On the Oceans of Eternity

by S. M. Stirling

  "That's a long time gone, sugar," Marian said. "Lot of water under the bridge, and the Sun People are pretty quiet, nowadays."

  "There, like the wind through woods in riot,"

  Through him the gale of life blew high;

  The tree of man was never quiet:

  Then 'twas the Roman, now 'tis I.

  The gale, it plies the saplings double,

  It blows so hard, 'twill soon be gone:

  Today the Roman and his trouble

  Are ashes under Uricon."

  "Yes," Swindapa said quietly. "Would you, would we have made war on the Sun People, if Walker hadn't come here and tried to be a King among them?"

  Ouch. That's a toughie. "I think we'd have helped the Earth Folk defend themselves," she said. "I was pushin' for that, as soon as I got to talking with you."

  A brilliant smile rewarded her, and Marian felt the familiar but always startling warmth under her breastbone. And personal matters aside, we needed something like the Alliance. Nantucket was too small in area and numbers to keep even the ghost of civilization alive on its own.

  "You were so shy in those days," Swindapa said. "I knew Moon Woman had sent you to rescue me and put down the Sun People, and that Her stars meant us to be together always, but I had to drag you into bed," she went on.

  "Well, whatever else the Fiernan Bohulugi are, they aren't shy," Marian agreed. Lordy, no. Got me out of the closet, for starters.

  Swindapa sighed again. "I thought once the Sun People were beaten, we'd have peace. Sailing, work, and the children."

  Marian's expression turned grim. "Not while William Walker's above-ground, I think." Her fist hit the saddle horn. "Damn, but I should have finished him off!"

  "You were nearly dead with wounds, yourself. And he was prepared to flee if he lost."

  Alston shook her head. There were no excuses for failure. "A rat always has a bolt-hole. All our problems since, they're because he got away."

  "When I was a fighting-man, the kettle-drums they beat;

  The people scattered roses before my horse's feet.

  And now I am a mighty King, and the people dog my track;

  With poison in the wine-cup, and daggers at my back."

  "Self-pity, Will?" Dr. Alice Hong asked mockingly.

  "Robert E. Howard," William Walker replied. "Kull the Conqueror, specifically."

  He turned from the tall French doors and their southward view over the palace gardens and the city of Walkeropolis. The valley of the Eurotas reached beyond, drowsing in a soft palette of green and brown and old gold, up to the blue heights of Mount Taygetos. The city's smoke and noise drifted in, mixed with flower scents from the gardens, and a warm hint of thyme and lavender from the hills.

  The King of Men smiled at her. "I thought it was appropriate."

  He was a little over six feet, tall even by twentieth-century standards, towering here in the thirteenth century B.C. Broad-shouldered and narrow-hipped, he moved with an athlete's quick, controlled gracefulness; reddish-brown hair fell to his shoulders, confined by the narrow diadem of royalty wrought in gold olive leaves. The face it framed would have been boyishly handsome yet, even in his thirties, if it had not been for the deep scar that cut a V across his cheek and vanished under the patch that hid his left eyesocket; the level green stare of the surviving eye glittered coldly. He wore loose trousers of black silk tucked into polished half-boots, and a gold-trimmed jacket of the same material cinched by a tooled-leather belt that bore revolver and chryselephantine dagger. A wolfshead signet ring of ruby and niello on the third finger of his right hand was the only other ornament.

  "Or to put it in American, babe," he went on in a voice that still held a trace of Montana, "the Greek VIPs liked it better when I was the wizardly power in the background and not Supreme Bossman. Planting my own lowborn outlander ass on the throne of the Kings of Men has seriously torqued them out."

  "Rational deduction from the information available," Helmut Mittler agreed, running a hand over his close-cropped gray-and-yellow hair. "The disaffected Achaean nobles haff little grasp of sophisticated conspiratorial politics, but they are not stupid men-not the surviving ones. They haff support among the more reactionary elements of the population… and they learn quickly."

  He pronounced that und zey learn kvickly; the Mecklenberger accent was still fairly strong. His Achaean was better, but for small conferences like this Walker preferred English. There was something about the sonorous formalities of Mycenaean Greek that wasn't conducive to quick sharp thought, in his opinion.

  "Evolution in action," Walker agreed, nodding to the ex-Stasi agent.

  Who managed to get out before the Berlin Wall went down, with a fair amount of money and some extremely good fake ID, he reminded himself. It wouldn't do to underestimate his security chief. Aloud he went on:

  "We caught the dumb ones first." A chuckle. He'd introduced crucifixion, along with the other innovations. "Those who cross me get crossed." It impressed the wogs no end.

  "I get a lot of information through the Sisterhood," Hong said. "Yeah, there are still a lot of the telestai and ekwetai… mmmm… unhappy-especially since Agamemnon… ah… died."

  "Shot while attempting to escape," Mittler chuckled. "Classic."

  "Jumped off a fucking cliff calling on the God-damned Gods," Walker grated. Which gave him major mojo among the wogs.

  The "given sacrifice," they called it. Walker'd had years of clear sailing, while Agamemnon imagined the foreigner he'd raised up was safe, because he didn't have the blood-right to the throne that too many of Mycenae's endlessly intermarried vassal Kings and nobles could claim. Fortunately, dead men had trouble taking advantage of their own baraka, especially when their heirs died with them.

  Dumb bastard, trying to break out like that. Hell, even at the end I was treating him well, and pretending that the orders came from him… in public.

  Now… he had the New Troops and their firepower, yes, and the crawling terror of Helmut's secret police, not to mention the supernatural dread of the Sisterhood of Hekate, but raw fear was a chancy basis for power. Frightened men were unpredictable. He'd take force over legitimacy any day, if he had to choose one or the other, but it would be nice to have both. Presumably his kids would-legitimacy meant staying on top until nobody could remember anybody else, when you came right down to it. Dynastic immortality wasn't the type he'd have picked, given options, but it was the only kind going.

  "And that's why I have to get back to Troy," he said, returning to his swivel chair behind the desk.

  The other two looked at each other. "Sir," Mittler said, "your position here in Greece is still unstable. Particularly with many troops being required abroad."

  "That's what I've got you and your Section One for, Helmut," Walker said genially. "How did the old saying go? A secure throne needs a standing army of soldiers, a sitting army of bureaucrats, a kneeling army of priests, and a crawling army of informers."

  Alice looked at him and gave the faintest hint of a wink; he replied with a smile that barely crinkled the skin around his eyes. And, of course, I have Alice and her little cult to watch the watchmen. Mittler's cold gray eyes caught the byplay, and the ash-pale brows rose slightly.

  Dr. Alice Hong was a complete nutter, a sadist in the literal clinical sense of the word-she couldn't get it off without inflicting or feeling pain, preferably both-but very smart. And fully conscious that a woman could never rule Meizon Akhaia in her own right, not in this generation, which made her the safest of all Walker's American followers. Mittler didn't have that drawback in plumbing design…

  Of course, Mittler was also smart enough to see that a power struggle at the top might well bring down the whole jury-rigged structure of Great Achaea. And Helmut Mittler wanted to defeat the Republic of Nantucket, wanted it very badly. Partly to keep the wealth and power he enjoyed, and partly to satisfy an old and bitter spite against the people who'd ruined his country and cause. The Nantucketers were the closest th
ing to the United States around, here in the Bronze Age.

  Walkerian Age is more appropriate now, he thought absently, considering, then came to a decision.

  There were times when the mushroom treatment was useful, but if you kept your top-flight people in the dark and covered in horseshit all the time you couldn't expect them to make sound decisions. And an operation this big required delegation, absolutely, however much it went against his personal inclinations. So… he'd fill them in.

  "I don't have Zeus Pater for a great-granddaddy," Walker said genially. "What I do have is the prestige of victory. Momentum. That keeps a lot of mouths shut and minds obedient that wouldn't be, otherwise. So I need a big, conspicuous win, particularly since we're up against guys with guns now, not just pumping out grapeshot at bare-assed spear-chuckers. So it's back to Troy for the last act there."

  "Sir," Mittler said, clicking heels and bowing his head. "I must therefore begin preparations. When Troy falls, we can at least deal with that damned Jew, Arnstein; he has been the brains of their intelligence apparat. Stupid of them to let him be caught there. If I haff your permission?"

  "Certainly, Helmut. Keep up the good work," Walker said. You pickle-up-the-ass kraut, he thought behind the mask of his face as the other man left.

  There were times when Mittler's eternally punctilious Middle European Ordnungsliebe got on the American's nerves; it was like being trapped with a Commie/Nazi villain from a bad fifties war movie. Ve haff vays to mak you talk. But he was a useful kraut.

  Of course, he's built up quite a local cadre who're loyal to him and not me or the kingdom, but it's an acceptable price. For now.

  Besides, everyone knows who Helmut is and what he does. That made him too unpopular to rule himself, like Beria, or Himmler.

  Alice stretched in her chair, arms over her head and small breasts straining against the thin white silk of her tunic. Walker watched with detached appreciation; sex with Alice was like fucking a humanoid cobra, but it had its points as an occasional diversion.

  "If dear, dear Helmut ever has to… go… you really must let me handle it," she said. "He doesn't know nearly as much as he thinks he does about what the human body can endure."

  Walker cocked an eyebrow. "I'd have thought you had some things in common," he said.

  "Really, Will! The man has no sense of artistry. He might as well be adjusting the bolts on a tractor." She looked at her watch. "Well, I have to run. We're holding an initiation tonight-quite important. Girls only, I'm afraid… unless you want to watch through the spyhole again?"

  "Thanks, but business calls. See ya, babe."

  The cult she'd established was a hobby with Alice, and another chance to engage in the sadomasochistic Grand Guignol she adored, but it had tentacles throughout Meizon Akhaia, among women of all classes, and in the medical service she'd organized and taught. These Gods-besotted wogs took religion very seriously indeed, and after the perversions and atrocities of the initiation process the new members felt completely committed, as if they'd severed all links to everyone except the Dark Sisterhood. He vaguely remembered reading that the Mau Mau had used the same tactics. Some of the Haitian bokor brotherhoods, the darker side of Voudun, did that, too-it had been in the Coast Guard briefing papers, when he was stationed down in the Caribbean watching for drugs and refugees coming out of Port-au-Prince.

  "Education is a wonderful thing," he mused, pulling another pile of reports toward him.

  Crops, roads, factories, schools… there was a hell of a lot more to being an emperor than "inventing" gunpowder, or even just commanding armies. Right now he was sweating blood trying to get a banking system established. Turning this Bronze Age feudal mishmash into something worth running had been like pushing a boulder uphill, even with twenty carefully picked American helpers and the fifty tons of cargo- machines, metals, tools, books, working models-that he'd liberated from Nantucket along with the schooner. And the earliest stages had been hardest.

  Satisfying, though, he thought. How had Jack London put it?

  "It is the King of words-Power," he quoted to himself, remembering a boy reading in the rustling scented solitude of a hay barn, alone with his savage, bright-colored dreams. "Not God, not Mammon, but Power. Pour it over your tongue till it tingles with it. Power."

  And there was no road to Power that didn't involve hard work; that made the work satisfying in itself, fun, worthwhile. He bent back to his task.

  "Lord King," a soft voice said a few hours later; he noticed that, as he hadn't the noiseless slaves who'd turned up the kerosene lanterns.

  Walker looked up. It was his house steward, the chief of the residential staff. "Yes, Eurgewenos?" he said.

  "Lord King, shall I have the kitchens send a meal here? And do you wish a particular girl for the night?"

  "Mmmm, no."

  He looked out the window; almost dark. Dinnertime, by the wall clock; they'd finally gotten those to work well enough for everyday use and were closing in on chronometers good enough for navigation. When he'd arrived, Mycenaean Greek had used a moment for all times less than their vague conception of an hour…

  "Inform the Lady Ekhnonpa that I'll be dining with her and the children."

  "The King commands; we obey."

  A hareem was very pleasant, but he had a certain nostalgic affection for Ekhnonpa and he'd kept her around. She'd borne him three children, and put on a good deal of weight, but her undemanding adoration was relaxing, sometimes. Her father, Daurthunnicar, had been a chieftain up in Alba, his first base of operations after he'd cleared out of Nantucket; he'd won the daughter and heir-apparent status by beating the tribal champion… to death, with his hands and feet. The Nantucketers had upset that applecart-he touched the scar and the patch over the empty eyesocket Alston's sword had left, and his lips curled back from his teeth for a moment.

  Time to settle that debt, he thought. In full. With interest.

  Swindapa raised her head, took a long breath through her nose, cocked an ear. "Not long now," she said. "That's hearth smoke, and a dog barking."

  The deer track widened and turned into a rutted mud road as it wound upward; that made the forest less gloomy, but it also let in more of the rain coming in from the Welsh mountains. A clearing appeared, and little thatched clusters of round wattle-and-daub huts with sheepfolds and cattle corrals around about; the cold breeze ruffled rain-dimpled puddles. Smoke came leaking out of thatch in tatters that ran down the wet driving wind-or in a few cases from chimneys of brick or sheet iron, nowadays. A noisy dog brought some of the inhabitants out to the side of the road. They were wrapped in sheepskins and blanketlike cloaks of raw wool, looking like hairy bundles with feet.

  A few carried weapons-steel-headed spears or crossbows handed out to the Republic's Fiernan allies during the Alban War a decade ago, and a couple of trade muskets with waxed leather wrapped around the flintlock and pan. They relaxed and pointed the business ends skyward when they saw the Nantucketer gear and uniforms, and the standard-bearer that marked an embassy. The Stars and Stripes hung limp and wet on the pole socketed into the bearer's stirrup, but the gilt eagle above was a bright flash in the rainy dimness.

  Marian glanced backward out of the corner of her eye; the khaki-clad Marines were sitting their horses easily, reins in their right hands and Werder rifles riding in the crook of their left arms, eyes wary even here among friendlies. She had her eye on their sergeant, Zena Ritter, for possible promotion-a slender, wire-tough young woman with cropped dark-red hair and an implausible number of freckles, who'd been taking correspondence courses from Fort Brandt OCS via Westhaven HQ. The Republic's military needed people who could function out on their ownsome without undue hand-holding, satellite links, or a Pentagon to do their thinking for them.

  As she watched, Ritter tossed a bar of ration chocolate to a clutch of children. The waxed paper wrapping came off to squeals of delight.

  Generous, Marian thought. Even back on Nantucket chocolate was still expensive, gathered
wild in Central America and traded to Islander schooners working the Main. And they recognized it. Must be a fair bit of trade through here…

  Swindapa reined her horse aside and spoke to the locals in the purling glug-glug of the Fiernan Bohulugi tongue, a language that had vanished a thousand years before the birth of Christ in Marian's history. She dropped the knotted reins on her saddlebow to let her hands move in fluid accompaniment to her thought. When she rode on she was shaking her head in amazement.

  "Sugar?" Marian asked. Lord, if you tied a Fiernan's hands, they'd be struck dumb.

  "It's… these people are out in the… what's the word, the sticks'? They talk a dialect I can barely follow."

  The black woman smiled to herself; Swindapa's lineage, the Kurlelo, lived by the Great Wisdom-Stonehenge-far south of here in Wiltshire on the open upland downs. By Fiernan reckoning, that made them the center of the world; the Kurlelo Grandmothers were the high priestesses of Moon Woman and students of the stars that revealed Her will. Those dry and sunny hills were thickly peopled and closely farmed as well, very different from these middle lands of Alba; here human habitations were still islands amid swamp and a wildwood-jungle of giant oak trees on heavy clay. Not until the Age of

  Iron brought better tools and plows would settlers make much progress against the King trees and the thick fertile low-country soils that bore them. In the original history at least…

  "In the sticks, yes," Swindapa went on, in pleased wonderment at how far the changes had gone. "And yet look at all they have! Ten years ago, they would have made most of their tools of wood and bone and stone, shared one bronze blade with the whole family. Now they have steel axes, pans, spades, scythes, Nantucket plows… even iron stoves. And yes, they say we're getting near Irondale. Right where you thought we were."