Pock's World

by Dave Duncan

  “Thank you.”

  Andre rose more circumspectly. “We shall both call on Skerry. I expect the car will be here soon.”

  “Before you go,” Athena said, “we never decided who should chair our mission. I nominate Friend Backet.”

  “I second that,” Ratty said quickly. He appreciated that the Senator didn’t want her name prominent on the report. He felt the same. She was also trying to calm the storm waves, and he approved of her peacemaking also.

  Linn gave them both a cynical glance, guessing what they were thinking. “I’ll third it.”

  Millie’s face lit up like a fireworks display.

  Andre’s smile was more genuine. “I concur, but I will not necessarily sign with the majority. Motion carried.”

  Millie sighed joyfully at the prospect of the Backet Commission’s place in history. “I thank you all for this very flattering appointment. I shall circulate a brief draft for your comments.”

  Andre took Wisdom’s hand and kissed it. “I hope I shall get the chance to see you again, Priestess. I shall pray for you always.”

  She smiled without showing her teeth. “And I for you, Jame. Live and die happy.”

  “You will return, I hope?” Athena asked.

  Andre nodded. “I hope so, too. Pagans are not the only ones who fear the end of the world. I will be at St. Michael’s, hearing confessions, providing what comfort I can. Come, young friend.”

  Before he and Solan reached the steps, Braata was towering in their path.

  “Father, may I come with you? Please?”

  Andre frowned. “I don’t see how it can matter now, but you gave your parole. Priestess?” He turned his head, not quite enough to look directly at Joy. “Can Friend Zyemindar be released on my recognizance?”

  “Just a moment…” Joy pouted. “Gownsman Oxindole is not answering calls. I have left a message.”

  “I am sure he will agree,” Andre told Braata. “As soon as he releases you, come to St. Michael’s.” He gave the younger man his blessing and set off up the stairs with Solan hurrying ahead of him.

  Braata nodded respectfully to Joy. “I shall be in my room, Holiness.” He ran up the stairs and disappeared. He, especially, must need time to meditate. His loyalties were more tangled than anyone’s.

  It was like a children’s counting song, Ratty thought—and then there were six. Joy still did not look in his direction.

  “No,” Wisdom said, as if answering a cognized question aloud. “I shall go to the temple. I expect there will be many people there.”

  Joy took a deep breath and began playing hostess. “Friend Athena, Friend Millie, Friend Linn, what can I offer you? Refreshment? A tour of the palace grounds, since the weather is so clement?” Her voice was toneless, her face a lifeless mask.

  “I should love to see some of the sights!” Millie said eagerly. “The ruins at Quassia?”

  “Did I see horses as we came in?” Linn asked.

  “We do have horses,” Joy agreed. “I am informed that our lower gravity enhances their performance.” She might have been reading from a guidebook.

  “That sounds like fun,” Athena agreed. “But it seems dreadful to consider fun when the world is about to end. Is there nothing we can do to help?”

  “Just refrain from spreading alarm,” the girl said. “It would be best if you do not comment on the probe or related matters. I am told that Gownsman Skerry is having reports prepared for you to consider and take home. And also he has requested samples of the physical evidence from the pirate probe. These are not ready yet. If there is anything else you wish, please do not hesitate to ask.” Still Joy was showing no more emotion than a music box. “I have summoned guides who will assist you.”

  Heart aching, Ratty watched in silence as the three Ayne folk walked up the stairs. A group of brown-capes appeared at the top to wait for them and then conduct them away. White-caped priestesses came down the other staircase, four of them with a carrying chair. They took Wisdom away, leaving him alone with Joy.

  He walked around the pool and pulled a cushion close to her. She was as rigid as a pillar of basalt, staring down at her hands.

  He must not be the first to touch. “I gave Bedel my word I would not tell you. That was before I knew how you were planning to honor me.”

  She nodded, bit her lip, still said nothing.

  He tried again. “I meant what I told the friar about Quassia. I trust you absolutely. I love you. He’s a crabby old fanatic.”

  “Joy died.”

  “What?”

  “When the present Wisdom was Love, her baby died. Some childhood infection. We’re not immortal. It happens.” Still she did not look at him.

  Ratty tried to work out the rest, spare her having to say it. “You mean what we did last night, the seminal catalyst thing, it only works once? Even if you go back to Real Quassia someday with another man, it’s just one ovulation per customer, once per incarnation?”

  She nodded.

  “Unless?” he prompted. “Did Bombardon jump, or was he thrown?”

  “The wind blew him off.”

  And it had worked. Women had no conscious control over their ovulation, but that did not mean that there was no mental factor involved. If the bereaved Love-who-was-now-Wisdom had believed that her lover must make such a sacrifice to let her bear another child, then it might well have been necessary.

  “So that’s why you were worried when I headed for Quoad’s pillar last night? That’s all there is to this human sacrifice thing?”

  She hesitated, then said, “Can you really do handstands?”

  “In this gravity? Easy!” He removed his red cloak and sandals. He dropped his hands to the edge of the pool and swung his legs up. There was nothing to it. She pushed, of course, and he toppled. He fell slowly in the low gravity, but the water he displaced was lighter, too, so he created a tsunami that soaked the innermost bench. By the time he surfaced, spluttering, Joy was in there with him and they embraced.

  “Why?” she demanded when they broke off the kiss and just hugged hungrily. “Why is the goddess so cruel? Why do I only get one day to love you?”

  Here was his test already. “I have sworn to obey you. You can forbid me to board the shuttle.”

  “You would obey me?”

  He thought about it, then nodded. “Yes, I would.”

  “But if I gave you that order,” she wailed, “that would prove I didn’t love you. And because I do love you, I couldn’t give you that order!”

  He said it before he saw where it would lead him: “You mean you don’t believe that your goddess will save the world, as Duty says?”

  She gasped. “You mean you do believe?”

  “Oh, I believe gods are powerful.” He just didn’t believe they were sentient.

  “You will stay with me, here on Pock’s World? You love me that much?”

  He had an erection like the Quoad pillar.

  “I will stay with you forever if you want me, my darling. I’ll be your gownsman or floor scrubber or anything you want. Let’s find a handy bed. No, forget the bed. Hot water’s fine. Hold on tight.” He unfastened his shorts.

  Chapter 5

  Millie was met at the top of the stairs by an imposing, matronly priestess who gave her name as Desipient. She wore a white top above a bare midriff and calf-length shorts, plus a one-shoulder cape of white with thin brown stripes. It wouldn’t have passed in a church on Ayne, but this was Pock’s, and travel made one tolerant of odd customs. With her silver-streaked hair in a simple cut, she was a more reasonable example of what a female cleric should look like than some of the freaks Millie had seen on Disgavel and Overgang.

  “You wish to do some sight-seeing, Director?”

  “If that is possible. My mission has completed its work, and we go home tomorrow. The secretary general has told me many times about the famous Querent ruins. She saw them on her state visit three years ago.”

  “That is certainly possible, but those clo
uds are about to rain on us. Perhaps you would like to see your quarters first?”

  Millie allowed herself to be tempted into inspecting the rooms assigned to her, and yes, a bath and a change of clothes would be very welcome. Possibly something like Desipient herself was wearing?

  Then shopping. The palace had a gift shop for visitors, and Desipient insisted that anything she fancied would be complementary. It would all vanish in a few days, of course, but Millie did not say so. She picked out a few small gifts for her nieces and nephew, materials that could pass through the entangler.

  After all preliminaries had been taken care of, most pleasantly, it was mid-afternoon, or so she was told. The sun that had risen two days ago had still not reached the zenith. The rain had ended for now. She left her bag in her room, taking only her visual recorder, which was a poor substitute for being able to store one’s memories directly in the Ayne Brain, but a necessary one when visiting worlds whose systems were not compatible with Ayne systems. She could view the mechanical records when she got home and download them to her friends’ visual cortexes that way. They would hardly know the difference.

  She was alarmed to find herself in front of four insectile fliers like the one Friend Braata had crashed into Draff Water the previous day. Even if it did feel like a week ago, so much had happened since. The machines were worryingly small, like toys standing on the grass. Beside them stood two big men, both wearing the blue capes of palace guards, with multi-mode weapons hanging at their hips.

  “Sergeant Gestant,” Desipient said of the older, “and Patrolman Flisk.”

  Sergeant Gestant was impressive, solid and imperturbable, balding, monolithic. Millie approved less of Flisk, who was taller and leaner, with a restless air, like a hungry feline. His thick black hair was as shiny as a helmet. She did not like the way he stared at her.

  “Guards?” she said. “Is there danger?”

  Desipient laughed. “None, I am sure, honored Director. People are upset at the terrible rumors, you know. They may resent any off-worlder today, so it seemed wise to bring an escort. Please do not concern yourself. This may be a wonderful opportunity. Quassia is normally packed with tourists, but most of them are now at the space ports, lined up for DNA clearance before departure, so we should not see many people there. I think the Brain will let me speak to you through your translator during our flight. The sergeant will control the flyer for you.”

  The flight went smoothly. Millie felt like a bird, soaring up over the palace and the town. She saw three volcanoes and lost count of the number of lakes and little rivers. Pock’s was all scenery, as Brother Andre said. What a pity it was going to be destroyed so soon! Desipient kept up an informative, educational commentary.

  This was going to be a wonderful wind-up to the finest trip of her life! Such wonderful memories she would have to share with her sisters and their families, and her coworkers. The whole sector would read the Backet Report. It would mean a promotion, of course, and a substantial raise. She would be able to buy that shore cottage she had her eye on, and to commute to work by boat on fine days.

  They spent some time at some famous hot springs, whose name Millie missed but could retrieve later. The natural terraces were very decorative. And then the celebrated grove of caongo trees, the tallest in the Ayne sector and perhaps the entire galaxy.

  And then Quassia!

  As Desipient had predicted, there was no one else at the ruins. There was not a great deal to see, either—mostly ferny hummocks and tumbledown stone walls—but Millie was determined to see all of what there was. She and Desipient walked over the entire site for hours with their guards stalking along behind like great cats, rarely saying a word. Desipient was knowledgeable, explaining the curious pentagonal plan of the best-preserved buildings, showing how the scale of the staircases indicated a very tall race, perhaps three meters, the astronomical layout of the dolmens around the Great Plaza, and how the two wells drilled through solid volcanic rock were evidence of a higher technology that had otherwise all rusted away. It was all extremely educational.

  The best for last, of course. Desipient led her up a long staircase—a human-sized timber one, built for visitors—to the summit of a knoll, the highest part of the entire site. Up there stood the infamous Altar, just like its pictures, a single slab of rock, about head-high and twice that across, badly weathered but originally pentagonal, with the remains of what looked like a spout. Millie worked her recorder lavishly.

  “And they used this for sacrifices, didn’t they?”

  “We think so,” Desipient said. “But the important thing is that this is not a native rock. It is a metamorphic gneiss that occurs nowhere on Pock’s and never in meteors, indeed nowhere in the Javelian system. It masses thousands of tons, and moving it through interstellar space is far beyond anything we can imagine.”

  Millie aimed her recorder at the spout. “What is there up there, on top?”

  “Very little to see. It is so weathered.”

  “Even if it was used for sacrifice, that doesn’t mean that the Querent were sacrificing each other, does it?”

  “No, although Pock’s had no large native fauna. A little refreshment, Director?”

  To Millie’s surprise, Sergeant Gestant was laying out bottles and beakers and plates on one of the many picnic tables. “Where in the world did he get those?”

  “The flyers have lockers. So you are going home tomorrow?”

  Millie sat down, realizing that she was thirsty and quite peckish. The view from up here was really very fine. She took more pictures. The sun had not visibly moved, but Javel was a thin crescent across the sky, and she knew enough astronomy now to know that eclipse could not be far off. The day was almost gone. Back to the grind tomorrow.

  “Yes, STARS will be sending a car for us. Tonight I must prepare a short statement of my mission’s findings, and I do believe that all the members will sign it.” As chair, she could put her signature first. The secretary general had not expected a unanimous report and it would be a considerable feather in Millie’s hat if she could obtain one, certainly a commendation in her file. She had always known that she lacked a great creative spark, but she took pride in being thorough and effective, and this mission would confirm her reputation as an achiever of results.

  The guards joined the women at the table. While Patrolman Flisk poured scarlet wine into silver beakers, Desipient waved tongs over a plate of greenish lumps.

  “Have you tried talion yet, Director? It is our greatest delicacy.”

  Millie was fairly sure that talion was what Brother Andre had called rotted tree octopus, but one could not visit a world without trying its greatest delicacy.

  “I don’t believe I have. Oh, that is plenty!”

  “You will love it. And what will your report say, or is that a secret?”

  “I shall stay with the facts and avoid controversy.” Talion tasted exactly as one would expect rotted tree octopus to taste, only worse. Millie took a drink. “Just that we are satisfied that an alien species of the cuckoo type has infected Pock’s World. That they are a danger to the entire sector and STARS was, I mean is, justified in taking drastic… stern measures to contain it.” She gulped down another slimy lump. “Regrettable though the results may be,” she added tactfully. Repressing a shudder, she reached for her beaker. Her companions were eating something else.

  “Monody insists that the world will not end, that we have nothing to fear,” Desipient said.

  “Well, she has to say something like that, doesn’t she? Can’t have panic! It was a STARS engineer who let out the secret prematurely.”

  The ground trembled. Millie almost dropped her wine. “Oh!” She had spilled some on her tunic, a great bloodstain over her bosom.

  “No need for alarm,” Desipient said. “It will come out in the wash.”

  If it ever got there. There was little point to doing laundry on Pock’s now.

  Surprisingly, Patrolman Flisk spoke up. It was the first time she
had heard his voice. “Pock’s shakes all the time, although the Mother protects this area. It is because of her special care that the Querent ruins have stood for so long.”

  “It is astonishing, isn’t it!” Millie agreed. “To think that when the Querent were building this place, our ancestors were chipping pebbles and trying to discover fire!” She laughed. “Ratty Turnsole would say, ‘Yes, but now we own the galaxy, and where are they?’ Oh, no more for me, please!” Too late. More of the disgusting, glistening green stuff had appeared on her plate.

  Flisk stretched a brawny arm across the table to refill her beaker. “Sometimes she sends us signs.”

  He had a very deep voice, a preacher’s voice. He also had the staring, shiny eyes of a fanatic to go with it. Now Millie knew why he had made her uncomfortable, right from the beginning. She had met his type before. It was compromise, not zeal, that made worlds go round.

  She laughed. “You mean the tremor? Well, I agree that Javel’s gravity field stresses the crust. But you’ll never persuade me that Javel is a goddess signaling.” If he hoped to convert her to planet-worship, he had a disappointment coming.

  “It is hard for you to understand,” Flisk agreed, still staring.

  “But I am impressed by Quassia. I agree it has an extremely spiritual quality. And I am very lucky to have seen it today when there is nobody else here!” She raised her beaker in a toast. “To the Querent, wherever they are! And to everybody else, wherever they are going.”

  Sergeant Gestant slapped both hands down on the table. “They are home with their families, their wives and children. And that is where I should be. Even if the rumors are false, people are worried.”

  Millie gasped with embarrassment. “But they are true! I mean, if you wish to go—”

  “Obviously we do not need two guards,” Desipient said. “Flisk will see us safely home.”

  “Of course!” Millie said. “Thank you very much for your help, Sergeant.” Why could the foolish man not have asked sooner?

  Gestant rose and strode off to the stairway.