Wingrove, David - Chung Kuo 02 (60 page)

"But we
have to. We're more than earth, Joel. More than mere clay to be
molded."

There was a hint
of bitterness in the last that made the man look up and meet the
boy's eyes.

"What is
it?" he asked softly.

"Nothing.
Just the memory of something."

It was strange.
They had not really spoken before now. Oh, there had been the
poems—the transfer of matters scientific—but nothing
personal. They were like two machines passing information one to the
other. But nothing real. As people they had yet to meet.

Hammond
hesitated, sensing the boy's reluctance, then spoke, watching to see
how his words were taken. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Kim looked back
at him. "This feels like home."

"Home?"

"Down deep.
Under the earth."

"Ah ... the
Clay."

Kim smiled
sadly. "You should have seen me, Joel. Eight years ago. Such a
tiny, skulking thing, I was. And thin. So thin. Like something dead."
He sighed, tilting his head back, remembering. "A bony little
thing with wide, staring eyes. That's how T'ai Cho first saw me."

He laughed, a
tighter, smaller sound than before. More like surprise than laughter.
"I wonder what it was he saw in me. Why he didn't just gas me
and dispose of me. I was just"—he shrugged, and his eyes
came up to meet the older man's, dark eyes, filled with sudden,
half-remembered pain—"just a growth. A clod of earth. A
scrap of the darkness from beneath."

Hammond was
breathing shallowly, intent on every word.

"Twice I
was lucky. If it weren't for T'ai Cho I'd be dead. He saved me. When
I reverted he made a bargain for me. Because of what he saw in me.
Five years I spent in Socialization. Doing penance. Being retrained,
restructured,
tamed."

Hammond looked
up, suddenly understanding. So that was why Kim's life was forfeit.
"What did you do?"

Kim looked away.
The question went unanswered. After a while, he began to speak again.
Slower this time. Hammond's question had been too close, perhaps; for
what Kim said next seemed less personal, as if he were talking about
a stranger, describing the days in Socialization, the humiliations
and degradations, the death of friends who hadn't made it. And other,
darker things. How had he survived all that? How emerged as he was?

Kim turned away,
leaning across to activate the viewer. Slowly the hemisphere of stars
revolved about them.

"We were
talking about stars, Joel. About vastness and significance." He
stood and walked to the edge, placing his hand against the upward
curving wall. "They seem so isolated—tiny islands in the
great ocean of space, separated by billions of
li
of
nothingness. Bright points of heat in all that endless cold. But look
at them again." He drew a line between two stars, and then
another two. "See how they're all connected. Each one linked to
a billion-billion others. A vast web of light, weaving the galaxy
together."

He came across,
standing close to Hammond, looking down at him. "That's what's
significant, Joel. Not the vastness or the power of it all, but how
it's connected." He smiled and reached down to take Hammond's
hand, clasping it firmly. "Apart or
a part.
There are
always two ways of seeing it."

"A web,"
said Hammond, frowning; he shook his head and laughed, squeezing the
hand that held his own. "A bloody web. You're mad, you know
that, Kim Ward? Mad!"

"Not mad,
Joel. Touched, perhaps, but not mad."

* *
*

IT WAS HER last
day on the island. She had slept late and had woken hungry. Now she
walked the wooded slopes beside the house, Erkki shadowing her. It
was a cool, fresh day. The storm had washed the air clean, and the
sky, glimpsed through the tall, black bars of pine, was a perfect,
unblemished blue.

At the edge of
the clearing she turned and looked back at the young guard. He was
walking along distractedly, looking down at the ground, his gun hung
loosely about his left shoulder.

"Did you
hear it?"

He looked up,
smiling "Hear what?"

"The
storm."

He shrugged. "I
must have slept through it."

She studied him
a moment, then turned back. In front of her the fire had burned a
great circle in the stand of trees. Charred branches lay all about
her. No more than a pace from where she stood, the ground was black.
She looked up. The trees on all sides of the blackened circle had
been seared by the heat of the blaze, their branches withered. She
looked down, then stepped forward into the circle.

The dark layer
of incinerated wood cracked and powdered beneath her tread. She took
a second step, feeling the darkness give slightly beneath her weight,
then stopped, looking about her. If she closed her eyes she could
still see it, the flames leaping up into the darkness, their
brightness searing the night sky, steaming, hissing where they met
the violent downpour.

Now there was
only ash. Ash and the fire-blackened stumps of seven trees, forming a
staggered H in the center of the circle. She went across to the
nearest and touched it with the toe of her boot. It crumbled and fell
away, leaving nothing.

She turned full
circle, looking about her, then shivered, awed by the stillness, the
desolation of the place. She had seen the violent flash and roar of
the gods' touch; now she stood in its imprint, reminded of her
smallness by the destructive power of the storm. And yet for a moment
she had seemed part of it, her thinking self lost, consumed by the
elemental anger raging all about her.

She crouched and
reached out, putting her fingers to the dark, soft-crumbling surface,
then lifted them to her mouth, tasting the darkness. It seemed sour,
unappetizing. Wiping her fingers against her knee, she stood and
moved further in, until she stood at the very center of the great
circle.

"Kuan Yin!
What happened here?"

She turned and
looked back at Erkki. He stood at the circle's edge, his eyes wide
with wonder.

"The
lightning did it," she said simply, but saw at once that he
didn't understand. Of course, she thought; you slept through it,
didn't you? In that you're like my father—like all of them—you
carry the City within you, wherever you are.

She turned back,
looking down. This evening, after supper, her father was coming to
take her back. She sighed. It would be nice to see her father again,
and yet the thought of returning to the City was suddenly anathema.
She looked about her, desperate to see it all one last time, to hold
it fast in memory, in case . . .

She shuddered,
then finished the thought. In case she never came again.

The nightmares
no longer haunted her, the three gaunt men no longer came to the edge
of the lake, their mocking eyes staring across at her. Even so, the
threat remained. She was the Marshal's daughter, and while he
remained important to the T'ang, her life would be in danger.

She understood
it now: saw it vividly, as if her mind had been washed as clear as
the sky. They had not been after her father. No. They had been after
her. For her death would have left her father drained, emotionally
incapacitated, a dead man filling the uniform of the Marshal.

Yes, she saw it
clearly now. Saw how her death would have brought about her father's
fall. And if the keystone fell, how could the arch itself hold up?

She knew her
father's weaknesses, knew that he had four of the five qualities Sun
Tzu had considered dangerous in the character of a general: his
courage too often bordered on recklessness; he was impulsive and
quick-tempered and would, if provoked, charge in without considering
the difficulties; his sense of honor was delicate and left him open
to false accusations; and, lastly, he was deeply compassionate.
Against these she set his strengths, chief of which was the loyalty
he engendered in those who served under him. As Sun Tzu had said in
the tenth book of the Arc
of War,
"Because such a general
regards his men as infants they will march with him into the deepest
valleys. He treats them as his own beloved sons and they will die
with him."

She nodded to
herself. Yes, and weaknesses sometimes were strengths and strengths
weaknesses. Take Hans Ebert, for instance. A fine, brave soldier he
might be, handsome, too, and well-mannered, yet her father's eyes saw
a different man from the one she had seen that day in the Ebert
mansion. To her father he was the son he had never had and was thus
born to be his daughter's life companion. But that was to forget her
own existence, to leave out her own feelings on the matter.

She turned,
chilled by the thought, then looked across at the young guard. "Come,
Erkki. Let's get back. I ought to pack."

She looked about
her as she walked, seeing it all as if it had already passed from
her. Yet she would never wholly lose it now. She had found herself
here, had discovered in this harsh and forbidding landscape the
reflection of her inner self, her
true
self; once awakened to
it she was sure she would never feel the same about her world. The
scent of pine and earth, the salt tang of the sea—these things
were part of her now, inseparable, like the voices of the island.
Before she had been but a shadow of her self, entranced by the dream
that was the City, unaware of her inner emptiness. But now she was
awake. Herself—fully herself.

* *
*

THE MESS ORDERLY
set the glasses down on the table between the two men, then, with a
smart bow, left the room.

"
Kan
pei!"
said Tolonen, lifting his glass to his future
son-in-law.

"Kan
pei!"
Ebert answered, raising his glass. Then, looking about
him, he smiled. "This is nice, sir. Very nice."

"Yes."
Tolonen laughed. "A Marshal's privileges. But one day you'll be
Marshal, Hans, and this room will be yours."

"Maybe so,"
Ebert answered, setting his glass down. "But not for many years,
I hope."

Tolonen smiled.
He liked young Ebert hugely, and it was reassuring to know that Jelka
would be in such good hands when she was married. Just now, however,
there was work to be done; there were other matters to occupy them.

"I've come
from the T'ang, "he said, sitting back. "I had to deliver
the interim report on the Executive Killings." He paused and
sniffed, his features re-forming themselves into a frown. "Li
Shai Tung wasn't pleased, Hans. He felt we ought to have got
somewhere by now, and perhaps he's right. But the very fact that
we've drawn so many blanks convinces me that DeVote's behind this
somehow."

"Do you
think so, sir?" Ebert looked away, as if considering the matter,
then looked back, meeting Tolonen's eyes. "But surely we'd have
found something to connect him. It would be rather too clever of him,
don't you think, not to have left some trace somewhere? So many
people were involved, after all."

"Hmm . . ."
Tolonen sipped at his drink—a fruit cordial—then set his
glass down again. "Maybe. But there's another matter, Hans.
Something I didn't know about until the T'ang told me of it today. It
seems that more was taken in the raid on Helmstadt than the garrison
expenses. Jewelry for the main part, but also several special items.
They were in the safe the Ping Two took. Three items of T'ang
pottery. Items worth the gods know how much on the collector's
market."

Tolonen reached
into his tunic pocket and pulled out three thick squares of black
ice. They were "flats," hologramic stills.

"Here,"
he said, handing them across.

Ebert held them
up, looking at them a moment, then placed one on the table beside his
drink and pressed the indented strip that ran along one edge. At once
a hologram formed in the air above the flat.

He studied each
in turn, then handed them back to the Marshal. "They're
beautiful. And as you say, they'd fetch astronomical prices, even on
the black market." He hesitated, looking down. "I realize
it's awkward but. . . well, might I ask what they were doing in the
safe at Helmstadt?"

Tolonen tucked
the flats away and picked up his glass again. "I have the
T'ang's permission to discuss this with you, Hans. But remember, this
is mouth-to-ear stuff."

Ebert nodded.

"Good.
Well, it seems Li Shai Tung was planning an experiment. The
statuettes were to be sold to finance that experiment."

"An
experiment?"

"Yes. There
have been talks—highly secretive talks, you understand—between
the T'ang's private staff and several of the Net's biggest Triad
bosses."

Ebert sat back,
surprised. "I see. But what for?"

Tolonen sniffed.
"It seems that Li Shai Tung wanted to try to reclaim parts of
the Net. To bring them back into the fold, so to speak. He would
guarantee basic services and limited travel in the lower levels, as
well as huge cash injections to bring facilities up to standard. In
return the Triad bosses would guarantee to keep the peace, within the
framework of existing law."

Ebert looked
down. "It seems . . ." he sighed, then looked up again.
"Forgive me for being candid, sir, but I'd say it was highly
optimistic, wouldn't you?"

Tolonen lowered
his voice. "Just between us, Hans, I fully agree. But ours is
not to question policy, ours is to carry that policy out. We are our
master's hands, neh?"

There was a
moment's silence between the men, then Tolonen continued. "Anyway,
it seems that the loss of the three statues has thrown things into
flux for the time being. The T'ang is reluctant to part with any more
of his treasures until it can be found what happened to these three.
If the Triads were involved—if they
are
trying to have
their cake and eat it—Li Shai Tung wants to know that. It may
answer other questions, too. We've had our suspicions for some while
that the
Ping Tiao
were working with another group in their
raid on Helmstadt. If they were acting in conjunction with one or
other of the larger Triad bosses, it would explain a lot. Maybe it
would even give us a handle on these murders."