Starquest: Scourge of the Spaceways, page 13
Napoleon said softly, "The Iss doorwarden will not let me in, nor take a message. To be frank, I am a little intimidated by Qa'a. Stars know how old he is!"
"Unless he is older than the stars, in which case, they don't." Hogarth slid his cigar from one side of his bill to the other with a shrug of his beak, "And whatever soul says Qa'a don't intimidate him is a fibber, or a bibber, or both!" Hogarth poked an emphatic feathery finger toward Napoleon. "That's why you talk to Celarent first."
Napoleon looked up. "Eh? I mean, I beg your pardon?"
"From the point of view of an Ancient Race, humans are hatchlings. But Equines are an Elder Race, younger brothers of the Ancients, so to speak. You get the nod of approval from Celarent, Qa'a might — might, mind you — might open his ear. He will know at least what you're selling is logical."
"But Celarent won't see me!" Napoleon drained his glass, smacking his lips with a scowl. The drink had been too fruity, and too little. "I have a better idea. You talk to him."
Hogarth emitted a quack of smoky laughter. "That Horse knows me too well. He's a good judge of character, and he knows I never got me one. But you? You're fresh and new. Come on! Humans are a race with no talents, no virtues, and no good looks, but you've coasted along on your charm for all history. A whole race of poets and fraudsters and used aircar salesmen. Limber up your silver tongue and get to work. And remember! Silver tongues won't work on Equines. They only listen to facts, statistics, and other facts."
"How do I get to see Celarent? He won't receive me."
"You'll think of something," snapped Hogarth. He clipped off the burning end of his cigar into an ashtray, wrapped the remainder in a tobacco leaf, and returned it to his pocket humidor. "But think of it fast! Time is wasting! Me, I have to nip over to the pleasure parlor for my weekly foot massage with a pair of buxom blonde twins from Hippocampus. I am a big tipper, so they can't get enough of me, see? That is the way a friendship of utility works! Read the classics!"
And with that odd admonition, the feathery senator hopped to the floor, and waddled away, mere moments before a pretty girl in an antique parlor-maid outfit brought the bill for Napoleon.
2. A Maddening She-Mule
In the Janiculum District, the architecture of the world-city took on a very different aspect. Here, the rooftops were broad and flat, covered with soil, grass, flowers, shrubs, and trees. Arbors crowned one arcology after another, looking like the squares of some expansive chessboard for three-dee chess, with platforms and wings holding smaller gardens. Midmost arose the wide, well-proportioned and many-pillared Acropolis of the Philosopher-Kings, who once held dominion here, in days now half-mythical.
Napoleon had a fair amount of time to think, as the Equines did not permit air-cabs to land on their rooftops. He had brought no entourage with him, as he had on previous attempts, but came alone, walking-stick in hand.
His walk down shady lanes of stately, thick-trunked olive trees was a long one, and led past murmuring marble fountains, past humming, wind-strummed aeolian harps hung on high pillars, or standing at the apex of domed pavilions or austere white marble fanes. The statues, pediments, and arches were sparsely adorned with equestrian figures of legendary sages and ascetics, logicians and astronomers, or with lifelike designs from nature, carvings of dove and carp, wheat and olive.
Before the pillared portico leading into the Acropolis was a long-eared Jennet, stiff and gray with age. She was of their Artisan class. Mules were bred for specific tasks not thought appropriate for those with family obligations. To Napoleon, who had grown up around horses his whole life, the creatures seemed more deerlike than not, since they had split hooves, a light frame, and necks both long and flexible. But their flowing manes and full tails were exactly horselike.
This particular Jennet was seated on her haunches before the door between two beehives, and was sewing with thread and needle.
Normally, the deerlike hooves would be too clumsy for the task, but in old age, Equine feet softened and separated, becoming useless for galloping, but allowing vestigial digits concealed in the dewclaws greater play and dexterity. Equine had no modesty taboo nor need of vestments, but the Custodian, Artisan, or Servile classes wore horse-collars holding weapons or tools designed to be held and used by teeth and tongue.
This old she-mule was the receptionist and secretary for the Senator, but had no desk, no comdisc, no holo-files, ledgers or notepads at hand. The Equines had memories more perfect than any robot brain, and boasted a Sack's organ like that of an electric eel, which they could use to encode and share high-speed information bursts with each other, swapping whole memory chains in a moment. The organ could also be used to give an unwary or untoward hominid a debilitating shock, or even lethal.
Napoleon knew it was wrong, but he could not but feel a twinge of old, old resentment upon seeing the creature with her awkward hands and overlarge head, seated amid austere columns whose capitals were decorated with intricate, mathematically-pleasing designs of leaf and flower.
He wondered how many of these monuments and pediments had been sculpted and erected by the hands of human helots, toiling under the emotionless, unsympathetic eye of Equine overseers. This ancient edifice was surely old enough to date from that age of long ago. Just as surely, no unaided Equine produced such handiwork.
"I am here to see the Senator," he announced.
The spectacle-lenses hovering, one before each eye, were opaque to human vision, so he could not tell if she even bothered to glance up at him.
He waited with growing impatience, first one moment, then two, then many, as the Jennet by not so much as an ear twitch shown she had heard him.
Napoleon took a deep breath to calm himself. He must not forget what sort of creatures Equines were. "Let me pass. It is necessary that I have an audience with the Savant and Senator Celarent of Alpherat, that he hear and address me, and I him, in dialog as immediately as can be arranged."
"Your request is out of order," the old Jennet answered curtly. "No dialog is needed. All matters of mutual interest are currently optimal. Done." She did not bother looking up.
Napoleon told himself not to be angry. He evidently did not listen, for his words came out in a sharp tone. "Matters are not optimal! Under limits of the Grand Charter, the navy is not allowed to deploy forces without a declaration of war — and without the favorable report of the Naval Intelligence committee, the committee on which Savant Celarent sits, the War Committee will not issue the declaration. If the navy does not deploy, the worlds of Hvalens Hode will be attacked and overwhelmed by piratical forces gathering in that sector, a matter of incalculable damage and loss of life. The Senator must be aware of this!"
The Jennet did not respond, did not look up from her needlework, which was slow and ungainly. She seemed to be tatting a doily. It was an unpleasant thing to watch, considering how patiently the old mule was working, and how inferior the work was. How did these creatures ever develop stardrive so much earlier than mankind? Napoleon resisted the urge to snatch the lacy fabric from her grasp and tear it to shreds.
He turned his head. The wide doorway, flanked by pillars, leading into the airy atrium of the edifice was open. Within, a shaft of light from high orient windows fell upon a flowing fountain of nested bowls, whose falling waters scattered reflections across the floors of bright mosaic.
There was no door in the frame. It stood open. Napoleon could have simply walked inside at will. And yet that would make things worse.
Equine did not use buildings for domiciles. Heat leaving or rain entering their buildings seemed not to bother them. Among themselves, they had neither things worth stealing nor trespassers to steal them.
But it was a reminder how alien the ancient races could be.
Napoleon said, "If Senator Celarent faithfully performs his duty as a Senator, he must make wise decisions based on complete information. A conversation with me may aid his decision process."
She said, "Likelihood is insignificant hence unactionable. Your reasoning errs. Done."
He gritted his teeth. "If you hinder his duties as a senator, you fail in your duty to him! It is insane not to let me see him!"
She said, "All rational creatures act to fulfill the dictates of nature, but the Equine hierarchic protocol pursues such actions prudently, patiently, and consistently. Conform your acts to nature, and they will be more perfectly coordinated with the hierarchic protocol. Correct lapses in your understanding; prioritize efficient expenditure of effort and time."
Napoleon swallowed his frustration. It was like talking to a robot, but somehow worse.
He had one last tactic to try, but it seemed so silly he hesitated. He shrugged, put on a serious expression on his face, and said, "I have one more topic I must see the Senator to discuss."
"The likelihood is insignificant. Name the topic."
"I must see the Senator to discuss the topic of whether I must see the Senator."
"Very well. Go in."
Napoleon stood blinking, confused at the sudden success. He felt like a man who stumbles at the top of an ill lit stairway, jarred when the last expected step is not there.
"What do you mean, 'go in'?"
"The building before you is the acropolis of the philosopher-king where the Senator Celarent currently is holding session. He is within. You are not currently in range of his hearing, so you must approach before a mutual discussion is feasible. Answer whether I have explained matters in sufficient simplicity for you to grasp."
Napoleon wrestled yet another spasm of irritation. "Very good, I understand, thank you."
"Address him as your honor to signify the onset of conversation, and use sir thereafter, or his name, to signify to whom your remarks are addressed. Avoid colloquialisms, metaphors, ambiguities, overgeneralization, simplification. Supply dates for any time-conditional remarks. Indicate intentional incompleteness, as partial lists, et cetera. Indicate when descriptors are meant to be useful rather than accurate, particularly with self-reflexive statements. Cease speaking after queries or imperatives to allow response. Indicate conclusions. Done."
"May I say 'thank you' rather than 'done' when I finish a sentence?" And, when she did not answer, he said, "Can you tell me where in the building I might find him? Or, rather, please tell me if you know."
"I do not know his current whereabouts, but I did not see him leave, so it is safe to suppose he is still within. A choke point search pattern may be more efficient than a grid search pattern. Go in."
Napoleon told himself that learning to control frustration and impatience was useful as a matter of maturity and self discipline. So he turned away with no further word, and stomped up the broad, wide stair to the open door, and entered the vast atrium.
3. The Constellation of the Sanctum
How long he spent wandering acre after acre of stately, empty temple, he could not say. It was surely less time than his seething impatience made it seem. Arcades broad as boulevards led to naves, choirs, and transepts wide as town squares. He saw no furniture, no machinery, nor appliances, aside from fountainworks. What few lamps he saw were simple hurricane lamps, merely chips of phosphor-radioactive material held in chimneys of antiradiation glass, designed to burn for millennia.
He saw no people, Equine or otherwise, nor did he come across a comdisc stand or kiosk where some helpful robot was stationed. He did see swarms of bees, bright and glittering as gems when they passed through slants of sunlight, moving up and down the transept, busy on some business of the Equines.
He sat down on an altarstone in the middle of a planetarium and put his head in his hands. Figures of local constellations, with the smooth curves of orbits and ecliptics of suns and stars, conjunctions, equinoxes, and so on were depicted in jeweled mosaic on the dome above, and looked down on him.
These were not the geometric constellations and grouping of stars seen from Alpherat. The architect, some long lost human manservant of the dispassionate Equine, had adorned the dome with the signs of Earth, old Earth, the Eden world of Humankind, called Tempe, from which sprang all the songs of the sons of Man. It was a world from a galaxy long dead, long dwindled into mere myth.
Napoleon wondered what Hogarth would make of this absurd situation: the Son of a Duke, having won himself an appointment with one of the most powerful senators from one of the most elder races in the Senate, was left to wander the aimless halls of some long dead Philosopher-King.
Still, Napoleon had resources other men did not. From an inner pocket he took a small jewel box. He removed his glove to work the thumbprint lock. Inside was a finger ring, set with a red opal that gleamed with more light than was in its environs. He placed the ring on his finger, and donned his glove to hide it.
He spoke the words softly, or perhaps only dreamed them. Unseen Servants of Eternal Light! Enfold me in the mantle of the mystery of night!
Like a cloud unfolding from a thurible of black incense, Nightshadow rose from the entranced and unmoving body of Napoleon. Beneath the wide brim of his galero hat, his cat-eyes gleamed gold. The cords and tassels of his hat floated near his breast and shoulders, swaying like seaweed in a current, and the long folds of his cape were as a midnight thundercloud seen by moonlight, streaming and flowing. The stone on his ring finger gleamed like a ruby coal.
But even as he straightened and stood upright in the middle of the air, a sense of pressure, a fearsome aura of immense mass, weight, dignity and power caught him. The nightmare sensation of being trapped in an airless void filled his mind and emptied his lungs. Fear froze him in place.
He dared not move his head nor twitch, but round he darted his eyes. The mosaics of the constellations had not moved, but he sensed that they were alive. Images of eyes and faces were turned toward him: a lion, an ox, an eagle, and throned king were staring balefully at him: a fish with a coin in its mouth; a ram in a thicket; twins wrestling, the smooth one clutching his hairy brother's ankle; a crab from the sea flourishing a dropped rood; a virgin nursing a child; a scapegoat; a satyr with a longbow dancing amid ruins; a black horseman uplifting balance scales; a prophet with a baptismal jar on his shoulder, bowing as he stooped to wash the feet of his disciples.
They were encircling him. He was trapped.
Surely these were astral images from the dream world, something from deep in the archetypal consciousness, the oceanic mind below all minds, which bound all forms of life together. But why were they here? What had called them?
They were guardians. Protectors. Watchmen who would never sleep.
Had he not been told this was a Temple? He knew that the Equines had directed its construction, but they had not raised these walls. Ancient peoples of his race raised them, back in an age when more was known about Kirlian arts, and protections against unholy things and dark dreams were ever-present. This temple was older than the Empire, and they had not dismantled nor desecrated it.
Against his will, as if clamped in a turning vise, his head was twisted to the north quarter of the dome. Below a throned queen toying with a mirror, and above a sea-creature sporting in the waves, between a winged horse, and a flying swordsman flourishing a severed gorgon head, here was a princess chained to a rock, golden and glorious, clad only in sea-foam.
Her stern eyes, angelic eyes, burned into Nightshadow's petrified gaze. Even when he closed his eyes, trembling, her eyes were burning within his brain.
Her words were like the sound of trumpets and rushing waters. "Behold my shame and peril, chained by corruption, menaced by monstrosity. The Unseen answers not to serve your ease, but to ease your service. No glory is his who serves the light in the dark. Lone, mine eye is on you."
He raised his hand, flourishing his ring. "Behold, the manservant of the Unseen! By this sign, I may go where none have been. In the name of the Highmost of the High, whose face none see, avert thine eye!"
Her look was one of sorrow.
At once he came to himself. Napoleon was awake and shaking and alone, and the constellations on the walls were merely lifeless images. He wondered what the last words meant. The image of her countenance, so perfectly inhuman and yet so sorrowful, haunted him.
He returned his ring to its hiding place, stood, and continued on his way.
4. Celarent
Napoleon emerged into a quadrangle where a cloister garden was laid, or, rather, an arbor, where a double row of cedar trees formed an arcade of grassy paths, surrounding a pleasant plot of herbs and ferns and flowerbanks.
The sky was blue and bright overhead, which made Napoleon blink and wipe his eyes. He could not recall the last time he had been anywhere in the world-city of Septentrion without some taller building overhead, blocking the view, except, perhaps, when he had been atop a spaceport lift-off pad. In the superscrapers tall enough to lift their penthouses above the general level of arcology rooftops, there was always a microscopic seasick sensation caused by building sway. There was none in this arbor. It almost felt like being back home on Vindamiatrix, or some other natural planet with soil and rock underfoot, rather than cubic miles of vaults and catacombs. This temple must have originally been built on a tall mountaintop.
Here was Savant Celarent, walking among the trees. Napoleon recognized him by the dappled pattern of his coat. When the Senate was in session, the Savant wore a white tool collar devoid of tools, to show that he was of the Contemplative Order, and headgear bearing a single white data diamond. Here, he wore no garb, no ornament. There was neither desk nor comdisc at hand, nor any servants, robots, security guards, nor entourage.
Napoleon walked nearer, and fell in step with him, as the Equine continued to amble along the arbor path at an unhurried, dignified pace.
Napoleon uttered a greeting, and heard no response; then complimented the Savant on the restful and pleasant layout of his gardens, and again heard no response.
