Assassins' Dawn (5 page)

“A Hoorka would put the tethers
under
the cloak. It won’t affect the holding field, and the cloak, as you have it, will bind your movements.”

Cranmer shook his head. Two shadow heads moved in sympathy. “It’s warmer this way, and I’m not planning to do any fighting. Why else have a Hoorka with you, if not to do your fighting! And I’m
cold.”
He shivered, involuntarily.

The Thane laughed, and echoes rose to share his amusement. “Scholars.”

“Fighters,” Cranmer replied, and smiled back at him, glad that the Thane seemed to have recovered some of his humor. He nodded toward the passage. “You’re the guide, then. Lead.”

They began walking, satin night retreating before them, giving way softly and grudgingly and falling back into place behind them. The Underasgard caverns, a system not yet completely mapped, were judged to be among the largest cave systems in the Alliance. The Thane made his way easily through the tumbled rocks with the nonchalance of one who had been this way before. The smaller and less muscular Cranmer followed with more difficulty—unlike the inhabited sections of the Hoorka caverns, the floor here hadn’t been cleared of rubble and ionized to a dustless, flat perfection. Cranmer picked his way slowly over the slippery rock. The dull clunking of stone against stone marked their progress. Milky-white clusters of mineral crystals splotched the gray-blue walls, a stone fungus. The narrow passageway opened out into a large room that the lamps failed to light fully, then narrowed again until the Thane was forced to stoop to avoid striking his head on the roof—Cranmer could walk upright. They slid over a scree of small pebbles and around a fractured slab of roofstone. Another room opened up before them, the lamps only dimly showing its perimeters. There the Thane stopped and pointed to a large recess under a projecting shelf of rock.

“I found this quite some time ago, but I’ve yet to show it to Hoorka-kin. I’ve questioned my reluctance to point it out, but I haven’t any answers.” The Thane laughed, more a modulated exhalation than amusement. “Count yourself privileged, neh?” He fumbled with a tether holder, turning the field off and holding the lamp globe in his hand. He opened the shutters wide and threw the ball toward the darkness of the shelf. The lamp bounced and rolled, wild shadows darting crazily. When it settled, they could see the white arch of an ippicator skeleton, the rib cage upright, the two left legs and three right ones sprawled out to either side, while the small neck and head had fallen and lay in disorder.

“It’s huge.” Cranmer’s voice was but a whisper.

“The largest I’ve seen,” said the Thane, pride in his voice. He left unspoken the obvious value of the skeleton. Ippicators were an extinct Neweden animal, and the only asymmetrical mammal yet discovered. Why they had developed the uneven arrangement of limbs was a question of great interest to paleontologists, but what mattered to Neweden was that the skeletons were rare and their bones could be polished to a vivid sheen—ippicator jewelry commanded a great price on the trade markets. This particular skeleton was, due to its size and condition, a thing of great potential wealth. The Thane, for his part, was determined that it would lie undisturbed.

Cranmer’s stance and awed demeanor showed the impression the ippicator had made on him. The Thane smiled with pleasure. “I had it dated once: took a chip of bone and sent it to the Alliance labs in the Center. It’s at least thirty thousand standards old. That makes it among the oldest ippicators found. And it’s well-preserved. Those bones would hold a polish unlike any other.”

The Thane settled himself on a rock and cupped his chin on his hands, staring at the skeleton. Cranmer fumbled in his cloak for his recorder, then hesitated. “You mind?” he asked.

The Thane shrugged. “As you like.” He paused. “I like to imagine that beast, the most powerful of its kind—perhaps an object of awe among its fellows—realizing that his time has come and that he’s no longer capable of ruling the ippicator world. So the beast dragged himself in here, through that passage”—the Thane pointed to a darkness on the far side of the room—“and lay down. It was better than simply growing older and weaker until some stronger challenger fought him and won. A good way to end things, still in control.”

“Too melodramatic. More likely it wandered in here and the stupid beast couldn’t find its way back out.” Cranmer pursed his lips. “Not that
I
could make my way back to the Hoorka caverns alone. So this is your meditation spot, yah?”

“I suppose that’s as good a description as possible.”

“It bothers you that the Hoorka-thane can have doubts, like the rest of common humanity? My friend, you’re one of a small group of violent people on a violent world, interesting only in that you’ve set up an organization with a moralistic rationale that passes for philosophy, and a religious understructure that is, at best, loosely bound. It’s hardly a thing to make the Alliance rise or fall. You worry overmuch.”

“And Sondall-Cadhurst Cranmer speaks strongly for a scholar here by the grace of the one he insults, and he has the arrogance of most Alliance people I’ve met.” The Thane used the impersonal mode of insult, the one most likely to cause offense on Neweden, and the one least likely to affect Cranmer. He smiled, with a tint of self-effacing sadness. “I’m not angry, Cranmer. I understand what you’re saying, but this small world is the one on which I’ve built Hoorka, and Hoorka—what it does and where it goes—is of primary importance to me. Like the rest of the kin, I’ve given it my primary allegiance. This is my family, and I owe it my loyalty. Hoorka owns me, not the Alliance.”

“Are you having doubts as to your ability to deal with the problems of Hoorka?”

“I didn’t say that.” The Thane’s voice was sharp in the quiet of the cavern.

“I apologize, then. I thought you might be hinting . . . ah, never mind.” Cranmer pitched a small stone into the darkness. Together they listened to it rattle and stop. The echoes eddied, growing steadily weaker until they died. There was a long silence, then, as both men stared at the skeleton.

“I don’t know my own mind anymore,” the Thane said, finally. He rubbed a muscular thigh with his hand, then stretched his legs out in front of him. “I’m not growing any younger, certainly, and the Hoorka problems are becoming more complicated as we grow. I hope the code can hold us together, that Dame Fate lets us survive. I know we’ll survive, if Hoorka-kin will let themselves be governed by the code.”

“Then you’re not thinking of finding some back cavern and crawling in to die?” Cranmer made a show of switching off his recorder and putting it back in his pocket. “I’m disappointed.”

The Thane smiled, adding to Cranmer’s laugh. “Disappointed that I don’t react as my ippicator? No, the analogy’s a poor one, anyway. Didn’t you tell me that from all indications, the ippicator was most likely a herbivore? That doesn’t sound like Hoorka-kin.”

Cranmer snorted in derision. “Thane, I’m an archaeo-sociologist, not a digger into dead bones. But yes, I seem to recall that in one of my university classes back on Niffleheim, I was told that the ippicator was a lowly grass-eater. I think so, at least.”

The Thane waved his hand. “It doesn’t matter.”

Velvet silence settled in on them again, pressing down like a tangible substance. The Thane could hear Cranmer breathing and the whisper of cloth against flesh as he moved. When Cranmer spoke, the sound startled him with its loudness.

“Thane, what happened back there with Aldhelm and Sartas? I’ve never seen you succumb to your anger before. The Hoorka
must
fail to kill their victims at times—it’s part of your code; Dame Fate has to have Her chance. Yes, it was the Li-Gallant’s contract, but surely he’ll understand what happened—and since the contract was unsuccessful, you won’t be revealing who signed the contract. He’s safe from retribution. Why were you so upset?”

“So I have to explain again?” The Thane swept to his feet. The hoverlamps followed him, and light flickered madly about the cavern. The bones of the ippicator danced in the moving light. “It’s
Vingi’s
contract,” the Thane said, his voice oddly quiet, “not some guild-feud jealousy or a personal feud. The Li-Gallant’s contract. I don’t want his paranoia affecting Hoorka. The Alliance has been watching us closely, even to the extent of giving us a contract in their sector of Sterka Port—and the Alliance is more important than Neweden, if I ever want Hoorka to go offworld. But Neweden—and Vingi—can foul that dream. That’s the importance.”

“Because you’re afraid that this organization you’ve built has a faulty structure and can’t survive a few questionings? Your protestations are surface, Thane. Something else had to drive you to lash out at your own kin when you knew they were blameless.” Cranmer’s voice was soft and he looked not at the Thane, but at the ippicator.

“Damn
you, Cranmer!” The Thane’s voice was suddenly hoarse with venom. Cranmer turned at the shout and saw the Thane’s hand on the hilt of his vibro.

And as suddenly as it had flared, the anger drained away and his hand moved to his side, away from his weapon, though his eyes were still held in sharp lines of flesh.
He’s right, old man. He’s right, and that’s why you’re angry. Because he’s pricked the core of your uncertainty. Because you always considered your emotions too well-hidden to be fathomed. Fool.
“You’ve had time to study Hoorka, scholar.” He stressed the last word slightly too much. “What do you think?”

“
I
don’t know. But I never get angry at my ignorance.”

“Some things are too large to be angry with.” The Thane watched Cranmer slowly relax as the smaller man realized that the irritation was gone from the Thane’s voice. “I’m surprised you maintain your interest in us.”

“I’ve been interested enough to have taken two extensions of my leave from Niffleheim Center.”

The Thane shrugged. He watched Cranmer draw his cloak tighter around him, noting for the first time the man’s growing discomfort from the cold of the room.

The Thane glanced a last time at the ippicator skeleton, shrugged again, and took a step toward the passage leading back to the Hoorka sector. “I’m tired of talk, and I’ve much to do back in Hoorka-home. If you’ve seen enough of our five-legged friend . . .”

“Thane, I’m willing to listen more, if that’s what you need. The recorder’s off, and I keep secrets.”

“I wouldn’t have shown you the ippicator if I hadn’t been sure of your discretion.” He shook his head and allowed his features to relax, his shoulders to sag. “No, I’ve tormented you with enough of my idiocy. But I thank you for the offer.” A pause. “Friend.”

Cranmer got to his feet. The Thane leading, they followed the sounds of their footsteps back to familiar ground.

Chapter 3

V
INGI’S KEEP HUDDLED against the Port barrier, as if drawing comfort from its proximity to that demarcation line between Neweden and land that was officially Alliance territory. The keep was a massive building of local white stone. Turrets flowered unexpectedly from one side, while a row of thin caryatids masked the front facing the city. Like most Neweden estates, it had its gardens, though these were larger than most, with plants coaxed into geometric patterns around which the footpaths meandered. A brook threw foam as it made its way around the rocks lining its bed; ground birds preened in their iridescent plumage. As a symbol of Vingi’s wealth and power, it was more than effective: a pretty but useless display. Vingi would starve were he reduced to eating the produce of his gardens. Still, it flaunted his success in the face of the poor world in which it stood.

The Thane, quite irrevocably, hated it.

The Hoorka felt the habitual disgust the keep grounds always engendered in him. Standing before the gates (real metal, not a shield: more ostentation and non-utility) he could see the great contrast between the keep and the rest of Sterka—and Sterka was the richest of Neweden’s cities, thanks to the trade of the Port. The Thane, who had seen most of the other urban centers, knew that the Keep was far and away the most lavish display of wealth on Neweden, shadowing even the famous Temple of Khala built by the Guild of Artisans.

And like any Neweden native, he knew that the wealth of Vingi derived not from Vingi but from his kin-father, a brilliant but cruel ruler who had leeched money from kin and kinless without a thought and built a base of power none had assailed. Vingi—now Li-Gallant, as his kin-father had been before him—had inherited that man’s cruelty but not his intelligence. It wasn’t a pleasant combination.

But, the Thane mused as he showed his pass to the gate ward, Neweden seemed none the worse for it. Guilds still fought with guilds, and kinship of guilds mattered more than biological ancestry, and lassari were still poor and despised. Nothing had changed.

It took much time to breach the layers of officialdom that shielded Vingi from the common public. The Thane was handed from attendant to attendant; from the gate ward to a garden-steward to a bland receptionist who ushered him into a waiting room and left him to stare at undecorated walls for several minutes. Finally, a secretary opened the door and beckoned to the Thane to follow—by the badge on the woman’s uniform, she’d been accepted into Vingi’s ruling guild and was now due the full respect of a person with kin. He bowed to her politely and entered the Li-Gallant’s office. The secretary bowed herself out.

The Li-Gallant was standing at a window, his back to the Thane. He said nothing in the way of salutation, but began speaking as if in the middle of a conversation.

“I failed to see a body at the gates this morning, Thane.” Vingi continued looking at the garden. His ornate robes of office moved with his breathing.

The Thane, knowing it would irritate the Li-Gallant, seated himself in a floater near the desk that dominated the room. The Li-Gallant, hearing no answer to his statement, opaqued the window and turned to see the Thane already seated. He grimaced. Rings flared from his gold-banded and pudgy fingers. “I asked a question, Hoorka. I have kin, and I’ll brook no insult from anyone. Speak, man.”