Future Indefinite (Round Three of The Great Game)

by Dave Duncan

  The ox's name was Tawny. Its owner, shuffling along at its ear, was a grubby, somewhat battered-looking man named Podoorstak Carter. Eleal had seen his like around the Cherry

  Blossom House often enough to be very glad she had not prepaid her return journey. The lumbering, bone-rattling wagon had been smelly even when it set out. After a day of baking sunshine, packed to suffocation with fourteen people, it reeked. Its cargo included two elderly nuns, who spoke only to each other in whispers. A very loud matronly lady, whose son had been slain by a reaper, wanted to give the Liberator her blessings and wise counsel on his campaign to slay Death. An addlepated, hunchbacked young man babbled nonsense about prophecies, rolling his eyes and slobbering. A girl of thirteen who had seen a vision she must describe to the Liberator was accompanied by her proud mother. There was a very sick baby, clutched by an underfed, worried-to-death woman who hoped that the Liberator might bring death to Death before her child died. The baby coughed a lot and threw up everything the woman fed it. There were two overweight, green-robed priests of Padlopan, the Niolian aspect of Karzon, who indicated grimly that they were going to beat the heretical manure out of the Liberator as soon as they got their hands on him. Unfortunately, their neighbors were an elderly couple wearing the gold ear circle of the Undivided. Their conversation with the priests was strained.

  Healthy, wholesome people had gone on foot or stayed home.

  The priests and the nuns, of course, were intent on stamping out heresy, and therefore traveling on the gods’ business. They regarded their companions as wastrels, sensation seekers, and potential heretics. When Eleal explained that she hoped to use her former friendship with the Liberator to recall him to the true faith, their manners improved a little. But not much. She did not mention that she was the Eleal of the Filoby Testament.

  Lubberly lot though they all were, they were a potential audience, and no true artist could resist an audience. So Eleal sang for them from time to time. They all seemed to enjoy that, excepting the baby and the straitlaced nuns. Later, she and Piol performed brief excerpts from some of his plays, and everyone enjoyed those except the priests, the baby, and the girl with the vision, who had an epileptic seizure halfway through Hollaga's Farewell.

  * * * *

  The wagon rolled ever more slowly as the tusk ox tired, but evening came at last, bringing them to Joobiskby. It had been a sleepy, peaceful little place when Eleal and Piol had slothed their way through it a few days ago, but now the only thing she could recognize was the spire of the temple. The inhabitants, male and female both, had built a barricade across the road and manned it, brandishing forks and mattocks to repel the intruders. It was fortunate that the harvest had been gathered in and the paddies, which in spring and summer had been thigh-deep in water, had dried to mere mud at this time of year, for the horde of visitors had trampled over everything, knocking down hedges and dykes, leaving a wasteland.

  Podoorstak halted the wagon a cautious quarter mile or so away from the ramparts, at the end of a long line of parked carts and coaches. The bored drivers and servants left to guard them ignored these latest arrivals.

  "Ain't going no nearer,” Podoorstak announced. “We'll leave from here at dawn, them as wants to come. Fend for yourselves till then."

  His passengers burst into complaint, but to no avail. Obviously the village was sealed and his ox could not drag the wagon through the soupy morass that surrounded it. Sighing, Eleal scrambled down and offered a hand to Piol. It was good to be out of the wagon at last, but she was not looking forward to the last stage of the journey. Her ultimate destination was obviously a small hillock to the north, for there the crowds had gathered. That must be where the Liberator was.

  Piol wanted to carry their little pack; she insisted on taking it. Side by side, they clambered over the remains of a ditch and set off across the fields. They moved more slowly than most, faster than some, and still pilgrims were arriving behind them. The going was hard—red mud sucking at her boots with every step.

  An old refrain was going around and around in her head: Woeful maiden, handsome lad.... She had not heard that song in years.

  "How many?” She puffed.

  "Thousands! Can't see them all from here.” Piol chuckled wheezily. “Trong never drew a house like this one. We should have kept D'ward in the troupe!"

  His good humor shamed her. “But are these people the audience or the extras, old man? Even Trong couldn't have directed so many."

  The situation seemed more and more hopeless the closer she came to the hillock. There was a building on the crest of it, perhaps an old shrine. The flanks supported a few scattered trees, but whatever else they might have borne—grass or fences or berry bushes—had vanished under the human tide.

  "This is madness! What do they all want? Just to see him or touch him?"

  "The madness of multitudes,” Piol murmured. His eyes were bright with a faraway look she could recall from her childhood, a sign of inspiration at work. “It will pass. Nectar-ants swarm so in spring. The Liberator is their queen and they must be as near him as they can."

  "If he speaks, most of them won't even be able to hear."

  "But he is something new in their lives. They will go home and tell all their friends. And when the world doesn't turn upside down in a fortnight, they will forget him. It will pass."

  As they reached the trampled lower slopes of the knoll, and then the edge of the horde, Piol took hold of Eleal's hand. There they stopped, seeing that any attempt to push into the throng would be not only fruitless but dangerous. She could hear a menacing rumble mixed in with the normal crowd buzz as those higher on the hillock resisted efforts to displace them or pack them tighter. Already more people were jostling in at her back. She exchanged rueful glances with the old man—neither of them was exactly tall. They would not even see the Liberator, let alone hear him. She assumed that he would speak. He would have to do something or the crowd would riot.

  "Sh!” said a few hundred voices all around her. Someone was making an announcement. She could not make out the words, but she sensed that the crowd was breaking up, somewhere off to the right.

  A moment later, she heard the speaker again, and this time he was closer.

  "There is food available around the other side. The Liberator will speak now, and later he will speak again for those of you who did not hear. Go and eat now, and come back."

  Eleal and Piol exchanged questioning glances. They had thought to bring food, so they were not hungry. How many would be tempted away?

  Then the speaker came in sight, walking around the outside of the gathering. He was a short, fair-haired youth, wearing only a loincloth, burdened with a leather satchel and a large round shield slung on his back. Slight though he was, he projected well. He made his proclamation yet again.

  The crowd began to roil, some fighting their way out to go in search of the promised meal, others pushing in to take their places higher on the hillock. Dragging Piol behind her, Eleal lurched over to the herald. She banged a hand on his shield just before he disappeared.

  "You!"

  He turned around and regarded her with soft blue eyes. His face was drawn with fatigue and reddened by the day's sun; he was spattered with mud. She expected annoyance, but he spoke with surprising patience. “Sister? How may I help?"

  "I need to speak with the Liberator."

  He even managed a smile, although her request was obviously insane, and raked fingers through curls that might be pure gold on a better day. “We all do. I have been trying to get a word with him myself for three days. I wish I could be more helpful."

  Eleal was impressed. He was really very cute. He would make an excellent Tion in the right sort of play.

  "I am Eleal."

  A guarded expression fell over his face like a visor. “Sister, I am very honored—"

  "Really I am. The Eleal of the Filoby Testament. I cared for him and washed him ... almost five years ago. I want to see him again."

  A fain
t smile of doubt. “Do you know his name? Can you describe him?"

  "His name is D'ward. He is tall. He has black hair, quite wavy, and the bluest eyes I have ever seen. When I knew him, he was very—lean, I suppose is the nice way of describing it. I expect he will have put on weight since then."

  The boy clicked his teeth shut. “No, he hasn't. You are Eleal!” He fell on his knees in the mud.

  "Er...” Eleal looked to Piol for guidance. He seemed equally astounded. The milling bystanders had noticed, and a ring of the curious was solidifying around them.

  "Don't kneel to me!” she said firmly. She found that strangely disturbing. “Get up, please! But I would like to see my old friend."

  The boy stood up, having trouble managing the big shield. He glanced around at the audience. “A moment!” He made his proclamation again, and again the people within earshot began stirring like vegetables in a boiling stew pot.

  He turned back to Eleal, biting his lip. “I cannot get you to him now. After he has spoken the second time, he will bid the crowd disperse or sleep. Then we have a—” He smiled a rueful smile. “Well, usually we have a meeting. The numbers are becoming so great that I can't even count on that today. But look for me, or for people carrying shields like this. Tell any of them what you have told me, or tell them I said so. My name is Dosh Envoy. I am sure that they will get you to the Liberator then."

  It was as much as she could have hoped for. “I thank you, Dosh Envoy."

  He nodded. “The blessings of the Undivided upon you, sister.” Then he eased his way off through the crowd.

  She would have to be content with that, and she supposed she would not die of impatience. Her craving to meet D'ward again seemed to be growing stronger all the time. The closer she came to him, the more eager she felt.

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  36

  Some of the places D'ward chose to pitch camp were bizarre, but Dosh could not have faulted the knoll at Joobiskby. It was a natural theater, for the little ruin at the top made an excellent stage and the slopes could have held even more thousands than had turned up. The problem was not the campsite but the wind and the size of the multitude. Loud as D'ward could be, he could not make his voice carry upwind. Those who had heard the first sermon—a necessarily brief one—were reluctant to move away and make room for others who had not. The lower slopes were muddier than the top, an unsavory place to sleep.

  Patience. Understanding. Tact. Above all, patience.

  Even with a manageable crowd, the shield-bearers would have had trouble, for they were all new at the job, other than Dosh himself and the two surviving Nagians. D'ward had appointed the shield-bearers the previous evening to replace the Warband, naming four women and six men, promising to add more soon. He had chosen well, Dosh believed, but dedication was no substitute for experience. Even Prat'han and his brothers would have been out of their depth shepherding this multitude. In retrospect, the band that had followed the Liberator through Nosokvale and Rinoovale seemed like a family on an outing—already those were the good old days, fond memories shining through golden haze. Now the greater burden had fallen on shoulders unprepared to take it. Dosh had not been off his feet since dawn; Tielan Trader and Doggan Herder were doing their best, but they were still numb with grief and shame at being alive.

  Dosh had shame to bear also, for he had not believed in the Liberator until their audience with Visek, so he had never had a chance to tell most of the Warband that they had been right all along and he had been wrong. He had not appreciated their courage and loyalty. Now, for the first time in his life, he knew what guilt was.

  Patience: “I know you are tired, brothers and sisters. There are many down there who have come just as far as you and have not yet had a chance to hear the Liberator. It would be a demonstration of the understanding he described if you were to give them a chance.... “And so on and so on.

  As he repeated the same carefully phrased and reasoned request for the thousandth time, Dosh wondered where he had learned patience. Not just patience, either. If the Dosh who had left Joal a fortnight ago were to meet himself now, they wouldn't know each other. They wouldn't like each other much, either. Fortunately, he was too accursedly busy to wonder whether he enjoyed being this sort of person. He supposed he would eventually weaken and revert to lechery. Meanwhile, he must keep on being a good boy, because there were whiffs of riot in the night air. He had broken up three fights already.

  The sun had set. There was not a single moon in sight, and D'ward had just begun his second speech. The wind was still rising, snatching his words away. The clouds that had been gathering at sunset over Niolwall portended the start of the winter rains—that would thin out the crowd in a hurry.

  Dosh began to work his way up the knoll. He had done all he could down here. He moved quietly and with exceeding care, literally stepping between people's legs, being careful not to bang any heads with his shield. A shield was a great honor, but a demoniacally heavy and awkward honor. In his case the honor was especially great, because he had been granted Prat'han's. The hole in it marked the blow that had felled the big man and the stains were his life's blood. To carry such a relic was honor and privilege.

  Dosh wondered if Queen Elvanife had obeyed the Liberator's edict and gone to Shuujooby to do penance. He wondered if D'ward would move on again tomorrow, as he usually did. He wondered how many of this horde would choose to join the Free and march with the Liberator. They would have to be fed, but his satchel was quite empty, although the collectors would soon have money for him. He wondered when he would get a chance to sit down.

  He reached the crumbled walls of the old shrine just as Kirb'l flashed into view in the east, shedding a welcome yellow light on the hundreds of upturned faces paving the sides of the knoll. D'ward stood on the highest corner, lit from below by a bonfire, casting his message to the night air.

  Amazingly, Kilpian and the others had managed to keep the crowds out of the shrine itself. Most of the walls had long since collapsed into heaps of stones, but even those were a barrier and gave a sense of privacy. Dosh climbed over a low spot and slithered down inside, spilling onto the grass. He detached himself from his shield and relaxed with a long sigh of wearied contentment.

  A portly, gray-haired woman came to him, offering a gourd of water. He accepted gratefully, trying to remember her name. She was a friend. D'ward had appointed shield-bearers and friends. The friends were supporters not yet quite ready profess their faith or to assume authority, he had said, but they were to be admitted to the evening meetings.

  Dosh drained the gourd and muttered thanks. The Liberator's voice rang out overhead.

  "Food?” she asked, smiling at his woebegone manner. Hasfral, that was her name, Hasfral Midwife.

  "Food? What's that? Has D'ward eaten yet?"

  "No."

  "Then I'll wait till he does."

  She shook her head as if puzzled. “That's what you all say."

  "Because we know there wasn't enough for everyone out there today."

  "Lots of them brought their own."

  "But some will go hungry, and D'ward won't want to eat if he knows that. The only thing that will make him eat then is if the rest of us haven't eaten either and he knows we'll do whatever he does."

  "Will you? Will you go without if he does?"

  Dosh sighed. “Let's hope we don't have to find out."

  He glanced around the little group. Quite a few missing still. Doggan Herder was brooding in a corner by himself. No sign of Tielan Trader. Kilpian Drover and Kondior Thatcher and Bid'lip ... Bid'lip Soldier had been one of the troopers who had defected in Nosokvale. He was a bear of a man, with the thickest eyebrows Dosh had seen since Bandrops Advocate's. He wasn't Prat'han, but he would be a strong arm for the Liberator. Half a dozen others ... A red-haired youngster sitting close by the fire was writing so busily that he must be trying to take down the Liberator's words verbatim.

  "Who's he?” Dosh whispered, pointing at
the scribe.

  "Dommi Houseboy. A friend."

  It was becoming hard to keep track of everyone.

  And there was Ursula Teacher. Dosh disliked her without quite knowing why. Perhaps it was a relic of his old days of lechery, when he had preferred women pliant and muscles on men. Her jaw was too square, her hair too short, her manner too domineering, but none of that should matter to him now. Or perhaps he just wasn't sure what to make of her—she spoke with the Liberator in a language unlike any he had ever heard. At least her insolent male friend had departed, heading out at dawn yesterday on a dragon; good riddance, whoever he was.

  The sight of Ursula suddenly reminded Dosh of Eleal Singer. Bother! Well, it would be useless to go and look for her in that mob out there. If she really was the fabled savior mentioned by the Testament, then she would find her way here somehow. Must remember to tell D'ward about her ... Screw it, but he was tired...!

  The sky was clouding over. No matter—no deluge would keep Dosh from sleeping tonight. He eyed the baggage heaped in one corner. With a groan, he sat up and prepared to rise.

  "Bid'lip? Give me a hand putting up the tent."

  The soldier shook his head. “D'ward said to leave it. Said we can all use it as a cover when the rain starts."

  Dosh sank back to where he had been before. He suspected that the Liberator rarely slept in the tent and it was only a decoy to deceive the reapers. There had been no reapers for several nights. What was the enemy up to now? While worrying about that, he almost dozed off. A jingling sound roused him when Kondior Thatcher dropped a cloth poke at his feet. The Liberator had just finished his speech and was clambering down from his vantage point, being steadied by Kilpian Drover. More shield-bearers and friends had arrived. The crowd on the slopes of the knoll rumbled like a great beast as it tried to make itself comfortable for the night.

  Hasfral Midwife and Imminol Herbalist were handing out the evening meal: beans and tubers and some pieces of fruit. D'ward accepted his gourd, looking around his followers, studying each in turn. When everyone had been served and no one had begun to eat, he smiled as if he knew what they were thinking.