Alak took out a cigarette and puffed it into lighting. "Go on, then," he invited tonelessly.
"I'd like to point out a few things, that's all." Varris was speaking Terran; the guards waited stolidly, not understanding, their eyes restless. "I wanted to say I'm a patient man, but there's a limit to how much persecution I'll stand for."
"Persecution. And the massacres at New Venus?"
Fanaticism smoldered in Varris' eyes, but he answered quietly: "I was the legitimately chosen dictator. Under Caldonian law, I was within my rights. It was the Patrol which engineered the revolution. It's the Patrol which now maintains a hated colonialism over my planet."
"Yes—until such time as those hellhounds you call people have had a little sense beaten into them. If you hadn't been stopped, there'd be more than one totally dead world by now." Alak's smile was wintry. "You'll comprehend that for yourself, once we've normalized your psyche."
"You can't cleanly execute a man." Varris paced tiger-fashion. "You have to take and twist him till everything that was holy to him has become evil and everything he despised is good. I'll not let that happen to me."
"You're stuck here," said Alak. "I know your boat is almost out of fuel. Incidentally, in case you get ideas, mine is quite thoroughly boobytrapped. All I need do is holler for reinforcements. Why not surrender now and save me the trouble?"
Varris grinned. "Nice try, friend, but I'm not that stupid. If the Patrol could have sent more than you to arrest me, it would have done so. I'm staying here and gambling that a rescue party from Caldon will arrive before your ships get around to it. The odds are in my favor."
His finger stabbed out. "Look here! By choice, I'd have my men cut you down where you stand—you and that slimy little monster. I can't, because I have to live up to the local code of honor; they'd throw me out if I broke the least of their silly laws. But I can maintain a large enough bodyguard to prevent you from kidnaping me, as you've doubtless thought of doing."
"I had given the matter some small consideration," nodded Alak.
"There's one other thing I can do, too. I can fight a duel with you. A duel to the death—they haven't any other kind."
"Well, I'm a pretty good shot."
"They won't allow modern weapons. The challenged party has the choice, but it's got to be swords or axes or bows or—something provided for in their law." Varris laughed. "I've spent a lot of time this past year, practicing with just such arms. And I went in for fencing at home. How much training have you had?"
Alak shrugged. Not being even faintly a romantic, he had never taken much interest in archaic sports.
"I'm good at thinking up nasty tricks," he said. "Suppose I chose to fight you with clubs, only I had a switchblade concealed in mine."
"I've seen that kind of thing pulled," said Varris calmly. "Poison is illegal, but gimmicks of the kind you mention are accepted. However, the weapons must be identical. You'd have to get me with your switchblade the first try—and I don't think you could—or I'd see what was going on and do the same. I assure you, the prospect doesn't frighten me at all.
"I'll give you a few days here to see how hopeless your problem is. If you turn your flitter's guns on the city, or on me . well, I have guns, too. If you aren't out of the kingdom in a week—or if you begin to act suspiciously before that time—I'll duel you."
"I'm a peaceable man," said Alak. "It takes two to make a duel."
"Not here, it doesn't. If I insult you before witnesses, and you don't challenge me, you lose knightly rank and are whipped out of the country. It's a long walk to the border, with a bull whip lashing you all the way. You wouldn't make it alive."
"All right," sighed Alak. "What do you want of me?"
"I want to be let alone."
"So do the people you were going to make war on last year."
"Good night." Varris turned and went out the door. His men followed him.
Alak stood for a while in silence. Beyond the walls, he could hear the night wind of Ryfin's Planet. Somehow, it was a foreign wind, it had another sound from the rushing air of Terra. Blowing through different trees, across an unearthly land—
"Have you any plan at all?" murmured Drogs.
"I had one." Alak clasped nervous hands behind his back. "He doesn't know I won't bushwhack him, or summon a force of gunners, or something lethal like that. I was figuring on a bluff—but it seems he has called me. He wants to be sure of taking at least one Patrolman to hell with him."
"You could study the local code duello," suggested Drogs. "You could let him kill you in a way which looked like a technical foul: Then the king would boot him out and I could arrest him with the help of a stun beam."
"Thanks," said Alak. "Your devotion to duty is really touching."
"I remember a Terran proverb," said Drogs. Galmathian humor can be quite heavy at times. " The craven dies a thousand deaths, the hero dies but once.' "
"Yeh. But you see, I'm a craven from way back. I much prefer a thousand synthetic deaths to one genuine case. As far as I'm concerned, the live coward has it all over the dead hero—" Alak stopped. His jaw fell down and then snapped up again. He flopped into a chair and cocked his feet up on the windowsill and ran a hand through his ruddy hair.
Drogs returned to the water pipe and smoked imperturbably. He knew the signs. If the Patrol may not kill, it is allowed to do anything else—and sublimated murder can be most fascinatingly fiendish.
In spite of his claims to ambassadorial rank, Alak found himself rating low—his only retinue was one ugly nonhumanoid. But that could be useful. With their faintly contemptuous indifference, the nobles of Wainabog didn't care where he was.
He went, the next afternoon, to Grimmoch Abbey.
An audience with Gulmanan was quickly granted. Alak crossed a paved courtyard, strolled by a temple where the hooded monks were holding an oddly impressive service, and entered a room in the great central tower. It was a large room, furnished with austere design but lavish materials, gold and silver and gems and brocades. One wall was covered by bookshelves, illuminated folios, many of them secular. The abbot sat stiffly on a carved throne of rare woods. Alak made the required prostration and was invited to sit down.
The old eyes were thoughtful, watching him. "What brought you here, my cub?"
"I am a stranger, holy one," said the human. "I understand little of your faith, and considered it shame that I did not know more."
"We have not yet brought any outworlder to the Way," said the abbot gravely. "Except, of course, Sir Varris, and I am afraid his devotions smack more of expediency than conviction."
"Let me at least hear what you believe," asked the Patrolman with all the earnestness he could summon in daylight.
Gulmanan smiled, creasing his gaunt blue face. "I have a suspicion that you are not merely seeking the Way," he replied. "Belike there is some more temporal question in your mind."
"Well—" They exchanged grins. You couldn't run a corporation as big as this abbey without considerable hard-headedness. But Alak persisted in his queries. It took an hour to learn what he wanted to know.
Thunsba was monotheistic. The theology was subtle and complex, the ritual emotionally satisfying, the commandments flexible enough to accommodate ordinary fleshly weaknesses. Nobody doubted the essential truth of the religion; but its Temple was another matter.
As in medieval Europe, the church was a powerful organization, international, the guardian of learning and the gradual civilizer of a barbarous race. It had no secular clergy—every priest was a monk of some degree, inhabiting a large or small monastery. Each of these was ruled by one officer—Gulmanan in this case—responsible to the central Council in Augnachar city; but distances being great and communications slow, this supreme authority was mostly background.
The clergy were celibate and utterly divorced from the civil regime, with their own laws and courts and punishments. Each detail of their lives, down to dress and diet, was minutely prescribed by an unbreakable code—t
here were no special dispensations. Entering the church, if you were approved, was only a matter of taking vows; getting out was not so easy, requiring a Council decree. A monk owned nothing; any property he might have had before entering reverted to his heirs, any marriage he might have made was automatically annulled. Even Gulmanan could not call the clothes he wore or the lands he ruled his own: it all belonged to the corporation, the abbey. And the abbey was rich; for centuries, titled Thunsbans had given it land or money.
Naturally, there was conflict between church and king. Both sought power, both claimed overlapping prerogatives, both insisted that theirs was the final authority. Some kings had had abbots murdered or imprisoned, some had gone weakly to Canossa. Morlach was in-between, snarling at the Temple but not quite daring to attack it.
"… I see." Alak bowed his head. "Thank you, holy one."
"I trust your questions are all answered?" The voice was dry.
"Well, now there are some matters of business—" Alak sat for a moment, weighing the other. Gulmanan seemed thoroughly honest; a direct bribe would only be an insult. But honesty is more malleable than one might think—
"Yes? Speak without fear, my cub. No words of yours shall pass these walls."
Alak plunged into it: "As you know, my task is to remove Sir Varris to his own realm for punishment of many evil deeds."
"He has claimed his cause was righteous," said Gulmanan noncommittally.
"And so he believes. But in the name of that cause, he was prepared to slay more folk than dwell on this entire world."
"I wondered about that—"
Alak drew a long breath and then spoke fast. "The Temple is eternal, is it not? Of course. Then it must look centuries ahead. It must not let one man, whose merits are doubtful at best, stand in the way of an advancement which could mean saving thousands of souls."
"I am old," said Gulmanan in a parched tone. "My life has not been as cloistered as I might have wished. If you are proposing that you and I could work together to mutual advantage, say so."
Alak made a sketchy explanation. "And the lands would be yours," he finished.
"Also the trouble, my cub," said the abbot. "We already have enough clashes with King Morlach."
"This would not be a serious one. The law would be on our side."
"Nevertheless, the honor of the Temple may not be compromised."
"In plain words, you want more than I've offered."
"Yes," said Gulmanan bluntly.
Alak waited. Sweat studded his body. What could he do if an impossible demand was made?
The seamed blue face grew wistful. "Your race knows much," said the abbot. "Our peasants wear out their lives, struggling against a miserly soil and seasonal insect hordes. Are there ways to better their lot?"
"Is that all? Certainly there are. Helping folk progress when they wish to is one of our chief policies. My . . my king would be only too glad to lend you some technicians—farmwrights?—and show you how."
"Also . it is pure greed on my part. But sometimes at night, looking up at the stars, trying to understand what the traders have said—that this broad fair world of ours is but a mote spinning through vastness beyond comprehension—it has been an anguish in me that I do not know how that is." Now it was Gulmanan who leaned forward and shivered. "Would it be possible to to translate a few of your books on this science astronomic into Thunsban?"
Alak regarded himself as a case-hardened cynic. In the line of duty, he had often and cheerfully broken the most solemn oaths with an audible snap. But this was one promise he meant to keep though the sky fell down.
On the way back, he stopped at his flitter, where Drogs was hiding from a gape-mouthed citizenry, and put the Galmathian to work in the machine shop.
A human simply could not eat very much of this planet's food; he would die in agony. Varris had taken care to have a food-synthesizer aboard his boat, and ate well that night of special dishes. He did not invite Alak to join him, and the Patrolman munched gloomily on what his service imagined to be an adequate, nutritious diet.
After supper, the nobles repaired to a central hall, with a fireplace at either end waging hopeless war on the evening chill, for serious drinking. Alak, ignored by most, sauntered through the crowd till he got to Varris. The fugitive was conversing with several barons; from his throne, King Morlach listened interestedly. Varris was increasing his prestige by explaining some principles of games theory which ought to guarantee success in the next war.
".. And thus, my gentles, it is not that one must seek a certain victory, for there is no certainty in battle, but must so distribute his forces as to have the greatest likelihood of winning—"
"Hogwash!" snapped Alak. The Thunsban phrase he used was more pungent.
"You disagree, then, sir?" inquired a native.
"Not exactly," said the Patrolman. "It is not worth disagreeing with so lunkheaded a swine as this baseborn Varris."
His prey remained impassive. There was no tone in the voice: "I trust you will retract your statement, sir."
"Yes, perhaps I should," agreed Alak. "It was too mild. Actually, of course, as is obvious from a single glance at his bloated face, Sir Varris is a muckeating sack of lip-wagging flatulence whose habits I will not even try to describe since they would make a barnyard blush."
Silence hit the hall. The flames roared up the chimneys. King Morlach scowled and breathed heavily, but could not legally interfere. The warriors dropped hands to their knives.
"What's your purpose?" muttered Varris in Terran.
"Naturally," said Alak in Thunsban, "if Sir Varris does not dispute my assertions, there is no argument."
The Caldonian sighed. "I will dispute them on your body tomorrow morning," he answered.
Alak's foxy face broke into a delighted grin. "Do I understand that I am being challenged?" he asked.
"You do, sir. I invite you to a duel."
"Very well." Alak looked around. Every eye in the place was welded to him. "My lords, you bear witness that I have been summoned to fight Sir Varris. If I mistake me not, the choice of weapons and ground is mine."
"Within the laws of single combat," rumbled Morlach venomously. "None of your outworld sorceries."
"Indeed not." Alak bowed. "I choose to fight with my own swords, which are lighter than your claymores but, I assure you, quite deadly if one does not wear armor. Sir Varris may, of course, have first choice of the pair.' The duel will take place just outside the main gate of Grimmoch Abbey."
There was nothing unusual about that. A badly wounded contestant could be taken in to the monks, who were also the local surgeons. In such a case, he was allowed to recover, after which a return engagement was fought. In the simple and logical belief that enmities should not be permitted to fester, the Thunsban law said that no duel was officially over till one party had been killed. It was the use of light swords that caused interest.
"Very good," said Varris in a frosty voice. He was taking it well; only Alak could guess what worries—what trap is being set?—lay behind those eyes. "At dawn tomorrow, then."
"Absolutely not," said Alak firmly. He never got up before noon if he could help it. "Am I to lose my good sleep on account of you? We will meet at the time of Third Sacrifice." He bowed grandly. "Good night, my lord and gentles."
Back in his apartment, he went through the window and, with the help of his small antigrav unit, over the wall and out to his boat. Varris might try to assassinate him as he slept.
Or would the Caldonian simply rely on being a better swordsman? Alak knew that was the case. This might be his last night alive.
A midafternoon sun threw long streamers of light across blue turf and the walls of Grimmoch Abbey. There was a hundred-meter square cleared before the gate; beyond that, a crowd of lords and ladies stood talking, drinking, and betting on the outcome. King Morlach watched ominously from a portable throne—he would not thank the man who did away with the useful Sir Varris. Just inside the gateway, Abbot Gulmanan
and a dozen monks waited like stone staints.
Trumpets blew, and Alak and Varris stepped forth. Both wore light shirts and trousers, nothing else. An official frisked them ceremoniously for concealed weapons and armor. The noble appointed Master of Death trod out and recited the code. Then he took a cushion on which the rapiers were laid, tested each, and extended them to Varris.
Alak's blade felt light and supple in his fingers. His vision and hearing were unnaturally clear, it was as if every grass blade stood out sharp before him. Perhaps his brain was storing data while it still could. Varris, one hundred forty meters off, loomed like a giant.
"And now, let the Allshaper defend the right!" Another trumpet flourish. The duel was on. Varris walked out, not hurrying. Alak went to meet him. They crossed blades and stood for a moment, eyes thrusting at eyes.
"Why are you doing this?" asked the refugee in Terran. "If you have some idiotic hope of killing me, you might as well forget it. I was a fencing champion at home."
"These shivs are gimmicked," said Alak with a rather forced grin. "I'll let you figure out how."
"I suppose you know the penalty for using poison is burning at the stake—" For a moment, there was a querulous whine in the voice. "Why can't you leave me alone? What business was it ever of yours?"
"Keeping the peace is my business," said Alak. "That's what I get paid for, anyhow."
Varris snarled. His blade whipped out. Alak parried just in time. There was a thin steel ringing in the air.
Varris danced gracefully, aggressively, a cold intent on his face. Alak made wild slashes, handling his rapier like a broadsword. Contempt crossed Varris' mouth. He parried a blow, riposted, and Alak felt pain sting his shoulder. The crowd whooped.
Just one cut! Just one cut before he gets me through the heart! Alak felt his chest grow warm and wet. A flesh wound, no more. He remembered that he'd forgotten to thumb the concealed button in his hilt, and did so with a curse.
Varris' weapon was a blur before his eyes. He felt another light stab. Varris was playing with him! Coldly, he retreated, to the jeers of the audience, while he rallied his wits.
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