Tschai-Planet of Adventure (omnibus) (2012)

by Jack Vance

  The Dirdirman, conditioned to other aesthetic precepts, spoke with condescension. “Typical of the Chasch mentality: formless, chaotic, devious. You have seen a Dirdir city? Truly noble! A sight to stop the heart! This half-bucolic botchery —” Anacho made a scornful gesture “— reflects the caprice of the Blue Chasch. Not as flaccid and decadent as the Old Chasch of course — remember Golsse? — but then the Old Chasch have been moribund for twenty thousand years … What do you do? What is that instrument?”

  For Reith, unable to contrive a method to read his transcom dials discreetly, had brought it forth. “This,” said Reith, “is a device which indicates the direction and distance of the object I seek, or so I hope. I read due west, at a distance of three and a half miles.” He sighted along the needle. “The line passes through that large structure with the high dome.” He pointed. “The distance is about right.”

  Anacho was looking at the transcom with gloomy fascination. “Where did you get this instrument? It is of a workmanship I have never seen before. And those markings: neither Dirdir nor Chasch nor Wankh! Is there some far corner of Tschai where sub-men make goods of this quality? I am astounded! I have believed the sub-men incapable of any activity more complicated than agriculture!”

  “Anacho, my friend,” said Reith, “you have a great deal to learn. The process will come as an appalling shock to you.”

  Anacho massaged his undershot jaw, pulled the soft black cap down over his forehead. “You are as mysterious as a Pnume.”

  Reith brought the scanscope from his pouch, inspected the landscape. He traced the course of the road, down the hill, through a grove of flame-shaped trees with enormous green and purple leaves, thence to a wall which he had not previously noticed and which evidently guarded Dadiche from the Green Chasch. The road passed through a portal in this wall and into the city. At intervals along the road were drays entering Dadiche loaded with comestibles, leaving with crates of manufactured goods.

  Anacho, inspecting the scanscope, made a clicking sound of irritated puzzlement, but restrained his comments.

  Reith said, “No point in going further down the road; however, if we rode along the ridge a mile or two, I could take another sight on that big building.”

  Anacho made no objection; they rode south almost two miles, then Reith took a new reading of the transcom. The line of sight passed through the same large domed structure. Reith gave a nod of certainty. “In that building are articles which at one time were mine, and which I want to recover.”

  The Dirdirman’s lips twitched in a grin. “All very well — but how? You can’t ride into Dadiche, pound on the door and cry ‘Bring out my object!’ You will be disappointed. I doubt if you are a thief sufficiently deft to fool the Chasch. What will you do?”

  Reith looked longingly down at the great white dome. “First, closer reconnaissance. I need to look inside that building. Because what I want most might not be there at all.”

  Anacho shook his head in mild reproach. “You talk in riddles. First you declare that your articles are there, then that they may not be there after all.”

  Reith merely laughed, far more confidently than he felt. Now that he was close to Dadiche, and presumably to the space-boat, the task of regaining possession seemed overwhelming. “Enough for today, at any rate. Let’s be back to Pera.”

  They rode, swaying and lurching on the leap-horses, and returned to the road, where they halted for a space watching the drays rumble past. Some were propelled by engines, others by slow-going pull-beasts. Those to Dadiche carried foodstuffs: melons, stacks of dead reed-walkers, bales of dingy white floss spun by swamp insects, nets bulging with purple bladders. “These drays go into Dadiche,” said Reith. “I’ll go with them. Why should there be difficulty?”

  The Dirdirman gave his head a lugubrious shake. “The Blue Chasch are unpredictable. You might find yourself performing tricks for their amusement. Such as walking rods over pits full of filth or white-eyed scorpions. As you gain equilibrium, the Chasch heat the rods, or send electricity through, so that you bound back and forth and perform desperate antics. Or perhaps you will find yourself in a glass maze with a tormented Phung. Or you might be blindfolded and set in an amphitheater with a cyclodon, also blindfolded. Or — were you Dirdir or Dirdirman — you might be set to solving logical problems to avoid unpleasant penalties. Their ingenuity is endless.”

  Reith scowled down at the city. “The draymen risk all this?”

  “They are licensed and go and come unmolested, unless they violate an ordinance.”

  “Then I will go as a drayman.”

  Anacho nodded. “The obvious stratagem. I suggest that tonight you strip off your clothes, rub yourself with damp soil, stand in the smoke of burning bones, walk in pull-beast dung, eat panibals, ramp and smudgers, all of which permeate the body with odor, and wipe the grease into your skin. Then dress from skin outward in drayman’s garments. As a last precaution, never pass upwind of a Blue Chasch and never exhale where one might detect the odor of your teeth or your breath.”

  Reith managed a wry grin. “The scheme sounds less feasible every minute. But I don’t care to die. I have too many responsibilities. Such as returning the girl to Cath.”

  “Bah!” snorted Anacho. “You are a victim of sentimentality. She is a troublemaker, vain and self-willed. Leave her to her destiny!”

  “If she were not vain I’d suspect her of stupidity,” declared Reith with feeling.

  Anacho kissed his fingertips: a gesture of Mediterranean fervor. “When you say ‘beauty’, you must mean the women of my race! Ah! Elegant creatures, pale as snow, with pates naked and glossy as mirrors! So near to Dirdir that the Dirdir themselves are beguiled … Each to his own taste. The Cath girl can never be other than a source of tribulation. Such women trail disaster as a cloud trails rain; think of the times she has led you into contention!”

  Reith shrugged, and kicked the leap-horse into motion; they bounded east along the road, back down upon the steppe, off toward the mound of gray-white rubble which was Pera.

  Late in the afternoon they entered the ruined city. They returned the leap-horses to the stables, crossed the plaza to the long half-subterranean inn, with the low sun shining on their backs.

  The common-room was half-full of folk consuming an early supper. Neither Traz nor the Flower of Cath was here, nor were they in the sleeping cubicles on the second floor. Reith returned downstairs and found the innkeeper. “Where are my friends: the boy and the Cath girl? They are nowhere on the premises.”

  The innkeeper drew a sour face, looked everywhere but into Reith’s eyes. “You must know where she is; how could she be elsewhere? As for the lad, he went into an unreasonable fury when they came to take her. The Gnashters broke his head and dragged him off to be hanged.”

  In a voice precise and controlled Reith asked, “How long ago did this occur?”

  “Not long. He’ll still be kicking. The lad was a fool. A girl like that is flagrant enticement; he had no right to defend her.”

  “They took the girl to the tower?”

  “So I suppose. What’s it to me? Naga Goho does as he pleases; he wields power in Pera.”

  Reith turned to Anacho, handed over his pouch, retaining only his weapons. “Take care of my belongings. If I don’t return, keep them.”

  “You plan to risk yourself again?” asked Anacho in wonder and disapproval. “What about your ‘object’?”

  “It can wait.” Reith ran off toward the citadel.

  Chapter IX

  The light of the setting sun shone full on the stone platforms and mounting blocks surrounding the gibbet. Colors held the curious fullness of all the Tschai colors: even the browns and grays, mustards, dull ochers, earthen colors in the garments of those who had come to watch the hanging imparted a sense of rich essence. The dull-red jackets of the Gnashters glowed rich and ripe; there were six of these. Two stood by the gibbet rope; two supported Traz, who stood on limp legs, head bowed, a trickle of b
lood down his forehead. One leaned negligently by a post, hand by his slung catapult; the last spoke to the apathetic herd before the gibbet.

  “By order of Naga Goho, this furious criminal who dared use violence upon the Gnashters must be hanged!”

  The noose was ceremoniously dropped around Traz’s neck. He raised his head, turned a glassy look around the crowd. If he noticed Reith he gave no sign. “May the incident and its consequence teach obedience to all!”

  Reith walked around to the side of the gibbet. No time now for delicacy or squeamishness — if, in fact, such occasions ever occurred on Tschai. The Gnashters at the hoist-rope saw him approach, but his demeanor was so casual that they gave him no heed and turned to watch for their signal. Reith slid his knife into the heart of the first, who croaked in surprise. The second looked about; Reith cut his throat with a back-hand stroke, then threw the knife to split the forehead of the Gnashter who stood by the gibbet-pole. In an instant the six had become three. Reith stepped forward with his sword and cut down the man who had uttered the proclamation, but now the two holding Traz, drawing blades, rushed at Reith, jostling each other in outrage. Reith jumped back, aimed his Emblem catapult, shot the foremost; the second, now the sole survivor of the six, stopped short. Reith attacked him, struck the sword from his hand, felled him with a blow to the side of the head. He freed the noose, yanked it tight around the neck of the fallen Gnashter, pointed to two men at the front of the fascinated onlookers. “Heave now; heave on the rope. We’ll hang the Gnashter, not the boy.” When the men hesitated, Reith cried: “Heave on the rope; do my bidding! We’ll show Naga Goho who rules Pera! Up with the Gnashter!”

  The men sprang to the rope; high into the air swung the Gnashter, kicking and flailing. Reith ran over to the derrick. He loosed the rope which held the cage aloft, lowered it to the ground, threw open the top. The wretch within, crouched and cramped, looked up in fearful expectation, then an impossible hope. He tried to raise himself but was too weak. Reith reached down, helped him forth. He signaled to the men who had hoisted on the rope. “Take this man and the lad to the inn; see that they are cared for. You need fear the Gnashters no more. Take weapons from the dead men; if Gnashters appear, kill them! Do you understand? There are to be no more Gnashters in Pera, no more taxes, no more hangings, no more Naga Goho!”

  Diffidently men took the weapons, then turned to look up toward the citadel.

  Reith waited only long enough to see Traz and the man from the cage helped toward the inn, then he turned and ran up the hill toward Naga Goho’s makeshift palace.

  A wall of piled rubble lay across the path, enclosing a courtyard. A dozen Gnashters lounged at long tables, drinking beer and munching strips of pickled reed-walker. Reith looked right and left, slid along the wall.

  The hill fell away below to become a precipice; Reith pressed close to the wall, clung to the corners and crevices of the blocks. He came to an aperture: a window crisscrossed by iron bars. Cautiously Reith looked within, to see only darkness. Ahead was another larger window, but the way was perilous, sheer over a seventy foot drop. Reith hesitated, then proceeded, moving with painful slowness, hanging to the rough edges and crevices by his fingertips. In the gathering dusk he was inconspicuous, a blot on the wall. Below spread old Pera, with yellow lights beginning to flicker among the ruins. Reith reached the window, which was screened by a grille of woven reeds. He looked through, into a bed-chamber. On a couch was the outline of someone sleeping — a woman. Sleeping? Reith peered through the gloom. The hands were raised in supplication, the legs were gracelessly sprawled. The body lay very still. The woman was dead.

  Reith tore open the grille, climbed into the room. The woman had been beaten about the head and strangled; her mouth was open, her tongue protruded foolishly. Alive she had been not uncomely, or so Reith conjectured. Dead, she was a sad sight.

  Reith took three long strides to the door, looked out into a garden courtyard. From an archway opposite came a murmur of voices.

  Reith slipped across the courtyard, looked through the archway, into a dining hall hung with rugs patterned in yellow, black, red. Other rugs muffled the floor; the furnishings were heavy chairs, a table of age-blackened wood. Under a great candelabra flaring with yellow lights sat Naga Goho at his evening meal, a splendid fur cloak thrown back from his shoulders. Across the room sat the Flower of Cath, head downcast, hair hanging past her face. Her hands were clasped in her lap; Reith saw that her wrists were bound with thongs. Naga Goho ate with exaggerated delicacy, conveying morsels to his mouth with mincing twitches of finger and thumb. As he ate he spoke, and as he spoke he flourished a short-handled whip in a mood of sinister playfulness.

  The Flower sat with a still countenance, never raising her eyes from her lap. Reith watched and listened for a moment, one part of him as single-minded as a shark; another, disgusted and horrified; still another sardonically amused for the grotesque surprise awaiting Naga Goho.

  He stepped quietly into the room. Ylin-Ylan looked up, face blank. Reith signaled her to silence, but Naga Goho perceived the focus of her eyes and swung around in his chair. He jumped to his feet, the fur cloak falling to the floor. “Ha ho!” he cried out, startled. “A rat in the palace!” He ran to seize his sword from the scabbard over the back of the chair; Reith was there first, and not deigning to draw his own blade, struck Naga Goho with his fist and sent him sprawling across the table. Naga Goho, a strong active man, turned an agile somersault, came up on his feet. Reith leapt after him, and now it developed that Naga Goho was as skilled in Tschai hand-fighting as Reith in the intricate techniques of Earth. To confuse Naga Goho, Reith began to throw left jabs into his face. When Naga Goho grasped for Reith’s left arm, to attempt a throw or a bone-break, Reith stepped in and hacked at Naga Goho’s neck and face. Naga Goho, desperate, attempted a terrible sweeping kick, but Reith was ready and seizing the foot he yanked, twisted, heaved, to break Naga Goho’s ankle. Naga Goho fell on his back. Reith kicked his head and a moment later Naga Goho lay with arms triced up behind him, a gag in his mouth.

  Reith liberated Ylin-Ylan, who closed her eyes. So pale was she, so drawn that Reith thought that she would faint. But she stood up, to stand weeping against Reith’s chest. For a moment or two he held her, stroking her head; then he said, “Let’s be out of here. So far we’ve had good luck; it may not last. There are a dozen or more of his men below.”

  Reith tied a length of thong around Naga Goho’s neck, yanked. “To your feet; quick now.”

  Naga Goho lay back, glaring, making angry sounds through his gag. Reith picked up the whip, flicked the side of Naga Goho’s face. “Up.” He hauled on the thong; the erstwhile chieftain rose to his feet.

  With Naga Goho hobbling in great pain, they passed along a hall lit with a reeking cresset, entered the courtyard where the Gnashters sat over tankards of beer.

  Reith gave the thong to the Flower. “Walk on through; don’t hurry. Pay no heed to the men. Lead the Goho on down the road.”

  Ylin-Ylan, taking the thong, walked through the courtyard leading Naga Goho. The Gnashters swung around on their benches, staring in wonder. Naga Goho made hoarse urgent noises; the Gnashters rose irresolutely to their feet. One of them came slowly forward. Reith stepped into the courtyard holding the catapult. “Back; into your seats.”

  While they stood, he slipped across the courtyard. Ylin-Ylan and Naga Goho were starting down the hill. Reith told the Gnashters, “Naga Goho is finished. So are you. When you come down the hill, you had better leave your weapons behind.” He backed out into the dark. “Don’t any come after us.” He waited. From within came a furious babble of talk. Two of the Gnashters strode toward the opening. Reith appeared in the gap, shot the foremost with his catapult, stepped back into the dark once more. Within the courtyard, while Reith dropped a new bolt into the slot, was utter silence. Reith looked back in. All stood at the far side of the courtyard, staring at the corpse. Reith turned, ran down the path, where the Flower struggled to con
trol Naga Goho, who jerked at the neck thong, trying to pull her close so that he might fall upon her, perhaps knock her down. Reith took the thong, dragged Naga Goho stumbling and hopping at a smart pace to the foot of the hill.

  Az and Braz both rode the eastern sky; the white blocks of old Pera seemed to glow with a wan intrinsic light.

  In the plaza stood a crowd of people, brought forth by rumors and wild reports, ready to slink off among the ruins should the Gnashters come marching down from the palace. Seeing only Reith, the girl and the stumbling Naga Goho, they called out in soft surprise and came step by step closer.

  Reith halted, looked around the circle of faces, pallid in the moonlight. He gave a yank on the thong, grinned at the crowd. “Well, here is Naga Goho. He is chieftain no more. He committed one crime too many. What shall we do with him?”

  The crowd moved uneasily, eyes shifting up to the palace, then back to Reith and Naga Goho, who stood glaring from face to face, promising dire vengeance. A woman’s voice, low, husky, throbbing with hate, said: “Flay him, flay the beast!” “Impalement,” muttered an old man. “He impaled my son; let him feel the pole!” “The flame!” shrilled another voice. “Burn him with slow fire!”

  “No one counsels mercy,” Reith observed. He turned to Naga Goho. “Your time has come.” He pulled off the gag. “Do you have anything to say?”

  Naga Goho could find no words, but made only strange noises at the back of his mouth.

  Reith said to the crowd, “Let’s make a quick end to him — though he probably deserves worse. You — you — you.” He pointed. “Lower the Gnashter. It’s the rope for Naga Goho.”

  Five minutes later, with the dark form kicking in the moonlight, Reith spoke to the crowd. “I am a newcomer to Pera. But it’s clear to me, as it must be to you, that the city needs a responsible government. Look how Naga Goho and a few thugs brutalized the entire city! You are men! Why act like animals? Tomorrow you must meet together, to select five experienced men for your Council of Elders. Let them pick a chieftain to rule for, say, a year, subject to the approval of the Council, who should also judge criminals and impose penalties. Then you should organize a militia, a troop of armed warriors to fight off Green Chasch, perhaps hunt them down and destroy them. We are men! Never forget this!” He looked back up toward the citadel. “Ten or eleven Gnashters still hold the palace. Tomorrow your Council can decide what to do about them. They may try to escape. I suggest that a guard be posted: twenty men up along the path should be ample.” Reith pointed to a tall man with a black beard. “You look to be a stalwart man. Take the job in hand. You are captain. Pick two dozen men, or more, and mount guard. Now I must go to see to my friend.”