by Andre Norton
“I come in peace—”
“With a weapon in hand?” she countered.
He looked surprised; he must have expected a foreign tongue in answer. But she had replied in the Basic which was the second language of all Confederacy planets.
“We have reason to believe that weapons are necessary with your people. I am Glanden Tork of Survey.”
“I am Tamisan and a Mouth of Olava.” Her hand went to her head and discovered that somehow, in spite of her passage through the air and her lacking-in-ceremony entrance into the ship, her crown was still there. Then she pressed the important question:
“Where is the champion?”
“Your companion?” The stunner was no longer centered on her and his tone had lost some of its belligerency. “He is in safekeeping. But why do you name him champion?”
“Because that is what he is—come to engage your selected champion in Right-battle.”
“I see. And we select a champion in return, is that it? What is Right-battle?”
She answered his last question first. “If you claim land, you meet the champion of the lordship of that land in Right-battle.”
“But we claim no land,” he protested.
“You made claim when you set your fiery ship down on the fields of Ty-Kry.”
“Your people then consider our landing a form of invasion? But this can be decided by a single combat between champions? And we pick our man—”
Tamisan interrupted him. “Not so. The Mouth of Olava selects—or rather the sand selects—the Seeing selects. That is why I have come, though you did not greet me in honor.”
“You select the champion—how?”
“As I have said—by the Seeing.”
“I do not see, but doubtless it will be made plain in the proper time. And where then is this combat fought?”
“Out there.” She waved to what she thought was the ship walls. “On the land being claimed.”
“Logical,” he conceded. And then he spoke as if to the air around them. “All that recorded?” Since the air did not answer him, he was apparently satisfied by silence.
“This is your custom, Lady—Mouth of Olava. But since it is not ours, we must discuss it. By your leave we shall do so.”
“As you wish.” She had this much on her side, he had introduced himself as a member of Survey, which meant that he had been trained in the necessity of understanding alien folkways. And the underlying principle of such training wherever possible was to follow planet customs. If the crew did accept this idea of championship, then they might also be willing to follow it completely. She could demand to see every member of the crew, thus find Kas. And once that was done—break-dream!
But, Tamisan told herself now, do not count on too easy an end to this venture. There was a nagging little doubt lurking in the back of her mind, and it had something to do with those death arrows, with the hulk of the derelict. The people of Ty-Kry, seemingly so weakly defended, had managed through centuries to keep their world free of spacers. When she tried to plumb the Tamisan-of-this-world’s memories as to how that was accomplished, she had no answer but what corresponded to magic forces only partly understood. That the shooting of the arrows was the first step in bringing such forces into being she was aware. Beyond that seemed only to lie a belief akin to her Mouth power, and that she did not understand, even when she employed it.
She was accepting all of this, Tamisan realized suddenly, as if this world did exist, that it was not a dream out of her control. Could Starrex’s suggestion be the truth, that they had by some means traveled into an alternate world?
Her patience was growing short; she wanted action. Waiting was very difficult. She was sure that scanners of more than one kind were trained on her and she must play the part of a Mouth of Olava, displaying no impatience, only calm confidence in herself and her mission. That she held to as best she could.
Perhaps the time she waited seemed longer than it really was. But Tork returned, to usher her out of the cell and escort her up ladder from level to level. She found the long skirts of her robe difficult to manage. The cabin they came into was large and well furnished, and there were several men seated there. Tamisan looked from one to another searchingly. But she could not tell, she felt none of the uneasiness she had known in the throne room when Hawarel had been present. Of course, that could mean Kas was not one of this group, though a Survey ship did not carry a large crew—mainly specialists of several different callings. There were probably ten, even twenty, more than the six before her.
Tork led her to a chair which had some of the attributes of an easirest, molding it to her comfort as she settled into it.
“This is Captain Lewald, Medico Thrum, Pyscho-Tech Sims, Hist-Techneer El Hamdi.” Tork named names and each man acknowledged with a half bow. “I have outlined your proposal to them and they have discussed the matter. By what means will you select a champion from among us?”
She had no sand. For the first time, Tamisan realized that handicap. She would have to depend upon touch alone, but somehow she was sure that would reveal Kas to her.
“Let your men come to me, touching hand to mine,” she raised hers to lay it palm up on the table. “When I clasp that of him whom Olava selects, I shall know it.”
“It seems simple enough,” the Captain returned. “Let us do as the lady suggests.” And he leaned forward to rest his own for a minute on hers. There was no response, nor was there any in the others. The Captain called an order on the intercom, and one by one the other members of the crew came to her, touching palm to palm, while Tamisan, with mounting uneasiness, began to believe she had erred. Perhaps only by the sand could she detect Kas. Though she searched the face of each as he took his seat opposite her and laid his hand on hers, she could see no resemblance to Starrex’s cousin, nor was there any inner warning her man was here.
“That was the last,” the Captain said as the final man arose. “Which is our champion?”
“He is not here.” She blurted out the truth, her distress breaking through her caution.
“But you have touched hands with every man on board this ship,” the Captain answered her. “Or is this some trick—”
He was interrupted by a sound sharp enough to startle. And the chanted numbers which spilled from the com by his elbow meant nothing to Tamisan but brought the rest in that cabin into instant action. A stunner in Tork’s hand caught her before she could rise, and once more she was conscious but unable to move. As the other officers pushed through the door on the run, Tork put out his hand, holding her limp body erect in the chair, while with the other he thumbed some alarm button set into the table.
His summons was speedily answered by two crewmen who carried her along, to thrust her once more into a cabin. This was getting to be far too regular a procedure, Tamisan thought ruefully as they tossed her negligently on a bunk, hardly pausing to see if she landed safely on its surface or not. Whatever that alert had meant, it had certainly once more brought her to the status of prisoner.
Apparently sure of the stunner beam, her guard went out, leaving the door open a crack so that she could hear the pad of running feet, the clangs of what could be secondary alarms.
What possible attack had the forces of the Over-Queen launched against a well-armed and already alert spacer? Yet it was plain that those men believed themselves in danger and were on the defensive. Starrex—and Kas. Where was Kas? The Captain said she had met all on board. Did that mean that the vision she had earlier seen was false, that the faceless man in the spacer dress was a creature of her too active imagination?
She must not lose confidence. Kas was here—he had to be! She lay now trying vainly to guess by the sounds what was happening. But the first flurry of noise and movement were stilled; there was only silence. Hawarel—where was Hawarel?
The stunner’s power was wearing off. She had pulled herself up somewhat groggily when the door of the cabin shot into its wall crack and Tork and the Captain stood there.
/> “Mouth of Olava, or whatever you truly are,” the Captain said with a chill in his voice which reminded Tamisan of Hawarel’s earlier rage, “the winning of time may not have been of your devising—this nonsense of Champions and Right-battle—or perhaps it was. Your superiors perhaps deceived you too. At any rate, now it does not matter. They have done their best to make us prisoner and will not reply to our signals for a parley. So we must use you for our messenger. Tell your ruler that we hold her champion and we can readily use him as a key to open gates shut in our faces. We have weapons beyong swords and spears, even beyond those which might not have saved those in that other ship. She can tie us here for a measure of time, but we can solve such bonds. We have not come as invaders, no matter what you believe, nor are we alone. If our signal does not reach our sister ship in orbit above, there will be such an accounting as your race has not seen, nor can conceive of. We shall release you now and you will tell your Queen this. If she does not send those to talk with us before the dawn—then it will be the worse for her. Do you understand?”
“And Hawarel?” Tamisan asked.
“Hawarel?”
“The champion. You will keep him here?”
“As I have said, we have the means to make him a key for your fortress doors. Tell her that, Mouth. From what we have read in your champion’s mind you have certain authority here which ought to impress your Queen.”
Read from Starrex’s mind? What did they mean? Tamisan was suddenly fearful. Some kind of mind probe? But if they did that, then they must know the rest. She was utterly confused now, and found it very hard to center her attention on the matter at hand, that she must relay this defiant message to the Over-Queen. And, since there seemed to be nothing she could do to protest that action, she would do so. Though what reception she might have in Ty-Kry—Tamisan shuddered as Tork pulled her from the bunk and half carried, half led her along.
11
FOR the third time Tamisan sat in prison, but this time she looked not at the smooth walls of a spaceship cabin, but had the ancient stones of the High Castle ringing her in. Captain Lewald’s estimation of her influence with the Over-Queen had fallen far wide of the truth, and her plea in favor of a parley with the spacemen had been overruled at once, while the threat concerning their strange weapons and their mysterious use of Hawarel as a “key” was laughed at. The fact that those of Ty-Kry had successfully dealt with this menace in the past made them confident that their same devices would serve as well now. And what those devices were Tamisan had no idea, save that something had happened to the ship before she had been unceremoniously bundled out of it.
Hawarel they had kept on board, Kas had disappeared —and until she had both to hand she was indeed a captive. Kas—her thoughts kept turning back to the fact he had not been among those who had faced her. Yet Lewald had assured her that she had seen all his crew—
Wait! She set herself to recall his every word—what had he said? “You have touched hand with every man aboard this ship.” But he had not said all the crew. Had there been one outside the ship? All she knew of space travel she had learned from tapes. But those had been very detailed as they needed to be to supply the dreamers with factual background and inspiration from which to build fantasy worlds. This spacer claimed to be a Survey vessel and not operating alone. Therefore—it might really have a companion in orbit, and there Kas could be. But, if that were so, she had no chance of reaching him.
Now if this were only a true dream—Tamisan sighed, leaned her head back against the dank stone of the wall and then jerked away from that support as its chill struck into her shoulders. Dreams—
Suppose—she sat upright, alert and a little excited—suppose she could dream within a dream—and find Kas that way? Was it possible? You could not tell until you proved it in one manner or another. She had no stabilizer, no booster. But those were only needed when a dream was shared. She might venture as well on her own. But if she dreamed within a dream, could she do aught to set matters right? Why ask questions she could not answer until it was put to the proof?
She stretched out on the stones of the cell floor, resolutely blocking off those portions of her mind which were aware of the present discomfort of her body. Instead, she began the deep, even breathing of a dreamer, fastening her thoughts on the pattern of self-hypnosis which was the door to her dream. But all she had as a goal was Kas and he as he was in his real person. So poor a guide!
She was going under—she could still dream!
Walls built up around her. Only these were of a translucent material through which flowed soft and pleasing colors. It could not be a space ship. Then the scene wavered, and swiftly Tamisan thrust aside that doubt which might puncture the dream fabric. The walls sharpened, fixed into a solid state: this was a corridor, facing her a door.
She willed to see beyond and was straightway, after the manner of a proper dream, in that chamber. Here the walls were hung with the same sparkling web stuff which had lined her chamber in the sky tower. Seeking Kas, she had returned to her own world. But she held the dream, curious as to why her aim had brought her here. Had she been wrong, and had Kas never come with her? But if that were so, why had she and Starrex been marooned in the other dream?
There was no one in the chamber, but she felt that faint pull drawing her on. She sought Kas and there was that which promised he was here. A second room. Entering, she was startled. For this she knew and well—it was the room of a dreamer. And Kas stood by an empty couch, while the other was occupied.
The dreamer wore a sharing crown, but what rested on the other couch was not any second sleeper but a squat box of metal, to which her dream cords were attached. And Tamisan was not the dreamer! She had expected to see herself. Instead the entranced was one of the locked minds, the blankness of her countenance was unmistakeable. Dream force was being created here by an indreamer, and seemingly it was harnessed to that box.
Given such clues, Tamisan projected the rest. This was not the same dreaming chamber where she had fallen asleep; rather it was a smaller room. And Kas was very much awake, intent upon some dials on the box top. The indreamer and the box, locked so together, could be holding them in the other world. But what of that faint vision of Kas in Ship’s uniform? To mislead her? Or was this a misleading dream, dictated by the suspicions she had detected in Starrex concerning his cousin? For this was the logical reasoning from such suspicions, that she had been sent with Starrex into a dream world and therein locked by this indreamer and machine—real or dream?
Was she now visible to Kas? If this were a dream, she should be. If she had come back to reality—Her head reeled under the listing of things which might be true, untrue, half true. To prove at least one small fraction, she moved forward and laid her hand on that of Kas as he leaned over to make some small adjustment to the box.
He gave a startled exclamation, jerked his hand from under hers and glanced around. But, though he stared straight at her, it was plain he saw nothing; she could be as disembodied as a spirit in one of the old tales. Yet if he had not seen her, he had felt something.
Again he leaned over the box, eyeing it intently as if he thought he must have felt some shock or emanation from it. The dreamer never moved. Save for the slow rise and fall of her breathing, which told Tamisan she was indeed deep in her self-induced and created world, she might have been dead. Her face was very wan and colorless. Seeing that, Tamisan was uneasy. This tool of Kas’s had been far too long in an uninterrupted dream. She would have to be awakened if she made no move to break it for herself. One of the dangers of indreaming was this possible loss of the power to break a dream. That occurring, the guardian must break it. Most of the dreamers’ caps provided the necessary stimulus to do so. Only the cap of this dreamer’s head had certain modifications Tamisan had never seen before, and these might prevent breaking—
What would happen if Tamisan could evoke waking? Would that also release her—and Starrex—wherever he might be now—from their dream, retu
rn them to the proper world? She was well drilled in the technique of deep dream break. But those she had used when she stood in reality beside a victim who had overstayed the proper dream time.
She reached out a hand, touched the pulse on the sleeper’s throat and applied slight massage. But though her hands seemed corporal and solid to her, there was no response in the other. To prove a point, Tamisan aimed a finger, thrusting it deeply as she could into the pillow on which the dreamer’s head rested. Her finger did not dent that soft roundness, but rather went into it, as if her flesh and bone had no substance.
There was yet another way. It was harsh and used only in cases of extremity. But to Tamisan this could be no else. She put those unsubstantial fingers on the temples of the sleeper, just below the rim of the dream cap, and concentrated on a single command. Awake!
The sleeper stirred, her features convulsed and a low moan came from her. Kas uttered an exclamation, hung over his box, his fingers busy pushing buttons with a care which suggested he was about a very delicate task.
“Awake!” Tamisan commanded with such force as she could summon.
The sleeper’s hands arose very slowly, unsteadily from her sides and wavered up toward the cap, though her eyelids did not raise. Her expression was now one of pain. And Kas, breathing hard and fast, kept to his adjustments on the box.
So they fought their silent battle for possession of the dreamer. And slowly Tamisan was forced to concede that whatever force lay in that box, it overrode all the technique she knew. But, the longer Kas kept this poor wretch under, the weaker she would grow. Death would be the answer, though perhaps that did not trouble him.
If she could not wake the dreamer, break the bonds which she was certain now were what tied her and Starrex to that other world, then she must somehow get at Kas himself. He had responded to her touch before—therefore he might just—
Tamisan slipped away from the head of the couch and came to stand beside Kas. He straightened up, a faith relief mirrored on his face as he studied the dreamer, and apparently his box reported that there was no longer any disturbance.
