Off Armageddon Reef

by David Weber

Safehold was unlike any other planet which had ever been inhabited by humans. Even the oldest of the Federation's colony worlds had been settled for less than two centuries when humanity first encountered the Gbaba. That had been long enough for the older colonies to develop strong local cultural templates, but all of those templates had begun from the frothy intermingling of all of Old Earth's cultural currents. There'd been enormously diverse elements bound up in all of them, and, of course, Old Earth herself had been the most diverse of all.

  But whereas the cultures on all of those other planets had been created by blending different societies, belief structures, ideologies, philosophies, and worldviews into a pluralistic whole, Safehold had begun with an absolutely uniform culture. An artificially uniform culture. The human beings who made up that culture had all been programmed to believe exactly the same things, so the differences which existed here on Safehold were the consequences of eight standard centuries of evolution away from a central matrix, rather than towards one.

  On top of that, there was the way Langhorne and Bédard had programmed the colonists into an absolute belief in the "religion" they'd manufactured. Nimue's library included the original text of the Safeholdian "Holy Writ" which Maruyama Chihiro, one of Langhorne's staffers, had composed, and she'd skimmed it with a sort of horrified fascination.

  According to the Church of God Awaiting, God had created Safehold as a home where His children could live in simple harmony with one another, embracing a lifestyle uncomplicated by anything which might come between Him and them. Towards that end, He had selected archangels to help with the creation and perfection of their world, as well as to serve as mentors and guardians for His children. The greatest of the archangels (of course) had been the Archangel Langhorne, the patron of divine law and life, and the Archangel Bédard, the patron of wisdom and knowledge.

  The version of the Church's scripture available to Nimue had almost certainly undergone significant revision following the events Commodore Pei had described in his final message. She had no way of knowing exactly what those revisions might have been until she could get her hands—or, rather, get one of her SNARCs' hands—on a more recent edition. But since the original version listed Pei Shan-wei as one of the archangels herself, the Archangel Langhorne's main assistant in bringing Safehold into existence in accordance with God's will, she was fairly sure that particular portion had seen some changes after Shan-wei's murder. Then there was the little matter of Kau-yung's intention to kill Langhorne and Bédard, as well. No doubt some judicious editing had been necessary to account for that, too.

  But it was clear that the fundamentals, at least, of the plan Langhorne and Bédard had concocted had been put into effect. The Church of God Awaiting was a genuine universal, worldwide church. For all intents and purposes, the original colonists truly had been created in the instant they stepped onto Safehold's soil and the false memories implanted in them took effect. They hadn't simply believed Langhorne, Bédard, and the other members of the Operation Ark command crew were archangels; they'd known they were.

  The fact that all of the original command crew would have continued access to the antigerone treatments had also been factored into Langhorne's original plan. The colonists had had those treatments themslves prior to leaving Old Earth, but in their new environment they would be unable to keep up the program of booster treatments. Since the command crew would be able to keep it up, they could expect total lifespans of as much as three centuries, and many of them had been as young as Nimue herself when they were assigned to the mission.

  The original "Adams" and "Eves" would live far longer than any human who'd never received the base antigerone therapy, probably at least a century and a half, and the nanotech aspects of the original therapy would keep them disease-and infection-free. Given the colonists' average ages when Operation Ark was mounted, that would give them each at least a hundred and twenty years of fully adult life here on Safehold, more than enough to distinguish them from their shorter-lived descendants by giving them (Nimue made a moue of distaste) life spans of truly biblical proportions, coupled with immunity from disease. Yet the "angels" would live even longer, which meant the colonists, and the first five or six generations of their descendants, would have direct physical contact with "immortal" archangels.

  The fact that literacy had been universal among the original colonists was yet another factor. The sheer mass of written, historically documentable firsthand accounts of their "creation" here on Safehold, of their later interaction with the archangels into whose care God had committed them, and of their enormously long lives must be overwhelming. Safehold's Church wasn't confined to the writings of a restricted number of theologians, or to a relatively small seminal holy writ. It had the journals, the letters, the inspired writings, of eight million people, all of whom had absolutely believed the accuracy of the events they'd set down.

  No wonder Bédard felt so confident her theocratic matrix would hold, Nimue thought sourly. These poor bastards never had a chance.

  And even if Kau-yung had succeeded in his plan to kill Langhorne and his senior followers, someone had clearly survived to take charge of the master plan. The Temple of God and City of Zion were evidence enough of that, she thought grimly, for neither had existed prior to Shan-wei's murder. And the Temple, especially, was the centerpiece of the physical proof of the Holy Writ's accuracy.

  She hadn't dared to let her SNARCs operate too freely in or around Zion after she'd realized there were still at least a few low-powered energy sources somewhere under the Temple, and she'd decided against using them inside the Temple itself at all, despite the hole she knew that was going to make in her information-gathering net. Unfortunately, she had no idea what those energy sources might be, and no desire to find out the hard way. But she hadn't had to get very close to the Temple to appreciate its undeniable majesty and beauty. Or the fact that it would probably outlast most of the local mountain ranges.

  It was ridiculous. She'd seen planetary-defense command bunkers which had been flimsier than the Temple, and she wondered which brilliant lunatic had decided to plate that silver dome in armorplast? It looked as if the plating was at least seven or eight centimeters thick, which meant it would have been sufficient to stop an old, pre-space forty-centimeter armor-piercing shell without a scratch. It seemed just a little excessive as a way to keep the dome and that ludicrous statue of Langhorne bright and shiny. On the other hand, the simple existence of the Temple, and the "miraculous" armorplast and other advanced materials which had gone into it—not to mention the fact that its interior appeared to be completely climate-controlled even now, which probably explained those power sources—"proved" archangels truly had once walked the surface of Safehold. Surely no mere mortal hands could have reared such a structure!

  And yet, for all its size and majesty, the Temple was actually only a tiny part of the Church's power. Every single monarch on the planet was ruler "by the grace of God and the Archangel Langhorne," and it was the Church which extended—or denied—that legitimacy. In theory, the Church could depose any ruler, anywhere, any time it chose. In fact, the Church had always been very cautious about exercising that power, and had become even more so as the great kingdoms like Harchong and Siddarmark had arisen.

  But the Church was still the mightiest, most powerful secular force on Safehold, in her own right. The Temple Lands were smaller than Harchong or Siddarmark, with a smaller population, but they were larger and more populous than almost any other Safeholdian realm. And not even the Church truly knew how much of the planet's total wealth it controlled. Every single person on Safehold was obligated by law to deliver a tithe of twenty percent of his income every single year. Secular rulers were responsible for collecting that tithe and delivering it to the Church; the Church then used it for charitable projects, the construction of yet more churches, and as capital for a profitable business lending funds back to the local princes and nobility at usurious rates. Plus, of course, the lives of incredible weal
th and luxury it provided to its senior clergy.

  It was a grotesquely top-heavy structure, one in which the absolutism of the Church's power was matched only by its faith in its own right to that power, and Nimue hated it.

  And yet, despite all of that, a part of her had actually been tempted to simply stand back and do nothing. The entire purpose of Operation Ark had been to create a refuge for humanity without the betraying high-tech spoor which might draw Gbaba scout ships to it, and so far, at least, Langhorne's megalomaniacal concoction seemed to be doing just that. But another part of her was both horrified and outraged by the monstrous deception which had been practiced upon the Safeholdians. And, perhaps more to the point, what her SNARCs had already reported to her indicated that the façade was beginning to chip.

  It doesn't look like anyone's challenging the basic theology—not yet, she thought. But the population's grown too large, and the Church has discovered the truth of that old saying about power corrupting. I wish I could get the SNARCs inside the Temple proper, but even without that, it's obvious this Council of Vicars is as corrupt and self-serving as any dictatorship in history. And even if it doesn't realize that itself, there have to be plenty of people outside the Council who do.

  It's only a matter of time until some local Martin Luther or Jan Huss turns up to demand reforms, and once the central matrix begins to crack, who knows where it may go? Any Safehold Reformation's going to be incredibly messy and ugly, given the universality of the-Church and its monopoly on temporal power. And these people absolutely believe the archangels are still out there somewhere, watching over them. The believers will expect the "Archangel Langhorne" and his fellows to come back, come to the aid of the Church—or of the reformers. And when they don't, somebody's going to proclaim that they never really existed in the first place, despite all the "evidence," and that their entire religion has been a lie for almost a thousand local years. And when that happens . . .

  She shuddered—a purely psychosomatic reaction, she knew—and her expression tightened.

  AUGUST, YEAR OF GOD 890

  I

  City of Tellesberg and Harith Foothills

  near Rothar,

  Kingdom of Charis

  "Your Highness, I don't think this is such a good idea," Lieutenant Falkhan said. "In fact, I think it's a very bad idea."

  Crown Prince Cayleb looked at his chief bodyguard and raised one eyebrow. It was an expression of his father's which he'd been practicing for some time now. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to have quite the same effect when Cayleb employed it.

  "It's all very well for you to give me that look," Falkhan told him. "You aren't the one who's going to have to explain to the King what happened to his heir if something unfortunate does happen. And with my luck, the instant I let you out of my sight, something will."

  "Ahrnahld, it's only a hunting trip," Cayleb said patiently as he handed his tunic to Gahlvyn Daikyn, his valet. "If I take a great thundering herd of bodyguards along, how am I going to hunt anything?"

  "And if it should turn out someone is inclined to be hunting you? Things are just a bit unsettled lately, you know. And the last time I looked, there were several people on Safehold who didn't cherish feelings of great warmth where your house is concerned."

  Ahrnahld Falkhan, the youngest son of the Earl of Sharpset, was only nine years older than Cayleb himself. He was also an officer in the Royal Charisian Marines, however, and by tradition, the Marines, and not the Royal Guard, were responsible for the heir to the throne's security. Which meant young Falkhan hadn't exactly been picked for his duties at random. It also meant he didn't let his youth keep him from taking his responsibilities to keep the heir to the Charisian throne alive very seriously indeed, and Cayleb hated it when he resorted to unfair tricks like logic.

  "They'd have to know where I was, to begin with," Cayleb said. "And I haven't said I'm not willing to take any bodyguards along. I just don't see any reason to drag the entire detachment up into the hills less than twenty miles from Tellesberg."

  "I see. And just how large a part of the detachment were you thinking in terms of?"

  "Well . . ."

  "That's what I thought." Lieutenant Falkhan folded his arms and leaned his broad shoulders against the wall of his prince's airy, blue-painted sitting room, and Cayleb was almost certain he'd heard a snort of agreement from Daikyn as the valet left the room.

  "The least I'll settle for is a minimum of five men," Falkhan announced.

  "Five?" Cayleb stared at him. "We won't need to stand off a regiment, Ahrnahld! Unless you think Nahrmahn or Hektor can get an entire army past the Navy."

  "Five," Falkhan repeated firmly. "Plus me. Any fewer than that, and you aren't going at all."

  "Unless I'm mistaken, I'm the prince in this room," Cayleb said just a bit plaintively.

  "And I'm afraid princes actually have less freedom than a lot of other people." Falkhan smiled with true sympathy. "But as I say, I'm not going to face your father and admit I let anything happen to you."

  Cayleb looked rebellious, but there was no give in Falkhan's eyes. The lieutenant simply looked back, patiently, waiting until his youthful, sometimes fractious charge's basic good sense and responsibility had time to float to the surface.

  "All right," Cayleb sighed at last. "But only five," he added gamely.

  "Of course, Your Highness," Lieutenant Falkhan murmured, bowing in graceful submission.

  * * *

  "Excuse me, Your Highness," Lieutenant Falkhan said the following day, as the crown prince, Falkhan, and five Marine bodyguards rode across a rolling valley through a winter morning which was working its way steadily towards noon.

  This close to the equator, the weather was still quite warm, despite the official season, and the lieutenant was sweating in his cuirass's airless embrace. That wasn't the reason for his sour expression, however. That stemmed from the fact that the small town of Rothar, a prosperous farming village eighteen miles from Tellesberg, lay two hundred yards behind them . . . along with the local mayor, who'd just finished answering Prince Cayleb's questions.

  "Yes, Ahrnahld?"

  "It's just occurred to me that there seems to have been a small failure in communication here. Unless, of course, you ever mentioned to me exactly what you were going hunting for and I've simply forgotten."

  "What?" Cayleb turned in his saddle and looked at the Marine officer with wide, guileless eyes. "Did I forget to tell you?"

  "I rather doubt that," Falkhan said grimly, and Cayleb's lips twitched as he valiantly suppressed a smile.

  The crown prince, Falkhan decided, had inherited every bit of his father's talent for misdirection. He'd gotten Falkhan so tied up in arguing about numbers of bodyguards that the lieutenant had completely forgotten to ask about the hunt's intended quarry.

  "Certainly you don't think I deliberately failed to tell you?" Cayleb asked, his expression artfully hurt, and Falkhan snorted.

  "That's exactly what I think, Your Highness. And I'm half inclined to turn this entire expedition around."

  "I don't think we'll do that," Cayleb said, and Falkhan's mental ears twitched at the subtle but clear shift in tone. He looked at the prince, and Cayleb looked back levelly. "This slash lizard's already killed two farmers, Ahrnahld. It's got the taste for man flesh now, and more and more people are going to be out working the fields over the next few five-days. It's only a matter of time before it takes another one . . . or a child. I'm not going to let that happen."

  "Your Highness, I can't argue with that desire," Falkhan said, his own tone and expression equally sober. "But letting you personally hunt something like this on foot comes under the heading of unacceptable risks."

  Cayleb looked away for a moment, letting his eyes sweep over the foothills leading up to Charis' craggy spine. The dark green needles of the tall, slender pines moved restlessly, rippling like resinous waves under the caress of a strong breeze out of the south, and the white-topped, dark-bottomed anvils of th
underclouds were piling up gradually on the southern horizon.

  Looking back to the west, towards Tellesberg, the green and brown patchwork of prosperous farms stretched across the lower slopes; above them to the east, the mountains towered ever higher. It was already noticeably cooler than it had been in the capital, and that would become steadily more pronounced as they climbed higher into the hills. Indeed, there was snow on some of the taller peaks above them year-round, and high overhead he saw the circling shape of a wyvern, riding the thermals patiently as it waited for some unwary rabbit or hedge lizard to offer itself as breakfast.

  It was a beautiful day, and he inhaled a deep, fresh draught of air. The air of Charis, the land to whose service he'd been born. He let that awareness fill his thoughts as the air had filled his lungs, then looked back at the lieutenant.

  "Do you remember how my father nearly lost his leg?"

  "He was almost as young and foolish as you are at the time, I understand," Falkhan replied, rather than answering the question directly.

  "Maybe he was," Cayleb conceded. "But however that may be, it didn't happen because he was running away from his responsibilities to his subjects. And there are at least a dozen children in Tellesberg today who have fathers because my father remembered those responsibilities." The crown prince shrugged. "I'll admit I didn't tell you about the slash lizard because I want to go after it myself. That doesn't change the fact that hunting it down—or, at least, seeing to it that it is hunted down—is my responsibility. And in this case, I think Father would support me."