The Navigator of Rhada (10 page)

What is the Unholy Trinity? The warlock, the Vulk, and science.

The Vulk Protocols,
authorship unknown,
Interregnal period

In times of social upheaval, a weak king will spawn strong generals whose ambitions, perhaps worthy in themselves, will threaten the stability of the social order. The pattern is immemorial: provincial quarrel, civil war, Imperial intervention--all leading to a suspension of hard-won liberties and eventual tyranny.

Varus Milenis,
The New Renaissance,
ate Second Stellar Empire period

They had left the sea, riding single file up the narrow defile Kynan found, leading to the plateau above. Here the wind from the frozen north was broken by the twists in the land, and the rain fell in curling sheets through the darkness.

Janessa, riding Skua at the rear of the little procession, listened for the sound of the surf. It had grown fainter, though she could still hear the waves rushing up the beach to pound against the foot of the Stoneland cliffs.

The Auroran girl could not imagine how late the hour might be. It seemed to her that they had been riding for fully half the night, though she knew this was not so. She was wet and cold and perhaps a bit more frightened than she would have Kynan believe. For his part, the Navigator was acting strangely. It was the aftereffects of the Vulk mind-touch, she was certain. He would lead at a pace that was dangerous in the wet darkness, and then from time to time he would slow, almost to walking pace, his white face perplexed and somber, as though unexpected thoughts were emerging from the dimness of memory. Janessa thought of the Vulk Gret and shivered. In the Dark Time, before the forces of Vyka and the Empire had come to Aurora, there had been pogroms on Aurora. The ancient warlords of the planet had encouraged the people to decimate the Vulk community again and again, until now there were nearly none of the strange creatures on Aurora.

The
Protocols
were discredited, of course; but people still said that the Vulk were in some mysterious way beyond human understanding parts of a single great organism. Even today, centuries after the dispersion, they still lamented the destruction of their home world of Vulka-- where they were once said to have lived together, sharing thoughts and the Star knew what else, like cells in a great single beast. Scattered over stellar distances, their numbers drastically reduced now, the beast was dead. But the Vulkish mind-powers remained to the survivors. They were everywhere, where one least expected to find them, meddling in human affairs and performing strange rites.

The Rhad thought Auroran anti-Vulkism primitive, but they tolerated it, as men did all over the Empire. It was frightening to Aurorans to see the extent to which the alien beings had infiltrated human society.

Janessa strained to see Kynan’s shadowy figure ahead. Even Nav Kynan, a holy Navigator and bond-son of a star king, regularly underwent Triad--and worse. Who could tell what devilment Gret was promoting? Still, she had no choice. It was either this or remain incarcerated at Melissande while her home world took the shock of an attack by the outraged warmen of Gonlan.

The force of the wind increased as they neared the top of the steep draw. Kynan stopped the silver mare and waited for Baltus and Janessa to come to him.

He leaned forward in the saddle so that he could be heard without shouting and addressed himself to the warlock.

“This is the time, Baltus,” he said. “You explain yourself here and now or we put you on foot and let you find your way back to Melissande alone. Why did you come?”

The warlock showed white teeth in his darkly bearded face. “You don’t think much of warlocks, Nav Kynan. Few Navigators do. You think us holdovers from the Dark Time.” He shrugged his shoulders against the wet cloth of his cloak. “Well, we may be that, of course. But Kreon, the king, was my friend as well as overlord, you know. I served him well for many years. You might remember that now.”

“Kreon is dead, Baltus,” Kynan said coldly.

“And so will thousands of Aurorans and Gonlani be if Tirzah and LaRoss let Crespus take the warband out.”

Baltus’s archaic use of the word “warband” for “army” reminded the Navigator just how ancient were the customs of the Rhadan worlds and how far they were now from Algol and the center of the Empire. Serving on the ships of other nations, one easily forgot that the Rim was still populated by men who followed the old ways.

Baltus said, “I don’t know what your plan is. I don’t even know if it is possible to stop what seems sure to come. But there’s a kind of madness at Melissande right now: war fever and the smell of priest-killing. I know that what’s planned is just a fuse that will light a great fire if it isn’t damped. I see the Empire and the Order mixing in--and the Star only knows what the result of that will be. Nothing good, of that I’m sure.”

“What you say seems true enough,” Kynan said. “But it doesn’t tell me why you are here.”

The warlock smiled. “Why are
you
here, Nav Kynan?”

Janessa thought of the Vulk and shivered in the wet cold.

“
‘A plan is executed one step at a time,’ “
Kynan said. “So it is written.” He heard himself and had the belated thought that quoting dogma from the way of the Navigator might make him sound hopelessly stuffy and constrained to Janessa. He wondered why he should care--and could a precept of the beatified Emeric ever be stuffy? Or was it Emeric? Perhaps it was Talvas Hu Chien. He wished he had done better in theology. Then he mentally shook himself and thought that this was no time and place to worry about such priestly things.

The warlock’s mount muttered impatiently and nipped at Skua, who shook her head and bared her teeth. Janessa murmured to her quietly.

”For what it is worth,” Baltus said finally, “I felt I could be of more use to you than to Tirzah or LaRoss. I offer my help.” When Kynan made no reply, he went on. “Then, too, remember that
I am
a
warlock. You will surely try to take Janessa to the sanctuary on Aurora. The enclave is the only reasonably safe place for her until this madness dies down somewhat. And I would give ten years of my already shortened life to see the sanctuary, Kynan. We are called warlocks--but we are
scientists .
. .“ He smiled sadly as both the Navigator and the girl unconsciously made the sign of the Star. “Well, no matter what you think of my calling. I’ve known you too long to believe you take the old accusations seriously--that we warlocks brought the Dark Time. Yes, it’s true the warlocks of the Golden Age made weapons for the kings. Scientists have always made weapons for their rulers--may God and the Star forgive them. It is the way of things. But the Dark Time came because men insisted on fighting among themselves. Across all the sky, they fought and brought ruin on themselves-- and on us, their descendants.”

This Kynan could not deny. It was history.

“Nav Kynan,” the warlock said with feeling, “there is so much to be learned--relearned. I believe that warlock and priest must uncover the old knowledge together--” He raised a hand to ward off Kynan’s angry denial. “The Order cannot do it alone, Kynan. The priests are too few, the knowledge too broad. Look now--do you realize that four generations after Glamiss the Magnificent reunited the Empire we still don’t know what power drives the starships--?”

“That is
holy
knowledge,” Janessa exclaimed.

The warlock said firmly, “It is simply knowledge--knowledge that we need, that all men need. Can we of the Second Empire build a starship? The idea is ludicrous-- yes, and to you blasphemous, isn’t it? But can we? By the Star, we can’t even build
aircraft
yet. We are forced to use starships of a million metric tons to transport a bale of goods from Gonlanburg to the other shore of the Gonlan Sea! We can’t build a hovercar that will carry us a hundred kilometers without needing to recharge batteries!” He broke off suddenly. “I apologize, Nav Kynan. I feel this so strongly that I risk offending you and your calling. But it is all part of why I am with you--and against men I have known and served most of my adult life. If one warlock can enter a sanctuary of the Order, it is a beginning. I know I run the risk of being burned for heresy and blasphemy-- but I don’t really believe the Order is so unenlightened now. In Hu Chien’s time, yes. But not now.”

Kynan regarded the warlock for a long time, listening to the sound of the wind and the rain. Presently he said quietly. “It may be that what you say contains some truth. But there may be war coming. It isn’t the time to challenge dogma men have lived by since Glamiss’s time.” “Let me help you prevent it, Nav Kynan. Perhaps I’ll earn my reward in that way.”

“I am only a priest, Baltus, not a prince of the Order.” The warlock leaned across the withers of the silver mare and placed his hand over Kynan’s. “You are the bond-son of my star king, Nav. That is hope enough for me.”

Kynan sat silently for a time and then inclined his head to touch the warlock’s knuckles in the ancient Rhad ritual gesture of acceptance of fealty. “So be it, then,” he said. “For better or worse, we are bound.” Then he spoke softly to the silver mare and led off up the leveling path to the wind-scoured plateau, where lay the path to Gonlanburg.

It was near the hour of dawn when they reached the town, but the stormy darkness was unbroken. The stone houses, most of them roofed with turf, stood shuttered against the weather. The soft pads of the horses’ feet made no sound on the wet and muddy cobblestones.

Kynan avoided the watch and skirted the main square of the city, heading the small procession toward the bare field that served the place as a port.

Even at a distance Kynan, Janessa, and the warlock could see the glow of the Lyri starship. The fields of energy surrounding it ionized the raindrops and made them radiate with sympathetic forces.

The intensity of the light and the rate at which it was brightening indicated to Kynan’s practiced eye that the great ship was making ready to depart.

Janessa urged Skua forward to ride side by side with the Navigator. “What is it?” she asked.

“Listen,” Kynan warned.

The rain rustled on the turfed roofs of Gonlanburg, and in the distance the three fugitives could hear the soft clatter of arms. “LaRoss and Tirzah have sent a detachment to hold the starship,” Baltus said softly.

“Brother Evart would never let them aboard,” Kynan said.

“True enough. But they can certainly prevent
us
from reaching the ship.”

“I don’t think Rhad warmen would interfere with me,” Kynan said with a confidence he didn’t feel.

The air had begun to hum in resonance with the power increase in the ancient engines of the starship. The farther houses were outlined, dark and squat, against the luminosity originating at the port.

Kynan’s mare reached the square nearest the field, and now the three of them could see the starship clearly. It was an awe-inspiring sight, even at this distance. The kilometer-long hull pulsed with patterns of light, the magnetic lines of force surrounding the great vessel swirling and changing as the negative charges built up. The nose cone of the control section was fully polarized, so that it looked crystalline, almost invisible, and the control instruments and consoles were dark shapes suspended in space. Kynan could see Brother Evart’s cowled figure reclining in the First Pilot’s couch and, less distinctly, the outline of Brothers Clement and Pius, the novices who were assisting in the takeoff.

Janessa caught Kynan’s mailed arm. “Nav Kynan. Look there--at the edge of the landing ground!”

Kynan had already seen, with sinking heart, the half company of warmen who stood watching the vessel make ready to lift into the night.

That they had come to prevent anyone’s taking Janessa aboard the Lyri starship was beyond argument. They were making no effort to delay the departure of the craft. It would have been blasphemous--and impossible, in any case. No force the modern world knew could force entry into a manned starship. But the detachment, some forty men, stood between the watchers and the ship.

Kynan said to Baltus, “Stay here. When I signal to you --come at a gallop.”

Janessa protested, “What are you going to do, Kynan? There are too many of them.”

“I’ve no intention of fighting my own people,” he said. “But we must reach that ship.” He urged his mount forward, and the silver mare’s teeth gleamed in the light reflected from the starship. She was making battle sounds and setting Baltus’s charger and old Skua to dancing eagerly.

The Navigator rode out of the town shadows at a trot and into the brightness pulsating across the wet grass of the open field. Kynan watched the transparent flank of the control room and prayed to the Star that Brother Evart would be able to see what was happening below him. Everything depended on that. But Evart was such a deliberate man that he might well devote his entire attention to matters within the ship. If this happened, they were lost.

Kynan told the mare to canter now, and she did. He could see the warmen turning to watch him. They had been told to expect more than a single rider, and they were possibly perplexed. He most fervently hoped so.

“You there!” the Rhad officer called. “Is that you, Nav Kynan?”

Kynan did not reply. Instead, he slanted away from the group, angling toward the immense overhanging bulk of the starship’s prow.

“Nav Kynan!” the officer called again, mounting his charger. “Stop! We have orders not to harm you--!”

Kynan wheeled the silver mare, at the same moment taking his pistol from its holster. He could look up into the starship’s control room, and he cursed Brother Evart with theological precision. The under-priest was paying not the slightest attention to the action developing directly under him on the ground. Kynan could almost hear the intent Navigators beginning to chant the power sequence preparatory to actually lifting the massive vessel from the surface.

The rain stung his face, and he hoped with all his heart that his primitive flintlock had been dried enough by the heat of his body to fire now, when it was needed. The warmen were wheeling and spreading to cut him off.