The Day of Their Return df-4

by Poul Anderson

“N-n-n-need you ask?” Ivar gave the king a nord-style bow. “Will you excuse me, sir?”

  Samlo nodded. A saturnine smile crossed his mouth.

  As he straightened, Ivar grew aware of the intentness of Erannath. One did not have to be Ythrian to read hatred in erected quills and hunched stance. His gaze followed that of the golden orbs, and met the red triplet of the luck’s. The animal crouched, bristled, and chittered.

  “What’s wrong, sweet?” Fraina reached to soothe her pet.

  Ivar recalled how Erannath had declined the hospitality of any wagon and spent his whole time outdoors, even the bitterest nights, when he must slowly pump his wings while he slept to keep his metabolism high enough that he wouldn’t freeze to death. In sudden realization, the Firstling asked him, “Don’t you like lucks?”

  “No,” said the Ythrian.

  After a moment: “I have encountered them elsewhere. In Planha we call them liayalre. Slinkers.”

  Fraina pouted. “Oh, foof! I took poor Tais along for a gulp of fresh air. C’mon, Rolf.”

  She tucked her arm beneath Ivar’s. He forgot that he had never cared for lucks either.

  Erannath stared after him till he was gone from sight.

  Beyond the ring of vehicles, the meadow rolled wide, its dawn trava turf springy and sweet underfoot, silvergray beneath heaven. Trees stood roundabout, intricacies of pine, massivenesses of hammerbranch, cupolas of delphi. Both moons tinged their boughs white; and of the shadows, those cast by Creusa stirred as the half-disc sped eastward. Stars crowded velvet blackness. The Milky Way was an icefall.

  Music faded behind him and her, until they were alone with a tadmouse’s trill. He was speechless, content to marvel at the fact that she existed.

  She said at last, quietly, looking before her: “Rolf, there’s got to be High Ones. This much joy can’t just’ve happened.”

  “High Ones? Or God? Well—” Non sequitur, my dear. To us this is beautiful because certain apes were adapted to same kind of weather, long ago on Terra. Though we may feel subtle enchantment in deserts, can we feel it as wholly as Erannath must? … But doesn’t that mean that Creator made every kind of beauty? It’s bleak, believin’ in nothin’ except accident.

  “Never mind philosophy,” he said. Recklessly: “Waste of time I could spend by your side.”

  She slipped an arm around his waist. He felt it like fire. I’m in love, he knew through the thunders. Never before like this. Tanya—

  She sighed. “Aye-ah. How much’ve we left?”

  “Forever?”

  “No. You can’t stay in the Train. It’s never happened.”

  “Why can’t it?”

  “Because you sitters—wait, Rolf, I’m sorry, you’re too good for that word, you’re a strider—you people who have rooted homes, you’re—not weak—but you haven’t got our kind of toughness.”

  Which centuries of deaths have bred.

  “I’m afraid for you,” Fraina whispered.

  “What? Me?” His pride surged in a wave of anger that he knew, far off at the back of his mind, was foolish. “Hoy, listen, I survived Dreary crossin’ as well as next man, didn’t I? I’m bigger and stronger than anybody else; maybe no so wiry, not so quick, but by chaos, if we struck dryout, starveout, gritstorm, whatever, I’d stay alive!”

  She leaned closer. “And you’re smart, too, Rolf, full of book stories—what’s more, full of skills we’re always short on. Yet you’ll have to go. Maybe because you’re too much for us. What could we give you, for the rest of your life?”

  You, his pulse replied. And freedom to be myself … Drop your damned duties, Ivar Frederiksen. You never asked to be born to them. Stop thinkin’ how those lights overhead are political points, and let them again be stars.

  “I, I, I don’t think I could ever get tired of travelin’, if you were along,” he blurted. “And, uh, well, I can haul my load, maybe give Waybreak somethin’ really valuable—”

  “Until you got swittled, or knifed. Rolf, darling, you’re innocent. You know in your bones that most people are honest and don’t get violent without reason. It’s not true. Not in the Trains, it isn’t. How can you change your skeleton, Rolf?”

  “Could you help me?”

  “Oh, if I could!” The shifty moonlight caught a glimmer of tears.

  Abruptly Fraina tossed her head and stated, “Well, if nothing else, I can shield you from the first and worst, Rolf.”

  “What do you mean?” By now used to mercurial changes of mood, he chiefly was conscious of her looks, touch, and fragrance. They were still walking. The luck on her shoulder, drawn into its mantle, had virtually seceded from visibility.

  “You’ve a fair clutch of jingle along, haven’t you?”

  He nodded. Actually the money was in bills, Imperial credits as well as Aenean libras, most of it given him in a wad by Sergeant Astaff before he left Windhome. ("Withdrew my savin’s, Firstlin’. No worry. You’ll pay me back if you live, and if you don’t live, what futterin’ difference’ll my account make?” How remote and unreal it seemed!) Tinerans had no particular concept of privacy. (I’ve learned to accept that, haven’t I? Privacy is in my brain. What matter if Dulcy casually goes through my pockets, if she and Mikkal and I casually dress and undress in their wagon, if they casually make love in bunk below mine?) Thus it was general knowledge that Rolf Mariner was well-heeled. No one stole from a fellow in the Train. The guilt would have been impossible to hide, and meant exile. After pickpocket practice, the spoils were returned. He had declined invitations to gamble, that being considered a lawful way of picking a companion clean.

  “We’ll soon reach the river,” Fraina said. “We’ll move along it, from town to town, as far as our territory stretches. Carnival at every stop. Hectic—well, you’ve been to tineran pitches, you told me. The thing is, those times we’re on the grab. It’s us against—is ‘against’ the word?—zans. We don’t wish harm on the sitters, but we’re after everything we can hook. At a time like that, somebody might forget you’re not an ordinary sitter. We even fall out with our kind, too often.”

  Why? passed across Ivar. Granted this society hasn’t same idea as mine of what constitutes property or contract. Still, if anything, shouldn’t nomads be more alert than usual when among aliens, more united and coordinated? But no, I remember from Brotherband visits to Windhome, excitement always affected them too, till they’d as likely riot among each other as with Landfolk.

  He lost the question. They had halted near an argentroofed delphi. Stars gleamed, moons glowed, and she held both his hands.

  “Let me keep your moneta for you, Rolf,” she offered. “I know how to stash it. Afterward—”

  “There will be an afterward!”

  “There’s got to be,” she wept, and came to him.

  He let go all holds, save upon her. Soon they went into the moon-dappled grotto of the delphi. The luck stayed outside, waiting.

  He who had been Jaan the Shoemaker, until Caruith returned after six million swings of the world around the sun, looked from the snag of a tower across the multitude which filled the marketplace. From around the Sea of Orcus, folk had swarmed hither for Radmas. More were on Mount Cronos this year than ever before in memory or chronicle. They knew the Deliverer was come and would preach unto them.

  They made a blue-shadowy dimness beneath the wall whereon he stood: a face, a lancehead, a burnoose, a helmet, picked out of the dusk which still welled between surrounding houses and archways. Virgil had barely risen over the waters, and the Arena blocked off sight of it, so that a phantom mother-of-pearl was only just beginning to awaken in the great ruin. Some stars remained yet in the sky. Breath indrawn felt razor keen. Released, it ghosted. Endless underneath silence went the noise of the falls.

  —Go, Caruith said.

  Their body lifted both arms. Amplified, their voice spoke forth into the hush.

  “People, I bring you stern tidings.

  “You await rescue, first from the grip of the tyrant,
next and foremost from the grip of mortality—of being merely, emptily human. You wait for transcendence.

  “Look up, then, to yonder stars. Remember what they are, not numbers in a catalog, not balls of burning gas, but reality itself, even as you and I are real. We are not eternal, nor are they; but they are closer to eternity than we. The light of the farthest that we can see has crossed an eon to come to us. And the word it bears is that first it shone upon those have gone before.

  “They shall return. I, in whom lives the mind of Caruith, pledge this, if we will make our world worthy to receive them.

  “Yet that may not be done soon nor easily. The road before us is hard, steep, bestrewn with sharp shards. Blood will mark the footprints we leave, and at our backs will whiten the skulls of those who fell by the way. Like one who spoke upon Mother Terra, long after Caruith but long before Jaan, I bring you not peace but a sword.”

  X

  Boseville was typical of the small towns along the Flone between Nova Roma and the Cimmerian Mountains. A cluster of neatly laid out, blocky but gaily colored buildings upon the right bank, it looked across two kilometers’ width of brown stream to a ferry terminal, pastures, and timberlots. At its back, canals threaded westward through croplands. Unlike the gaunt but spacious country along the Ilian Shelf, this was narrow enough, and at the same time rich enough, that many of its farmers could dwell in the community. Besides agriculture, Boseville lived off service industries and minor manufacturing. Most of its trade with the outside world went through the Riverfolk. An inscribed monolith in the plaza commemorated its defenders during the Troubles. Nothing since had greatly disturbed it, including rebellion and an occupation force which it never saw.

  Of was that true any longer? More and more, Ivar wondered.

  He had accompanied Erannath into town while the tinerans readied their pitches. The chance of his being recognized was negligible, unless the Terrans had issued bulletins on him. He was sure they had not. To judge by what broadcasts he’d seen when King Samlo ordered the Train’s single receiver brought forth and tuned in—a fair sample, even though the nomads were not much given to passive watching—the Wildfoss affair had been soft-pedaled almost to the point of suppression. Evidently Commissioner Desai didn’t wish to inspire imitations, nor make a hero figure out of the Firstling of Ilion.

  Anyhow, whoever might identify him was most unlikely to call the nearest garrison.

  Erannath wanted to explore this aspect of nord culture. It would be useful having a member of it for companion, albeit one from a different area. Since he was of scant help in preparing the shows, Ivar offered to come along. The Ythrian seemed worth cultivation, an interesting and, in his taciturn fashion, likable sort. Besides, Ivar discovered with surprise that, after the frenetic caravan, he was a bit homesick for his own people.

  Or so he thought. Then, when he walked on pavement between walls, he began to feel stifled. How seldom these folk really laughed aloud! How drably they dressed! And where were the male swagger, the female ardor? He wondered how these sitters had gotten any wish to beget the children he saw. Why, they needed to pour their merriment out of a tankard.

  Not that the beer wasn’t good. He gulped it down. Erannath sipped.

  They sat in a waterfront tavern, wood-paneled, roughraftered, dark and smoky. Windows opened on a view of the dock. A ship, which had unloaded cargo here and taken on consignments for farther downstream, was girding to depart.

  “Don’t yonder crew want to stay for our carnival?” Ivar asked.

  A burly, bearded man, among the several whom Erannath’s exotic presence had attracted to this table, puffed his pipe before answering slow: “No, I don’t recall as how Riverfolk ever go to those things. Seems like they, m-m-m, shun tinerans. Maybe not bad idea.”

  “Why?” Ivar challenged. Are they nonhuman, not to care for Fraina’s dancin’ or Mikkal’s blade arts or—

  “Always trouble. I notice, son, you said, ‘Our carnival.’ Have care. It brings grief, tryin’ to be what you’re not born to be.”

  “I’ll guide my private life, if you please.”

  The villager shrugged. “Sorry.”

  “If the nomads are a disturbing force,” Erannath inquired, “why do you allow them in your territory?”

  “They’ve always been passin’ through,” said the oldest man present. “Tradition gives rights. Includin’ right to pick up part of their livin’—by entertainments, cheap merchandise, odd jobs, and, yes, teachin’ prudence by fleecin’ the foolish.”

  “Besides,” added a young fellow, “they do bring color, excitement, touch of danger now and then. We might not live this quietly if Waybreak didn’t overnight twice in year.”

  The jaws of the bearded man clamped hard on his pipestem before he growled, “We’re soon apt to get oversupplied with danger, Jim.”

  Ivar stiffened. A tingle went through him. “What do you mean … may I ask?”

  A folk saying answered him: “Either much or little.”

  But another customer, a trifle drunk, spoke forth. “Rumors only. And yet, somethin’s astir up and down river, talk of one far south who’s promised Elders will return and deliver us from Empire. Could be wishful thinkin’, of course. But damn, it feels right somehow. Aeneas is special. I never paid lot of attention to Dido before; however, lately I’ve begun givin’ more and more thought to everything our filosofs have learned there. I’ve gone out under Mornin’ Star and tried to think myself toward Oneness, and you know, it’s helped me. Should we let Impies crush us back into subjects, when we may be right at next stage of evolution?”

  The bearded man frowned. “That’s heathenish talk, Bob. Me, I’ll hold my trust in God.” To Ivar: “God’s will be done. I never thought Empire was too bad, nor do I now. But it has gone morally rotten, and maybe we are God’s chosen instruments to give it cleansin’ shock.” After a pause: “If’s true, we’ll need powerful outside help. Maybe He’s preparin’ that for us too.” All their looks bent on Erannath. “I’m plain valley dweller and don’t know anything,” the speaker finished, “except that unrest is waxin’, and hope of deliverance.”

  Hastily, the oldster changed the subject.

  Night had toppled upon them when Firstling and Ythrian returned to camp. After they left town, stars gave winterkeen guidance to their feet. Otherwise the air was soft, moist, full of growth odors. Gravel scrunched beneath the tread of those bound the same way. Voices tended to break off when a talker noticed the nonhuman, but manners did not allow butting into a serious conversation. Ahead, lamps on poles glowed above wagons widespread among tents. The skirl of music loudened.

  “What I seek to understand,” Erannath said, “is this Aenean resentment of the Imperium. My race would resist such overlordship bitterly. But in human terms, it has on the whole been light, little more than a minor addition to taxes and the surrender of sovereignty over outside, not domestic, affairs. In exchange, you get protection, trade, abundant offplanet contacts. Correct?”

  “Perhaps once,” Ivar answered. The beer buzzed in his head. “But then they set that Snelund creature over us. And since, too many of us are dead in war, while Impies tell us to change ways of our forefathers.”

  “Was the late governorship really that oppressive, at least where Aeneas was concerned? Besides, can you not interpret the situation as that the Imperium made a mistake, which is being corrected? True, it cost lives and treasure to force the correction. But you people showed such deathpride that the authorities are shy of pushing you very hard. Simple cooperativeness would enable you to keep virtually all your institutions, or have them restored.”

  “How do you know?”

  Erannath ignored the question. “I could comprehend anger at the start of the occupation,” he said, “if afterward it damped out when the Imperial viceroy proved himself mild. Instead … my impression is that at first you Aeneans accepted your defeat with a measure of resignation—but since, your rebellious emotions have swelled; and lacking hopes of i
ndependence in reality, you project them into fantasy. Why?”

  “I reckon we were stunned, and’re startin’ to recover. And could be those hopes aren’t altogether wild.” Ivar stared at the being who trotted along beside him so clumsily, almost painfully. Erannath’s crest bobbed to the crutchlike swing of his wings; shadows along the ground dimmed luster of eyes and feathers. “What’re you doin’, anyway, tellin’ me I should become meek Imperial subject? You’re Ythrian—from free race of hunters, they claim—from rival power we once robbed of plenty real estate—What’re you tryin’ to preach at me?”

  “Nothing. As I have explained before, I am a xenologist specializing in anthropology, here to gather data on your species. I travel unofficially, hyai, illegally, to avoid restrictions. More than this it would be unwise to say, even as you have not seen fit to detail your own circumstances. I ask questions in order to get responses which may help me map Aenean attitudes. Enough.”

  When an Ythrian finished on that word, he was terminating a discussion. Ivar thought: Well, why shouldn’t he pretend he’s harmless? It’ll help his case, get him merely deported, if Impies happen to catch him … Yes, probably he is spyin’, no more. But if I can convince him, make him tell them at home, how we really would fight year after year for our freedom, if they’d give us some aid—maybe they would!

  The blaze of it in him blent into the larger brilliance of being nearly back in camp, nearly back to Fraina.

  And then—

  They entered a crowd milling between faded rainbows of tentcloth. Lamps overhead glared out the stars. Above the center pitch, a cylinder of colored panes rotated around the brightest light: red, yellow, green, blue, purple flickered feverish across the bodies and faces below. A hawker chanted of his wares, a barker of games of chance, a cook of the spiceballs whose frying filled every nostril around him. Upon a platform three girls danced, and though their performance was free and small-town nords were supposed to be close with a libra, coins glittered in arcs toward their leaping feet. Beneath, the blind and crippled musicians sawed out a melody which had begun to make visitors jig. No alcohol or other drugs were in sight; yet sober riverside men mingled with tinerans in noisy camaraderie, marveled like children at a strolling magician or juggler, whooped, waved, and jostled. Perched here and there upon wagons, the lucks of Waybreak watched.