The Stone Dogs (20 page)

"Nantes control, this is A7SD24, approachin', requestin'

clearance fo' in-district release," the Draka said, touching the smooth surface of the control panel. "Headin' upstream to Chateau Retour plantation."

"Is that—" the voice hesitated, as the ground-sensor computers queried the machine's. "Greetings, Citizen." A French accent, some serf technician. "Feeding clearance data for approach routes; central control under two thousand meters."

"Ovah to AI," Yolande said, lifting her hand from the stick.

The aircraft turned east and then north to enter the in-city approach path, sliding down an invisible line in the sky and weaving its way among the busy low-level traffic over the Loire estuary. A Bambara did not extend to that sort of computer, but Nantes ground control would be handling it from here. She nodded toward the other forward seat. "C'mon up front, iff'n yo'

like," she added.

"Thanks kindly, Mistis," Jolene said, sliding forward and buttoning her blouse; she and Myfwany had been necking in a desultory sort of way until a little while ago. Alertly, the serf studied the controls. She was a Category V Literate, authorized to operate powered vehicles, but this board was all-virtual, touch-sensitive simulations of dials and screens, and that was just now coming in for the top-line civilian market. "May I?"

At Yolande's nod, a slender black finger touched the upper quadrant of the central screen. She ran through the menu quickly until a map of Nantes appeared; then another of the Loire valley as far east as Tours. A light flicked on the bank of the river.

"This where we stayin', Mistis?"

"Fo' a few days. Meetin' my second cousin Alexandra an' my brothah John, a friend name of Mandy, family gatherin',"

Yolande said. "Then up east a ways, boar-hunt."

The aircar was slowing down to 500 kph and banking in for the approach path; you could always tell when a computer was flying… Jolene touched the screen again and hesitated until the Draka signed permission with a flick of her wrist. The sale contract from Domarre & Ledermann scrolled up.

"800 aurics?" Jolene said, disappointment in her voice. Ten times what a prime unskilled laborer cost, but less than might be expected for a special item like her.

"Notice," Yolande said, indicating two clauses. "We suckered them. See, a buy-back option fo' yo', and a first-purchase option on any of yo' children." At the serfs questioning look, she continued: "We're… my family doesn't sell, 'cept in-house."

"Oh." The serf looked relieved.

Probably afraid we'd just picked her up for the holiday
, Yolande thought.

Then, after a pause: "Yo' don't intends to breed me, either, Mistis?"

"Not fo' sale, anyhows, or if yo' don't want. Like children?"

"Oh, yes," Jolene said, with a shy smile. "I helped out in the nursery a lot at the creche. I;"—another hesitation —"I was sort of hopin' to be a nurse, had some of the trainin', but…" She made a gesture towards herself. The startling hair hung halfway down her back in a mass of loose curls; she had the long-limbed African build, slender neck, high firm breasts, buttocks that

.were rounded but showed the clench of muscle in the tight trousers. Carefully exercised, with a pleasant glow of youthful health.

Yolande nodded; not much chance the Agency would sell her at three hundred aurics as a medical technician when they could get two or three times that for a fancy.

"Well," she said, "we might find yo' work in a plantation infirmary, later. Plannin' on keeping yo' with, while we're in the Service."

"Thanks, Mistis, I was… hmm, I was afraid I hadn't been pleasin'."

"Oh. that," Yolande shrugged. "Don't worry, that's my fault.

I'm sort of inhibited that way. Need to get to know yo' better befo' it works proper fo' me. Myfwany certainly enjoyed yo'. Not the main reason we bought yo', anyhows."

Reassured, the serf smiled. "Glad to hear it, Mistis. I's lucky."

At Yolande's questioning look: "Nightclubs and suchlike were biddin' on me, too." She made a slight face. "Rather belong to folks I can get to know personal… Glad to get the auction an'

such ovah with's well, I mean, the waitin' once yo' passes eighteen an' all. .- . . We meetin' yo' old servants down theres, Mistis?"

The Draka nodded; the other staff were nearly as important to a fresh purchase's life as the owners, and just as much a matter of potluck. She thought for a moment; as Pa used to say, a little consideration went a long way in getting first-rate service.

Besides that, as Ma always said, serfs were inferiors, but inferior people, not machinery; there was no point in making their lives more difficult than necessary.

"Lele, my maid, she won't give yo' any trouble," Yolande said judiciously. "Sensible wench. Sofia, she's Myfwany's, she gets, ah, a little jealous sometimes." In fact, Yolande thought that deep down there were times when Sofia got jealous of her, which was ridiculous beyond words. Pitiful, in fact. "Don't stand any nonsense, and I'm sure yo'll make friends soon enough." That prompted another thought. "Oh, remind me when we get in, I'll have yo' cleared with Central Communication to call back to yo'

creche, talk to yo' friends there when yo've a mind to."

"Oh, thank yo', Mistis,"
Jolene said, her face lighting.

There was a stirring behind them. "Thanks fo' what?"

Myfwany asked. The serf rose and slid back into the body of the aircar; Yolande heard a brief yelp-giggle before her friend sank down in the bucket seat, yawning and rubbing her hands over her face and hair, the red locks now just long enough to curl.

They exchanged a brief kiss before the other Draka turned to run a quick eye over the displays.

"Damn, down to twenty-five percent, need to refuel again,"

she said.

"Could be worse; they could have made this thing run on hydride 'stead of kerosene," Yolande said, and laughed.

Turboram and scramjets ran on hydrogen compounds.

"Not until they build 'em orbit-capable… What's so fanny?"

"Oh, nothin'. Just happy, is all. Wishin' this holiday could last fo'ever." She stretched with her hands over her head, watching the other's green eyes narrow in a silent grin. Myfwany's face had more freckles now, and a faint golden bloom that was as much of a tan as her complexion and Sola Screen would allow, much lighter than Yolande's toast-gold. The flight-school pallor and gauntness were gone; she looked relaxed, fit, sleeker.

"Know how yo' feel, love," Myfwany said gently, brushing the back of her hand on the other's cheek. "Though we'd get bored with it, soon enough."

A beep from the machine, and they looked back to the board.

The middle of the main screen had switched automatically to an underbelly shot, showing a city center of garden-green interspersed with roofs of umber tile and black slate. It shifted as the aircar banked, and then a message flashed:
Manual control
below one thousand.

"Jolene, number between one and ten," Myfwany said, and looked at Yolande. "I'm six."

"To'," Yolande said.

"Mistis Yolande wins," Jolene said; her voice was slightly muffled, as she pressed her face against the side of the canopy.

"Shit," Myfawny replied good-naturedly, and sat back.

Yolande let her hand fall on the sidestick. "Initiath V sequence,"

she said, and touched the consol. "Manual."

"Cleared, Citizen," the Nantes control answered; a trifle grumpily, she thought.
Probably prefer me to
let the computer
do it
.
Fuck that.

She throttled back to 400 kph, and the wings slid forward to right-angles with the fuselage. The river wound below them, blue shimmer marked with the gold teardrop-shapes of sandbars and the metallic silver of shallow water. Levees flanked the wandering braided stream, although the level was down from the wintertime floods; Yolande brought the aircar down to three hundred meters, close enough to see details. Much greener than Tuscany, where you could sense the earth's dry hard bones even in the rains. They passed over Samur on its white cliffs, the pale stone of the castle blinding in the morning light; then the banks sank lower, only subtle changes in crop and growth showing where the sandy flood-plain gave way to upland
gatine.

"This it?" Myfwany asked.

"Mmm-hmm," Yolande replied.

Unmistakable, an old chateau built in checkerboard of white stone and red brick, with black Angers-slate roofs; four towers, and a big pool-reservoir behind the Great House with landscaped banks. The Quarters were to the east, the cottage roofs almost lost among the trees. Around the manor grounds were blocks of orchard, pink and white froth of apple and apricot and peach; dairy pasture down by the river, green-blue wheat and dark-green corn farther north, and long low slopes of vineyard black-shaggy with new growth. A hoe-gang looked up as they passed, faces white under the conical straw hats, then bent again to their work.

"There's the House landin' field," she continued. A square of asphalt among trees, on the border between the manor gardens and the croplands. She touched the transmitter control.

"Chateau Retour, Yolande here," she said.

"Mistress Ingolfsson." A serfs voice, the plantation radio watch. "Please—"

"Hiyo." A Citizen… yes, Aunt Tanya. A courtesy aunt, Yolande's mother's first cousin technically. "Y'all cleared. Yo'

stuff arrived yesterday."

"Thanks, Tanya. See yo' in a bit."

The near-inaudible whine of the turbines altered, as the slotted louvers beneath the aircar's body cycled open. Motion slowed, turned sluggish as the Bambara dropped below aerodynamic stallspeed and shifted to direct vertical lift. The inship systems balanced it effortlessly, and Yolande began to relax her grip on the pistol-trigger throttle built into the control column. It didn't require much in the way of piloting, really, just a steady hand…

And memory
, she thought, reaching out to touch the bypass fan initiator. There was a chung sound from behind the compartment, and a lower-pitched toning as the engines transferred some of their energy to pumping cool air through the lift-nozzles. Ceramic turbines were adiabatic, they ran hot. Hot enough to melt metal; that was what made them efficient. Also hot enough for the exhaust to damage an asphalt landing-stage, and Edward and Tanya von Shrakenberg would not appreciate that.
Sometimes I think I
need a computer just to keep the
relations straight
, she thought idly.

The altimeter unreeled. She touched another part of the smooth glassy surface before her, and the wings folded back and in, disappearing in their slots as the wheels lowered. Engine noise mounted, and wisps of dust flew off the smooth pebbled surface of the stage. An indicator blinked as the wheels touched down. Yolande touched the groundmode button, and the console rearranged itself; Bambaras were theoretically road and surface-water capable, although she felt that was a needless flourish.

The canopy above them split into three segments and half retracted to the rear. Air poured in, spring-chill and fresh, smelling intensely of blossom, greenery, very faintly of burnt fuel.

Quiet struck, the ears ringing with the engine's silence after so many hours. Nothing was louder than the
ping
of cooling metal; there was the murmur of wind in trees, birdsounds, no backround city-sound of engines. She had missed that country quiet, these last few days.

The landing field had a low hangar at one end, overshadowed with trees and vine-grown; Yolande could see a twin-engine winged tilt-rotor craft within, a couple of ducted-fan aircars.

Plantation servants were already loading a dolly with the suitcases from the Bambara's luggage compartment. She and Mvfwany rose, buckling their gunbelts and donning the Shantung silk jackets they had picked up in China. That prompted a thought; Yolande looked back and saw Jolene standing and staring about with an expression of half delight and half bewildered terror, the small carrying-case that held all her lot in one hand.

And getting goosebumps. Yolande snapped her fingers for the serfs attention, then took her hand and laid the palm against the screen. "Scan, identify," she said. That would access the personal file from the Labor Directorate net. "Well have to have the plantation seamstress run yo' up a few outfits, Jolene."

The two Draka vaulted out of the aircar; the compartment was only chest-high above the pavement, not worth the effort of opening the door, and Jolene clambered down more slowly to where Myfwany could grip her at the waist and swing her to the ground. Yolande could feel the residual heat of the jets on her legs through the linen of her trousers as she flipped up an access plate and touched the panel within. The canopy slid back above the passenger compartment and flashed from clear to mirror to a dull nonreflective black.

"Thumb here, Jolene," Yolande said, and keyed. "All right, yo've got vehicular access." Not to the controls, of course. Raising her voice, she called one of the porters: "Yo', boy." The stocky'

middle-aged French buck looked up from laying a cylindrical leather case of hunting-javelins on top of the pile of baggage and bowed. "See this wench to our rooms along with the rest of our things."

"Yolande Ingolfsson, kitten-adopter, small birds rescued to order," Myfwany said fondly, as they strolled arm-in-arm to the pathway that lead to the manor.

"I'll spoil my half an' yo' can flog the othah," Yolande replied dryly.

"Nothin' wrong with a kindly heart, love," Myfwany said, and yawned again, stretching. "Now let's lunch."

The Protracted Struggle is as clear-cut an example of a struggle between good and evil, freedom and slavery, as human history affords. Or to put it another way, never have two so clearly antithetical worldviews stood in such immediate opposition. At stake is not merely political power, but the power to define and in a sense, create the human race. That this is so indisputable. That it has hazards for us of the Alliance is not so generally realized. Because the cause we represent and fight for is so indisputably good, there is a widespread tendency to assume that our actions are necessarily correct This is perilously close to the Draka ethical maxim that to desire an end is to desire the means necessary to achieve it. Consider how some of the institutions we have come to take for granted might appear to generations before the Eurasian War: compulsory national Service for both sexes, for example; a peacetime military of over 20 million; a single police-intelligence-counterintelligence agency, the OSS, with an unaccountable budget of over five percent of our collective GNP. This is not to say that these measures were not necessary; simply that we should not assume therefore that they are good in themselves.