The Children of the Sky

by VernorVinge

  Ut fearfully came closer. When it spoke, it was to relay Tycoon’s confident and demanding voice: “Recall, Vendacious, I want both two-legs delivered to me. What’s left of Remasritlfeer, too.”

  No doubt Tycoon was lounging about in the comfort of his palace. The fat bastards’ notion of “surviving in style” was to have Vendacious do all the hard work. Eight years of practice had not made it any easier to suck up to the fool, but Vendacious managed a respectful response: “I understand, sir. Their airship is just now being moored.”

  “What about the two packs who were captured with the humans?”

  Vendacious had been expecting this question. With the right strategy, he wouldn’t have to release them. “They’re loyal dupes, but eventually I should be able to undo the humans’ influence.”

  Ut relayed a sigh. “That’s the way it has so often been with these two-legged monsters. One wonders how they can fool anyone.”

  “Their technology gives them an overwhelming advantage, sir.”

  “Of course. But in the end, that will not protect them from me.”

  Vendacious grimaced. You couldn’t talk to Tycoon for more than a minute without his ego slopping out. Of course, that was half the reason he was so easy to manipulate. “Your time will come, sir…I see the ship’s hatch has opened. I’ll have a wagon deliver the humans directly to you.”

  Mercifully, Tycoon wasn’t interested in further conversation; there was no need for more groveling. Vendacious stayed near the landing pylon but spread out to watch the prisoners coming down from the other ship:

  Ritl. All that was left of Remasritlfeer. He watched the singleton as it pranced regally across the concrete, a bit of flotsam that could still cause trouble.

  Ravna and Jefri. With Johanna gone, these were the two most dangerous humans alive. They could destroy everything he had created. From interrogating Amdiranifani and the Steel remnant, he knew how Chitiratifor had botched his mission.

  Still, a clean solution might have been possible if Tycoon had not meddled in the follow-up search. And now? Perhaps it was just as well these two weren’t in his clutches. The temptation to end them would have been irresistible and alas, he’d already spent far too much of his credibility by murdering others he’d held for Tycoon.

  He watched the rickshaw wagon pull away with the two humans and the singleton. Tycoon’s guard padded along after.

  What then was the good news in this debacle? Amdiranifani. He was perhaps the ideal hostage and certainly an entertaining victim. Breaking down a genius was often the most fun, especially in this case, in which the victim still thought it could outsmart the interrogator.

  —————

  When the airships landed, Timor Ristling was up in his dungeon. The early morning had brought the usual rain, but also a good breeze. Maybe it wouldn’t get too terribly hot today. He sat in the westside window, enjoying the rainy breeze, doing his best to ignore all the old aches and pains. They were still there, but if he gave in to them, he would not have a life.

  Timor’s dungeon was in one of the four spires that surrounded Tycoon’s palace. This was the highest point anywhere in the Reservation—though the Choir’s pyramid was so much taller that on sunny mornings most of the palace was in its shade. From his west-side window, Timor could look down on the airfield and the cuttlefish ponds, as well as the factories beyond. He kept his ankles wrapped around the nearest window pillar and leaned back firmly against the wall. Just sitting on a ledge so high up was deliciously scary.

  The lead airship was audible now. It slanted down toward the pylon in front of Vendacious’ hangar. Okay, so nothing officially belonged to Vendacious—but he controlled that area and the palace annex, and all who lived there. It was a miracle that Geri had survived her tendays in the annex.

  He watched the landing crew tie down the first airship. The airships reminded him of insystem freighters floating on agrav; the similarity always made Timor sad. Someday, someday, if Ravna can only win…we’ll make it back to the Beyond.

  Several packs got off the first ship—and now the second aircraft was coming down. Tycoon had been unusually secretive about what to expect. In principle that should mean Timor was almost clueless, since very few packs in Tycoon’s palace spoke Samnorsk. On the other hand, the cuttlefish gave him occasional clues in their scatterbrained way, and Timor had become adept at building speculations out of Tycoon’s silences and complaints and brags and favors. Five days ago, these two ships had abruptly left. Tycoon had let slip that Vendacious was aboard, so action against humans was probably planned. If no humans were aboard this second ship…well, that might be a very bad sign.

  Someone was coming out of the second ship! It was a singleton or maybe a small human child. Timor’s eyesight was almost as bad as the average pack member’s; all he was sure of was that this passenger was not a pack. Timor climbed down from the windowsill and grabbed the binoculars Tycoon had given him. The gear was heavy and—of course—without a bit of stabilization or enhancement. Timor had had to wheedle a connecting frame out of Tycoon; the guy had complained about the inconvenience of dealing with human limitations, but Timor could tell that he was secretly proud to show off. Tycoon claimed that telescopes were the invention of his own pack brother, more than ten years ago. “We really don’t need you humans, you know.” Tycoon said that a lot.

  Timor rested the device on the window ledge and looked through it, seeing nothing but a lot of rain-wet concrete. No sign of that small first passenger. Ah, now he was looking at some part of the airship. The main hatch was hidden beneath the curve of the hull, but he could see a pack near the entrance. It was watching something that it thought was important. Timor looked for a second more, holding the optics as steady as he could…A gunpack came smartly down the stairs, its gun muzzles down, but watching in all directions. It looked like Mr. Skeetshooter, the fellow who usually guarded Timor.

  And then there was a human. A guy, tall. From this angle, it was hard to…that was Jefri Olsndot! But I thought he was one of Nevil’s toadies? The thought flitted out of his mind because a second human had appeared.

  Ravna!

  Timor hunched forward, losing the view for a moment. When he found her again, Ravna had descended the stairs. She seemed to be leaning against Jefri. Seeing her here was the best thing he could imagine…or was it the worst? He’d know when he saw which direction they were taking her. Mr. Skeets herded Ravna and Jefri to a little rickshaw wagon. There was the singleton, already aboard.

  After a moment the rickshaw driver pulled them away, followed by Mr. Skeets. They were headed here, to the House of Tycoon! The rickshaw disappeared beneath his tower’s view. He watched the airships a few moments more, but saw only crew and maintenance packs.

  Timor slid down to the floor, the binoculars now unnoticed in his lap. Maybe he should keep watching, but he was too busy thinking about what this could mean and what he should do: Tell Geri. Decide how to approach Tycoon on this. Timor had gotten better at guessing how the big guy would react to developments—even if the reasons for the reaction were not always clear. In the beginning, Timor had tried to explain that Ravna was a good person who should be an ally. That had not worked very well, though Timor was sure—almost sure—that Tycoon would not kill her out of hand the way Vendacious wanted.

  Suddenly he was overcome by the need to move; he’d plan on the way. He climbed to his feet and set the binoculars in their velvet box. Geri’s cell was above his. Getting up the stairs was always a pain, though Tinish steps were easier for him to climb than steps the size most humans preferred. He’d considered complaining about the problem—but there was no way to make the stairs more convenient for his bad legs. If the Big Guy took him seriously, he might just move Timor out of the tower entirely.

  The tiny stairwell was cool, the walls and steps slick with condensation. The door at the top was metal, edged with a rubber sealing ring. He tapped politely on its surface, then popped it open.

  “Hei, Geri
. It’s me, Timor.” Actually, it couldn’t be anyone else, not through this door. “Can I come in?”

  There was no answer, but Geri replied only on her really good days. Timor eased the door open and stepped into the cold semidarkness. Actually the room was pretty warm by Domain standards, but it was at least ten degrees cooler than outdoors, and unlike in the stairwell, the air was relatively dry. Timor himself had lived in this room for a few tendays—till the lack of windows and the hassle of moving in and out of the heat had gotten to him. Geri would have that problem too if—when she felt well enough to leave the room.

  “Geri?”

  Shadows shifted and a head poked up. “She here. She say no visit.” That was the jailer, a not very bright foursome—but one of the few packs who spoke some Samnorsk.

  “Hei, Jailer,” and he tried to gobble-whistle the Jailer’s given name.

  As usual Jailer bobbed a smile, but whether she was amused or pleased, Timor had never been able to figure out. The pack was gathered together all on one side of the bed. Geri became visibly upset when a pack surrounded her. As Timor settled down on the other side, Geri shifted uneasily under her blankets, shrinking away from him. She stared determinedly away from both Timor and Jailer. This must be one of her bad days, when she couldn’t bear to be touched, much less hugged.

  Darn the luck, but he had to tell someone. Timor rested his hand on the edge of the five-year-old’s blankets. Geri was years younger than Timor now, but he was still only a little taller than she was. Once upon a time, Geri surely had understood that Timor was older, just stunted down to her size. Now she often seemed to confuse him with her Academy playmates. Since her time with Vendacious, there was a lot she was confused about, and lots more she refused to think about. “Geri, I have good news. Ravna is here! I saw her myself!”

  Her violet eyes shifted in his direction; some distant emotion passed across her small, dark face. Timor took any expression that wasn’t fear as a positive thing. The little girl seemed to consider him for a second. “What did she say?”

  Um. What a smart and deflating question. Geri could do that. He remembered the four-year-old he’d known back in the Domain. Back then, she’d been inquisitive all the time! “I haven’t actually talked to her yet. I’m going down to Tycoon right now. Maybe I can help her.”

  Another pause, but Geri didn’t look away. “Can I come? Can Edvi come? We can help too.”

  She liked Tycoon, but this was the first time she’d ever talked of going to see him. Unfortunately, Edvi was almost certainly dead. “Not this time, Geri. I have to get down to Tycoon right away. But I’ll tell him that you need Ravna.”

  Interest dimmed, but after a moment Geri replied, “Okay.”

  —————

  The stairs extended downwards only as far as the veranda at mid-tower. When Timor got there and emerged into the heat, it was like diving into a pool of very warm water.

  The veranda was the only way in or out of the tower—and that only if you could convince two gun-toting guards to let you pass. One of those packs stood around the door now, watching Timor impassively. Timor gave him a wave and limped a few meters around the curve of the tower to where the other pack—it was Mr. Sharpshooter this morning—sat by the elevator dock. “Hei, Sharpsie. I want to go down. Must see Tycoon.”

  Sharpsie rolled his heads in an officious, irritated way. He exchanged some hooting and gobbling with the pack by the door. The gunpacks really didn’t like to leave just the one guard here. On the other hand, it was Tycoon’s rule that Timor was not to be allowed to run around by himself. In the end—no big surprise—Sharpsie caved in. The four of him came to their feet. One of him slid open the elevator gate, while two others grabbed Timor’s shirt and pants to make sure he didn’t fall through the space between the veranda and the elevator carriage. These guys thought Timor’s tremor was much more dangerous than it really was. He had only fallen that once, and that was on the stairs…

  The elevator cable extended from the tower dock, diagonally down to a point on the palace dome. The ride was always exciting, the carriage slightly swaying, nothing but thirty meters of empty air between them and the dome below. Tycoon claimed that elevators were just another of his long-lost brother’s inventions. Maybe, but the thin little cable was made by char-burning woven reeds in just the right way—surely that was another trick stolen from Ravna’s starship.

  Five minutes later, he was safely at the dock on Tycoon’s own residential level. Mr. Sharps didn’t object when Timor took the shortcut through the aquarium room, though he insisted on walking both in front and behind.

  They weren’t more than five steps into the room before the cuttlefish spotted him. “Hei Timor! Timor! Hei Ti’Timor! Hei—hei—h’h’h’hei!” The squeaky voices started nearby, sweeping away from the door he had just come through, along the walls of the aquarium, all the way to the far end of the hall—where the little squeakers could not even have seen him yet.

  Timor moved as fast as he could down the aisle between the leaky glass tanks. Any other time he would have stopped in wonder, and stayed to chat. The aquarium had a water ladder down to the pools and streams of the airfield, so there was often news here from very far away. The cuttlefish were such marvelous creatures. The torpedo-shaped bodies were just thirty centimeters long. Their eyes covered one end; their tentacles extended the rest of their body length. Hundreds of them tumbled and turned as they swarmed to follow his progress. I don’t have time, little ones! Their greetings had shifted into questions. The cuttlefish were not mindless, but they were differently minded. The cuttlefish were scatterbrained and careless of their own lives. But they spoke Interpack. Tycoon claimed that they had spoken a Southseas version of pack talk when they were first discovered. They had learned a little Samnorsk just since he had started talking to them.

  Two of Sharps ran a little way ahead. One looked around the corner in the direction of Tycoon’s audience hall—and suddenly the whole pack seemed to go on parade, all its steel claws clacking on the floor in unison. Something strange was going on ahead. Timor slowed down, provoking an irritated hiss from Sharps’ two behind him.

  He reached the corner, and peeked around. The audience room doors were shut! Tycoon hardly ever did that. He liked to wander back and forth and schmooze with the cuttlefish. Not today. He must be running the air-conditioning a lot, like he did when he really wanted to impress someone. Okay, that was good.

  Unfortunately, there was a pack standing by the doors, glaring in their direction. That was Sharps’ boss, what would have been the royal chamberlain back in Woodcarver’s palace. Timor straightened up as much as he could and approached him. Mr. Sharps’ two walked in formation with him, then merged with its two members that had gone on ahead. All four stopped and came to attention. Sharps’ maneuver was supposed to be fierce and impressive, but to Timor he just looked like doggies with toy guns strapped to their backs.

  Timor walked on forward, right up to the boss pack. He really needed to get through these doors. If Tycoon would give Ravna a fair hearing, they were all home free. The problem was, sometimes the Big Guy would go running with his preconceptions. Vendacious was always trying to take advantage of that. What if Vendacious is in there too? Timor stifled the thought.

  “Hei, Boss.” He waved at the doors. “Tycoon want me now. I help with words.”

  The boss pack stared back impassively. This one had no sense of humor, and today he seemed even less jolly than usual. Several of him looked past Timor at Sharps. There was a warbling exchange of views. Timor could only pick out a few of the chords, but he made up the rest with this imagination:

  Boss pack: “Hei, Sharpsie. Did this two-legged clown really get an order from the Big Guy to come down here?”

  Sharps, doing his best to stay at full attention: “No way, Sir. Jailer is the only one who’s been to the tower today.”

  The Boss turned all his attention back to Timor, and what he actually said in Samnorsk came as a surprise even
to Timor’s imagination: “You no go here. Tycoon make that real order. To me, about you.”

  CHAPTER 33

  Tycoon’s great palace might not have been where Ravna had expected, but it was every bit the grandiose thing she had imagined: huge, domed, and spired. Unfortunately, she and Jefri spent the rest of the morning stuck in the lowly outskirts of the place, even as the rickshaw whisked Ritl merrily off to some more honored destination. The gunpack guided Ravna and Jefri toward magnificent twenty-meter-wide stairs—then off to the side, where there was an awning-shaded area. Packs brought them food (yams!) and some kind of weak beer. So they sat and looked across the airfield at the airships and the long barracks-like structures beyond. Eventually the airships were wheeled into their hangars, but there was no end to mysterious comings and goings near those barracks. The clouds scudded away and the sun beat down and things got really hot, even here under the awnings. Jefri paced to the limits that the gunpack would allow, looking at everything, arguing with gunpack and the occasional servant, even though nobody seemed to speak Samnorsk. Finally, he came back, looking as wilted as Ravna felt. “You okay?” he said.

  “Yeah.” This was very much the setting of the Age of Princesses, and yet another blow to her childhood fancies.

  “I think this is some kind of psychological warfare,” Jefri said.

  “They’re softening us up?”

  “Maybe.” He looked around. “You know, a lot of this doesn’t look so regal up close. I see mildew, water stains. Choir aside, there are good reasons why Northerners never settled here. Maybe Vendacious and Tycoon came here out of weakness. Maybe they’re moving the furniture around right now,” he jerked a thumb at the palace’s main entrance, “polishing up the part we’re going to see.”