A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows

by Anderson, Poul

  virile, alien to Terra and rather contemptuous thereof--a culture

  influenced by Merseia, both directly and through the, uh, zmay element

  in your population.

  "Aye, granted, you've long been in the forefront of resistance to the

  Roidhunate. However, such attitudes can change overnight. History's

  abulge with examples. For instance, England's rebellious North American

  colonies calling on the French they fought less than two decades before;

  or America a couple of centuries later, allied first with the Russians

  against the Germans, then turning straight around and--" He stopped.

  "This doesn't mean anything to you, does it? No matter. You can see the

  workings in your own case, I'm sure. Dennitza is where your loyalties

  lie. What you do, whom you support, those depend on what you judge is

  best for Dennitza. Right? Yes, entirely right and wholesome. But

  damnably mislead-able."

  "Are you, then, a Terran loyalist?" she demanded.

  He shook his head. "A civilization loyalist. Which is a pretty thin,

  abstract thing to be; and I keep wondering whether we can preserve

  civilization or even should.

  "Well. Conflict of interest is normal. Compromise is too, especially

  with as valuable a tributary as Dennitza--provided it stays tributary.

  Now we'd received strong accusations that Dennitzans were engineering

  revolt on Diomedes, presumably in preparation for something similar at

  home. His Majesty's government wasn't about to bull right in. That'd be

  sure to bring on trouble we can ill afford, perhaps quite unnecessarily.

  But the matter had to be investigated.

  "And I, I learned a Dennitzan girl of ranking family had been caught at

  subversion on Diomedes. Her own statements out of partial recollections,

  her undisguised hatred of the Imperium, they seemed to confirm those

  accusations. Being asked to look into the questions, what would I do but

  bring you along?"

  He sighed. "A terrible mistake. We should've headed straight for

  Dennitza. Hindsight is always keen, isn't it, while foresight stays

  myopic, astigmatic, strabismic, and drunk. But I haven't even that

  excuse. I'd guessed at the truth from the first. Instead of going off to

  see if I could prove my hunch or not--" His fist smote the table. "I

  should never have risked you the way I did. Kossara!"

  She thought, amazed, He is in pain about that. He truly is.

  "A-a-ah," Flandry said. "I'm a ruthless bastard. Better hunter than

  prey, and have we any third choice in these years? Or so I thought. You

  ... were only another life."

  He ground out his cigarette, sprang from the bench, strode back and

  forth along the cabin. Sometimes his hands were gripped together behind

  him, sometimes knotted at his sides. His voice turned quick and

  impersonal:

  "You looked like a significant pawn, though. Why such an incredibly

  bungled job on you? Including your enslavement on Terra. I'd have heard

  about you in time, but it was sheer luck I did before you'd been thrown

  into a whorehouse. And how would your uncle the Gospodar react to that

  news if it reached him?

  "Might it be intended to reach him?

  "Oh, our enemies couldn't be certain what'd happen; but you tilted the

  probabilities in their favor. They must've spent considerable time and

  effort locating you. Flandry's Law: 'Given a sufficiently large

  population, at least one member will fit any desired set of

  specifications.' The trick is to find that member."

  "What?" Kossara exclaimed. "Do you mean--because I was who I was, in the

  position I was--that's why Dennitza--" She could speak no further.

  "Well, let's say you were an important factor," he replied. "I'm not

  sure just how you came into play, though I can guess. On the basis of my

  own vague ideas, I made a decoy of you in the manner you've already

  heard about. That involved first deliberately antagonizing you on the

  voyage; then deliberately gambling your life, health, sanity--"

  He halted in midstride. His shoulders slumped. She could barely hear

  him, though his look did not waver from hers: "Every minute makes what I

  did hurt worse."

  She wanted to tell him he was forgiven, yes, go take his hands and tell

  him; but no, he had lied too often. With an effort, she said, "I am

  surprised."

  His grin was wry. "Less than I am." Returning, he flopped back onto the

  bench, crossed ankle over thigh till he peered across his knee at her,

  swallowed a long draught from his glass, took out his cigarette case;

  and when the smoke was going he proceeded:

  "Let's next assume the enemy's viewpoint, i.e. what I learned and

  deduced.

  "They--a key one of them, anyhow--he realizes the Terran Empire is in an

  era when periods of civil war are as expectable as bouts of delirium in

  chronic umwi fever. I wasn't quite aware of the fact myself till lately.

  A conversation I had set me thinking and researching. But he knew right

  along, my opponent. At last I see what he's been basing his strategy on

  for the past couple of decades. Knowing him, if he believes the theory,

  I think I will. These days we're vulnerable to fratricide, Kossara. And

  what better for Merseia, especially if just the right conflict can be

  touched off at just the right moment?

  "We've been infiltrated. They've had sleepers among us for ... maybe a

  lifetime ... notably in my own branch of service, where they can cover

  up for each other ... and notably during this past generation, when the

  chaos first of the Josip regime, then the succession struggle, made it

  easier to pass off their agents as legitimate colonial volunteers.

  "The humans on Diomedes. brewing revolution with the help of a clever

  Alatanist pitch--thereby diverting some of our attention to Ythri--they

  weren't Dennitzans. They were creatures of the Roidhunate, posing as

  Dennitzans. Oh, not blatantly; that'd've been a giveaway. And they were

  sincerely pushing for an insurrection, since any trouble of ours is a

  gain for them. But a major objective of the whole operation was to drive

  yet another wedge between your people and mine, Kossara."

  Frost walked along her spine. She stared at him and whispered: "Those

  men who caught me--murdered Trohdwyr--tortured and sentenced me--they

  were Merseians too?"

  "They were human," Flandry said flatly, while he unfolded himself into a

  more normal posture. "They were sworn-in members of the Imperial Terran

  Naval Intelligence Corps. But, yes, they were serving Merseia. They

  arrived to 'investigate' and thus add credence to the clues about

  Dennitza which their earlier-landed fellows had already been spreading

  around.

  "Let the Imperium get extremely suspicious of the Gospodar--d'you see?

  The Imperium will have to act against him. It dare not stall any longer.

  But this action forces the Gospodar to respond--he already having reason

  to doubt the goodwill of the Terrans--"

  Flandry smashed his cigarette, drank, laid elbows on table and said most

  softly, his face near hers:

  "He'd hear rumors, and send somebody he could trust to look into them
.

  Aycharaych--I'll describe him later--Aycharaych of the Roidhunate knew

  that person would likeliest be you. He made ready. Your incrimination,

  as far as Terra was concerned--your degradation, as far as Dennitza was

  concerned--d'you see? Inadequate by themselves to provoke war. Still,

  remind me and I'll tell you about Jenkins' Ear. Nations on the brink

  don't need a large push to send them toppling.

  "I've learned something about how you were lured, after you reached

  Diomedes. The rest you can tell me, if you will. Because when he isn't

  weaving mirages, Aycharaych works on minds. He directed the blotting out

  of your memories. He implanted the false half-memories and that hate of

  the Empire you carry around. Given his uncanny telepathic capabilities,

  to let him monitor what drugs, electronics, hypnotism are doing to a

  brain, he can accomplish what nobody else is able to.

  "But I don't think he totally wiped what was real. That'd have left you

  too unmistakably worked over. I think you keep most of the truth in you,

  disguised and buried."

  The air sucked between her teeth. Her fists clenched on the table. He

  laid a hand across them, big and gentle.

  "I hope I can bring back what you've lost, Kossara." The saying sounded

  difficult. "And, and free you from those conditioned-reflex emotions.

  It's mainly a matter of psychotherapy. I don't insist. Ask yourself: Can

  you trust me that much?"

  XII

  ---

  Sickbay was a single compartment, but astonishingly well equipped.

  Kossara entered with tightness in her gullet and dryness on her tongue.

  Flandry and Chives stood behind a surgical table. An electronic helmet,

  swiveled out above the pillow, crouched like an ugly arachnoid. The

  faint hum of driving energies, ventilation, service and life-support

  devices, seemed to her to have taken on a shrill note.

  Flandry had left flamboyancy outside. Tall in a plain green coverall, he

  spoke unsmiling: "Your decision isn't final yet. Before we go any

  further, let me explain. Chives and I have done this sort of thing

  before, and we aren't a bad team, but we're no professionals."

  This sort of thing--Muhammad Snell must lately have lain on that

  mattress, in the dream-bewildered helplessness of narco, while yonder

  man pumped him dry and injected the swift poison. Shouldn't I fear the

  Imperialist? Dare I risk becoming the ally of one who treated a sentient

  being as we do a meat animal?

  I ought to feel indignation. I don't, though. Nor do I feel guilty that

  I don't.

  Well, I'm not revengeful, either. At least, not very much. I do remember

  how Trohdwyr died because he was an inconvenience; I remember how Mihail

  Svetich died, in a war Flandry says our enemies want to kindle anew.

  Flandry says--She heard him from afar, fast and pedantic. Had he

  rehearsed his speech?

  "This is not a hypnoprobe here, of course. It puts a human straight into

  quasisleep and stimulates memory activity, after a drug has damped

  inhibitions and emotions. In effect, everything the organism has

  permanently recorded becomes accessible to a questioner--assuming no

  deep conditioning against it. The process takes more time and skill than

  an ordinary quiz, where all that's wanted is something the subject

  consciously knows but isn't willing to tell. Psychiatrists use it to dig

  out key, repressed experiences in severely disturbed patients. I've

  mainly used it to get total accounts, generally from cooperative

  witnesses--significant items they may have noticed but forgotten. In

  your case, we'd best go in several fairly brief sessions, spaced three

  or four watches apart. That way you can assimilate your regained

  knowledge and avoid a crisis. The sessions will give you no pain and

  leave no recollection of themselves."

  She brought her whole attention to him. "Do you play the tapes for me

  when I wake?" she asked.

  "I could," he replied, "but wouldn't you prefer I wiped them? You see,

  when our questions have brought out a coherent framework of what was

  buried, a simple command will fix it in your normal memory. By

  association, that will recover everything else. You'll come to with full

  recall of whatever episode we concentrated on."

  His eyes dwelt gravely upon her. "You must realize," he continued, "your

  whole life will be open to us. We'll try hard to direct our questioning

  so we don't intrude. However, there's no avoiding all related and

  heavily charged items. You'll blurt many of them out. Besides, we'll

  have to feel our way. Is such-and-such a scrap of information from your

  recent, bad past--or is it earlier, irrelevant? Often we'll need to

  develop a line of investigation for some distance before we can be sure.

  "We're bound to learn things you'll wish we didn't. You'll simply have

  to take our word that we'll keep silence ever afterward ... and, yes,

  pass no judgment, lest we be judged by ourselves.

  "Do you really want that, Kossara?"

  She nodded with a stiff neck. "I want the truth."

  "You can doubtless learn enough for practical purposes by talking to the

  Gospodar, if he's alive and available when we reach Dennitza. And I make

  no bones: one hope of mine is gaining insight into the modus operandi of

  Merseian Intelligence, a few clear identifications of their agents among

  us ... for the benefit of the Empire.

  "I won't compel you," Flandry finished. "Please think again before you

  decide."

  She squared her shoulders. "I have thought." Holding out her hand: "Give

  me the medicine."

  The first eventide, her feet dragged her into the saloon. Flandry saw

  her disheveled, drably clad, signs of weeping upon her, against the

  stars. She had long been in her own room behind a closed door.

  "You needn't eat here, you know," he said in his gentlest tone.

  "Thank you, but I will," she answered.

  "I admire your courage more than I have words to tell, dear. Come, sit

  down, take a drink or three before dinner." Since he feared she might

  refuse, lest that seem to herself like running away from what was in

  her, he added, "Trohdwyr would like a toast to his manes, wouldn't he?"

  She followed the suggestion in a numb way. "Will the whole job be this

  bad?" she asked.

  "No." He joined her, pouring Merseian telloch for them both though he

  really wanted a Mars-dry martini. "I was afraid things might go as they

  went, the first time, but couldn't see any road around. You did witness

  Trohdwyr's murder, he suffered hideously, and he'd been your beloved

  mentor your whole life. The pain wasn't annulled just because your

  thalamus was temporarily anesthetized. Being your strongest lost memory,

  already half in consciousness, it came out ahead of any others. And it's

  still so isolated it feels like yesterday."

  She settled wearily back. "Yes," she said. "Before, everything was

  blurred, even that. Now ... the faces, the whole betrayal--"

  {Nobody died in the cave except Trohdwyr. The rest stood by when a mere

  couple of marines arrived to arrest her. "You called them!" she screamed

>   to the one who bore the name Steve Johnson, surely not his own. He

  grinned. Trohdwyr lunged, trying to get her free, win her a chance to

  scramble down the slope and vanish. The lieutenant blasted him. The life

  in his tough old body had not ebbed out, under the red moons, when they

  pulled her away from him.

  Afterward she overheard Johnson: "Why'd you kill the servant? Why not

  take him along?"

  And the lieutenant: "He'd only be a nuisance. As is, when the Diomedeans

  find him, they won't get suspicious at your disappearance. They'll

  suppose the Terrans caught you. Which should make them handier material.

  For instance, if we want any of those who met you here to go guerrilla,

  our contact men can warn them they've been identified through data

  pulled out of you prisoners."

  "Hm, what about us four?"

  "They'll decide at headquarters. I daresay they'll reassign you to a

  different region. Come on, now, let's haul mass." The lieutenant's boot

  nudged Kossara, where she slumped wrist-bound against the cold cave

  wall. "On your feet, bitch!"}

  "His death happened many weeks ago," Flandry said. "Once you get more

  memories back, you'll see it, feel it in perspective--including time

  perspective. You'll have done your grieving ... which you did, down

  underneath; and you're too healthy to mourn forever."

  "I will always miss him," she whispered.

  Flandry regarded ghosts of his own. "Yes, I know."

  She straightened. He saw her features harden, as if bones lent strength