• • •
The spires of the Port were gilded by the early sun. Far off on the flattened expanse of earth that served as Neweden’s link to the worlds of the Alliance, ground vehicles bore the phallic cylinders of storage units to the waiting freighters at the edge of the landing field. To one side of the Port stood the buildings of Sterka—nearest the Port, the hostels, the bars, and places of varied entertainment for the crews of the Alliance ships coming in and out of Neweden. Across the field from the city stood the ornate and intricate architecture of the Diplo Center. It was a varied if not beautiful scene by morning, and m’Dame d’Embry, the Alliance Regent of the Diplos on Neweden, gazed long at it before opaquing the window and turning back into her rooms.
She often compared Neweden to Niffleheim, and Neweden sometimes had the best of the comparison. Neweden had the rough grace of untitled and little-known regions to recommend it, a crude pastorality that the more urban and urbane worlds lacked. Crowded worlds and aesthetics that turned to dry dust in the eyes seemed to go together—it had been decades since she had been awed by the sight of Niffleheim’s metallic surface.
The room had already taken the sleeping plate to the ceiling, where the plate functioned as a lighting unit. Music drifted in polyphonic eddies from the walls—a harpsichord concerto by Hagee, an obscure Terran composer—and a holo of d’Vellia’s soundsculpture Gehennah, half-size, loomed in the corner nearest the comlink. In her dressing gown and without the bodytints that had once been fashionable (and which she still wore, unaware or simply uncaring that they were no longer in favor), her body reflected its age. The eyes were caught up in a finely-knit spiderweb of lines, her face had a patina of grayness, and when she moved it was with a certain sureness that is missing in a younger person’s step, the kittenish ungainliness of youth. She didn’t bother to treat her hair—it was dry and whitened. The flesh on her body had a laxness, a sag, as if it had once confined more bulk than she now possessed. But if d’Embry had lost physical fullness, she was compensated by an avid spirit; as if in leaving, the flesh had cast off and left behind the energy it once encompassed. The snared eyes were undimmed and lively, the gnarled hands strong and agile. She was a legend in Diplo circles, the grand-dame of Niffleheim, and she had resisted all well-meaning attempts to retire her from active duty with a fervor that had impressed, awed, and irritated the Niffleheim authorities. As a Diplo, she was effective; as a political in-fighter, without peer.
And she was nearing the end. Inside, she knew it. Perhaps another ten standards before the drugs, implants, and mechanical aids could no longer keep that body together. That gave her drive, and if she was occasionally brusque and quick, she attributed it—in her mind—to that fact. She had little time to waste on foolishness.
“Comlink,” she said to the empty room.
“M’Dame?” The screen of the comlink flared and settled into a blue-gray background that flickered slightly. D’Embry moved to the mechanism and, running her hands across the keyboard there, pressed a button. Light surged and letters raced across the screen. “Neweden status bank,” chimed the comlink in a neuter voice, echoing redundantly the words printed on the screen.
“Report from local time 21:30 to the present. I want an emphasis on governmental problems. Briefly. You know what I’m after.”
The comlink voice changed to a woman’s contralto, evidently that of a staff Diplo. “M’Dame, one moment please.”
“Certainly.” D’Embry tapped the carpet of the room with one bare foot, noticing that the carpet needed to be trimmed again—it had grown too high for her liking. She made a mental note to have the Maintenance Department groom the rug.
“Sorry for the delay, m’Dame. I note here that at 22:00, the Li-Gallant received a committee of guild-members sympathetic to his guild’s rule.” The woman’s voice continued as an accompanying text appeared on the screen. “Topic of their discussion is unknown, but the conjecture is that it concerned consolidation of support after the Assembly meeting of yesterday afternoon. Query?”
“No.” D’Embry’s voice was dry, and she cleared her throat. “Continue, please.”
“22:15. Gunnar and Potok were seen in the pastures of their guild holdings outside Sterka. They refused to speak to the news services. Query?”
“No. Give me a general update, quickly.” She used a side panel of the comlink to order her breakfast, then asked the room to elevate a chair. She sat, then spoke as the woman on the link began to speak again. “Cancel that last request. My mind’s already cluttered with enough useless facts for the day. What of the Hoorka?”
“We understand that they fulfilled a contract last night in Irast. A copy of the completed contract was sent to the Center from Underasgard in compliance with your request. Query?”
“Put the contract on visual, please.” D’Embry scanned the contract without truly reading it. She glanced at the names of contractor and victim, her lips pursed in a moue of distaste, but the names were simply a random arrangement of letters that meant nothing to her. Her fingertips tapped the console of the comlink. The gray paint was worn to bare metal where her hands rested. “Negate,” she said, and the screen cleared.
“Please come on visual yourself,” she said. The screen flickered and then filled with the head and shoulders of a young woman, her hair short at the sides and long down her back in current fashion, her eyelids and lips touched with a faint scarlet sheen that seemed to burn with a tepid fire. “Ahh, Stanee,” d’Embry said. “Good morning.”
The face smiled. “Thank you, m’Dame. Anything else I can do for you?”
D’Embry waved the question away. “I hate the coldness of the words on the screen after a while, so you’ll excuse the visual contact. I simply get an urge, now and again, to see to whom I’m talking. A whim, child, nothing more.”
Stanee’s smile remained fixed. It seemed the predominant feature of her face. “Certainly, m’Dame.”
“Do you have the figures for Sterka last night?—not the gory facts that get attached to them in this barbaric place, just the figures. And I’ll probably ask you to stop halfway through them, so don’t be overly perturbed at your record-keeping being unappreciated.”
Stanee looked down, below the camera’s view. The head and shoulders on the screen moved as her fingers raced over controls. Without looking up, she began reading. “Sterka continent: killed by bloodfeud, three. Assaults, twenty. Incidents that might lead to guild conflicts, four reported . . .” The list went on, number after number sifted from the chaff of the night.
“Enough,” d’Embry interrupted finally. She sigh-smiled and shook her head at Stanee. “Enough for now. Did it ever occur to you that this is a world with damnably little to recommend it—with the exception of ippicator skeletons and some pretty but unspectacular scenery? Ahh, never mind, never mind.” She waved a hand in the air. “Just the normal morning grumpiness. Have a flimsy sent to my office to look over later, will you? You can cram into it all those boring details that I know you’ve been dying to give me, neh?”
Dutiful laughter. “Yes, m’Dame. Is that all?”
“For now. End,” she said in a less personal tone of voice. The comlink cleared to a blank blue-gray. “Off.” The screen darkened and went black as it eased into its niche in the wall, out of sight.
D’Embry went to the window and cleared it again. The sun had risen higher in the sky, pursued by high cumulus clouds, and the light had gone from the honey-thick yellow of the dawn to the whiter, more penetrating glare of full day. The buildings basked in warmth, throwing sharp-edged shadows across the plain of the Port. A freighter rose, its attitude jets throwing off hot gases to waver the air. The ship hovered low over the Port for a moment, and then arced into the Neweden morning, leaving a dirty trail that the wind wiped across the sky. In the city, dark specks of birds wheeled in alarm.
The Port was alive with workers and Alliance personnel beginning a new day. For them, another day of relative sameness. The daily problems came
and went without ever being eliminated.
M’Dame d’Embry sighed deep within herself and slapped at the window controls. She watched the glass turn slowly smoky and then deep purple-black, inking out the view of the Port. She leaned against the wall in reverie for a moment or two, forcing her mind to come to full alertness. Finally, rather desultorily, she began to dress.
• • •
The sun warmed the soil of the hills, but the heat and light of the sunstar failed to disturb the cool night that lingered below ground. The caverns of Underasgard, eternally cloaked and ever-mild, paid little attention to the vagaries of the surface.
For Hoorka-kin, however, the rising sun heralded a Rites Day, a day full with the worship of their patron gods. Kin spoke quietly to one another, the kitchens served only cold bread and milk, and the apprentices were kept busy ensuring that all nightcloaks were pressed and clean. A hurried calm held the caverns, a busy laziness. The Hoorka gathered slowly in the Chamber, the largest of the caverns they inhabited, and took their seats before the High Altar.
The Thane, sitting to the utter rear of the Chamber, watched the assembly as if rapt. His mind, however, dwelt elsewhere. He was only marginally aware of Valdisa’s warmth at his side, of Cranmer’s fidgeting, of Aldhelm’s curt greetings. He distantly nodded to the journeymen and apprentices as they entered. When the ponderous chords of the chant of praise rose, his lips mouthed the words and his voice sang, but he heard nothing.
“I love the feel of your body.” Valdisa smiled, faint lines appearing at the corners of her mouth. Teasing, her eyes danced.
The Thane rolled over on his back so that her roving hands had access to all of him. His gaze moved from her face and down the lean tautness of Valdisa’s body. He stroked the upper swell of her breasts softly, and smiled as her eyes closed.
“Damn you,” she said, a velvet growl, and her hand found him. Laughing, they kissed. Still laughing, she straddled him.
The chanters had finished the descant. Ric d’Mannberg began a short reading from the annals of She of the Five Limbs, one of the more violent passages. His droning voice spoke of kin slaying kin, of disembowelments and cannibalism. The Thane woke from his reverie and found Cranmer engrossed in the account of She. “You find this fascinating, scholar?” he whispered.
Cranmer leaned toward the Thane, whispering in return. “Only in the sheer number of gods with which Neweden, for all her poverty, is, ahh, blessed with having. It’s staggering. All the various guilds, and few of them sharing the same patrons . . . Neweden must have been a crowded world during the days of these gods.”
“Until She of the Five Limbs banished most.”
“For an ippicator, even one of such power, that must have been an amazing feat.” Cranmer glanced at the Altar, where d’Mannberg had closed the book and nodded in salutation. “And I notice that your attention wanders, Thane. I’m curious—your true father was an offworlder by birth, and came to Neweden’s religions as a convert. Do you believe, or is it simply convenient?”
“Do you have faith, Cranmer?”
“In gods? No.”
“Too bad.” The Thane leaned back in his seat, closing his eyes again. D’Mannberg opened the Annals once more. His voice droned on.
His real parents, lassari, had brought the boy to Hoorka. The Thane had glared down at the thin, wiry child of . . . thirteen? And the boy had glared back, uncowed. The Thane had liked the defiance of the child and took the young Aldhelm as kin. The parents, over-grateful, and perhaps pleased to be rid of the extra mouth, had taken a quick leave. They had never again inquired after their son. He now had kin—parents were unimportant.
“Watch your opponent’s hips,” he’d said to the new apprentice one day, during a training session. “Other parts of the body may feint—the legs, the arms, the head, the eyes. But where the hips go, the body must follow.”
Aldhelm shook his head. His hands toying with the hilt of his vibro, he’d stared at the Thane. “No, that seems wrong. I watch the hands and feet. They do the damage.”
“You don’t have four eyes to watch each.”
“Two are sufficient.”
Something in the boy’s stubbornness and insistence touched a response in the Thane. He’d stripped and joined the youngster on the practice floor. “Defend yourself, then,” he’d said. He circled the apprentice, watching the vibro and the hips. It took much longer than he’d anticipated—the Thane was slick with sweat when they’d finished—but he found the flaws in Aldhelm’s defense, disarmed and pinned the boy to the floor of Underasgard. Still, he was impressed by Aldhelm’s raw, untutored skill.
“You see,” he said, getting to his feet and releasing the boy. “Had you watched me correctly, that would not have happened. In a fight, you’d have been very dead, boy, despite your thoughts on what to watch.”
“I’ll think about it, sirrah.” That was as much admission as Aldhelm would give the Thane.
The dance to Hag Death had begun. Brilliant in scarlet robes and satin ribbons, blue hairplumes bobbing with movement, the dancers circled each other. Steel blades in their hands glinted in the lights. A sackbutt snorted a chorus, joined by a trio of recorders. There were two dancers of each sex, and their bare feet slapped the stones of Underasgard as they went through the ritualistic steps, a choreographed battle representing the strife between Dame Fate and the Hag. Blades flashed and met, clashing with a faint, bell-like ringing.
The bells for evening meals had just rung. Aldhelm had brought the Thane’s dinner to him, dismissing the apprentice that usually performed that task. He sat the tray on the Thane’s table, setting the controls to “warm” so that the meat remained hot. Fragrant vapors filled the room.
“Aldhelm?” the Thane said in some surprise. “Since when do you perform apprentice’s tasks? You’re nearly a full Hoorka.”
“I had a favor to ask, a boon.” His voice, usually so confident, was slow and unsure, halting.
“Ask, then.”
A hesitation. “You’ll sponsor me for my mastership in the Hoorka, be my kin-father?” Aldhelm said the words in a rush, the words falling over each other in their haste to leave his mouth. But his eyes—they held the Thane, and there was open affection there, and an unusual vulnerability that was foreign to Aldhelm.
Knowing what he was going to say, that openness hurt the Thane more than he thought possible.
“I’ve never sponsored any journeyman, Aldhelm.” He said the words slowly, hoping that Aldhelm might reconsider and withdraw the request himself, and knowing that it wouldn’t happen that way.
Aldhelm frowned. He looked down at the floor and then up to the Thane. “I realize that. That’s why I’ve waited so long to ask.” A vague smile touched his lips. “You’ve spoken well of me, and we like each other. I would like your sponsoring. It would mean much to me.”
“I”—a pause—“can’t.”
Aldhelm was stoic. His stance was as erect as before, his body betraying no disappointment. Yet something had changed: his eyes were guarded now, and perhaps too moist.
The Thane hastened to explain. “If there were a journeyman I would take as kin-son, it would be you, Aldhelm. Truly. But I don’t care to have the Hoorka become like other guilds, where the kin-son of the guild ruler inherits his father’s position. The best Hoorka should always rule Hoorka, and all the kin should have some say in who governs them. If I were to name a son or daughter, it would be a statement, an indication of favoritism. It’s easier if I simply avoid that.”
The Thane stared at Aldhelm, but the young man simply gazed back at him, his eyes unreadable and untouchable. “Do you understand? Aldhelm, I don’t wish to hurt you—as I said, were I to sponsor anyone . . .”
“I understand, Thane.” Aldhelm shrugged and began to leave the room.
“Aldhelm . . .”
“Yah?” The Hoorka turned and faced the Thane.
“What of Bronton? He admires your skill as much as I, and he is well-liked among the kin. He wou
ld sponsor you, and it would be to your credit.”
“Thank you for your concern, Thane.” Again, the shrugging of shoulders. A smile came and vanished, tentative. “I’ll ask him.” And with that, Aldhelm turned and left.
The Thane stared at the tray of food on his table for long minutes before beginning to eat.
The dancers, in a flourish of weapons, left the dais. A journeywoman attired in saffron robes intoned the benediction. An audible sigh crossed the Chamber, and with a rustling of cloth, the Hoorka-kin rose and began to leave. The Thane stretched and rose as Cranmer and Valdisa stood beside him.
“He slept well, didn’t he, Valdisa?” Cranmer placed his hands below his head in imitation of a pillow and closed his eyes.
“Our Thane?” Valdisa smiled. “He has an excuse, having taken the contract last night.”
“Both of you are mistaken. I simply concentrate better with my eyes closed. Prayer, after all, is a mental effort. Neh, scholar?” The Thane yawned, involuntarily, then joined in with the laughter of the other two.
Chapter 6
A LARGE GATHERING HAD CROWDED en masse before the Assembly Hall after marching noisily from Tri-Unity Square. A few flat-signs proclaimed various guilds’ support of one obscure issue or another, but the guards ranked on the steps to the Hall didn’t bother to read them, being all too used to such displays. Protests of one variety or another were commonplace enough on Neweden since the advent of the All-Guild Assembly created by Li-Gallant Perrin, the current Li-Gallant’s kin-father. The week before, it had been a group of ore farmers from Nean that had staged a minor riot in the capital city of that continent during the Li-Gallant’s visit. Several demonstrators had been incarcerated, and more were injured in the fighting that came when the security people attempted to disperse them. It was not, however, an unusual occurrence except in the number of injuries.
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