It stopped beside Maggie and Orick, and a single long feeler twisted up from beside its mouth. The feeler wrapped around Maggie’s wrist. She stood abruptly, wanting to run, but found she was trapped between two tables with her back against the wall.
The dronon’s feeler held her like a thick cord, binding her in case she should try to flee. Beneath the creature’s mouth was an organ that looked like dozens of small, blunt fingers poised above the stretched membrane of a drum. The fingers began rhythmically tapping, creating an odd thrumming noise not unlike the sound that some deep-voiced locust might make. Yet the thrumming varied greatly in intensity and pitch. Maggie could distinguish words in that music. The dronon was speaking to her.
“You are not from this world. Where are you from?” the dronon demanded.
Maggie froze, not knowing how to answer. She pressed herself farther against the wall. The dronon’s grip tightened, and it raised one arm overhead. She looked up—the arm was heavy, like the claw of a crab, and had a serrated edge. The dronon’s tiny segmented hand had retracted, leaving a single large hooklike claw. If the dronon struck her, the arm would chop her in half like an axe. The dronon hissed, threatening to strike her into oblivion if she did not answer.
“You are not of this world. Where are you from?”
At a nearby table, the man dressed in black robes, the man with a golden face that glowed like starlight, stood and answered. “Great Lord, she is a Silent One from Pellarius!” He stepped forward. “She cannot speak. The singers there thought her voice lacked beauty, so they cut out her vocal cords and sterilized her so that she could not breed. Still, I have purchased her as a worker so that she might serve the greater glory of the dronon empire.”
“What is her function?” the dronon asked.
“She is an aberlain, highly skilled in installing genetic upgrades in the unborn.”
“If she is an aberlain, where is her Guide?” The dronon’s feeler began probing Maggie’s scalp.
“She has been a class-two aberlain,” the stranger said, “and is ready to be promoted to class one. I am having a new Guide created for her at this very moment.”
“Where is her current Guide?” the dronon demanded.
“Here, in my pocket.” The stranger pulled out a wide band of silver, a crown with small lights in it. He held it up for the dronon to see. The dronon warrior abruptly lowered its battle arm.
“May your work prosper the empire,” the dronon said, addressing both Maggie and the stranger in the same breath. It regarded Orick for a moment, then hunched and dragged its massive body through the cafeteria. It turned at the hallway and disappeared into the deeper recesses of the building.
Maggie found herself shaking, dizzy. She could not move. Terror held her in place. The dronon’s feeler had left a gray powder on her arm that burned slightly.
The people in the cafeteria resumed talking. Maggie sagged into her chair. The stranger with the golden face watched her unabashedly. For the past half hour, Maggie had noticed that he had been studying her and Orick with an intensity that others in the room could not match. She did not know how to thank him.
The stranger came to their table. He took her arm, and poured her mug of drinking water over the skin where the dronon had touched her, then began to sponge it with a cloth napkin. “I don’t know where you are from,” he whispered, “but you obviously know nothing of the dronon. I envy that.” He sponged her face and scalp. “The first lesson you must learn is that the dronon’s exoskeleton produces a weak acid. They come from a dry world, and the acid coating is an effective addition to their immune system. But if they touch you, you must wipe off the acid to avoid getting burned.”
He set down the napkin and peered into her face, ignoring Orick. The stranger had a strong jaw, penetrating brown eyes. Up under his black hood, he wore a silver headdress, much like the one Everynne had worn. Long silver chains dangled from it with hundreds of small triangles, like some metallic wig. She wondered why he would hide this beautiful headdress under a cloak, but did not ask.
“So,” the stranger said, “my name is Karthenor, Lord of the Aberlains.”
“I … I saw you watching me earlier,” Maggie said.
“Forgive my inquisitiveness,” Karthenor said. “I did not mean to offend you. But I have never seen anyone dressed like you, nor have I ever seen anyone like your friend.” Karthenor glanced at Orick and said with a tone of dismissal as if Orick were a child, “I recognize the species. He is a bear.”
“A black bear!” Orick grumbled.
“Excuse me,” Karthenor said, raising a brow. He looked at Orick with a new degree of respect. “He is a genetically enhanced black bear.” He addressed Orick, “I am pleased to make your acquaintance.”
Karthenor pulled up a chair. Maggie could sense an eagerness in him, an expectancy she associated with traders who wanted to sell something. “You and your friend have been watching us, too. I suspect that you find us to be as strange as we find you. Am I right?”
Maggie studied his golden face. She could not think of a lie. In fact, she didn’t know if she should tell one. She knew only that she wanted an ally, and Karthenor offered help. Gallen’s brief mention that another man dressed like this had saved his life inspired her to a degree of confidence that was perhaps dangerous, but on impulse she said, “We came here through the World Gate. Yes, we do find it strange.”
Karthenor leaned back in surprise, his voice so neutral that Maggie could not guess what he might be thinking. “You came through a World Gate? What is your name? Where are you from?”
“My name is Maggie Flynn—from the town of Clere.”
Karthenor looked at her impassively, then bowed deeply. “I am honored to meet you, Maggie Flynn from the town of Clere. I … hope that I am not being too inquisitive, but may I ask what world you hail from?”
“Earth,” Maggie answered.
The stranger seemed perplexed. He stared at Maggie and Orick with a bemused expression, rested his elbows on the table, and touched a gloved finger to his lips. “Which Earth are you referring to? You obviously speak English, so you’ve been genetically engineered to remember our language. Yet you speak it with an odd accent, one I’ve never heard.”
“Earth,” Maggie said. “Where I live.”
The stranger turned his head to the side, thinking. “What continent are you from on this Earth of yours?”
“Tihrglas,” Maggie said.
“Ah, that Earth!” The stranger smiled. He folded his hands, looked at Maggie and Orick appraisingly. “Surely you did not find a gate key just lying around on Tihrglas? How did you come by it?”
Maggie felt inexplicably frightened. It had nothing to do with Karthenor’s mannerisms. He seemed kindly, hospitable. But Maggie froze, not letting the stranger prod her further.
“Ah, forgive me! I’ve frightened you,” Karthenor whispered, and his golden face crinkled in a beneficent smile. “Obviously, because you are a stranger to our land, you do not know our ways. Here on Fale, we are very open with each other. Perhaps you find this … disconcerting. Please, ask me any questions first, if this will put you at ease.”
“Are you human?” Orick asked.
Karthenor smiled, touched his own cheek. “You mean the mask? Of course I am human, by most standards.”
“Why do you wear the mask, then?” Maggie asked.
“To reveal,” Karthenor said, taking Maggie’s hand companionably. “It is a style here. The masks reveal our innermost selves. Those who do not wear the mask may hide emotions from one another, but when one wears the mask of Fale, he cannot hide behind his flesh and is ever forced to reveal his true emotions. Those of us who wear masks can practice no deceit. That is why, among all worlds, those who wear the mask of Fale are known to be trustworthy.” He smiled gently at Maggie, and in that moment, Maggie felt ashamed for having distrusted him.
Karthenor held her hand, as if she were a child, and smiled as he looked out past the veranda to the swallow
s dipping in the wide river. Children were out on the water now, riding the backs of giant geese. “If you like, I can give you a tour of our city,” Karthenor offered. “If you come from Tihrglas, you will find it quite marvelous. Not at all like your home, I dare say.”
“You’ve been to Tihrglas?” Orick asked.
“Heavens no,” Karthenor answered. “I don’t travel, but there are records. What do you know of Fale?”
“Nothing.”
“Well then, it is time you learned. Our ancestors once lived together on the same world, long ago. A planet called Earth, but not the same Earth that you live on now.”
Maggie looked at Karthenor suspiciously but said nothing as he continued. “On that planet, our ancestors had descended from animals, and there they acted the part—always warring, seeking wealth.
“Eventually, they developed space flight and journeyed to distant stars. There was an explosion of knowledge and technology unlike anything ever before. Machines learned to think. Men learned to hold death at bay and extend their lives for millennia. We met new races, new allies who also traversed among the stars.
“Still there were wars, still there was poverty and sadness. So some of our ancestors rejected technology, decided to live on backward planets in rustic settings. They came to be known as Backwards, and eighteen thousand years ago, some of them settled on your world. They took only the most basic tools—a few genetic upgrades that would let them remain relatively healthy and transmit an inborn memory of English. They took seeds for house-trees and plants.
“That is where our ancestors split: my ancestors were Forwards. They embraced technology and traveled to the stars.” Karthenor waved his hand in a gesture that encompassed the sky.
“How do you know about our ancestors?” Maggie asked. “I’ve never heard these tales.”
Karthenor touched the silver headdress, the tiny triangles. “My mantle is telling me about it,” he said. “The mantle is a teaching machine that knows far more than any human.” Maggie studied the ringlets and triangles. “Would you like to learn about such things? I have another teaching device here.” His golden face was strangely intense. He reached into his pocket, pulled out the silver crown and gave it to Maggie. She held it, turned it over. The outside of the band showed only a single opening, a small window. But inside were colored lights. Two tiny prongs protruded so that they would push gently into the back of the wearer’s neck.
“This is a Guide,” Karthenor said. “Here in Fale, it is considered to be a thing of great worth. I want to give it to you, as a gift. You are a beautiful young woman. You will need it if you are to make a living here.”
Maggie asked, “What does it do?”
“It is a teaching device, to make you wise,” Karthenor said. “It is not only beautiful when worn in your hair, but very valuable. If you wear it, you will learn all of the secrets of how to become an aberlain. You will learn how to create life, shape the human genome into new complexities so that future generations will be wiser, stronger, and better servants of society than they are now. If you choose to wear such a Guide, you would become rich beyond imagination, and in time your wealth and power will rival that of the Lords. Here, let me show you how to put it on.”
A hundred questions flooded through Maggie’s mind: If it was so valuable, why would Karthenor simply give it to her? She realized now that many of the people here in the cafeteria wore similar Guides. They were the ones who ate silently, seemed to have no need to communicate with words. She wondered how long Karthenor would let her wear the thing.
Karthenor lifted the crown. It was bow-shaped and would not fit completely around Maggie’s head. Instead, Karthenor began to put it on from behind, so that the ends of the bow touched the top of Maggie’s neck. Just as it touched her, another question flooded into Maggie’s mind, one that had nothing to do with the Guide: If Karthenor’s mask kept him from lying, then how could he have lied to the dronon?
The cool metal Guide wrapped around Maggie’s forehead. A faint itching pierced her skin where the prongs touch.
“There now,” Karthenor said. “This will be your Guide. It shall teach you all things that you shall do. It will be your comforter and your constant companion. With it, you shall learn many great things.”
Maggie looked up. Karthenor’s black robes silhouetted his golden face, and Maggie looked into his malicious grin. She clawed at the Guide, trying to pull it free, and a raging fire seemed to sweep through her head. Tears rolled down her face, burning like molten lead. Maggie cried out and fell to the floor, gasping.
“Get that off her!” Orick roared. Karthenor glanced back at the bear, waved his hand. A web of thin gray wires, so small that they could hardly be seen, shot out from a device at Karthenor’s wrist. The webs struck Orick and the wall, gluing the bear in place. Orick roared in terror and tried to claw his way free, but the tiny net held.
“Help!” Maggie shouted, rolling on the floor, looking to the others in the room.
Karthenor’s image swirled, and Maggie watched him through a fog of pain and dismay. He bent low and hissed, “No one can help you. I am a Lord here. Don’t try to remove the Guide—it will only punish you for your efforts! Now: tell me how you got through the gate at Tihrglas! Where did you find the key?
Maggie’s muscles went limp, and though she fought to move, she could not control her arms, could not budge a muscle. Yet as Karthenor had promised, the Guide began to teach her.
In an overwhelming instant, knowledge coursed into her like a pure foaming river, filling her with more facts than she’d ever thought she could know. The tide of human learning cascaded over her, drowning her, and she despaired.
In one marvelous moment, Maggie understood the work of an aberlain. With the Guide to help her, she would spend the rest of her life altering the genetic makeup of the unborn children, making them into better servants for the dronon empire. In return, each child and their offspring in perpetuity would become indebted to Maggie and her Lord Karthenor. Though they sweated for a thousand generations, a portion of all their earnings would be deducted for payment. The work of aberlains had been illegal until six years ago, had been considered immoral.
But now the dronon ruled, and in the dronon society, each creature was born into a caste he could never escape. Images flashed before Maggie’s eyes of her dronon leaders: the Golden Queen, Tlitkani, who had so recently seized control of six thousand worlds; the black Lord Vanquishers, her soldiers; the small, sand-colored artisans of dronon society; and the vast oceans of white-skinned workers. Each was born to its place, and the dronons now sought to remake mankind in their own image.
Karthenor, Lord of Aberlains, was one of mankind’s greatest enemies on this world. Through genetic manipulation, he hoped to engineer a race of slaves and reap endless profit.
And through the Guide, Maggie would become a slave. The Guide stored information on an atomic level. The silver band housed billions of volumes of data along with transmitters and receivers. Already, the Guide’s nanotech components were creating artificial neurons to thread through her cerebrum and brain stem, binding her to the machine. Within hours, she and the machine would be one.
Maggie looked up at Karthenor with undisguised hatred. “I know you!” she growled. The effort caused her great pain.
Karthenor laughed, “Now, see, your eyes are beginning to open already. In your own small way, you are becoming like one of the gods. I want you to think about gods for a moment, and tell me where you got their key.”
Karthenor waved his hand. Two silver android servants came to the table, lifted Maggie by each arm, and began dragging her into the recesses of the building. Orick roared and growled in rage, but he could not save her.
When Karthenor said the word “gods,” the world went gray as information flooded her senses. Just as Maggie had this small Guide enmeshed in her brain, others across the galaxy were joined to larger intelligences. Karthenor’s silver mantle stored far more information than Maggie’s G
uide, yet some immortals were connected to intelligences the size of an entire planet. They were gods.
In her mind’s eye, Maggie saw Semarritte, the great judge who had ruled this sector of the galaxy for ten thousand years. She was a woman of proud bearing and dark hair, very much like Everynne, but older. Semarritte had built the gates at the beginning of her reign as a means of traveling between worlds quickly. Yet to protect herself, she had kept the method for constructing the gate keys a secret.
In one bitter moment, Maggie understood that Everynne was the daughter of Semarritte, and that Everynne had stolen the gate key in a desperate bid to win back her mother’s worlds.
Karthenor and his servants dragged Maggie down a long hall. With each jarring step it felt as if the androids would pull her arms from her sockets. They passed shops and hallways and came to a blank wall which turned to mist when Karthenor touched it.
They entered a living room with comfortable sofas and luxurious white rugs. The androids laid Maggie on the floor, and Maggie’s lips began to move against her will.
She lay helplessly and listened to herself tell Karthenor of the Lady Everynne, of the dronon that dogged her trail in Tihrglas, and of Gallen’s own naive efforts to aid Everynne. With each word, Maggie betrayed Gallen, herself, the Lady Everynne—every human on every world.
Sometimes Karthenor would stop her, ask a question, such as, “And where is your friend Gallen now?” No matter how hard Maggie sought to lie, the whole truth came out. She could not will her mouth to shut.
When Maggie finished, tears rolled down her face. Karthenor said, “Go to your quarters.”
Maggie suddenly knew where her sleeping quarters lay in an upstairs loft. She willed herself to run away but could not move her feet. She moved to the rhythm of the machines.
This is your home now, the Guide whispered. You will serve Karthenor. I will teach you what you must do. Stiffly, the Guide moved Maggie’s legs and arms, taking her down a sterile white corridor, up a long staircase. Maggie watched, knowing that she was no longer human. She climbed into bed, then lay down, thinking. The Guide was always thinking.
The Golden Queen Page 11
