Orion Shall Rise (28 page)

‘– and his favoring of the Maurai Federation, that colossus which has for too long bestridden the world …

‘– cultivate relationships with the Northwest Union, as it resurges from the bonds that the Maurai laid upon it.’
Give them a laugh.
‘I am supposed to be a devout Gaean. Well, I admit Gaeanity has an important message for us. Many of you agree. But if it’s Gaean devoutness to encourage the machine-heavy Northwest Union, not as an ally or anything like that but as a counterweight to the biologically minded Maurai Federation, why, what can I say except that they aren’t putting the kind of stuff into Gaean devoutness that they used to?’

Nothing, ever, about Northwestern emissaries who’ve sought me out and worked with me. That peculiar little man MikliKarst – He was busy in Uropa before the Espaynians approached me. Rumors about somebody collecting nuclear explosives … Rumors only, as far as I’m concerned. There may be reports in the secret files of the Captaincy. I’ll find out.

‘– For its own survival, for the sake of everything it can contribute to mankind, the Domain must cease looking inward and begin looking outward. We must become a world power, not for empire but for peace.…

‘– Seniors can always meet and vote a bad Captain out of office. It has happened twice in our history.…’
No soldiers occupied Skyholm then.

‘– In all humility, in reverence for the past and hope for the future, I offer the Domain my services.’

4

Ironically, Terai and Wairoa were bound for the Prynys when they heard the news. A month of travel, talk, and watchfulness, in their guise of merchant adventurers, had given clues to something brewing in those mountains. Likewise had indications picked up by other agents covering other parts of the Domain.

Terai and Wairoa had garnered the most data themselves. Bluff, genial, the former could usually steer conversation with a local man – whether groundling or of the Aerogens, somebody whose affairs had him in touch with widespread regions – toward the matters that really interested him, once they had finished with his ostensible business and were relaxing over a drink. ‘– Yes, of course we Maurai have no monopoly on visiting your country. I hear that these days you’re meeting scouts like me, or even tourists, from as far as Merique. – Mong missionaries, yes. – That many North-westerners? Really? I’m surprised. – Do you happen to know if they tend to concentrate on particular areas? It would
give
me a hint as to what sort of competition to expect. – Thank you, sir, you’re very kind. I won’t forget, after we’ve gotten our enterprise established here. And if ever you happen to visit N’Zealann –’

Meanwhile Wairoa sat quietly observing, with his special senses and his special mind. He did the same when wandering about in the apparent aimlessness of any curious newcomer to town. His physique made some persons shun talk, some eager for it, but always it put them off balance, vulnerable to his talents. He was a copious reader of newspapers and magazines, a listener to radio broadcasts, who paid special attention to such matters as markets and shipping.

Pieces of the puzzle fell together. Mikli Karst had ranged extensively about, mostly contacting aristocrats, but the focus for him and his associates was in the Prynys, and perhaps beyond. They’re too few to be engineering trouble by themselves,’ Terai said. ‘Or are they?’

‘It doesn’t take much catalyst to make a reaction go,’ answered Wairoa. There
is
a magnate in the South by the name of Talence Jovain Aurillac. We should investigate him.’

‘Eh? Why?’

‘You may recall that mention of him has occurred occasionally. Body language at those times suggested he might be more important than he seems to be. Why has he kept himself in virtual exile these past two years? What did happen between him and that Iern Ferlay we hear of as a good prospect for the next Captain? I have nothing but hints, and an intuition that we need more than this.’

Intuition,
Terai thought.
Subconscious logic? I don’t know; but Wairoa’s hunches are worth more than most fellows’ demonstrations.
‘All right. We’ll drift in that direction.’

To travel straight and fast could raise too many questions. Terai
zigzagged at a leisurely pace, by air, rail, and the generally execrable roads of a country where mechanized ground vehicles were rare. He sought men prominent in commerce. He was affable and gossipy as he inquired about possible demand for copra, coral, maricultural products, synthetic fibers, bacterial fuel cells, and the like. Their friends, including Clansfolk, heard about it and often wanted to meet him too. He was invited to homes, shown the local sights, sometimes given a romp in bed. He did not consider that an infidelity when Elena was half a world away, nor would she. His ‘assistant’ Wairoa stayed in the background, observing and thinking.

The news of Jovain’s takeover reached them in Toulou. ‘Oh-oh,’ Terai muttered; and as soon as he and Wairoa were alone: ‘We’d better get back to the ship. Every one of us. Nan the Destroyer knows what’s about to happen – I don’t.’

‘Won’t that look suspicious, when we have just arrived?’ Now and then Wairoa showed a curious ignorance about standard-issue human beings.

‘Not if we don’t mind looking rather timid. Strangers in a strange land and so forth; it’s natural for us to feel nervous. I’ll bluster out a feeble excuse. That should be in character for me. You contact the rest.’

Wairoa nodded and slipped off. A suitcase in their baggage contained a radio set capable of activating a sensitive recorder anywhere within five hundred kilometers. The signal was scrambled; outsiders who chanced to tune in would suppose they heard a burst of static. Agents who got the message also got instructions to relay.
Back to Kemper, as fast as compatible with not blowing your cover!

Next morning the two Maurai boarded a dirigible for Renn, capital of Ar-Goat. There they would change for their destination in Ar-Mor. Passengers sat in tense quietness, waiting for newscasts. The music that a cabin loudspeaker brought them in between times did not ease them, nor did food and wine.

Renn felt close to explosion, during a night’s layover there. Wairoa went prowling through the dark, overhearing or eavesdropping. He sought Terai again at dawn. ‘The place reeks of fear and anger,’ he reported.

‘Well, nothing like this has ever happened before,’ Terai said. ‘It’s a terrible shock.’

‘Many people believe Jovain did frustrate a conspiracy. At any rate, they want to believe it. But then who are those shadowy figures
behind the conspiracy, and what further
evil
have they in train? Many others think it’s a hoax, and are afraid Jovain means to stuff Gaeanity down their throats. And many others – The Domain is not the tranquilly unified realm that it has seemed for so long to be, from the outside. It’s shot through with rivalries and antagonisms, ethnic, religious, social, economic. When nobody knows what to expect, everybody dreads that somebody else will become able to take a sudden advantage.’

Terai scowled. ‘A civil war here is bloody near the last thing the Federation wants. The Domain’s our natural partner, or should be, as interested as us in keeping the world stable. … Well, let’s hope this doesn’t come to blows. And let’s go get us some breakfast. If a miserable Francey roll and cup of herb tea count as breakfast.’

They heard on their flight to Kemper: the Council of Seniors had chosen Talence Jovain Aurillac the new Captain. ‘I can imagine the scene,’ Terai grunted to Wairoa in their language. ‘His supporters will have been ready to argue and put on pressure in organized style, though I don’t suppose many of them knew in advance what he planned to do. Those who like part of what he stands for – Gaeanity, for instance, or opposition to foreign influences – they were easy to persuade. The cautious and the cowardly would mostly fall in line. I daresay an armed hillman looks persuasive, no matter what assurances his boss has given, and in any event, it’d appear safest to vote yes and scuttle home.’

‘At that,’ Wairoa pointed out, ‘he received a bare plurality. He probably could not have won if the opposition weren’t split among several candidates.’

‘And surely not if Iern Ferlay had been there. I gather that that’s one popular lad. What the Nan’s become of him, anyway?’

Presently the radio carried a speech by Jovain. It was short and conciliatory, urging people to go unafraid about their daily business, promising a detailed program later that would serve the needs and aspirations of the entire Domain. The bedbug letter,’ Terai muttered.

‘What?’ asked Wairoa.

‘Never mind. An archeologically ancient joke. We’re descending.’

At the airport the two got a carriage to the riverside dock where
Hivao
lay and went aboard. There Terai stopped to gaze around him.

The scene was a colorful and peaceful skin stretched across events. Shore leaves had been canceled and every crewman was back. However, they had made the most of their stay, not only in excursions but in cultivating friendships. Being exotic helped vastly. The skipper saw no immediate reason why they should not have visitors. Flutes and drums resounded, feet danced, girls laughed and chattered and embraced and sometimes slipped below with a nautical companion. Men were guests too, mostly sailors and navvies, come to drink and talk and gamble. Terai noticed one, afar at the taffrail, who did not resemble a Breizhad – tall, gaunt, sandy-haired, horse-faced; he played a stringed instrument and sang for a group of listeners, when he wasn’t upending a jug.

Several meters beyond lay the ship from the Northwest Union, a catamaran that bore an aircraft pod similar to
Hivao’s.
Her crew had avoided the Maurai, not even being sociable when in the same taverns, doubtless under orders. To Terai, that meant they weren’t civilians as alleged, but Navy. Those on watch today stared forward at the festivites here, surely more than a little envious.

The afternoon was warm and bright. Water clucked against hulls. A steam dredge chuffed and dumped a load into its barge, maintaining basin and channel. Tarry odors lifted from the wharf. Above the warehouses, Terai saw the twin towers on the cathedral, remembered their antiquity, and for a moment felt dwindled to a dayfly.

He kicked the notion from him. ‘We’ve got work to do,’ he said.

‘What?’ inquired Wairoa.

‘M-m-m … for the time being, I suppose, we wait to sec how things go. I daresay Mikli and company will soon get here. Whether or not they had anything to do with what’s happened, they can’t be certain either what’ll come of it. Better stay close to base, eh?’

‘He should not find out you are in the Domain.’

‘Oh, no. Agreed. Until he arrives, though, I suppose I can move about pretty freely, if I don’t
give
my right name.’

‘What have you in mind?’

‘We’ve already seen the local higher-ups. I don’t think they’re involved in any plots, do you? But yon ship’s been seven months in this port. Ordinary people are bound to have had plenty of contact with the Norrmen, and scraps of information are bound to have slipped out. Not that townsfolk would recognize it for what it signifies. But we –’ Terai chuckled. ‘Yes, we have a great excuse for pub-crawling.’

5

A few kilometers north of Dulua, for it took no more to be deep in the forest, Vanna Uangovna had her communion shrine. Individual seers and seeresses differed in the settings where they could most readily and fully know Gaea: a hilltop, a cave, a riverbank, a grove. … Vanna wanted more than untouched nature, she wanted a place to which humanity was integral, on which she herself could work as air and sunlight and unseen tiny life did. So had she commanded years before, and so had it been done for the proróchina.

One dawn she went there, neither alone nor leading a class as often aforetime, but with a single attendant. The air was still cold and damp, tendrils of mist a smoke over the ground, but already full of pine and earth fragrances. Radiance from the right: stole among surrounding evergreens, lost itself in their needles and shadows, then suddenly glowed on a high branch or gleamed off a dew-wet spider-web. Birdcalls had begun trilling and pealing, mosquitoes whined as they sheered off from repellent, a squirrel halted its comet-pace up a bole and clittered, otherwise the woods were hushed. Nearly hidden by duff, the trail was soft and whispery underfoot.

Having left cultivation behind, the two walked in fitting silence among the trees for a while before Vanna said low: ‘You are troubled, child.’

Jiyan Robbs swallowed hard. She was of pure Merican blood, or a throwback to it, her blond head looming above her ucheny’s, her fullness straining a linsey-woolsey frock; but she was not quite sixteen, and a sluga. Her hands, coarsened and reddened by the house-cleaning tasks to which her steward had most recently assigned her, writhed together.

Vanna dropped back a pace, to walk alongside and lay a hand of her own, feather-light, on the girl’s arm. Tell me, dear,’ she murmured. ‘Let me do whatever I can toward easing your mind. Afterward let Gaea give you peace.’

‘I – I am afraid –’ Jiyan could not go on.

‘Fear must be a servant, never a master, not to be overworked, ultimately to be retired from service as no longer needed.’
Yet you must not ignore the fact that reality can be brutal.
‘What are you afraid of? Mistreatment? A word from me should put a quick stop to that.’

‘Oh, no, reverend lady. But I – I’m afraid I can’t leave home after all.’ Jiyan knuckled her eyes. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘What?’ Vanna kept her tone serene. The major hasn’t said anything against it, has he?’ The Robbs family were slugai of the Kharsovs, born to serve that house. They were not bound to a patch of soil, though, but had been towndwellers for generations, many of them in skilled jobs or positions of trust, modestly well-to-do.

Admittedly Bors Kharsov, major in the Blue Star Polk that owned half the property hereabouts, was not happy about letting Jiyan go. He had complained that it was fine for her to be a disciple in her free time – yes, yes, we are One in Gaea, sluga and Soldat alike –– but sending her off for advanced study was something else again. Whether or not she showed promise, the example would make others of her class restive. … When Vanna insisted, he had not ventured to oppose the Librarian on a matter of that kind.