, and even the able-bodied will be reluctant to follow a bareneck human. But you will lead them, nonetheless."

  Brede's hand now rested on the latch of the door. She said to Amerie, "Your task will be the most difficult of all, for you will have to help her during the terrible time of adjustment. But you were her friend—and you are the only one of the original group left for Elizabeth to turn to. You will understand her, even though you are not a metapsychic. She does not need a fellow initiate now. She needs a friend ... and a confessor."

  The door opened. Within was a large dimly lit room, three of its walls carved from the living rock. The wall at the far end had a long horizontal slot, glassed over, that revealed a late afternoon panorama of Muriah and the salt flats to the south. There were storage lockers lining the side walls and in the center of the room, a low cot with a figure in red denim lying on it.

  "Remain here until tomorrow morning. Do not leave this place before dawn, no matter what should happen. You will not see me again, because I must go down to be with my people in the hour that I have foreseen. When Elizabeth wakes, tell her this: Now you are free to make a true choice. Guard her well, for she will soon be the most important person in the world."

  Brede faded from their sight, enigmatic to the last. The three of them exchanged glances and shrugs, and then Amerie went to examine Elizabeth while the men opened the lockers.

  ***

  With the Fifth Day now winding down to the final hours of the High Mêlée, both armies were inflamed and hopeful of victory, even though the Firvulag knew very well that the odds were lengthening against them.

  King Yeochee spent most of the afternoon in the darkened Tent of the Seers, where talented crones used farsensing powers to project choice bits of action for the noncombatant Little People to view. The duel between old Leyr and Imidol of the Host had been particularly gripping ... and poignant, too, for Yeochee remembered well what a firebreather the old Lord Coercer had been before his banishment by Gomnol. Even though Leyr was one of the Foe, that had been a hard way for him to go—sliced up slowly like a salami and then forced, by the superior metafaculty of the young coercer, to open his gorget and cut his own throat. Ah, well. Youth would have its day.

  He left the seers and rambled on to the field hospital where the wounded were being treated preparatory to disembarking for home. Boats had already begun to leave Aven, and many more would sail before the Combat had its official finale at dawn. The post-Combat Truce, like that prior to the games, was only one month in length—and overland travel with the wounded was a slow business, especially since they could not utilize river boats on their homeward journey.

  Yeochee wandered up and down the rows of battered and bloody gnomes. A word of cheer from the Old Man always seemed to bolster the warriors' spirits, and they needed all the help they could get. There was no magical healing Skin in the field hospital of the Little People. All they had were their rough and ready surgical skills, fortitude, and the superior resistance of a tough race that had matured in a natural environment fraught with hazard. Nearly half of the original Firvulag complement was now hors de combat. But the Foe, King Yeochee reminded the smirking casualties, had lost almost the entire 2000 of their gray elite corps and most of the 1500 silvers—as well as a respectable number of the rash and punier-powered among the Tanu and human golds.

  "We still have a chance!" the little King asserted. "We're not licked yet. This might just be the year that the Sword of Sharn comes home!"

  The broken warriors croaked and gargled and whistled. Yeochee hopped on top of an empty bandage crate, knocking his crown askew again.

  "So we haven't
got as many high-point banners as they do! So we've only got four skulls in the 'Most Exalted' class! Damme if two of 'em don't belong to the Host—and one of those a High Tabler! Velteyn and Riganone are worth ten extra points right there, and that offsets our loss of poor old Four-Fang and Nukalavee. We've still got the Heroic Encounters to come, and one good upset there could wipe out all the Foe's advantage in the Petty Nobility tally. If they do beat us, it'll be by a squeaker. But they won't beat us! We're going to fight, and we're going to win!"

  The tent rang with ragged cheers. One game soul even managed to turn on his sparkling centipede apparition for a moment.

  Wiping away a furtive tear, Yeochee stood proudly and let his regal aspect come slowly upon him. His dusty fur-trimmed robe turned to obsidian parade armor, blazing with a thousand gems. His tall crown (sitting foursquare) sprouted its ram's horns and beak of enameled gold, and brushed the roof of the great hospital tent as he attained his full stature, dark and terrible, eyes glowing like green beacons.

  "This is the end of my term in office, warriors. And I confess that I never dared hope to see the old days of glory restored before my retirement. But those days are at hand! Even if we fall a little short this time... just wait till NEXT year!"

  "Let's hear it for Yeochee!" somebody yelled. And the maimed and mangled hauled themselves up and hailed the Sovereign Lord of the Heights and Depths, the Monarch of the Infernal Infinite, the Undoubted Ruler of the Known World.

  Illusionary aspects flashed and flared and the tent seemed crowded with a thousand monsters. But then as quickly as they had appeared they were extinguished, and the little man in the dusty robe with the tilted crown was saying, "Te lift your fighting hearts, lasses and lads," and all the brave demons turned again to bloodstained and weary gnomes.

  Yeochee slipped outside into the evening calm of the Last Recess. He would still have to get something to eat and say his prayers and then get into harness to join Pallol and the generals overseeing the last of the Mêlée. In the four hours before midnight, the free-for-all battle would have its wild climax. Some of the Firvulag shitfires were sure to be bucking for the empty champion slots—and Yeochee wanted to be there on the spot with the commendation if any of them came through. No proxy accolading for him!