The Last Castle

by Jack Holbrook Vance

  The statement was manifestly accurate. The Peasants, small andromorphs originally of Spica Ten, were not so much timid as incapable of performing a vicious act.

  A dour silence held the table. 0. Z. Garr finally spoke. “The dogs have stolen our power-wagons, otherwise I’d be tempted to ride out and chivvy the rascals home with a whip.”*

  * * *

  *This is only an approximate translation and fails to capture the pungency of the language. Several words have no contemporary equivalents. ‘Skirkling’, as in ‘to send skirkling’, denotes a frantic pell-mell flight in all directions accompanied by a vibration or twinkling or a jerking motion. To ‘volith’ is to toy idly with a matter, the implication being that the person involved is of such Jovian potency that all difficulties dwindle to contemptible triviality. ‘Raudelbogs’ are the semi-intelligent beings of Etamin Four, who were brought to Earth, trained first as gardeners, then construction laborers, then sent home in disgrace because of certain repulsive habits they refused to forgo.

  The statement of 0. Z. Garr, therefore, becomes something like this: “Were power-wagons at hand. I’d volith riding forth with a whip to send the raudelbogs skirkling home.”

  * * *

  “A matter of perplexity,” said Hagedorn, “is syrup. Naturally they carried away what they could. When this is exhausted—what then? Will they starve? Impossible for them to return to their original diet—what was it, swamp mud? Eh, Claghorn, you’re the expert in these matters. Can the Meks return to a diet of mud?”

  “No,” said Claghorn. “The organs of the adult are atrophied. If a cub were started on the diet, he’d probably survive.”

  “Just as I assumed.” Hagedorn scowled portentously down at his clasped hands to conceal his total lack of any constructive proposal.

  A gentleman in the dark blue of the Beaudrys appeared in the doorway: he poised himself, head high his right arm, bowed.

  Hagedorn rose to his feet. “Come forward, B. F. Robarth; what is your news?” For this was the significance of the newcomer’s genuflection.

  “The news is a message broadcast from Halcyon. The Meks have attacked; they have fired the structure and are slaughtering all. The radio went dead one minute ago.”

  All swung around, some jumped to their feet. “Slaughter?” croaked Claghorn.

  “I am certain that by now Halcyon is no more.”

  Claghorn sat staring with eyes unfocused. The others discussed the dire news in voices heavy with horror.

  Hagedorn once more brought the council back to order. "This is clearly an extreme situation; the gravest, perhaps, of our entire history. I am frank to state that I can suggest no decisive counteract.”

  Overwhele inquired, “What of the other castles? Are they secure?”

  Hagedorn turned to B. F. Robarth: “Will you be good enough to make general radio contact with all other castles, and inquire as to their condition?”

  Xanten said, “Others are as vulnerable as Halcyon: Sea Island and Delora, in particular, and Maraval as well.”

  Claghorn emerged from his reverie. “The gentlemen and ladies of these places, in my opinion, should consider taking refuge at Janeil or here until the uprising is quelled.”

  Others around the table looked at him in surprise and puzzlement. 0. Z. Garr inquired in the silkiest of voices: “You envision the gentlefolk of these castles scampering to refuge at the cock-a-hoop swaggering of the lower orders?”

  “Indeed I do, should they wish to survive,” responded Claghorn politely. A gentleman of late middle-age, Claghorn was stocky, strong, with black-gray hair, magnificent green eyes, a manner which suggests great internal force under stern control. “Flight by definition entails a certain diminution of dignity,” he went on to say. “If 0 Z. Garr can propound an elegant manner of taking to one’s heels. I will be glad to learn it, and everyone else should likewise heed, because in the days to come the capability may be of comfort to all.”

  Hagedorn interposed before 0. Z. Garr could reply. “Let us keep to the issues. I confess I cannot see to the end of all this. The Meks have demonstrated themselves to be murderers. How can we take murderers back into our service? But if we don’t—well, to say the least, conditions will be austere until we can locate and train a new force of technicians.”

  “The spaceships!” exclaimed Xanten. “We must see to them at once!”

  “What’s this?” inquired Beaudry, a gentleman of rock-hard face. “How do you mean: ‘see to them’?”

  “They must be protected from damage! What else? They are our link to the Home Worlds. The maintenance Meks probably have not deserted the hangars, since, if they propose to exterminate us, they will want to deny us the spaceships.”

  “Perhaps you care to march with a levy of Peasants to take the hangars under firm control?” suggested 0. Z. Garr in a somewhat supercilious voice. A long history of rivalry and mutual detestation existed between himself and Xanten.

  “It may be our only hope,” said Xanten. “Still—how does one fight with a levy of Peasants? Better that I fly to the hangars and reconnoiter. Meanwhile, perhaps you, and others with military expertise, will take in hand the recruitment and training of a Peasant militia.”

  “In this regard,” stated 0. Z. Garr, “I await the outcome of our current deliberations. If it develops that here lies the optimum course, I naturally will apply my competences to the fullest degree. If your own capabilities are best fulfilled by spying out the activities of the Meks, I hope you will be large-hearted enough to do the same.”

  The two gentlemen glared at each other.

  A year previously their enmity had almost culminated in a duel. Xanten, a gentleman tall, clean-limbed, nervously active, was gifted with great natural flair, but likewise evinced a disposition too easy for absolute elegance. The traditionalists considered him ‘sthross’, indicating a manner flawed by an almost imperceptible slackness and lack of punctilio: not the best possible choice for clan chief.

  Xanten’s response to 0. Z. Garr was blandly polite. “I shall be glad to take this task upon myself. Since haste is of the essence I will risk the accusation of precipitousness and leave at once. Hopefully I return to report tomorrow.” He rose, performed a ceremonious bow to Hagedorn, another all-inclusive salute to the council and departed.

  III

  He crossed to Esledune House where he maintained an apartment on the thirteenth level: four rooms furnished in the style known as Fifth Dynasty, after an epoch in the history of the Altair Home Planets, from which the human race had returned to Earth.

  His current consort, Araminta, a lady of the Onwane family, was absent on affairs of her own, which suited Xanten well enough. After plying him with questions she would have discredited his simple explanation, preferring to suspect an assignation at his country place. Truth to tell, he had become bored with Araminta and had reason to believe that she felt similarly—or perhaps his exalted rank had provided her less opportunity to preside at glittering social functions than she had expected. They had bred no children. Araminta’s daughter by a previous connection had been tallied to her. Her second child must then be tallied to Xanten, preventing him from siring another child.*

  * * *

  *The population of Castle Hagedorn was fixed; each gentleman and each lady was permitted a single child. If by chance another were born he must either find someone who had not yet sired to sponsor it, or dispose of it another way. The usual procedure was to give the child into the care of the Expiationists.

  * * *

  Xanten doffed his yellow council vestments. Assisted by a young Peasant buck, he donned dark yellow hunting-breeches with black trim, a black jacket, black boots. He drew a cap of soft black leather over his head, slung a pouch over his shoulder, into which he loaded weapons: a coiled blade, an energy gun.

  Leaving the apartment he summoned the lift and descended to the first level armory, where normally a Mek clerk would have served him. Now Xanten, to his vast disgust, was forced to take himself
behind the counter, and rummage here and there. The Meks had removed most of the spotting rifles, all the pellet ejectors and heavy energy-guns. An ominous circumstance, thought Xanten. At last he found a steel sling-whip, spare power-slugs for his gun, a brace of fire grenades, ,a high-powered monocular.

  He returned to the lift, rode to the top level, ruefully considering the long climb when eventually the mechanism broke down, with no Meks at hand to make repairs. He thought of the apoplectic furies of rigid traditionalists such as Beaudry and chuckled. Eventful days lay ahead!

  Stopping at the top level he crossed to the parapets, proceeded around to the radio room. Customarily three Mek specialists connected into the apparatus by wires clipped to their quills sat typing messages as they arrived. Now B. F. Robarth stood before the mechanism, uncertainly twisting the dials, his mouth wry with deprecation and distaste for the job.

  “Any further news?” Xanten asked.

  B. F. Robarth gave him a sour grin. “The folk at the other end seem no more familiar with this cursed tangle than 1. I hear occasional voices. I believe that the Meks are attacking Castle Delora.”

  Claghorn had entered the room behind Xanten. “Did I hear you correctly? Delora Castle is gone?”

  “Not gone yet, Claghorn. But as good as gone. The Delora walls are little better than a picturesque crumble.”

  “Sickening situation!” muttered Xanten. “How can sentient creatures perform such evil? After all these centuries, how little we actually knew of them!” As he spoke he recognized the tactlessness of his remark; Claghorn had devoted much time to a study of the Meks.

  “The act itself is not astounding,” said Claghorn shortly. “It has occurred a thousand times in human history.”

  Mildly surprised that Claghorn should use human history as referent to a case involving the sub-orders, Xanten asked: “You were never aware of this vicious aspect to the Mek nature?”

  “No. Never. Never indeed.”

  Claghorn seemed unduly sensitive, thought Xanten. Understandable, all in all. Claghorn’s basic doctrine as set forth during the Hagedorn selection was by no means simple, and Xanten neither understood it nor completely endorsed what he conceived to be its goals; but it was plain that the revolt of the Meks had cut the ground out from under Claghorn’s feet. Probably to the somewhat bitter satisfaction of 0. Z. Garr, who must feel vindicated in his traditionalist doctrines.

  Claghorn said tersely, “The life we’ve been leading couldn’t last forever. It’s a wonder it lasted as long as it did.”

  “Perhaps so,” said Xanten in a soothing voice. “Well, no matter. All things change. Who knows? The Peasants may be planning to poison our food… I must go.” He bowed to Claghorn, who returned him a crisp nod, and to B. F. Robarth, then departed the room.

  He climbed the spiral staircase—almost a ladder—to the cotes, where the Birds lived in an invincible disorder, occupying themselves with gambling at the game of quarrels, a version of chess, with rules incomprehensible to every gentleman who had tried to understand it.

  Castle Hagedorn maintained a hundred Birds, tended by a gang of long-suffering Peasants, whom the Birds held in vast disesteem. They were garish garrulous creatures, pigmented red, yellow, blue, with long necks, jerking inquisitive heads, an inherent irreverence which no amount of discipline or tutelage could overcome. Spying Xanten, they emitted a chorus of rude jeers: “Somebody wants a ride! Heavy thing!” “Why don’t the self-anointed two-footers grow wings for themselves?” “My friend, never trust a Bird! We’ll sky you, then fling you down on your fundament!”

  “Quiet!” called Xanten. “I need six fast, silent Birds, upon an important mission. Are any capable of such a task?”

  “Are any capable, he asks!” “A ros ros ros! When none of us have flown for a week!” “Silence? We’ll give you silence, yellow and black!”

  “Come then. You. You. You of the wise eye. You there. You with the cocked shoulder. You with the green pompon. To the basket.”

  The Birds designated, jeering, grumbling, reviling the Peasants, allowed their syrup sacs to be filled, then flapped to the wicker seat where Xanten waited. “To the space depot at Vincenne,” he told them. “Fly high and silently. Enemies are abroad. We must learn what harm if any has been done to the spaceships.”

  “To the depot then!” Each Bird seized a length of rope tied to an overhead framework; the chair was yanked up with a jerk calculated to rattle Xanten’s teeth, and off they flew, laughing, cursing each other for not supporting more of the . load, but eventually all accommodating themselves to the task apd flying with a coordinated flapping of the thirty-six sets of wings. To Xanten’s relief, their garrulity lessened; silently they flew south, at a speed of fifty or sixty miles per hour.

  The afternoon was already waning. The ancient countryside, scene to so many comings and goings, so much triumph and so much disaster, was laced with long black shadows. Looking down, Xanten reflected that though the human stock was native to this soil, and though his immediate ancestors had maintained their holdings for seven hundred years, Earth still seemed an alien world.

  The reason of course was by no means mysterious or rooted in paradox. After the Six-Star War, Earth had lain fallow for three thousand years, unpopulated save for a handful of anguished wretches who somehow had survived the cataclysm and who had become semi-barbaric Nomads. Then seven hundred years ago certain rich lords of Altair, motivated to some extent by political disaffection, but no less by caprice, had decided to return to Earth. Such was the origin of the nine great strongholds, the resident gentlefolk and the staffs of specialized andromorphs.

  Xanten flew over an area where an antiquarian had directed excavations, revealing a plaza flagged with white stone, a broken obelisk, a tumbled statue. The sight, by some trick of association, stimulated Xanten’s mind to an astonishing vision, so simple and yet so grand that he looked around, in all directions, with new eyes. The vision was Earth re-populated with men, the land cultivated. Nomads driven back into the wilderness.

  At the moment the image was far-fetched. And Xanten, watching the soft contours of old Earth slide below, pondered the Mek revolt which had altered his life with such startling abruptness.

  Claghorn had long insisted that no human condition endured forever, with the corollary that the more complicated such a condition, the greater its susceptibility to change.

  In that case the seven hundred year continuity at Castle Hagedorn—as artificial, extravagant and intricate as life could be—became an astonishing circumstance in itself. Claghorn had pushed his thesis further. Since change was inevitable, he argued that the gentlefolk should soften the impact by anticipating and controlling the changes—a doctrine which had been attacked with great fervor. The traditionalists labeled all of Claghorn’s ideas demonstrable fallacy, and cited the very stability of castle life as proof of its viability. Xanten had inclined first one way, then the other, emotionally involved with neither cause. If anything, the fact of 0. Z. Garr’s traditionalism had nudged him toward Claghorn’s views.

  Now it seemed as if events had vindicated Claghorn. Change had come, with an impact of the maximum harshness and violence.

  There were still questions to be answered, of course. Why had the Meks chosen this particular time to revolt? Conditions had not altered appreciably for five hundred years, and the Meks had never previously hinted dissatisfaction. In fact, they had revealed nothing of their feelings—though no one had ever troubled to ask them—save Claghorn.

  The Birds were veering east to avoid the Ballarat Mountains, to the west of which were the ruins of a great city, never satisfactorily identified. Below lay the Lucerne Valley, at one time a fertile farm land. If one looked with great concentration the outline of the various holdings could sometimes be distinguished. Ahead, the spaceship hangars were visible, where Mek technicians maintained four spaceships that were jointly the property of Hagedorn, Janeil, Tuang, Morninglight and Maraval, though, for a variety of reasons, the ships we
re never used.

  The sun was setting. Orange light twinkled and flickered on the metal walls. Xanten called instructions up to the Birds: “Circle down; alight behind that line of trees, but fly low so that none will see.”

  Down on stiff wings curved the Birds, six ungainly necks stretched toward the ground. Xanten was ready for the impact. The Birds never seemed able to alight easily when they carried a gentleman. When the cargo was something in which they felt a personal concern, dandelion fluff would never have been disturbed by the jar.

  Xanten expertly kept his balance, instead of tumbling and rolling in the manner preferred by the Birds. “You all have syrup,” he told them. “Rest: make no noise; do not quarrel.

  By tomorrow’s sunset, if I am not here, return to Castle Hagedorn and say that Xanten was killed.”

  “Never fear!” cried the Birds. “We will wait forever!” “At any rate till tomorrow’s sunset!” “If danger threatens, if you are pressed—a ros ros ros! Call for the Birds!” “A ros! We are ferocious when aroused!”

  “I wish it were true,” said Xanten. “The Birds are arrant cowards, this is well known. Still I value the sentiment.

  Remember my instructions, and be quiet above all! I do not wish to be set upon and stabbed because of your clamor.”

  The Birds made indignant sounds. “Injustice, injustice! We are quiet as the dew!”

  “Good.” Xanten hurriedly moved away lest they should bellow new advice or reassurances after him.

  IV

  Passing through the forest, he came to an open meadow at the far edge of which, perhaps a hundred yards distant, was the rear of the first hangar. He stopped to consider.