by David Brin
In victory, the winners took possession of ashes.
In defeat, the losers marched forth singing.
Aided by a few qheuen allies, the craft workers started the fight evenly matched against the fanatical followers of Jop the Zealot. Both sides were angry, determined, and poorly armed with sticks and cudgels. Every man, woman, and qheuen of fighting age was away on militia duty, taking the swords and other weapons with them.
Even so, it was a wonder no one died in the melee.
Combatants swelled around the village meeting tree in a sweaty, disorderly throng, pushing and flailing at men who had been their neighbors and friends, raising a bedlam that blocked out futile orders by leaders of both sides. It might have gone on till everyone collapsed in hoarse exhaustion, but the conflict was abruptly decided when one side got unexpected reinforcements.
Brown-clad men dropped from the overhanging branches of the garu forest, where gardens of luscious, protein-rich moss created a rich and unique niche for agile human farmers. Suddenly outflanked and outnumbered, Jop and his followers turned and fled the debris-strewn valley.
“The zealots went too far,” said one gnarled tree farmer, explaining why his people dropped their neutrality to intervene. “Even if they had an excuse to blow up the dam without guidance from the sages … they should’ve warned the poor qheuens first! A murder committed in the name of reverence is still a crime. It’s too high a toll to pay for following the Path.”
Nelo was still catching his breath, so Ariana Foo expressed thanks on the craft workers’ behalf. “There has already been enough blood spilled down the Bibur’s waters. It is well past time for neighbors to care for one another, and heal these wounds.”
Despite confinement to her wheelchair, Ariana had been worth ten warriors during the brief struggle, without ever aiming or landing a blow. Her renowned status as the former High Sage of human sept meant that no antagonist dared confront her. It was as if a bubble of sanity moved through the mob, interrupting the riot, which resumed again as soon as she had passed. The sight of her helped the majority of farmers decide to come down off the garu heights and assist.
No one pursued Jop’s forces as they retreated on canoes and makeshift rafts to the Bibur’s other bank, re-forming on a crest of high ground separating the river from a vast swamp. There the zealots chanted passages from the Sacred Scrolls, still defiant.
Nelo labored for breath. It felt as if his ribs were half torn loose from his side, and he could not tell for some time which pains were temporary, and which were from some fanatic’s baton or quarterstaff. At least nothing seemed broken, and he grew more confident that his heart wasn’t about to burst out of his chest.
So, Dolo has been won back, he thought, finding little to rejoice over in the triumph. Log Biter was dead, as well as Jobee and half of Nelo’s apprentices. With his paper mill gone, along with the dam and qheuen rookery, the battle had been largely to decide who would take shelter in the remaining dwellings.
A makeshift infirmary was set up surrounding the traeki pharmacist, on a stretch of leaf-covered loam. Nelo spent some time sewing cuts with boiled thread, and laying plaster compresses on bruised comrades and foes alike.
The task of healing and stitching was hardly begun when a messenger dropped down from the skyway of rope bridges that laced the forest in all directions. Nelo recognized the lanky teenager, a local girl whose swiftness along the branch-top ways could not be matched. Still short of breath, she saluted Ariana Foo and recited a message from the commander of the militia base concealed some distance downriver.
“Two squads will get here before nightfall,” she relayed proudly. “They’ll send tents and other gear by tomorrow morn … assuming the Jophur don’t blow the boats up.”
It was fast action, but a resigned murmur was all the news merited. Any help now was too little, and far too late to save the rich, united community Dolo Village had been. No wonder Jop’s people had been less tenacious, more willing to retreat. In their eyes, they had already won.
The Path of Redemption lies before us.
Nelo walked over to sit on a tree stump near the town exploser, whose destructive charges were commandeered and misused by Jop’s mob. Henrik’s shoulders slumped as he stared over the Bibur, past the shattered ruins of the craft shops, at the zealots chanting on the other side.
Nelo wondered if his own face looked as bleak and haggard as Henrik’s.
Probably not. To his own great surprise, Nelo found himself in a mood to be philosophical.
“Never have seen such a mess in all my days,” he said, with a resigned sigh. “I guess we’re gonna have our hands full, rebuilding.”
Henrik shook his head, as if to say, It can’t be done.
This, in turn, triggered a flare of resentment from Nelo. What business did Henrik have, wallowing in self-pity? As an exploser, his professional needs were small. Assisted by his guild, he could be back in business within a year. But even if Log Biter’s family got help from other qheuen hives, and held a dam-raising to end all dam-raisings, it would still be years before a waterwheel, turbine, and power train could convert lake pressure into industrial muscle. And that would just begin the recovery. Nelo figured he would devote the rest of his life to building a papery like his former mill.
Was Henrik ashamed his charges had been misused by a panicky rabble? How could anyone guard against such times as these, when all prophecy went skewed and awry? Galactics had indeed come to Jijo, but not as foreseen. Instead, month after month of ambiguity had mixed with alien malevolence to sow confusion among the Six Races. Jop represented one reaction. Others sought ways to fight the aliens. In the long run, neither policy would make any difference.
We should have followed a third course — wait and see. Go on living normal lives until the universe decides what to do with us.
Nelo wondered at his own attitude. The earlier shocked dismay had given way to a strange feeling. Not numbness. Certainly not elation amid such devastation.
I hate everything that was done here.
… and yet…
And yet, Nelo found a spirit of anticipation rising within. He could already smell fresh-cut timber and the pungency of boiling pitch. He felt the pulselike pounding of hammers driving joining pegs, and saws spewing dust across the ground. In his mind were the beginnings of a sketch for a better workshop. A better mill.
All my life I tended the factory my ancestors left me, making paper in the time-honored way.
It was a prideful place. A noble calling.
But it wasn’t mine.
Even if the original design came from settlers who stepped off the Tabernacle, still wearing some of their mantle as star gods, Nelo had always known, deep inside—I could do a better job.
Now, when his years were ripe, he finally had a chance to prove it. The prospect was sad, daunting … and thrilling. Perhaps the strangest thing of all was how young it made him feel.
“Don’t blame yourself, Henrik,” he told the exploser, charitably. “You watch and see. Everything’ll be better’n ever.”
But the exploser only shook his head again. He pointed across the river, where Jop’s partisans were now streaming toward the northeastern swamp, carrying canoes and other burdens on their backs, still singing as they went.
“They’ve got my reserve supply of powder. Snatched it from the warehouse. I couldn’t stop ’em.”
Nelo frowned.
“What good’ll it do ’em? Militia’s coming, by land and water. Jop can’t reach anywhere else along the river that’s worth blowing up.”
“They aren’t heading along the river,” Henrik replied, and Nelo saw it was true.
“Then where?” he wondered aloud.
Abruptly, Nelo knew the answer to his own question, even before Henrik spoke. And that same instant he also realized there were far more important matters than rebuilding a paper mill.
“Biblos,” the exploser said, echoing Nelo’s thought.
The paper
maker blinked silently, unable to make his brain fit around the impending catastrophe.
“The militia … can they cut ’em off?”
“Doubtful. But even if they do, it’s not Jop alone that has me worried.”
He turned to show his eyes for the first time, and they held bleakness.
“I’ll bet Jop’s bunch ain’t the only group heading that way, even as we speak.”
Rety
THE MORE SHE LEARNED ABOUT STAR GODS, THE less attractive they seemed.
None of ’em is half as smart as a dung-eating glaver,
she thought, while making her way down a long corridor toward the ship’s brig. It must come from using all those computers and smarty-ass machines to cook your food, make your air, tell you stories, kill your enemies, tuck you in at night, and foretell your future for you. Count on ’em too much, and your brain stops working.
Rety had grown more cynical since those early days when Dwer and Lark first brought her down off the Rimmer Mountains, a half-starved, wide-eyed savage, agog over the simplest crafts produced on the so-called civilized Slope — all the way from pottery to woven cloth and paper books. Of course that awe evaporated just as soon as she sampled real luxury aboard the Rothen station, where Kunn and the other Daniks flattered her with promises that sent her head spinning.
Long life, strength and beauty … cures for all your aches and scars … a clean, safe place to live under the protection of our Rothen lords … and all the wonders that come with being a lesser deity, striding among the stars.
There she had met the Rothen patrons of humankind. Her patrons, they said. Gazing on the benevolent faces of Ro-kenn and Ro-pol, Rety had allowed herself to see wise, loving parents — unlike those she knew while growing up in a wild sooner tribe. The Rothen seemed so perfect, so noble and strong, that Rety almost gave in. She very nearly pledged her heart.
But it proved a lie. Whether or not they really were humanity’s patrons did not matter to her at all. What counted was that the Rothen turned out to be less mighty than they claimed. For that she could never forgive them.
What use was a protector who couldn’t protect?
For half a year, Rety had fled one band of incompetents after another — from her birth tribe of filthy cretins to the Commons of Six Races. Then from the Commons to the Rothen. And when the Jophur corvette triumphed over Kunn’s little scout boat, she had seriously contemplated heading down to the swamp with both hands upraised, offering her services to the ugly ringed things. Now wouldn’t that have galled old Dwer!
At one point, while he was floundering in the muck, talking to his crazy mulc-spider friend, she had actually started toward the ramp of the grounded spaceship, intending to hammer on the door. Surely the Jophur were like everybody else, willing to deal for information that was important to them.
At a critical moment, only their stench held her back — an aroma that reminded her of festering wounds and gangrene … fortunately, as it turned out, since the Jophur also proved unable to defend themselves against the unexpected.
So I got to just keep looking for another way off this mud ball. And who cares what Dwer thinks of me? At least 1 don’t make fancy excuses for what I do.
Rety’s tutor had been the wilderness, whose harsh education taught just one lesson — to survive, at all cost. She grew up watching as some creatures ate others, then were eaten by something stronger still. Lark referred to the “food chain,” but Rety called it the who-kills mountain. Every choice she made involved trying to climb higher on that mountain, hoping the next step would take her to the top.
So when the Jophur were beaten and captured by mythical dolphins, it seemed only natural to hurry aboard the submarine and claim sanctuary with her “Earth cousins.” Only now look where I am, buried under a trash heap at the bottom of the sea, hiding with a bunch of chattering Earthfish who have every monster and star god in space chasing them.
In other words, back at the bottom of the mountain again. Doomed always to be prey, instead of the hunter.
Crax! I sure do got a knack for picking ’em.
• • •
There were a few small compensations.
For one thing, dolphins seemed to hold humans in awe — the same kind as the Daniks had for their Rothen patrons. Furthermore, the Streaker crew considered Rety and Dwer “heroes” for their actions in the swamp against the Jophur sky boat. As a result, she had free run of the ship, including a courtesy password that let her approach a sealed entrance to the Streaker’s brig.
For a brief time both airlock doors were closed, and she knew guards must be examining her with instruments. Prob’ly checkin’ my innards, to see if I’m smugglin’ a laser or something. Rety took a breath and exhaled deeply, washing away her body’s instinctive panic over confinement in a cramped metal space. It’ll pass … it’ll pass.…
That trick had helped her endure years of frustration in her feral tribe, whenever defeat and brutality seemed to press in from all sides.
Don’t react like a savage. If others can stand living in boxes, you can, too … for a little while.
The second hatch opened at last, showing Rety a ramp that dropped steeply to a chamber that was flooded, chesthigh, with water.
Ugh.
She disliked the mixed compartments making up a large part of this weird vessel — half-immersed rooms that were spanned above by dry catwalks, allowing access to both striding and swimming beings. The liquid felt warm as Rety sloshed downslope, reminding her of volcanic springs back home in the Gray Hills, but with an added fizzy quality that left trails of tiny bubbles wherever she moved. Feigning relaxed confidence, Rety approached the guard station, where two sentries were assisted by a globular robot whose whirring antennae watched her acutely. One of the dolphins rode a six-legged walker unit — without the bug-eyed body armor — enabling it to stride about dry areas of the ship. The other “fin” wore just a tool harness, using languid motions of his flippers to face a set of monitor displays.
“May we help you, missss?” the latter one asked, with a tail splash added for punctuation.
“Yeh. I came to question Kunn an’ Jass again. I figure I’ll get more out of ’em if I try it alone.”
The guard focused one eye back at her with a dubious expression. The first attempt had not gone well, when Rety accompanied Lieutenant Tsh’t to interrogate the human prisoners. They had been groggy and unhelpful, still wearing bandages and medic pacs for their various injuries. While the dolphin officer tried grilling Kunn about matters back in the Five Galaxies, Rety endured a hot glare of hatred from her cousin Jass, who murmured the word traitor and spat on the floor.
Who’d you figure I betrayed, Jass? she had wondered, eyeing him coldly until his stare broke first. The Daniks? Even Kunn isn’t surprised I switched sides, after the way he treated me.
Or do you mean I’ve turned against our home clan? The band of grubby savages that birthed me, then never showed me a day’s kindness since?
Before looking away, his eyes showed it was personal. She had arranged for Jass to be seized, tormented, and pressed into service as Kunn’s guide. His being locked in this metal cage was also her doing.
That thought cheered her up a bit. You gotta admit, Jass, I finally made an impression on you.
But soon things are gonna get even worse.
I’m gonna make you grateful.
Meanwhile, Kunn told Tsh’t that the siege of Earth went on, though eased somewhat by a strange alliance with the Thennanin.
“But to answer your chief question, there has been no amnesty call by the Institutes. Several great star clans have blocked a safe-conduct decree to let your ship come home.”
Rety wasn’t sure what that meant, but clearly the news was bitter to the dolphins.
Then a new voice intruded from thin air, where a spinning abstract figure suddenly whirled.
“Lieutenant, please recall instructions. Have the prisoner explain how his vessel tracked us to this world.”
Rety recalled seeing a tremor course down the dolphin’s sleek gray flank, perhaps from irritation over the machine’s snide tone. But Tsh’t snapped her jaw in a gesture of submission, and sent her walker unit looming closer to Kunn’s bunk. The human star voyager had nowhere to retreat as her machine pressed close, threateningly. Rety recalled sweat popping out on the Danik warrior’s brow, giving lie to his false air of calm. Having watched him intimidate others, she was pleased to see the tables turned.
Then it happened. Some piece of equipment failed, or else the lieutenant’s walker took a misstep. The right front ankle abruptly snapped, sending the dolphin’s great mass crashing forward.
Only lightning reflexes enabled Kunn to scramble out of the way and avoid being crushed. By the time guards arrived to help Tsh’t untangle herself, the dolphin officer was bruised, angry, and in no humor to continue the interview.
But I’m ready now, Rety thought later, as one of the brig wardens prepared to escort her down a narrow passage with numbers etched on every hatch. I’ve got a plan … and this time Kunn and Jass better do as I say.
“Are you sure you want-t to do this now, miss?” the guard asked. “It’s night cycle and the prisoners are asleep.”
“That’s just how I want ’em. Groggy an’ logy. They may blab more.”
In fact, Rety hardly cared if Kunn named the admirals of all the fleets in the Five Galaxies. Her questions would only serve as cover for communication on another level.
She had been busy in the room the Streakers assigned her — a snug chamber once occupied by a human named Dennie Sudman, whose clothes fit her pretty well. Pictures on the wall portrayed a young woman with dark hair, who was said to have gone missing on some foreign planet years ago, along with several human and dolphin crew mates. On her cluttered desk Dennie had left a clever machine that spoke in a much friendlier manner than the sarcastic Niss. It seemed eager to assist Rety, telling her all about the Terran ship and its surroundings.
I’ve studied the passages leading from this jail to the OutLock. I can name what kind of skiffs and star boats they keep there. And most important, these Earthfish trust me. My passwords should let us out.