The Long Night df-10 Page 12

  Chang felt he had no choice.

  Soon afterward, he and his principal officers stood outside. The men who guarded them were clad and equipped like savages; but they spoke with courtesy. “I would like you gentlemen to meet some friends,” said the one named ICarlsarm. From the forest, toward the captured flying tower, walked a number of women. They were more beautiful than could be imagined.

  * * *

  Ridenour was among the last to go aboard. Not that there were many—a skeleton staff of chosen Imperialist officers, for the aphrodites could not make captives of more in the short time available, those women ‘themselves, whoever of the army possessed abilities even slightly useful in space warship. But perhaps the measure of Karlsarm’s audacity was his drafting of a known spy.

  Whose loyalties had not been altered.

  Standing in cold, blowing fogbanks, Ridenour shuddered. The cruiser was dim to his eyes, her upper sections lost. Water soaked the earth and dripped from a thousand unseen trees; the insects that made this weather flitted ceaselessly between lake and air, in such myriads that their wingbeats raised an underlying sussuration; a wild beast bellowed, a wild bird shrilled—tones of the wilderness. But the outback reaches were not untamed nature. Like some great animal, they had been harnessed for man, and in turn, something of theirs had entered the human heart.

  A Terran went up a gangway, into the ship. His uniform was still, neat blue; emblemmed with insignia and sunburst. He still walked with precision. But his eyes scarcely left the weather-beaten, leather-kilted woman at his side, though she must be twenty years his senior. “There but for the grace of God,” Ridenour whispered.

  Evagail, who had appeared mutely a few minutes ago, gave him a serious look. “Is their treatment so dreadful?” she asked.

  “What about their people at home? Their home itself? Their own shame and self-hate for weakness—” Ridenour broke off.

  “They’ll be released… against their wills, I’m sure; they’ll plead to stay with us. You can make it part of your job to see that their superiors understand they couldn’t help themselves. Afterward, you have reconditioning techniques, don’t you? Though I expect most cases will recover naturally. They’ll have had just a short exposure.”

  “And the, the women?”

  “Why, what of them? They don’t want to be saddled with a bunch of citymen. This is their wartime duty. Otherwise they have their private affairs.”

  “Their Skills.” Ridenour edged away from her.

  Her smile was curiously timid. “John,” she said, “we’re not monsters. We’re only the Free People. An aphrodite doesn’t use her Skill for unfair gain. It has therapeutic applications. Or I—I don’t like raising my strength against fellow humans. I want to use it for their good again.”

  He fumbled out the tobacco he had begged from a Terran and began to stuff his pipe. It would give some consolation.

  Her shoulders slumped. “Well,” she said in a tired voice, “I think we’d better go aboard now.”

  “You’re coming too?” he said. “What for? To guard me?”

  “No. Perhaps we’ll need my reaction speed. Though Karlsarm did hope I’d persuade you—Come along, please.”

  She led him to the bridge. Terran officers were already posted among the gleaming machines, the glittering dials. Hunyadi sat in the chair of command. But Karlsarm stood beside him, the catavray head gaping across his brow; and other men of the forest darkened that scene.

  “Stand by for liftoff.” Hunyadi must recite the orders himself. “Close airlocks. All detector stations report.”

  Evagail padded over to Karlsarm. Ridenour could not help thinking that her ruddy hair, deep curves, bare bronze, were yet more an invasion of this metal-andplastic cosmos than the men were. A faint odor of woman lingered behind her on the sterile air.

  “What’s our situation with the enemy?” she asked.

  “Fair; as near as we can learn,” Karlsarm said. “You haven’t followed events since the last fight?”

  “No. I was too busy making arrangements for prisoners. Like medical care for the injured, shelter for everyone. They were too wretched, out in this mist.”

  “Can’t say I’ve enjoyed it either. I’ll be glad when we can let it up… Well. We didn’t try an aphrodite on old Chang. Instead, we had him call the Terran chief, Admiral Cruz, and report the capture of his ship. Naturally, having no idea we’d be able to raise her, he didn’t give that fact away. Supposedly we’ll hold vessel and personnel for bargaining counters. The stratosphere’s full of aircraft above us, but they won’t do anything as long as they think we’re sitting with our hostages. Only one spaceship has moved to anything like immediate striking range of us.”

  “Are you certain?”

  “About as certain as you can be in war, whatever that means. We gave the chief communications officer to an aphrodite, of course. He listened in and decoded orders for the main fleet to stand out to space. That was a logical command for Cruz to issue, once the evacuation notice went out.”

  “Evacuation—?”

  “Loveling, you didn’t think I’d vaporize the Cities and their people, did you? The instant I foresaw a chance to grab this boat, I got in touch with the Grand Council—by radio, for the other continents, because time was short, so short that it didn’t matter the Terrans would hear. They’re good codebreakers, but I think the languages we used must’ve puzzled them!” Karlsarm grinned. “As soon as we’d made this haul, orders went out to our agents in every City, whether Terran—or Arulian-occupied. They were to serve notice that in one rotation period, the Cities would be erased. But they were to imply the job will be done from space.”

  Fright touched Evagail. “The people did evacuate, didn’t they?” she breathed.

  “Yes. We’ve monitored communications. The threat’s convincing, when there’s been so much fear of intervention from Aruli or from Merseia herself. An invading fleet can’t get past the blockade. But a certain percentage of fast little courier boats can. Likewise a flight of robot craft with nuclear weapons aboard: which wouldn’t be guaranteed to distinguish between friendly and unfriendly target areas.”

  “But has no one thought that we, in this ship, might—”

  “I trust not, or we’re dead,” ICarlsarm stated. “Our timing was phased with care. The fog, and interference, and our ground fire, kept the Terrans from finding out what had happened to their cruiser. We informed them immediately that she was disabled, and they doubtless supposed it was logical. How could anyone take an undamaged Imperial warcraft, without equipment they know we don’t have? In fact, they probably took for granted we’d had outside technical assistance in rigging a trap. Remember, the City warning was already preoccupying their thoughts. Chang’s call was a precaution against their growing frantic and bombing us in the hope of getting, our supposed Merseian or Arulian allies. He made it a few hours ago; and I made certain that he didn’t say the ship was captured intact.”

  “They’ll know better now,” Hunyadi said. His face was white, his voice tormented.

  “Correct. Lift as soon as you’re able,” Karlsarm said. “If we’re hit, your woman will die too.”

  The executive officer jerked his head. “I know! Bridge to all stations. Lift at full power. Be prepared for attack.”

  Engines growled. The deck quivered with their force. Isis climbed, and the sun blazed about her.

  “Communications to bridge,” said the intercom. “Calls picked up from Imperialists.”

  “I expected that,” Karlsarm said dryly. “Broadcast a warning. We don’t want to hurt them, but if they bother us, we’ll swat.”

  Sickly, Ridenour saw the planet recede beneath him.

  Flame blossomed a long way off. “Missile barrage from one air squadron stopped,” said the intercom. “Shall fire be returned?”

  “No,” Karlsarm said. “Not unless we absolutely must.”

  “Thank you, sir! Those are… my people yonder.” After a moment: “They were my peopl
e.”

  “They will be again,” Evagail murmured to Ridenour. “ff you help.”

  “What can I do?” he choked.

  She touched him. He winced aside. “You can speak for us,” she said. “You’re respected. Your loyalty is not in doubt. You proved it afresh, that night when—We don’t belong to your civilization. We don’t understand how it thinks, what it will compromise on and what it will die for, the nuances, the symbols, the meanings it finds in the universe. And it doesn’t understand us. I think you know us a little, though, John. Enough to see that we’re no menace.”

  “Except to the Cities,” he said. “And now the Empire.”

  “No, they threatened us. They wouldn’t leave our forests alone. As for the Empire, can’t it contain one more way of living? Won’t mankind be the richer for that?”

  They looked at each other, and a thrumming aloneness enclosed them. A screen showed space and stars on the rim of the world.

  “I suppose,” he said finally, “no one can compromise on the basics of his culture. They’re the larger part of his identity. To give them up is a kind of death. Many people would rather die in the body. You won’t stop fighting until you’re utterly crushed.”

  “And must that be?” Her speech fell gently on his ears. “Don’t you Terrans want an end of war?”

  An earthquake rumble went through the ship. Reports and orders seethed on the bridge. She was in long-range combat with a destroyer.

  Undermanned, Isis could not stand off Cruz’s whole fleet. But those units were scattered, would not reach Freehold for hours. Meanwhile, a solitary Imperial craft went against her with forlorn gallantry. Her fire-control men wept as they lashed back. But they must, to save the women who held them.

  “What can I do?” Ridenour said.

  “We’ll call as soon as we’re finished, and ask for a parley,” Evagail told him. “We want you to urge that the Terrans agree. Afterward we want you to—no, not help plead our cause. Help explain it.”

  “Opposition attack parried,” said a speaker. “Limited return broadside as per orders appears to have inflicted some damage. Opposition sheering off. Shall she be annihilated?”

  “No, let her go,” Karlsarm said.

  Ridenour nodded at Evagail. “I’ll do what I can,” he said.

  She took his hands, gladness bursting through her own tears, and this time he did not pull away.

  Isis swung back into atmosphere. Her turrets cut loose. A doomed, empty City went skyward in flame.

  * * *

  Admiral Fernando Cruz Manqual stood high in the councils of this Imperial frontier; but he was a Terran merely by citizenship and remote ancestry. Military men have gone forth from Nuevo Mexico since that stark planet first was colonized. His manner toward Ridenour was at once curt and courteous.

  “And so, Professor, you recommend that we accept their terms?” He puffed hard on a crooked black cigar. “I am afraid that that is quite impossible.”

  Ridenour made a production of starting his pipe. He needed time to find words. Awareness pressed in on him of his surroundings.

  The negotiating commissions (to use a Terran phrase, the Free People called them mind-wrestlers) had met on neutral ground, an island in the Lawrencian Ocean. Though uninhabited thus far, it was beautiful with its full feathery trees, blossoming vines, deep cane-brakes, wide white beaches whtre surf played and roared. But there was little chance to enjoy what the place offered. Perhaps later, if talks were promising and tension relaxed, a young Terran spaceman might encounter a lightfoot outbacker girl in some glen.

  But, discussion had not yet even begun. It might well never begin. The two camps were armed, separated by three kilometers of forest and, on the Terran side, a wall of guns. Ridenour was the first who crossed from one to another.

  Cruz’s reception had been so cold that the xenologist half expected arrest. However, the admiral appeared to comprehend why he was there and invited him into his dome for private, unofficial conversation.

  The dome was open to a mild, sea-scented breeze, but also to the view of other domes, vehicles; marines on sentry-go, aircraft at hover. Wine stood on the table between the two men, but except for a formal initial toast it had not been poured. Ridenour had stated the facts, and his words had struck unresponding silence.

  Now:

  “I think it’s best sir,” Ridenour ventured. “They can be conquered, if the Empire makes the effort.

  But that war would be long, costly, tying up forces we need elsewhere, devastating the planet, maybe making it unfit for human habitation; they’ll retaliate with some pretty horrible biological capabilities. The prisoners they hold will not be returned. Likewise the his. You’ll be compelled to order her knocked out, an operation that won’t come cheap.”

  He looked straight into the hard, mustached face. “And for what? They’re quite willing to remain Terran subjects.”

  “They rebelled,” Cruz bit off; “they collaborated with an enemy; they resisted comtiands given in His Majesty’s name; they occasioned loss to His Majesty’s Navy; they destroyed nine Imperial communities; thereby they wrecked the economy of an entire Imperial world. If this sort of behavior is let go unpunished, how long before the whole Empire breaks apart? And they aren’t satisfied with asking for amnesty. No, they demand the globe be turned over to them!”

  He shook his head. “I do not question your honesty, Professor—someone had to be messenger boy, I suppose—but if you believe an official in my position can possibly give a minute’s consideration to those wood-runners’ fantasy, I must question your judgment.”

  “They are not savages, sir,” Ridenour said. “I’ve tried to explain to you something of their level of culture. My eventual written report should convince everyone.”

  “That is beside the point.” His faded, open-throated undress uniform made Cruz look more terrible than any amount of braid and medals. The blaster at his hip had seen much use in its day.

  “Not precisely, sir.” Ridenour shifted in his chair. Sweat priclded his skin. “I’ve had a chance to think a lot about these issues, and a death-strong motivation for doing so and a career that’s trained me to think in impersonal, long-range terms. What’s the real good of the Empire? Isn’t it the solidarity of many civilized planets? Isn’t it, also, the stimulus of diversity between those planets? Suppose we did crush the Free—the outbackers. How could the Cities be rebuilt, except at enormous cost? They needed centuries to reach their modern level unaided, on this isolated, metal-impoverished world. If we poured in treasure, we could recreate them, more or less, in a few years. But what then would we have? Nine feeble mediocrities, just productive enough to require guarding, because Merseia considers them a potential threat on her Arulian flank. Whereas if we let the real Freeholders, the ones who’ve adapted until they can properly use this environment, if we let them flourish… we’ll get, at no cost, a strong, self-supporting, self-defending outpost of Empire.”

  That may not be strictly true, he thought. The out-backers don’t mind acknowledging Terran suzerainty, if they can have a charter that lets them run their planet the way they want. They’re too sensible to revive the nationalistic fallacy. They’ll pay a bit of tribute, conduct a bit of trade. On the whole, however, we will be irrelevant to them.

  They may not always be so to us, of course. We may learn much from them. If we ever fall, they’ll carry on something of what was ours. But I’d better not emphasize this.

  “Even if I wanted to accommodate them,” Cruz said, “I have no power. My authority is broad, yes. And I can go well beyond its formal limits, in that a central government with thousands of other worries will accept any reasonable recommendation I make. But do not exaggerate my latitude, I beg you. If I suggested that the City people, loyal subjects of His Majesty, be moved off the world of their ancestors, and that rebels, no matter how cultivated, be rewarded with its sole possession… why, I should be recalled for psychiatric examination, no?”

  He sounds regr
etful, leaped within Ridenour. He doesn’t want a butcher’s campaign. If I can convince him there is a reasonable and honorable way out—

  The xenologist smiled carefully around his pipestem. “True, Admiral,” he said. “If the matter were put in those words. But need they be? I’m no lawyer. Still, I know a little about the subject, enough that I can sketch out an acceptable formula.”

  Cruz raised one eyebrow and puffed harder on his cigar.

  “The point is Ridenour said “that juridicially we have not been at war. Everybody knows Aruli sent arms and troops to aid the original revolt, no doubt at Merseian instigation. But to avoid a direct collision with Aruli and so possibly with Merseia, we haven’t taken official cognizance of this. We were content to choke off further influx and reduce the enemy piecemeal. In short, Admiral, your task here has been to quell an internal, civil disturbance.”

  “Hm.”

  “The, outbackers did not collaborate with an external enemy, because legally there was none.”

  Cruz flushed. “Treason smells no sweeter by any other name.”

  “It wasn’t treason, sir,” Ridenour argued. “The outbackers were not trying to undermine the Empire. They certainly had no wish to become Arulian or Merseian vassals!

  “Put it this way: Freehold contained three factions, the human City dwellers, the Arulian City dwellers, and the outbackers. The charter of Imperial incorporation was, negotiated by the first of these parties exclusively. Thus it was unfair to the other two. When amendment, was refused, social difficulties resulted. The outbackers had some cooperation with the Arulians, as a matter of expediency. But it was sporadic and never affected their own simple wish for justice. Furthermore, and more important, it was not cooperation with outsiders, but rather with some other Imperial subjects.