“That was the main reason, Don Andrek. On the other hand, there are still some things that you don’t know about your brother, and which I intend to tell you before I kill you.”
“Proceed, then. I would like very much to hear them.”
“I wouldn’t be too sure about that, your Honor.” Huntyr smiled almost languidly. “Well, as I was saying, the old Regent demanded this thing of the Master Surgeon, that he build a marvelous device to sing and make lovely poetry, and take the mind of his nephew away from thoughts of dying. So the Master Surgeon set about making his design. The design called for an electron circuit identical to the cerebrum of the Laureate. But it would take many weeks. They didn’t have that much time. So we simply seized the Laureate himself—”
“—Omere!” breathed Andrek. And now that he was finally to learn the answer to his eighteen-year search, he found that he was struck dumb, stunned, unaware of anything in the cabin except Huntyr’s face and voice. The end was coming. His body seemed floating in a slow horrid realization that pounded at him with every beat of his heart. Within a matter of seconds it would be more than he could endure. “Omere?” he whispered again.
“Yes, Omere. I handled it personally. It wasn’t difficult. We took him from the coronation straight to the hospital wing. The Master Surgeon performed the cranial operation and circuit integration into the computer console. There was some question about whether the computer should be sighted or blind. They decided, I think, that the rendition of aural imagery would be sharpened if they cut his optical circuits. So, to make him an even better poet, they blinded him.”
Andrek’s face was dead-white. He saw a vision of a great cabinet of fine polished wood, with dials, an interior of intricate electronic circuits. He had listened to it many times. And it could not risk their mutual deaths to reveal its identity. He did not recognize his own voice, drawn, pain-blinded, far away. “Omere … Rimor!”
Huntyr nodded. He was immensely pleased with the effect on the other. He pulled his mouth back over his teeth in a tigerish grin.
“But how…”—Andrek’s voice was thick, barely intelligible—“could they force him to perform … to sing … to compose…”
“It was easy. Quirinal—the slave drug—when you take that, you find yourself wanting to do what you are best at doing…”
“Be silent!” shrieked Andrek. In one smooth motion he raised the biem, sighted over Raq’s crouched body, and pulled the trigger.
Huntyr jerked—not so much (it seemed to Andrek) from the physical impact of the bolt—as from disbelief. The slug-gun fell from his hand. He seemed then to be trying to raise his hand, to point … at Iovve. His lips came together, but only a whispered sigh emerged. “Maa—” Then his hand dropped, and his eyes stared at nothing.
Something inside Andrek watched this with bright elation. But then, discovering this feeling within himself, he jerked up straight in his chair. He felt he should censor this primitive attitude toward his enemies. He, an advocate sworn to uphold the laws of the Home Galaxy, had taken the law into his own hands, and had again slain a man. Again, it was self-defense, but it still cut across the grain of a lifetime of conditioning. He shook his head slowly. Thinking this way did nothing to relieve the fact that he had been absolutely delighted on seeing that clean gaping hole appear in Huntyr’s chest. But no matter, the main thing, regardless of what anyone thought about it, was that he was still living, and Huntyr was dead.
He looked vaguely over toward Iovve, as though to find either absolution or an answer. And what had Huntyr been trying to say, there at the last, when he almost pointed at Iovve…? Had Huntyr known the pilgrim? He’d have to find out. Too many mysteries. Solve one, two more sprang up.
Iovve returned Andrek’s questioning stare quietly. “Get hold of yourself. We still have a lot to do.”
“What?” said Andrek numbly.
“Do you have an extra suit? Full legal robes of a don?”
“Yes.”
“Get Huntyr’s bloody jacket off, then get the robes on him.”
What was Iovve up to? He shrugged his shoulders. He’d have to trust him. “All right.” After much fumbling, Andrek got the robe on Huntyr’s body. “It’s too small,” he mumbled.
“No matter. Just leave him there. Get Raq back in your pocket, and get your case and valise. We’re moving.”
“Moving?”
“Of course. We can’t stay here.”
“Where’ll we go?”
“To Number Twelve, Huntyr’s suite.”
Andrek’s jaw dropped. “Are you crazy?”
“Wake up, dear boy. It’s the only safe place on the ship.”
“But how about Vang?”
“I think he’s either tied up or dead. In either case, he wouldn’t be a problem. And my guess is that Huntyr killed him when he found your check. But if Huntyr didn’t kill him, we will.”
“And then?”
“We’ll just move the body in here, and trade his Alean mantle for the simple gray of a Ritornellian pilgrim.”
Andrek stared at the pilgrim in near awe. “I see! The ship’s officers will think the bodies in my cabin are you and me!”
“Correction. They’ll know. Because you’ll call the captain from Huntyr’s suite and tell him just that. Wait a moment, while I get my bag and medical kit, and we’ll both go down there together.”
As they had expected, they found Vang in Number Twelve. He lay crumpled on the floor, and his pallid face was finally at peace. Andrek had the strange impression that Vang was glad the end had come. His death was not difficult to reconstruct. He had been strangled with his own cord. There had been a struggle, and pieces of furniture were still floating about. A chair had somehow got attached to the ceiling. The poison case was broken open; some of the vials were crushed, and their contents half-absorbed into the foam-cushion lining. They did not search the body. Undoubtedly Huntyr had retrieved the check. Andrek was content to leave it in Huntyr’s wallet.
Andrek contemplated the still form in silence. Either the goddess, or a strange anatomic freak, had prevented the engorgement of cheek and protrusion of eyeballs that normally accompanied the gift of Alea. Vang’s one lapse, in an otherwise blameless service to the blind one, had evidently been forgiven, and the goddess had accepted him. The knowledge of her love was written in his mouth and eyes. His hand still tightly clasped the fatal dodecahedron that had betrayed him. Andrek pushed the thumb back and looked at the number. It was of course twelve, the most favored to Alea.
The advocate sighed. He had engineered this death, and he would do it again, given the same threat to his own life. Yet it was a sad thing.
“We’ll have to hurry,” said Iovve crisply.
“Silence!” growled Andrek. “Vang was my enemy, but we were classmates. There are last words to be said, and to be thought for him, and I must do this, since there is no one else.” After a moment he muttered, “I did not want this. Good-bye, Ajian.”
Hurriedly, they hauled the corpse back to Andrek’s former cabin, and left it alongside what was left of Huntyr.
Ten minutes had not elapsed before they both sat in front of the intercom in Huntyr’s suite. Andrek slipped the switch. His voice was strangely calm. “Huntyr here,” he said, imitating the investigator’s harsh guttural. “Give me the captain. Captain Forgaz! Huntyr. Yes, mission accomplished. Thank you. Both bodies in the don’s cabin. Can you send a couple of crewmen around there? They must be discreet. The Great House doesn’t want any publicity. We will hold you responsible. Of course, Captain. Just thought I’d mention it. Hold on a moment.” Andrek paused, and almost smiled when he continued. “My Alean friend here insists that all three of us undergo purification rites. What? Purification rites. Yes, news to me, too. He will be fasting for the next three days. No, Captain, just him. I and my assistant, Mr. Hasard, will not be fasting, but we are not supposed to leave the cabin until we dock at the station. Can you ask the chef to send up meals in the tube for the two of us? Than
k you, Captain. I’ll mention you in my report to the Magister.”
Andrek flipped off the switch, then continued to sit there, silent, immobile. After a long time, he turned around.
Iovve was lying in one of the three bunks, his gloved hands folded peacefully over his rhythmically moving chest. “There is an unwitting trace of truth in that very fanciful fable,” he murmured sleepily.
“What do you mean?”
“About sending up meals. Actually, you will need food only for yourself. During these last days of my pilgrimage, I shall truly be fasting. And now, my son, I suggest we both retire. It’s been a hard day.”
Andrek stared at his companion, then shrugged. A strange one! He floated up quietly, drifted over to the porthole, and looked out. Outside, all was blackness. There was no point of reference to show the fantastic speed of the ship, transphotic even under chemical drive.
He reached cautiously into his pocket, pulled Raq out, and placed her on the drapes alongside the porthole. She ran up the fabric a short distance and disappeared into the folds.
He was alone.
And now what?
For the moment, he seemed safe. At least until the ship reached the Node Station. Another day and a half. He’d have to leave the ship when they got there. He couldn’t return to Goris-Kard for a long time; perhaps never. He thought of his father and brother, and his throat knotted. His father was dead. He accepted that. But Omere—in a sense, at least—was still alive. But he might as well be dead, for all the help that Andrek could give him. For even if he, Andrek, were back in the Great House now, wielding all the power of the Magister and all the skill of that infamous Master Surgeon, he could still do nothing for Omere.
That seemed to leave only—revenge? On whom? The old Regent was dead. Huntyr was dead. The Master Surgeon had vanished, and might well be dead. That left Oberon. But could he lift his hand against the father of Amatar? He didn’t know. And just now it was quite academic whether he could or could not, because he was now a fugitive, under sentence of death. He would do well to save his own skin. It was foolish even to think of revenge until he was safe from Oberon.
He felt very tired. With forced gestures he undressed and got into his pajamas. With one hand on his bunk, he turned and looked over at Iovve, now asleep. You, he thought, have risked your life to keep me alive. For what? Whatever the reason, you bungled it. You don’t know it, strange Doctor, but you never did plug in your so-called force-field generator into the ship’s current. But your field came on anyway. Is it something under those gray robes? Is this why you used to glow in the dark? It must be something over which you have no real control, because it turned off exactly at the instant Xerol entered the Node. When the ship went off nuclear, so did you. There must be something on, or even in, your body, something nuclear-powered, and which permeates your whole system, so that, outside the Node, it ionizes the air around you. And it’s your whole body, not just your face.
And now you claim you are fasting. But I suspect, my friend, that fasting for you is normal—that you do not eat at all, in the hominid sense.
Iovve, who are you?
(And do I really want to know?)
What is this unknown thing for which you are saving me? How long am I to be kept alive? What is my small role in your mysterious plan?
Since you refuse to tell me the fate you have in store for me, you must think I might have preferred Huntyr’s death. And what about your robes, pilgrim? You are making your last journey—this time to die at the Node. Is it just a bit of religious faker, or do you really intend to go through with it? And what will be the manner of your death? You have had several opportunities to die within the last several hours—and you have refused them all. What are you waiting for? What remains to complete your pilgrimage? And when it is all done, am I supposed to die with you?
He climbed into his bunk and strapped himself in, still musing. And what was Huntyr trying to tell me about you as he sat there, dying? Huntyr knew you, pilgrim, and as he died, he tried to name you. Huntyr lifted his finger and pointed, and tried to speak. But nothing recognizable passed his lips. So your secret is safe. But in a manner of speaking, I am grateful to Huntyr. For Huntyr, my enemy, has told me a great deal more than you, Iovve my friend. And I think, my pious companion, that there is one danger worse than Vang … or Huntyr … or Hasard. Worse even than Oberon of the Delfieri. And that is Iovve, the gray pilgrim of Ritornel.
And so thinking, he fell asleep.
11. AN ENTRANCE QUESTIONED
In the last hour of the third day, as Xerol was cautiously nosing in toward the Node Station under slow deceleration, Andrek happened to look out the porthole. “Iovve, look!” He pointed excitedly. “A planet. It must be Terror.”
“Very likely, my boy, very likely.” The pilgrim clacked over to the quartz window and peered out. “So it is.”
They watched in silence as the ship drifted past the great ball in a slow parabola. As a warning to navigation, thousands of light-buoys were orbiting the planet, forming a giant spectral crown. The lights were turned inward toward the globe, bathing her equator in a band of ghostly, pale radiance. To Andrek, it seemed somehow highly incongruous. Terror, the Devil Planet, with a halo! No matter. Tomorrow those lights would vanish forever.
Andrek then suddenly noticed that Iovve was watching him. “Well?” he demanded.
“Nothing, my boy. Not a thing. Just wondering about your own feelings. About Terror, I mean.” He nodded toward the porthole. “See that?”
Andrek peered out again. Beyond the halo, a tiny light was slowly circling the planet. “What is it?”
“The demolition ship. Tomorrow, they expect to activate the explosive capsule that will destroy the planet. They wait only for the final order from the arbiters.”
“Well, of course they’re going to destroy the planet. It’s required by intergalactic law. It’s the just fate of every planet that starts a nuclear war.” He turned and stared hard at the pilgrim. “That’s my mission here. Within a few hours, I will appear before the arbiters and formally confirm the position of my government, that Terror must be destroyed. There’s no conceivable alternative.”
“Of course, my boy, of course,” said Iovve smoothly. He paused, and said in a reflective tone, “A solemn moment, nevertheless. We’re among the last to see Terra alive.”
Andrek turned on him grimly, “You said—Terra!”
“I did. Terra. We can at least be realistic. That is the real name, as you well know. Their name for their planet.” He shrugged. “Terror … Terra. It is the privilege of the victors to curse the defeated with any name they choose. No son of Terra is now alive to rise in her defense. And her grandsons and nephews, including you, my boy, couldn’t care less.”
Was it coming now? Was Iovve finally about to untangle the web? Breathing was suddenly difficult, and he fought off a feeling of suffocation. But he knew he could not hurry the pilgrim. He said bluntly: “That’s strange talk, coming from a man of peace and holiness.”
Iovve blithely ignored him. He continued, as though talking to himself. “We have accepted her gifts in a thousand ways. We still use the old tongues on occasion.” He peered sideways at Andrek. “The word ‘Amatar,’ for example.”
Andrek started. “What do you mean,” he stammered.
“He! He! I thought that would get you! Yes, Amatar … from a mater—‘without mother.’ Amatar, the Motherless One. But you’re not interested in Terran etymology. You’re here to destroy Terra and everything Terran.”
And now again the tantalizing feeling of recognition. He had heard these words before. And this voice. Far away. Where? When? The Motherless One. It meant something. He had heard it before. He had been afraid before. Was he afraid now? His mouth was dry, and his palms were wet. He seized the pilgrim by the shoulders. “Why is she called the ‘Motherless One’?” he demanded. “What do you know about Amatar?”
“Gently, my boy. Everything in good time.”
A buz
zer was sounding insistently in the room. “Just now,” said Iovve, “the ship is locking on at the station. We have about two minutes to pack and get out. And let’s hope we don’t run into anybody whom the fact of our continuing existence might startle or distress. So why don’t we just get everything together and walk out through the freight port.”
Andrek was defeated again. His arms dropped from Iovve. Very soon, he thought, we are going to have a long talk, about many things. He looked about the room. “What’ll we do about Raq? Take her along?”
“Out of the question, dear boy. Have you observed her condition recently?”
“Condition?” Andrek went over to the fold in the porthole drape, which Raq had selected as “home.”
“Not too close,” Iovve called out.
Standing about a yard away, Andrek could make out the little silken ball, nearly complete. Raq stopped work on it and covered it with her body as his shadow fell on her.
“Great bouncing Alean eyeballs!” said Andrek softly. “It’s an egg sac! She’s a mother!”
“Or soon will be. I think, my boy, we’d better give our god-fatherly blessings from a safe distance. There’s nothing like motherhood to foul up a conditioned recognition reflex.”
“But—the ship’s crew… If we leave her here, they’ll be bitten.”
“Yes, won’t they!” agreed Iovve gleefully. “Sorry we won’t be here to watch the fun. But we can’t move her. The alternative is to kill her here and now.”
“We can’t do that.” Andrek clenched his teeth. “All right. Good-bye, Raq, and thanks.”
Cases in hand, they sneaked down back corridors to the freight elevators.
Xerol’s flank was sealed into the docking locks of the Node Station at several points. Officers, crew, and passengers used the forward tubes. Fuel and water lines were intermediate. The freight room was aft.
Holding to the handrails, Andrek and Iovve floated over, around, and through stacks of metal boxes, mostly bound with metal straps to the floor, walls, and ceiling of the freight room, propelling themselves from time to time by gentle nudges of toes and fingertips. As they approached the great doorway opening into the station, the clutter and congestion grew. They encountered several of the crew, working with cargo, but hurried past without challenge. They had a bad moment when the last exits seemed hopelessly blocked by the flow of goods on a conveyor belt running into the ship. But they waited a few seconds and then sailed over the belt onto the station dock.
The Ring of Ritornel Page 15