Pliocene Exile - The Adversary Part 73

There is considerable risk. I've not yet had the opportunity to translate any living thing in the external field. You would be riding outside the starship, as it were. In theory, it should work.

"What must I do?"

If you could manage to stand upright, and come as close as possible to the apparatus without touching it.

Basil groped about and found the shovel. "I shall have to balance on my broken ankle. The left leg is compounded. You'll have to be quick at it, for I shan't last long."

Come.

He sank the blade into the snow and heaved. The pain came in sickening waves and he cried out. Then he was standing, wobbling slightly before the dead-black monstrosity.

"I'm ready," he said, and the grey limbo claimed both of them.

III.

Nightfall

CHAPTER ONE.

Rain deluged the Armorican night. Goriah, on the northwestern horizon, was an indistinct blob of light all but lost amid the lightning flashes. Secure inside a bubble of psychocreative force, Elizabeth and Minanonn flew through the storm.

"It seems more like January than early October," Elizabeth observed.

Minanonn said, "Four great tempests, one following the other! The weather reflects the perverse spirit of the times. In my stronghold in the Pyrenees, the snows have already sealed the high pa.s.ses. This has never happened so early in the season during the five hundred and sixteen years of my banishment.

It's enough to make one believe in Nightfall! Our legends say that the Terrible Winter precedes it."

"Then we should be safe from war until spring," Elizabeth said.

"I wish that were so! But winter was an ambiguous term on Duat. Because our planet has no axial tilt, the seasons are not clearly defined. To us, therefore, winter is any prolonged period of bad weather."

Elizabeth did not comment on this. Instead she asked, "Will the mountain snows prevent members of the Peace Faction from attending the games?"

"Those who could not resist the lure of Aiken's novelty left last week, on the first day of the Truce. They are already in the lowlands. I fear that most of them will have to spend the next half-year there unless the weather moderates-and I blame myself not a little for their predicament. If I had not accepted the King's invitation to partic.i.p.ate, my Peaceful Folk would not have been so attracted to the spectacle."

Rather undiplomatically, Elizabeth asked, "Whatever possessed you to accept?"

The Heretic uttered a rueful laugh. "I could rationalize the decision, saying that thus I affirm Aiken-Lugonn's sublimation of the ancient blood-letting of the Grand Combat. But why not be honest? In my heart, I was fired by the prospect of once again joining in on a whacking great row! My intellect may abjure violence and contention-but the Battlemaster of old still lurks within me, whether I will or no. Sometimes this drives me to despair. But at other times, when I am more philosophical, I bless Tana for having let me know myself as she must know me ... while still steadfastly holding me in her loving hand."

"Don't you ever curse yourself for giving in? For letting your frailty get the better of you?"

The Heretic's face had a lambent glow in the stormy darkness.

"Tana did not make us perfect, it is said, for then there could be no growth through triumph over pain and adversity, no supervening transcendence. Not for the individual, and especially not for the Galactic Mind."

"I was taught that," Elizabeth admitted. "Long ago. But the idea easily slips away from one. Especially when we're forced to confront suffering and evil. One becomes impatient with mysteries, and despairs of waiting for good to come out of one's own weakness."

They began to descend over Goriah. Minanonn showed a momentarily youthful grin. "Nevertheless, I still plan to fight in Aiken's Grand Tourney!"

The King himself came to greet them as they landed in the courtyard of the Castle of Gla.s.s. Only guttering oil lamps and torches lit the scene. In the shadowed area next to the garrison buildings, more than twenty of the dark, birdlike aircraft stood shrouded under high-slung canopies.

"Great to see you again in the flesh!" Aiken said to Elizabeth.

He stood on tiptoe and planted a light kiss on her cheek.

Minanonn rated only a sardonic tip of the royal hat. "What say we go inside so I don't have to strain my meagre faculties keeping the rain off us?"

"We wouldn't want you to exert yourself unduly," Minanonn said. "You must conserve your strength for the Grand Tourney.

So far, the storms have bypa.s.sed Nionel, but if this unseasonable rain continues, the Field of Gold may require metapsychic roofing. In bygone days, Kuhal and his late twin, Fian Skybreaker, performed the sheltering office at the arena in Muriah.

But I fear that Kuhal's solitary effort would not prove adequate to the task of covering the tournament grounds. The job would fall to you, High King."

"Or you, Brother Heretic," the King retorted. "Kuhal's not fighting in the lists. If you gave him a psychocreative hand, the pair of you could umbrella the Field of Gold against a cyclone.

What d'you say? It's a peaceful enough manifestation of power."

"I'll think about it," said Minanonn, rather glumly. They came into the castle portico, with its twisted pillars of bronze metal and purple gla.s.s, and tall, gold-gleaming torcheres.

Elizabeth put a casual question. "Is that all the aircraft you managed to salvage-twenty-one?"

"Observant, aren't you?" Aiken remarked. "No, we retrieved all twenty-seven. I sent six off to Fennoscandia right away to join the prospecting team." He eyed Elizabeth speculatively. "I thought you'd know that already, All-Seeing One."

She shot him an irritated glance. "I have to rest sometime.

And after monitoring that a.s.sault on Monte Rosa-"

"Excuses, excuses," the King scolded waggishly. "Some Pliocene dirigent you are."

"I'm not the dirigent!" she snapped. "n.o.body appointed me to the office. Not Brede-and certainly not you."

Aiken raised one eyebrow. "Most of us took your a.s.sumption of the role for granted, lovie. Isn't it a bit late in the game to tell us you never intended to play?"

"I-I never said I wouldn't do my best to help you. And the others. But my position is only informal, advisory. I'm not competent to direct, and I have no power. I don't want any-"

"Oh, la.s.s." The King was grave. "Still flying high above us all, are you? Looking down on all the scrambling Lowlives and f.e.c.kless faerie folk? ... And do you have a bit of company now? A kindred proud soul to share your n.o.ble melancholia?"

Elizabeth said, "Don't be a b.l.o.o.d.y idiot." Her mind-tone was desperately weary.

"Where is he, anyway?" the King enquired. "I haven't been able to fa.r.s.ee hide nor hair of him for nearly a week. And with these storms one right after another, even the schooner's dropped out of sight. I was thinking about sending one of the flyers out to reconnoitre-in spite of the danger of it getting zapped by Marc's shipmates. But now that you're here, we won't have to risk lives. Will you come up to the tower with me right now and do a fast scan?"

"It's not necessary," Elizabeth said. "I know where Marc is.

That's what I've come here to talk to you about. You and Hagen and Cloud."

"Ah," said the King. "So that's the way the wind blows."