The Ragged Astronauts lao-1

by Bob Shaw

  Lain shook his head. “Under the circumstances — no.”

  “You are a valuable man, Lain Maraquine.”

  “Majesty, I don’t understand this,” Glo protested, echoing Toller’s own puzzlement. “There is no conceivable reason for providing a ship with only enough fuel for one transit.”

  “A single ship, no,” the King said. “A small fleet, no. But when we are talking about.…“He turned his attention back to Lain. “How many ships would you say?”

  Lain produced a bleak smile. “A thousand seems a good round figure, Majesty.”

  “A thousand!” There was a creaking sound from Glo’s cane frame as he made an abortive attempt to stand up, and when he spoke again an aggrieved note had crept into his voice. “Am I the only person here who is to be kept in ignorance of the subject under discussion?”

  The King made a placating gesture. “There is no conspiracy, Lord Glo — it’s merely that your chief scientist appears to have the ability to read minds. It would please me to learn how he divined what was in my thoughts.”

  Lain stared down at his hands and spoke almost abstractedly, almost as though musing aloud. “For more than two-hundred days I have been unable to obtain any statistics on agricultural output or ptertha casualties. The official explanation was that the provincial administrators were too severely overworked to prepare their returns — and I have been trying to persuade myself that such was the case — but the indicators were already there, Majesty. In a way it is a relief to have my worst fears confirmed. The only way to deal with a crisis is to face up to it.”

  “I agree with you,” Prad said, “but I was concerned with avoiding a general panic, hence the secrecy. I had to be certain.”

  “Certain?” Glo’s large head turned from side to side. “Certain? Certain?”

  “Yes, Lord Glo,” the King said gravely. “I had to be certain that our world was coming to an end.”

  On hearing the bland statement Toller felt a unique emotional pang. Any fear which might have been part of it fled at once before curiosity and an overwhelming, selfish and gloating sense of privilege. The most momentous events in history were being staged for his personal benefit. For the first time in his life, he was in love with the future. “…as though the ptertha were encouraged by the events of the past two years, in the manner of a warrior who sees that his foe is weakening,” the King was saying. “Their numbers are increasing — and who is to say that their foul emissions will not become even more deadly? It has happened once, and it can happen again.

  “We in Ro-Atabri have been comparatively fortunate thus far, but throughout the empire the people are dying from the insidious new form of pterthacosis in spite of all our efforts to fend the globes off. And the newborn, upon whom our future depends, are the most vulnerable. We might be facing the prospect of slowly dwindling into a pitiful, doomed handful of sterile old men and women — were it not for the looming spectre of famine. The agricultural regions are becoming incapable of producing food in the quantities which are necessary for the upkeep of our cities, even allowing for our vastly reduced urban populations.”

  The King paused to give his audience a thin sad smile. “There are some among us who maintain that there is still room for hope, that fate may yet relent and wheel against the ptertha — but Kolcorron did not become great by supinely trusting to chance. That attitude is foreign to our national character. When forced to yield ground in a battle, we withdraw to a secure redoubt where we can gather our strength and determination to surge forth again and overwhelm our enemies.

  “In the present case, as befits the ultimate conflict, there is the ultimate redoubt — and its name is Overland.

  “It is my royal decree that we shall prepare to withdraw to Overland — not in order to cower away from our enemy, but to grow numerous and powerful again, to gain time in which to devise means of destroying the ptertha in their loathsome entirety, and finally — regardless of how long it may take — to return to our home world of Land as a glorious and invincible army which will triumphantly lay claim to all that is naturally and rightfully ours.”

  The King’s oratory, enhanced by the formalism of the high tongue, had carried Toller along with it, opening up new perspectives in his mind, and it was with some surprise that he realised no response was forthcoming from either his brother or Glo. The latter was so immobile that he might have been dead, and Lain continued to stare down at his hands as he twisted the brakka ring on his sixth finger. Toller wondered, with a twinge of guilt, if Lain was thinking of Gesalla and the baby which would be born into turbulent times.

  Prad ended the silence by choosing, oddly in Toller’s view, to address himself to Lain. “Well, wrangler? Have you another demonstration of mind reading for us?”

  Lain raised his head and eyed the King steadily. “Majesty, even when our armies were at their most powerful, we avoided going against Chamteth.”

  “I resent the implications of that remark,” Prince Leddravohr snapped. “I demand that.…”

  “Your promise, Leddravohr!” The King rounded angrily on his son. “I would remind you of your promise to me. Be patient! Your time is at hand.”

  Leddravohr raised both hands in a gesture of resignation as he settled back in his chair, and now his brooding gaze was fixed on Lain. The spasm of alarm Toller felt over his brother’s welfare was almost lost in the silent clamour of his reaction to the mention of Chamteth. Why had he been so slow to appreciate that an interplanetary migration fleet, if it were ever constructed, would require power crystals on such a vast scale that its needs could be met from only one scource? If the King’s awesome plans also included going to war against the enigmatic and insular Chamtethans, then the near future was going to be even more turbulent than Toller could readily visualise.

  Chamteth was a country so huge that it could be reached just as readily by travelling east or west into the Land of the Long Days, that hemisphere of the world which was not swept by Overland’s shadow and where there was no littlenight to punctuate the sun’s progress across the sky. In the distant past several ambitious rulers had tried probing into Chamteth and the outcome had been so convincing, so disastrous that Chamteth had virtually been erased from the national consciousness. It existed, but — as with Overland — its existence had no relevance to the quotidian affairs of the empire.

  Until now, Toller thought, striving to rebuild his picture of the universe. Chamteth and Overland are linked…bonded… to take one is to take the other…

  “War against Chamteth has become inevitable,” the King said. “Some are of the opinion that it always has been inevitable. What do you say, Lord Glo?”

  “Majesty,!.…” Glo cleared his throat and sat up straighter. “Majesty, I have always regarded myself as a creative thinker, but I freely admit that the grandeur and scope of your vision have taken my… hmm… breath away. When I originally proposed flying to Overland I envisaged despatching a small number of pathfinders, followed by the gradual establishment of a small colony. I had not dreamed of migration on the scale you are contemplating, but I can assure you that I am equal to the responsibilities involved. The designing of a suitable ship and the planning of all the necessary.…” Glo stopped speaking as he saw that Prad was shaking his head.

  “My dear Lord Glo, you are not a well man,” the King said, “and I would be less than fair to you if I permitted you to expend what remains of your strength on a task of such magnitude.”

  “But, Majesty.…”

  The King’s face hardened. “Do not interrupt! The extremity of our situation demands equally extreme measures. The entire resources of Kolcorron must be reorganised and mobilised, and therefore I am dissolving all the old dynastic family structures. In their place — as of this moment — is a single pyramid of authority. Its executive head is my son, Prince Leddravohr, who will control and coordinate every aspect — military and civil — of our national affairs. He is seconded by Prince Chakkell, who will be responsible to him for the
construction of the migration fleet.”

  The King paused, and when he spoke again his voice had none of the attributes of humanity. “Be it understood that Prince Leddravohr’s authority is absolute, that his power is unlimited, and that to go counter to his wishes in any respect is a crime equivalent to high treason.”

  Toller closed his eyes, knowing that when he opened them again the world of his childhood and youth would have passed into history, and that in its place would be a dangerous new cosmos in which his tenure might be all too brief.

  Chapter 8

  Leddravohr was mentally tired after the meeting and had been hoping to relax during dinner, but his father — with the abundant cerebral energy which characterises some elderly men — talked all the way through the meal. He switched rapidly and effortlessly from military strategy to food rationing schemes to the technicalities of interworld flight, displaying his fascination with detail, trying to explore mutually incompatible probabilities. Leddravohr, who had no taste for juggling with abstracts, was relieved when the meal was finished and his father moved out to the balcony for a final cup of wine before retiring to his private quarters.

  “Damn this glass,” Prad said, tapping the transparent cupola which enclosed the balcony. “I used to enjoy taking the air here at night. Now I can scarcely breathe.”

  “Without the glass you wouldn’t be breathing at all.” Leddravohr flicked his thumb, indicating a group of three ptertha drifting overhead across the glowing face of Overland. The sun had gone down and now the sister world was entering the gibbous phases of its illumination, casting its mellow light over the southern reaches of the city, Arle Bay and the deep indigo expanses of the Gulf of Tronom. The light was good enough to read by and would steadily increase in strength as Overland, keeping pace with the rotation of Land, swung towards its point of opposition with the sun. Although the sky had darkened only to a rich mid-blue the stars, some of which were bright enough to be visible in full daylight, formed blazing patterns from Overland’s rim down to the horizon.

  “Damn the ptertha, too,” Prad said. “You know, son, one of the greatest tragedies of our past is that we never learned where the globes come from. Even if they are spawned somewhere in the upper atmosphere, it might have been possible at one time to track them down and destroy them at source. It’s too late now, though.”

  “What about your triumphant return from Overland? Attacking the ptertha from above?”

  “Too late for me, I mean. History will remember me for the outward flight only.”

  “Ah, yes — history,” Leddravohr said, once again wondering at his father’s preoccupation with the pale and spurious immortality offered by books and graven monuments. Life was a transient thing, impossible to extend beyond its natural term, and time spent in trying to do so was a squandering of the very commodity one was seeking to preserve. Leddravohr’s own belief was that the only way to cheat death, or at least reconcile oneself to it, was to achieve every ambition and sate every appetite, so that when the time came the relinquishing of life was little more than discarding an empty gourd.

  His single overriding ambition had been to extend his future kingship to every quarter of Land — including Chamteth — but that was now denied him by a connivance of fate. In its place was the prospect of a hazardous and unnatural flight into the sky, followed by little more than a tribal existence on an unknown world. He was angry about that, filled with a gnawing canker of rage unlike anything he had ever known, and somebody would have to pay.…

  Prad sipped pensively at his wine. “Have you prepared all your dispatches?”

  “Yes — the messengers leave at first light.” Leddravohr had spent all his free time after the meeting personally writing orders to the five generals he wanted for his staff. “I instructed them to use continuous thrust, so we should have distinguished company quite soon.”

  “I take it you have chosen Dalacott.”

  “He’s still the best tactician we have.”

  “Aren’t you afraid that his edge might be blunted?” Prad said. “He must be seventy now, and being down in Kail when the plague broke out there can’t have done him much good. Didn’t he lose a daughter and a grandchild on the very first day?”

  “Something like that,” Leddravohr replied carelessly. “He is still healthy, though. Still of value.”

  “He must have the immunity.” Prad’s face became more animated as he fastened on to yet another of his talking points. “You know, Glo sent me some very interesting statistics at the beginning of the year. They were collated by Maraquine. They showed that the incidence of plague deaths among military personnel — which you would expect to be high because of their exposure — is actually somewhat lower than for the population in general. And, significantly, long-serving soldiers and airmen are the least likely to succumb. Maraquine suggested that years of being near ptertha kills and absorbing minute traces of the dust might train the body to resist pterthacosis. It’s an intriguing thought.”

  “Father, it’s a totally useless thought.”

  “I wouldn’t say that. If the offspring of immune men and women were also immune, from birth, then you could breed a new race for whom the globes were no threat.”

  “And what good would that be fo you and me?” Leddravohr said, disposing of the argument to his own satisfaction. “No, as far as I’m concerned Glo and Maraquine and their ilk are ornaments we can well do without. I look forward to the day when.…”

  “Enough!” His father was suddenly King Prad Neldeever, ruler of the empire of Kolcorron, tall ainl rigid, with one terrible blind eye and one equally fearsome all-seeing eye which knew everything Leddravohr would have wished to keep secret. “Ours will not be the house which is remembered for turning its back on learning. You will give me your word that you will not harm Glo or Maraquine.”

  Leddravohr shrugged. “You have my word.”

  “That came easily.” His father stared at him for a moment, dissatisfied, then said, “Neither will you touch Maraquine’s brother, the one who now attends to Glo.”

  “That oaf! I have more important things with which to occupy my mind.”

  “I know. I have given you unprecedented powers because you have the qualities necessary to bring a great endeavour to a successful conclusion, and that power is not to be abused.”

  “Spare me all this, father,” Leddravohr protested, laughing to conceal his resentment at being admonished like a wilful child. “I intend to treat our philosophers with all the consideration they deserve. Tomorrow I’m going to Greenmount for two or three days — to learn all I need to know about their skyships — and if you care to make enquiries you’ll hear that I am emanating nothing but courtesy and love.”

  “Don’t overdo it.” Prad drained his cup with a flourish, set it down on the wide stone balustrade and prepared to leave. “Good night, son. And remember — the future watches.”

  As soon as the King had departed Leddravohr exchanged his wine for a glass of fiery Padalian brandy and returned to the balcony. He sat down on a leather couch and gazed moodily at the southern sky where three great comets plumed the star fields. The future watches! His father was still cherishing the notion of going down in history as another King Bytran, blinding himself to the probability that there would be no historians to record his achievements. The story of Kolcorron was drawing to a bizarre and ignominious end just when it should have been entering the most glorious era of all.

  And I’m the one who is losing most, Leddravohr thought. I’m never going to be a real King.

  As he continued drinking brandy, and the night grew steadily brighter, it came to Leddravohr that there was an anomaly in the contrast between his attitude and that of his father. Optimism was the prerogative of the young, and yet the King was looking to the future with confidence; pessimism was a trait of the old, and yet it was Leddravohr who was gloomy and prey to grim forebodings. Why?

  Was it that his father was too wrapped up in his enthusiasm for all things s
cientific to concede that the migration was impossible? Leddravohr took stock of his thoughts and was forced to discard the theory. At some stage in the day-long meeting he had been persuaded by the drawings, the graphs and the chains of figures, and now he believed that a skyship could reach the sister world. What, then, was the underlying cause of the malaise which had entered his soul? The future was not completely black, after all — there was the final war with Chamteth to anticipate.

  As Leddravohr tilted his head back to finish a glass of brandy his gaze drifted towards the zenith — and suddenly he had his answer. The great disk of Overland was now almost fully illuminated and its face was just starting to show the prismatic changes which heralded its nightly plunge into the shadow of Land. Deepnight — that period when the world experienced real darkness — was beginning, and it had its counterpart in Leddravohr’s mind.

  He was a soldier, professionally immune to fear, and that was why he had been so slow to acknowledge or even identify the emotion which had lurked in his consciousness for most of the day.

  He was afraid of the Overland flight!

  What he felt was not straightforward apprehension over the undeniable risks involved — it was pure, primitive and unmanning terror at the very idea of ascending thousands of miles into the unforgiving blueness of the sky. The force of his dread was such that when the awful moment for embarkation arrived he might be unable to control himself. He, Prince Leddravohr Neldeever, might break down and cower away like a frightened child, possibly having to be carried bodily on to the skyship in full view of thousands.…

  Leddravohr jumped to his feet and hurled his glass away, smashing it on the balcony’s stone floor. There was a hideous irony in the fact that his introduction to fear should have taken place not on the field of battle, but in the quietness of a small room, at the hands of stammering nonentities, with their scribbles and scratchings and their casual visions of the unthinkable.