TIME PRIME

by H. Beam Piper

  “Don’t even look at those,” Coru-hin-Irigod advised. “They are but culls; the market is almost over. We’ll go to the house of Nebu-hin-Abenoz, where all the considerable men gather, and you will find those who will be able to trade slaves worthy of the goods you have with you. Meanwhile, let my people take your horses and packs to my house; you shall be my guests while you stay in Careba.”

  It was perfectly safe to trust Coru-hin-Irigod. He was a murderer and a brigand and a slaver, but he would never incur the scorn of men and the curse of the gods by dealing foully with a guest. The horses and packs were led away by his retainers; Ganadara and Atarazola pushed their horses after his and Faru-hin-Obaran’s through the crowd.

  The house of Nebu-hin-Abenoz, like every other building in Careba, was flat-roofed, adobe-walled and window-less except for narrow rifle-slits. The wide double-gate stood open, and five or six heavily armed Caleras lounged just inside. They greeted Coru and Faru by name, and the strangers by their assumed nationality. The four rode through, into what appeared to be the stables, turning their horses over to slaves, who took them away. There were between fifty and sixty other horses in the place.

  Divesting themselves of their weapons in an anteroom at the head of a flight of steps, they passed under an arch and into a wide, shady patio, where thirty or forty men stood about or squatted on piles of cushions, smoking cheroots, drinking from silver cups, talking in a continuous babel. Most of them were in Calera dress, though there were men of other communities and nations in other garb. As they moved across the patio, Gathon Dard caught snatches of conversations about deals in slaves and horse trades, about bandit raids and blood feuds, about women and horses and weapons.

  An old man with a white beard and an unusually clean robe came over to intercept them. “Ha, lord of my daughter, you’re back at last. We had begun to fear for you,” he said.

  “Nothing to fear, father of my wife,” Coru-hin-Irigod replied. “We sold the slaves for a good price and tarried the night feasting in good company. Such good company that we brought some of it with us—Atarazola and Ganadara, men of the Jeseru; Cavu-hin-Avoran, whose daughter mothered my sons.”

  He took his father-in-law by the sleeve and pulled him aside, motioning Gathon Dard and Antrath Alv to follow.

  “They brought weapons; they want outland slaves of the sort I took to sell in the Big Valley country,” he whispered. “The weapons are repeating rifles from across the ocean, and six-shot revolvers. They also have much ammunition.”

  “Oh, Safar bless you!” the white-beard cried, his eyes brightening. “Name your own price; satisfy yourselves that we have dealt fairly with you; go, and return often again! Come, lord of my daughter; let us make them known to Nebu-hin- Abenoz. But not a word about the kind of weapons you have, strangers, until we can speak privately. Say only that you have rifles to trade.”

  Gathon Dard nodded. Evidently there was some sort of power struggle going on in Careba; Coru-hin-Irigod and his wife’s father were of the party of Nebu-hin- Abenoz, and wanted the repeaters and six-shooters for themselves.

  II

  Nebu-hin-Abenoz, swarthy, hook-nosed, with a square-cut graying beard, lounged in a low chair across the patio; near him four or five other Caleras sat or squatted or reclined, all smoking the rank black tobacco of the country and drinking wine or brandy. Their conversation ceased as Cavu-hin-Avoran and the others approached. The chief of Careba listened to the introduction, then heaved himself to his feet and clapped the newcomers on the shoulders.

  “Good, good!” he said. “We know you Jeseru people; you’re honest traders. You come this far into our mountains too seldom. We can trade with you. We need weapons. As for the sort of slaves you want, we have none too many now, but in eight days we will have plenty. If you stay with us that long—”

  “Careba is a pleasant place to be,” Ganadara said. “We can wait.”

  “What sort of weapons have you?” the chief asked.

  “Pistols and rifles, lord of my father’s sister,” Coru-hin-Irigod answered for them. “The packs have been taken to my house, where our friends will stay. We can bring a few to show you, the hour after evening prayers.”

  Nebu-hin-Abenoz shot a keen glance at his brother-in-law’s son and nodded. “Or, better, I will come to your house then; thus I can see the whole load. How will that be?”

  “Better; I will be there, too,” Cavu-hin-Avoran said, then turned to Gathon Dard and Antrath Alv. “You have been long on the road; come, let us drink cool wine, and then we will eat,” he said. “Until this evening, Nebu-hin-Abenoz.”

  He led his son-in-law and the traders to one side, where several kegs stood on trestles with cups and flagons beside them. They filled a flagon, took a cup apiece, and went over to a pile of cushions at one side.

  As they did, three men came pushing through the crowd toward Nebu-hin- Abenoz’s seat. They wore a costume unfamiliar to Gathon Dard—little round caps with red and green streamers behind, and long, wide-sleeved white gowns—and one of them had gold rings in his ears.

  “Nebu-hin-Abenoz?” one of them said, bowing. “We are three men of the Usasu cities. We have gold obus to spend; we seek a beautiful girl to be first concubine to our king’s son, who has now come to the estate of manhood.”

  Nebu-hin-Abenoz picked up the silver-mounted pipe he had laid aside and re-lighted it, frowning. “Men of the Usasu, you have a heavy responsibility,” he said. “You have the responsibility for the future of your kingdom, for a boy’s character is more shaped by his first concubine than by his teachers. How old is the boy?”

  “Sixteen, Nebu-hin-Abenoz; the age of manhood among us.”

  “Then you want a girl older, but not much older. She should be versed in the arts of love, but innocent of heart. She should be wise, but teachable; gentle and loving, but with a will of her own—”

  The three men in white gowns were fidgeting. Then, suddenly, like three marionettes on a single string, they put their right hands to their mouths and then plunged them into the left sleeves of their gowns, whipping out knives and then sprang as one upon Nebu-hin-Abenoz, slashing and stabbing.

  Gathon Dard was on his feet at once; he hurled the wine flagon at the three murderers and leaped across the room. Antrath Alv went bounding after him, and by this time three or four of the group around Nebu-hin-Abenoz’s chair had recovered their wits and jumped to their feet.

  One of the three assailants turned and slashed with his knife, almost disemboweling a Calera who had tried to grapple with him. Before he could free the blade, another Calera brought a brandy bottle down on his head.

  Gathon Dard sprang upon the back of a second assassin, hooking his left elbow under the fellow’s chin and grabbing the wrist of his knife-hand with his right; the man struggled for an instant, then went limp and fell forward. The third of the trio of murderers was still slashing at the fallen chieftain when Antrath Alv chopped him along the side of the neck with the edge of his hand; he simply dropped and lay still.

  III

  Nebu-hin-Abenoz was dead. He had been slashed, cut and stabbed in twenty places; his throat had been cut at least three times, and he had almost been decapitated. The wounded Calera wasn’t dead yet; however, even if he had been at the moment on the operating table of a First Level Home Time Line hospital, it was doubtful he could have been saved, and under the circumstances, his life-expectancy could be measured in seconds. Some cushions were placed under his head, and women called to attend him, but he died before they arrived.

  The three assassins were also dead. Except for a few cuts on the scalp of the one who had been felled with the bottle, there was not a mark on any of them.

  Cavu-hin-Avoran kicked one of them in the face and cursed. “We killed the skunks too quickly!” he cried. “We should have overcome them alive, and then taken our time about dealing with them as they deserved.” He went on to specify the nature of their deserts. “Such infamy!”

  “Well, I’ll swear I didn’t think a
little tap like I gave that one would kill him,” the bottle-wielder excused himself. “Of course, I was thinking only of Nebu-hin- Abenoz, Safar receive him—”

  Antrath Alv bent over the one he had hand-chopped. “I didn’t kill this one,” he said. “The way I hit him, if I had, his neck would be broken, and it’s not. See?” He twisted at the dead man’s neck. “I think they took poison before they drew their knives.”

  “I saw all of them put their hands to their mouths!” a Calera exclaimed. “And look; see how their jaws are clenched.”

  He picked up one of the knives and used it to pry the dead man’s jaws apart, sniffing at his lips and looking into his mouth. “Look, his teeth and his tongue are discolored; there is a strange smell, too.”

  Antrath Alv sniffed, then turned to his partner. “Halatane,” he whispered. Gathon Dard nodded. That was a First Level poison; paratimers often carried halatane capsules on the more barbaric time-lines as a last insurance against torture.

  “But, Holy Name of Safar, what manner of men were these?” Coru-hin-Irigod demanded. “There are those I would risk my life to kill, but I would not throw it away thus.”

  “They came knowing that we would kill them, and took the poison that they might die quickly and without pain,” a Calera said.

  “Or that your tortures would not wring from them the names and nation of those who sent them,” an elderly man in the dress of a rancher from the southeast added. “If I were you, I would try to find out who these enemies are, and the sooner the better.”

  Gathon Dard was examining one of the knives—a folding knife with a broad single-edged blade, locked open with a spring; the handle was of tortoise shell, bolstered with brass. “In all my travels,” he said, “I never saw a knife of this workmanship before. Tell me, Coru-hin-Irigod, do you know from what country these outland slaves of Nebu-hin-Abenoz’s come?”

  “You think that might have something to do with it?” the Calera asked.

  “It could. I think that these people might not have been born slaves, but people taken captive. Suppose, at some time, they had been sold to Nebu-hin- Abenoz, and sold elsewhere by him, one who was a person of consequence—the son of a king, or the priest of some god,” Gathon Dard suggested.

  “By Safar, yes! And now that nation, wherever it is, is at blood-feud with us,” Cavu-hin-Avoran said. “This must be thought about; it is an ill thing to have unknown enemies.”

  “Look!” a Calera who had begun to strip the three dead men cried. “These are not of the Usasu cities, or any other people of this land. See, they are uncircumcised!”

  “Many of the slaves whom Nebu-hin-Abenoz brought to Careba from the hills have been uncircumcised,” Coru-hin-Irigod said. “Jeseru, I think you have your sights on the heart of it.”

  He frowned. “Now, think you, will those who had this done be satisfied, or will they carry on their hatred against all of us?”

  “A hard question,” Antrath Alv said. “You Caleras do not serve our gods, but you are our friends. Suffer me to go apart and pray; I would take counsel with the gods, that they may aid us all in this.”

  Ulvarn Rarth parked his aircar on the twelfth floor of the Old Town Dhergabar City Garage, where he walked to the corner antigrav shaft and dropped to the bottom level. From there, he stepped onto Main Street. Old Town was the only section of the city that had ground access; in fact, it resembled nothing so much as one of the ubiquitous Fourth Level cities housing millions, although its current population was somewhere around five hundred thousand—mostly Serv Sec Proles and petty criminals. It was the oldest section of the City dating back to the Pre-Paratime Era.

  He understood why Hadron Tharn liked to use it for private meetings. Here the doors opened without ident-keys or thumb-locks, providing the necessary anonymity the low-ground denizens preferred.

  Ulvarn wore his loose-fitting tunic with a hood that covered most of his face. There were sky-eyes above to keep watch for the Metro Police for any street level criminal activity. Fortunately, despite all their efforts, Metro hadn’t been able to get spy-eyes and ear-taps installed inside the clip joints, honkytonks, drug emporiums, cabarets, juke joints, flash-bars, tap-rooms, nightclubs, gambling dens and barrooms that proliferated throughout Old Town.

  This decade, Fourth Level Europo-American was all the rage and the streets were lined with dim street lights and neon signs. It was time for the evening rain and the bright florescent lights appeared smeared and luminescent. The tallest buildings, mostly brownstones, were only twelve stories high and they looked squat and foreboding. When he was growing up, Second Level Vathroff Sector had been at the peak of its influence and as adolescents his gang had their faces morphed into animal shapes and worn multi-colored tattoos all over their bodies. When he got older, it had cost his parents a small fortune to have his entire epidermis removed and re-grafted. He still kept a lynx face mask and wore it to costume parties and pantomimes.

  Ulvarn saw the garish blue and red neon sign flashing Speakeasy and knew he’d found Hadron’s latest “hangout.” He had to knock on the door and provide the code word “Be-bop,” which Hadron had left on his voice-drop, before entering. Inside the door he was frisked by two men wearing wide-lapelled brown suits. Another man stood behind them cradling a Tommy gun. A neon-bubbling jukebox was playing a piano rag and several men in trench coats and fedoras were dancing the Lindy Hop with their molls.

  In the rear corner, facing the door, Ulvarn saw Hadron Tharn hunched over a mug of beer with his favorite henchman, Warntha, at his side. Warntha—who never bothered with disguises—was rumored to be an ex-military Strike Team commander, who’d been cashiered after the last Prole Uprising for use of excessive force, which in this case probably meant outright murder and torture. He certainly wasn’t a man any sane person would cross.

  Today Hadron Tharn’s face was covered by a skin-mask that hid his identity and he was dressed in an all black Fourth-Level style paramilitary uniform. He had tiny silver death-heads as collar tabs. “You’re late, Ulvarn.”

  “I’m sorry, Leader. I thought someone might be following so I took an air-cab from the Paratime Building and made a couple of false stops and turns before stopping at my residence.”

  Hadron nodded. Warntha smiled and he shivered.

  The tableau froze for a moment when a bartender, in a leather apron, came over to take their drink order. He ordered a beer, Old Milwaukee, same as Hadron’s.

  After the bartender left, Ulvarn said, “I gave Salgath your instructions.”

  “What did he have to say for himself?” Hadron asked.

  “He wasn’t happy with how things are going.” Ulvarn shrugged his shoulders. “I think he’ll do what he’s told—for now. Still, I believe he’s more afraid of Tortha Karf and the Paratime Police than he is of the Organization.”

  Warntha shook his head slowly.

  “That’s a mistake on his part,” Hadron Tharn said.

  “Warntha, I want you to set up an action-team, just in case Salgath gets cold feet somewhere along the line. Most of these politicians are soft sisters when the blood starts to run.”

  Ulvarn found himself shivering. How did I get involved with this lunatic?, he asked himself. It had begun five years ago, when he had been threatened with expulsion from the University for a practical joke. He’d gone to one of his father’s politically connected friends, a member of the Executive Council for the Opposition Party, who’d recommended he visit Hadron Tharn. Hadron had taken care of his problems in exchange for some errands.

  Later on, Hadron had put him on his payroll and helped him when he needed to pick up some easy Paratemporal Exchange Units so that he could afford an outtime holiday, or pay off his gambling debts. Since then he’d been involved in shakedowns, credit cleaning, petty larceny and skullduggery. His life hadn’t been his own.… However, he had made many important contacts, who would further his career in politics now that he knew their deepest secrets and fears.

  “Rarth, stop your wool
gathering. I want you to hang close. I might need you for another errand, soon.”

  It was full daylight, but the sun was hidden; a thin rain fell on the landing pad around Police Terminal Dhergabar Equivalent when Vall and Dalla left the rocket. Across the black lava-like pavement, they could see the bulky form of Tortha Karf hunched under a long cloak, with his flat cap pulled down over his brow. He shook hands with Vall and kissed cheeks with Dalla when they joined him.

  “Car’s over here,” he said, nodding toward the waiting vehicle. “Yesterday wasn’t one of our better days, was it?”

  “No. It wasn’t.” Vall agreed. They climbed into the car, and the driver lifted straight up to two thousand feet and turned, soaring down to land on the Chief ’s Headquarters Building, a mile away. “We’re not completely stopped, sir. Ranthar Jard is working on a few ideas that may lead him to the Kholghoor time-lines where the Wizard Traders are operating. If we can’t get them through their output, we may nail them at the intake.”

  “Unless they’ve gotten the wind up and closed down all their operations,” Tortha Karf said.

  “I doubt if they’ve done that, Chief,” Vall replied. “We don’t know who these people are, of course, and it’s hard to judge their reactions, but they’re willing to take chances for big gains. I believe they think they’re safe now that they’ve closed out the compromised time-line and killed the only witness against them.”

  “Well, what’s Ranthar Jard doing?”

  “Trying to locate the sub-sector and probability belt from what the slaves can tell him about their religious beliefs, about the local king, and the prince of Jhirda, and the noble families of the neighborhood,” Vall said. “When he has it localized as closely as he can, he’s going to start pelting the whole paratemporal area with photographic auto-return balls dropped from aircars on Police Terminal over the spatial equivalents of a couple of Croutha-conquered cities. As soon as he gets a photo that shows Croutha with firearms, he’ll have a Wizard Trader time-line.”