A Stone in Heaven

by Poul Anderson

  Just the same—

  We’ll take no chances, we’ll strike immediately and hard. In a few more hours, Cairncross would be on the moon Elaveli, issuing orders. Let Broderick lead a detachment to Port Lulang and occupy it, on the grounds that he was searching for a spy—true, as far as it went. But probably Flandry was on Ramnu. I’ll command the planetside operation. The stakes are too high for a lesser player. They are the destiny of civilization.

  Brief wistfulness tugged at Cairncross. He’d cherished a secondary hope of winning Flandry over to his cause. The man would be valuable. And why shouldn’t he join me? What does he owe Gerhart? He’s been slighted, ignored, shunted aside. I’d have the brains to reward such a follower as he deserved, and listen to him. My aim is to give the Empire the strong, wise government it so desperately needs, to found a dynasty armored in legitimacy against usurpers … yes, then I’ll clone myself … Why, there’ll no longer be any reason not to reverse the glaciation on Ramnu. In fact, it will be a suitably glorious achievement for my reign. An entire race of beings will revere my name for as long as their sun endures.

  Though that will be the littlest part of what I shall do. I could be remembered through the lifetime of the universe.

  Beneath the triumphant vision went a sigh. It is very lonely to be an embodiment of fate. He had daydreamed of gaining a friend in Flandry; their spirits were much alike, and the officer’s derisive humor would relieve the Emperor’s austere seriousness. But as matters had developed, the odds were that Cairncross would seize the other, wring him dry of everything he knew with a deep hypnoprobing, and mercifully obliterate what was left.

  Civilization was deathly ill; the rot had reached the heart. Nothing could save it but radical surgery.

  Yewwl’s first encounter was with a couple of native workers. Her party was riding toward Dukeston, which was as yet hidden from sight by a ridge in between. Its lights made a glow that night-adapted eyes saw as brilliant. Thence rolled a low rumbling, the sound of machines at their toil. Here the land seemed untouched. Hills lifted stark, white-mantled save where crags reared forth, above gorges full of blackness. Frosty soil rang beneath hoofs; stones rattled; brush cracked. The air hung still and bitterly cold, making the travelers keep their vanes wrapped around them; breath formed frost crystals that lingered in glittery streamers. Overhead twinkled more stars than a human would have seen unaided, though fewer than Yewwl had observed on pictures from Terra. Mothermoon was a crescent, scarcely moved from its earlier place among them, while Fathermoon was well down the sky. Childmoon rose tiny in the east.

  The strangers appeared suddenly, around the corner of a bluff. They halted, like Yewwl’s group. Stares went back and forth. She saw them quite clearly, except that she couldn’t be sure of the precise color of their fur. It was paler than hers, and the two were tall and slender. In their hands and strapped to their thighs they carried objects that must be made by star-folk.

  After a moment, one of them spoke something that could be a question. Yewwl opened and drooped her vanes, trying to show she didn’t understand. She emphasized it by saying aloud, “We share not the same language.”

  To her surprise, the male of the pair addressed her in Anglic. He had less vocabulary and grammar than she had acquired from Banner, and neither of them had a vocalizer to turn the sounds into those that a human would have formed. Nevertheless, a degree of comprehensibility got through: “Do you know this talk?”

  “Yes,” she replied.

  —“Don’t admit to knowing much,” Banner warned in her head. “They mustn’t identify you.”

  “A little,” Yewwl added, nervously fingering the scarf that hid her collar. “How did you guess?”

  “You are from afar,” the male answered shrewdly.

  “I have never seen your kind before, though my mate and I range widely in our work. But they say that off westward is another human settlement, and I thought you might well have come from there. None of the barbarians known to us do any business here.”

  Communication was not truly that easy. It was full of obscurities, false starts, requests for repetition, annoyed rephrasings. But persistence kept it limping along.

  Like many local natives, in these hills and the marshes below, the couple were employed by the star-folk. Live timber cruisers, harvesters, and so forth—including operators of various machines—came cheaper than robots. They were paid in trade goods, by which this region had become prosperous but upon which it was now, after centuries, totally dependent. (—“Don’t you think we have been kinder to your people at Wainwright?” Banner murmured.) These two were prospectors, searching out the ores for which Dukeston’s appetite had become insatiable of late. The colony itself had grown at the same pace. Why? Who knew? The humans must have their reasons, but those were beyond the grasp of simple Ramnuans.

  Yewwl bristled to hear that.

  She gave a brief explanation of her ostensible errand, and the pair guided her band onward. This was an exciting development for them! En route, she cautioned her followers anew, “Forget not: say nothing about our having been flown here, should we meet somebody who knows our tongue. We are supposed to have spent days going overland. Nor ever let fall that I am in tie with a star-person. We are to spy out what may be a hostile territory, under guise of being envoys. Let me talk for everyone.”

  “I seize no sense,” Ngaru of Raava complained.

  In truth, the idea of organized enmity was vague and tricky as wind, and felt as icy. “Suppose a feud is between Banner and the clan-head at this place,” Yewwl said. “Their retainers are naturally loyal to them, and thus likewise at odds.”

  “But we’re asking for her/his help,” Kuzhinn protested. “Why should we abide with the House of the Banner, which gives us naught?”

  The time for explanation had been far too short—not that Yewwl had a great deal more to go on, herself, than faith in her oath-sister. “Banner would help us if she could, and in a mightier way,” Yewwl said. “First she must overcome those who are holding her back from it. She believes the leaders here are among them. I don’t expect they would ever really grant aid. Why should they? It is with the House of the Banner that the clans have ancient friendship.”

  “What is it, again, that we are to do?” Iyaal inquired.

  Yewwl rumpled her vanes in sign of exasperation. “Whatever I tell you,” she snapped. “Belike that will mainly be to stay cautious. I alone will know what to look for.”

  —“Will I indeed?” she asked her distant comrade.

  —“I will, seeing through your eyes,” the woman reminded her. “Don’t get reckless. I could hardly bear to have anything bad happen to you … on my account.”

  —“On account of us all, I think.”

  Skogda clapped hand to knife. “If luck turns ill,” he said, “let me take the lead. I’ll make sure they know they’ve been in a fight!” His retainer Yen growled agreement.

  “You will do what you’re told, as long as I remain aglide,” Yewwl responded angrily. Inside, she wondered if her son was capable of obedience. She wished she could confide her fears to Banner. But what good would it do? Her oath-sister had woe abundant already. She could not so much as stir her body while the mission lasted. That took a bleak bravery Yewwl knew she herself lacked.

  The travelers topped the ridge, and Dukeston blazed ahead. Yewwl had sufficient knowledge of such places, from what Banner had shown and explained over the years, that she was not utterly stupefied. She recognized an old central complex of buildings, akin to those at Wainwright Station. Newer, larger units spread across several kilometers of hills. She discerned housing for native workers, foreign though the designs and materials were. Elsewhere, structures that droned or purred must hold industries of different kinds. The enigmatic shapes that moved along the streets were machines. Air intake towers bespoke extensive underground installations. (Banner identified those, adding that the air was altered for her race to breathe.) A paved field some ways off, surrounded by equi
pment, bore a couple of objects that the woman said were moonships. Overhead circled raindrop shapes that she said were aircraft, armed for battle.

  Despite this, it was mostly a dream-jumble, hard to see; the mind could not take hold of forms so outlandish. Besides, the illuminating tubes above the streets were cruelly bright. They curtained off heaven. Had she not had Banner with her in spirit, Yewwl might well have turned and fled.

  As was, she must encourage her companions. Their vanes held wide, their fur on end, they were close to panic—apart from Skogda, in whom it took the form of a snarl that meant rage. The onsars were worse, and must be left in care of folk who came out to meet the newcomers. Yewwl’s party continued afoot. Between these high, blank walls, she could scarcely glide had she sought to, and felt trapped.

  At the end, she stopped in a square whereon were tiers of benches. It faced a large screen set inside a clear dome.—“Yes, this is for assemblies,” Banner declared in Yewwl’s head. The magnified image of a man appeared.—“I’ve met him occasionally,” Banner said. “The deputy chief, an appointee of Duke Edwin’s … ” Yewwl did not follow the second part.

  Talk scuttled back and forth until a female human was fetched to interpret. Using a vocalizer, she could somewhat speak the language of the clans; unaided Ramnuan pronunciation of Anglic seemed to baffle her. “What is your purpose?” she demanded.

  Yewwl stepped forward. The blood was loud within her; both vanes throbbed to its beat. She saw in blade-edge clarity each single line, curve, hue on the face in the screen, the face that was so dreadfully like Banner’s. If those lips released a particular word, she and her son and their companions would be dead.

  —“Courage,” came the whisper. “I know her too, Gillian Vincent, a fellow xenologist. I felt sure they’d call on her, and … I think we can handle her.”

  Yewwl took forth her parchment, which she had been holding, and unrolled it before the screen for inspection. Banner laughed dryly.—“She can’t read your written language very well, but doesn’t want to admit it. Quite likely she won’t notice your name, if you don’t say it yourself.”

  That had been a fang of trouble in the planning. The document was bound to specify its bearer, and her relationship to Wainwright Station was well-known. Since the name was common, and the scheme implausibly audacious, it could be hoped that no suspicions would rise. But—

  “Declare your purpose,” Gillian Vincent said.

  Yewwl described her request for help against the Ice, the offer to exchange resources or labor for it. At first the woman said, “No, no, impossible.” Prompted by Banner, Yewwl urged the case. At last the man was summoned back into view. Conference muttered.

  —“I can hear them fairly well. They don’t know what to make of this, and don’t want to dismiss you out of hand,” Banner exulted. “The bureaucratic mentality.” That bit was in Anglic, and gibberish to Yewwl.

  In the end, Gillian Vincent told her: “This requires further consideration. We doubt we can reach the kind of agreement you want; but we will discuss it among ourselves, and later with you again. In the meantime, we will direct our workers to provide you food and shelter.”

  Eagerness blazed high in Yewwl. Those folk would take for granted that newly arrived foreigners—primitives, in their viewpoint—would wander about gaping at the marvels of the town. And nobody would suppose that primitives would recognize the secret things Banner thought might be here.

  Whatever those were.

  XI

  Hooligan flitted back westward until the broad dim sheet of Lake Roah glimmered below her. The terminator storm had moved on and the night was at peace.

  There was no peace in Flandry. The lines were drawn harsh in his face and his fingers moved with controlled savagery as he piloted. The navigation system and a map found for him the bay on the south marge that Banner had picked. Instruments told him that everything was sealed; Chives pattered about to make certain. For a minute, gravity drive roiled water, then the little ship was under the surface. She sank fifty meters before coming to rest in ooze and murk.

  Her topside was less far down. Flandry shut off or damped powered units as much as he could. The lake screened most emission, but not all; an intensive search could find him, and he lived by the principle of never giving an enemy a free ride. The largest demand on the generators while lying quiet was for the interior fields that maintained normal weight against Ramnu’s pull. It helped to be oriented lengthwise, not needing a tensor component to keep feet drawn deckward as when the vessel was in vertical mode. Yet six out of seven standard gees were still being counteracted. He and Chives could endure being heavier than on Terra—say two gees—for as long as they must endure this wait.

  First he activated one of the numerous gadgets he had had made for Hooligan over the years. A miniature hatch in the outer hull opened and a buoyant object emerged, trailing a wire. Its casing was of irregular shape; unless you came within centimeters, it looked like a chance bit of vegetable matter, on any of hundreds of planets, bobbing about. In reality, it was an antenna and a fish-eye video scanner. Transmitted, computer-refined, optically amplified, the image on the screen beneath was of less than homeview quality—“but ’tis enough, ’twill serve,” Flandry judged. He set a monitor to sound an alarm if a member of certain classes of objects appeared. Thereafter he reduced the negagravity, and his mass laid hold of him and dragged.

  “That was fun,” he said to no one in particular. “Now what shall we play?”

  Can’t get drunk, or drugged any different way, he thought. If and when I need to be alert, I’ll receive no advance notice. Electrostim? No, the after-euphoria might fade too slowly. I need to be mean and keen. Besides, it wouldn’t feel right to sit tickling my pleasure center while Banner’s in peril of her life and hurting on account of her friend.

  Ha, getting moral, am I? Probably need a fresh course of antisenescents.

  He rose and made his way aft, feeling every step, feeling how he must strain to hold his spine erect. In earlier days, he had shortened his hated exercises by turning up the weight before he did them; and under standard conditions, he seldom noticed himself walking—he floated. Nowadays—Well, he wasn’t yet elderly, he could still pace most men twenty or thirty years his junior, but a hundred variable cues kept him reminded that time was always gnawing, the snake at the root of Yggdrasil. Who was it had said once that youth is too precious to be wasted on the young?

  Chives was in the saloon, stooped under the burden. “Sir,” he reproached, “you did not warn me of this change in environment. May I ask how long it is to prevail?”

  “Sure, you may, but don’t expect an answer,” Flandry said. “Hours, days? Sorry. You knew we’d have to lie doggo, so I assumed you’d realize this was included.” With concern, “Is it too hard on you?”

  “No, sir. I do fear it will adversely affect luncheon. I was planning an omelet. Under two gravities, it would get leathery. Will sandwiches be acceptable instead?”

  Flandry sat down and laughed. Why not? The gods, if any, did. I sometimes think we were created because the gods wanted to be entertained one evening by a farce—but no, that can’t be. We are high comedy at least.

  The prospector who spoke some Anglic was called Ayon Oressa’ul. Folk hereabouts did not live in the large, shared territory of a clan, but on patches of land, each owned by a single family which bequeathed a common surname to its children. Ayon was evidently trusted by the chief (?) of Dukeston, for he was put in charge of the visitors. That involved a lengthy discussion on a farseer in his house, while they waited outside. He came back to them looking self-important.

  “We will quarter you in my dwelling and its neighbors,” he announced. His gestures included three round-walled, peak-roofed structures. Their sameness made them yet more peculiar than did their foreign style and artificial materials. Inhabitants stared at the strangers but made no advances. Their postures suggested they were used to regarding all outsiders as inferior, no matter whethe
r one among those understood human language. “You are not to leave except under escort, and always together.”

  Yewwl sensed a catch of Banner’s breath. It brought home anew to her how cut off her band was, how precarious its grip on events. Her natural reaction was anger, an impulse to strike out. She suppressed it. Not only would it compromise her venture, but that in turn would gust her and her companions down into mortal jeopardy. She was ready to die if that would help avenge Robreng and their young ones upon the Ice; but having worked off the worst grief, she was once more finding too many splendors in the world to wish to leave it.

  She smoothed her stance and asked politely, “Why? We intend no harm, we who came in search of aid.”

  “You might well come to harm yourselves,” Ayon said. “Or you might, through ignorance, cause damage. Things strange and powerful are at work here.”

  Yewwl seized the chance. “We are eager to see them. Besides being curious, perhaps we will get an idea of how our country can be rescued. Please!”

  “Well … well, I suppose that would be safe enough.”

  “At once, I beg you.”

  “What, you do not want to rest and eat first?”

  “We have no sharp need of either. Also, we fear that at any moment the humans may decide to deny our plea. Then we would be sent away, no? Unless, before, we have thought of a more exact proposal to make. Please, kind male.”

  (The conversation was not this straightforward. Yewwl and Ayon had gained a bit more mutual fluency, talking on the way to town, but it remained awkward. She saw advantages in that, such as not having to explain precisely—and falsely—what she had to do with Wainwright Station.)

  Ayon relented. He was proud of the community he served and would enjoy showing it off. “I am required to take certain things along when conducting you,” he said, and went back into his house. He re-emerged with a box strapped to his left wrist, which Banner identified as a radiophone, and a larger object sheathed on his right thigh, which Yewwl recognized as a blaster. “Stay close by me and touch nothing without permission,” he ordered.