Glory Season (44 page)

“Life is the continuation of existence,” the captain intoned. Perhaps it was the cowl that lent his voice a deep, vatic tone. Or maybe it was part of being captain.

“
Life is the continuation of existence
,” the ship’s company responded, echoing his words, accompanied by a background of creaking masts and flapping sails.

“Life is the continuation of existence, yet no thing endures. We are all patterns, seeking to propagate. Patterns which bring other patterns into being, then vanish, as if we’ve never been.”

Maia had heard the invocation so many times, recited
in countless accents at dockside arenas in Port Sanger and elsewhere. She knew it by heart. Yet this was her first time standing as a contestant. Maia wondered how many other women had. No more than thousands, she felt sure. Maybe only hundreds.

Renna listened to the ancient words, clearly entranced.

“… We cannot control our progeny. Nor rule our inventions. Nor govern far consequences, save by the foresight to act well, then let go.

“All is in the preparation, and the moment of the act.

“What follows is posterity.”

The captain held out his staff, hovering above the winking timing square.

“Two teams have prepared. Let the act be done. Now … observe posterity.”

The staff struck down. The timing square began chiming its familiar eight-count. Even though she was prepared, Maia jumped when the flat array of sixteen hundred black and white pieces seemed all at once to explode.

Not
all
at once. In fact, fewer than half flipped their louvers, changing state because of what they sensed around them. But the impression of sudden, frantic clattering set Maia’s heart racing before a second wave of sound and motion suddenly crossed the board. And another.

Fortunately, she did not have to think. Any Game of Life match was already over the moment it began. From now on, they could only stand and watch the consequences unfold.

I
found it hard overcoming prejudices, during my first visit to a Stratoin home.

It wasn’t the concept of matriarchy, which I’ve met in other guises on Florentina and New Terra. Nor the custom that men are another species, sometimes needed, often irksome, and fortunately rare. I was prepared for all that.

My problem arises from growing up in an era obsessed with individuality.

Variety was our religion, diversity our fixation. Whatever was different or atypical won favor over the familiar. Other always came before self. An insane epoch, say
psychohistorians … even if its brief glory produced ideal star travelers.

In voyaging, I’ve encountered many stabilized societies, but none more contrary to my upbringing than Stratos. The unnerving irony of this world’s fascinating uniqueness is its basis in changelessness. Generations are not rent by shifting values. Sameness is no curse, variety no automatic friend.

It’s just as well we never met. Lysos and I would not have gotten along.

Nonetheless, I was delighted when Savant Iolanthe asked me to spend some days at her family’s castlelike estate, in the hilly suburbs of Caria. The invitation, a rare honor for a male in summer, was surely a political statement. Her faction is the least hostile toward restored contact. Even so, I was cautioned that my visit was to be “chaste.” My room would have no windows facing Wengel Star.

I told Iolanthe to expect no problems in that regard. I will avert my gaze, though not from the sky.

Nitocris Hold is an ancient place. Iolanthe’s clone-line has occupied the sprawling compound of high walls, chimneys, and dormered roofs for most of six hundred years. Related lineages dwelled on the site almost back to the founding of Caria.

Our car swept through an imposing gate, cruised along a garden-rimmed drive, and halted before a finely sculpted marble entrance. We were formally greeted by a trio of graceful Nitocri who, like Iolanthe, were of stately
middle age, dressed in shimmering yellow silken gowns with high collars. My bag was carried off by a younger clan-sister. More siblings bearing distinctive Nitocris features—soft eyes and narrow noses—rushed silently to move the car, seal the gate, and usher us inside.

So, for the first time, I entered the sanctum of a parthenogenetic clan, prime unit of human life on Stratos. “They aren’t bees or ants,” I thought silently, suppressing facile comparisons. Within, I repeated the motto of my calling—

“Let go of preconceptions.”

The savant cheerfully showed me courtyards and gardens and grand halls, unperturbed by a crowd of children who whispered and giggled in our wake. The Nitocri keep no domestic employees, no hired vars to carry out unpleasant tasks beneath the dignity of wealthy clones. No Nitocris resents taking her turn at hard or dirty chores, such as scouring fire grates, or scrubbing lavatories, or laying down roof tiles. All is well-timed according to age, with each girl or woman alternating between onerous and interesting tasks. Each individual knows how long a given phase will last. After a set interval, a younger sister will be along to take over whatever you are doing, while you move on to something else.

No wonder even children and youths move gracefully, with such assurance. Each clone-daughter grows up watching elders just like her, performing their tasks with a calm efficiency derived from centuries of practice. She knows the movements unconsciously before ever being called upon to do them herself. No one hurries to take on
power before her time. “My turn will come,” appears to be the philosophy.

At least, that’s the story they were selling me. No doubt it varies from clan to clan, and almost certainly works less than perfectly even among the Nitocri. Still, I wonder …

Utopians have long imagined creating an ideal society, without competition, only harmony. Human nature—and the principle of selfish genes—seemed to put the dream forever out of reach. Yet, within a Stratoin clan, where all genes are the same, what function remains for selfishness? The tyranny of biological law can relax. Good of the individual and that of the group are the same.

Nitocris House is filled with love and laughter. They seem self-sufficient and happy.

I do not think my hosts noticed when I involuntarily shivered, even though it wasn’t cold.

T
here was glory on deck the next morning. Freshly fallen from high, stratospheric clouds, the delicate frost coated every surface, from spars and rails to rigging, turning the Manitou into a fairy ship of crystal dust, glowing in a profusion of pink sunrise refractions.

Maia stood atop a narrow flight of stairs leading up from the small cabin she shared with nine other women. She rubbed her eyes and stared at the sweetly painful dawnlight glitter outside.
How pretty
, she thought, watching countless pinpoints of rose-colored brilliance change, moment by moment.

She recalled occasions when Port Sanger received such a coating, causing shops and businesses to close while women hurried outside to sweep puffballs from their windowsills into vacuum jars for preservation. A sprinkle of glory disrupted daily life far more than thicker falls of normal snow, which simply entailed boots and shovels and some seasonal grumbling.

Certainly
men
preferred dense drifts of the regular kind. Even slippery ice, making the streets slick and treacherous, seemed to perturb the rough sailors nowhere near as much as a thin scattering of lacy glory. Most males
fled to their ships, or beyond the city gates, until sunlight cleansed the town, and its women citizens were in a less festive mood.

That was on shore
, Maia remembered.
Here, there’s no place for the poor fellows to run.

From the narrow doorway at the head of the stairs, Maia inhaled a cool, faintly cinnamon odor. This was no minor dusting, like in Long Valley. The air felt bracing, and provoked a tingling in her spine. Sensations vaguely familiar from prior winters, yet enhanced this time.

Of course, she hadn’t been a grown woman before. Maia felt combined eagerness and reluctance, waiting to see if the aroma would have a deeper effect, now that she was five.

There was movement on deck, male sailors shuffling with the desultory slowness of dawn-shift workers. They were physically unaffected by the icy encrustation, yet the captain’s expression seemed unhappy, irritated. He snapped at his officers and frowned, contemplating the fine, crystal dusting.

The unhappiest person in sight was the only female—the youngest of Kiel’s company of Rads, a girl about Maia’s age. She was using a broom to sweep glory frost into a square-mouthed bucket, which she proceeded to empty over the side before going back for another load.

Maia sensed a stirring behind her—another woman rising with the sun. She glanced back and nodded a silent good-morning as Naroin climbed the short, steep steps to squeeze alongside. “Well, look at that,” the older var commented, sniffing the soft, chill breeze. “Quite a sight, eh? Too bad it’s all got to go.”

The petite sailor redescended, plunging momentarily into the dimness of the narrow cabin. She reached onto the bunk Maia had just vacated, and returned bearing Maia’s coat. “There you go,” Naroin said with a kindly tone, and pointed at the girl outside, sweeping the deck
dejectedly. “Your job, too. Law of th’ sea. Women stay below till the frost goes. Except virgies.”

Maia blushed. “How do
you
know I’m a—”

Naroin held up a hand placatingly. “Just an expression. Half o’ these vars”—she jerked her thumb at those still sleeping below—“never had a man, an’ never will. Nah, it’s a matter of age. Youngsters sweep up. Go on, child. Eia.”

“Eia,” Maia responded automatically, slipping on the coat. She trusted Naroin not to lie about something like this. Still, it seemed unfair. Her feet shuffled reluctantly as the bosun gently pushed her outside and shut the door behind her. Chill air condensed her breath in steamy plumes. Rubbing already-numb hands, Maia sighed and went to the utility locker to fetch a broom.

The other girl gave her a look that seemed to say, Where have
you
been? Maia lifted her shoulders in the same silent language.

I didn’t know anything about it. Do I ever?

It was logical, when she thought about it. Glory didn’t affect women as strongly as summer’s aurorae did men, thank Lysos. Still, it drew those of fertile age toward ideas of sex at exactly the time of year when most men preferred a good book. What males found irksome but avoidable on land could not be escaped so easily at sea. Fivers and sixers, who were less affected by the seasons, and unattractive to males anyway, naturally got the job of sweeping up, so other women might be permitted to emerge before noon.

The chore soon lost whatever attraction lay in novelty, and Maia found the faintly pleasant tingling in her nose less fixating than advertised. Carrying bucketsful to the rail, she could not escape the sensation of being watched. Maia felt certain some of the sailors were pointing at her, sniggering.

The reason had nothing to do with the glory fall, and
everything to do with last night’s fiasco of a “competition.” It was bad enough being a lowly young var, on a voyage not of her choosing. But the Life match had left her a laughingstock.

Sure enough, one of her opponents, the cook’s assistant, was firing up his stove under the eaves of the poop deck. The boy grinned when Maia’s sweeping brought her nearby. He lisped through a gap left by two missing teeth, “Ready for another game? Whenever you an’ the Starman want, me an’ Kari are ready.”

Maia made as if she hadn’t heard. The youth was clearly no intellect, yet he and the cabin boy had made quick hash of Renna’s carefully-thought-out Game of Life plan. The rout became obvious within a few rounds.

With each pulse, ripples of change had swept the board. Black pieces, representing “living” locations, turned white and died, unless conditions were right to go on living. White pieces flipped over, coming alive when the number of black neighbors allowed it. Patterns took shape, wriggling and writhing like organisms of many cells.

The forty-by-forty grid was by no means the largest Maia had seen. There were rumors of boards vastly bigger, in some of the towns and ancient sanctuaries of the Méchant Coast. Yet, she and Renna had worked hard to fill their side with a starting pattern that might thrive, all to no avail. Their labors began unraveling from almost the very start.

One of their opponents’ designs began firing self-contained gliders across the board, configurations that banked and flapped at an oblique angle toward the edge, where they caromed toward the oasis Renna and Maia had to preserve. Maia watched with a lump in her throat as the other glider gun on this side—her own contribution to Renna’s plan—launched interceptors that skimmed past their short fence barrier just in time to—

Yes!
She had felt elation as their antimissiles collided with the enemy’s projectiles right on schedule, creating explosions of simulated debris.

“Eia!” she had cried in excitement.

Intent as she had been on that threat, Maia was rudely yanked back by an abrupt roar of laughter. She turned to Renna. “What is it?”

Ruefully, her partner pointed toward the synthetic figure they had counted on to hold the center of the board. Their “guardian,” with its flailing arms and legs, had seemed guaranteed to ward off anything that dared approach. But now Maia saw that a bar-shaped entity had emerged from the other side of the board, approaching inexorably. At that instant, she experienced a queer sense of recognition, perhaps dredged out of childhood memory, from watching countless games at dockside in Port Sanger. In a strange instant, the new shape suddenly struck her as … obvious.

Of course. That shape will absorb
 …

The flickering intruder made contact with the branching patterns that were the guardian’s arms, and proceeded to suck them in! To the eye, it seemed as if their opponents’ creature was devouring game pieces, one by one, incorporating organs from the guardian into its growing self.