John Rackham (18 page)

The
cold spray stung like ice-needles, the hot found aches he never knew he had,
and the foaming agent had a smell like pine trees. The hot blast dried him
faster than any towel. And then he had problems with the clothes. The shirt was
easy enough, just a pull over his
head,
and something
made it cling snugly to his wrists, but the pants were curious until he
realized that all he had to do was press the two edges together in front and
they stayed together. After that the tunic was easy. And Haldar had remembered
boots, calf-high and glossy-black
wonders,
they were,
snug and yet as soft as the well-worn sandals he had just discarded. He caught
sight of his reflection in the mirror that was one wall of the cubicle, and was
astounded, suddenly self-conscious. This was fine raiment indeed. Even Earl
Dudley himself had nothing so spectacular. He gathered his grubby homespun
under an arm, together with his bow, quiver, and all the other bits and
pieces, then drew the curtain hesitantly, and stepped out, to meet three pairs
of critical eyes. All smiled, but he was interested only in the deep blue pair.
He saw her nod approval, and
say
something
...
but her words meant nothing at all to
him.

Then
he remembered the helmet. And then the fact that she was alien. The realization
shocked him. Haldar came, saying something and pointing, to take his turn with
the shower. Jack guessed it was a reference to the meal he could smell, and
went to take it from the warm-chamber and over to the table that was now laid
with a white cloth and dazzling implements. Silvana had gone ahead, was already
seated. Jack settled by Jasar, keeping his eyes on his plate, glancing aside to
see what to do with the strange tools, managing awkwardly.

"I am taught a lesson, Jasar," he
mumbled. "You understand what I say, and I you, but only because of your
helmet. The speech of the others is meaningless to me, and mine to them. We
are all strangers, after all."

Jasar
worked stolidly on a mouthful, disposed of it, shook his head. "While you
are open to lessons, Jack, learn another. Speech is only the fringe of
communication. The helmet does not translate all
that
well
You
contribute your own understanding to
it. Cast your mind back to our first meeting, and how we spoke then. Can
you?" "I can, but I would rather forget."

"And
throw away something useful? AH advanced races communicate in the same fashion.
It needs only practice and confidence. Will you try it?"

"You
did not ask me, last time. You just came
...
into my head!"

"That's
lesson one." Jasar remained stolidy patient. "I pushed nothing at
you, at all. Speech is the clothing of thought, lad. That dress that Lady
Silvana is wearing now, it adds color and ornament to her shape. Well-chosen
words can do that. A different kind of dress might hide her shape altogether
...
and words can do that, too. But when
she stood naked before us, she was allowing us to see her as she actually is.
And that was what I did with my mind. I took away any covers, and let you see
it
And
you did."

"But
...
but I heard you, inside my head!"

"Just so.
Look!" Jasar held up a silvery implement "Look at this. Where
do you see it?"

"Where?"
Jack frowned. "There
...
in your hand!"

"Where are your eyes,
lad? Where are they, over here?"

Jack
frowned again, but realized that Jasar had some intent in mind. "They are
in my head, of course.
As you know."

"I
do. You are seeing this fork with your eyes.
In your head.
But you know the fork itself is here, in my hand. You know that
...
so you see it so.
Because
you are in that habit.
So I tell you, you saw thoughts in my
mind .
..
but
because you had to understand them in your own, you
'heard' them there
...
in error. With
practice, you can learn otherwise. You can see my thought, if you look and wish
so
...
and if I open my mind to you.
Try it now. I will not speak a word."

Jack
stared at him, momentarily baffled by the need to make an effort of some kind.
Then, just as he was about to give up, he heard, eerily, "Friends, Jack,
and good comrades. Nothing can ever alter that." And it was in Jasar's
"voice," without doubt. Jasar grinned at his expression.

"But I heard it, in my
head!"

"Of
course you did, and will, until you learn. Jack, you are hearing my words now,
in your ears and head, but you 'know' they are coming from me, so you place
them properly. You'll learn, with practice."

Jack turned back to his plate and ate,
growing more and more confused the more he thought over it
But
one aspect became clear to him. He could hear someone else's thought, if that
someone "opened" his mind for it
...
whatever that meant. But how could he "talk" to someone else?
How could
he
open his mind? When he put the question to
Jasar the little scout cocked his head aside ruefully.

"That
is not so easy, lad. How good is your imagination? You might try a symbolic
approach. Whichever symbol is easiest for you to handle. Say
...
if you imagine you have a doorway built
into your head, and then open it. Or a curtain
...
and draw it away. Something like that Whatever seems real to
you."

Jack
chewed over that idea for a while,
then
felt a flood
of humbling panic. Would he want someone else to be able to see inside his
head? To see all the jumble and confusion that raged there?

He looked up and away from his chaotic
thoughts to see Haldar coming to the table, meal in hand, to seat himself
alongside Silvana. Jack had to gape again. This was a new Haldar, with gleaming
gold hair and beard, in tunic and pants of deep velvet red, with the gleam of
white shirt at his throat and wrists. There were sparkling gold slashes on his
shoulders and breast and he smiled in a curiously twisted manner.

"Just for a little while," he said,
"I am resurrected. Not vermin, no longer the helpless tool of Garmel, but
Haldar Villar of Berden, goldsmith and master-craftsman. I feel myself again,
and I thank you, both of you, for you made it possible, if only for a brief
while."

"There
is nothing wrong in a man feeling proper pride," Jasar said, aad Jack
smothered a gasp as he realized he had understood all that Haldar had said.
Without being aware of it! Jasar went on. "The briefness of the time is
our most pressing concern. Do you have a chrono here?"

"Somewhere.
In the bedroom, I think.
I’
ll
take it out as soon as I've eaten. You go and have a shower when
you're ready. I regret I have nothing in my wardrobe that will fit you, my
friend."

"The shower will be welcome." Jasar
rose. "And this harness is good enough. I've lived in it before. Once
you've found the chrono we must make sleeping arrangements."

"There is a point." Silvana spoke
up as Jasar went away, and Jack's gaze clung to her face in fascination.
"I feel guilty at turning you out of that room. You must see it, Jack. It
is simple yet wonderfully arranged, and so very comfortable. And it is yours,
Haldar."

"It
was. I used it, in the early days, to preserve something that I thought was
important and civilized in me, against the evil of Garmel. But my conscience
began to bite me. It is not easy to lie soft when so many others are suffering,
and dying. Now, for these last few moments under Garmel's heel, I can sleep
anywhere and be easy. You are not depriving me. Is the food to your liking?
There will be wine later, when Jasar is back from showering, and when I find
that chrono. I think it is in the bedroom. And I must look for blankets for us.
I have plenty of everything."

"Let
me help with that!" Jack said, and even in his own ears the words sounded
strange and crude. He saw Haldar look up in surprise, then Silvana got the same
expression, and he knew, scarlet-faced, that they had not understood his words.
He felt tongue-tied, but Haldar smiled easily.

"I
think you offered to help. It seems you understand what I say, even if I cannot
quite grasp your words. But there is no need. Except for the chrono, I know
where everything is."

"We
will look for it," Silvana offered cheerfully. "Jack will help me. I
want him to see that bedroom anyway; it's such a tasteful place." Jack was
watching her, managed to get her words perfectly, but there was something else
that came, over and through her words and yet overwhelmingly plain. A
"voice" that was half singing, half murmuring, warm as summer
sunshine
...
"so innocent
...
yet so like a young prince. . . ."
With a pulse hammering in his ears he stumbled to his feet, hoping she couldn't
see what was in
his
mind. She held out her hand
to him, took his fingers,
led
him away to the room, pushed
the curtain aside. It was small, compact, but the walls were hung with patterned
weaving that hid the starkness of metal, and the floor was covered too. One
light hung from the roof, another stood out over the head of the low bed that
lay alongside one wall, and a third projected over a small table and stool by
another wall, near the bed's foot. There was a mirror, and on the table a comb
and brush and a keen blade in a box. And everywhere were curious shapes done in
fine gold wire, of birds and flowers and figures.

"A
strange man, Haldar," she said, seating
herself
and putting the brush to her hair. "I have met one or two like him. This
war, my Jack, has caught all kinds in its jaws, crushing them, changing them,
using them for its own ends, not caring whether they are willing or not. It
must be harder for a man who is not only a craftsman, but an artist too."

Jack
lowered himself onto the foot of the bed and watched her brushing. It was
glorious stuff, that hair. Long, heavy, gleaming gold, it was as his mother's
had once been. In his head she was still crooning
...
"my prince, my beloved prince
..."
so that he was taken aback when she asked, quite
suddenly:

"So much for Haldar, but what of you, my Jack?
What manner of man are you?" Her
question was serious enough, but she had turned to let him see the glint of mischief
in her eyes. Catching something of that mood he retorted:

"Why
do you find me so strange? Have you never known anyone like me?"

"Strange,"
she repeated.
"Completely alien.
Your words mean
nothing
...
yet I know you speak
kindly, and I love your voice. I would say more, but I dare not, until I know
what you are thinking." Heat came into his face again, and he felt
helpless, until from somewhere came the thought that he was only too willing
she should know. Remembering Jasar's hint, he imagined a shutter in his
forehead, threw it open, and put out his hand timidly.

"Will
you let me brush your hair?" he asked. "I have done such before, for
my mother. Hers is as long as yours but not so golden, so beautiful. She says
it is a pleasant feeling...." There had been a dimple in her cheek when he
began, but it was gone now, drowned in a rosy glow.

"You
would wait on me, like a serving maid?" she whispered.

"I will be gentle. And
it will give me pleasure."

"That I can well believe.
Because of this war-madness I have met many
unusual people. The Salviar Federation binds together more than a thousand
planets, after all. But never have I encountered anyone like you. You are so immediate,
direct, unsubtle, and yet so completely honest, that I am taken off-balance and
breathless at you. No man ever wanted to wait on me before. If all men and
women on Earth are like you, it must be a wondrous place."

"I
know little about other men, or women, only myself. Nor do I know very much
about Earth, only that part where I live."

"By
the minute you grow more and more strange
...
and yet
...
there is a bond
between us such as I have never known before." She let her words
drift
into silence and a curious tension
grew between them, to be snapped like a thread as knuckles rapped, outside.

"May
I enter, please?" It was Haldar, his meaning obvious, and she put a hand
to her mouth in dismay as she called him in and chattered to him
apologetically. As he went down on a knee to drag a box from under the bed, and
then to bring out a device with a white dial and pointers, Jack caught up. The
chronol It triggered an idea, and he moved forward.