The Old One Who Is Young steepled his fingers and looked thoughtfully off at something only he could see. His pale grey eyes seemed to light from within.
“I am very old. Once I realized that short of accident I was likely to continue living with mind and body unimpaired by age, I will admit, I wondered why. I also wondered if there were any others who shared my peculiar gift. Finding others like me was the first spur that sent me on my wanderings.
“In that quest, I was doomed to disappointment. Rumor after rumor I followed, but at the end of the trail either the traces faded or I found some man or woman—perhaps of great years, but lacking my singular vitality. Failing to find any like myself, I also failed to find a clear answer to the ‘why’ of my gift.
“The recognized adaptations—such as the ability to breathe underwater or to see in the dark—were clearly useful in certain environments and professions. What use was there in long life and abiding health, especially since, to my great disappointment, I appeared to be unable to have children who might share some portion of my gift? Clearly I was not meant to found a dynasty in the literal sense—a dynasty that could bring the order that vanished with the slaughter of the seegnur. What then was I to do?
“For a time I studied with the loremasters, absorbing all I could of what had come before us. Eventually, I concluded that my life’s mission would be to see if I could reawaken the glorious technological devices that had been common in the days before the slaughter of the seegnur, even if most had not known they existed.”
Griffin listened, careful not to so much as shift in his chair lest he distract the Old One from his tale. He had the impression that the Old One had almost forgotten his presence.
“Eventually, I decided that the key must be in the seegnur nature itself. The lore contained many indications that the people of Artemis had been created by the seegnur in their own image. I came to believe that just as the smallest terrier carries within it the seeds of the wolf, so the people of Artemis carried within them the seeds of the seegnur.
“There were hints here and there that the technology of the seegnur was not like our own machinery—and that the difference was more than one of sophistication. I came to believe that at least some of the seegnur’s technology was operated by an interweaving of the seegnur and the machine.”
The pale eyes fastened on Griffin as if looking for confirmation.
Griffin nodded. “Yes. We have similar tales—most agree that the seegnur could interface the living and the created. However, no one has ever succeeded in figuring out how this was done.”
The Old One’s lips moved in what must be called a smile, but was an expression that indicated his own sense of superiority. “You told me that the wars that destroyed the great empire also destroyed the planets they had most treasured, as well as the most sophisticated of their technology.”
“That is true. By the time the Old Empire fell, fear that someone would inherit their power and so come to dominate in turn led to both places and people being destroyed.”
“Tell me honestly, Griffin, do you consider yourself of the same stock as the seegnur of old?”
Griffin hesitated, tempted for a moment to make that very claim. However, then he might be asked to prove it—or worse, he could threaten the Old One’s conceit. He decided to walk a narrow line.
“Not purebred, no. There are many indications that the rulers of the empire and their most chosen associates were different from those over whom they ruled. However, there are ample indications that we shared common stock. The ruling class regularly intermarried with their subjects and children came from those unions.”
Griffin thought the Old One might be threatened by the mention of children, since he himself was sterile but, if he was, he did not show it.
He only nodded. “That seems a fair assessment. The lore contains scattered references that on Artemis the seegnur sought to create something unique for themselves. Have you been told our creation story?”
“Yes. Adara told it to me.”
“Did she tell you how initially Artemis was created without human residents, how later they were added, then later still the adaptations were worked into small portion of the population?”
Griffin nodded.
“It is my belief that the adaptations were rooted in the same abilities that the seegnur used to operate their most sophisticated technologies—and that those technologies, in turn, were used to create the underlying structure of Artemis because, only then, could they be hidden so completely from sight that the illusion of an unspoiled world could be maintained.”
“I see. And?”
“Therefore, just as with enough patience and time one could breed back to a wolf from a domestic dog, so I believe that it would be possible to breed back to the abilities that enabled the seegnur to operate their most sophisticated machinery.”
Griffin blinked, straightening in his chair. The idea was insane, yet … He remembered the tales he had read of how the seegnur held their vast empire together because they alone possessed the secret of ships that could cover vast distances in the blink of an eye. How early in the war—before a heroic strike on the part of the rebels destroyed some of the most crucial planets in the seegnur’s structure—the seegnur had defeated far vaster hosts by apparently defying the accepted laws of physics. There were other such stories, most dismissed by scholars as the victors presenting the odds against them as much higher than they had been in order to justify the level of destruction they had used.
But what if the stories had been true?
He spoke, his voice hoarse. “But not only were the seegnur slaughtered, your lore speaks of the death of machines. Even if you could breed back to those who could operate the seegnur’s old technology, nothing will function.”
The Old One’s expression showed satisfaction. “Will it? I wonder. There are indications that those who led the slaughter of the seegnur expected to return to Artemis. What if the machines were not so much ‘killed’ as put to sleep?”
Griffin thought of the landing facility, sealed but its basic works left in order, of this repair facility. He remembered tales of how the seegnur had often built where water would hide their constructions from casual view.
He inclined his head, encouraging the Old One to continue. Griffin suspected that while the Old One might have shared some of his speculations with trusted associates, he was telling Griffin far more because Griffin could understand without being hampered by superstition.
“I had hoped,” the Old One said, “that if I managed to breed back to someone with abilities close to those of the original seegnur, that one would be able to serve as a key. Thus far, I will admit, I have not been successful. I am hampered by not knowing precisely what qualities the seegnur valued. Yet, I will tell you this. Even when an adaptation appears to be purely physical—as with Adara’s night vision—there is a mental component. I have tested with others who share that talent. Even when they are in darkness so complete that a cat or other such creature blunders around as if blind, these eventually begin to cope. I believe there is a mental enhancement—an ability to see with the eyes of the mind as well as those of the body—that aids them. Might not these eyes of the mind have been part of what was used to guide the seegnur’s ships so that they could see paths through the void to which others were blind?”
“It might have been so,” Griffin slowly agreed. He thought of Ring, who lived in perpetual confusion because he could not tell which future he was living in. Surely the Old One had bred for that—perhaps a variation on the superb natural sense of direction he had heard Terrell and Adara mention that some hunters and factotum possessed.
He realized that there was a question he must ask. “Wait! I was so fascinated by your ambitious plans, for the goal you have set yourself, that I may have misunderstood you. Did you say you have already begun this program?”
“Yes. Some generations ago. At first I attempted to recruit from among the adapted that I knew—and I knew
a great many, for I had often sought them out in my wanderings. They in turn, especially if they came from areas where the adapted are less than welcome, were glad to befriend one who admired them.
“Later, I realized that I was up against human nature. Sometimes a woman would promise me a child to raise—a child fathered by a man I had suggested to her as having a complementary talent. When the child was born, she would decide she could not part from it. Also, I was coming to realize that it might take me generations to breed for the qualities I needed.”
Griffin swallowed his repulsion and said as matter-of-factly as he could, “As it would take generations to breed even a fighting dog, already close to a wolf in appearance, back to its wolfish stock.”
“Precisely! Therefore, I needed more control. I sought among those of the adapted who had found themselves shunned. I offered them a home and a purpose, the promise that they and their children would never go without shelter or food, that they would live within a community where they would be accepted.”
He went on for some time in this vein. Griffin listened intently. Never once was kidnapping mentioned, never once forced coupling. Griffin found himself wondering if Winnie had been a rebel within a mostly contented community, if her tale had been distorted. Had Lynn’s daughter actually been kidnapped? Perhaps Mabel had been recruited and later regretted her choice …
The Old One was drawing his account to a close. “Yet, I was handicapped. Ideally, I would have set up my community of the adapted in some isolated area, where they could flourish free from the stigma attached to them. However, I did not wish to leave my researches into the physical technologies of the seegnur. These islands—thought of as ‘haunted’ by the good but credulous people of the town—were the perfect solution. The seegnur had sculpted the surrounding area so that the islands could not be approached by any water craft, large or small. I, however, had found the tunnel that led here. The door had been closed but not locked. Eventually I chanced on the means of opening it.”
“As if it was meant to be,” Griffin said softly. He wondered again how Winnie’s tale fit into this. Adara claimed to have found the location of the original area where the Old One had kept his captives. Wouldn’t the islands have been a better choice all along? Someone was not telling the whole truth and he would bet that someone was not Adara the Huntress.
“Now,” the Old One said, his grey eyes shining as he turned his thoughts to the present, “once again I receive an omen that I am on the right course, that I am doing what was meant to happen. You land here on Artemis, not far from where one of my most devoted followers lives. Soon after your landing, for the first time since the death of machines, a machine awakens. I believe the time has come for Artemis to waken from the sleep she has slept these five hundred years.”
He leaned forward. “I had thought I would need to wait until I created a key that more or less accidentally fit the lock. Now … Now … Perhaps you have brought the key with you. What do you say to this? We will go into the mountains and find our way into your shuttle. I believe you must have brought with you something that would enable you to counter the nanobots that slaughtered the machines. Only the suddenness of your landing kept you from taking it with you.
“We will go. We will retrieve it. We will awaken the dormant technologies. Then you can contact your orbiting ship and arrange for your freedom and I … I will be a step closer to achieving my dream of making Artemis the place she once was before greed and misery sealed her into silence.”
Interlude: Reluctant Dreamer
I don’t want to dream of you,
I’d much rather dream of her.
She’s sexy, supple, hot as fire …
I’ve even made her purr.
But unkind fate has mated me
To your colder fire.
Much as I would dream of her,
Your wish is my desire.
19
The Roots of Things
When Adara and Terrell announced their intention of moving out of the Sanctum and back over to the Trainers, the Old One surprised them both by asking if they—especially Terrell—would care to stay.
“As you know,” he said, offering them one of his rare smiles, “I have a great appreciation for those with training in the lore. Terrell, you have shown yourself exceptionally talented—and free from the more rigid dictums that limit so many who have followed that difficult course. And you, Adara, have an engaging curiosity. That, combined with your ability to see in the dark, have already provided a considerable advantage to my research.”
For the slightest of moments, Adara was tempted. Perhaps they were wrong to blame the Old One. Perhaps Julyan was acting on his own … And even if the Old One was guilty, wasn’t it easier to hunt the prey when one could keep a close watch on it?
That last thought was what convinced Adara that she, for one, was not going to stay in the Sanctum. Perhaps the Old One wanted to be able to keep a close eye on her and Terrell—at least until he was certain that they had no suspicions regarding him.
She inclined her head politely. “I appreciate your offer, good sir, but I have no desire to remain shut in. We’ll be based out of the Trainers,’ but I will be staying mostly out of doors. If you need my help on some difficult search, a message sent there will reach me.”
Terrell also declined, though his explanation for exactly why he would leave such an honored patron was rather incomplete. Adara wondered that someone with Terrell’s training in etiquette could not have managed something better.
She said as much to Terrell after he, Adara, and Sand Shadow had taken their leave of the Sanctum.
Grinning rather wickedly, Terrell confided, “Oh, I did that on purpose. Later, I went back to the Old One and, shuffling my feet a bit, I let on that I had been courting you since last summer, that I hoped that with Griffin gone—sad as that was—I had some hope of finally winning my suit.”
“Clever,” Adara said, “and even better because now the Old One will be inclined to see Griffin as your rival, not your friend.”
“My thought exactly,” Terrell said smugly. “In any case, lies rooted in truth are least likely to come back to trip one up.”
“Terrell…”
“I’ve never told you I’d given up, only that I was willing to wait and let you make up your mind. I’m still willing—and I don’t see that it hurts to remind you occasionally.”
“Fair enough. But my mind hasn’t changed. I’m not sure I’m in love with you or with Griffin. I’m not sure I’m capable of love at all.”
“You are.”
“Right now,” Adara said firmly, “what I am capable of is doing my best to find Griffin. We have two trails we can follow: Julyan and the people in that little fishing village. I also want to see if I can find my way into the place where the Old One kept his breeding stock before Winnie and Ring and the others made their escape.”
“What do you think you’ll find?”
“I don’t know, but I’ve been wondering. We’re pretty sure that place is deserted now. We know from Winnie that there were a good number of people there. How did the Old One move them out? Small groups? A mass shipping? One thing I’m sure of—he didn’t kill them all and start over. Humans are slow breeders. He’d be setting back his program by years, maybe even decades.”
“Fair enough,” Terrell said. “I’ll see what I can do in town. One good thing about our reason for staying on in Spirit Bay is that I have ample excuse for roaming around and talking to people while I shop for supplies to take back to Shepherd’s Call. Learning about that fishing village should be easy—people like to gossip about their competitors.
“Tell me what you can about Julyan. I’m not going to want to ask about him by name, but I can ask indirectly. Other than hunting and seducing the love of my life, what interests did he have?”
Adara acceded, though her heart ached as she dredged up buried memories. She faithfully repeated every little detail she could remember, from quirks about foo
d (Julyan had hated both honey and cherries, a bad thing for someone who lived in Bruin’s home), to mannerisms, to games he had liked, to his love for music.
“Singing, eh?” Terrell said when she finished. “I might be able to make something of that. You say he was good?”
“Very,” Adara said. “And he loved to perform.”
“So it’s possible that, unless his entire life here has been lived in concealment, that Julyan might be known in some of the local taverns. Did he have a piece or two he particularly liked?”
Wincing slightly, Adara sang:
“My love is like a panther swift.
I caught her in my snare.
And after I had captured her,
I left her hanging there.
“My love is like a rabbit fleet.
I caught her in a trap.
And after I had captured her,
I gave her heart a snap.”
Terrell cocked an eyebrow. “That’s a pretty tune. The lyrics certainly aren’t of the common sort. Yes. I can use that.”
He fell silent, obviously planning his approach with much the same care that Adara would a complex hunt. She respected this and kept silent, but the little tune—with lyrics she had written to Julyan’s order—kept echoing through her mind. She was sure Julyan still sang it. There was a vanity that would make him reluctant to reject something so perfect for his voice and style, even though he had rejected the love that inspired it.
* * *
Griffin wondered how he would have reacted to the Old One’s vision if he had not first learned about the cost to those who would provide the breeding stock for these new seegnur.
But you’d be less than honest, he thought, if you didn’t admit you’re tempted, eh, Griffin Dane? After the crash you gave up on the shuttle and all it contains. Now here is a man who is determined to excavate it—and who has the resources to do so, who has the means of giving you back the stars.
Artemis Awakening Page 27
