Ancient Light

by Mary Gentle

  ‘They’ve been moving for twenty minutes now, and we’re getting readings consistent with weapons power-up. Whatever they’ve got on those tubs, Lynne, they’re ready to use it; and goddammit, you ought to be here, there has to be a decision taken about what action we’ll take!’

  ‘What course – never mind: I’ve got it.’

  Some moments are frozen, out of time, quite separate from life. Now in this lamp-lit room, among heaped parchments and print-outs, night pressing against the windows; now is one of those moments. Blaize with one warm hand resting on my shoulder as he leans over the holotank, its light harsh on his intent, scarred face. And the child-messenger, ten or eleven years old, with great dark eyes in a triangular face; padding across the ziku-wood floor to peer into the holotank, claw-nailed hands gripping the edge, scarlet mane rooting down its spine …

  In the holotank, bright images: the firefly-specks that are heat-sensor readings of jath ships sailing out from the shelter of the Sisters Islands. Blue lines that are projected course estimates, and more than two hundred and thirty vessels are moving, and the course estimates are east: all of them east, towards the sunrise and Melkathi.

  ‘“Power-up”?’

  ‘There,’ I said. ‘Satellites wouldn’t pick up CAS weaponry, but those are beampulsers; see, there … Christ Jesus, what are they doing? Cory’s panicking – no, no she’s not –’I keyed repeat on the comlink. ‘Where the hell is Doug, why doesn’t he answer?’

  Blaize’s calloused hand tightened, released. ‘How long will it be until your craft comes from Kumiel?’

  ‘A ’thopter? Ten minutes or so – no, wait. Cory,’ I turned back to the comlink, ‘I’ll want the ‘thopter for local transport here. I’ll keep in real-time contact with you, but we need to know what the response here will be. As soon as the ‘thopter gets here, I’m going up to the Citadel. We can’t take a decision until we see what’s happening.’

  ‘Acknowledge.’

  The contact snapped to relay, and I keyed it into my wristlink.

  ‘Christie.’

  The ziku-wood floor was hard under my bare feet. I blinked, still sick with the suddenness of that waking; and reached out to Blaize. The child gazed at us with silent curiosity, s’aranthi and Orthean not often seen together. After a few seconds Blaize broke away, and said, ‘Go to the Citadel. I’ll go up to Westhill-fort; I must see the Crown Guard.’

  ‘Come to the Citadel first.’

  He hesitated, and then nodded; and went through into the further room, and came back with two cloaks, and with my boots, and with the CAS-IV stungun in its holster. I belted it on with fingers that shook.

  ‘T’an,’ said the child, puzzled (and I realized we had been speaking Sino-Anglic, both of us), ‘what’s happening? What shall we do?’

  Blaize said, ‘Wake the house, and warn them that a ship-of-the-air will come, and that they should wake other telestre-houses here; it may be nothing, but it is better to be ready.’

  The child’s running footsteps faded, clattering down the inner stairs. I looked at Blaize, that scarred face that was now blank with calculation. As at Northfast, I thought, You’ve gone where I can’t go – where I hope never to be.

  ‘Mother of the Wells,’ he said; and then the membrane slid back from those pale blue, whiteless eyes. They’re fools if they do this.’

  A muffled roar grew in volume, rattling the windows in their sockets. The door’s bead-curtain lashed inward. The room was filled with the intermittent flash of the ‘thopter’s landing-lights; descending down into the inner courtyard. The noise was too loud to shout over. I gestured, and with Blaize behind me, ran down into the courtyard and scrambled up into the hovering ‘thopter, half-blind with dust raised by its blades.

  As he fell into the seat, pressed against me by upward acceleration, I put my mouth close to his ear. ‘If they do what? Fools if they do what?’

  Blaize Meduenin said, ‘If they attack Tathcaer.’

  So much confusion on Citadel crag: I didn’t think even the landing of an ornithopter could get the guards’ attention. Cory’s pilot put the machine down near the top of Crown Steps, on a mossgrass lawn between night-curled lapuur. While Blaize scrambled out, I keyed an automatic acknowledgement back to Kumiel, and then followed him: staring up at the multi-towered Citadel, hearing shouts, seeing messengers rushing to and fro between buildings; and then – as we came to one of the main entrances – a voice hailed me in Anglic:

  ‘Lynne! Have you contacted your people? I can’t get through to the Residence.’

  ‘There’s no one there now. Yes; Douggie, we’ve got to talk.’

  I saw a frown on Doug’s face, that lasted for only a second. Blaize, I realized. Then Doug glanced past both of us at the ’thopter, idling now; raised eyebrows, and said, ‘The T’An Suthai-Telestre has messengers going out for you, and for the T’An Commander. We’d better find him.’

  It’s those ships out there we have to contact, I thought. The Desert Coast families …

  How?

  As if he read my mind, Douggie stopped under the archway-entrance to the Citadel. ‘I believe some kind of observation may be in order. Lynne, if I could borrow your ’thopter for half an hour: I want to get to my shuttle on Kumiel.’

  ‘You’re not thinking of overflying those ships –’

  ‘One might make a voicecast contact.’

  Two Orthean males in Crown Guard uniform pushed between us, and Blaize called them back; stepping to one side to speak with them urgently and concisely. Doug’s gaze followed him. That prim mouth quirked a little, and he looked at me, but said nothing. Two s’aranthi among so many Ortheans … Doug checked his own wristlink again, and his face cleared.

  ‘Kumiel are answering. Lynne, I’ll tell the pilot to come back here, as soon as he’s flown me to the island.’

  ‘If you overfly, stay out of range. The hiyek ships fired on us before.’ I shivered. The wind began to blow cold, and though the east was still dark that meant first twilight wasn’t far away. Starlight was dimming. Voices of messengers and guards rang in the Citadel’s cold stone walls.

  ‘I imagine I’ll be back here within two hours or so,’ Doug said. ‘Convey my apologies to the T’An Suthai-Telestre.’

  He turned and walked hurriedly away from the arch, across the dew-soaked mossgrass, and I saw him duck under the ‘thopter’s idling blades and speak with the pilot, and then climb up into the cabin. A siren-blast split the night air. Two or three Ortheans close by moved rapidly back, and the ‘thopter lifted, curving away off Citadel crag and out over the city.

  Blaize appeared beside me. ‘I’ll be with you as soon as I’ve put this troop in order. Tell T’An Santhil I’m setting up heliograph-links between here and the forts on Easthill and Westhill. Riders aren’t fast enough. Send word if you need me, arykei-te.’

  I touched the comlink fastened to his broad wrist. ‘Send word if you hear anything before I do.’

  Hardly minutes that we stood there: still, a dull grey light was growing round us. First twilight passing into dawn. We parted, and I went into the Citadel’s low-roofed interlocking rooms. The press of the crowd was even greater here. I caught sight of a male in Wellhouse robes, and began to push through towards him. Then, bright against the pale plaster walls, there was the scarlet mane of Cassirur Almadhera; and I forced my way through to the Earthspeaker’s side.

  ‘Where are the takshiriye? Who’s here?’

  She held a thin strip of paper in those brown, six-fingered hands. A rashaku message? When she looked up from reading it, her face was grave. ‘Give you greeting, Christie. The T’An Suthai-Telestre is in the north tower. I’ll accompany you there. I fear …’

  Cassirur said no more, but drew her slit-backed green robe closely about her, and pushed hurriedly between a group of s’ans in Roehmonde dress. I followed. She went unerringly to lesser-used rooms, and then out into a courtyard surrounded on all five sides by high walls, and crossed to a flight of outside steps. I fel
t the cold wind. The arch of the sky was grey, paling to white; the highest pinnacles of this Citadel just touched with a yellow light.

  I lifted my wrist, about to key in a contact to the Kumiel Island base. Before I could do that, the wristlink suddenly emitted a high-pitched squeal.

  ‘S’aranth, what –?’ Cassirur stopped with her foot on the bottom step.

  ‘I don’t know. I – Jesus Christl!’ I ripped the wristlink off, dropping it on the stone; and the sound rose to a pitch and then shattered: the casing split with a sharp crack. That gunshot-sound echoed back from high walls. Cassirur Almadhera frowned. I knew then what it was: for a minute the implications silenced me. Then: ‘Warn the people here. Cassirur, let’s move; that means –’

  She said,’ I don’t understand. You can’t speak with your people?’

  Blaize I thought. And then: What’s happening to Doug, now? And Kumiel – Christ, what are they doing on Kumiel; what will Cory do!

  Cassirur’s urgent questions went by me unheeded, I could only stand there, in that deserted courtyard, watching the light of the unseen rising sun gild the high walls; watching and waiting, and – there. A sound in the distance, a hollow noise. So very small, for what it is. Another followed, and another; and the red-maned Orthean female turned her head, listening.

  I bent down and picked up the useless wristlink and put it in my belt-pouch.

  ‘Pulseblocker,’ I said, not caring that she wouldn’t understand. ‘Oh, damn Pramila Ishida. Her and Sethri and all the others … They’ve got a transmission-blocker on one of those ships. A CAS-II. That’s done us, that’s finished us …’ I looked at Cassirur. That’s all communications out. Ship-to-ship. Ship-to-base. Base-to-orbiter. We’re isolated. I can’t talk with Cory’s people – hell, they can’t talk with the shuttles that are already on surveillance – Christ, what a mess!’

  That hollow noise came again. Small and soft: only frightening because of how distant it must be, and so how devastating at its source …

  Cassirur Almadhera pushed the red mane back from her face, intently listening. Then she turned back to the steps. ‘Come. I’ll hear by rashaku. By heliograph, when it’s light. We’re not in ignorance, S’aranth. Come.’

  The attack’s begun, but where? What’s happening? Is it a few ships, is it all of them, is it only here, is it – what’s happening? We should have guessed they’d have trans-mission-blockers; if I didn’t, Cory should have; what we could have done – what could we have done? What can we do now?

  Across the six-mile distance between the Citadel and the harbour comes, faintly, the sounds of beampulser and projectile fire.

  A white fog clung to the land. It shrouded the river on the city’s eastern side, blurring the line of the Ymirian hills, far to the sunrise. And it hung in the alleyways, between the telestre-houses, so that I could see only a glimpse of flat roofs below. That and the gilded dome of the Wellhouse, and running figures in the Square … Almost dawn: river fog turning from grey to white to gold.

  ‘“… attack on harbour”.’ Nelum Santhil Rimnith turned away as the heliograph-spark ceased to flash. ‘Christie? Give you greeting; I’ve no time for s’aranthi now, unless you’ve news?’

  The lookout post was no more than a flat stretch of the Citadel crag’s rock. A low wall had been built on the edge, so that no one could fall down the cliff that went sheer, vine-covered, down to the Square. A handful of Ortheans stood on this pale rock, gazing south over the city towards Easthill, on which the heliograph lately ceased; tall and braided-maned and richly robed – the T’Ans of the Hundred Thousand.

  ‘Only that our communications are cut,’ I said.

  He nodded once, and his eyes veiled. Without another word, he gestured a young male to him; and as I watched them speaking I thought, Yes, you know what it means.

  I put both hands on the low wall to steady myself. The pale stone felt cold. Across the fog-shrouded city, the two hills were faint grey lines on the horizon. A brief flash of light there drew my gaze. Two more followed: the crack echoed up to us minutes later. I squinted, the sun in my eyes – and realized, that warmth on my cheek, that the sun was rising above the fog: Carrick’s Star burning silver, acid-white. And saw also that pale specks caught the light high above. Peace Force shuttles. Not in cruise-patterns, but criss-crossing the area at random. What will they do when they see –

  See the attack?

  Something wrong with the silhouette of Easthill, Easthill where I once had my envoy’s Residence – and then I made out that the line of the hilltop was jagged, not smooth. The whine of CAS-weapon leakage reached my ears, and I thought, At this distance? and I should do something and What?

  ‘S’aranth, you shouldn’t be here,’ a worried voice said; and Haltern n’ri n’suth Beth’ru-elen came to stand at the wall beside me, leaning heavily on his hanelys cane. ‘You can be of no use; go.’

  ‘Hal –’

  ‘Why are they doing this?’ He gripped my arm, little strength in that thin six-fingered hand. ‘Christie, I never thought I should see this!’ He raised his head. ‘What will your people do now?’

  One of the s’ans a few yards further along the cliff cried out. As he pointed down into the city, a Wellhouse male came up with a rashaku message; and I leaned out from the wall and stared into the distance – and there: firing to the west side of the city, flashes of light, and now a plume of dust going up into the morning sunlight.

  Haltern said, ‘Ferries. Ferries and bridges. They will send their jath-rai upriver to destroy the bridges!’

  An answering flare and crack! drowned out his words. Down in the fog, still blotting out the eastern-side river, red and yellow flame billowed up; a black pall rising. Sun glinted on metal sails. Jath-rai. Jath-rai and the sunrise tide, I thought stupidly, and: why are they blasting the bridges?

  The T’An Suthai-Telestre Nelum Santhil strode away, back towards the walls and arches of the Citadel, half the Ortheans going with him. I turned, would have spoken, thought: What can I say? A male in Wellhouse robes padded across the pale rock towards us.

  ‘T’an S’aranth. T’an Beth’ru-elen. Will you come? We are to get all who may leave away from the city, while that can still be done.’ His eyes veiled, as the sound came of distant explosions. ‘If you will come, come now.’

  ‘Hal …’

  He looked up at me, the morning light sharp on his lined face and wisp of white mane. Those harassed blue eyes had the clarity of a child’s. The city lay below and beyond him, mist rising as the sun burned it off, and, rising with it, the smoke-palls of explosions. The air shook. Fear cramped in my stomach, as I knew then: this is happening, this cannot be stopped, they are attacking.

  If I can get somewhere I can signal to a shuttle …

  Such a feeling of isolation gripped me that I clenched my fists, nails biting into my palms.

  ‘There are Beth’ru-elen in the city,’ Haltern protested.

  People are here that I have known and worked with for the last half-year; some that I’ve known for far longer – and I didn’t, even to myself, think: Where is she? Citadel or Wellhouse or down in the city?

  ‘We’re coming,’ I said, putting my arm round Haltern’s shoulders and urging him towards the Citadel walls. The Wellhouse male nodded and set off in front of us. ‘Didn’t you always tell me to leave a losing game?’

  ‘This isn’t ochmir, S’aranth.’

  Footsteps eat up so small a distance, compared with what we have to cross: the mossgrass lawns, black with dew; the rooms of the Citadel, the city’s alleys, the ferries or the bridge …

  ‘Hal, I’m scared, and I’m taking you out of here. What do you think will happen when CAS weapons and beampulsers attack people who have harur-blades and winchbows? For God’s sake, Hal!’ And then, seeing his face, I was ashamed of that brutality: ‘Please come. There isn’t time to argue now.’

  Explosions sounded nearer. A crack! sounded almost at my side, and I jumped, and then saw how – quarter of a mil
e away – one of the eastside bridges cleared the mist. Two stone pilings jutted out into the water: beyond that, heaps of fallen stone smoked in the air, and the river-water rose swiftly to choke the makeshift new dam. At this distance, figures no larger than ants ran with ants’ seeming purposelessness. The cold east wind made my eyes sting. I had a sudden flashback to another place and time – what world was that? – and then realized: Not my Service career, but when I was a child, thirty years ago, caught when they put down the Food Riots in the European Enclaves. The child’s fear now bitter as copper in my mouth.

  ‘Hal, come on –’

  One hand under his elbow: I hustled him into the shadow of the Citadel’s walls, and then – since I must let him rest – called the Wellhouse male back. Two Ortheans in Peir-Dadeni dress left the crowd, and Hal raised his head to speak breathlessly with them. I stared east. The edge of the crag hid the city, and the sky was silver-bright. A deep grinding roar sounded, so that I felt it rather than heard it: the very rock vibrating. A dark speck crossed the arch of the sky. A shuttle – and I’m here, I raged inwardly. How can I signal, how can I let them know?

  What is Cory Mendez doing now?

  I turned to the Wellhouse male. ‘Are there rashaku on Kumiel Island? Or a heliograph? Is there any way to get a message there?’

  He shrugged, alien musculature moving lightly under the brown robe. I wanted to hit him. His fair mane was shaven down to fur, and his eyes were veiled with membrane; and he had the calmness of an Earthspeaker. I thought of Cassirur’s many will go to the Goddess and I wanted to cry.

  ‘Is there?’

  ‘If there is, t’an, you would have to go to the forts on Easthill or Westhill, or the great Wellhouse here, and I think that impossible now. The forts –’

  ‘I’ll go to the Wellhouse.’

  The sun is not yet clear of the dawn mist, it isn’t ten minutes since the ’thopter landed me here. Ten minutes, I thought. I walked across to Haltern Beth’ru-elen, and said, I’ll join you as soon as I can. I’m going to try and get word to Mendez.’ The old male looked up. ‘What will you tell her to do?’