Demero followed his glance. “That warding device hasn’t failed us yet, and I trust it. Any Unclean mental probe would set it off, so we can talk in confidence. As for the computer, it is showing progress. At first, when we studied the books you brought, it seemed impossible to create the tiny devices—chips, they’re called—on which it is based.” For a moment, a smile came to his face. “Then one of our brighter young men realized that many of the pieces in our archives, recovered from the sites of the ancients, were really parts of the thing described in the books. We think now there must have been millions of computers around before The Death. But even with the books and the parts, it takes time. We have to re-create a whole new way of thinking. And when finished, the computer is going to need what is called programming. My young men say they can do the job—but again, it takes time. The same old story.”
He leaned across the rough table. “How many years ago was it,
Aldo, when we first met and determined, even as young men—or youngish men, I should say—-that the church and the Order ought to be allies? And even then, we knew that time was working always in every way against us. Well, it hasn’t changed. Here you are, high in the Council of the Eleventh Brotherhood, and you know where I am. But it’s still time, with them ahead and us behind. Nevertheless, we must get ready, as well as we can. That bear creature, now, the one you call Gorm. Is he really going to be of any use?”
“Very great use—I hope,” was the prompt answer. “But he has to get the backing of his people. I gather they have rulers, too, these new bear people. We know of them, though they have never contacted us directly. And before you ask, let me read your mind, dear fellow. Yes, they are as intelligent as we, though also different. On how different hangs their willingness to help. And that will, as you have already guessed, take more time.”
“Red tape with bears!” the old Metz snorted. “That’s all we need! And I’ve had no reply from the Dam People either, speaking of odd allies. But they never budge without months of fumbling around. The bears will be fast by comparison.”
“I hate to bring this up, since you must be sensitive,” Brother Aldo said, “but what about your personal problem on the Council? The two—ugh!” He hesitated.
“Don’t mind my nicer feelings,” Demero snapped. “The two traitors. Well, I have almost enough evidence to hang them. A week or so should do it. And meanwhile, they don’t blow their snotty noses without my knowledge.”
“I suppose they can’t just, well, disappear?”
“No, they can’t, you peace-loving Elevener! This is not your barbarous ex-kingdom in the swamps of the South! We’ll get them, but they have to be tried. Fairly!”
“Too bad. The rough old days had their points. I find in retrospect. A symptom of advanced age, no doubt. Well, what next? How many regiments can you field and in what order? And the new ships you have been building? And, above all, what of the Otwah League? They have traitors, too, you know.”
The discussion continued, growing both acrimonious and technical. And when, in the small hours of the morning, two old men said their separate prayers, Hiero would have been comforted to know how largely he figured in both sets.
The prince-priest, the exile from everywhere, as it sometimes seemed to him, had other things to think about. He was currently atop the tallest tree he could find, studying the distant prospect and trying to figure out exactly what he was seeing. The scene in the distance before him was in some ways an odd one, and he wanted to study it carefully before venturing closer.
He had sent out his cautious probes the night before as usual. This time, he had very quickly picked up a human response, the aura of an awake man. Then, widening his search, he had found many others. There were the minds of women and children too, and he sensed as well the massed presence of domestic animals, probably some variety of kaw, such as he had known in D’alwah. There must be villages ahead, or some sort of settlements. He resolved to probe yet further and to see what, if anything, he could learn from one individual mind.
He picked one at random, that of a man who seemed to be slightly closer than others. He settled down and very carefully inserted his thoughts into the brain of his specimen, watching with all his trained ability at the same time in case the man was somehow alerted. The mind was one of a very stupid fellow, indeed. Moreover, it was so full of fear that there was almost no room for anything else. Intrigued, Hiero sought for the source of the fear, which was so overpowering that it seemed a constant condition.
At first he thought that it was a simple fear of the dark. In this savage land, the night with its terrible beasts would be a logical thing to fear. But following the traces through the peasant mind, he found that the situation was more complex. The man knew of the beasts, of course, and was well aware of their danger to himself. But he equated them with other natural terrors, such as lightning, floods, and forest fires. They were to be guarded against, but only that. What he really feared, to the point of acute psychosis, was—ghosts!
Searching the simpleton’s memories, the Metz tried to learn about the ghosts, but he was largely unsuccessful. The fear was most deeply ingrained in the man’s system but also suppressed to a degree. The fellow couldn’t bear to think consciously about his fears. On the surface, he simply feared the night. All would be well for those who lived until dawn. Night was an evil to be endured. The good would survive until another day brought safety. This was the sum of his surface thought.
Hiero dug deeper. There were clues, but ones hard to find. Real though the terror was, the man actually knew very little in the way of fact to bolster his nighttime state of constant panic. He had never seen a ghost. No one he knew had, either. Ghosts came in the dark. No walls, no huts, could exclude them. They took what they wanted. If they were annoyed for any reason, the person who annoyed them disappeared. They were wandering ghosts, for they were not always around. The priest of the community knew much more about them, and the priest said they were not always bad to have as neighbors, these ghosts. They kept away dangerous animals, if they were treated properly. Thus it made sense for the man and his fellows to sacrifice an animal of the herds once in a while when the ghosts wanted one. There was a smoldering resentment in the mind, Hiero noted, at this particular thought. One of the man’s own animals had been taken recently. This made the ghosts seem even worse!
The Metz withdrew, puzzled and rather annoyed. A crowd of superstitious cowherds was going to be no help to him at all. He had learned other and perhaps more useful facts from the dull mind, however. The southern fringes of the great jungle, the incredible forest of the South, lay no more than two days’ march to the north. Hiero had no idea how far to the west of D’alwah he had come in the last weeks. But north of the jungle, at some distance, of course, must lie the Inland Sea. The brain he had examined had never heard of it, but the lummox had never heard of anything beyond his horizon. Apparently traders never called in this remote area at all. Maybe, Hiero thought, they had heard, of the ghosts! He smiled ironically as he fell asleep.
He did not sleep as well as usual and, when he awoke, he felt strained and stiff. His dreams had been full of running and leaping, wild dreams full of excitement. Through his mind ran the thought of a hunt, for some reason. It must be the memory of his cast of the symbols and the little Spear. He stretched himself vigorously and did a few simple exercises to limber up before descending to start a hearty breakfast of yesterday’s kill.
At noon, he was staring at what must be the village of his mind search on the previous night. He could see for at least three miles, barring the blanks caused by other tall groves of timber. Then the heat haze closed in. But the sight before him was not half a mile away.
There was a stockade, a good, strong one, with sharpened timbers planted facing out as a chevaux-de-frise. Even the great, tusked beasts would have found that hard to penetrate. Inside the stockade rose the smoke of small fires, and he could see the shapes of rounded huts, seem
ingly thatched. There were corrals for the kaws, and several small herds of these grazed not far from the village, watched by the tiny figures of men. One great tree grew in the heart of the village, but there were no others near at all. A small river lazed over the plain only a short distance on the far side of the village, and he guessed that this would provide all the water they needed, save for times of extreme drought, which was a rare occurrence in the well-watered land. The last one in D’alwah had been over a hundred years in the past.
It was a peaceful scene and one that he had no desire to interrupt. But he needed information badly. This priest of whom his unwitting informant of the night had thought might be able to provide it. Hiero sent out his mind probe again, but soon learned that the man he wanted was away on some errand to another village just over the edge of sight on his left.
He brooded for a while and then decided that he had little to risk by showing himself. He could see some small but well-tended fields on the outskirts of the village, and his keen nose had long since detected the smell of baking. He had not tasted bread for a long time and he needed salt as well. These simple folk with their fear of the night would find little to affright them in the appearance of one man alone in the heat of the day. They would be able to see quite clearly that he was not a ghost! In this supposition he was one hundred percent correct.
Long before he was anywhere near the village, he saw men swarming out of the one great gate. Now that he was closer, he could see a small platform high in the big tree in the village and he realized that these people were not as unprepared as he had thought. They had seen him and taken action accordingly, and now a line of the men was slowly advancing on him.
As they drew near, he laid his spear carefully down so that they could see it. Then he raised both empty arms, in the oldest gesture of amity. At the same time, he searched their minds for any trace of hostility. He found wariness and surprise at his appearance, but no anger. They were, as he had assumed, not afraid of one man.
They were a short, swarthy people, heavy rather than graceful, but sturdy and not ill-looking. They wore simple leather kilts and sandals not unlike his own and also carried spears, though they seemed to have no shields. The spears were mostly stone-tipped, but here and there he saw the light catch a metal point. They had lowered them now and seemed to be waiting for him to make the first overture.
He selected an. older, gray-bearded man and addressed him in batwah, the trade language used over thousands of leagues. The man jabbered an answer, though in a different tongue. But Hiero had rioted a look of surprise in his eyes and caught the fact from the fellow’s brain that batwah had been heard before. He listened carefully as the man spoke again and this time he heard a few words that sounded familiar. While on the deck of the Foam Girl, a year back on the Inland Sea, he had spoken with her mongrel crew, culled by her owner, Captain Gimp, from all over the known world. Later, in the forest, he had gotten to know them all even better. This speech recalled a dialect he had picked up from an escaped slave who had become one of his especial admirers. In a few minutes, using the enhanced ability of his mind to read the fellow’s thoughts, he was chattering away with enough skill to make himself easily understood.
They were perfectly friendly and more than willing to give him any information that they possessed. Yes, they had bread, and he was welcome to take all he could carry. But he had better hurry. It was past noon now, and he didn’t have much time.
“Time for what?” Hiero asked. “I planned to get some sleep in your village tonight. I’m not in that big a hurry.”
The elder, whose name was something like Grilparzer, with a grunt in the middle, looked first baffled, then sad, and finally thoughtful.
“I was afraid of this,” he said. “You’re like the others, the ones who came when I was a child. Come along and walk to the village. You cannot stay with us. I’m sorry, but it is not permitted. Only those born to us may live inside our walls. I’ll send one of the boys along to get the bread, and it will be waiting when we get there. Then, Hiero, you have to go. For your sake, I hope you’re a good runner.” Several of the others, trudging along close by, shook their shaggy heads in agreement.
“Why?” the Metz asked. “Is there some danger? Why can’t I stay in your village? I don’t eat babies.” He was tempted to add that he certainly bathed more frequently than most of his new acquaintances, but decided against it.
“No, no,” Gril-grunt-parzer said. “You don’t understand. We won’t hurt you. But you have to go. You can’t stay in the village. That is the law. And if you’re found outside when it’s dark …..!” He shuddered, and Hiero caught the very real fear in the simple mind.
“I can climb pretty well.” He pointed with his spear to a distant herd of game. “Nothing that kills those things has been able to catch me yet. If you have some taboo about strangers, why don’t I camp under your walls or in a tall tree over there in one of those groves? Then I can come and have a talk with your priest in the morning.”
This time, those walking close by suddenly picked up their feet and went on ahead at a faster pace. It was obvious that the conversation was one they chose to avoid.
Grilparzer was made of sterner material. He was unhappy, but he felt he had a duty to this pleasant-spoken foreigner and he was going to do his best. He halted and put his hand on Hiero’s chest, to make the Metz halt.
“When I was a little lad, other men came. Not like you, but they spoke the way you did at first. They wanted to trade things with us. For hides and fur, they had metal and cloth such as we almost never see. When we do, well, we get it the way we got theirs.” He was obviously wrestling with a concept of utter horror to him, and again Hiero felt the sweat of mental fear. In fact, the man was sweating physically! But he persevered.
“We tried in every way we could to get them to leave. They were well armed and laughed at us. They camped by the gate and lighted many fires. They put out guards and we locked and barred the gate.” He paused again. “In the morning they were gone. All of them, as we knew they would be. A great company, two tens of strong men and all their beasts of burden. Most of their gear was left. After a while, we went out and took it and covered the ashes of their burned-out fires.” He tapped the bronze hilt of a dagger thrust into his belt. “I got this knife then when we shared their goods among us.”
Hiero was silent as he thought. Whatever drove these people, there was no doubt of their sincerity. That could not be concealed. Ghosts! He still stood poised in thought, however. The ugly story he had heard must have had some basis in fact. Whatever had happened to the unfortunate traders of long ago, it appeared to have something besides irrational fright behind it.
“All right,” he said at length. “I see that you fear the night and what may come in the dark hours.” Some stray thought stirred in his subconscious and he added, not quite sure why, “I do not fear that which runs in the night.”
The man who stood before him shrank back as if lashed over the face. Spinning on his heel, he ran for the village gate, bawling something as he went. An approaching youth hastily deposited some burden he carried on the earth and also turned and fled. All the other men were running full out, too, as if Hiero were some demon who would devour them on the instant.
The gate, which was only a few hundred yards away, began to close as the last of the running men passed through it. Hiero heard it thud heavily shut behind them. He walked slowly forward and stooped to examine the parcel that the youngster had dropped so quickly. As he had thought, it was two loaves of the promised bread, still hot from some crude oven and wrapped in a piece of hide.
He stood up and looked about him. The distant herdsmen also were gone, and so were their herds. The westering sun was now slanting down with the light of late afternoon. Hiero looked curiously at the palisade and the sharpened stakes of the village. Neither there nor on the platform in the great tree was any head visible. Some distant antelope raised a small cloud of dust far off in the path of the red su
n. Aside from these, nothing moved, save for a few vultures, black dots in the high sky.
His mind went out and he sought to probe the village. All he could get was an amorphous mass of stark terror, even for him almost impossible to penetrate and pick out individual minds. The strength of the fear amazed him. Why, it’s as if it were ingrained, hereditary or something, he thought.
Picking up the bundle of bread, he shouldered his spear and set off at a walk for the nearest trees, perhaps half a mile away. Be damned if I’ll run, was his last thought.
VII
Hunters and Their Prey
Hiero lay stretched along a great fork, far up on the outer limb of the tree. In the distance, the roar of the saberfang rumbled, to be followed by silence. It was a cloudy night, and the moon came and went fitfully from gaps in the racing clouds. He was staring in the direction of the distant village, but he could see only its outline, a black and lightless mound in the intermittent moon gleams. No sound had come from it since he had found his present perch, save for the occasional restless mooing of a kaw somewhere in a pen.
He lay at seeming ease, but his spear was firmly held in his right fist, and his shield was strapped on the other arm. In need, he could drop the haft of the spear and draw the ancient short sword from over his shoulder in a second. There was no way he could get into a better position for defense. Now he could only wait and see what the night brought.
The tree had been reached and his site selected well before the last light faded in the west. He had eaten, and the coarse bread tasted fine, after many weeks deprived of grain. With the coming of dark, he had cautiously begun to probe with his mind, sending out his thoughts on an ever-widening sweep. And it was then that the surprises had commenced. Almost instantly he had touch with another mind!
Hiero Desteen (Omnibus) Page 51
