The Coelura

by Anne McCaffrey

“The batteries are fully charged,” he said in a slow deep voice that showed the regret as much as his garment did. “With that power and what you have in your fuel tanks, you should reach the base of the Triangle.”

  “Thank you, Murell,” she said, putting as much and as little meaning as she could in that trite phrase. Then quickly she walked past him into the sun-dappled forest.

  As they climbed slowly up to her speedster, for the path the coelura had found for Murell wound in steep but manageable gradients, the aerial rainbows encouraged them with trills and whistles. Their song seemed to be aimed at Caissa, trying to lighten her spirits. She wished that somehow there could be a more joyous conclusion for herself, Murell and Murell’s faithful coelura. But they, above all, and he for whatever reason, must be protected by her silence.

  Fortunately, he had to sit behind her in the speedster, there being but one pilot’s seat. She concentrated on her flying and the directions he gave in a composed voice. She could feel his presence in every pore of her skin. She tried to discount this tremendous attraction for him to the coelura he wore but somehow . . .

  He gave her a heading due east of the island and then pointed out the shoreline features where she was to turn inland. She marked one hundred kilometers in silence until he asked her to reduce altitude. The landing site was visible as a rocklined square in the midst of tossing vegetation that pushed against rocky upthrusts of what had once been one of Demeathorn’s myriad volcanoes. She landed. She released the doorlock. He covered her hand with his.

  “Go safely, Caissa. Be well!” His deep voice was charged with emotion. He stepped down, with an awkwardness that now endeared her last vision of him.

  It was then that she realized no coelura were in evidence, dancing about him. She couldn’t question that. Lifting the speedster to leave Murell was the hardest task she had ever performed. She did catch a final glimpse of him ducking into the jungle, the colorlessness of his clothes reflecting his regret at leaving her more than the most polished phrase.

  When she was well within range, she contacted Blue City Tower, a smooth explanation of malfunction ready for the Chief Guardian. He responded by advising her of heavy air traffic into Blue Triad City and that she must surrender manual operation within sixty kilometers of the Tower. So, she hadn’t even been missed. She could easily have remained with Murell a few days. . . . She abruptly cancelled such thoughts. No one must ever suspect that she had been northeast or anywhere near the interdicted Oriolis shores.

  Trin had missed her and been keenly worried, Caissa discovered when she finally reached her apartments through the crowded grav channels.

  “What’s going on, Trin?” Caissa demanded. “No, I’m perfectly all right. I forgot to check my fuel tanks yesterday and had to wait until the batteries recharged this morning. I was completely safe from harm. Now, what is causing such furor? Cavernii seem to be assembling here like nathus on mired rerbok.”

  “Both Triads are in the Council Room, my lady,” Trin said, her eyes wide in her grey face. “Not a whisper why. None whatever!”

  “Both Triads in the Council Room?” Caissa recognized a meeting of premier significance. No secret had ever been extracted from that shielded chamber. Further, Red Ruler had been reputed mortally ill. Yet, if he were here in Blue City and so many Cavernii congregating, an executive decision was imminent. She shook with an apprehensive seizure as devastating as large-fever. “I’ll change and see what I can learn from my sire.” She had to know what was happening from Baythan for Murell’s and the coelura’s sakes.

  She hesitated as she unfastened the garment that Murell had touched. With reluctant hands, she stripped it off and watched Trin bundle the clothing aside. Caissa had herself well composed by the time Trin had dressed her appropriately.

  The many-leveled Blue Tower was a massive ziggurat, its square base eight kilometers broad, its subterranean facilities even broader. The upper tiers with their fine, far views were reserved for ranking residents but even the serving classes had windows. The public facilities included an enormous Hall off which lay the shielded Council Room and the Rulers’ private quarters and offices as well as an immense Function Room where the favored could promenade, enjoying spectacular views of forest, cliff and sea Amenities such as dining alcoves for large or small parties, dancing and entertainment arenas were situated on levels adjacent to the Public Complex.

  When Caissa reached the Function Room, it was crowded. She had never seen her languid peers so animated. She ought to have enjoyed that evening for rumor and speculation raised conversations out of the platitudinous to the provocative and amusing. But she found herself falling into reveries of her encounter with Murell. She re-examined every nuance and word, every caress and glance. She couldn’t concentrate on what anyone said to her, no matter how witty or outrageous. Nor could she find her sire among the milling horde of elegant people. Curiously enough, no one inquired from her of his health or whereabouts. She didn’t at first notice that omission, being required to greet visiting Cavernii and parry their urgent queries as to the Council’s extraordinary invocation. She even remembered to laugh as if she ought to know and couldn’t tell. Finally, she gave up searching for Baythan, to find herself looking out to the northeast. Surely that was a coincidence but she permitted herself to gaze long into the twilight distance, seeing but not seeing the lights of transports homing in on the Blue City Tower.

  Then she had to admit that she might be just slightly infatuated by Murell. Although she’d experienced that sort of shallow lustfulness before, her thoughts of Murell dwelt less on the sensuality of that brief relationship and more on the concepts exchanged and her intense desire to see him just once more. While loving, they had continued to converse, silent only when their mutual need demanded satiation. But they had talked with rare candidness, in total empathy, one with the other, for that short night. How different Murell had been, mused Caissa, sighing as she forced herself back to the social exigencies of the company she now graced.

  Then she saw her sire, making his way quickly towards her through the crowds. He had a compliment for her film-mist costume. The hazy dress was the nearest thing in her wardrobe to coelura. Indeed she ached within her fashionable mist for the rare and personal touch of coelura: Murell’s coelura, a garment that fitted the wearer as more than skin and soul!

  “The Cavernus Gustin met you?” Baythan’s expression was politely attentive. Nor did his eyes betray more than a casual interest in her answer.

  “I met him, my sire, and rejected him as well as his casket of badly cut bluestones!” Caissa allowed contempt to seep into her formal words.

  “Too bad,” said Baythan insincerely. “Look about you, my dear heir. The best and the worst are gathered. Including some you may not have previously encountered.”

  Caissa inclined her head. “Was your hunt productive?” she asked, feigning indifference to the answer.

  “My hunting gave me great satisfaction.” The quiet note in his voice, the slight raising of his chest, the tiniest suspicion of a glint in his eyes told Caissa more than she wanted to know.

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, my heir. Look for a Cavernus to please you--just long enough to supply your need.”

  He smoothly glided past her towards an important Caverna and her escort. Caissa knew that Baythan had told her all he intended her to know.

  And she desperately needed to know more. She must discover with whom he had hunted that previous day, where he had been hunting lately. She questioned his usual companions discreetly but each thought Baythan had hunted with someone else.

  “He does hunt solitary sometimes, Caissa,” one frequent comrade told her. “Says it’s more sporting for the prey if he’s got no back-up. Reckless of him, but that’s Baythan!”

  She left the Function Room then and returned to her own quarters. With the basest and best of motives, she used her sire’s code to check on his speedster. All flights were entered in the Blue Tower’s air traffic control but the
log of Baythan’s craft told her nothing. Distance travelled, mechanical servicing required, fuel used but all his flights were entered for the hunting preserves. Which, as Caissa knew, did not indicate his actual destinations.

  She wished she could ease her terrible fear that her sire had been hunting coelura. Though how he could, she didn’t understand. Murell had seemed to think that there had been no illegal visitations to the interdicted Oriolis. But then, he had been wrecked on that island for weeks. Caissa reviewed her sire’s interests during that period. She checked his daily log and appointments and he had, as usual, been hunting. Unless he had to attend either the Blue or Red Ruler, Baythan had hunted some part of every day for years.

  The next week was one of dreadful suspense for Caissa. Though Baythan did not permit her any private conversation, he watched her so intently that she had to affect interest in the various Cavernii to whom he introduced her and appear to be enjoying the festivities. Then it was announced that the privy negotiations of the two Rulers had been concluded. No more than that but the atmosphere turned electric, a current of jubilation rather than apprehension. Caissa’s fear for the coelura mounted in direct proportion to the lack of more explicit detail.

  On the eighth morning after her return to Blue City, Baythan presented himself at her quarters, dressed in the skin-fitting attire he customarily wore daytimes when not hunting.

  “I am entering a contract with a Caverna,” he told her casually. Then smiled as he glanced down at the resolution of the labyrinth game. “Well done, my dear Caissa. As my body-heir, you will favor me by being present at the ceremonial signing. Rather a choice, if unexpected, contract for me,” he said, glancing at his reflection in the mirrors.

  Caissa knew that she was expected to believe that his contract was spontaneous but she did not. Too many ploys had been cast at her sire on Demeathorn for him to acquiesce so amiably during this past week. Her anxiety for the coelura intensified.

  “An heir-contract is being entered,” he went on, more concerned about the small pucker across his lower back than his body-heir’s opinion. “She’s young and needs guidance for her heir,” and Baythan favored Caissa with a doting smile. “I shall expect you to make allowances for that. She’s never resided in either city. Rather a good move on my part. Good hunting in her area. Brilliant, you might say. You’ll know the whole of it soon enough, Caissa. Meanwhile, deny any rumors.”

  “Of course, sire,” she managed to say through taut lips.

  “You never disappoint me, Caissa. You are as discreet as stone.”

  Caissa lowered her eyelids in acceptance of that barbed compliment.

  “You would do well to follow my example and secure a Cavernus for yourself. There must be one man on Demeathorn you could endure for the time it takes to get an heir.”

  With that, he gave her a formal leave-taking and strode out.

  Caissa was shattered. What her father had not said, not even the name of the Caverna nor her area, confirmed suspicions that Baythan would have no way of knowing she entertained. Somehow her sire had encountered the Oriolis Caverna and persuaded the unsophisticated and sheltered girl to enter an heir-contract. And that heir-contract must include benefits and concessions which caused the two Rulers to meet in extraordinary council. Quite likely to remove the interdiction and sanctions on Oriolis. Caissa comprehended with a sickness in her soul that was close to active nausea that one of those concessions would concern coelura. She trembled now with disgust that it was her sire’s machinations that would endanger coelura.

  Yet Murell had told her, several times, that coelura were safe. Had he not also indirectly hinted that the Oriolis isolation would soon end? But, if he were part of coeluran protection and had been deliberately abandoned on that island, had he walked into another trap?

  She knew the coordinates of the landing strip where she had left him. She stripped off her morning wear, dialing for her speedster to be fueled and ready as she donned flying gear. She was dressed before her call got through to the hangar manager.

  “I do apologize, Lady Caissa,” he said with proper deference, “but no private vehicles are allowed clearance before . . .”

  “You forget who I am!” Caissa did not often use rank on those in subordinate positions but she had to find Murell.

  The manager stammered a repetition of his orders and added that these were issued by the Triad Rulers. Incoming traffic was thick as splodges, he said, and he didn’t know where he was going to put them.

  “Your problems don’t interest me. I intend to hunt today!”

  She disconnected, her finger trembling as she punched the Chief Guardian’s code. After some delay, he greeted her, apologizing punctiliously, but he confirmed the restriction on out-going traffic.

  “The rule applies to everyone, Lady Caissa. We’ve never had so many people in the City and from some mighty unexpected. . . .” His line cut off.

  “Origins,” she murmured, finishing the Guardian’s indiscreet remark. She clenched her hands until her nails made red crescents in her palms. How could she reach Murell if she couldn’t leave the City?

  She didn’t necessarily need her own vehicle, she realized. Any one would do. In fact, the first one she could find with sufficient fuel near an exit.

  She took the fast grav channel to the hangar level. Her rank got her past a nervous guard at a side entrance. Gigantic as the City’s storage space was, speedsters, cars, airbuses and even cargo vessels had had to be stacked to accommodate the numbers. The Oriolis vehicles were easily identified: their designs were so antique that she wondered how their patched and mended hulls had remained airborne. The largest one, which must have conveyed the Caverna, had been recently sprayed and its canopy was so new that it must have been a pre-contract gift. There was no vehicle close to the exit that she would consider safe to appropriate.

  Then it occurred to her that if the Oriolii were here to celebrate the contract, perhaps one of them might know Murell Three thin bands of red, yellow and blue had been his heir-tattoo. Too simple for much rank, she imagined, but enough for identification. He might even be here. She wanted to see him. She didn’t dare to see him. Yet, her sire had suggested she find a Cavernus. Surely the Oriolii had more than one.

  Caissa was surprised to discover that the location of the Caverna’s quarters and those of the visiting Oriolii was privileged information. Using her sire’s code, she did obtain their level and direction. Surely, as she would shortly be in a contractual relationship, she would have access to the Caverna’s rooms.

  Triad guardroids ignored her request as well as her voiced demand. They’d been programmed for limited service and firmly recognized that limitation. Her name had not been included in their briefing.

  Frustrated but undaunted, Caissa returned to her quarters. She changed into formal attire for surely Oriolii would join those gathered in the Function Room for the evening’s entertainments.

  She wandered through the assemblage twice before she realized there were no unknown faces and that her sire wasn’t present. To her increasing dismay, she also overheard comment on all sides that, not only had the elusive Minister Baythan agreed to an heir-contract, but the Triad Rulers were to make an announcement of planetary significance at the official signing of that document. Why hadn’t she told Murell of her suspicions on that island? They had only been unsubstantiated suspicions then, the conclusions of privileged fact and coincidence. She would not really have dishonored her relationship with her sire by voicing mere speculation. Or would she?

  She almost cried out with relief when her call ring tightened on her finger, indicating a message for her. Murell? She found the nearest unit in the Function hall and didn’t know whether to be annoyed or relieved that Trin timorously but urgently requested her to return to her apartment for a moment.

  As Trin had never before interrupted her attendance at a function, Caissa couldn’t imagine what prompted the request but any excuse to leave served Caissa well. She used the fast lane
, reserved for persons of her rank or official android messengers and might have missed the encounter had there been anyone else travelling at the moment. Something about the person in the slow channel opposite her caught her attention

  “Murell!”

  Though he was dressed in plain service clothes and had his head averted, she knew a shock of recognition that couldn’t be denied

  He glanced back as she swept by him, confirming her intuition.

  “Murell! Wait!” she cried, skillfully turning and thrusting herself across the fast channel to catch him. “Please wait! Grab hold. There’s terrible danger for the coelura. Your accident might have been arranged. Please! Wait! Something has to be done!”

  He had been half across into the fast channel to evade her when he paused, caught a handhold and pulled out of the stream to permit her to reach him. His face was as stern as it had been when she had admitted knowing of coelura. Since his clothing was dull as a servant’s ought to be, and not coelura, she could not measure his real feelings.

  “Murell, I only heard today. My sire is Baythan and has contracted with an Oriolis Caverna--with a body-heir clause for her, since I am his. And I wish I weren’t for he is somehow betraying the coelura to the Triad.” Did she just imagine that he was relenting towards her? “The day I met you, he’d been hinting at achieving his mission here. It must involve coelura. He cannot realize what he is doing to those glorious creatures!” She began to weep with stress, her words tumbling through the sobs she tried to control. “I tried to leave the city to warn you but no one is permitted to leave. I went to the hangar, hoping . . . but I couldn’t get a craft. Then I found where the Oriolii were quartered . . .” she had his unreserved attention now, “but they are android guarded and I wasn’t coded for admittance despite the contract. I’ve been in the Function Room but there isn’t a single Oriolis present. I did try, Murell. I did try! If there is any way in which I can help, let me know. The coelura must not be made to spin!”

  Unexpectedly, Murell captured her in his free arm and his voice soothingly repeated her name. He tilted her chin to make her look at him and then dried her tears as they drifted together in the backswirl of grav lap. She was astonished at his ministration and the kindness in his eyes.