Eyes of the Calculor

by Sean McMullen

  "Neither the Highliber nor the Overmayor wished to lend any legitimacy to this farce by attending in person. That is why we are here."

  "And when can we leave?"

  "Just as soon as formal proceedings are complete. That will be this afternoon."

  The termination of formal proceedings was not quite so simple as the envoy had hoped, however. Late in the afternoon he found himself being granted an audience with Jemli herself.

  "I note that Rochester did not choose to worship the Word of the Deity by sending the head of state," she began ominously.

  "Frelle Prophet, Rochester is a secular commonwealth," replied the envoy, who had been expecting just such an observation. "We reacted to the Black Thirteenth crisis by commencing an adjustment of our secular structures, and that is taking all of the time and energy of both our Overmayor and Highliber."

  "So they do not think that my word, the Deity's Word, is worth considering?"

  "On the contrary, Frelle Prophet, I was sent precisely because Rochester does take you seriously indeed."

  "Rochester could easily be described as a godless and evil wasteland!" rasped Jemli.

  "But not accurately. We are a secular commonwealth where a diversity of religions coexist in harmony, just as the many religions of your followers coexist in harmony."

  "You have a smooth and agile tongue, Envoy. You remind me of the former Overmayor of Woomera."

  "My death, detention, or torture would result in the instant and unconditional declaration of war against the offending state. Forget that at your peril," replied the envoy firmly. "It is in the articles of exchange, of which I have a copy here. May I also remind you that Rochester's armies are completely intact, as are Rochester's paraline and beamflish networks? Can you say the same of yours?"

  "Need I remind you that I am also Overmayor of Kalgoorlie and all its western mayorates?" declared Jemli with cold authority in her voice.

  "Need I remind you that I am the Overmayor of Rochester's brother? With respect, Overmayor."

  Jemli managed to contain her anger. She had wished to swamp the Rochestrian Commonwealth, to win it over through sheer charisma, but with no audience to perform to this was not an option. A war would be easy to provoke but hard to wage. Her forces were enthusiastic but ill equipped, and even less well organized and led. The difference was thanks to the Dragon Librarian Service that Jemli wished to control. Overmayor Lengina could definitely shatter Woomera's disorganized armies and cut the paraline to Kalgoorlie. Jemli chose tactical retreat.

  "I am concerned only for the salvation of all Rochestrians," she declared soothingly, suddenly dismissing all the acrimony of only seconds earlier. "I wish to threaten neither you nor the Commonwealth."

  "I am gratified to hear it, Overmayor."

  "Return to Rochester, tell your Overmayor that I again request a conference with her. I shall travel to Rochester alone, with only the Deity to protect me."

  "Consider it done, Overmayor," replied the envoy with immense but well-concealed relief.

  Rochester, the Rochestrian Commonwealth

  In the two months since her revival, Velesti had slowly come to trust Martyne with something approaching friendship, and even went so far as to be seen with him in public. Much of this public visibility consisted of blindingly fast sparring and applications training on the university lawns, however, and by late November they had a regular audience of students and academics when the weather was fair.

  "I have noticed that many who watch are there regularly," said Velesti as she sat on a visitor's chair in Martyne's office.

  Her Morelac flintlock was partly dismantled on his desk, along with a set of tools, jar of oil, and some cleaning rags.

  "Some of them are my theology students," replied Martyne, who was preparing a lesson. "It leaves me a little self-conscious."

  "I have been thinking about founding a new students' guild."

  "In what? Blood-sports appreciation?"

  "No, an actual sports guild."

  "There are sports guilds already. Shooting, fencing, riding, and lawn bowls."

  "Except for fencing, none require much exertion. I think I could start a Baleshanto guild."

  The quill fell from Martyne's fingers.

  "Baleshanto? As in the martial art? As in the martial art from Balesha monastery that no sane person could ever contemplate?"

  "It has attractions. What other sports guild offers such personal contact?"

  "Velesti, Baleshanto's version of personal contact involves beating the stuffing out of an opponent who is trying to do precisely that to you as well. This is hardly an attraction."

  "It is for me. I would have more opponents. Will you approach the Academicians' Council on my behalf? You can be the head instructor; you have had formal training."

  "And what training have you had?" asked Martyne, replacing his quill in a rack and placing his fingertips together.

  Velesti tried to ignore the question, and continued cleaning and oiling the mechanism of her flintlock. The silence lengthened. Martyne waited. Velesti frowned. She began to replace the striker spring, lost her grip, and sprayed components into the air.

  "Now look what you made me do," she said.

  "What training have you had?" asked Martyne again.

  "Adequate training."

  "From whom?"

  "I know Baleshanto. Is that not enough?"

  "No explanation, no Baleshanto guild."

  Velesti said nothing, but began to gather the gun's trigger components together and lay them out methodically.

  "You are not Velesti," continued Martyne, picking the trigger

  spindle out of his hair and placing it on the desk beside Velesti's disassembled gun.

  "I am still missing a screw, a retainer plate, and the spring. As for the Velesti of more than two months past, I have no memory of her. I am only two months old, Fras Martyne."

  "Then let me tell you a little story. Years ago, in the days when Highliber Zarvora took control of Mirrorsun, a package was dropped to Earth. It contained four collars, just like the one you wear."

  "And very stylish it is, too."

  "The collars represented the very pinnacle of pre-Greatwinter science, they were not manufactured by Mirrorsun's machines. There were then only four in existence. Like much of what Mirrorsun has sent to Earth, they were in storage. They are two thousand years old, not newly built in the celestial workshops. Zarvora wore one of them, and discovered that it was a device to control distant machines using the entire body and brain. They are powered by nutrition in human blood, but they do not need much. They work equally well if worn on the wrist or neck. Two of them Zarvora gave to Abbess Theresla, who was meant to be her successor, and one just vanished."

  "You have left out the one that Zarvora wore herself."

  "Legend has it that Zarvora came to control Mirrorsun so very intimately with her collar that her very soul copied itself into its structure. When she was assassinated, she lived on in Mirrorsun. She later detonated her collar when one of her assassins tried to wear it, and bits of him are still being dug out of the brickwork of a certain tower in Libris. Theresla is known to have traveled to the North American continent on one of the sunwings, and has never returned. One collar was obviously kept in Griffith until it was applied to your own neck, leaving one more to account for."

  "Perhaps the abbess took it with her to North America also."

  "Perhaps, but she would have had to take Mayor John Glasken of Kalgoorlie with her, because I saw him wearing it when he briefly took refuge in Balesha after being denounced by his wife as a heretic."

  A thoroughly poisonous silence gripped the room as they stared

  unblinking at each other. In the distance the university clock tower rang a quarter past the hour.

  "Go on," prompted Velesti.

  "A group of us monks and neophytes was sent into the desert with him, and for three weeks we toiled to level a stretch of ground, remove the stones, water the sand from
a barrel cart, and pack the sand down to bake in the sun. At the end of this time we were sent back to Balesha, where a select few were loaded with stores of dried fruits, nuts, cheeses, and waterskins. Then we trudged back to the strip of level ground where Mayor Glasken was waiting. We arrived late in the morning, and were told to wait. When the sun was just passing noontime a great bird appeared in the sky. It circled us, losing height, and as it got closer I saw that its wings were at least a hundred feet across, and that two shimmering, whirring disks grew out of them. Then I realized it was a machine. It landed almost silently on our carefully leveled strip of desert and rolled to a stop.

  "Mayor Glasken had us grasp the wingtips and turn it to face down the length of what he now called the ascent strip. It was only when the machine was ready to ascend into the sky again that Abbess Theresla opened a hatch and stepped out onto the ground. She greeted Glasken, stretched, then cleaned sundry bags of rubbish from within the cabin. I handed her the bags of new supplies, which she loaded with efficient haste. I remember that she smelled stale, as if she had not bathed in days, if not weeks. She wore a collar, just like Glasken, and as she worked she said in Austaric, T dropped Frelle Darien in a place called Veraguay, there to prepare our path and learn the local language.' He said, 'How long to reach Veraguay?' and she replied, 'Four days, if the weather is fair.'

  "To us he now said, 'When we have gone, sweep the marks of the wheels from the ascent strip and strew stones and rocks across it again.' To the monk in charge he gave a handful of gold and said it was a gift to Balesha in thanks for loyalty. To me he said, 'Take the bags of rubbish, build a pyre of brushwood, and burn them to ashes.' Then he told us to stand clear. The machine's spinning blades whirled all the more quickly, and sped it along the ascent strip until it rose into the sky."

  Martyne reached into his jacket and drew out a small fruit knife with a carved bone handle.

  "I found this amid the rubbish that I burned. I imagine that it is from Veraguay, because the artwork and letters are like nothing that I know of from this continent."

  Martyne placed the carefully cleaned and honed knife down beside Velesti's disassembled gun. After staring at it for a time she reached out, ran her finger along the handle, then picked it up.

  "This says Theresla' in Veraguay's script," she said, holding it by the blade and stroking the handle. "May I keep it? I have nothing else to remember her by."

  "Of course, Fras Glasken, to me it is just a curio—"

  "Frelle Velesti, if you please," interjected Velesti with sad resignation. "Any other identity is pointless—no pun intended, of course."

  They both snickered for a moment.

  "Do you wish to tell your side of it?" asked Martyne.

  "What is there to tell? Theresla did not wear her collar properly, and so her image was not stored in Mirrorsun. She was never strong on following orders. I was, however, and when I was shot dead I found myself to be an image in an immense lattice of memories and thoughts. Worse, I was sharing it with Zarvora. Needless to say, we did not get along harmoniously. After a time she told me that one of the collars on earth had been applied to a body whose heart was still beating, but whose brain had been deprived of blood too long as a result of strangulation. The soul had departed, but the ancient collar could let me live in the body from Mirrorsun. After a time of being forced to work by the band, the brain might heal itself and my consciousness would gradually be imprinted into it. It is still too early to know whether that will happen, but if it does I shall remove the band, and Zarvora will erase the image of me in Mirrorsun. Anyway, I agreed, with as much enthusiasm as a dead man can manage."

  "Then you awoke to discover that Zarvora had omitted one vital detail?"

  "You have the measure of her. I have felt a great number of

  breasts in my former life, but none of them had been attached to me. You can imagine my dismay."

  Martyne cringed and covered his eyes. "Well, yes."

  "I teetered on the edge of insanity."

  "Perhaps you did more than teeter?"

  "Indeed, I actually fell a long way. My thoughts became exceedingly poisonous for quite some time. I suppose I tried to get back as much of a man's physique as is feasible, but after I had killed the last of Velesti's attackers I began to mellow. Do you know what I have discovered?"

  "I'm afraid I do not have the benefit of your experience or insights," replied Martyne.

  "I learned that I quite enjoy the company of women, just for its own sake. Take away lust, and I still like them. It was quite liberating to realize it. Men are still a problem, I cannot stand the touch of them. You are, perhaps, something approaching a friend."

  Martyne swallowed. "The feeling is mutual."

  "But nothing more!"

  "Of course not! But I am still honored to be your friend."

  Velesti sat back and sighed with relief.

  "Thank you. So, now you know why I am so strange and twisted."

  "There are plenty of people more strange and twisted than you. Me, for example."

  "I. . . have been meaning to raise the subject of your relationship with my mother," began Velesti.

  "You know?" cried Martyne, sitting bolt upright, pop-eyed with alarm.

  "Yes, but let us not discuss it just now." Velesti absently stroked the little fruit knife, displaying the only real tenderness that Martyne had noticed in her since he had returned from Balesha. "Do you know what I hate most about being a girl?" she asked presently.

  "The cost of makeup?" ventured Martyne.

  "Being groped, fondled, and grabbed. I had no idea how much touching, seizing, and feeling is foisted upon us women. Nearly two-

  thirds of my fights have started with being grabbed, and often by someone stronger than me."

  Martyne suddenly brightened. "Grabbed, as in by the arm?"

  "Now that you mention it, yes."

  "Excellent."

  "Excellent? It's repulsive!"

  "Ah, then recent developments in Baleshanto would interest you. There is a lot more emphasis on twisting, breakouts, and pressure-point holds."

  "I have done twist dodges."

  "No, more than dodges." Martyne stood up, came around the desk and extended his arm. "Pretend I am a girl and grab me."

  Velesti warily stood up, then seized his wrist. "Now, notice if I twist my arm thus, only your thumb is holding me, and if I do it quickly, thus, I am in a fine position to give you a backhand fist to the nose."

  "Or a chop to the throat," suggested Velesti. "Grab me, let me try it."

  Velesti did several breakouts.

  "Now, take it a stage further. What does the average yoick expect a girl to do when grabbed?"

  "Scream?"

  "She pulls away. The last thing a man expects is her to push forward. If she pushes forward while twisting out of his grip, he is still braced backwards for someone pulling away. Move in on him, and he will be off balance. Give it a try."

  Several moves later Velesti was quite confident with the technique.

  "You did an interesting block when we killed the last of those rapists," said Velesti. "You somehow got your hand under my arm and onto my shoulder, so that you could knee me in the cheek."

  "I do apologize, my reflexes took over. You threw a punch for my groin, as I recall."

  "I do apologize."

  "Think nothing of it. Now throw the punch again, slowly. I did

  a low sweep block, brought my open hand under and around your upper arm, then pushed up onto your shoulder thus, and pressed down, thus. Notice how your face is now at knee level."

  "So was that first block with an open hand?"

  "Yes, a lot of the new blocks are with an open hand, so that you can grasp as well."

  "I don't like grasping."

  "Oh no, seize my wrist, right to right, now watch as I—"

  "Arrgh!"

  "Was that effective?"

  "How did you do that?"

  "I pinned your elbow while pressing you
r hand down to force you to keep holding me, then dropped my weight to bend your wrist sideways. Did it hurt?"

  "Obviously! Show me again, I like that."

  After an hour they had managed to smash a visitor's chair, practice a dozen moves, and gather together all the missing pieces from the mechanism of Velesti's flintlock. An overcast had covered the late afternoon sun as they strolled across the university lawns, arms folded behind their backs.

  "This afternoon has been my happiest few hours since I shot up the barracks at Griffith," Velesti announced.

  "I must admit I enjoy having a peer-level partner to practice with," replied Martyne.

  "What do you think of me?"

  "Well. . . you fight like someone two or three times your weight, and with a lot more reach."

  "Really?"

  "Yes."

  "When I was in Balesha I was indeed twice this weight, and was a lot taller."

  "You need to use more elbow strikes, and to concentrate on close-in fighting."

  "I don't like being close to men."

  "But you could hurt them a lot more."

  "Hmm, point taken."

  "I feel thirsty just now. What would you say to a beer?"

  "I would say 'Afternoon's compliments, Frelle Beer.' "

  At the gates of the university an orator in a green jacket was standing on one of the two stone gargoyles that guarded the gates. She was addressing several dozen students. Others dressed in green were handing out pamphlets to those passing by. Martyne and Velesti stopped to listen, although at some distance from the group.

  "This is not about Islam, or Christianity, or Gentheism, this is about the Word of the Deity," cried the speaker, spreading her arms to the ground, where the god of the Gentheists was thought to dwell. "It is not our path to poison the sacred body of the Allcaring, we must care as we are cared for. Fueled engines poison the Deity, electrical machines torture the Deity's body, abominations disease the Deity. Do you care for your may orate?"

  "Yes!" shouted those Gentheists planted in the crowd, plus a few genuine converts.

  "Do you care for your world?"

  "Yes!" came a more unified and louder response.

  "Then go back to your temples, churches, shrines, mosques, and cathedrals, remind your clergy of the principles that your religions are founded upon. Fight for the purity of your religions, and fight for your world."