Helliconia Spring h-1

by Brian Aldiss

  For scours were always patrolling neighbouring territory, keeping the settlement informed of what was happening elsewhere, and capturing anything that came within their sweep. The central pens were well stocked with a transient population of prisoners.

  The prisoners were handed over to phagors as tribute. In exchange, the phagors left the settlement alone. Why not? The warrior-priest Festibariyatid had cunningly founded the settlement on a false octave; no phagor was motivated to invade it.

  But there remained the enemy inside the camp. Two protognostics giving their names as Cathkaarnit-he and Cathkaarnit-she had fallen ill on arrival and soon died. The pen master had called a doctor-priest, who had identified bone fever. The fever was spreading, week by week. This morning, a scout was found in the bunkhouse, limbs locked tight, eyeballs rolling, sweat pouring from his flesh.

  Inconveniently, the disaster happened at a time when the colonists were trying to build up stocks of captives to present to the approaching phagor crusade. Already, they had informed themselves of the name of the ancipital warrior-priest, who was none less than Kzahhn Hrr-Brahl Yprt. A large number of deaths would spoil the tribute. By order of the High Festibariyatid, extra prayers were sung at each declension.

  Laintal Ay heard the prayers as he walked into the settlement and was pleased by the sound. He looked with interest at all about him, ignoring the two armed sentries who escorted him to a central guardhouse, outside which prisoners were raking dung into piles.

  The guard captain was puzzled by a human who was not from Sibornal and yet walked voluntarily into the camp. After talking to Laintal Ay for a while and trying some bullying, he sent a subordinate to fetch a priest-militant.

  By this time, Laintal Ay was having to accustom himself to the fact that anyone who had not suffered the plague looked, to his new eyes, uncomfortably fat. The priest-militant looked uncomfortably fat. He confronted Laintal Ay challengingly, and asked what he thought were shrewd questions.

  “I met with some difficulties,” Laintal Ay said. “I came here hoping to find refuge. I need clothes. The woods are too populated for my liking. I want a mount of some kind, preferably a hoxney, and am prepared to work for it. Then I’m off home.”

  “What kind of human are you? Are you from far Hespagorat? Why are you so thin?”

  “I have come through the bone fever.” The priest-militant fingered his lip. “Are you a fighter?”

  “I recently killed off a whole tribe of Others, the Nondads…”

  “So you’re not afraid of protognostics?”

  “Not at all.”

  He was given the task of guarding the pens and feeding their miserable inmates. In exchange, he was presented with grey wool clothing. The thinking of the priest- militant was simple. One who had suffered from the fever could look after the prisoners without inconveniently dying or passing on the pandemic.

  Yet more of the colonists and the prisoners went down with the scourge. Laintal Ay noticed that the prayers in the Church of Formidable Peace became more fervent. At the same time, people kept more closely to themselves. He went where he would and nobody stopped him. He felt that he somehow lived a charmed life. Each day was a gift.

  The scouts kept their mounts in a railed compound. He was in charge of a bunch of prisoners whose job it was to carry in hay and fodder to the animals. Here was where the big fodder problem of the settlement lay. An acre of green grass could feed ten animals for a day. The settlement had fifty mounts, used for scouring an increasingly large area; they consumed an equivalent of 24,000 acres per year, or rather less, since some feeding was done beyond the perimeter. This grave problem meant that the Church of Formidable Peace was generally full of half-starved farmers—a rare phenomenon, even on Helliconia.

  Laintal Ay refused to shout at the prisoners; they worked well enough, considering their miserable circumstances. The guards stayed at a distance. A light rain made them keep their heads down. Only Laintal Ay took notice of the mounts as they crowded round, thrusting forward their soft muzzles, breathing gently in expectation of a treat. The time was coming when he would select a mount and escape; in a day or two more, the guard would be disorganised enough for his purposes, judging by the way things were going.

  He looked a second time at one of the hoxney mares. Seizing up a handful of cake, he approached her. The animal’s stripes ran orangey-yellow from head to tail, with a dark powdery blue between.

  “Loyalty!”

  The mare came over to him, taking the cake and then plunging her nose under his arm. He clung to her ears and petted them.

  “Where’s Shay Tal, then?” he asked.

  But the answer was obvious. The Sibornalans had caught her and traded her to the phagors. She would never get to Sibornal now. By this time, Shay Tal was a gossie. She and her little party, one with time.

  The name of the guard captain was Skitosherill. A wary friendship developed between him and Laintal Ay. Laintal Ay could see that Skitosherill was frightened; he touched nobody, and wore a posy of raige and scantiom at his lapel, to which his long nose frequently resorted, hoping to protect its owner from the plague.

  “Do you Oldorandans worship a god?” he asked.

  “No. We can look after ourselves. We speak well of Wutra, that’s true, but we kicked all his priests out of Embruddock several generations ago. You should do the same in New Ashkitosh—you’d have an easier life.”

  “Barbarian behaviour! That’s why you caught the plague, vexing God.”

  “Nine prisoners died yesterday, and six of your people. You pray too much, and it does no good.”

  Skitosherill looked angry. They stood in the open, a breeze rippling their cloaks. The music of prayer drifted over to them from the church.

  “Don’t you admire our church? We’re only a simple farming community, yet we have a fine church. There’s nothing like it in Oldorando, I’ll gamble.”

  “It’s a prison.”

  But as he spoke, he heard a solemn melody coming from the church which addressed him with mystery. The instruments were joined by voices, uplifted.

  “Don’t say that—I could have you beaten. Life’s in the Church. The circular Great Wheel of Kharnabhar, the holy centre of our faith. If it was not for the Great Wheel, we’d still be in the grip of snow and ice.” He made a circle on his forehead with his index finger as he spoke.

  “How’s that?”

  “It’s the Wheel that moves us closer to Freyr all the time. Didn’t you know that? I was taken to visit it on pilgrimage as a child, into the Shivenink Mountains. You are not a true Sibornalan unless you’ve made the pilgrimage.”

  The following day brought another seven deaths. Skitosherill was in charge of the burial party, which consisted of Madi prisoners, scarcely competent enough to dig graves.

  Laintal Ay said, “I had a dear friend who was captured by your people. She wished to make a pilgrimage to Sibornal, to consult the priests of that Great Wheel of yours. She thought they might be the source of all wisdom. Instead, your people made her prisoner and sold her to the stinking phagor. Is that how you treat people?”

  Skitosherill shrugged. “Don’t blame me. She was probably mistaken for a Pannoval spy.”

  “How could she be mistaken? She rode a hoxney, as did members of her party. Have the people of Pannoval hoxneys? I never heard so. She was a splendid woman, and you brigands handed her over to the fuggies.”

  “We’re not brigands. We just wish to settle here in peace, moving on when the ground’s used up.”

  “You mean, when you’ve used up the local population. Fancy trading women in exchange for your safety.”

  Grinning uneasily, the Sibornalan said, “You barbarians of Campannlat, you don’t value your women.”

  “We value them highly.”

  “Do they rule?”

  “Women don’t rule.”

  “They do in some countries of Sibornal. In this settlement, see how well we take care of our women. We have women priests.”

/>   “I haven’t seen one.”

  “That’s because we take care of them.” He leant forward. “Listen, Laintal Ay, I understand you are not a bad fellow, all things considered. I’m going to trust you. I know the state of affairs here. I know how many scouts have gone out and not returned. They’ve died of the plague in some miserable thicket and had no burial, their corpses probably devoured by birds or Others. It’s going to become worse, while we sit here. I am a religious man, and I believe in prayer; but the bone fever is so strong that even prayer cannot prevail against it. I have a wife I love dearly. I wish to strike a bargain with you.”

  As Skitosherill spoke, Laintal Ay stood on a low eminence, looking down a miserable bit of ground which sloped towards a stream; stunted thorn trees grew along the watercourse. Among the stones littering the slope, the prisoners were slinging back earth, while seven cadavers—the Sibornalan corpses wrapped in sheets—lay in the open awaiting burial. He thought to himself, I can understand why this overweight lump wishes to escape, but what is he to me? He’s no more than Shay Tal, Amin Lim, and the others were to him.

  “What’s your bargain?”

  “Four yelk, well fed. Me, my wife, her maidservant, you. We leave together—they’ll let me through the lines without difficulty. We ride back with you to Oldorando. You know the way, I protect you, see to it that you have a good steed. Otherwise you’ll never be allowed to get away from here—you’re too valuable—particularly when matters get worse. Do you agree?”

  “When do you plan to leave?”

  Skitosherill buried his nose in the posy and looked up searchingly at Laintal Ay. “You say a word of this to anyone and I’ll kill you. Listen, the crusade of the phagor kzahhn, Hrr-Brahl Yprt, is due to start passing here before Freyr-set, according to our scouts. We four will follow on afterwards—the phagors will not attack us if we are in their rear. The crusade can go where it will; we shall progress to Oldorando.”

  “Are you planning to live in such a barbarian place?” Laintal Ay asked.

  “We shall have to see how barbarian it is before I answer that. Don’t try to be sarcastic to your superiors. Do you agree?”

  “I’ll have a hoxney rather than a yelk, and choose it myself. I’ve never ridden a yelk. And I want a sword, white metal, not bronze.”

  “Very well. You agree, then?”

  “Do we shake hands on it?”

  “I do not touch other hands. Verbal agreement is enough. Good. I’m a godfearing man, I’ll not betray you; see you don’t betray me. Get these corpses buried while I go to prepare my wife for the journey.”

  As soon as the tall Sibornalan had gone, Laintal Ay called the captives to halt their activity.

  “I’m not your master. I’m a prisoner as much as you. I hate Sibornalans. Throw those corpses in the water and cover them with stones—it’ll save you labour. Wash your hands afterwards.”

  They gave him suspicious looks instead of thanks, he in his grey woollen garments, tall, standing above them on the bank, he who talked with the Sibornalan guard on equal terms. He felt their hatred and was unmoved by it. Life was cheap if Shay Tal’s life was cheap. As they scrambled among the corpses, they brushed the sheet from one of them, so that he glimpsed an ashen face underneath, frozen in its anguish. Then they had the body by feet and shoulders and tossed it down to the stream, where dashing water seized ravenously on the covering, moulding it round the body, which it began to roll unceremoniously downstream.

  The watercourse marked the perimeter of New Ashkitosh; on its other bank, beyond a flimsy rail, no-man’s land began.

  When their task was over, the Madis considered the prospect of escape by fording the stream and running away. Some advocated this course of action, standing on the edge of the water and beckoning their fellows. The more timid hung back, gesticulating towards unknown dangers. All kept glancing anxiously at Laintal Ay, who stood where he was, arms folded. They were unable to make up their minds whether to act individually or corporately, with the result that they did nothing but argue, starting up the bank or down into the stream, but ever returning to a common centre of indecision.

  There was reason for their hesitation. The no-man’s land on the far side of the river was filling with figures that moved westward. Birds made uneasy by constant disturbance flew up before them, wheeling in the sky and then attempting to realight.

  The land rose to a low horizon in the middle distance, where it dropped sharply to reveal a line of drums, the crowns of ancient rajabarals which emitted steam. Beyond their vapour, the landscape continued on a grander scale, revealing hills, stacked distant and serene in misty light. Stone megaliths stood here and there, curiously incised, marking land- and air-octave lines.

  The fugitives heading westward turned their faces away from New Ashkitosh, as if fearing its reputation. They were sometimes solitary but more often in groups, frequently large groups. Some drove animals before them, or had phagors with them. Sometimes the phagors were in control.

  Progress was not always continuous. One large group stopped on a slope some distance from where Laintal Ay stood. His keen eyes made out the signs of lamentation, with figures alternately bowing down or stretching upward in sorrow. Other groups arrived or passed; people ran from group to group. The plague travelled among them.

  He found himself searching the more distant landscape for sight of that from which the refugees fled. He fancied he saw a snow-covered peak between the fold of two hills. The quality of light on it constantly changed, as if shadowy beings sported on its upper slopes. Superstitious fears filled his mind, clearing only when he realised that he was seeing not a mountain, but something closer and entirely less permanent: a flight of cowbirds, converging as they streamed through a pass.

  Then at last he broke his reverie. Turning away from the protognostics, who still quarrelled in their ditch, he made his way back to the guard buildings.

  It was clear to him that these refugees, many already infected by the plague, would descend on Oldorando. He must return as soon as possible, to warn Dathka and the lieutenants; otherwise, Oldorando would sink under a tide of diseased humanity and inhumanity. Anxiety for Oyre tugged at him. He thought of her too little since the days of his snoktruix.

  The suns shed warmth on his back. He felt isolated, but there was no remedy for that at present.

  He kicked his heels at the guardhouse, listening for music from the church, but only silence came from that direction. Being uncertain whereabouts on the wide perimeter Skitosherill and his wife lived, he could only wait for the couple to appear. Waiting increased his foreboding.

  Three scouts entered the settlement on foot, bringing with them a pair of captives, one of whom collapsed immediately, to lie in a heap by the guardhouse. The scouts were sick and exhausted. They staggered into the guardhouse without a glance at Laintal Ay. The latter looked indifferently at the prisoner who remained on his feet; prisoners were no concern of his anymore. Then he looked again.

  The prisoner stood with his feet apart in a defiant attitude, although his head hung as if he were tired. He was of a good height. His thin stature indicated that he also had survived bone fever. He wore clumsy black furs which were draped loosely about his body.

  Laintal Ay put his head round the guardroom door, where the newly-arrived scouts were leaning on a table drinking root beer.

  “I’m taking the prisoner outside to work—he’s needed immediately.”

  He retreated before they could answer.

  With a curt order to the man, Laintal Ay directed him to the Church of the Formidable Peace. Priests were inside at a central altar, but Laintal Ay led the captive to a seat against the wall where the light was dim. The man sank down thankfully, subsiding like a bag of bones.

  It was Aoz Roon. His face was gaunt and lined, the flesh of his neck hung like a wattle; his beard had turned almost entirely grey; but, from the knit of his brows and the set of his mouth, there was no mistaking the Lord of Embruddock. At first, he would not
recognise the thin man in Sibornalan cloth as Laintal Ay. When recognition came, he gave a sob and clutched him close, his body shaking.

  After a while, he was able to explain to Laintal Ay what had happened to him, and how he had come to be stranded on a small island in the middle of a flood. As he recovered from his fever, he realised that the phagor stranded with him was starving to death. The phagor was not a warrior but a humble fungusmonger, by name Yhamm-Whrrmar, terrified of water and consequently unable or unwilling to eat fish. In the anorexia that seized those who recovered from the fever, Aoz Roon himself needed almost nothing to eat. The two of them had talked across the intervening water, and eventually Aoz Roon had crossed to the larger of the two islands, to strike up an alliance with his erstwhile enemy.

  From time to time, they saw humans and phagors on the banks and shouted to them, but no one would cross the rapid-gliding water to aid them. Together, they tried to build a boat, which took many vexatious weeks.

  Their first attempts were useless. By intertwining twigs and lining them with dried mud, they finally constructed a vessel that would float. Yhamm-Whrrmar was persuaded to climb into it, but leaped out again in fear. After much argument, Aoz Roon pushed off on his own. In the middle of the river, the mud all dissolved and the coracle sank. Aoz Roon managed to swim to a bank some way downriver.

  It was his intention to find a rope and return to rescue Yhamm-Whrrmar, but such things as he met were either hostile or fled from him. After many wanderings, he had been captured by the Sibornalan scouts, and dragged to New Ashkitosh.

  “We’ll go back to Embruddock together,” Laintal Ay said. “Oyre will be so delighted.” Aoz Roon made no response at first.

  “I can’t return… I can’t … I can’t desert Yhamm-Whrrmar… You can’t understand.” He rubbed his hands on his knees.

  “You’re Lord of Embruddock still.”

  He hung his head, sighing. He had been defeated, had failed. All he wished for was a peaceful refuge. Again the uncertain movement of hands on knees, on shabby bearskin.

  “There are no peaceful refuges,” Laintal Ay said. “Everything’s changing. We’ll go back to Embruddock together. As soon as we can.” Since Aoz Roon’s will had deserted him, he must make his decisions for him. He could obtain a suit of the Sibornalan cloth from the guardroom; so disguised Aoz Roon could join Skitosherill’s party. He left Aoz Roon with disappointment. This was not what he had expected.