Anderson, Poul - Novel 18

by The Winter of the World (v1. 1)

  Ever oftener he saw mounds where clusters of habitation had collapsed. Finally the entire landscape was an upheaval of them, scores of hundreds. He rode to the top of one for a wide view. In moss and tufts he glimpsed fragments, a broken brick, a ceramic shard, splinters of glass, bits of smooth stuff like hardened resin which men had molded. On the crest, he halted. His breath gusted outward, sharper than the wind that spooked around these barrows.

  Elsewhere in the world, remnants of ancient cities were seen above ground, but remnants only, long since mined out by denser populations. Roong was too huge to comprehend. At this nearness, the Ice behind had turned into a setting for it, like earth and sky. Most of its buildings were fallen, even as that which moldered beneath his horse’s feet. But they had been so thick that their cemetery became a single undulating elevation.

  Brush grew on this, because pieces stood yet to check the wind and trap the warmth. From hill-high rubble piles lifted snags of masonry walls, chimney stumps, eroded pillars drunkenly half-erect. And in a single district, though isolated giants reared elsewhere across more miles than his eyes reached, in a cluster he saw the towers.

  Dark athwart Ice and heaven, they bulked, they climbed, they soared. Time had gnawed them also. Windows gaped empty, lost sections of siding opened hollownesses to weather and rats, roofs had come crashing own through floor after floor, entrances were buried in rubbish and drifted soil, lichen had gone up their flanks to their shattered crowns, where hawks and owls now housed. But they were the towers. Such pride and power had raised them that they outlasted nations, empires, histories; before the final one of them toppled, they would have outlasted gods.

  Shaken to his heart, Sidfr rode downhill and onward.

  Scouts reported desertion, everywhere they reconnoitered. While thousands of foemen could lie hidden in these graveyard reaches, Sidtr did not believe any were. He led his troopers down overgrown lanes which had been avenues, and heard no challenge except echoes off ramparts. He thought those jeered, faintly, without really caring. A few more dayfly intruders were not worth dropping a comice upon.

  He felt his intuition confirmed when he found signs of the Northfolk. That was at an outlying titan. It fronted on a square otherwise bounded by wreckage; but its shadow had already filled the space with dusk, however much its heights still shone against blueness. Brush had been cleared, firepits dug, debris rearranged into huts across which hide canopies could be stretched. Trample marks and dried dung showed that horses had lately made use of a southbound thoroughfare. Most noticeable was a pile of steel beams, copper wire, aluminum sheet, metals more exotic, stacked inside an entrance which workers had chiseled. The Rogaviki mined Roong in summer. They returned in winter, when the tundra had frozen hard, to fetch their booty. This gang must have abandoned its enterprise to go fight the invaders.

  “We’ll establish ourselves here,” Sidir ordered.

  The men dismounted and hustled about, investigating, choosing spots, preparing for night. Their bodies would rest in a bit of comfort such as they had not known throughout the past month. Their souls— They spoke little, in muted tones. Their eyes flickered.

  Sidfr and Develkai entered the tower for an inspection. The space they found was a trifle brighter than outside, since gaps in the west facade admitted sunbeams. But overhead, everything swiftly vanished into gloom. A few girders barely showed, like tag ends of spiderweb. A chain and hook of modem workmanship dangled groundward. The air was raw; breath steamed, words did not ring as they should. In its odor went a tang of rust.

  “They salvage from the top down, eh?” Develkai remarked, jerking a thumb at the hoist. “Makes sense. Wouldn’t want to undermine the structure. As is ... hm,

  I suppose nothing has kept this from corroding away except what facing is left—curtain walls, interior cement and plaster, resin wrap, that kind of thing. The Rogaviki rip it off and attack the metal with saws and torches.”

  “Almost a sacrilege,” Sidfr murmured.

  “I don’t know, sir. I don’t know.” Develkai had a good education, but also a full share of Barommian hardheadedness. “I never really appreciated till now ... what a lot the ancestors grabbed. They left us mighty lean mines and oil wells, didn’t they?”

  Much of the best we have is along certain coasts, thought Sidfr, which does give weight to the theory that those lands were under water in the days when Roong got built. He knew little more than that. It was Seafolk, not Rahfdians, who read the rocks in search of a past older than mankind. But a sense of ineluctable time tingled along his backbone and out to the tips of his fingers.

  “Why shouldn’t we reclaim?” Develkai continued. “As is, nobody will ever make anything like this city again—”

  Was that why the ancients died? Had they spent so much of the earth that, when the Ice overcrawled a great part of it, not enough remained for them to live in the only way they knew?

  “—but we and our children have a right to take what we can, to use how we can, haven’t we, sir?”

  What can we? Since I have seen the thing itself-— Yurussun’s shriveled countenance appeared at the back of Sidfr’s mind. The scholar from Nafs had conversed with the scholars of Arvanneth, and later told his colleague from Haamandur: “—Long ago when this society was vigorous, its explorers got as far as Roong. I have found pieces of their descriptions, quoted in later works which the libraries preserve. What they tell suggests that the ancients made a fantastic effort to save the place, digging great channels, erecting great dams. As a result, the glacier advanced around instead of across it. Death struggle of a civilization that owned the entire world. ... I speculate if destruction came on those people—apparently fast, within centuries—if it came because of something they did.”

  I never understood what Roong is, nor the Ice which dwarfs it, until I saw them.

  “And we will. The Captain General was absolutely right about this mission. I admit I had my doubts, but you were right, sir. The barbarians have barely been picking at the treasure. After we install proper management, modem methods—”

  He does not yet understand. Sidir looked into the honest visage and said slowly, “We may be here too short a time.”

  —He refused explanation. A while later, rather recklessly, he took a lantern and climbed alone. Up he went on concrete stairs that were eroded to turtlebacks and slippery with evening’s frost—up over gaps where the Rogaviki had fastened ladders—at last onto a platform they had built at the summit. There he stood and shivered. Westward the sun lay below the glacier, which loomed as a barricade of darkness under a bleak green heaven. The moon hung crooked above black humps. Eastward the sky was the hue of clotted blood. A few stars peered forth. Below them, a frozen lake and frozen precipice caught lingering glimmers. Wind had died down and the silence was immense.

  I was not right. I was wrong, he confessed to the twilight. I led my men astray. We cannot use what here we have taken. Maybe we cannot even hold it. 1 doubt now that we should try to. He rallied courage. Eventually—oh, yes, yes, a tamed and settled land, a proper highway laid across the tundra, yes, here will be wealth past guessing. But not for us tonight. For us, the way is too hard, the country too stem, the ruins too big, too many. Meanwhile summer ages, winter comes on apace, hunger lopes close behind.

  I have not proclaimed that. The length of the Jugular River, each outpost supposes its trouble is unique. But I see all their reports. Everywhere the Northfolk are doing better than I would have dreamed at driving the wild cattle of every kind beyond our reach. Well, they ’re beasts of prey themselves, who know their quarry. . . . Donya is such a wolf, if Donya lives.

  He lifted his head. Surely his tired body talked, not his mind. His mind knew that, while he had counted on feeding his army largely from hunting, he was never so rash as to make his plans dependent on this. Soon they might lack fresh meat in his cantonments; but they would have bread, com, rice, beans, and they could go ice fishing. They might see him crawl back from Roong with his whole ba
nd, his venture proven futile; but they would know that was an inconsequential setback, and would come afire at his tale of what riches lay waiting. They might have difficult years ahead, tracking down an elusive, crafty, cruel enemy; but they would complete their task. It was a matter of steadfastness. In the end, they would possess all Andalin, for themselves and their seed.

  Then why am I sad? What do I fear?

  Donya, where are you, as night closes in on us both?

  CHAPTER 19

  Restless after several days, the mistress of Owlhaunt joined a hunting party. The Landmeet had dispersed, but that size of gathering inevitably scared away the game it didn’t kill, across considerable distances. She expected to be gone awhile. Josserek stayed at Thunder Kettle Station and labored. He declined a couple of offers from girls. To his surprise, everything he needed for his construction was in stock. Here in truth was the principal mart, workshop, hostel of the Northlands. The girls agreed amiably that, since he could, he should devote every waking hour to the task. He didn’t tell them that this helped keep him from missing Donya beyond endurance.

  She came back in a week. The first he knew was when she entered the room he had made his laboratory. It was large, rammed-earth walls whitewashed, windows full of sun though chill hung in the air. Hand and power tools cluttered the bench where he stood. A file grated as he trimmed a brass rod to exact size and shape.

  He heard the door open behind him, looked about, and there she was. The courtyard at her back lay dazzling bright. For a moment he saw her as a shadow, haloed by stray blond locks of hair. Then he made out the tinge along limbs and throat. She wore merely boots and a brief doeskin tunic. “Josserek,” she said. ‘The stars dance for me.” He came to her, borne on the tide of his blood, and their kiss had lasted long when he remembered to shut the door and turn again her way.

  She shoved him off, playfully, laughing, “Soon. In a better place.” And then, springing straight to seriousness: “How have you fared?”

  It isn’t me she’s asking about, he knew like a knife thrust.

  Although—

  When she gave him as much time as if he were a husband, he believed her endearments were honest. Yet he dared never hope her feelings came near being like this. That kind of wild captivity should have ended for him before his teen years did; and the Rogaviki didn’t seem to recognize it at any age. If they knew an emotion over and above fondness, fidelity, the sharing of fates, they kept it among their household privacies. There was no use in his wondering what kind of gladness she got from her sworn men. And there was no use in being jealous of them. They were fine fellows, who cordially accepted him and his linkage to their wife. Yes, they went out of their way to show him friendship....

  But they had ridden off beside her while he must stay behind.

  He swallowed, clenched fists, and brought himself down to calm. “Quite well,” he said. ‘How was your outflight?”

  “Good. Ho, let one tell you how Orovo bulldogged a moonhom—Later, later.” She gripped his arm. He felt her shiver. “Can you at last explain what you’re doing?”

  This is her country that’s endangered. In like circumstances, I’d want the news before I went on to my own affairs. And I haven’t her oneness with a homeland.

  “I kept pretty noncommittal,” he apologized, “because I wasn’t sure the scheme would work.” I could have studied the matter more carefully earlier, Donya, but you were here and I would not waste a heartbeat of your company. “Since, I’ve become confident it will. In fact, I expect to finish the apparatus in another two or three days.”

  She let go of him and crossed over to the bench, to see what he had assembled thus far. He snatched the pleasure of pleasing her by demonstrations. Fire crackled between the terminals of his induction coil, gold leaf spread and shut inside a glass electroscope like butterfly wings, a compass needle jumped in response to shifting magnetic fields.

  “And . . . this will talk . . . across a thousand miles?” she marveled. “I’ve never heard of the like. How could you keep in your head the knowledge of making it?”

  “Well, it’s not too complicated.” A simple spark gap oscillator and kite-borne antenna. “The hardest part was collecting what I needed for power.” How do you say “sulfuric acid” in Rogavikian, how test the selection of liquids offered, how check the output of the lead-plate batteries you at length construct? “Then, certain dimensions must be rather precise, or at least the relationships of their values must be correct.” Resistance, capacitance, inductance to generate a wavelength which will activate a shipboard receiver kept turned for this.

  Agile, her mind pounced: “How do you measure? Surely our yardsticks don’t match yours.”

  “No,” he smiled. “I carry mine around. You see, in my work of intelligence gathering, I might well sometimes have to build assorted devices from scratch. So I know the lengths and thicknesses of different parts of my body. Given those, I can measure out a pretty exact amount of water for weight, or a pendulum for time. If I need better accuracy—” He held out his forearms, whereon anchor, snake, and orca stood tattooed. “If you look closely at these designs, you’ll see small markings. They were put in very carefully.”

  She crowed in delight and clapped hands together. “Then soon you can call the Seafolk?”

  “Well, not two-way,” he said. “I can tap out a message in dot-dash code which they should hear on their instruments.

  “But as I told you, my chiefs didn’t throw me into Andalin alone and at random, like a die in a game. We’ve other agents busy in the Empire. And several ‘trade exploration’ ships in the Hurricane Sea and Dolphin Gulf are really fighting craft of ours.

  “Now—” he found he must shift temporarily to Arvannethan—“for this mission, I’ve a high brevetcy in my service. If I tell them to send a party to meet me and, more important, to pass on information and proposals of time to our chiefs in Eaching, they will.” In Rogavikian again: “This thing here is a time-saver. Without it, I’d likely have taken months to find my way to our ships, then months yet to get action started, while your people suffered and died. They might be harmed beyond hope. I don’t believe Sidfr would spend the winter idle, do you? As is ... by the time I make rendezvous on the Dolphin coast, my fellows ought to be in motion.”

  Joy brought tears. They clung and sparkled in heavy lashes. “And you’ll break him, Josserek, bearslayer, darling, hawk. You’ll rid the land of his horde.” She embraced him.

  He had everything he could do to stand back after a minute, fold his arms, shake his head, and say most softly:

  “I? Oh, no, Donya. Not I. Nor some boatloads of sailors. Nor barons from the provinces, theives and assassins from the alleys of Arvanneth. Only you Northfolk can free yourselves. If you are able to.”

  Hurt, astonished, she protested, “But you said before I left ... you told me your Seafolk could raise the city ... cut Sidfr’s army off—”

  “I said maybe that could be,” he answered. “He left the Jugular delta lightly defended. Nevertheless, we’ll be way too few. We’ll need a lot of Rogaviki fighters.”

  “Yes, yes, I understand that, and you heard at the Landmeet how many shouted they’ll come whenever you ask. Their kin who stayed home will too— tenfold.”

  “Dear, you do not understand,” he sighed. “I don’t know if I can ever show you. Listen, though. We Killimaraichans cannot take an open lead. Our country doesn’t want a war with the Empire. We’d be disowned, turned over to Rahfd for punishment . . . unless both powers can keep a pretense that we were nameless freebooters from an unknown part of the Mother Ocean, seeking what loot we could lift if we stirred up trouble.” He saw her puzzlement—governments, policies, criminal law, pirates, legal fictions, meaningless, meaningless— and hurried on: “Well, the Lords in Arvanneth’s hinterland can raise their tenant levies, the Knife Brotherhoods know street fighting, the Wise can maybe help make arrangements and intrigues; but we’ll still have to have plenty of Northfolk.

&nbs
p; “And beyond that—Sidfr’s army will still be unscathed. He’ll not meekly trudge home cross-country, you realize. He’ll come back down the Jugular to regain what’s been lost.

  “Then we’ll need many Northfolk.”

  She stood silent, fingers twisting together, before she whispered, “You shall have them. Word is flying from camp to camp.”

  He nodded. She had done her share of thinking before she left. Much of his, afterward, had drawn on what she told him. The valley kiths would not send warriors at once. They could not. Their grounds were under the sword. But east of them, as far as the Wilderwoods, ought to be a response in territories not yet assaulted. And mainly he could look for volunteers out of the western regions, from the Tantian Hills to the loess plaines of Starrok. Thus had Rogaviki rallied in the past to aid each other against the civilized. This time, the threat to destroy their herds throughout their lands should bring them together by the thousands.

  “Only say when and where they shall meet,” Donya asked.

  “I can’t be sure of that now,” he replied. “It won’t be very soon. I have to get south, meet my countrymen, help them lay the groundwork of revolt. Two months at least, likelier three. Then we’ll send for our first contingent of allies. Can you—can somebody—have them standing by, about that time, among households whose wintergarths aren’t far from the border?”

  “Yes.”

  “My message will say where they should join us. If luck is kind, they’ll give the extra strength to overrun the Imperials down there. The garrisons are undermanned and have little in the way of fortifications.

  “But then things get weasel-tricky. Sidfr will muster his troops and hurry downriver. We’d not fare well if we met him with our backs to the sea. We’ll have to move north. And the second, larger contingent of Rogaviki will have to meet us upstream, at a rather closely figured time. Can they do that?”