Clarion

by William Greenleaf

  "Yeah, right!" Ogram exclaimed. "Something they can't do in that flyer. My father used to do it all the time."

  Paul stared at the vidscreen. There was no sign of the ruins or the village of Fairhope.

  Ogram leveled the craft at an altitude that was barely above the treetops. He glanced over at Paul.

  "You look a little pale. Feeling okay?" Paul shook his head wonderingly. "I've never seen anyone skip that close to a mass-plus before."

  "Mass-plus?"

  "Clarion. The planet. The gravitational basis for the skip."

  Ogram shrugged and turned back to the

  vidscreen. Paul realized with growing horror that Ogram didn't realize how close he had come to killing all of them. Even a navigation computer needed a few seconds to compute the maneuvers that were required to move a craft through the kohlmann stream using a local mass-plus. And with the mass-plus less than a thousand feet below them ...

  CLARION 63

  Slowly, Paul released the deathgrip he had taken on the arms of the seat. Ogram was guiding the streamer along the scar of an old riverbed, twisting through the connected bases of low, rolling hills. He reduced the craft's speed and left the riverbed to fly up the gentle slope of a hill that was covered with lush vegetation. His eyes searched the vidscreens that were now set on wide-angle. When the craft crested the hill, Paul could again see the valley, and scattered signs of the ruins of Chalcharuzzi.

  "Ah, here we are." Ogram swung the craft into a gentle turn and climbed the slope a few hundred meters. Then he brought the scoutship to a stop and hovered unsteadily above a grassy clearing that was sheltered all around by high trees.

  As the craft dropped closer to the ground, a warning light winked amber on the console screen. Paul waited for Ogram to lower the landing struts and realized with a sudden surge of panic that Ogram hadn't even noticed the light. He tried to speak, but his mouth had gone suddenly dry. Frakes had said something about that other man from Clarion: He came down too fast. . . stasis engines blew. . . crispy by the time they got him out. . .

  "The struts!" Paul yelled. "Lord—" Ogram's head jerked around; then he reached forward and hit the four banded switches an instant before the streamer landed with a bone-jarring thump.

  "Sorry," Ogram said. "Guess I could use a little more work on that, too."

  Paul released a breath, drew another. His heart hammered.

  "Anyway, we're here." Ogram swiveled around and pressed the bar to open the hatchcover. The outside environment sensors went to work while Ogram tapped his fingers impatiently on the arm of 64

  William Greenleaj CLARION 65

  his chair. A moment later the hatchcover lifted with a pneumatic hiss. Two men waited outside near the edge of the clearing. Ogram unsnapped his harness, ducked out through the hatchway and trotted down the short ramp. He stopped at the bottom and turned back to Paul and Borland.

  "Coming?"

  Paul looked at Dorland, waiting. Doriand stared at him; then something in his face softened a little and he offered a weary grin.

  "Sorry about all this. You shouldn't have come." Paul didn't know what to say. In truth, he was beginning to feel the same way.

  Dorland fumbled with his harness and got it loose with Paul's help; then the two of them went down the ramp to join Ogram. The ground underfoot was spongy. The air was cool on Paul's sweaty face and neck, and carried a pleasant outdoor scent.

  One of the men stepped forward and tilted his head at Dorland. "Is that him?"

  The voice didn't match the appearance. Paul looked closer and realized that the person who had spoken was a young woman with short hair. She wore dark coveralls like Ogram's. A belt pouch hung from her waist, cinched with dark cord.

  "Dorland Avery," Ogram said by way of introduction. "This is Karyn DiMemmo. She—"

  "I remember," Dorland said. A brief smile touched his lips, and he held his hand out at waist level, palm down. "You were this high when I saw you last. How are your parents?"

  "They're both dead."

  The smile faded. "I'm sorry . . ." Her dark eyes remained on him a moment longer; then she looked at Paul. "Who's he?" Ogram answered: "He works for Dorland—"

  "You were supposed to bring Dorland. Nobody else."

  "Dorland wouldn't come without him. Sabastian said not to bring him unless he agreed to come willingly."

  The girl clearly wasn't pleased with Paul's presence. Beside her stood a thin, feral-looking man with a mane of black hair shot with gray. There was a generally unkempt, straggling look about him. He wore bulky coveralls like the others, but carried a knapsack instead of a belt pouch. He grinned up at Paul, showing teeth that were stained and broken.

  "Let's get this over with," Paul said. "Dorland and I want to get back home."

  "This is Dorland's home," the girl said.

  "Sabastian is waiting." She turned to lead the way into the trees.

  Chapter Six

  OGRAM WATCHED THE GIRL STALK. AWAY. "MY, aren't we in a sour mood today."

  The thin man spoke for the first time. "Elder Jacowicz had three people strung up on the wall today."

  The humor went out ofOgram's face. "Let's go," he muttered, and turned to follow the girl up the wooded slope.

  Paul and Dorland fell into step behind him.

  "What wall is he talking about?" Paul asked.

  "The God Wall," Ogram said tersely. "You'll find out about it soon enough."

  They climbed for a few minutes in silence. Trees with heavy gray bark towered above them, shading them with large, blue-green leaves. There was no path, but Karyn DiMemmo seemed to know her

  way well enough. Paul moved carefully, watching |

  his step. Heavy underbrush pulled at him.

  "How far is it?" he asked.

  "Half a kil," Ogram answered. "Take us a few minutes."

  The slope steepened. The forest thinned, and the William Greenleaf

  68

  ground became rocky with patches of vegetation showing through. They climbed past several large outcroppings of pink-veined rock, and large boulders that looked as if they were on the verge of tumbling down the slope. The boulders were oddly uniform, with rounded comers. Then Paul realized they were arranged in two curved rows that ran ten meters or more across the slope of the hill. A barrier—and when he looked closer he saw that it was a lethal one. Each boulder was held in place by a pair of wooden angle braces. Ropes attached to each brace trailed away up the slope.

  They live in a cave, and their defense consists of throwing big rocks, he thought wonderingly. They picked their way carefully through the barrier. Beyond it were a few scattered benches made of roughly cut wood. A thin wisp of smoke spiraled upward from a primitive fire pit. Beyond the pit loomed the mouth of a large cave. A big man at the entrance sat on a sawed tree stump and worked at something he held in his hands. Wood shavings lay on the ground at his feet. He wore rough coveralls and a shaggy beard. He looked up at the approaching group and pushed himself to his feet.

  "Hey, Dorland!"

  Dorland stopped to take the man's hand. "Olaf. It's good to see you."

  "You, too, boy." The big man shook his hand. Dorland introduced Paul, and the man named

  Olaf shook his hand. Then his eyes went back to Dorland. "You shouldn't have come back. I told Sabastian to leave you alone." He seemed to run out of breath. When he drew another, Paul heard an unhealthy rattle. "He wouldn't listen to me."

  "Are you all right?" Dorland had a concerned look on his face.

  "Aw, yeah. A little lungspot, that's all." Olaf paused for another rattling breath. "All they let me

  CLARION 69

  do around here is cook, if you can believe that." He laughed, then broke into a fit of coughing. When it was over, he hooked a thumb toward the cave.

  "You better go see Sabastian. I'll fix up a big pot of stew for supper."

  "This way," Karyn said, obviously impatient. Paul and Dorland followed her into the cave. Just inside the opening, an ol
der man sat hunched over a rough wooden table. His attention was on something that had been disassembled and laid out across the table. A machine, but unrecognizable to Paul—an odd assortment of springs and cylinders and other small pieces. A few hand tools were arranged carefully on one side of the table. A woven basket on the ground beside the table held more parts.

  The old man carefully fitted a thumb-sized cylinder over the end of a tube and tightened something at the end of the cylinder with a bladed tool. Then he placed the tool on the table and leaned back in the chair to regard Dorland.

  "Do you know what this is?" he asked, holding up the cylinder-and-tube assembly. His voice was dry and gravelly.

  Dorland looked more closely at the object. "It's part of a power pack for a light globe."

  "That's right. We had twelve of them when you were here. Now we're down to three. When those are gone, we will be forced to light wooden torches at night." Nobody had bothered with introductions, but Paul had already decided the old man was Dorland's uncle, Sabastian Avery. He was lanky, with a face composed of harsh angles and straight lines. His skin was sun-darkened and wrinkled. The family resemblance was unmistakable; in Sabastian's dark, brooding eyes, heavy brows and thick black hair, Paul saw an older version of Dorland.

  Sabastian's eyes moved to Paul, and a single 70 William Greenleaf CLARION 71

  bushy eyebrow rose slightly. Selmer Ogram cleared his throat and offered his brief explanation for Paul's presence. Sabastian nodded his acceptance and turned to select another cylinder from the basket beside the table.

  "Thank you for coming back," he said. This brought no response from Doriand. Selmer Ogram disappeared into the cave and returned with two folded chairs. He set them up near the table and offered them to Paul and Doriand. He and Karyn sat facing them on a log that had been placed near the fire pit. Ogram clasped his hands between his knees and looked through them at the ground. Karyn's eyes were on Doriand.

  "I'm sorry we had to ask you to come back," Sabastian went on. He plugged one end of a cable into the cylinder, and the other end into a small instrument he had placed in front of him on the table. He frowned, unplugged the cable and began removing the cap from the cylinder. "It wasn't an easy decision. I had hoped you would find a new life on the outside."

  "I did. Selmer said you need my help." Sabastian looked up at Doriand, holding the cylinder shell carefully between thumb and forefinger. "There are only five of us left. Schaefer and Michelson are dead. And Cleve Quinton."

  "I know," Doriand said quietly. "Cleve was first witness when Diana and I were married. Selmer said Cleve saw something come out of the chauka during the semarch ceremony."

  The old man reached for the bladed tool again.

  "Cleve wore a fartalker, and Karyn and Jacque were listening outside the wall. Cleve relayed what he saw until the deacons found him and killed him." He twisted the tool and the end popped off the cylinder, exposing a web of tiny wires. "He may have been hallueinating. We know he was under great stress."

  "This happened during a religious ceremony?" Paul asked.

  Sabastian nodded. "Semarch—when the young men are initiated into the Sons of God."

  "Then you're probably right," Paul said. "About Cleve Quinton hallucinating, I mean. From what I've heard, that's fairly common among some religions. People get worked up to the point they may see anything."

  "Perhaps."

  Paul was more interested in something else

  Sabastian had said. Erich Frakes had mentioned it also—a Tal Tahir machine. "What's the chauka?"

  "The chauka is the most sacred of Tal Tahir artifacts," Sabastian said. He went back to work on the cylinder and made a delicate adjustment with the tool. "It is inside the temple of the Tal Tahir, and only the deacons and elders of the Holy Order are permitted to see it. According to legend, it is used to summon Lord Tern from beyond the Far Peaks."

  "Selmer told me the Tal Tahir are all dead. As you said, this man Quinton must have been hallucinating. Why is the chauka so important to you?"

  "The chauka is a symbol of Lord Tern. If we destroy it, the people of Fairhope will see that the Holy Order is not invincible. We hope they will learn to control their fear of the Holy Order and turn against it."

  "Why do you need Doriand?"

  Sabastian connected the cylinder to the instrument and frowned at the result. Once again he began prying gently at the cap. "I hope Doriand will agree to go into the sacred chamber and try to discover what Cleve saw during the semarch ceremony." Paul issued a grunt of surprise. "After what happened to him? How can you expect—"

  "Cleve saw something that he thought was Lord 72 William Greenleaf CLARION 73

  Tern," Sabastian said in the same quiet tone. "We want to find out what he saw. I have always believed that the ceremony was merely a ritual. Now I am not so sure."

  The statement confused Paul. "Are you saying you think Lord Tern may really exist?"

  "I am saying only that I want to leam what I can about what Cleve saw inside the sacred chamber."

  "But if Lord Tern is a fabrication of the Holy Order—"

  The old man turned to look at Paul. "It may be that what we have taken as myth and lies is actual fact. It may be that Lord Tern lives inside the temple."

  Paul shook his head. He felt as if the conversation had drifted off somewhere and left him behind. Doriand sat silently beside him.

  "Send someone else to the temple," Paul said at last to Sabastian. He waved a hand toward the thin, rough-looking man who had been waiting with K-aryn when the streamer landed. The man squatted near the fire pit talking to Olaf. He noticed Paul's attention and grinned. "He seems more the type to try something like that."

  "Jacque Hakim is expert with weapons," Sabastian admitted. "But Doriand has been trained in the ways of the Holy Order and Lord Tern." He paused to concentrate on the fine work of removing the wiring from the cylinder. Paul wondered how he could have the patience to keep at it so persistently. Then he remembered what Sabastian had said. When these are gone, we will be forced to light wooden torches at night. "It is said that one must be properly trained before an encounter with Lord Tern. If not, his power will destroy your mind."

  "How can—" Then Paul stopped and shook his head in confusion. "You're saying something happened to Cleve Quinton because he wasn't properly

  . . . trained?"

  "We don't know what happened during the ceremony, but we know that he was subjected to a mental trauma." Sabastian got up and moved to a small wooden box that was set against the cave wall. He opened the lid carefully and removed a tool. When he came back, Paul realized he walked with a heavy limp. He remembered something

  Ogram had said to Doriand: He lost a leg to the deacons. "I don't know what happened to Cleve. There is much about the temple and the sacred chamber that we do not understand—secrets that are closely guarded by the Holy Order. I am hoping that Dorland's training will help him understand some of those secrets."

  "You keep talking about Dorland's training. What do you mean?"

  Sabastian's eyes flicked to Doriand, then back to Paul. "The deacons and elders go through a program of mental training that is meant to prepare them for communication with Lord Tern."

  "The deacons and elders? But—" Paul stopped, his eyes going to Doriand. Doriand had pulled into himself and was seemingly oblivious to the discussion.

  "Doriand was once in line for eldership in the Holy Order," Sabastian said.

  Chapter Seven

  PAUL SAT ON AN OUTCROPPING OF ROCK THAT

  overlooked the valley. Clarion's butter-yellow sun hung low over the horizon. The woods around him were filled with the sounds of countless insects. He'd been sitting there for an hour looking down at the valley and the ruins that were stretched out below him. He was only a short distance from the camp, but he felt a much-needed solitude. Too much had happened today. He had to put it in some kind of order.

  But his thoughts were continually drawn to the Tal Tahir city below
him. Even after fifty thousand years the vegetation had not succeeded in covering it entirely. Farther back he could see the village of Fairhope, and beyond it the speckled white fields of a crop called cotton that had been brought with the original colonists on Vanguard. Selmer had told him it was used to make most of their clothing. The dinner he had eaten with the others at the cave lay heavy and sour in his stomach. Olaf Blackburn's stew was made from something called poca—a vegetable root that grew in the forest 75

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  below the cave. Olaf boiled the poca in a big pot, adding other ingredients that did little to improve the root's bitter flavor. According to Selmer Ogram, poca was often dried into cakes because it was easy to pack and would keep for a long time without spoiling. Paul shuddered when he thought about dry cakes of the foul-tasting plant.

  In some ways the area that was spread out below him reminded Paul of the woodlands that surrounded his house on Farrady. He and Trisha lived in a two-story flydown that was isolated from all but air traffic. The house was large and luxurious, nicer by far than anything he'd ever expected to own—one of the many benefits of being Doriand Avery's business manager. He had bought it shortly after he and Trisha had taken residence together. Trisha. He'd hardly had time to think of her during the past few hours, but now he felt a pang for home like he had never felt during a tour. Of all the unpleasant chores he'd had to take care of to make this unexpected trip, lying about it to Trisha had been the worst. She and Paul had been together for more than a year, and Paul was proud of the fact that he'd always been honest with her. It was a symbol to him that his hell-raising days were over

  —and he had felt increasingly comfortable with that. Now and then he found himself thinking of suggesting a permanent bond with Trisha. He had even considered the possibility of children. You're overreacting, he told himself. You lied to her, but it was for her own good.