Ancient Light

by Mary Gentle

  ‘I’m getting …’ I leaned up against the pale plaster wall, ‘… getting too old for this sort of thing. And what the fuck I think I’m going to do here, I don’t know.’

  The Meduenin grinned. Wind off the harbour whipped his yellow mane across his scarred face, and brought the rank smell of dekany-weed and overripe siir-vine. Standing here, at sea level, there was no view in any direction. A windvane towered over this part of the quay, vanes slowly turning; I glanced up and down the dock – warehouses and companion-houses and no Freeporters at all. So quiet you could hear the waves slap at the harbour wall … and hear, in the far distance, voices loudly shouting.

  ‘They’ve reopened the Seamarshal’s palace,’ Blaize Meduenin said. I remembered seeing it boarded-up, half a year ago. He drew harur-nilgiri, holding it in his left hand; and membrane slid down over those pale blue, whiteless eyes. ‘Look: there.’

  Confused, I glanced round. Then, as he pointed, I saw the hoop-mast of a jath-rai not three hundred yards away in the channel between this island and the next. Meshabi-robed Ortheans crowded the deck. Morning sun flashed from the metal sail and chains. It was automatic to step back into the shadow of the warehouse-arch, and I thought Lynne don’t be ridiculous and a chip of mud-brick stung my cheek. After a second, my eyes focused on the head of a winchbow-bolt, buried deep in a split in the brickwork.

  ‘Think they’ll be lucky, don’t they?’ Blaize touched my arm. ‘Christie – this way; come.’

  The sun was hot on my head as we crossed the quay again, slipping into an alley that led away from the harbour. Darkness flicked across the dusty earth and biscuit-coloured walls: the shadow of a ’thopter. I tried to push all thought aside. My stomach churned; I was aware of a sideways glance from Blaize.

  The alley opened into a square, crowded with Freeport Ortheans. Over their heads I glimpsed the round-arched doors of the Seamarshal’s palace. A crowd in constant movement, men and women arriving and leaving: in the far corner a bronze marhaz threw up its head and bugled loudly. I swiftly searched for faces I might know, in that confusion of dark and fair manes; Ortheans in Morvren’s slit-backed robes, and the leathers of marhaz-riders from the north; there a thin, tall woman whose green-gold skin could only belong to a fenborn; there an ashiren no more than twelve seasons old, bearing harur-blades …

  ‘Khassiye will be in the palace, if he’s here,’ Blaize observed. With that scar-crooked grin, he added, ‘When there’s fighting, our T’An Andrethe will be well out of it!’

  Loud voices rang in our ears; Ortheans calling and shouting. Morning sun shone back from pale walls. Two-and three-storey buildings surrounded this square, windowless but for slots on the top floor. As we pushed through the crowds, I searched for words; at last protested: ‘Blaize, this isn’t a game.’

  His eyes looking at me were alien. He doesn’t fear death here, how could he, remembering other deaths and other rebirths – but it is not a reality for me. Reality is the sickness, the weakness, the disablement of fear. I can call the ’thopter; I can call it now –

  ‘There’s Khassiye Reihalyn,’ I pointed to the low stepped terrace that ran along beside the Seamarshal’s palace. The tall fair-maned male stood with three or four other men and women; his gold-studded fingers flashed as he gestured, giving orders. He frowned, seeing us.

  ‘T’an S’aranth, we have enough Earth devices here without your setting down ships-of-the-air on telestre land.’

  ‘Unavoidable necessity, T’An Andrethe. But do you mean there are hi-tech weapons being used here? Have the hiyek-Ortheans –’

  ‘Communicating devices,’ Khassiye Andrethe said. He squinted up in the sunlight as a shuttle glided overhead, casting its shadow down on the crowded square. ‘It must be so, S’aranth; they act together, though their jath-rai are beyond sight of each other. The attack came simultaneously upon our several different islands here.’

  Blaize put in, ‘This isn’t their whole force. What word of the rest?’

  A black-maned male in Freeport robes said, ‘Still in the islands, t’an. Doubtless they will come.’

  ‘And the attack?’

  ‘There’s fighting on Southernmost and Little Morvren and round Spire Gate. The fires on Little Morvren are beyond control.’ The black-maned Orthean turned to me. ‘Do you bring us help, s’aranthi, or only fair words?’

  ‘We won’t interfere in Morvren – on either side.’

  One of the Orthean females chuckled. She had her mane drawn up into a plume on the crown of her head, and braided down her spine; one of Peir-Dadeni’s northern riders. With some derision, she said, ‘Trust s’aranthi? T’an, you’ll interfere when it suits you.’

  A shout echoed. I looked up, and saw an Orthean male on the roof above, leaning over the low wall. He called again, pointing; and I didn’t catch the words, but his urgency made me go cold.

  ‘Caveth! Zilthar!’ Khassiye Andrethe called two of the Seamarshal’s guard to him, and gave a string of rapid orders.

  ‘Call your people,’ Blaize Meduenin said to me. The square emptied rapidly now, Ortheans filing out into the broad avenues of that island. The windvane creaked as it turned, not far away; and under the sound I heard a confused shouting. Coming nearer? The sea wind whipped sound away: impossible to tell.

  ‘Blaize –’

  ‘There’s nothing to be done,’ the scarred male said. ‘Go and speak with the hiyeks if you think there is. Go tell your T’An Mendez to fire on jath-rai. S’aranth, if you can’t do that, all you can do is leave us to fight.’

  ‘That isn’t fair!’ I recovered some control. ‘I can’t – I won’t – order Peace Force intervention. I will try and make contact with the hiyek-Ortheans on those ships, though I don’t hold out much hope –’

  ‘Sunmother!’ He swore. Then he moved down the palace steps, staring towards the avenues; and the morning sun shone brightly on that dusty silver-yellow mane where it tangled down his spine, Harur-blade harness made a soft metallic sound. Without looking back at me, he said, ‘Call your people. Leave. And when you leave, let me take that far-speaking device of yours. I need to know if the jath-rai in the islands sail.’

  I thumbed the recall key, and walked down to stand beside him.

  ‘You’re staying here? I suppose this is what I could never imagine – you as mercenary commander. And yet I’ve been in this position on other worlds, there’ve been outbreaks of fighting; low-tech weapons …’

  Straining my ears, listening for the beat of a ’thopter’s approach: all I could hear was shouting. Orthean voices; now there was no mistaking it, they were coming closer. Blaize rested his hand on my shoulder and I jumped. And then laughed, shakily; and realized how I looked all the time at the entrances to this square, the alleys and avenues; now empty, but all potential threat. Hot morning sun, and quietness, and distant sounds that must be fighting … Deep inside, I went cold.

  ‘Will you go?’ Blaize said. There was something in his tone besides exasperation. ‘Christie, you were always stubborn. There’s nothing you can do here. And you’re terrified – I know; I’ve seen enough raw young fighters.’

  ‘“Young”?’ That made me smile, for a second. A distant beat resolved itself into the throb of a low-flying ’thopter, and I thumbed the recall-key on the wristlink again, to give a location-fix. The roar of the engines drowned all other sound, and suddenly the sun gleamed on its plastiglas body as the ’thopter seemed to rise up over the roof of the Seamarshal’s palace.

  ‘They don’t need you here –’ I had to shout to make myself heard over the noise. He held out one six-fingered hand, gesturing at my wristlink. I unfastened it. He took it, and I thought, There’s so much I want to say. How can I persuade you out of this –?

  The ’thopter grounded in a storm of dust and gravel. At the end of one avenue, a hundred yards away, there was confused movement: the momentary brightness of metal. Blaize Meduenin strapped on the wristlink and drew harur-nazari, almost in one smooth movement; as if it were cho
reographed, we ran; he for the shelter of the wall, me for the open port of the ’thopter. I ducked down, running under the rotors; hit arm and knee as I scrambled up into the cabin, realized I can’t leave and shouted to the pilot to put down. He either didn’t hear or chose to ignore me. The ’thopter lurched up a dozen feet into the air and I grabbed the strut by the open port, stomach convulsing. There were ten people in the alley now, more pouring in, bright-maned Ortheans in dusty robes; all of them running together, mouths moving but I could hear nothing over the beat of the rotors.

  Hanging there, on a level with the roofs, I looked dizzily down at Blaize Meduenin. The fair-maned male stood in the shadow of the wall. For a heartbeat I thought, They’ll all pass him; and all did, except for one male who hesitated after the others had gone, running in a strung-out line towards the quay. My throat rasped sore; I hadn’t realized I was shouting. The hiyek male stopped, shading his eyes with his hand as he looked up, attention taken by the ’thopter twenty feet above him; his gaze locked with mine. Thin-faced, middle-aged. His mouth moved as if he shouted, and he gestured with the hook-bladed knife he carried in his right hand. A flick of movement caught my eye and then Blaize Meduenin ran between us, one arm outstretched, hardly seeming to brush the hiyek male across the midriff; metal gleamed, the male folded over and fell to his knees, and slid down on the earth. The ’thopter lurched again and then rose like an elevator. Fifty feet straight up, swinging round in a curve; I vomited and then spat bile through the open port.

  When I scrambled forward and fell into the seat beside the pilot, and got him to swing the craft round and double back over the island, there was no way to spot one fairmaned Orthean male amongst the running crowds. I reached out to key the wristlink contact and then hesitated: Don’t distract him –

  ‘… shuttle?’ the pilot mouthed, sparing me a brief glance. ‘Observation and …’

  ‘Take us down as low as you can!’ I had to shout to make myself heard.

  The ’thopter dipped and suddenly shot off towards the harbour, skimming the surface, then rising to fifty or so feet above the waves; and the smell of dekany-weed mixed with evaporating fuel. An island to either side of us: it disorientated me – had our landing been there, or there, or over there? Looking down on water that is jade green, blinded by the morning sun as the ’thopter swings round again; and I managed to key in an open channel and grabbed for the headphones, hoping to hear the rest of Cory’s ships:

  ‘– no, repeat negative, no usage of anything above level five technology –’

  ‘– movement of local ships on the river on the increase. Request permission to extend my flight further up-country; we don’t want any nasty surprises from that direction –’

  ‘– estimated local casualties –’

  ‘– make contact with the Company representative, and ascertain present location –’

  The pilot glanced at me and I nodded, and he began to transmit co-ordinates.

  ‘Cory?’ I yelled into the pick-up. ‘What’s the fuel situation; how long can you keep an observation-pattern going?’

  ‘– position you over the southernmost of these islands,’ Cory’s voice rasped. All transmissions had that intermittent failure that must be due to what lay several hundred miles north: the Glittering Plain.

  Now the ’thopter circled a small island, and I looked down on tiny telestre-houses, roof-gardens thick with scurrying figures; down on alleys in which the shadows were shortening – it must be late morning, close on midday – and on a dock and a harbour arm. The masts of jath were foreshortened from this height. One ship shimmered, quivering in the warm air; small figures ran from invisible flames, plunging over the side into cerulean water. My hands were flat against the plastiglas: a wall between me and the world, not real, I thought; then the rotors feathered the sea into flattened ripples, spreading out from us; one bright-maned head dipped under the water, and never reappeared. The ’thopter swooped up again, high over the island.

  ‘– attempt to force a cease-fire –’

  ‘What attempt?’ I shouted. The comlink crackled, and I swore in frustration; and then Corazon Mendez came through with total clarity.

  ‘– I’ve made attempts at contacting the attacking ships with broadcasts from a low-level flight, Lynne. No, repeat negative, no response. I want your authorization to fire a warning shot. Simply a threat; no loss of life involved. I’ll use mid-tech explosive projectiles. These natives can understand that. The threat of force –’

  Interference washed out her voice. The ’thopter hung high over Southernmost, and the sun half-blinded me as we turned. Sea and earth and daystarred sky; and the long level line of the horizon …

  Cory’s transmission faded back in:

  ‘– the threat alone will have the required effect: but I want it entered on Company records, Lynne, that I have your authorization for this.’

  31

  The Viper and Her Brood

  I didn’t answer. As the ’thopter steadied, I touched the pilot’s shoulder and pointed north. We swung away from the Rasrhe-y-Meluur, that great pillar of chiruzeth whose shadow fell on the waves below us. The port was still retracted: cool air blustered in, bringing a smell of ocean, making me shiver – but that was with more than cold. At two thousand feet now, the depths of the estuary made a pattern of deep green and shallow jade below us.

  Voices intersected on the comlink-circuit. I ignored them. The thrum of the rotors drowned thought; I felt in suspension at some God-like point of overview – we passed over a jath-rai, its white trail fading; decks lined with hiyek-Ortheans.

  ‘Cory, I’m considering what you say.’ I took a breath, hoping to rid myself of a sick dizziness that was nothing to do with flight. The docks of Southernmost flashed past beneath. Now the flames had a hold: black smoke rolled up from jath and dockside companion-houses.

  ‘Yes, I’ll give you your authorization,’ I said. ‘Listen to me – Commander. I’m not trying to teach you your business. I have a contact on Northfast, repeat, a contact on Northfast; that’s the city-island nearest the mainland. Co-ordinate it so that he can attempt to pull some of his people back. That might just do it. We might just have our cease-fire.’

  ‘Affirmative. Lynne, put your comlink on-circuit; I’ll have my officers co-ordinate the strike –’

  I automatically followed her order. When I glanced up from the comlink console, seconds later, the ’thopter was again in the channel between Little Morvren and Northfast. Billows of black smoke swirled in from the west, and the pilot pulled us up another five or six hundred feet. Looking down on the smoke was like looking down on a coral reef or tree tops: the same shape, but this lived and moved. A spark burned below. How great a conflagration?

  ‘… have to take us out of their air-space,’ the pilot called.

  I leaned half out of the port as we flew north. Telestre-houses, windvanes, wide avenues … People lay in the avenues; six, ten, a dozen; arms outflung, or legs twisted. Nothing to be seen but their stillness; they look as if they might at any moment get up and run. Suddenly my heart lurched: that is the Residence, that is the house of Cassirur Almadhera, that, burning fierce as phosphorus, is the Sea-marshal’s palace – square, flat-roofed buildings; the dry kazsis-vine sprouting into flame. Now there were people running, some in small groups, some alone, no crowds; running in the immemorial jerky patterns of street-fighting. It’s wrong to look at this, I thought, wrong to be a spectator; and then my stomach and lungs clenched with fear: I might still be down there, no spectator at all.

  The ’thopter, running low, no more than a thousand feet, passed over the docks. A shadow flicked us: the bulk of an F90 hung in hover-mode over the harbour arm. Part of its shadow fell on hiyek ships there, part on Ortheans running across the quay. I had to lean out of the port and look up to see the sun on that white whale-backed craft; it dazzled me. Then we were past.

  ‘Strike co-ordinate at twelve hundred – ’

  ‘– contact made with land
forces – ’

  ‘– strike at 057.253.746; repeat, 057.253.746 –’

  Suddenly we were no longer over the sea, but skimming the mainland; the flat and dusty banks of the Ai River. Ferry-shacks were scattered along it; dense crowds gathered round them. Marhaz-riders raised dust-trails. Small boats bobbed like wood-chips in the mouth of the estuary, their yellow and white sails bright against the muddy water.

  A grinding, bass explosion ripped the air. I felt it rather than heard it; felt it in the chest and stomach and bones; couldn’t help glancing up at the clear sky – such a phenomenon must be thunder, too fearful to be manmade – and then turned in my seat to stare back. A dust-cloud ballooned up over Northfast, blocking out light and turning the sun sepia. A curious line seemed to be running from the island across the sea towards the mainland – simultaneous to realization, the ’thopter swung into the Shockwave and was for long seconds buffeted and pushed sideways. My hands clenched on the siderail, knuckles white. Somewhere below a tidal wave must be hitting the estuary. I clung, eyes shut.

  ‘– made successfully at twelve-oh-two – ’

  ‘– no damage sustained by shuttle –’

  ‘– I’m getting visual damage-estimate; wait –’

  Carrick’s Star blinded me. I rubbed at my watering eyes, tried to focus. A thousand feet below, a river-boat lay on its side in the water. Tiny figures splashed, swimming; no larger than insects. No sooner seen than passed.

  ‘Jesus!’ the pilot whistled softly, in admiration. ‘Made a mess of them didn’t we – sorry, Representative Christie.’

  After the fear, the exultation: I tried to repress both. No point now in thinking, Was that the right decision, should I have waited, what else could I have done? And wrong to feel that joy that comes with the use of power, any power, for any reason. I leaned forward as we skimmed the side of that rising mass of dust and grit and rubble turning lazily end over end in the air, only now just beginning to fall …