‘Except that thanks to my tardiness our priority is still to make Tevana secure. We will lose momentum. We will have to divide our forces.’
Credig uttered an exasperated curse. ‘A diversionary attack was always part of the plan, Madok. You know that. You devised the damned thing. The attack on Grake Castle will act as our diversion. Vethran will assume our mission is to rescue Tevana. While he’s concentrating on Grake we’ll take the Citadel. Now stop punishing yourself. Let’s decide on the actions we have to take tonight.’
‘You’re right, Credig. Let’s get on with it.’ Madok looked up again at the radio mast. ‘The first thing is to contact Kedin.’
I have failed to protect my lord’s beloved, Madok thought to himself. And I’ve failed to protect Ace. I must not fail again.
Bep-Wor found the Doctor in the upper floor of the farmhouse. He was in a bedroom, lit by a single lamp, staring down at the bed.
‘Was this necessary?’ the Doctor said, before Bep-Wor could speak. The Doctor turned, and Bep-Wor recoiled from the lambent fire in his shadowed eyes. He looked instead at the bloody body lying on the bed. He sighed.
‘This is a time for celebration, Doctor,’ he said gently. ‘Not for regret. We have freed thirty of our people tonight.’
The Doctor raised a pointing finger. ‘Bep-Wor,’ he began.
Bep-Wor was in no mood to receive a lecture. He was too full of joy. ‘Doctor,’ he said, ‘I must show you something.
Come here.’ He extended a hand towards the Doctor.
When he was sure the Doctor was following him Bep-Wor left the room. There, on the landing, where he had left her, Kia-Ga was waiting for him. He took her hand in his.
‘Look,’ he said as the Doctor emerged from the room. ‘This is Kia-Ga.’
The Doctor knotted his brows and merely glanced at Kia-Ga. He was clearly going to be truculent. The Doctor’s problem, Bep-Wor knew, was that he was too sensitive and thoughtful. No doubt thought and sensitivity were necessary if a person hoped to achieve knowledge and wisdom such as the Doctor’s. But emotion and practicality were sometimes more important. He had to try to make the Doctor understand the importance of the evening’s triumph.
‘Doctor,’ he said, caressing Kia-Ga’s arm, ‘please listen to me. On my world, on the islands of the archipelago, people mate for love, and a couple love, together, for life. Kia-Ga and I have grown together: we are the two halves of a single fruit.
When she was taken from me I no longer wanted to live. Only my cowardice prevented me from killing myself. Now I have found her, and entirely thanks to you. If I had not met you, I would be dead by now, or enslaved. You have saved me, and you have brought me to Kia-Ga.’
The Doctor’s face showed only pain and sorrow. ‘Bep-Wor,’
he said, she has taken the drug.’
The icy weight that Bep-Wor thought had disappeared for ever from his heart was there again. ‘I know, Doctor,’ he said.
He turned to Kia-Ga and stroked her cheek. ‘But you know who I am, don’t you, Kia-Ga?’
‘Bep-Wor,’ Kia-Ga said, and smiled.
‘And you remember our life together, before the invaders captured you?’
‘Yes,’ she said. Her voice became excited. ‘Blue walls in the kitchen. Cooking fish. Sunlight on the bedroom wall. Kissing you. Warm bread in the morning. Wine in the evening.’
‘You see?’ Bep-Wor said to the Doctor. ‘It’s all there. She remembers everything.’
‘But she has no volition,’ the Doctor said. ‘She does only what you tell her to do. You are simply her new master.’
‘No, sir,’ Kia-Ga stated. She bowed her head to the Doctor.
‘I am free now. Bep-Wor has told me. All of our people will be free, as long as we follow our new master. You are our lord.’
The Doctor grasped the sleeve of Bep-Wor’s uniform and with surprising strength pulled him across the landing.
‘This nonsense must stop,’ the Doctor whispered urgently.
‘I’m a scientist, not a miracle-worker. I don’t want your people to think of me as their master.’
‘I understand, Doctor,’ Bep-Wor said. He wondered whether the Doctor was merely being modest, or whether he truly doubted his own powers. Whichever was the case, it was important to placate him now. ‘This is a matter of being practical. Those who have taken the drug act more normally when they are told that you are our leader. They copy the behaviour of those of us you saved on the journey from our world to this. We are all your followers.’ He decided to change the subject. ‘I have asked all the freed men and women if they have heard of the woman named Ace. I’m afraid none has.’
Bep-Wor was relieved to see that his ruse had worked. The Doctor was once again preoccupied with finding his oddly-named friend.
‘I must find the centre of government on this planet,’ the Doctor muttered. ‘I may be able to do some good there.’ He looked up at Bep-Wor. ‘I’m going to the capital,’ he stated.
‘I promised to follow you,’ Bep-Wor said, ‘once I had regained Kia-Ga. I won’t let you down. We will all follow you.’
There was a barely-audible hiss. That was all. No crackles; no whooping noises like the calls of demented birds. When Madok had tested Kedin’s first radio set, only five years previously, he and Kedin had been in adjoining rooms, and the reception had been so poor that the sound in the headphones had resembled a forest full of wailing beasts.
Now Kedin and he were thousands of miles apart, separated by the vacuum of space, and he could hear Kedin as clearly as if he were in an adjoining room.
Madok was trying to apologise. ‘But I was too late, my lord.
If I had arrived only an hour earlier -’
‘Don’t blame yourself, Madok,’ Kedin’s voice cut in. ‘Of course I would be happier if I knew Tevana was safe. But at least we know that she is well, we know where she will be kept, and we know that we can rescue her. And if you had succeeded in taking her from Cathogh, Vethran would have known that we were about to move against him. He would have been prepared. Now he believes that he has Tevana even more securely imprisoned, and he will expect us to continue to fly his armies back and forth and to ship him ever more of these wretched Twos. He will be confident that he can control me. He is in for a surprise.’
‘You agree, then,’ Madok asked, ‘that we should strike now?’ He wanted to be sure that there was no doubt. Once the operation had begun there could be no turning back.
‘Yes, Madok. There’s no time like the present. The operation starts now. Within four days we’ll take tea in whatever remains of Vethran’s new throne room.’
Holding the mouthpiece in front of his face and the earphones on his head, Madok turned from the desk to look at the Castlain. ‘Understood, Kedin. We start immediately.’
Credig nodded. A grim smile spread across his face. Madok recognised the expression: action at last.
‘First,’ Kedin said, although both he and Madok had rehearsed the order of events a hundred times, ‘I’ll pull all our ships off Mendeb Two. Vethran’s invasion army will be stranded there, and they have no way of contacting the Council.’
‘Are you ready to send decoy messages?’ Madok reminded him. ‘A sudden silence from the invasion army will alert the Council as surely as a warning would.’
‘They rely on us to transmit their signals,’ Kedin said. ‘We know their codes and their protocols.’
‘The new transmitter is working here,’ Madok went on. ‘I’m sure you’ve noticed the improved quality of the signal. The Castlain will co-ordinate the sending of orders to our forces down here. The covert teams will move into Gonfallon and converge on the palace. The motorised and airborne units will move by night to the camouflaged bunkers and landing strips.’
‘The strike force will set off from the space station precisely one day from now,’ Kedin said. ‘We’ll pretend to be one transport ship: remind Credig to monitor our signals and listen for the code words.’
‘And I’ll
make for Grake castle,’ Madok said.
‘Maintain radio silence unless we have to deviate from the plan,’ Kedin said. ‘And: good luck, Madok. Your part of this operation is the closest to my heart. Bring Tevana to me, and we’ll drink a toast to the overthrowing of tyrants. In four days, Madok. Just four days.’
It was now three days since the chains had been struck from Bep-Wor’s wrists. He had been a slave; now he was leading a crusade. He had been filthy, unshaven, and dressed in rags; now his skin smelt of perfume and the buttons of his uniform glittered.
He was riding one of the tall beasts, which he had learnt were called camelopes. The Doctor insisted on walking.
As the Doctor’s confidant and mouthpiece, Bep-Wor found that almost as many offerings were made to him as to the Doctor himself. A second plate of food would appear in front him at meal times; men would bring him the best trinkets and weapons that they had found in the farms and cottages they had liberated; women would come to him at night. Like the Doctor, Bep-Wor refused all such offerings. Unlike the Doctor, Bep-Wor allowed himself a few privileges: a camelope to ride, a daily shave, clean clothes, and a separate room each night, in whatever house they had sequestered, for himself and Kia-Ga.
No one had ever seen the Doctor wash, or shave his face, or change his clothes, or sleep. And yet he remained clean, grew no beard, and remained alert. When questioned about it, Bep-Wor would smile inscrutably: it did no harm to let the people believe that he was privy to the Doctor’s secrets.
Protected by the uniform, a gun, a sword, and the speed of his steed, Bep-Wor had cantered ahead of the Doctor and the long column of marchers. He had swung south, to check that the column was still proceeding parallel to the main road that led to the capital, and that there were no soldiers on the road. He had pressed on, into the increasingly dense woodlands, to blaze a trail and to search for settlements, whether so large that they were to be avoided or sufficiently small that they could be overrun.
He had found not so much as a cottage, but there were tracks running through the woods that indicated that the forest had some populated areas. Through the trees he had seen that in the distance the woodlands merged into a dense forest that covered the flanks of the jagged peaks ahead.
At every farm and cottage the prisoners had passed since their escape, Bep-Wor had sought information as well as opportunities to free other slaves. Sometimes he bought intelligence; sometimes, when the Doctor wasn’t nearby, he used threats. He therefore knew that somewhere in the woodlands, before the ground rose towards the distant peaks, he and his people would come to a wide river. They would have to cut south to the road, where they would be able to cross the river on a bridge. There was a farm there, and a trading post and a store: more slaves to liberate, plenty of food, roofs to sleep under for the night.
Once over the river, they would be in Gonfallon: the lands owned by the leader of all the people of this world. He called himself by the title of King. His name, Bep-Wor had learnt, was Vethran.
Bep-Wor knew, but would not admit to knowing, that the woman with whom he had been lying for the past two nights was not the same Kia-Ga he had loved on his own world. In the same way he knew that the Doctor’s rag-tag army of escaped prisoners and freed slaves could not prevail against the soldiers of this world, with their guns and their loud vehicles and their flying machines. And he knew that the lands of the King would be heavily guarded.
But the Doctor wanted to go to the capital, and Bep-Wor and all the others would follow him.
I will view the capital, Bep-Wor vowed. I will see the city at the heart of this world. And then I’ll let the Doctor go on without me. I’ll lead whoever will follow me into the forests, and we’ll survive as best we can.
He urged his camelope to a trot, and set off to return to the marching column.
It irked Tragar that no matter how many extra-stipendiary purses and occasional gratuities he obtained from Balon Ferud; no matter how many times he overstated prices and skimmed off the excess coins for himself, without that fool Bared even noticing; no matter how much gossip about his lord’s household he was able to sell to the chamberlains of Underton’s other great houses; no matter how hard he tried to accumulate wealth, he never had quite enough to afford his own pleasure Two.
He had, of course, found plentiful opportunities to taste such sweetmeats. Pleasure Twos - the most attractive, voluptuous, dextrous and pliable of the ever-willing migrants from Mendeb Two - were bartered and sold between the greater nobility with a frequency that was unsurprising, given that aristocrats have preternaturally-jaded tastes. And as chamberlain of Balon Ferud’s household, it was Tragar’s responsibility to oversee the despatch and receipt of such merchandise. Security was paramount, as pleasure Twos were valuable. Almost as important was secrecy: the very existence of pleasure Twos was merely a scandalous rumour as far as the wives, servants, soldiers and tenants of the noblemen were concerned.
Tragar unfailingly used his position to sample the goods in transit.
I wouldn’t do it, he told himself, if the Twos objected. But they’re always so happy to oblige.
Nonetheless, he resented the fact that he couldn’t afford one of his own. Particularly as Balon Ferud, who was more interested in hunting and politicking than the erotic arts, kept two or three pleasure Twos at a time locked in an attic room above the south wing.
And so it was that Tragar found himself feeing a dilemma.
Rigora had completed her training of Ace. The girl was ready to enter Balon’s service, in almost any capacity from kitchen drudge to arena warrior. It was Tragar’s duty to inform Balon that Ace was ready, and to have her taken from Tragar’s apartments in the east wing to whatever part of the house Balon deemed appropriate, or to another of Balon’s residences. Balon might even have Tragar send her to a trader for re-sale.
Tragar couldn’t bring himself to send the news to Balon. In any case, Tragar reasoned, Balon would have no opportunity to put Ace to any use in the immediate future: the King had summoned all the members of the Council to the capital.
Balon was due to leave that very afternoon, and would be away for at least a week.
It was Tragar who had seen the potential in Ace, and who had won the bidding for her. It seemed to him only fair that he should have the girl to himself for a few days, until Balon returned.
He realised that, deep in thought, he was walking in circles around his study. He paced deliberately to the window, and took several deep breaths as he looked out across the town.
The view usually calmed him, even after he had been locked in disputation with Bared about the household finances. It reassured him to know that while Balon was above him, and while that upstart Bared was prepared to challenge him, he, Tragar, was superior to even the wealthiest of the tradesmen and merchants in the squalid houses whose roofs he looked down on.
Today, however, his hands wouldn’t stop trembling.
Heavens, he wanted Ace so badly he’d defy his lord to have her.
I should smoke a pipe, he told himself. I should let the spore-seed calm me, and then, once Balon has departed for the capital, I will venture down the stairs, and fetch Ace.
No. I can’t wait. I’ll have her now.
He strode to the door, pulled it open, and called down the length of his hallway. ‘Poa-Nan! Go downstairs, go to Rigora, and tell her that I want the Two named Ace in my apartments immediately.’
He closed the door and leant against it. What if Balon should want to see me before he leaves? he thought. It would be typical of him to make a fuss about the house, just as he’s leaving it for a week. What if he summons me while I’m in the middle of...? His thoughts became incoherent as he imagined, for the hundredth time, some of the activities that he might perform with Ace.
He smiled. So much the better, he decided. It would be amusing to leave Ace in order to discuss the stocking up of the pantry, or some such trivia: to bow, and murmur reassurances to Balon, while halfway through using Balon’s mo
st expensive Two.
Poa-Nan knocked at the door.
‘Enter,’ Tragar called. The door opened, and Ace walked into the room, followed by Poa-Nan.
She looked to left and right as she approached him. Once again he marvelled at her. Twos didn’t do that: they were universally uninterested in their surroundings, unless told to look at something. What had Ace been like, he wondered, before she was processed for use as a Two? She must have been a tempestuous girl; uncontrollable.
It gave him a thrill of pleasure to think that this once-wild girl would now happily obey the most humiliating instructions.
‘Leave,’ he ordered Poa-Nan. ‘Shut the door behind you.
And don’t disturb me until I call for you.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Poa-Nan said. The Two left the room.
At last Tragar was alone with the most costly Two on the planet. He resisted the urge to touch her immediately. There was no need to rush. Every delay simply sweetened the tasting.
Ace stood still, smiling slightly, as he walked around her.
When should he order her to undress? Not yet: she was so perversely appealing in her tightly-fitting, masculine, black costume.
‘Walk to the window, Ace,’ he said. Lean on the sill and look out across the town.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Ace said, and did as she had been instructed.
Tragar folded his arms and watched her. How unselfconsciously she moved; how unaware she was of the provocative pose she had adopted as she gazed through the window.
Which should he try first: the Plough and the Furrow, perhaps? Or Covering the Bitch? How many of the Hundred Forbidden Acts would he be able to teach her before Balon returned from court?
Poa-Nan’s knock sounded on the door.
‘Enter,’ Tragar said, automatically, a second before he remembered that he had told Poa-Nan not to disturb him.
He turned towards the door, gathering the breath with which to shout his anger at the Two. But he let the breath go with a sigh. Poa-Nan was a Two, and a Two never disobeyed.
Independence Day Page 18