Eyes of the Calculor

by Sean McMullen

  "No. As aviad, in Mounthaven, you soon are being shot."

  "So I stay here, even if I help you steal a wing?"

  "Please."

  "Well... I seem rather short on options."

  Samondel closed her eyes and lay against him for a while, savoring the moment.

  "What you are doing without me?" she asked.

  "Being very sad."

  "I mean, without me, pastime?"

  "Oh, dine with Velesti in taverns, then wander the streets looking for bully boys to beat up. Climb onto hostelry roofs and hang upside

  down at windows watching couples at dalliance and calling out suggestions. Then sleep alone and remember you."

  "Sounding more merriment than reigning over Highland Barto-lica, then sleep alone, thinking of you. So you will helping me leave, really?"

  Martyne thought for a moment, but only to think of the most suitable words.

  "Would I keep a bird in a cage?"

  They washed in the chilly waters from the cistern, rubbed each other dry with grass brushes, then built a fire and boiled up a soupy mixture of dried meat, nuts, and potatoes, and toasted each other with rainwater. The wreckage on the wingfield had been cleaned up by the time they arrived there, not particularly well rested but very happy. Samondel was wearing an embroidered flight jacket from one of the dead Yarronese, and a dozen Australican flyers were already waiting for instruction at the adjunct's pennant pole.

  Each of the super-regals was in turn ascended, and Samondel spent the entire morning teaching the Avianese flyers to control them. All through the lunch break she taught the artisans what she knew of the new engines and mechanisms. The adjunct was reluctant to let Samondel ascend in the captured sailwing, given her plea the night before to fly it to Lake Taupo, but when Martyne volunteered to ascend with her he relented.

  It was in the late afternoon that they finally did ascend, with Martyne at the controls and Samondel lying in the navigator's bunk. The aircraft was in good condition, and Martyne noted that it was very easy to fly.

  "There will be times, when apart, we are living," said Samondel as they made a wide, leisurely circle of the capital of Avian.

  "If you return early, you will find me alone," said Martyne.

  Samondel pressed the stud that lowered the headrest, pulled herself forward, and wrapped her arms around his neck.

  "Myself also. Sleep alone, it is incentive, for to keep trying, ah, to return. But. . ."

  "But?"

  "But one promise."

  "Yes?"

  "You will promise?"

  "Promise what?"

  "Promise first. Then hear. Is possible, for you."

  Martyne sighed.

  "Very well. Now, what have I promised?"

  "Is never, never, setting foot in rocketwing again."

  "What?" Martyne laughed.

  "Rather surprise you with whoopsicle girl than have to bury you."

  "Frelle, I've survived fourteen Skyfire flights, two of them in combat. I'm currently Avian's greatest gunwing ace. How can I—"

  "Please Martyne! Damn, bloody things climb faster than gun-wings can dive. Not natural. Dangerous."

  "Samondel—"

  "Highly unstable below two hundred miles per hour. Flies like brick at stall speed. All this, told by you! In bed. Last night."

  "Well, perhaps I was exaggerating a little."

  "Think of you with other woman, annoying. Think of you in rocketwing, terrifying! Not to be tolerated. I—"

  "Yes, yes, yes, all right. No more rocketwings, I promise. No other women either, for what it's worth."

  She squeezed him, then rested her head against his.

  "Then forever I am yours."

  Martyne reached down and drew his reaction pistol. He handed it to Samondel, along with three clips of ammunition.

  There was a small access hatch just behind the headrest. It was cramped in the cockpit, too cramped for a rapid exchange of positions between flyer and navigator in an emergency. Thus another set of controls had been provided, rudimentary but adequate. Samondel pushed the emergency throttle forward, then steered for the east. The Skyfire rocketwings were much faster, but they were not now on standby and had an extremely short range. By the time they could be armed and fitted with rockets she would be well outside their operational circle.

  Martyne slid the hatch open. After giving Samondel one final, lingering kiss, he jumped.

  Samondel locked the emergency controls in a shallow climb heading southeast, then crawled into the cockpit. She began a careful examination of the compression spirit floats. The tanks had been neither drained nor added to since the sailwing had been captured, and it had a little under half of its compression spirit remaining. With the prevailing winds behind her, this would probably be more than enough to reach Lake Taupo.

  After adjusting her heading with the float compass and solarac, Samondel waited until she was out of sight of Tasmania Island, then turned due east and brought the sailwing to its optimal cruising altitude. Finally she throttled back the compression engines and locked the controls. The sun was on the sea's horizon for her, but at ground level it had been night for some time. Samondel now began to weep, and had not ceased weeping by the time dusk had faded completely from the sky and Mirrorsun was well above the eastern horizon. She checked the sailwing's course, made a minor correction, then lay back in the seat again with her hands over her eyes.

  Lake Taupo, New Zealand

  ■ed-eyed from the fifteen-hour flight from Australica and from almost as many hours of mourning the loss of Martyne for a second time, Samondel did a slow circuit of the Lake Taupo wingfield before coming in for her descent. There were bodies visible beside the ascent strip, and all of the shelters had been burned. Nothing was moving.

  No sign of any burned-out wings, observed Samondel grimly to herself as she wound down the flaps. But no bodies actually on the ascent strip, no damage to the surface, and nothing rolled across it to hamper any wings coming in. Very significant.

  Samondel began winding the wheels down, and there was an emphatic clack of the lock pins snapping into place. The wheels

  screeched briefly, then she was rumbling along the surface toward the burned-out shelters. Samondel taxied off into the staging bay, then stopped the compression engines. There had been nine bodies visible in and around the ruins, but she treated the carnage as if it had been as normal a thing as a pre-ascent inspection. Three men appeared from beside the compression spirit shelter as Samondel slid back the canopy hatch. They were armed, but looked to be at ease as they walked over. She jumped to the ground.

  "So, how did it go?" asked one of them in Yarronese.

  "Seventeen kills, no losses," replied Samondel through the scarf shrouding her face, raising both thumbs into the air.

  "Good hunting! And what do you think of all this?"

  "Impressive," said Samondel as she began to untie the scarf.

  "All our own work, I think we made things look like quite a convincing Avianese attack. When the others arrive we must go over our story. How far behind are they?"

  "Twenty minutes."

  "That's not Warden Hareak, that's a girl!" shouted one of the men.

  "Correct," said Samondel quietly as she drew the Clastini from her jacket and opened fire.

  With the reaction pistol in one hand Samondel examined her victims. All were dead. She walked to one of the other bodies and saw that it had been dead some days. The fiction was obviously that aviads from Tasmania Island had mounted a sneak attack and destroyed most of the wingfield facilities and stores before being driven off. A counterattack was sent to Launceston to destroy their capacity to fly or build wings. The Council of Airlords would sanction an alliance with some human faction to establish a base on the mainland and mount further raids on the Avianese survivors.

  All very clever, Samondel concluded, looking down at the dead.

  Launceston, Tasmania Island

  Let me clarify this yet again," said t
he Overhand of Avian. "You say she reached down and drew your reaction pistol, then pressed it against your head."

  "Yes," replied Martyne.

  "Did you not struggle? Did you not try to stop her?"

  "I was making my first flight in a new wing, I was giving it all my concentration."

  "And you took six hours to return to the wingfield after parachuting out."

  "I had no say in where to jump."

  "You were seen to perform some ceremony with her after the battle," said the adjunct.

  "The American colors salute, yes. We carry each other's colors."

  "Might I suggest that you were less than reluctant to give her your gun?"

  "You might, but I shall deny it."

  "The wingfield guards cannot say where the airlord slept on the night after the battle, Fras Shadowmouse. Would you have any suggestions?"

  "No more than for where you slept, Fras Adjunct."

  "You seem of good humor," said the mayor, "especially for one facing a charge of treason. Do you really appreciate your position?"

  "Somewhat better than the three of you," replied Martyne, his face and voice suddenly hardening. "Yesterday you promised the Airlord of Highland Bartolica the use of the sailwing after she had instructed us in the flying of the super-regals and sailwing. I acted within the parameters of that agreement."

  "And you had my direct order not to let her escape with the sailwing," shouted the overhand.

  "Your secret order, Fras Overhand."

  "You can also be secretly shot, Fras Shadowmouse."

  "Not so. Frelle Samondel agreed to fly via the mainland, refuel, and leave a message before ascending for Taupo. That message is

  for the Highliber of Libris, consort of that well-known and highly placed aviad sympathizer, the Overmayor of Rochester. It explains everything, Fras Overhand, and it includes a personal plea from Air-lord Samondel that the Overmayor make diplomatic representations to have all charges against me revoked—and make me a flyer instructor on the ferry flights to the mainland."

  Martyne's audience of three took some time to assimilate this news.

  "/ have authority here," said the mayor.

  "Would you like to test your authority against that of the beloved of the Overmayor of the Rochestrian Commonwealth? She who could grant a treaty? She who could order secure wingfields built? She who could authorize the building of distilleries to supply unlimited compression spirit? Yield to the logic of the situation, gentlemen. You have lost one sailwing in return for benefits to Avian exceeding your wildest dreams. Would you endanger all of that for the sake of one petty act of revenge?"

  Martyne walked from the room a free man, and the Avianese leaders' secret decision to betray Samondel was sponged from existence. By the time that the mayor, overhand, and wingfield adjunct of Launceston learned that Samondel had made no descent to the mainland, and that the message to Dramoren had never existed, their emotions had cooled somewhat and they were content to let the matter rest.

  Lake Taupo, New Zealand

  /fter sleeping for the best part of the day, Samondel awoke in the late afternoon, and refueled her sailwing. With a cloth tied over her face, she dragged the decomposed bodies to the compression spirit store, then took her three victims to the firewood stack. Soon everything was blazing fiercely while Samondel stood flinging reaction guns and carbines as far into the lake as her strength would allow. She stood watching the blaze for a time, rubbing a mixture of glycerine and charblack into her hair, then she tied it back tightly.

  At last she returned to her sailwing, pulling a little steam engine on a trolley behind her. Once it was stoked up and chugging strongly she strapped it to her compression engines and spun them into life, then stood back and fired a short burst from her reaction pistol into its boiler. She ascended with a pall of black smoke rising into New Zealand's overcast skies.

  Samoa

  fs she approached the Samoa Wingfield, Samondel noted a smoke flare rising to welcome her, and she wound down her wheels and banked into an easy approach in almost windless conditions. Three men were waiting for her as she stopped her engines.

  "Aye then, Sair, what news?" asked the leader, who was wearing an adjunct's jacket embroidered with silver thread and set with onyx plates.

  "Semme, if you please," said Samondel as she unstrapped.

  "Semme Bronlar, my apologies," responded the wingcaptain.

  "We had complete success, and we even arranged direct trade links with the Rochester humans," continued Samondel. "Thus we still have a supply of compression spirit and horses."

  They began to whoop and cheer as she climbed out of the hatch. "And our losses?" asked the captain.

  "Heavy, heavier than expected."

  "Defeat would have been worse."

  Samondel jumped to the ground.

  "Now, then, who is still alive here?" she asked.

  "As of last week, just us three."

  Samondel drew her reaction pistol and sprayed them with fire until the clip was empty. She slapped another clip into the gun.

  "And as of now, just me," she said to the bodies.

  The following day Samondel refueled her sailwing. Ascending, she circled the wingfield, noting that from the air all was identical to when she had arrived the day before.

  "I truly am sorry," she said softly to the three lying dead below her, "but you chose the wrong side."

  She turned the sailwing for twenty degrees past north and began a long, slow climb to cruising altitude.

  Rochester, the Rochestrian Commonwealth

  Vorion was not the type of man to defy his superiors, but neither was he liable to shirk from telling Dramoren any unpalatable truth. He handed the Highliber of Libris a closely written sheet of poor-paper and stood back while he read. Presently Dramoren looked up.

  "Who else knows of this?" he asked.

  Vorion snatched the sheet from his hands, crumpled it, and tossed it into the fire.

  "Only me, Highliber."

  "You spied on me?"

  "I filled holes in your security, through which the like of this might have leaked."

  "Thank you."

  "Highliber, you cannot do this! Your name will be reviled by both aviads and Rochestrians."

  "The Reformed Gentheists will probably make me a saint."

  "But you will die, then be hated forever. It will break the Over-mayor's heart when she learns that you were a traitor."

  "Better one broken heart than the death of my species."

  Tears began to trickle down Vorion's cheeks, and his face contorted with sobs before he covered it with his hand.

  "Over may or, don't do this. It makes me so sad. You are the finest person I have known since Frelle Zarvora died, your name deserves to be remembered in honor and glory, just as hers is."

  "Vorion, if the truth that I am an aviad is revealed, Lengina's enemies will say that her humane policies toward them were whispered by my lips into her ears. She will lose credibility, and there will be more massacres and lynchings. No, I must play the role of

  traitor. She will be filled with hate for all Reformed Gentheists, and she will bring the Commonwealth down on them like a brick on a peanut. I have already arranged for Avian to offer help to Rochester once . . . well, when I am gone. It will be the start of the first aviad-human alliance. My death and disgrace is worth that."

  The little librarian wiped his tear-streaked face and stared defiantly at Dramoren.

  "Service to the Highlibers has been my life, but now I must make a stand. Make me part of your plan or kill me, Highliber. Otherwise I shall reveal your schemes to the Overmayor this very hour."

  Dramoren closed his eyes and thought through both the offer and alternatives. It did not take long.

  "Very well, you give me no choice. You are recruited."

  "Thank you, Highliber. I swear to betray Commonwealth and Dragon Librarian Service with dedication and diligence."

  Dramoren laughed softly as he stood up. "Go n
ow, I shall have instructions for you at the stroke of the next half hour."

  Vorion pulled the door shut behind him as he left, then set off for the little office that had been his for nearly four decades.

  "And I swear to betray you too, Highliber, and to become a saint," he whispered as he walked.

  Hawaii

  By the time Samondel reached Hawaii her nerve was beginning to fail. There would be more people to kill face-to-face, more bodies to drag away and bury in a shallow trench. The flight had been perfect, with strong, consistent tailwinds. She had made near-record time and had ample compression spirit to spare.

  She circled the wingfield and tiny settlement. All but one house had been burned, and bodies were visible even from several hundred feet. A streak of smoke speared up, clearing her to descend, and she could see a single sailwing on the dispersal track with two figures beside it. She made a low pass, the pair on the ground waved. She

  came around, wound down her wheels, and approached more slowly. Those on the ground could not see her unlock the sailwing's reaction guns.

  The spray of gunfire cut down the two figures on the ground almost before they realized that anything was amiss. Samondel wound her wheels back up and came around again, this time strafing the sailwing, from which fragments scattered. Nobody came rushing out to shoot at her. She brought her sailwing around to a heading for the North American mainland. She noted that the winds continued to favor her, and hoped that it was a sign of divine approval.

  Rochester, the Rochestrian Commonwealth

  It started with the traditional Alms Day ceremony, in which the mayors of all mayorates in the Commonwealth went among their people to distribute alms to those most in need. The day had no specific date, for past experience had shown that all manner of people in very convincing beggars' robes would be present if advance notice was given. Overmayor Lengina simply appeared in the streets, trailed by several lackeys and escorted by a dozen of the palace guard. Also present in the background, and attempting to look inconspicuous, were several members of the Dragon Librarian Service. Present, but succeeding in not being noticed at all, were representatives of the Espionage constables. The latter were taking notes on people encountered by the Overmayor and how they behaved.