Hiero Desteen (Omnibus)

by Sterling E. Lanier

  I wonder where we are, B’uorgh sent, after a companionable silence, while they listened to the monster in the slime below, now retreating noisily. Can this sea, this mighty water, be far off, do you think, Hiero? I have viewed it in your mind, but frankly, I find it hard to believe, even so. So much water in one place!

  Oh, it’s there, the man answered. We have to cross it somehow. I simply have to get back to the real war, to find out what my own people are doing, to say nothing of the Unclean. I don’t know if the weapon that I found, the machine that thinks for all—this was as close to describing the computer idea as he could get—ever arrived in my country. I don’t know if my country is even still defending itself I don’t know if any messages have come from the South, from, my she and her country. The only thing I do know is that going all the way around the edge of the Inland Sea would take many months, assuming that we ever got there at all. We have to cross it and cross it fast.

  There was a silence again as the cat minds considered yet once more all the marvelous new ideas. The great waters alone were wild enough in conception for folk who only knew the lazy little rivers of the savannas. But the idea of going on things that floated, like sticks on a rivulet! It was frightening, yes, but also wonderful.

  These boats, these ships, I understand, I think, M’reen sent. But the way they move! I can understand that if many people put sticks in the water that push, the boat-thing moves forward. But that the wind itself can make the boat move, that is almost beyond any belief For perhaps the fiftieth time, Hiero tried to explain what sails were and what it was that they did. The real joke, which he could not share, was that he was sure that the cat people would make marvelous sailors! They had no fear at all of heights and moved up and down smooth branches, well—like cats. He felt sure that a crew of trained catmen would rival the finest human sailors in existence. Probably they would need little or no training, either, once the principles were understood. Of course, there was a possible problem of seasickness, but he doubted that such a small thing would stop his friends for very long. As they fell into a drowsy slumber, he was still chuckling to himself at the thought of a great barque, such as The Ravished Bride, her rigging full of flitting, dancing figures, like spotted sprites.

  The following day brought Hiero to a sudden halt. It was midaf-ternoon and they were moving rapidly along a highway of the world aloft, a series of interlaced branches of great size, almost as easy to run on as a town street. The man suddenly held up one hand, and the others stopped in their tracks as the message penetrated,

  Hiero’s mind had gone roving ahead in its usual manner, but he had been pushing it a bit harder and farther than he normally did. Then he realized they were already near the Inland Sea. There could be no other explanation for the void in the life auras he was accustomed to gathering into his head. The vast, teeming mass of sheer life which made up the collective biota of the titanic forest suddenly halted. There was a clear limit beyond which, with sharp finality, all surface life ceased. All normal surface life, that was!

  Motioning the others to stillness, he crouched on the branch and listened with all his mental ability, for he was operating his power at extreme range. He was sensing men, men of so-called civilization, for the first time in months. And they were very much the wrong kind of men!

  He was detecting the crew of an Unclean ship! No other explanation made any sense. They were closely grouped physically; that he could tell with ease. And they were out in the emptiness that he knew from the past, which could only mean the sea. The sea had many forms of life, but they did not as a rule operate on its surface, certainly not on bands of mental energy used by humans. And none of the natural forms of the great freshwater ocean would be likely to own an Unclean mind shield! One assortment of people, of whatever stock he could not tell, had such. He had learned in his flight from the North to detect these things when they were being used to send messages. In their closed or defensive condition, they revealed nothing. But the creature of the enemy was using this one to send. This left him open to detection by Hiero and, more than that, enabled the Metz to read the message. What was being sent was most interesting.

  None of our ships have been sighted. Not even a trader of the common scum. It is as if the coast west of Neeyana had been swept clean somehow. I have received messages only from yourself. Suggest that a Brother be sent in one of the secret ships to investigate. We are two days’ sail from Neeyana, but we are hampered by bad winds. There is a strong feeling among both the officers and the crew that something very funny is going on. We should have sighted the front-runners of the spring trade by now, but have seen nothing. We return to port unless I receive further orders. Message ends. Sulkas.

  Hiero listened intently with every fiber of his senses, but could detect no answer. If there were one, it must be coming on some wavelength too attenuated, possibly by distance, for him to reach. But he rather thought not. Whoever Sulkas was, he was no member of the Unclean Brotherhood. The mind, though intelligent, was not of the same caliber, nor was it of the same “feel.” This was some trusted servant, a pirate, perhaps, like the late Bald Roke, whom Hiero and Gimp had killed. While the catfolk chatted quietly among themselves, the priest settled down to try to analyze what he had heard.

  The message had probably been sent at a fixed time. No reply was thought necessary for the present. Clearly, the Unclean, whom he knew controlled the port of Neeyana on the southern coast of the sea, were uneasy about something. This vessel, which had a crew of no more than a dozen, was sent out as a scout. The crew had found nothing save an empty ocean, and this made them in turn uneasy, for it should not have been so, not at this time of the year. The report had gone to home base, to Neeyana, for further action. A suggestion had been made that one of the Brothers, a robed wizard of the Unclean, should be sent on one of the “secret ships.”

  Hiero had no trouble guessing what was meant. He had been a prisoner on one of those secret ships, powered by some force he did not as yet understand, but of which he had many suspicions. He was reasonably sure, as was Brother Aldo of the Eleventh Brotherhood, that the Unclean had atomics! Both men felt that the metal vessels they had encountered were driven by the powers of the atom, the shunned, the abhorred, the unspeakable! In their hidden laboratories, the scientists of the Unclean had wrought many horrors. They had bred mutated animals as slaves, as they had tried to do with the cat people. But this was the Ultimate Crime. This was the final horror of The Death, something so awful that normal humanity shrank from even contemplating it.

  Hiero remembered their group thrill of nausea when he, Luchare, Aldo, and the bear Gorm had first glimpsed the buried cavern of the past, where the great, plastic-shrouded machines had lain, the dispatchers of the ancient terror throughout the world. Aldo, the lover of all life, had almost fainted.

  As Hiero sat now, brooding over what he had learned, his determination hardened. The Unclean were going to perish, root and branch, down to the last serf, the merest acolyte in the most minor degree. This was his mission, and he would not fail.

  At length, he turned to his fellow venturers. He knew what he wanted to do, but it might prove a trifle hard to explain. Yet he must make the attempt.

  We must be just south of the main road from the west to a city held by our enemies. One old road runs from the southeast to the northwest, springing from many other roads far away in the South. We must have been moving roughly parallel to it, though a goodish way off. It is the only way from the east to the port of Neeyana, at least through the forest. West of Neeyana there are other roads and eventually, I think, also more open country, at least in part, but I have never been there or examined detailed maps of that region, except in the most casual way. The shores are very dangerous, and most traffic goes by ship.

  He explained further what he had just been doing. There was an enemy vessel present out on the waters, and they must all be very, very careful from now on. If the Unclean ship were no more than two days’ sail from th
e harbor of the foe, then there would soon be contact with someone, probably a someone they had no wish to meet unawares.

  We must guard our minds, he went on. Use your speech aloud to one another and talk with me only if urgent. You people use an odd mental band and not one likely to be constantly watched, which is good. But the Unclean have many servants who are not human and with whom they must speak, so be careful! Also, the nonhumans watch and listen, as well as send messages on their own account. We must go like shadows from here on. Something strange out on the sea seems to have disturbed our enemies. I have no idea what it is, but anything that bothers them is likely to be in our favor.

  The catfolk had no trouble understanding him, though they grew wildly excited at the thought of actually coming into contact with the legendary wizard lords, whose crimes had been instilled into each of them in their youth. When Hiero explained that he had no real plans other than somehow to steal a small vessel and escape with it, they seemed to feel that this would prove easy—a simple matter of overpowering whoever stood in their way.

  I will loose the Wind of Death on them. Then we will cut their throats! This was M’reen, tapping the pouch which hung at her belt. It took a while for Hiero to quiet them down, to explain the numbers of the Unclean and their servants, and to make sure they would do nothing rash, but would follow his orders. After a while, he felt sure of them. The first rush of hatred would not make them behave in an irresponsible way.

  They continued on for the remainder of the day with redoubled caution, using hand signals when they wanted to tell Hiero something and conversing in their own purring murmur among themselves.

  That night they camped on another natural platform. After Hiero had grilled his share of the meat, they put out the fire, remote though the chance was that it might be observed. Water had never been a problem to date; not only did the tree crotches often hold it in quantity, but many of the large, epiphytic plants contained small pools as well.

  As the catfolk dozed through the dark hours, the man. continued to reach out with his thoughts into the night, not only in the direction they were moving but on either side as well. He was beginning, if his senses were operating in a correct manner, to feel what he thought was the town of Neeyana, a way off to the north and east of their present position. He could not read any individual minds, but the sensation of grouped humanity gave off a feeling almost of heat in his head. He was fairly sure he was right.

  It was not in his original plans to approach the place at all, at least not closely. There was far too much danger of Unclean detection. He now realized that it might prove to be the only sensible course, especially if they were to steal a small boat. He knew of no other towns to the east; Captain Gimp, on the previous voyage, had mentioned none, though they must exist somewhere along the coast. But he knew nothing at all of the western and southwestern coasts, either. There was a port, known to and used on occasion by the Abbeys, but it lay a thousand leagues to the northwest. He had been warned to avoid it by his superiors when he had set out a year before, for it was full of spies, and only a few of the traders could be really trusted. This was the brawling port of Namcush. A river led down to it from far up near the borders of the territories of the Republic, a river along which trade ran in both directions, though uncertain and often interrupted. In any case, it was of no present use to him, though it might prove a place to steer for in an emergency.

  Eventually he slept, but the guard on his mind never relaxed. In the morning he felt there would be much to do.

  They had not been on the march for more than a few hours when the road he had been seeking appeared below them. On Hiero’s orders, the group had been traveling through the lowest level of the arboreal highway, though even that was far above the ground. The bog had come to an unheralded end sometime during the day before, and firm ground now lay at the base of the mighty trees.

  It was M’reen, taking a turn to scout ahead, who signaled the break in the trees. The others joined her to peer down at what lay below.

  The trade route was well trampled and wide, though circuitous, for the tremendous task of felling the forest giants had never been attempted, at least not in these parts. The track simply wound about among their bases, back and forth, but always holding a rough course from east to west. Hiero had never before seen it, since he had left it leagues off to his right on his previous venture south. He knew, however, that it connected after Neeyana through a maze of other paths and roads with distant D’alwah, and that goods passed along it of every sort, ranging from fabrics and furs to dried fruit and spices, and not excluding slaves. It was most probably along the eastern part of this route that his wife had been taken as a slave to Neeyana. At least, from her description, it had sounded like this way.

  The trail lay empty and silent under the green shadows of the giant trees, with dappled sunbeams illuminating patches of it here and there. While the others waited patiently, the Metz scanned the immediate surroundings with his mind, using the utmost care. The Unclean would be sure to have a watch on this route, a. main artery of trade to both east and west, and the last thing the little party needed now was to stumble on some outpost or other. He could detect nothing, however, in either direction, and this puzzled him. The distant mass of mental activity which he felt sure was Neeyana had grown increasingly stronger throughout the morning, but why was there nothing nearer? Surely some traders or one of the Unclean patrols ought to be within detection range,

  He considered. The mental shields that the Unclean had begun to issue when last he was in the North might account for the silence all about. This seemed implausible, though. He knew the shields were rare and probably very costly in both time and skilled workmanship. He felt sure such shields would be issued to only key personnel—commanders, members of the Unclean Brotherhood, and others in high authority. A simple unit of watchers on the trails would be most unlikely to have one; or, if the captain possessed one, then Hiero ought to be able to pick up the thoughts of the other, humbler members of the group. It was most perplexing.

  Keeping his thoughts to the catfolk on the lowest energy level, undetectable save at close range, he issued his orders. They would scout along on either side of the path, moving east and going very slowly and with the utmost care. His allies would signal in their own speech, which was highly unlikely to be sorted out from the myriad forest noises around them, if they found anything worthy of reporting. Meanwhile, he would bring up to the rear and screen everything in a circle with his own mental nets, M’reen would stay close to him on the left side of the trail with B’uorgh, while the other two would take the right. So it was decided and they set out, descending a mighty tangle of lianas and interwoven aerial roots until within a few feet of the earth. Then they dropped and separated.

  Their progress was slow, but they covered the ground nonetheless. Every cluster of the widespread roots and great base flanges of the colossal trees had to be scouted and then circled after investigation. Since many of them were enormous in circumference, making the redwoods of the past look like saplings by comparison, this took time. They tried never to lose sight of the trail, while remaining invisible from any eyes that they might somehow have overlooked. Hiero had warned them to be especially wary of any attack from overhead, and he was soon proved right, even though they were not attacked.

  A faint yowling call from Ch’uirsh on the far side of the trail brought them up short. Following B’uorgh’s hand signals, the three crept closer, until they were on the edge of the broad path and could see the spotted forms of the two young warriors on the other side. Ch’uirsh and Za’reekh were pointing upward along the route, to something in the fork of a great tree, overgrown with cable-sized vines and even bushes. Straining his eyes, Hiero finally picked out something alien in the mass of tangled foliage, some darker and more structured shape.

  They spent five more minutes scouting the neighborhood before climbing cautiously upward. In another minute, they were in the neatly concealed watchto
wer of the enemy. It was a roofed platform of logs, cleverly bound about with living plants of all kinds and providing a clear view of the path below in both directions—and it was completely empty. That it had not been empty long was obvious. There was a pile of ripe but not yet rotten fruit in one corner; a rude cabinet in another held dried meat and even some hard biscuit. A perfectly good belt of heavy leather, with a brass buckle and studs, had been dropped under a half-full wineskin near the leaf-covered entrance. Smelling the wine, Hiero found it perfectly drinkable.

  Over all the place hung a faint, sour odor, and it was one the man had no trouble identifying. Manrats, he sent, using the lowest energy level of brain waves. The enemy has had a garrison of the foul things they bred here. There was at least one human as well, since they do not drink this stuff in the leather bag. They have been called away suddenly, and I would badly like to know why. He thought hard and came to a decision.

  The other four crouched on their haunches, and, very carefully,

  Hiero sent a probe out in the direction of the Inland Sea. It could not lie more than a few miles to the north of their present position, and he wanted to know what was going on off their flank as they continued. Presently, he found a thing of interest, although exactly what he had found, he was not sure. There was something out there or a number of somethings, maybe, but the whole embodiment of whatever it was lay under a mental blanket, a cover concealing the nature and identity of what was hidden therein. All Hiero could detect was a mass like a huge mental cloud, an inchoate something which he could not pierce. Beyond all shadow of a doubt, the thing was moving; and it was moving, though not fast, in his direction.