by Jack Vance
Reith was tended first by the eight-year-old urchin, then by a small hunched crone with a face like a raisin, then by a girl who, were it not for her joylessness, might have been attractive. She was perhaps eighteen years old, with regular features, fine blonde hair typically tangled with twigs and bits of fodder. She went barefoot, wearing only a smock of coarse gray homespun.
One day, as Reith sat on a bench, the girl came past. Reith caught her around the waist, pulled her down upon his knee. She smelled of furze and bracken, and the moss of the steppes, and a faintly sour scent of wool. She asked in a husky alarmed voice, “What do you want of me?” And she tried half-heartedly to rise.
Reith found her warm weight comforting. “First, I’ll comb the twigs from your hair ... Sit still now.” She relaxed, eyes turned sidelong at Reith; puzzled, submissive, uneasy. Reith combed her hair, first with his fingers, then with a chip of broken wood. The girl sat quietly.
“There,” said Reith presently. “You look nice.”
The girl sat as in a dream. Presently she stirred, rose to her feet. “I must go,” she said in a hurried voice. “Someone might see.” But she lingered. Reith started to pull her back, then thought better of the impulse and let her hurry away.
The next day she chanced past again, and this time her hair was combed and clean. She paused to look over her shoulder, and Reith could remember the same glance, the same attitude from a hundred occasions on Earth; and the thought made him sick with melancholy. At home the girl would be reckoned beautiful; here on Aman Steppe, she had no more than a dim awareness of such matters ... He held out his hand to her; she approached, as if drawn against her will, which was undoubtedly the case, for she knew the ways of her tribe. Reith put his hands on her shoulders, then around her waist, kissed her. She seemed puzzled. Reith asked, smiling, “Hasn’t anyone done that before?”
“No. But it’s nice. Do it again.”
Reith heaved a deep sigh. Well, why not? ... A step behind him: a buffet sent him sprawling to the ground, accompanied by a spate of words too fast for his understanding. A booted foot struck into his ribs, sending shivers of pain through his mending shoulder.
The man advanced on the cringing girl, who stood with fists pressed to her mouth. He struck her, kicked her, pushed her out into the compound, cursing and bawling insults: “disgusting intimacy with an outland slave; is this your regard for the purity of the race?”
“Slave?” Reith picked himself up from the floor of the shed. The word rang in his mind. Slave?
The girl ran off to huddle under one of the towering wagons. Traz Onmale came to look into the uproar. The warrior, a stalwart buck of about Reith’s own age, pointed a quivering finger toward Reith. “He is a curse, a dark omen! Was not all this foretold? Intolerable that he should spawn among our women! He must be killed, or gelded!”
Traz Onmale looked dubiously toward Reith. “It seems that he did small damage.”
“Small damage indeed! But only because I happened past! With so much energy for ardor, why is he not put out to work? Must we pamper his belly while he sits on pillows? Geld him and set him to toil with the women!”
Traz Onmale gave a reluctant assent, and Reith, with a sinking heart, thought of his survival kit dangling from the tree, with its drugs, transcom, spanscope, energy pack, and, most especially, weapons. For all their present benefit to him they might as well be with the Explorator IV.
Traz Onmale had summoned the butcher-woman. “Bring a sharp knife. The slave must be made placid.”
“Wait!” gasped Reith. “Is this any way to treat a stranger? Have you no tradition of hospitality?”
“No,” said Traz Onmale. “We do not. We are the Kruthe, driven by the force of our Emblems.”
“This man struck me,” protested Reith. “Is he a coward? Will he fight? What if I took his emblem from him? Would I not then be entitled to his place in the tribe?”
“The emblem itself is the place,” Traz Onmale admitted. “This man Osom is the vehicle for the emblem Vaduz. Without Vaduz he would be no better than you. But if Vaduz is content with Osom, as must be so, you could never take Vaduz.”
“I can try.”
“Conceivably. But you are too late; here is the butcherwoman. Be good enough to disrobe.”
Reith turned a horrified glance upon the woman, whose shoulders were broader than his own and inches thicker, and who advanced upon him wearing a face-splitting grin.
“There is still time,” muttered Reith. “Ample time.” He turned upon Osom Vaduz, who snatched forth his rapier with a shrill whine of steel against hard leather. But Reith had stepped in close, within the six-foot reach of the blade. Osom Vaduz tried to leap back; Reith caught his arm, which was hard as steel; in his present condition Osom Vaduz was by far the stronger man. Osom Vaduz gave his arm a mighty jerk to fling Reith to the ground. Reith pulled in the same direction, swung around to drag Osom Vaduz reeling off-balance. Reith thrust up his shoulder, Osom Vaduz rolled across his hip and crashed to the ground. Reith kicked him in the head, grounding his heel into Osom Vaduz’s throat, to crush the windpipe. As Osom Vaduz lay twitching and croaking his hat rolled off; Reith reached for it but the Chief Magician snatched it away.
“No, by no means!” cried the magician in a passion. “This is not our law. You are a slave; a slave you remain!”
“Must I kill you too?” asked Reith, edging ominously forward.
“Enough!” cried Traz Onmale peremptorily. “There has been enough killing. No more!”
“What of the emblem?” asked Reith. “Do you not agree it is mine?”
“I must consider,” declared the youth. “In the meanwhile, no more. Butcher-woman, take the body to the pyre. Where are the Judgers? Let them come forth and judge this Osom who carried Vaduz. Emblems, bring forth the engine!”
Reith moved off to the side. A few minutes later he approached Traz Onmale. “If you wish, I will leave the tribe and go off by myself.”
“You will know my wishes when they are formulated,” declared the lad, with the absolute decisiveness conferred upon him by the Onmale. “Remember, you are my slave; I ordered back the blades which would have killed you. If you try to escape, you will be tracked, taken, flogged. Meanwhile you must gather fodder.”
It seemed to Reith as if Traz Onmale were straining for severity, perhaps to divert attention-his own as well as everyone else’s-from the unpleasant order he had given to the butcherwoman and which, by implication, he had rescinded.
For a day the dismembered body of Osom, who once had carried the emblem Vaduz, smoldered within a special metal kiln, and the wind blew a vile stench through the camp. The warriors uncovered the monstrous catapult, started the engine and brought it into the center of the compound.
The sun sank behind a bank of graphite-purple clouds; sunset was an angry welter of crimson and brown. Osom’s corpse had been consumed; the fire was ashes. With all the tribe crouching in murmurous ranks, the Chief Magician kneaded the ashes with beast-blood to form a cake, which was then packed into a box and lashed to the head of a great shaft.
The magicians looked into the east, where now rose Az the pink moon, almost at the full. The Chief Magician called in a great belling voice: “Az! The Judgers have judged a man and found him good! He is Osom; he carried Vaduz. Make ready, Az! We send you Osom!”
The warriors on the catapult engaged a gear. The great arm swung across the sky; the elastic cables ground with tension. The shaft with Osom’s ashes was laid in the channel; the arm was aimed toward Az. The tribe set up a moan, rising to a throaty wail. The magician cried: “Away to Az!”
The catapult gave a heavy twunggg-thwack! The shaft sped away too swiftly to be seen. A moment later, high in the sky, appeared a burst of white fire; and the watchers gave a sigh of exaltation.
For another half-hour the folk of the tribe stood looking up toward Az. Did they envy Osom, Reith wondered, presumably now rejoicing in the Vaduz palace on Az? He sought among the dark shapes, linger
ing before going to his pallet, until, with a smile of grim amusement for his own weakness, he realized that he was hoping to locate the girl who had occasioned the entire affair.
On the following day Reith was sent forth to gather fodder, a coarse leaf terminating in a drop of dark-red wax. Far from resenting the work, Reith was happy to escape the monotony of the camp.
The rolling hills extended as far as the eye could reach, alternate cusps of amber and black under the windy sky of Tschai. Reith looked south, to the black line of forest, where his ejection seat still hung in a tree, or so he hoped. In the near-future he would ask Traz Onmale to conduct him to the spot ... Someone was watching him. Reith swung around, but saw nothing.
Wary, watching from the corner of his eyes he went about his task, plucking leaves, filling the two baskets he carried on a shoulder-pole. He started down into a swale, where grew a copse of low bushes, with leaves like red and blue flame. He saw the flutter of a gray smock. It was the girl, pretending not to see him. Reith descended to meet her and they stood face to face, she half-smiling, half-cringing, awkwardly twisting her fingers together.
Reith reached forth, took her hands. “If we meet, if we are friends, we’ll get in trouble.”
The girl nodded. “I know ... Is it true that you are from another world?”
“Yes.”
“What is it like?”
“It’s hard to describe.”
“The magicians are foolish, aren’t they? Dead people don’t go to Az.”
“I hardly think so.”
She came closer. “Do that again.”
Reith kissed her. Then he took her by the shoulders and held her back. “We can’t be lovers. You’d be made unhappy, and get more beatings...”
She shrugged. “I don’t care. I wish I could go with you back to Earth.”
“I wish you could too,” said Reith.
“Do that again,” said the girl. Just once more...” She gave a sudden gasp, looking over Reith’s shoulder. He jerked around, to see a flicker of movement. There was a hiss, a thud, a heartrending sob of pain. The girl sagged to her knees, fell over on her side, clutching at the feathered bolt buried in her chest. Reith gave a hoarse call, looked wildly here and there.
The skyline was clear; no one could be seen. Reith bent over the girl. Her lips moved, but he could not hear the words. She sighed and relaxed.
Reith stood looking down at the body, rage crowding all rational thought from his mind. He bent, lifted her-she weighed less than he expected-and carried her back to camp, reeling and straining. He took her to the shed of Traz Onmale.
The boy sat on a stool, holding a rapier which he glumly twitched back and forth. Reith lay down the body of the girl as gently as he was able. Traz Onmale looked from the body to Reith with a flinty stare. Reith said, “I met the girl picking fodder. We were talking-and the bolt hit her. It was murder. The bolt might have been meant for me.”
Traz Onmale glanced down at the bolt, touched the feathers. Already warriors were sauntering close. Traz Onmale looked from face to face. “Where is Jad Piluna?”
There were mutters, a hoarse voice, a summons. Jad Piluna approached: one whom Reith had noticed on previous occasions: a man of dash and flair, with a keen high-colored face, a curious V-shaped mouth, conveying, perhaps unintentionally, a continual insolent mirth. Reith stared at him in a fascination of loathing. Here was the murderer.
Traz Onmale held out his hand. “Show me your catapult.”
Jad Piluna tossed it, an act of casual disrespect, and Traz Onmale turned up a glittering glance. He looked at the catapult, checked the claw release and the film of grease customarily applied by the warriors after using their weapons. He said: “The grease is disturbed; you have fired this catapult today. The bolt”-he pointed down at the corpse-”has the three black bands of Piluna. You killed the girl.”
Jad Piluna’s mouth twitched, the V broadened and narrowed. “I meant to kill the man. He is a slave and a heretic. She was no better.”
“Who are you to decide? Do you carry Onmale?”
“No. But I maintain that the act was accidental. It is no crime to kill a heretic.”
The Chief Magician stepped forward. “The matter of intentional heresy is crucial. This person”-he pointed toward Reith” is clearly a hybrid; I would suppose Dirdirman and Pnumekin. For reasons unknown he has joined the Emblem Men and now circulates heresy. Does he think we are too stupid to notice? How wrong he is! He suborned the young woman; he led her astray; she became worthless. Hence when-”
Traz Onmale, again displaying the decisiveness so astonishing in a lad so young, cut him short. “Enough. You talk nonsense. The Piluna is notoriously an emblem of dark deeds. Jad, the carrier, must be brought to account, and Piluna curbed.”
“I claim innocence,” said Jad Piluna indifferently. “I give myself to the justice of the moons.”
Traz Onmale squinted in anger. “Never mind the justice of the moons. I will give you justice.”
Jad Piluna gazed at him without concern. “The Onmale is not permitted to fight.”
Traz Onmale looked around the group. “Is there no noble emblem to subdue the murderous Piluna?”
None of the warriors responded. Jad Piluna nodded in satisfaction. “The emblems stand aloof. Your call has no effect. But you have laid a slur on Piluna; you have used the word ‘murderer.’ I demand vindication from the moons.”
In a controlled voice Traz Onmale said, “Bring forth the disc.”
The Chief Magician departed, to return with a box carved from a single huge bone. He turned to Jad Piluna. “To which moon do you call for justice?”
“I demand vindication from Az, moon of virtue and peace; I ask Az to demonstrate my right.”
“Very well,” said Traz Onmale. “I beseech Braz, the Hellmoon, to claim you for her own.”
The Chief Magician reached into the box, brought forth a disc, on one side pink, on the other blue. “Stand clear, all!” He spun the disc into the air. It tilted, wobbled, seemed to float and glide, and landed with the pink side on top. “Az, moon of virtue, has decided innocence!” called the magician. “Braz has seen no cause to act.”
Reith gave a snort of sour amusement. He turned to Traz Onmale. “I call upon the moons for judgment.”
“Judgment in regard to what?” demanded the Chief Magician. “Certainly not your heresy! That is demonstrable!”
“I ask that the moon Az concede me the emblem Vaduz, so that I may punish the murderer Jad.”
Traz Onmale gave Reith a startled glance.
The Chief Magician cried out in indignation. “Impossible; how can a slave carry an emblem?”
Traz Onmale looked down at the pathetic corpse and gave a curt sign to the magician. “I release him from bondage. Throw the disc to the moons.”
The Chief Magician stood curiously stiff and reluctant. “Is this wise? The emblem Vaduz-”
“-is hardly the most noble of emblems. Throw.”
The magician glanced askance at Jad Piluna. “Throw,” said Jad Piluna. “Should the moons give him to the emblem I will cut him into small strips. I have always despised the Vaduz trait.”
The magician hesitated, considering first the tall hard-muscled figure of Jad Piluna, then Reith, equally tall but thinner and looser, and still lacking his full vigor.
The Chief Magician, a cautious man, thought to temporize. “The disc is drained of its force; we can have no more judgments.”
“Nonsense,” said Reith. “The disc is controlled, so you claim, by the power of the moons. How can the disc be drained? Throw the disc!”
“Throw the disc!” ordered Traz Onmale.
“Then you must take Braz, for you are evil and a heretic.”
“I have called on Az, which can reject me if it chooses.”
The magician shrugged. “As you wish. I will use a fresh disc.”
“No!” exclaimed Reith. “The same disc.”
Traz Onmale sat erect and leaned forwa
rd, his attention once again engaged. “Use the same disc. Throw!”
With an angry gesture the Chief Magician snatched up the disc, spun it high and twinkling into the air. As before, it wobbled, seemed to float, drifted down with the pink face up.
“Az favors the stranger!” declared Traz Onmale. “Fetch the emblem Vaduz!”
The Chief Magician stalked to his shed and brought it forth. Traz Onmale handed it to Reith. “You now carry Vaduz: you are an Emblem Man. Do you then challenge Jad Piluna?”
“I do.”
Traz Onmale turned to Jad Piluna. “Are you prepared to defend your emblem?”
“At once.” Jad Piluna whipped forth his rapier, flourished it whistling around his head.
“A sword and hand-foil for the new Vaduz,” said Traz Onmale.
Reith took the rapier which presently was tendered him. He hefted it, whipped the blade back and forth. Never had he handled so supple a sword, and he had handled many, for swordsmanship was an element of his training. An awkward weapon, in some respects, useless for close-range fighting. The warriors at practice held their distance from each other, swinging, slashing, lunging, swerving the blade down and up, in and out, but using relatively little footwork. The triangular knife-foil for the left hand was also strange. He swung the blade back and forth, watching Jad Piluna from the corner of his eyes, who stood contemptuously at ease.
To attempt to fight the man in his own style was equivalent to suicide, thought Reith.
“Attention!” called Traz Onmale. “Vaduz challenges Piluna. Forty-one such encounters have occurred previously. Piluna has humiliated Vaduz on thirty-four occasions. Emblems, address yourselves.”
Jad Piluna instantly lunged; Reith parried without difficulty, hacked down with his own blade: a blow which Jad Piluna glossed off with his knife-shield. As he did so Reith jumped forward, struck with the point of the knife-shield, to puncture Jad Piluna’s chest: a trifling wound, but sufficient to destroy Piluna’s complacence. Eyes bulging in wrath, the red in his face almost feverish, he leaped back, then launched a furious attack, overwhelming Reith by sheer strength and technical brilliance. Reith was extended to the utmost even to fend away the whistling blade, without thought for counterattack. His shoulder gave a sudden ominous twinge and began to burn; he panted for breath. The blade slashed into his thigh, then his left bicep; confident, gloating, Jad Piluna pressed the attack, expecting Reith to fall back, to be carved into tatters. But Reith lurched forward, knocked aside the blade with his knife-shield, slashed at Jad Piluna’s head and struck the black hat askew. Jad Piluna stepped back to set his hat straight but Reith jumped forward again, inside comfortable fighting distance with the rapier. He struck with the knife-shield, batted again at Jad Piluna’s hat, knocked it off, and with it the emblem Piluna. Reith dropped the knife-shield, seized the hat. Jad, bereft of Piluna, stood back aghast, his face ringed by brown curls. He lunged; Reith swung the hat, caught the rapier in the ear-flaps. He stabbed with his own rapier, piercing Jad’s shoulder.