by Dan Simmons
Kassad returned with his powered binoculars and handed them around.
“Ousters?” asked Lamia. “Is it the invasion?”
“Ousters, almost certainly,” said Kassad. “But almost as certainly just a scouting raid. See the clusters? Those are Hegemony missiles being exploded by the Ouster ramscouts’ countermeasures.”
The binoculars came to the Consul. The flashes were quite clear now, an expanding cumulus of flame. He could see the speck and long blue tail of at least two scoutships fleeing from the Hegemony pursuers.
“I don’t think …” began Kassad and then stopped as the ship and sails and Sea of Crass glowed, bright orange in reflected glare.
“Dear Christ,” whispered Father Hoyt. “They’ve hit the treeship.”
The Consul swept the glasses left. The growing nimbus of flames could be seen with the naked eye but in the binoculars the kilometer-long trunk and branch array of the Yggdrasill was visible for an instant as it burned and flared, long tendrils of flame arcing away into space as the containment fields failed and the oxygen burned. The orange cloud pulsed, laded, and fell back on itself as the trunk became visible for a final second even as it glowed and broke up like the last long ember in a dying fire. Nothing could have survived. The treeship Yggdrasill with its crew and complement of clones and semisentient erg drivers was dead.
The Consul turned toward Het Masteen and belatedly held out the binoculars. “I’m so … sorry,” he whispered.
The tall Templar did not take the glasses. Slowly he lowered his gaze from the skies, pulled forward his cowl, and went below without a word.
The death of the treeship was the final explosion. When ten minutes had passed and no more flares had disturbed the night, Brawne Lamia spoke. “Do you think they got them?”
“The Ousters?” said Kassad. “Probably not. The scoutships are built for speed and defense. They’re light-minutes away by now.”
“Did they go after the treeship on purpose?” asked Silenus. The poet sounded very sober.
“I think not,” said Kassad. “Merely a target of opportunity.”
“Target of opportunity,” echoed Sol Weintraub. The scholar shook his head. “I’m going to get a few hours’ sleep before sunrise.”
One by one the others went below. When only Kassad and the Consul were left on deck, the Consul said, “Where should I stand watch?”
“Make a circuit,” said the Colonel. “From the main corridor at the base of the ladder you can see all of the stateroom doors and the entrance to the mess and galley. Come above and check the gangway and decks. Keep the lanterns lit. Do you have a weapon?”
The Consul shook his head.
Kassad handed over his deathwand. “It’s on tight beam—about half a meter at ten meters’ range. Don’t use it unless you’re sure that there’s an intruder. The rough plate that slides forward is the safety. It’s on.”
The Consul nodded, making sure that his finger stayed away from the firing stud.
“I’ll relieve you in two hours,” said Kassad. He checked his comlog. “It’ll be sunrise before my watch is over.” Kassad looked at the sky as if expecting the Yggdrasill to reappear and continue its firefly path across the sky. Only the stars glowed back. On the northeastern horizon a moving mass of black promised a storm.
Kassad shook his head. “A waste,” he said and went below.
The Consul stood there awhile and listened to the wind in the canvas, the creek of rigging, and the rumble of the wheel. After a while he went to the railing and stared at darkness while he thought.
5
Sunrise over the Sea of Grass was a thing of beauty. The Consul watched from the highest point on the aft deck. After his watch he had tried to sleep, given it up, and come up onto deck to watch the night fade into day. The stormfront had covered the sky with low clouds and the rising sun lit the world with brilliant gold reflected from above and below. The windwagon’s sails and lines and weathered planks glowed in the brief benediction of light in the few minutes before the sun was blocked by the ceiling of clouds and color flowed out of the world once again. The wind which followed this curtain closing was chill, as if it had blown down from the snowy peaks of the Bridle Range fust visible as a dark blur on the northeastern horizon.
Brawne Lamia and Martin Silcnus joined the Consul on the aft deck, each nursing a cup of coffee from the galley. The wind whipped and tugged at the rigging. Brawne Lamia’s thick mass of curls fluttered around her face like a dark nimbus.
“Morning,” muttered Silenus, squinting out over his coffee cup at the wind-rippled Sea of Grass.
“Good morning,” replied the Consul, amazed at how alert and refreshed he felt for not having slept at all the night before. “We have a headwind, but the wagon still seems to be making decent time. Well definitely be to the mountains before nightfall.”
“Hrrgnn,” commented Silenus and buried his nose in the coffee cup.
“I didn’t sleep at all last night,” said Brawne Lamia, “just for thinking about M. Weintraub’s story.”
“I don’t think …” began the poet and then broke off as Weintraub came onto deck, his baby peering over the lip of an infant carrier sling on his chest.
“Good morning, everyone,” said Weintraub, looking around and taking a deep breath. “Mmm, brisk, isn’t it?”
“Fucking freezing,” said Silenus. “North of the mountains it’ll be even worse.”
“I think I’ll go down to get a jacket,” said Lamia, but before she could move there came a single shrill cry from the deck below.
“Blood!”
There was, indeed, blood everywhere. Het Masteen’s cabin was strangely neat—bed unslept in, travel trunk and other boxes stacked precisely in one corner, robe folded over a chair—except for the blood which covered great sections of the deck, bulkhead, and overhead. The six pilgrims crowded just inside the entrance, reluctant to go farther in.
“I was passing on my way to the upper deck,” said Father Hoyt, his voice a strange monotone. “The door was slightly ajar. I caught a glimpse of … the blood on the wall.”
“Is it blood?” demanded Martin Silenus.
Brawne Lamia stepped into the room, ran a hand through a thick smear on the bulkhead, and raised her fingers to her lips. “It’s blood.” She looked around, walked to the wardrobe, looked briefly among the empty shelves and hangers, and then went to the small porthole. It was latched and bolted from the inside.
Lenar Hoyt looked more ill than usual and staggered to a chair. “Is he dead then?”
“We don’t know a damn tiling except that Captain Masteen isn’t in his room and a lot of blood is,” said Lamia. She wiped her hand on her pant leg. “The thing to do now is search the ship thoroughly.”
“Precisely,” said Colonel Kassad, “and if we do not find the Captain?”
Brawne Lamia opened the porthole. Fresh air dissipated the slaughterhouse smell of blood and brought in the rumble of the wheel and the rustle of grass under the hull. “If we don’t find Captain Masteen,” she said, “then we assume that he either left the ship under his own will or was taken off.”
“But the blood …” began Father Hoyt.
“Doesn’t prove anything,” finished Kassad. “M. Lamia’s correct. We don’t know Masteen’s blood type or genotype. Did anyone see or hear anything?”
There was silence except for negative grunts and the shaking of heads.
Martin Silenus looked around. “Don’t you people recognize the work of our friend the Shrike when you see it?”
“We don’t know that,” snapped Lamia. “Maybe someone wanted us to think that it was the Shrike’s doing.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” said Hoyt, still gasping for air.
“Nonetheless,” said Lamia, “we’ll search in twos. Who has weapons besides myself?”
“I do,” said Colonel Kassad. “I have extras if needed.”
“No,” said Hoyt.
The poet shook his head.
“No,” said the Consul. He had returned the deathwand to Kassad when his shift ended two hours before first light.
“All right,” said Lamia, “the priest will come with me on the lower deck. Silenus, go with the Colonel. Search the mid-deck. M. Weintraub, you and the Consul check everything above. Look for anything out of the ordinary. Any sign of struggle.”
“One question,” said Silenus.
“What?”
“Who the hell elected you queen of the prom?”
“I’m a private investigator,” said Lamia, leveling her gaze on the poet.
Martin Silenus shrugged. “Hoyt here is a priest of some forgotten religion. That doesn’t mean we have to genuflect when he says Mass.”
“All right,” sighed Brawne Lamia. “I’ll give you a better reason.” The woman moved so fast that the Consul almost missed the action in a blink. One second she was standing by the open port and in the next she was halfway across the stateroom, lifting Martin Silenus off the deck with one arm, her massive hand around the poet’s thin neck. “How about,” she said, “that you do the logical thing because it’s the logical thing to do?”
“Gkkrgghh,” managed Martin Silenus.
“Good,” said Lamia without emotion and dropped the poet to the deck. Silenus staggered a meter and almost sat on Father Hoyt.
“Here,” said Kassad, returning with two small neural stunners. He handed one to Sol Weintraub. “What do you have?” Kassad asked Lamia.
The woman reached into a pocket of her loose tunic and produced an ancient pistol.
Kassad looked at the relic for a moment and then nodded. “Stay with your partner,” he said. “Don’t shoot at anything unless it’s positively identified and unquestionably threatening.”
“That describes the bitch I plan to shoot,” said Silenus, still massaging his throat.
Brawne Lamia took a half step toward the poet. Fedmahn Kassad said, “Shut up. Let’s get this over with.” Silenus followed the Colonel out of the stateroom.
Sol Weintraub approached the Consul, handed him the stunner. “I don’t want to hold this thing with Rachel. Shall we go up?”
The Consul took the weapon and nodded.
The windwagon held no further sign of Templar Voice of the Tree Het Masteen. After an hour of searching, the group met in the stateroom of the missing man. The blood there seemed darker and drier.
“Is there a chance that we missed something?” said Father Hoyt. “Secret passages? Hidden compartments?”
“There’s a chance,” said Kassad, “but I swept the ship with heat and motion sensors. If there’s anything else on board larger than a mouse, I can’t find it.”
“If you had these sensors,” said Silenus, “why the fuck did you have us crawling through bilge and byways for an hour?”
“Because the right equipment or apparel can hide a man from a heat-’n’-beat search.”
“So, in answer to my question,” said Hoyt, pausing a second as a visible wave of pain passed through him, “with the right equipment or apparel, Captain Masteen might be hiding in a secret compartment somewhere.”
“Possible but improbable,” said Brawne Lamia. “My guess is that he’s no longer aboard.”
“The Shrike,” said Martin Silenus in a disgusted tone. It was not a question.
“Perhaps,” said Lamia. “Colonel, you and the Consul were on watch through those four hours. Are you sure that you heard and saw nothing?”
Both men nodded.
“The ship was quiet,” said Kassad. “I would have heard a struggle even before I went on watch.”
“And I didn’t sleep after my watch,” said the Consul. “My room shared a bulkhead with Masteen’s. I heard nothing.”
“Well,” said Silenus, “we’ve heard from the two men who were creeping around in the dark with weapons when the poor shit was killed. They say they’re innocent. Next case!”
“If Masteen was killed,” said Kassad, “it was with no deathwand. No silent modern weapon I know throws that much blood around. There were no gunshots heard—no bullet holes found—so I presume M. Lamia’s automatic pistol is not suspect. If this is Captain Masteen’s blood, then I would guess an edged weapon was used.”
“The Shrike is an edged weapon,” said Martin Silenus.
Lamia moved to the small stack of luggage. “Debating isn’t going to solve anything, Let’s see if there’s anything in Masteen’s belongings.”
Father Hoyt raised a hesitant hand. “That’s … well, private, isn’t it? I don’t think we have the right.”
Brawne Lamia crossed her arms. “Look, Father, if Maste en’s dead, it doesn’t matter to him. If he’s still alive, looking through this stuff might give us some idea where he was taken. Either way, we have to try to find a clue.”
Hoyt looked dubious but nodded. In the end, there was little invasion of privacy. Masteen’s first trunk held only a few changes of linen and a copy of Muir’s Book of Life. The second bag held a hundred separately wrapped seedlings, flash-dried and nestled in moist soil.
“Templars must plant at least a hundred offspring of the Eternal Tree on whatever world they visit,” explained the Consul. “The shoots rarely take, but it’s a ritual.”
Brawne Lamia moved toward the large metal box which had sat at the bottom of the pile.
“Don’t touch that!” snapped the Consul.
“Why not?”
“It’s a Mobius cube,” responded Colonel Kassad for the Consul. “A carbon-carbon-shell set around a zero impedance containment field folded back on itself.”
“So?” said Lamia. “Mobius cubes seal artifacts and stuff in. They don’t explode or anything.”
“No,” agreed the Consul, “but what they contain may explode. May already have exploded, for that matter.”
“A cube that size could hold a kiloton nuclear explosion in check as long as it was boxed during the nanosecond of ignition,” added Fedmahn Kassad.
Lamia scowled at the trunk. “Then how do we know that something in there didn’t kill Masteen?”
Kassad pointed to a faintly glowing green strip along the trunk’s only seam. “It’s sealed. Once unsealed, a Möbius cube has to be reactivated at a place where containment fields can be generated. Whatever’s in there didn’t harm Captain Masteen.”
“So there’s no way to tell?” mused Lamia.
“I have a good guess,” said the Consul.
The others looked at him. Rachel began to cry and Sol pulled a heating strip on a nursing pak.
“Remember,” said the Consul, “at Edge yesterday when M. Masteen made a big deal out of the cube? He talked about it as if it were a secret weapon?”
“A weapon?” said Lamia.
“Of course!” Kassad said suddenly. “An erg!”
“Erg?” Martin Silenus stared at the small crate. “I thought ergs were those forcefield critters that Templars use on their treeships.”
“They are,” said the Consul. “The things were found about three centuries ago living on asteroids around Aldebaran. Bodies about as big as a cat’s spine, mostly a piezoelectric nervous system sheathed in silicon gristle, but they feed on … and manipulate … force-fields as large as those generated by small spinships.”
“So how do you get all that into such a little box?” asked Silenus, staring at the Möbius cube. “Mirrors?”
“In a sense,” said Kassad. “The things field would be damped … neither starving nor feeding. Rather like cryogenic fugue for us. Plus this must be a small one. A cub, so to speak.”
Lamia ran her hand along the metal sheath. “Templars control these things? Communicate with them?”
“Yes,” said Kassad. “No one is quite sure how. It’s one of the Brotherhood secrets. But Het Masteen must have been confident that the erg would help him with …”
“The Shrike,” finished Martin Silenus.
“The Templar thought that this energy imp would be his secret weapon when he faced the Lord of Pain.” The poet laughed.
Father Hoyt cleared his throat. “The Church has accepted the Hegemony’s ruling that … these creatures … ergs … are not sentient beings … and thus not candidates for salvation.”
“Oh, they’re sentient, all right, Father,” said the Consul. “They perceive things far better than we could ever imagine. But if you mean intelligent … self-aware … then you’re dealing with something along the lines of a smart grasshopper. Are grasshoppers candidates for salvation?”
Hoyt said nothing. Brawne Lamia said, “Well, evidently Captain Masteen thought this thing was going to be his salvation. Something went wrong.” She looked around at the bloodstained bulkheads and at the drying stains on the deck. “Let’s get out of here.”
The windwagon tacked into increasingly strong winds as the storm approached from the northeast. Ragged banners of clouds raced white beneath the low, gray ceiling of stormfront. Grasses whipped and bent under gusts of cold wind. Ripples of lightning illuminated the horizon and were followed by rolls of thunder sounding like warning shots across the windwagon’s bow. The pilgrims watched in silence until the first icy raindrops drove them below to the large stateroom in the stern.
“This was in his robe pocket,” said Brawne Lamia, holding up a slip of paper with the number 5 on it.
“So Masteen would have told his story next,” muttered the Consul.
Martin Silenus tilted his chair until his back touched the tall windows. Storm light made his satyr’s features appear slightly demonic. “There’s another possibility,” he said. “Perhaps someone who hasn’t spoken yet had the fifth spot and killed the Templar to trade places.”
Lamia stared at the poet. “That would have to be the Consul or me,” she said, her voice flat.
Silenus shrugged.
Brawne Lamia pulled another piece of paper from her tunic. “I have number 6. What would I have achieved? I go next anyway.”
“Then perhaps it’s what Masteen would have said that needed to be silenced,” said the poet. He shrugged again. “Personally, I think the Shrike has begun harvesting us. Why did we think we’d be allowed to get to the Tombs when the thing’s been slaughtering people halfway from here to Keats?”
