Collected Short Fiction, page 847
“I serve you, sir,” she breathed at my ear. “Ask for what you wish.”
What I wished for was Norlan table manners. My place was set with a vast gold plate surrounded with a bewildering array of silk napkins, bowls and cups and glasses, silver knives and forks and spoons. With no skills for them, I watched the engineer for clues.
He seemed amused when he saw me aping him, and I relaxed a little when it struck me that really I need not worry. Good etiquette could have condemned me as a native Norlaner, a traitor to my race.
The meal came in many courses, elaborate dishes accompanied with a series of alcoholic drinks. Sherleth served me with an eager zeal, refilling every glass or dish I touched, asking what was wrong when I could only taste the liquors and toy with the food.
A hopeless depression had killed my appetite. No matter whether the Council hanged Ram or set him free, I saw that he could never bring an end to slavery. This whole world was built on it. Call these people good or evil or in-between, they would fight to the death to defend it.
26.
The screams of a woman under torture woke me next morning. They continued for nearly two hours, broken with sounds of strangling and gasping cries for mercy. I felt sick and jittery before at last they ceased. Kenleth had slept on the floor, but he woke, crawled into the bed, and lay trembling against me.
It was Sherleth who entered with our breakfast tray when the Guard unlocked the door. She looked drawn and nervous, her eyes puffy and red. Silently, she set our meal on a little table. I couldn’t help asking if she had heard the screaming.
“Nobody screamed,” she whispered. “Perhaps a happy child was singing.”
“She was hurting.” Kenleth shook his head. “Bad. Maybe dying. I was frightened. I have no license. Could I be next?”
“You won’t be.” She tried to smile. “Not now.”
“What happened?” I asked. “Can’t you say?”
Her swollen eyes fixed on me.
“You are friend of Chenji?” I heard a desperate plea in her voice. “He is true son of Anak? Will set us free?”
“If he can.”
“I pray to Anak.” Her slender fingers made a fleeting sign. She paused to peer into my eyes. “You will not speak?”
“I promise.”
She glanced at the door to be certain it was shut.
“My sister.” Her voice fell, and her words came fast. “Ty Crail chose her to bathe him. Favored her too greatly. Tyba hated her for that. Tyba told butler she found her coupling with him in the tub. Not true, but butler fears Tyba. Ty Crail—” She tried to stifle a sob. “He wants no quarrel with Tyba.”
She stifled a sob and dropped to her knees.
“Ty,” she whispered, “may I serve you now?”
Kenleth tried to put his arms around her. She shook her head and pushed him away. I let her serve our breakfast. Her hands shaking, she spilled a few drops of tea and cried out as if in pain. She wiped her eyes when we had eaten, gathered up the dishes, slipped silently away.
Next morning another woman brought our breakfast. We never saw Sherleth again. Kenleth was not allowed out of the room, but the valet appeared every afternoon to dress me for dinner. The intelligence officer, Ayver Krel, was always there to update Crail on the slave rebellion. A wiry little fox-faced man who spoke a dozen native tongues, he had been a corath trader and a collector for the museum.
Day by day, I saw Crail’s loss of nerve as Krel reported the revolt spreading down the river toward his holdings. More violence than the river patrol could contain. More planters and traders murdered. More towns and factories burned. More refugees waiting on the riverbanks or crowded into the rescue camps set up for them on the river islands.
Krel always tried to lift his spirits.
“We re secure, Ty. They can’t storm Blood Hill with jungle knives. The constabulary can certainly contain any trouble on the delta. The advance flotilla of the fleet is already steaming up the channel.”
Crail asked about Chenji.
“His fate is still uncertain. The council would vote to hang him at once, if not for—”
He stopped with a frosty stare at me, down at the foot of the table.
“Frankly, Ty, we face a nasty stalemate. The blacks take Chenji for a son of Anak, sent to throw us off the continent. The white—” He shrugged. “He doubles the dilemma.”
I drew a long breath and tried to keep a blank expression. The whole group stared at me until at last Krel proposed at toast to Crail’s wife, the “uncrowned queen of Periclaw.”
Glasses clinked, and her cold smile wrenched me with thoughts of Sherleth’s sister slave and her shrieks of torture.
Krel was back a few nights later news that the whole fleet was now at anchor in the harbor, with ten thousand men aboard the troop transports under command of General Arka Zorn.
“Periclaw’s now secure,” he told Crail. “And we’re stabbing at the heart of the rebellion. Tribes never conquered, up north in the Black River basin, are joining the rebels. Their heads are filled with the poison notion that Chenji’s here from heaven to create a new Black Dominion.”
The Black River was a major tributary of the Blood, navigable for a thousand miles into territory that only a few explorers had seen. General Zorn would be pushing up it, with a dozen gunboats and four thousand troops.
“With victory on the Black, we can hang the traitors and snuff the trouble out like a dying candle.”
With no news of Ram, I dreamed that night that we were back at the trading post upriver. I saw him hanging from that twisted odd, blood dripping from the hook through his ribs. He was gasping for water, but blood filled the cup when I got it to lips.
At dinner the next evening, the guest included the Admiral Kuch, General Zorn, and their staff officers all in full uniform and gleaming with jeweled swords and medals. Zorn was a bronzehaired giant in starch-creased whites and a crimson sash, his voice a raucous bark.
A mulatto Guard and my nearly white waitress alert behind me, I sat alone at the foot of the table, empty chairs on either side of me. Laughing with the officers, Krel gave me a mocking introduction as “the honorable ambassador from the magic planet Earth.” When the meal was half over, a sudden silence fell. People turned to stare at the door. Celya Crail and Ram stood there, two guards with them.
“Ty Ram Chenji.” She caught his arm and turned to face her parents. “Governor Volmer has released him in my custody.”
In the startled silence, the butler escorted them to the empty places beside me. Limping, leaning on a cane, Ram wore yellow-striped prison coveralls His face bruised and swollen, he had a white bandage taped across his forehead where the crown of world had been. He stopped behind his chair and gave me a dismal shrug.
Krel murmured to Zorn and the admiral.
“That black devil!” Zorn was on his feet, stabbing a furious finger at Ram. “What’s he doing here?”
Crail gaped at him and then at Celya.
“General, Ty Chenji is my guest.” She caught Ram’s arm. “The council inquiry is still in progress. We have evidence that he and Ty White are what they claim to be, travelers from another world who meant no harm to us.”
“A monstrous fraud!” Zorn blinked at her, then at Ram and me. “They’ll hang for it.”
“Perhaps.” She shrugged. “Charges have been filed. They are not yet convicted of anything, but their lives have been in danger. I have accepted custody to protect them.”
“Wasn’t Chenji safe in prison?”
“Not safe, Ty. Intelligence exposed a plot to kill him.”
“Is that true?” Zorn swung his fury to Kiel. “In prison?”
The little intelligence man cringed and braced himself.
“Ty, a guard was bribed to knife him. He disarmed and disabled the guard. His food was poisoned. He lay near death in the prison hospital until Tyba Celya brought her doctors to save his life.”
“Who would kill him?”
“The culprit has not been identified.” Krel glanced down the table at us. “These men have enemies everywhere.”
“General Zorn.” Celya spoke beside me. “Ty Chenji is more than my guest. He is a weapon against the rebels. He has traveled in the jungle. He has met the Elders, leaders of the wild tribes that support the enemy. He has given us valuable information about their positions and resources.”
“Or misinformation?” Zorn huffed. “The story of his arrival on Mount Anak has been well substantiated.”
“By that white traitor?” He glared at me.
“And others, Ty. His best witness is the double agent known as Toron.”
“A double agent?” Zorn scowled at her. “Whose agent? Yours or theirs?”
She looked at Krel, who squirmed and raised his voice.
“Ty, we trust the man. He has been a useful asset for many years. He led the group that saw Ty Chenji and Ty White appear on Mount Anak. He has penetrated the rebel leadership. Their reports have been reliable.”
“If you think they are actual magicians from this magic Earth—” Zorn glowered at him. “I think they’re enchanted you. I know they’ve inspired the rebellion. They are a blade in our guts.”
A troop of waiters had appeared with platters of broiled quail. The scent wet my mouth in spite of the tension, and Crail rapped a glass.
“Gentlemen, can’t we let the meal continue?”
“One moment, Ty. If this splendid son of Anak has appeared to arrange the surrender of Periclaw to a horde of black savages—” Zorn clenched his jaws in indignation, and stopped to squint at Ram. “Can’t he speak for himself?”
Celya nodded at Ram. He gave me a wry shrug and turned to face Zorn.
“Ty.” His voice rasped and he cleared his throat. “Ty White and I never asked to be here. I’m not the son of any god. I never claimed to be.”
“Yet you wore a mark of magic power.”
“The birthmark?” He touched the bandage across his forehead. “I was born with it. A small pale freckle. Nothing uncommon, but it had the shape of a crown. Only an accident, I think, but it has been taken for the fulfillment of a prophecy.”
“Nothing uncommon?” Zorn’s harsh voice sharpened. “Wasn’t it shining in the dark?”
“That’s why they cut it out.”
He said nothing of his black greatgrandmother and her story of escape from another world. Zorn scowled at him and bent to hear something from Krel.
“I am told you command the rebels.”
“No true, Ty. Some of them may claim me for a leader, but I have no authority. I have met native people and heard their legends of a great civilization destroyed by war. I came out of the jungle hoping for a peace that would stop it from happening again.”
“I think you’re a liar or a fool. Likely both.”
With a nod to Crail, Zorn sat down. Crail clinked his glass. Frozen waiters came to life, refilling glasses and serving the quail. The silent guests relaxed and talked again. Ram grinned at me. I reached to take his hand. He stiffened and drew back. Celya frowned at me, her lips set tight.
“No contact allowed.”
27.
Ram was back every evening at dinner, the guards and Celya with him, seated near me at the foot of the table. A white bandage still crossed his forehead, but the bruises healed. The prison stripes were gone, but he looked no happier in his starched and creased formal attire.
Sometimes he winked or gave me a grim little nod, but we were not allowed to speak. Her parents ignored him, but she sat with him, smiled at him, and introduced him to other guests as if he were a welcome friend. The guards were always close.
We saw no more of Zorn. Determined to stab the rebels to the heart, he had gone up Black River with his gunboats, an infantry battalion, a long-range rocket battery, support troops, and a shipload of “crawler cannons.” Meeting no resistance, his gunboats were already near Sheko Falls, at the head of navigation.
Krel, the intelligence officer, was always there to share war news with Crail. A second flotilla was steaming up Blood River to pick up refugees and relieve outposts under siege.
Admiral Kuch was often back. A heavy, deliberate man with a hearty appetite and shrewd green eyes in a smooth bland face, he was full of good humor and basking happily in his popularity as the champion defender of the nation. Careful with his ships and his men, he would have been a winning poker player. He held half his fleet held in reserve, still at anchor in the harbor.
He had spoken in the council to oppose Zorn’s adventure.
“I’ve known Arka Zorn since we were cadets,” he told Crail. “He always liked a fight, and fought to win. He half killed himself, working to stay at the top of his class. But I’m uneasy for him now. He’s never known the jungle. Fighting jungle blacks is like boxing with smoke. They’re nomads. They’ve got no towns. No forts. He can fire his cannon. Maybe hit some savage in his hut. More likely nothing. The jungle doesn’t care.”
Celya was back with Ram every evening. At first he was stolidly silent, she warily alert. I saw them change. In my freshman classes back at home I had watched a hundred new romances bloom. I knew the signs. The tender glances, the gentle touches, the secret smiles. Like a Romeo reborn and an alien Juliet, they were falling in love.
Her parents were no happier than the Capulets. I saw their hostile stares at Ram, their cold frowns for her. Tears filled her eyes when she looked back at them. Sometimes I caught a grimace of pain. They must have tried to reason with her. She would have said she was an agent of intelligence, assigned to pry for anything that might betray him. What had they to fear from a prisoner under constant guard?
She must have felt tom between conflicting loyalties, but I saw more smiles for Ram as the romance ripened. I’d first seen her in a plain white dress, her long hair straight and free. It was soon cut shorter, curled, sometimes with flowers in it. Her lacy gowns were styled to reveal sleek white flesh that must have tempted him.
He was silent and restrained, nodding impassively when curious guests wanted to meet him and she had to explain that the terms of his release didn’t let him speak in public. They spoke enough to each other, murmuring softly, heads bent together. Their shoulders touched. She often caught his arm. Once I saw his hand on her thigh. I felt apprehension for him, and sharpening unease for Kenleth and me.
Days went by with nothing new about the war. Periclaw and the delta were not yet touched, the commercial docks still busy. Freighters still slid down the channel to the sea, laden with grain, sugar, and rum for Norlan. General Zorn had reached a great waterfall at the head of navigation on Black River. At the last report, he had led his ground forces up the cliffs beyond to attack a reported native stronghold.
Crail was an optimist.
“Like us or not,” he told the admiral, “the rebels will come to see the fools they are. They can torch a few buildings and leave good crops to rot, any time they want to hang for it. They forget that they’d be back in the Stone Age without us. They’ve got to have our metals for every tool and pot they use, our drugs to save them from their jungle fevers, our faith to keep them out of hell.”
He raised his voice, staring down the table at Ram and his daughter.
“If you want to see our actual danger, look at those deluded few who want an end to slavery. They call it cruel. Call it wrong. They’re blind to the facts. The workers on my plantations live better lives than their jungle kin. They get food and shelter, medical care, safety from their jungle brothers who’d hunt them down for trophy skulls.”
Celya flushed and bit her lip. Ram stared coolly back. The shrieks of Sherleth’s dying sister echoed in my mind.
Confined to our room, Kenleth was restless as a caged monkey. He tried to talk to the maid who brought our trays and cleaned the room. She would only touch her lips and shake her head. We played catch with green apples. He learned to juggle them. We carried on our language lessons. He asked a thousand questions about the trilithons and the worlds we had seen and Earth itself.
If I ever went back there, could he come with me?
I told him he could, if we could ever escape from the Crails. If Ram came with us. If we could find Derek and Lupe. If they had discovered some way home. If Ram still had his emerald key. If we could find an intact trilithon programmed to take us in the right direction.
A wild dream, but it brightened his troubled face. Sometimes, in the long and anxious nights, I almost believed it. After all, miracles sometimes happened. Nothing was ever quite what you expected. The Sahara gate itself was proof of that.
The war picture suffered a sudden change. One evening Krel and the admiral arrived late for dinner. They burst in together, pushed past the butler, rushed to whisper at Crail’s ear. He rose to huddle with them. We sat waiting until he rapped his glass and looked down the table.
“Sad news,” his old voice was nearly too faint for me to hear. “Sad news.”
He sat again as if his knees were weak and let the admiral talk.
“Until today, nothing had been heard from General Zorn since he left his boats below the Sheko Falls.”
He spoke slowly and carefully, perhaps repeating testimony he had given the council. Pausing from time to time, he turned to Krel for a word or a nod of support.
“We sent three courier craft upriver to ask for information. The first two never returned. The third has just come back, bringing a man they met on the river in a small boat. He tells a story I didn’t want to believe until intelligence could confirm its accuracy.”
“Convincing detail came from native sources,” Krel said. “The wild tribes keep in touch with drum talk. You hear the drums at night.”
“This man had been Zorn’s orderly,” the admiral continued. “He’d gone on with Zorn above the falls. They’d heard tales of a ruined temple of Anak and a center of native power around it in an area that had never been explored. The orderly says their native guides took them out of the jungle and on across a barren plateau where the vegetation was scant and strange. He describes a plant the blacks call the gut worm.”
