XIII
DEEP by the stone-lined wells at the base of Threerivers, Warret and Bival drew down on the rope together, lifting the bucket up the shaft to the first way tank. Bival was sore, her face strained.
“Rest, Bi. I can lift alone awhile. I just won’t fill the bucket quite so full.”
“No. If you can do it, I can. I just wish those old ladies wouldn’t take quite so many baths.”
Warret chuckled. “We’ve all said that often enough. There seems no limit to their cleanliness. Anyway, this is better than the cell, isn’t it?”
“On one account. I’m with you again. I hadn’t known … I have so much to make up for.”
“No. We both needed to rethink things. I needn’t have been so proud. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. That’s all behind us.”
“But what’s ahead? Six more women left last night to join their men.”
“They’ll have a long trip. I just heard most of the men have gone far beyond Northwall, to start a community way up in the area of the Sentani winter hunt.”
“Who told you?”
“A guardsman. He took the message from the aviary to the Protector.”
“She will never announce that.”
“No.”
“Do you think we will survive?”
“It depends. On the Peshtak and on Pelbarigan.”
“On the Peshtak? Even if there were only four or five of us here, they could never get in.”
“I don’t know. I don’t know. Bi, do you want to leave? I’ll go if you want to.”
“No. We started it We need to see it to the end, whatever that is.”
“I wish I understood about Brudoer. He seems to have vanished. I’m convinced that the guardsmen didn’t kill him. The refugees said they didn’t take him. He refused to come.”
“I don’t know. I just don’t know.”
Meanwhile, Brudoer was still exploring the inner structure of Threerivers. It was not easy. He found that while Craydor had arranged for small cracks of light to enter the passages from the inside, those had long ago been plastered over in most places. Only in the high arcing walls of the Judgment Room, or on the tall stairs, and in some odd corners, was light available to the inner spaces. Many places in the inner structure one could only crawl. At others an occasional small room lay cupped under the heavy inner arches of the city.
Brudoer had found seven other wedge stones, each with an iron handle on its back, all allowing egress into the city itself. In each case the stone was locked in from the back.
He also found a passage into Craydor’s tomb, long sealed off. His arrival at the tomb surprised him. He had seen etchings of the interior, with its high, arched windows leading nowhere, supposedly for air, but when he came to one from the other direction, it took him a few moments to orient himself in the flickering light of his lamp.
The tomb occupied a small room, up at the high tip of the pyramid that had been an early external structure of the city. Brudoer was fascinated to see how the geometric shape had been planned, so the city fit around it, hooking into it ingeniously, wedging all securely.
Worming through the small arch, he dropped into the room, In the center stood the block of the tomb itself, of rough limestone like the rest of the city. On it was the neat inscription, “CRAYDOR, FOUNDER OF THREERIVERS. I know that what I have done here is for a time only, as I was, but I have tried to channel the underlying principles of harmonizing of parts and interests into it, to make it last. When it is time to rebuild, those principles will be present, as vital as they ever were.”
Brudoer recognized the passage. It was from her last essay, the “Unfinished.” Brudoer wondered who was to read it, shut up here, then realized that it was for him as much as anyone, or for anyone present at the unbuilding, the starting over, whenever that might be, if it would be. He ran his fingers over the stone. At the foot he found another inscription. It simply said, TAKE HEART. He walked around to the head and found there inscribed, TAKE THOUGHT. Otherwise the room was bare.
Brudoer also found ways of renewing his provisions of food and lamp oil. The lowest reaches of the passages descended to well level, so he was supplied with water. A small bathing stone was also cupped into the rock, and a drain. Clearly the inner structure was built for a fugitive.
One day he found a long passageway leading east, he thought, though orientation was extremely difficult in the passages. Following it, he eventually came to what he knew to be the living rock of the bluffs back from the river. They were hollowed out into rooms. Evidently he had found fhe original quarry from which the rock of the city had come.
While hostile peoples passed and repassed outside, and the City mysteriously grew during their absences, these chambers must have teemed with workers cutting rock and trimming everything to fit. Brudoer found living quarters, the remains of an ancient mushroom farm, fish holding tanks, even a slaughterhouse with an icehouse adjacent to it.
One room contained the remains of a large stock of Sentani weapons and some dried clothing of Sentani type. Brudoer puzzled on this a long time, finally realizing that the early city had fed itself in part by having its hunters masquerade as a Sentani band. It seemed hardly possible. Yet he could see no other ready explanation, unless some Sentani had allied themselves secretly to the Pelbar.
He remained interested in the current life of the city, now so changed, but his insights into it were extremely fragmentary. He could see they were struggling, with such a large female population, many too old to work, or unwilling because of their social standing. He longed to help, to make contact. But it seemed somehow the wrong time. He had been beaten enough.
At this time Udge fretted and planned in the Broad Tower, but the rhythm of the city she had grown up in seemed to have slipped away. She relied on the quadrant counsels almost entirely. The mood of the city had been slowly turning. She could feel it. Perhaps some accommodation should have been made. Perhaps it was severe to beat the boy. Perhaps a reconciliation should have been tried. The wind in the high stones of the city seemed to whisper it. Udge reacted, though, by becoming even more adamant.
Cilia brought a petition from the family heads of her quadrant. “Could not Pelbarigan be asked for help?” she read. “Food production, water, honey, trade products are all down. We are in need of men for heavy work, fish-cleaning, carpentry, rock-cutting. Could we not even install one of the far-speaking communication systems the dome people had brought to Pelbarigan?”
Udge sighed. “Do you not see, my child? These are only signs of weakness, of drifting from Craydor’s ideal, of accommodation? The design of our city is sound. The city will renew itself. It has simply purged itself of the unworthy. If there is less food production, there are fewer mouths to feed as well. If stoneworkers are needed, then the men will simply have to work a little harder.”
“But there are only thirty-four men left here, and some are old, Protector.”
“New ones will come. Was not one born only two weeks ago?”
“He is already gone, with his mother, Protector.”
“Were they not pursued?”
“By whom, Protector? The guardsmen are all doing double duty now.”
“The answer to your petition, in any case, is not negative, Cilia. We will take, it under advisement We will see how things go this summer.”
Cilia sighed and murmured, “Yes, Protector.”
“May we have a date, Protector?” Lamber asked. “For the decision, I mean?”
Udge raised her eyebrows. “A date? Is that necessary. It will all come in good time.”
“Yes, Protector. Still, it might help us deal with the people if we had a date. It gives them the feeling that everything is being dealt with in proper order and with efficiency.”
“And you think it is not?”
“That is not the question, Protector. Is it not time we gave some thought to the people and their feelings? While some of them are still in the city?”
Udge rose. “Gind,” she said to the guardsman, “please remove the Eastcounsel so she may think about decorum for a time.”
The guardsman moved toward Lamber, who waved, him away. “No need, Gind. I am going.” Udge stared after her, her lip trembling.
West of the junction of the Heart and the Oh, a Peshtak sentinel jerked a cord, which, running from tree to tree, lifted a small flag some distance away. Immediately a detachment of the small force loped out toward the watch post. When they arrived, silently, the sentinel said, “It’s all right. Sorry. It’s Steelet.”
The scout and two of his men were ushered into the river-bottom brake where Annon awaited them. “Well?” the Peshtak leader said, behind his bland mask.
“It’s Threerivers, Command Annon. Something has gone wrong there. We think it’s grown weak. They may be our chance.”
Annon laughed bitterly. “After our probe force was wiped out last winter? By the Pelbar? With their new weapon? Think, fool. You advise us to take Threerivers?”
“We’ve seen no bloody evidence that the weapon is at Threerivers. But people keep leaving the fishsucking place. There seem hardly any men left. They coop themselves up inside.”
“And if we take it, what then? The Pelbar will come from the north with the weapon and take it back.”
“We may treat with them. They may compromise.”
“Treat with us or wipe us out. Why we sent such a swine-scratcher as you I don’t bloody know.” Annon mused, pressing his fingers against his face mask. “Suppose the men are gone. Could we get in?”
“With surprise, yes. Once we are in, we could take the place.”
Annon laughed again. His face was itching unmercifully beneath the mask. “Remember Northwall. Remember what the fishsucking Pelbar did to the Tantal. We well know those hogsniffers are no pushovers.”
“All right, Command Annon. I’ll go back. I am merely reporting as you requested.”
Annon stood, offended by Steelet’s tone. His hand went to his short-sword. Then he relaxed. “All right, Steel. Go back. First get some provisions. We have to do something this snoutrooting summer. Word has it the Innaniganis have sent a new probe into the mountains. The Kitats captured one. ‘To wipe out the plague,’ he said under torture. We are the plague. Well, if we are, somebody else is going to feel it.”
“Yes, Command,” Steelet muttered. He wondered still if the plague would appear on him. He and his men turned and sauntered through the brake. Annon slumped back down in his chair, drumming his fingers. If only his face would stop itching.
Far to the north, at Pelbarigan, Ahroe, the guardchief, bowed at the door of the Protector’s chambers and was admitted. Sagan waved her to a chair. Ahroe sat.
“Have you made contingency plans for the aid of Threerivers? Yes, I know you have. Review them with me.”
“We can move in to reconstitute the government if the city finally revolts against Udge, Protector. We can also accommodate the whole remaining society if it abandons the city. We can even see them safely north to join the refugees. We have made some plans to defend the city in case of Peshtak attack. We are also stocking winter stores if they run short. We can run those downriver, protected, at any time but full ice. I am concerned about our plan if we have to supply them in dead winter. That is, only because of the Peshtak. We have no signs of them lately, but the Tall Grass Sentani have had two more raids.” Ahroe pushed several broad sheets of paper toward the Protector. “Here. I have summarized the contingencies for you.”
“You have not mentioned taking the city.”
Ahroe wearily shook her head. “I don’t see how we could, except by surprise. Craydor really designed the city flawlessly. A handful could defend it. I can’t see losing any Pelbar liyes to dictate to Pelbar.”
“Have you had any success in planting a radio there? So they could summon us for aid?”
“No. None. The likely candidates have all left. We have seen they are well supplied with message birds. But that means delay.”
Sagan fell silent. “One Other thing, Protector,” Ahroe said.
“Yes?”
“I think we are making progress with the Peshtak prisoners, finally. It’s their fear of the disease. Each one has asked me privately if he is the one who has it.”
“Have you told them?”
“No, Protector. I have done what you said. We will let them know if they cooperate. We are careful to treat them all as if they have it.”
“And Royal? Has he made progress with it?”
“Yes, Protector, Much. He thinks he can cure it. Though it was generated in ancient times to plague an enemy, it has evolved somewhat, he thinks. He also feels it is less virulent than it used to be and only very mildly contagious—except that he feels that some other animal is acting as a host.”
“Whatever that means. What animal?”
“Royal has questioned them without revealing his reasons, but they say little. He thinks it is pigs. They use pigs when they swear all the time.”
Sagan smiled wryly. Then she laughed outright. “You mean it is transferred by eating?”
“Probably. And handling the animals. He thinks the cycle could be broken unless the disease changes again.”
“Can he cure it once it is established?”
“He is working on an old formula of his own called panimmune. But he lacks the materials. He thinks that would arrest it. He feels also that the character of the individual has something to do with receptivity to the plague.”
“Yes. I didn’t understand his explanation. Something about the changes of secretions in someone with a tendency to anger.”
“Then the one who has it is the one we call Red. The tallest one.”
Ahroe raised her eyebrows. “Yes. That one.”
The Protector stood, and before Ahroe could stand, leaned over and kissed her forehead. “How’s the little one?”
“Fine. Stel is spoiling her, I think, but she is fine.”
“Don’t feed her any pigs.”
“No.”
“Let’s work on these Peshtak then, to see what we can learn. You would think they could be civil if we can help them.”
“I don’t know, Protector. There seems no limit to their viciousness.”
“There always is a limit, Ahroe. There has to be. They are humans.”
“Humans. But what humans are capable of!”
“Both ways, Ahroe, both ways.”