Return To The Whorl Part 51

"You do not wish to fail." Pig's big hand tightened on his.

He said, "I would give my life not to fail," and meant it.

"You already have."

"You must lie here, on this acceleration couch." Hari Mau bent over him. "You must be strapped in, as well. I apologize, though it is essential."

"I know, I've been on them before. I'm worried about Oreb."

Hari Mau's smiled widened. "There under your arm he will be safe. The lighter one is, the less strain. Oreb is very light." A wide strap snapped closed, pressing the azoth into the tense muscles under it. "For yourself you are not afraid, Rajan Silk?"

If they wished to call him that, that was what they wished to call him. Not wanting to stare, he looked from Hari Mau's bearded face to the woven matting that had replaced--what? He tried to remember the interior of the lander that had brought him from Blue to Green, but he could recall only the long rows of crude brown couches, the cramped little galley that had fed them spa.r.s.ely and badly, the shooting and the shouting, the twisted steel grip of Sinew's knife protruding from the back of a man whose name was forgotten.

Hari Mau repeated, "For yourself you are not afraid?"

"Of dying?" He shook his head. "No, not of that. In a way it would be a relief, a mitigation of failure. May I confide in you?"

"Of course! I am your friend."

"What I fear is showing fear. I am afraid I'll scream when the--the push comes, and the explosion."

Hari Mau brought cotton for his ears, and he stuffed it in them gratefully. "You must put your head under your wing, Oreb, and pretend you are going to sleep. Keep out as much of the noise as you can."

"No hear?"

"Yes," he said firmly. "No hear," and watched with approval as Oreb tucked his head beneath his wing.

He had wanted a couch near the others, perhaps next to Hari Mau's, but Hari Mau had hustled him away, farther down, nearer the front of the lander, nearer the strange place to which Silk had once gone from which one could--while still in the whorl--see the stars. He was . . .

He craned his neck in a vain effort to see behind him.

Two or three rows farther down. Three rows at least, he decided, and more likely four. At least this lander was not jammed like the one in which he and Nettle had come to Blue.

Where was she now? He tried to imagine her and what she was doing, but found that he could only picture a much younger Nettle renting folding stools. I am distracted, he told himself as a slight tremor shook the lander. Under such circ.u.mstances as this, I am bound to be distracted.

Matting, woven of the split stems of some tropical plant. It would be warm in Gaon. He s.h.i.+vered.

Someone had ripped open the very walls to steal wire. If he and Hari Mau and all the rest were lucky, that someone would have left the insulation strewn about so it could be replaced and confined behind the matting. If they were not, it was gone and had been replaced with something else, the coa.r.s.e and dirty hair of slaughtered cattle or something of the sort.

No, they did not eat their cattle in Gaon. Hari Mau had said so. Cattle were the mother G.o.ddess, were Nurturing Echidna, just like snakes. Snakes were understandable, of course. It was that way in Viron, too, to some extent. But cattle? Though cattle were a.s.sociated with both Echidna and Pas, now that he thought of it. Rain from Pas, gra.s.s from Echidna; it was an old saying. Rain, the intercourse of the G.o.ds.

In Gaon, Hari Mau had said, cattle were offered to Echidna, but never eaten. The entire animal was burned on the altar. That said something about the size of altars in Gaon, and the supply of wood as well, surely.

The monitor's face appeared in a gla.s.s to his right, nearly human, though blurred about the mouth. "We'll cast off for the planet called Blue in thirty seconds. Your couch is secured."

"Yes," he said unnecessarily. "Yes, I think so." He wanted to ask whether they would get there, whether they would arrive and whether they would make a safe landing, but did not.

"If you suffer from heart disease, it would be best for you to remain in the Whorl, Whorl," the monitor reminded him.

"I don't." There was a momentary roar, deafening even through the cotton. The lander trembled with a violence that its builders could not possibly have intended. He asked, "Is everything all right?"

"I am verifying our capabilities, Patera Silk."

It was maddening to be thus mistaken by a mere machine; what was almost worse, Oreb had taken his head from beneath his wing to listen. "Good Silk!"

"I am not Silk," he told the monitor. "You have been misinformed."

"Your name is on my pa.s.senger list, Patter Silk."

"Supplied by Hari Mau, of course." He could not keep the bitterness from his voice.

"I will first cast off from the Whorl, Whorl," the monitor was saying. Higher up, others were saying the same thing. "When I have attained sufficient alt.i.tude, I will fire my engines. As soon as they are silent, you may move about the lander, Hari Mau. You will be unwell. Please employ the housekeeping tube to keep your area clean."

It struck him that it had been at least two minutes since the monitor had said they would leave in thirty seconds. He groped for his housekeeping tube and found that it was missing.

"It will activate upon access. You are responsible for your own area, Hari Mau."

That was because he had insisted that he was not Silk, he decided. Aloud he said, "I have no housekeeping tube, Monitor, and I will not be sick. I've traveled on landers before. I even flew here on this one. On no occasion was I sick."

"No sick," Oreb confirmed.

"I will first cast off from the Whorl, Whorl, Potter Sulk." The blur around the monitor's mouth was spreading over its face like a cancer; the lower half of that face moved to the right, then jerked back into place. "When I have attained att.i.tude, fire my engines. You may move about my. Plus deploy the housekeeping." The monitor's blurred gray face flickered, then vanished. Potter Sulk." The blur around the monitor's mouth was spreading over its face like a cancer; the lower half of that face moved to the right, then jerked back into place. "When I have attained att.i.tude, fire my engines. You may move about my. Plus deploy the housekeeping." The monitor's blurred gray face flickered, then vanished.

This was death, death's overture. This lander had been damaged too badly to fly. Although they had flown to the Pole in it, it could never return to Blue. It would explode when the rockets fired or crash when it tried to land, or leave them floating in the abyss to starve, visited perhaps by inhumi.

"I got there. I did it. I got back to Viron, where I could look for Silk." Suddenly aware that he was speaking out loud, he clenched his teeth.

"Good Silk!"

"Put your head under your wing, or you will be deafened. You may well be deafened anyhow."

Obediently, Oreb tucked his scarlet-capped head beneath a jet black wing.

"No, fly." It was a whisper. "Stay here."

It had been the best part of his life, the days when he had been with General Mint, with Silk in the Calde's Palace. How few they had been! How very, very few. The hours in Silk's palace, and the hours in the boat with Seawrack. "I've been happy twice," he told the bird in a voice that he himself could scarcely hear. A sh.e.l.lback comb floated before his eyes. He murmured, "Most men are not happy even once," and was violently, messily ill.

Sitting in what had been the lowest part of the lander, he seemed suspended in the sky. The Short Sun blazed to his left, mercifully obscured by the darkened canopy. To his right, stars shone, and Blue lay at his feet like a lost toy. Home.

Hari Mau joined him, strapping himself into the seat. "No one should see this twice, but I cannot get enough. It is like women."

He smiled. "Yes, in a way I suppose it is."

"My friends will not look. Mota and Roti? Those fellows? They came up here for as long as it takes to eat a banana. It was enough for them. I cannot satisfy myself, ever."

Oreb had been left out of the conversation long enough. "No eat," he declared.

"No," his master told him, "you cannot eat the stars, save with your eyes. I . . ."

"What is it Rajan?" Hari Mau leaned toward him and touched his neck, as though to gauge its temperature or feel his pulse.

"I just realize that the Whorl Whorl is no longer my home. I grew up there, Hari Mau, and Nettle and I, in our real home on Lizard Island, used to say 'home' when we spoke of it. In those days, we never thought it would be possible to go back. Now I have, and if I had not, perhaps she would have gone instead." He was tempted to say that she might even have succeeded in finding Silk; but he knew it would make Hari Mau angry. is no longer my home. I grew up there, Hari Mau, and Nettle and I, in our real home on Lizard Island, used to say 'home' when we spoke of it. In those days, we never thought it would be possible to go back. Now I have, and if I had not, perhaps she would have gone instead." He was tempted to say that she might even have succeeded in finding Silk; but he knew it would make Hari Mau angry.

"It did not make you happy, Rajan?"

"It did at first, and often after that." He sighed. "Or at least I would have told you I was if you had asked me."

"But you weren't?"

"Perhaps I should say that what I had, when I realized I was not only back in the Whorl Whorl but near Viron--and when I re-entered the city--was not true happiness. Only the antic.i.p.ation of it." but near Viron--and when I re-entered the city--was not true happiness. Only the antic.i.p.ation of it."

"So I feel when everything is settled back there," Hari Mau jerked a thumb over his shoulder, "and I can come up here. Here I am happy. But looking at happiness is no bad thing, Rajan."

"No," he agreed, "it isn't. Nor is it happiness we ought to seek in life. For one thing, only those who seek something else find it."

"Work or war?"

"Yes, sometimes. Peace, too, and home. I don't mean to say that wherever one lives is good. Sometimes people try all their lives to make a home, and succeed just before the end, and are happy. Some--like me--succeed much earlier, but are not happy because they don't know. When you came here, I almost said that I didn't think a man who never saw the stars could ever be truly happy."

"There is much truth."

"Then I realized that there are millions like Hound--"

"Good Hound!" Oreb explained.

"Yes, he is. He's honest and humble; and he works hard, I believe. His wife wants children, and so does he, and he will love them when they get them. But he lives in the Whorl Whorl and has never seen the stars. In all probability he never will, though it is he and others like him who will touch them for us all." and has never seen the stars. In all probability he never will, though it is he and others like him who will touch them for us all."

"I do not understand, Rajan."

"The Whorl Whorl will leave our Short Sun," he pointed to it, "when the repairs are completed. I'm surprised you didn't learn about it when we were at the pole. After we had finished talking about Pig, it was one of the first things they told me." will leave our Short Sun," he pointed to it, "when the repairs are completed. I'm surprised you didn't learn about it when we were at the pole. After we had finished talking about Pig, it was one of the first things they told me."

"Oh, that." Hari Mau shrugged.

"Yes, that. It may take twenty years, or fifty. Or several hundred. There's still a great deal they have to learn. But the raw materials are there, and there's an abundance of labor. They will conquer the heat, rain will fall as it never has in living memory, and Lake Limna--all the lakes--will be sweet again. Streams that have not flowed in a hundred years will run as pure and clear as on the day when Pas's finger traced their courses."

"Perhaps. But you and I will never see it, Rajan."

"No. For us a little point of light in the sky will brighten, then fade until at last it vanishes."

"You will be happy in Gaon, Rajan."

Oreb clucked unhappily.

"No doubt I will. Certainly I will try to be. What about you, Hari Mau? Will you be happy, too?"

"Delighted, Rajan. Elated." Hari Mau's tone left no room for doubt. "I will be the one who found you, who brought you to our town. You will be our foremost citizen, and I will be second only to you. We will be respected and admired, and all of us will live in peace and justice for the rest of our lives. It is not a small thing to be second in a such a town."

"No," he agreed, "it isn't. Indeed, it may well be better than being first."

Hari Mau laughed. He had a warm laugh, full of joy. "You would not talk like that, Rajan, if you could see the house we are building for you. The work had begun before we left, and it will be finished by now. We have been in Gaon only fourteen years. Perhaps I told you?" He paused, counting on his fingers. "Fifteen now. It became fifteen while we were looking for you in the foreign city."

"You mean Viron?"

"Yes. We were there only eleven days. Were we not fortunate to find you so quickly?"

The man he called Rajan looked mildly surprised. "Why no."

"But we were, Rajan. Not fortunate, to find you so quickly out of so many thousands? Echidna favored us greatly."

Oreb c.o.c.ked his head. "Good luck?"

"Certainly not, Oreb--or at least it wasn't lucky as luck is usually reckoned." His master turned back to the bronzed young hero beside him. "First of all, you were not lucky because you did not find the man you were looking for. I know you think I'm Silk; many people do. Nevertheless, I'm not. I've stopped objecting where your friends may overhear me, but I know who I am."

Hari Mau started to protest, but was silenced by a gesture.

"Second, because it was carefully arranged that you should find me and take me away. I believe Calde Bison must have had a hand in it, and quite certain His Cognizance the Prolocutor did."

"Are you sure, Rajan? If you are, Gaon owes them much."

"Gaon owes them nothing, because they were not concerned to benefit it. They wanted me out of the way, and being decent men at base were happy to accomplish their end without murder. They thought I was Silk, you see, just as you do; and as Silk I was an embarra.s.sment, an encroachment on their authority. Calde Bison, I would guess, sent the merchant who conveniently offered my friend Hound candles at a bargain price."

"Rajan . . . ?"

He sighed. "I sincerely hope they carried through their ruse, and Hound actually got the candles to take back to Tansy and her mother in Endroad. What is it?"

"Your temple. Trumpeters were sent through the city to announce that you would offer many beasts to the G.o.ds there. It cannot be that they were not proud of you."

"Did they? I hadn't heard about that. It was while I was talking with His Cognizance and General Mint, I suppose. In that case, Calde Bison's involvement--"

"Bad man!"

"Is quite certain. The Chapter doesn't have trumpeters, but the Calde's Guard does. No, he isn't, Oreb. That's what I've been telling you. A bad man would have had me killed. Councilor Potto would have been delighted to arrange it, and giggled over it afterward."

"If they wished you away, Rajan, why pay you such honors?"

"So they would not be blamed for my disappearance, to begin with." He laughed, and there was something of a gleeful child in that laughter. "We plot and plan so very hard to do the Outsider's will, Hari Mau. We think ourselves, oh, so wise! I understood at the end. Have I told you?"

"No, Rajan." Hand together, Hari Mau made him a little seated bow. "I would be pleased to learn."

"They took away Hound, you see. Or at least Bison did, and it's even possible his wife helped, though I doubt it. They left me Pig, thinking he would be easy for you to deal with. Because he was blind, he would be no protection to me."