Ace Books by Gordon R. Dicbon
ALIEN ART & ARCTURUS LANDING
THE ALIEN WAY
COMBAT SF THE FAR CALL THE FOREVER MAN HOME FROM THE SHORE
IN IRON YEARS JAMIE THE RED (with Roland Green)
LOVE NOT HUMAN MASTERS OF EVERON NAKED TO THE STARS
ON THE RUN SPACEPAW THE SPACE SWIMMERS
SPACIAL DELIVERY TIME TO TELEPORT/DELUSION WORM
WAY OF THE PILGRIM
THE EARTH LORDS
The "Childe Cycle" Series
DORSAI! LOST DORSAI NECROMANCER SOLDIER, ASK NOT THE SPIRIT OF DORSAI TACTICS
OF MISTAKE THE FINAL ENCYCLOPEDIA THE DORSAI COMPANION
THE CHANTRY GUILD
THE
CHR TRY
GUILD
fil AGE BOOKS, NEW YORK
This Ace book contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition. It
has been completely reset in a typeface designed for easy reading, and was
printed
from new film.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
An Ace Book / published by arrangement with
the author
PRINTING HISTORY Ace hardcover edition / October 1988 Ace mass market edition
/ June 1989
All rights reserved. Copyright @ 1988 by Gordon R. Dickson.
Cover art by Jim Bums. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by
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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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CHAPTER
A little before dawn, Amanda Morgan woke in the front room of the tiny
apartment rented by the family which had risked giving her shelter. A young
girl shared the front room floor with her; but she still slumbered, as did the
rest.
Amanda had slept in the shapeless brown smock that had been all but forced on
the inhabitants of this world and its sister planet of Mara by the Occupation
Forces now ruling them. She rose now without putting on her ankle-high bush
boots, and squatted on her heels beside her borrowed sleeping mat, and rolled
it up.
Stowing it in a corner of the room and picking up the boots in one hand, she
quietly let herself out into the hall. Still carrying the boots, she went
along it to make use of the communal bathroom at the hall's end; then
descended the narrow wooden stairs into the street.
Just inside the tenement's street door, she stopped to put on the boots. The
smock had a hood, which she now pulled up over her head to hide her face.
Silently, lifting the latch of the door, she slipped out into the mist-dimmed,
pre-dawn light of the empty streets of Porphyry. It was a small town in the
subtropical uplands of Hysperia, the northeastern continent of the Exotic
planet of Kultis.
Through those streets between the graying, unpainted wood faces of the
tenements, she went swiftly. Most of the local
2                    Gordon R. Dickson Exotics, rooted out of their
countryside homes, had been brought here and required to build these dwellings
for their own shelter, close under the eye of authority; and the fact that the
required design and materials of the buildings made them firetraps had not
been entirely unintentional on the part of the designers. For the plan behind
the Occupation was for the Exotics of Mara and Kultis to die off-as much as
possible by their own doing.
She thought of those sleeping within; and felt a sensation as if her heart
moved under her breast at the thought of leaving them, as a mother might react
at having to leave her children in the hands of brutal and antagonistic
caretakers. But the word that had been sent her was the one message that could
override all else; and she had no choice but to go.
After several turnings down different streets she slipped between two
buildings and emerged into the open yard-space behind them. Just before her
lifted the six-meter height of the wooden fence that now enclosed the town;
and which those who inhabited it had also been forced to build.
At the foot of this fence she stopped and, reaching in through a slit in her
robe, loosened something. As she gave her body a shake a coil of loose rope
dropped about her feet. She stepped out of it and bent to pick it up by the
running loop already worked into one end.
She gathered up the rest of the rope and dropped it by arm-lengths back onto
the sparse grass of the untended ground at her feet, shaking it out and
recoiling it up again into loose loops in her left hand, to make sure there
were no kinks in it. Then, taking the last meter or so of the other end with
the running loop into her right hand, she shook the loop sliding through that
eye of rope to a larger circle, swung it a few times to get the feel of its
weight and balance, and took a step back from the foot of the wall.
She looked up at the fence, past the flimsy walkway that allowed it to be
patrolled by those on guard, with no more than their heads showing above the
pointed ends of the uprightly placed logs that made it.
Selecting one particular log-end, she swung the captive loop in her right hand
in a couple of graceful circles and then let it fly upward. She had been
handling a lasso since her early childhood on the distant planet of her birth,
one of the few Younger Worlds
THE CHANTRY GUILD                              3 where a variform of horses
had flourished. The loop flew fair and true to settle over the upper end of
the log she had chosen.
She pulled it tightly closed, and tried her weight on the rope. Then, with its
aid, she walked up the inner face of the wall until she could pull herself
onto the walkway. Loosening the loop from the log-end, she enlarged it and put
it around her so that it formed a loop diagonally about her body from one
shoulder and around and under her opposite hip. Doubling that loop with more
of the rope, she threw the long end of it down the wall's far side, climbed
over the fence and proceeded to rappel down its outside face, mountaineer
fashion. Once solidly on the ground she pulled the rest of the rope around the
log-end overhead and down into her hands. Recoiling it around her waist over
her robe as she went, she headed for the darkness of the forest, only a short
distance away.
The forest hid her and she was gone. But she had not left unobserved. One of
the early waking inhabitants of a building, looking out a back window, had
seen her go. By bad luck, he was one of the few locals who tried to curry
favor with the Occupation Forces-for there were good and bad Exotics, as there
were people of both kinds in all cultures. His attention had been caught by a
glimpse of a figure moving outside while the curfew of the night just passed
was still in effect. Now he lost no time in dressing and hurrying himself to
Military Headquarters.
Consequently, she was almost to her destination when she became aware of being
followed by green- uniformed, booted figures, with the glint of metal in their
hands that could only come from power rifles or needle guns. She went on, not
hurrying her pace. They wei-e already close enough to kill her easily with
their weapons, if that was what they wanted. They would be waiting to see if
she would lead them to others; and in any case their preference would be to
take her alive; to question her and otherwise amuse themselves with her before
killing her. However, if she could only gain a few minutes more, a small
distance farther . . .
She walked on unhurriedly, her resolve hardening as she went. Even if they
tried to take her now before she reached her intended destination, still all
might not be lost. She was Dorsai, of the Dorsai; a native of that cold, hard,
meagerly blessed planet whose only wealth of natural resources lay in its
4                      Gordon R. Dickson planet-wide ocean and the scanty
areas of arable and pasture land on its stark islands, upthrust from the waves
like the tops of the underseas mountains.
For generations, the Dorsai had seen their sons and daughters leave home to
sell their military services in the wars of the other Younger Worlds; and so
earn the interstellar credits the Dorsai needed to survive. While those behind
her now were the sweepings of those other worlds. Not real military; and
spoiled beyond that by the fact that the Exotics they were used to dominating
did not know how to fight, even if they were willing to do so to save their
lives. So that those who followed her now had come to believe that merely to
show a weapon to any unarmed civilian produced instant obedience.
So, at close quarters, if those behind did not first cripple her with their
power or needle guns, she could handle up to half a dozen of them. In any
case, it would be strange if in the process she could not get her hands on at
least one of their weapons. If she did that, she would have no trouble dealing
with even a full platoon group.
But she was almost to the place toward which she had been headed; and they
were still some meters behind her. It became more and more obvious they were
merely following, unsuspecting that she might know they were there, and hoping
she would lead them to others they could capture as well. She had been working
here as an undercover agent from Old Earth for three years now; helping the
local populace endure, and wherever possible, resist these followers of
Others-the new overlords of the Younger Worlds. These soldiers would at least
have heard rumors of her. Undoubtedly it was inconceivable to them that she
could be alone and elude them that long-that she must have some organization
helping her.
She smiled a little, to herself'. Actually, her most active work in those
three years had amounted to occasionally rescuing a prisoner of these same
jack-booted imitation soldiers, when this could be done without giving away
her true identify. Mostly, her job had been to provide reassurance to the
local Kultans. So that they, like the other dominated peoples of' the Younger
Worlds, would know they had not been entirely forgotten by those still holding
out behind the phase-shield of Old Earth. Holding yet, against the
THE CHANTRY GUILD                             5
combined strength of the Younger Worlds and the self-named, multitalented
Others who ruled them.
But now, her hopes lifted. Those following had delayed almost too long. She
had at last reached the little hillock of flourishing undergrowth and young
trees, which she had transplanted here three years before with great care and
labor. She stopped; and, almost casually, began to tear up a strip of turf
between two of the trees.
That, she thought, should intrigue them enough to keep them from rushing upon
her too swiftly. The turf came free, as it had been designed to do; being
artificial, rather than real, like the rest of the vegetation in the hillock.
Below it was the metal face and handle of a ship's entry port.
At last, she moved swiftly, now. A second    later the door was open and she
was inside, closing it behind her. As she turned the handle to locking
position, the blast from a power rifle rang ineffectively against its outer
side. She took two strides, seated herself in the chair before the command
panel and laid hands on the controls.
A Dorsai courier vessel did not need time to warm its atmosphere drive before
responding, even after three years of idleness. Almost in the same moment as
she gripped the control rod, the ship burst from the hillock, sending an
explosion of earth, grass and trees in all directions. On ordinary atmosphere
drive she lifted and hedgehopped over the nearest ridge. As soon as she knew
she was out of her pursuers' sight, she phase-shifted the craft clear of the
planet in one jump. Her next shift was almost immediate, to two light-years
beyond the sun just now rising, which was the star called Beta Procyon by
those on Old Earth.
Out at last in interstellar space, she was beyond pursuit and discovery by any
ship of the Younger Worlds. Here in deep space, she was as unfindable as a
minnow in a world-wide Ocean.
She glanced around the unkempt interior of the vessel. It was hardly in
condition for a formal visit to Old Earth, let alone to the Final
Encyclopedia. But that was beside the point. What mattered was that she had
got away safely past whatever ships had been on guard patrol around the Worlds
under Beta Procyon. Ahead of her still lay the greater task, the matter of
6                    Gordon R. Dickson reaching Old Earth itself-, which would
mean running the gauntlet of the Younger Worlds' fleet besieging that world.
Somehow she must slip safely through a thick cordon of much better armed and
ready battleships, to which her own small vessel would indeed be a minnow by
comparison.
But that was a problem to be dealt with when she came to it.
CHAPTER
2
Through the library window, the cold mountain rain of early winter in the
north temperate zone of Old Earth could be seen slanting down on the leafless
oaks and the pines around the little lake before the estate building that was
the earliest home he could remember, as Hal Mayne. Overhead, obscuring the
peaks of the surrounding mountains, the sky was an unbroken, heavy, gray
ceiling of clouds; and the gusts from time to time slanted the rain at a
greater angle, and made the treetops bow momentarily. The darkness of the day
and the lowering clouds made the window slightly reflective; so that he saw
what was barely recognizable as an image of his face, looking back at him like
the face of a ghost.
An unusually early winter had commenced upon the Rocky Mountains of the North
American continent. An early winter, in fact, was upon the whole northern
hemisphere of the planet. Outside, the day was chill and dismal, sending
forest creatures to their dens and holes. Within the library a fire burned
brightly in the fireplace, with the good smell of birch wood, started by the
automatic machinery of the house on a signal from a satellite overhead. The
ceiling lighting was bright on the spines of the antique books that solidly
filled the shelves of the bookcases covering all the walls of the room.
This was the home where the orphan Hal had been raised by his tutors, the
three old men he had loved-and the place where
8                     Gordon R. Dickson he had watched those three killed when
he had been sixteen eleven years ago. It was an empty house now, as it had
been ever since; but usually he could find comfort here.
They're not dead, he reminded himself. No one you love ever dies-for you. They
go on in you as long as you live. But the thought did not help.
On this cold, dark day he felt the emptiness of the house inescapably around
him. His mind reached out for consolation, as it had on so many such
occasions, to remembered poetry. But the only lines of verse that came to him
now did not comfort     * They were no more than an echo of the dying year
outside. They were the lines of a poem he had himself once written, here in
this house, on just such a day of oncoming winter, when he had just turned
thirteen.
Now, autumn's birch, white-armed, disrobedfor sorrow, In wounded days, as that
weak sun slips down From failing year and sodden forest mold, Pray for old
memories like tarnished bronze;
And when night sky and mist, like sisters, creeping, Bring on the horned owl,
hooting at no moonMourn like a lute beneath the wotfskin winds, That on the
hollow log sound hollow horn.
-A chime rang its silvery note on his ear. A woman's voice spoke. "Hal," said
the voice of Ajela, "conference in twenty minutes. " "I'll be there," he said.
He sighed. "Clear!" he added, to the invisible technological magic that
surrounded him. The library, the estate and the rain winked out. He was back
in his quarters at the Final Encyclopedia, in orbit far above the surface of
the world he had just been experiencing. The rain and the wind and the
library, all as they would actually be at the estate in this moment, were left
now far below him.
He was surrounded by silence -silence, four paneled walls and three doors; one
door leading to the corridor outside, one to his bedroom, and one to the
carrel that was his ordinary
THE CHANTRY GUILD                               9
workroom. About him in the main room where lie stood were the usual padded
armchair floats and a desk, above a soft red carpeting.
He was once again where he had spent most of the past three years, in that
technological marvel that was an artificial satellite of the planet Earth, the
Final Encyclopedia. Permanently in orbit about Earth. Earth, which in this
twenty-fourth century its emigrated children now called Old Earth, to
distinguish it from the world of New Earth, away off under the star of Sirius
and settled three hundred years since.
Around him again was only the silence-of his room, and of the satellite
itself. The Final Encyclopedia floated far above the surface of Earth and just
below the misty white phase-shield that englobed and protected both world and
Encyclopedia. Too far off to be heard, even if there had been atmosphere
outside to carry the sound, were the warships which patrolled beneath that
shield, guarding both the satellite and Earth against any intrusion by the
warships of ten of the thirteen Younger Worlds, beyond the shield.
Hal stood for a moment longer. He had twenty minutes, he reminded himself'.
So, for one last time, he sank into a cross-legged, seated position on the
carpeting and let his mind relax into that state that was a form of
concentration; although its physical and mental mechanisms were not the usual
ones for that mental state.
They were, in fact, a combination of the techniques taught him as a boy by
Walter the InTeacher-one of those three who had died eleven years ago-and his
own self-evolved creative methods for writing the poetry he had used to make.
He had developed the synthesis while he was still young; and Walter the
InTeacher, the Exotic among his tutors, had still been alive. Hal remembered
how deeply and childishly disappointed he had been then, when he had not been
able to show off the picture his mind had just generated, of the birch tree in
the wet autumn wood. The raw image of the poem he had just written.
But Walter, usually so mild and comforting in all things, had told him sternly
then that instead of being unhappy he should feel lucky that he had been able
to do it at all. The ability Walter had said, was not unknown, but rare; and
few people ha@ ever been able to conceptualize on that level. He had explained
10
Gordon R. Dickson
that the difference between what most could manage and what Hal had evidently
been able to do was the difference in the creation of what Walter gave the
name of "vision, " as opposed to an "image" -quoting an ancient artist of the
twentieth century who also had the capability. "Most people can, with
concentration, evoke an image," Walter had told him, "and, having evoked it,
they can draw it, paint it, or build it. But an image is never the complete
thing, imagined. Parts of it are missing because the person evoking it takes
for granted that they're there. While a vision is complete enough to be the
thing, itself; if it only had solidity or life. The difference is like that
between a historic episode, thoroughly researched and in the mind of a
historian, ready to be written down; and the same episode in the memory of one
who lived through it. Now, is it an actual vision you're talking about?" "Yes.
Yes!" Hal had said eagerly. "It's all there-so much you can almost touch it,
as if it was solid. You could even get up and walk around it and see it from
the back! Why can't you try harder and see it?" "Because I'm not you," Walter
had answered.
So, now, under the pressure of his concentration, but for the last time, there
seemed to take shape in the air before Hal a reproduction of the core image of
the Final Encyclopedia's stored knowledge.
Its shape resembled a very thick section of cable made of red-hot, glowing
wires-but a cable in which the strands had loosened, so that now its thickness
was double that it might have had originally-it appeared about a meter in
cross section and perhaps three meters in length.
In this mass, each individual strand was there to be seen. Not only that; but
each strand, if anyone looked closely enough, was visibly and constantly in
movement, stretching or turning to touch the strands about it, sometimes only
briefly, sometimes apparently welding itself to another strand in what seemed
a permanent connection.
Originally it had appeared before him like this thanks to the same
technological magic of the Encyclopedia that had seemed to place him in his
old home, below. With the broadcast image he had formed this continually
updated vision in his room so that he could study it. But over the years, as
he had come to
THE CHANTRY GUILD
II
learn each strand of it, he had begun to be able to envision it by
concentration alone.
He had begun this study after seeing Tam Olyn, then Director of the
Encyclopedia, standing in the data control room and examining the same image
perpetually broadcast there. For all Hal knew, at the moment that room and
image could be next door to him now. There was no permanent location within
the Encyclopedia to any of its parts, because it moved them around at the
convenience of its occupants.
Tam Olyn had been Director of the Encyclopedia for nearly a hundred years.
Before that he had been an interstellar newsman, who had tried for his own
personal revenge to turn the hatred of all the occupied worlds upon the
peoples of Harmony and Association, the two self-named Friendly Worlds
colonized by the Splinter Culture of both true faith-holders and religious
fanatics.
Tam had blamed them, then, for the death of his younger sister's husband-to
avoid facing his own guilt for that death. When he had failed to make the
Friendlies anathema to the rest of the human race, he had at last seen himself
for what he had become. Then he had come back here, to the Encyclopedia, at
which he had once shown a rare talent. Here, he had risen to the Directorship;
and he alone had learned to identify the knowledge behind each apparently
glowing strand, merely by gazing at it, without the help of the instruments
used by the technicians who were always on duty in the core room.
So it had been Tam's example that fired the imagination of Hal. For a moment
even the vision before Hal now dimmed, overlaid in his mind by the gray shadow
of the old man. Tam would be sitting alone, now, in those quarters of his;
that had been transformed by the Encyclopedia into an illusion of a woodland
glade with a stream running through it, its day and night always as the
surface of Earth directly below him saw the sun or not.
Tam would be alone now because Ajela, the Assistant Director, had left him to
hold the conference. Alone, and waiting for death, as someone weary at the end
of too long a day might wait for steep. Waiting, but holding death, like
sleep, at bay; because he still hoped for a word from Hal. A word of success
Hal had not been able to bring him.
12
Gordon R. Dickson
Three years before, Hal had had no doubt he would bring that word, eventually.
Now, after those slow years with no progress, the time had come when he must
face the fact he never would. He must announce it at the conference of which
Ajela had reminded him. He could not be late, after his unusual offer to
attend, when for so long he had avoided such administrative discussions
between Ajela and Rukh Tamani, the faith-holder and kindler of Old Earth's
awakening.
Now, Hal tried once more to concentrate on his vision of the knowledge store.
He had gone beyond Tam in the reading of it. Like Tam he could know from a
particular part of a glowing wire which specific bit of knowledge it
represented. But, more than Tam, he had been able to reach through to 'hat
knowledge directly; though he had failed at becoming able to read it.
It would not have been a conscious reading in any case. What the knowledge
was, would have simply, suddenly been available there in the back of his
memory. A dead and buried bit of memory; but one which, with an effort, he
would have been able to bring alive to his conscious mind. It was not that he
lacked mental space to hold so much information. He had tried, and found that
that same back of the human mind-though not the consciousness up front-could
contain all the knowledge the Encyclopedia itself held; which was all the
knowledge remembered and known on the world below.
But so far it was still, to him, an untouchable knowledge   ' To bring it
back to life required its being put to use consciously; and this final step
his conscious mind had proved incapable of. The human conscious could only tap
stored wisdom along the straight-line, simple route of concrete thought-one
piece at a time.
For the last year and a half he had struggled to find ways to put to conscious
use the whole of the stored knowledge. But he had found none, and in
consequence the doorway to the Creative Universe he believed in had remained
closed to him. Yet he knew it was there. All the art and inventions of
recorded history attested to that fact; each piece of art and each invention
was an existing proof that a purely Creative Universe, where anything was
possible, could be reached and used. He had made use of it himself to create
poems-good or bad, made no difference, as long as they had had no existence in
the known universe until he
THE CHANTRY GUILD
13
made them. And they had not. But still they came only from his unconscious.
So, the doorway was there. But he could not enter it. What he wanted was to
physically put himself inside it, as he might put himself inside another
physical universe. The bitter part was to know it could be entered, but not
know how. Since he had been born as Donal Graeme, the Dorsai, he had several
times entered it; but always without knowing how he did so. Once, had been his
return to consciousness among the historically fixed events of the
twenty-first century. In that instance he had made use of a dead man's body to
move about, had heard a carved stone lion roar like the living animal; and he
had come back from that past time to a moment eighty years later than he had
left, physically changed from an adult man to a two-year-old boy.
The doorway had been there for him to pass through then, seemingly simply
because he had believed then he could do it. Why could he not find that belief
again, now? Unless he could; and unless he could enter it at will, knowing how
he had done it, all he had accomplished and experienced in three different
personas had been wasted.
He told himself grimly, now, that the goal he had set himself a hundred years
in the past as Donal Graeme could only have been a false one. All he had
achieved had been to prod the historic forces of humanity into giving birth to
the Others, and the eventual certainty of Old Earth's conquest and
destruction.
He could not go on this way, possibly only making matters worse. But, even
thinking this, he had weakened. Now, even with Ajela and Rukh waiting, he was
going to try to find the doorway one more time before giving up forever. He
sat, filling his mind with the storehouse of knowledge represented by the
image before him, until it was all within him.
He tried, once more, to use it, to enter the place where he could use it.
And . . . Nothing. He sat unchanged, unenlightened. The knowledge lay like a
dead thing within him, useless as books forgotten as soon as they had been
read, cloaked in an eternal darkness. "Hat," said the voice of Ajela, "Rukh
and I are already here
14                 Gordon R. Dickson
in my office. Are you coming?" "Coming," he answered; and put the image of the
knowledge core, together with all the hopes of his lifetime, away for good.
CHAPTER
"Sorry I'm late," Hal said. He came in and sat down in the empty float
remaining of the three that were pulled up to Ajela's large desk, now awash
with paper. That had never been the case up until the last year. Now, with Tam
almost helpless physically -not because his body had been damaged, or lost any
of its natural strength, but because the living will in him to move it was
fading-Ajela begrudged every moment she could not be by his side. "You weren't
tempted to change your mind about coming?" Ajela asked. Her blue eyes were
sharp upon him. "No," said Hal.
As usual, the controls of the Final Encyclopedia had aligned his quarters with
the corridor that led for a short distance past the Director's office, which
Ajeia had used since Tam had quitted it permanently, two years before, naming
Hal to succeed him as Director. Hal had had to walk only a few meters to get
here. "No excuse. No delays. I just forgot the time."
Rukh Tamani, he saw, was also looking at him penetratingly. The two women had
been talking as he came in-something about Earth, of which Ajela had, somewhat
unwillingly, become, de facto chief executive. This, because simply as a
practical matter, with Hal leaving everything to her in order to search for a
way into the Creative Universe, she controlled the
16
Gordon R. Dickson
Final Encyclopedia. More importantly she had defacto control of the
Encyclopedia's contract for the services of the Dorsai.
For the Dorsai, when they had come to the defense of Earth at Hal's urging,
had been too wise from over two hundred years of experience not to insist that
they would refuse to give their lives without the usual contract for their
military use.
Knowing history, and the minds of those on worlds that had employed them, they
had made their contract with the Encyclopedia; ignoring all the frequently
quarreling local governments of Earth, itself. That had meant that, in theory,
at least, the defense of Earth took its orders from this desk of Ajela's.
Hal knew, and the two women at the table knew, that the Dorsai would have come
to put their lives and skills at the service of the Mother World, in any case.
The contract they had signed called for compensation for two million trained
men and women, warships and equipment, which represented a fully prepared
space force only a full world with the resources of Earth could afford to pay
for; and even that, over an extended period of time. But whether the Dorsai
would ever actually collect their final pay or not made little difference.
They all knew that, barring a miracle, the odds were there would be few of
them left to collect when the time came.
Without the breakthrough that Hal had been unable to make, these three now in
this room, at least, were aware that the Others, with all the war resources of
the Younger Worlds ava' lable, must, in the end, prevail. Driven by the
remarkable intelligence and destructive intentions of their leader, Bleys
Ahrens, eventually that fleet outside the shield would grow large enough to
break through; and, dying in droves if they must, overwhelm the more
skillfully crewed, but less numerous, ships that could be put up in opposition
by the Dorsai alone.
Thirty-one hundred and sixty-two fighting ships, operated around the clock by
a scant two million people divided into four shifts-three of them working and
one rotating in reserve at all t1mes-were few enough to patrol the inner
surface of a globe lar@eenough to enclose, not only the Earth itself, but the
orbit of the Final Encyclopedia. The day had to come when the Younger Worlds'
fleet would phase-shift through the shield in incredible numbers; and the end
be sealed.
The fact that the Dorsai would be dead before the forces of
THE CHANTRY GUILD
17
the Others owned the skies over a helpless Earth would be little consolation
to Earth's people when that day came. "To catch you up on what I've just been
talking over with Rukh," said Ajela, 11    we've got unexpected good news from
below in the shape of the latest statistics."
The concept of "good news" jarred on Hal in the face of what he knew and had
come here to say. But, surprisingly, he saw that Rukh was clearly in agreement
with Ajela's assessment. Both women were looking at him with what seemed to be
lifted spirits-and the difference was particularly noticeable on Rukh's part.
She had been pushing her frail physical strength to the limit by adding much
of Ajela's office work to her already excessive speaking engagements down on
the surface, so as to free the other woman, Ajela, to have as much time as
possible with Tam in his last days.
The least Hal could do for them, he told himself now, was to listen first to
what they had to tell him before delivering the bad news of his own hard
decision. "Tell me," he said.
Ajela picked up a paper from the desk before her. "These are statistics from
Earth as a whole, compiled from all the areas," she said; and began to read: "
'. . food production as a whole up eight per cent-' (in spite of all those
wild complaints we've had that the phase-shield cuts down on needed sunlight
over growing areas-) 'metals production up eleven per cent. Metals directly
required in spaceship production up eighteen per cent. Production of warships,
fullyfitted, armed, and test-flown, now up to an average of one every three
and a half days. Enlistment in the training camps for spaceship crews by
Earth-born applicants, up'-listen to this, Hal-'sixty-three per cent!
Graduation of fully trained but inexperienced crew people up eleven per cent
' ' *' "
She continued to read. Rukh was also watching her now, Hal saw. He sat
listening to Ajela and watching them both. Rukh's dark-olive face seemed to
glow with an invisible but palpable inner light from under her black crown of
neat, short hair.
That light had always been there, since he had met her in the camp of the
guerrillas she had led on Harmony. But it seemed to stand out more now,
because she had never really recovered Physically from her weeks of torture at
the hands of Amyth
18
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
Barbage-then an officer of the Harmony Militia, and now, ironically, her most
dedicated disciple and protector.
It was an index of the power of her faith that, simply by being what she was,
she had been able to turn that lean and fearless fanatic from what he had been
to what he was now. Strangely, also, her unbelievable beauty had been
heightened rather than lessened by that ordeal in the prison. She seemed in
some ways to Hal-and he knew that those who flocked in their thousands to hear
her felt it even more strongly-more spirit than flesh.
Underneath the wine-colored shift she wore, with its long sleeves and
collarless neck, Hal knew she now weighed only slightly more than ten pounds
over the weight she had been reduced to when he had carried her, more dead
than alive, out of the Militia prison on Harmony. The skin was still stretched
taut over her meager flesh and bones. And at that moment there was a glint
from the narrow column of her neck, as the highly polished lines of a cross
incised in a gray-white disk of Harmony granite, hung from a steel chain-the
only thing resembling an ornament he had ever seen her wear-caught the
overhead lighting of the room. It flashed momentarily with a light not unlike
the light behind her dark eyes.
There were no circles under those eyes, no tightening of the skin over her
cheekbones-if that were possible-to show the exhaustion that must be within
her. But Hal knew she was tired, self-driven to the point of near-collapse;
for she would not refuse the hosts of people down on all parts of the Earth
who begged to see her in person. And she would not step back from the work she
had taken to herself up here, too.
Nor could he blame Ajela for allowing her to take over the work at this desk.
Ajela had not asked to be the ultimate authority over a clamoring, bickering
Old Earth that was only now beginning to wake from its illusions. At last, now
that it was possibly too late, Earth was beginning to realize that, if not for
those who had come to its aid unasked, it would have been as vulnerable-or
more-than any other of the human-inhabited planets.
Like Rukh, Ajela showed no obvious physical signs of the strain she was under;
but the responsibility of her position, plus the gradual, inevitable slide
toward death of the old man she loved more than anyone else on all the
inhabited worlds, was gradually conquering her. In short, both of the people
on which
19
the Encyclopedia depended for control, were closer to reaching their limit, in
Hal's opinion, than they realized-or were ready to admit.
It showed particularly in Ajela's case, in these last few months, that what
she chose to wear had been different from the commonsensical clothes she had
always worn and programmed the Final Encyclopedia to have ready for her at the
beginning of each workday. Strangely, for someone Exotic-born, these last few
months she had begun to dress flamboyantly-sexily, to be blunt about
it-although Tam was almost the only person who saw her much. . . .
His thoughts were wandering. He tried to pull them back to the statistics she
was reciting, but they insisted on straying again . . . certainly, as she was
costumed now, no one could appear in greater contrast to Rukh than Ajela,
unless it might be Amanda. Hal hastily thrust the thought of Amanda from his
mind.
Ajela still looked almost as young as the day he had first met her here in the
Encyclopedia, when he had been running from the killing of his tutors, on his
estate, eleven years ago. Her skin was still as fair; and her hair around her
bright face as literally golden and long-in fact, perhaps lately she had worn
it even longer. She wore a brown brocade tunic over silky gold blouse and
pantaloons that all but hid the cinnamon -colored slippers on her feet. There
was no necklace around her neck, but earrings of a honey-colored amber; and on
the middle finger of her right hand shone a ring with a large, irregular chunk
of the same color of amber, containing tiny seeds encased there, looking alive
and ready to sprout, even after the hundreds of years since the amber had been
gathered.
Her face was round, her skin fresh. But in her he thought he saw the tightness
around the eyes that was not visible in Rukh. No single sign, but her whole
self, to him who knew her so well, betrayed an inward-held but growing
desperation; growing, he knew, from her inability to keep Tam from death.
She had come originally to the Encyclopedia from Mara, one of the two Exotic
worlds, where part of the philosophy had been the hope that an evolved human
race would outgrow any need of death except by choice. Thoughts of those same
two Exotic worlds brought Kultis and Amanda to his mind again . . . almost
savagely, he pushed her out of his thoughts.
20
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
21
-Ajela had come here as a young girl of twelve, with her parents' permission;
in love with the idea of the Encyclopedia. which Exotic funds had largely
financed. She had stayed to rise to the position of Assistant Director, under
Tam Olyn; and to also fall in love with Tam, himself, although already by that
time he was old enough to be her great-grandfather.
Now she and Rukh sat together at this desk with its load of paper piled over
all its surface except the small rectangles of the viewing screens inset there
before each of the three of them. All these screens right now showed a view of
space directly above and about the Encyclopedia.
The white opacity of the shield wall was directly overheadand it thinned off
in every direction, as the screens' angle o@ vision began to slant, revealing
both the inner and outer walls of the shield, until finally there were only
the lights of the stars against the black of airless space. The sun, Hal
thought inconsequentially, must be directly overhead, to be hidden by the
greatest thickness of the mist-wall. It could not be they were nightside now,
for it had been afternoon at the estate, almost directly below them-
He woke suddenly to the fact that Ajela had stopped talking and both Rukh and
Ajela were looking at him. Like an echo half heard lingering on his ear, he
realized that Ajela had laid down her paper and asked him something. "I'm
sorry," he said, and his voice came out more harshly than he had intended,
under the gaze of those waiting eyes, "I didn't catch the question. "
The faint indentation of a frown line, if that was what it was and not an
expression of puzzlement, appeared between Ajela's hazel eyes, followed
immediately by an expression of concern. "Hal," she said, "tell me-do you feel
all right?"
Concern was showing on Rukh's face as well. Their reactions doubled the sense
of guilt in him. "I'm fine," he said. "I just wasn't listening as I should
hale-that's all. What was it you asked me, just now?" "I said," said Ajela,
"that we'd thought of checking with one of the Dorsai Sector Commanders. But
since you said you were coming today, we thought we'd rather ask the question
in-house. You just heard that remarkable list of how the Earth is finally
realizing it has to help defend itself, and beginning to build some muscle. Do
you think there's a chance, now, if we
keep on improving this way, building ships and training crews for them, that
we can put up a fleet as big as anything the Younger Worlds can throw at us?
And, if so, how long would it take? Can we match them before they're ready to
try a mass breakthrough of the shield?" "I can only guess," he said.
Ajela looked disappointed. Not so much, Rukh. "We thought . . .," Ajela said,
"because you told us how you were really Donal Graeme to begin with . . ."
"I'm sorry," Hal shook his head. "You two are the only people outside of
Amanda who know about my past and my being first Donal, in the last century,
then Paul Formain, two hundred years before that. But now Donal's only an old
part of me and deeply buried. Much of what he was I've worked to get away
from. But even Donal could only have guessed." "What would he have guessed,
then?" asked Rukh.
Her voice came at him so unexpectedly, for some reason, that Hal almost
started. He looked at her. "He'd guess-pretty strongly I'm afraid," he
answered slowly, --that it wouldn't matter what the answer to your questions
would be, because it wouldn't make any difference, even if you were able to
match the Younger Worlds' ship power. I I
He hesitated. It was hard to dash their hopes this way, too, when he had come
to dash them as well in another. :'Go on," said Ajela. 'It wouldn't matter,"
Hal said, "because Bleys Ahrens doesn't want victory. He wants destruction.
He's as determined to destroy the Younger Worlds as he is to reduce Earth's
population to just those who'll follow him. In the case of the Younger Worlds,
he plans to depopulate and impoverish themso humanity will eventually die off
there. Or be reduced at Iasi to a handful of people who, lacking communication
with other civilized worlds, will degenerate into savagery and eventually die.
Die, because they'll be moving backwards from, not forward toward
,civilization. At the same time he and his mere handful of Others can move in
and take control of a depopulated Earth.- "He's said that, I know," said
Ajela, "but he's not insane. He can't really mean-" "He does," said Hal. "He
means exactly what he says.
22
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
23
That's why he doesn't care how he bleeds the Younger Worlds to conquer Earth.
All that matters is the conquest. So he'll throw his ships through the shield
at you eventually; no matter what defensive position you're in. I think you'll
find your Dorsai knew this and faced it from the start." "Thou art saying,"
said Rukh-and her rare use of the canting speech of her religious sect was
evidence enough that she was deeply moved, --that there's no way Earth can
win. "
Hal took a deep breath. "That's right. There isn't, in any ordinary way." "I
can never accept that," said Rukh-and with her words Hal again remembered her
as he had first seen her, on Harmony, in all the physical strength and purpose
of her earlier years. The power pistol she had worn strapped to her hip, then,
had not been as strong as the sense of will and purpose that drew followers to
her. "For Bleys to win he must extinguish God; and that he or no one else can
ever do." "Think, Hal," said Ajela. "Earth's got as great a population still
as all the Younger Worlds combined. It still has as massive resources of metal
and other materials as all the Younger Worlds, combined. If we can match their
strength, or even come close to it, why can't we fight them off even if they
jump through in mass attack?" "Because it'll be a suicide attack," said Hal.
"That's the measure of Bleys' control over the crews of the ships he'll be
sending in. Each one will be a weapon of destruction, aimed at any target it
can reach. The greatest number of them will only take out one of our ships.
But some are going to reach the surface of the Earth. Only a few, maybe, but
enough to kill off billions of Earth's people in the phase-explosions of their
impacts. "
Rukh was looking hard at him. "Hal," she said, "you're talking very strangely.
You're not telling us to give up?" "No," he said. "That is, not you. But I'm
afraid I came here today-I've got something rather hard to tell you both."
"What?" said Ajela. The single word came at him like a command. "I'm trying to
say          he began.
The words sounded suddenly clumsy in his mouth, and he felt
heavily the effort of continuing. ". . . that maybe it's out of our hands to a
certain extent. The phase-shield, the Dorsai coming, the contributions of
wealth and knowledge from the Exotics, all the true faith-holders from Rukh's
two worlds-in the end they all came here only to buy time while I found an
answer to Bleys' plan." They were both staring at him. He went on. "That's
been the only possible plan, ever since, as Donal, I found out that in welding
the Younger Worlds into a political unit-and playing with the laws of history,
as Paul Formain -I'd produced an unexpected side effect-the emergence of the
Others, the most able of the crossbreeds between the Splinter Cultures."
He looked at them. He had expected some response-at least a protest that it
had not been him alone that they had all been depending upon. But neither of
the other two said anything; only sat, watching and listening. "A group like
the Others," he said, "has always been outside our control. Something neither
the commercial skill of the Exotics, the Faith of the Friendlies, nor the
fighting abilities of the Dorsai were equipped to stop. Because the Others
attack the instinct of the human race to grow and progress in a new way. A way
no one had foreseen." He stopped, but neither of them said anything. He went
on. "We dreamed of superpeople and, God help us, we got them," he said, "only
too soon and with a few things like empathy and a sense of responsibility to
the race, missing. But they've been unstoppable from the first because their
powers are powers of persuasion, which work on a majority of humanity. You
know all this! Otherwise, why would the only immune ones be the true Exotics,
the true faith-holders among the Friendlies, the Dorsai, and that majority of
full-spectrum humans on Earth who've got that in-born cantankerous
individualism that's always rejected any persuasion?"
He paused a moment, then went on. "So it's been necessary from the first that
a new answer be found for this new threat. And it's been up to me to find it.
I thought I could lay the devils I'd raised. Well, I was wrong. That's what
I've come here to tell YOU today. I've faced it now. I've failed."
There was a moment's utter silence. Ajela was the first to react.
24
Gordon R. Dickson
"You!" said Ajela. "You, of all people, Hal-you're not going to sit there and
tell us there's no such answer!" "And if you tell us so," said Rukh, "I will
not believe thee; for it cannot be."
She spoke in a voice that was completely serene. As serene as a mountain,
barring a pathway.
CHAPTER
4
Hal gazed at Rukh, almost helplessly. "No," he said. "No, of course not. It's
not that the Others can't be stopped; it's just that I can't stop them, in the
way I hoped to. The rest of you haven't failed. I've failed." "Thou art
alive," said Rukh. The mountain was as impenetrable as collapsed metal. "Thou
canst not therefore use the word failed-yet. " "I could go on trying
indefinitely," said Hal, "but it'll be best for everyone under the
phase-shield if we face facts and I Stop trying. Now." "But wh 'y should you
stop?" said Ajela. "Because for a year now, I've tried to take the final step,
and I can't do it. Ajela, you understand how the memory of the Final
Encyclopedia works. But Rukh-'* He turned to the other woman. --how much do
you understand'?" "Call it nothing," said Rukh, calmly. "Some scraps of
understanding I've picked up in my time here. But essentially I know nothing."
"Well, I want you to understand as well as Ajela," Hal said, "because it's not
easy to explain. Rukh, briefly, the Encyclopedia's memory is, for all
practical purposes, bottomless. It already holds all the available knowledge
of the human race. Theoretically, it could hold no one knows how many times
that much more, added to what's there already. You see, like the
25
26
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
27
phase-shift we use to travel between the stars in our ships, and the
phase-shield that protects Earth, now-to say nothing of the earlier one that's
guarded this Encyclopedia for twenty years-it's a product of phase mechanics."
"I know nothing of phase mechanics," Rukh said. "No one else fully understands
it, not even our own Jeamus Walters, here," said Hal. "You know him?" "The
Head of Technical Research at the Encyclopedia," answered Rukh. "And you've
seen the representation of that stored knowledge in the Operations Section
down below us?" Hal said. "I've seen it, yes," said Rukh, "like a mass of iron
wires red hot. And the people working with it made some attempt to explain it
to me; but I still understood almost nothing." "Basically," said Hal, "what it
represents isn't the knowledge itself, but the so-called 'tags' that identify
each piece of information stored in the Encyclopedia. The information itsell
can be as extensive as a book-set of encyclopedias, or larger; but the tags
are each represented by only a tiny section of the knowledge-chains that look
like wires in the display." "Yes," said Rukh, "Irememberthem telling
methatmuchat least. " "And you know Tam was unusual in that, by just looking
at the image, he could to a certain extent read it?" "Yes." Rukh frowned.
"Wasn't there something about his finding evidence that at least two of the
visiting scholars from Earth had been spies for Bleys? Back at a time when the
Encyclopedia was always open to qualified scholars from all the Worlds?"
Hal nodded. "That's right," he said. "But you have to understand something,
The addition of any new information always causes a slight movement in one of
the chains--the apparent wires. There were tiny differences of position that
gave away to Tam that the knowledge store had been systematically searched
across wide fields of knowledge, in a way no one scholar would have needed to
do. But if you'd been there and asked him, he wouldn't have been able to tell
you what the knowledge was they'd examined. He could read the display, but not
what it represented, not the actual information itself, and in spite of three
years of trying, neither can I.-
He stared hard at her. "Do you follow me? The difference is the way it would
be between having an encyclopedia in a set of books but with each book locked
closed, so that you couldn't get at the information in it. " "Ah," said Rukh.
She looked back at him appraisingly. "So Tam could see, but not read? And
you-?" "I was only able to go a little further," said Hal. "I spent two years
at it; and I got to the point where I could hold the whole display in my mind,
as I had last looked at it. But the information's still locked away from me,
too." "Now I don't follow you," saidAjela, leaning forward across the table
toward him. "Why do you need to do more than that? Or even that much?"
He turned to her. "Because two things are needed to create anything-say, a
great painting. The concept, which is the art of it, and the skill with colors
and brush that's the craft behind its making. To have a great dream is one
thing. To execute it in real elements calls for a skill with all the elements
involved; and that requires knowledge. "
Ajela was frowning, he thought doubtfully. "Look," he said, "you could tell
yourself 'I'd like a castle.' But to create that castle in the real universe,
you'd have to know many things; the architecture of its structure, all the
crafts of building with different materials, even knowledge about the ground
that would have to support its weight. To physically enter a creative universe
you have to first create at least some kind of Physical place to support your
presence there. To do that, you need to know everything about the surface
below your feet, the atmosphere around and above you, what kind of sun you
want in the sky overhead . . . and a long, long list of other things.    " "I
see, then,- said Rukh. "So that was why you wanted to be able to read from the
knowledge of the core image directly?" "I'd have to be able to," said Hal.
"It's impossible otherwise. " "In effect," Ajela said, her voice sharper than
usual, "you were hoping to enter the Creative Universe and use there any or
all of the information stored in the Final Encyclopedia-by ma ing some use of
phase mechanics, using your mind, alone?"
28
Gordon R. Dickson
Hal nodded, slowly. "Very well. I now understand the size of the problem. But
why give up now?" demanded Rukh. "Why, at this particular point?" "Because I
believe the sooner I'm gone, the sooner my quitting is likely to improve the
odds for all the rest of you." "What makes you say that?" Ajela's voice was
even more sharp.
He was a little slow answering. He had been carried away by the unusual
emotion behind his own last few words. "I'm hoping that with me gone, the
pressure I've exerted, balancing the pressure of Bleys in the historical
forces, will be removed; and the sudden vacuum will cause the forces to react
against his side of the argument, rather than ours. It might even . . . be the
cause of our winning, after all, by some different route." "What would you do,
then?" Rukh's voice was abruptly soft.
Hal smiled grimly. "Take a new name for the last time, perhaps," he said.
"Go down to the surface and enlist with the real Earth-borns who'rc signing up
for training by the Dorsai. Anything, so that as a major force I'd be
permanently out of the picture. I could probably be useful on one of those new
warships they're turning
Z_ out so fast." "Thou wouldst go looking for death," said Rukh, "which is a
sin in the Name of God. And how would doing anything like that be best for the
rest of us?" "I think it might rectify a mistake I made, attempting to
influence the historic forces," Hal answered. "That's no answer," said Ajela
with an absolutely nonExotic near-approach to exasperation. It was, thought
Hal         'a sign of the exhaustion in her finally beginning to wear her to
the quick. "To make an excuse out of something the workings of which
apparently only you fully understand!" "I've never claimed I fully understand
the historic forces," Hal said. "I doubt if anyone in the human race will, for
generations yet. There're simply too many factors operating in every case. But
I thought you, at least, did-enough to understand why I'm doing this, Ajela."
"I thought I did too," she replied, "but evidently I don't. You've talked
about it many times, and explained it I don         ,t
THE CHANTRY GUILD
29
know how often. Let me see what I remember. You've said something to the
effect of-'the course of history is determined by the cumulative effect of all
the decisions resulting in physical acts of the people alive in the race at
any given time. It used to be thought that only a few people made decisions.
We now realize that these people are influenced by the people around them, and
those people by more people around them, until in effect every person may have
had an influence on decisions made, and therefore on the course of history.
Thefarther back in history we go, the slower the influence of the mass of the
people concerned, on any decision point. ' " "That last bit's the crucial
one," said Hal. "In earlier centuries it often took a very long time for mass
decision to shape history; though it always did, in the end. The difference
between then and now is communications. Present communications make it
possible for the effect of mass attitudes and actions to have an effect almost
immediately within the chain of human interaction. The minute I leave here
permanently and this becomes known to the worlds in general, attitudes will
change throughout the race and the effect of those changes be noticed very
quickly. As I say, my going will leave a vacuum opposing Bleys; and the
instinctive inertia of the historic forces should cause the racial momentum to
react against him and for us." "How?" said Ajela. "You know what I've been
after from my beginning as Donal," said Hal. "I've been trying to push
humanity toward a greater instinctive sense of responsibility. Apparently this
last effort, trying to access the Creative Universe, was too much force in one
direction. The historic forces pushed back by Producing something new, that
none of the present human social groups could fight against. The Others, with
their ability to influence any political structure from behind the scenes.
They Push away from responsibility, toward instinctive obedience."
He stopped, unsure about whether he had made sense to them Or not. "And?" said
Rukh. "And so you've got the present situation, with Bleys heading up the
other faction, and me, until now, heading up ours."
I'll in still waiting to hear," said Ajela-but she said it patiently' this
time--what this has to do with your giving up and going off, as Rukh said, to
look for death."
30
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
31
"It removes me as the spearhead on our side," said K.%@. "That gives Bleys and
the Others too much of an advantage That means, as I said a few moments ago,
he'll be the one wh(-, pushing against the balance of forces; and they'll
react agair,t him." "What'll happen?" said Ajela. "I don't know," said Hal.
"If you start to estimate sonic     -
thing like that, you have to begin by estimating the influence of my leaving
on people, like you, immediately around me. Then you have to figure in the
impact of your reactions on the larger group of humans around you, and then on
those around theiii. and so on and on-until you're into backlash reactions;
and in the end you have to take everyone in the human race into account. "
"Have you forgotten Tam?" interrupted Rukh. "All these years he's been like
Simeon, in the Gospel according to Luke, in the Book of God. You know the
story of Simeon?" "Yes," said Hal, both his memory and his work with the core
of the Encyclopedia bringing the passage back to his mind. "I don't!" said
Ajela. "Tell me."
Rukh turned toward her, but Hal knew that her words were still aimed at him. "
'. . . And behold,' '' said Rukh, as steadily as if she were reading from
pages open before her, " 'there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon;
and the same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel;
and the Hol1v Ghost was upon him. " 'And it was revealed unto him by the Holy
Ghost that lie should not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ. "
'And he came by the Spirit into the temple: and when the parents brought in
the child Jesus to dofor him after the custoin of the law, " 'Then he took him
up in his arms, and blessed God and said, " 'Lord, now lettest thou thy
servant depart in peace accordt.ng to thy word, , , 'For mine eyes have seen
thy salvation.'
Rukh paused, and Ajela turned her gaze unwaveringly back to Hal. "If you give
up now, Hal," said Rukh, "what about Tarn. whose whole life has been waiting
for you to fulfill the promise he found in you?"
Hal felt the pain of her words as if it was a physical thing inside him. "I
know what it'll do toTam," he said harshly. "But the race has to come first;
and the only hope for the race I can see now is for me to step out of the
equation. I've got to go; leaving the natural actions of the historic forces
to guide us to what I couldn't reach by myself. Those forces have kept the
race moving forward and upward from the beginning. It was my own good opinion
of myself that led me to think I was necessary to moving it where it needed to
go." "But what about him, when he learns you've quit?" said Ajela fiercely.
"What about him, I say?" "Let him . . . " The words were painful to Hal, but
he had to say them. "Let him go on thinking I'm still trying . . . to the end.
It's the kindest thing; and there's no choice about my going. I have to keep
repeating-un less I actually remove myself, the pressure on the historic
forces won't change. Rukh-"
He turned to her. "You understand now, don't you?" he said. "All that can be
done is let me go; and hope . . . "
But, surprisingly, Rukh was no longer listening to him. Instead, she was
looking down at the screen inset in the desk-top before her. "There's someone
outside-a very small ship dodging around outside the shield, trying to get
inside right now," she said to Ajela, as if Hal was not only not speaking, but
no longer there. "There is?" said Ajela.
She looked down at the screen before her and her fingers began to fly on the
control pad beside it, tapping out commands. "We've talked before, you'll
remember," said Hal, hoping that if he spoke on quietly, they would give up
whatever had fascinated them on the screens and return to the important matter
at hand, "about how the human race is, in some ways, like a single composite
organism-a body made up of a number of separate and individual parts, the same
way a hive of bees or an ant colony can be considered a single individual-"
But they were not listening. Looking into his own screens, Hal saw the focus
there was now all on the movements of the small ship Rukh had mentioned. At
Aiela's tvved commands
32                   Gordon R. Dickson the screens were using the capabilities
of the Encyclopedia to cancel out the visual blocking of a direct sight at the
phaseshield, so that the ship outside it they watched was clearly visible,
dodging among the enemy vessels.
Puzzled, Hal watched it, also. Its driver-no one who was familiar with
spaceships used the ancient word "pilot" anymore -was phase-shifting in small
jumps. His or her craft, a midge among the warships on patrol out there, was
obviously trying to keep the gathering enemy from getting into formation
around it. Meanwhile, it was jockeying for a position where it might be able
to jump through the screen.
Just at that moment, in fact, it achieved the position it wanted, and jumped
through. It was instantly englobed by two wings of defensive ships, driven by
Dorsai commanders much more capable than those in the enemy ships
outside-besides having had the advantage of being able to lie in wait for the
small craft.
The enemy warships did not attempt to shift through in pursuit. They probably,
thought Hal, had orders not to in any case@ but if they had they would have
been easily destroyed by the better Dorsai-built craft and their more capable
crews. The incoming vessel lay still in the midst of the defending vessels,
making no effort to escape.
There was a chime on the air of the office. "Forgive this interruption,
Ajela," said a masculine voice. "I know you're not to be disturbed during
conferences; but this is a ship asking to be allowed into the Encyclopedia,
and you left orders-" "It's small enough to get into one of the locks?" Ajela
cut in. "Yes," said the voice.
The vessel entrances of the Encyclopedia, Hal knew, had been designed for the
shuttles that carried people up from the surface of the Earth and back down
again, or out to other ships. By ordinary warship standards the lock
dimensions were impossibly small. For any regular space warship, it would have
been like a bear trying to get into a badger hole. "Good. Permission to come
in granted." Almost in the same breath she went on. "Hal," she said.
He raised his head at the sound of his name. "Hal, I want you to put this
decision about giving up on hold, for a few days at least. This ship coining
in is one I've been
THE CHANTRY GUILD
33
expecting. It just may have some information that could change the way you
think. If you don't mind, I want to talk to the driver alone. So would you
mind leaving the office, now? Rukh, wait for a minute, will you? There's
something more I want to say to you. "
Hal looked back, surprised. Ajela had not merely asked if he would wait a few
days before making his decision-a decision he had believed he had already
made-she had, in effect, ordered him to wait. Not only was that unExotic, it
was totally unlike her; and to top it off, she had no authority to order him
to do, or not do, anything. Technically, she was his assistant. Though in
justice he knew how little he had actually run the Encyclopedia; and how fully
she had.
She could probably force him to stay, for a while, at least, by refusing him
transportation to the surface; but the thought of the situation coming to that
pass was ridiculous.
However, of course he would wait; for as long as she wanted. Or rather, for
any reasonable length of time. Anything else was unthinkhble. But the way she
had put it was strange. It had to be her exhaustion talking. As, come to think
of it, was her excluding him from whatever business she had with the driver of
this incoming ship. The driver was almost certainly one of those who had
volunteered to go out as a spy on to one of the Younger Worlds; so that Earth
would have some idea of how matters stood out there. Though how apything so
learned could affect his present decision to leave . . . however, there was no
point in worrying about it now. "Of course," he said.
Getting up, he went out of the office, back toward his own quarters. There
was, in fact, one more thing he was going to do in any case; though there was
no telling if it would do any good. That was to write down and make sure it
was stored in the Encyclopedia itself, all he knew or had learned, surmised or
come to believe, about the Creative Universe and the possible ways into it.
He would include an account of the ways he himself had tried and failed. It
might save whoever took up the work someday Some time that otherwise might be
wasted in duplicating efforts that had proved useless.
Behind him, neither Ajela nor Rukh even looked up from their screens as the
door closed.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
35
CHAPTER
5
Amanda had made it to the system of Earth's Sun in five phase-shifts, where
any non-Dorsai would have taken ten and she herself would have broken it into
at least seven, under more leisurely conditions. The last shift brought her
back into specific location deep enough in the gravitic shadow of Jupiter to
hide her vessel from the instruments of the ships besieging Earth. From there,
she paused to examine the situation.
There were more enemy craft on patrol about the whitely gleaming sphere of the
phase-shield than there had been when she had last had a report on the
situation of the Home World.
It was to be expected. But Amanda chilled as she watched. It was that strange
part of her which occasionally saw, or felt-neither word was quite right-what
would or might be. In this case, it was the sight of the ever-growing military
power of ten worlds massing for invasion about the single planet that was
their Mother World, Old Earth; and she envisioned what was coming not as clear
pictures in her mind, but as massive shapes half seen, moving in a clammy mist
which obscured all things.
In this instance, what she sensed was something like a huge tidal wave,
growing, growing, ready to smash down on sleepy small homes and other
buildings, which would be wiped clean from the surface of the land, as if a
giant's hand had passed. And it would come, as soon as the wave was large
enough, ordered to its hammer-strike by that small but all-powerful
group of highly intelligent but self-indulgent men and women who, under Bleys
Ahrens, controlled all the Younger Worlds.
But there was some little time before that, yet. For now, the enemy ships
blocked entrance by any others to the sphere whose surface they dared not
touch; and their coverage was good. She studied them in her viewer screen.
They were divided into Wings of six ships each, and each Wing patrolled a
curved, rectangular sector of the globe that was the phase-shield.
Theoretically, that gave them complete coverage. But Amanda noticed that they
cut inside the comers of their rectangles when a Wing's patrol route took them
past one. There was a way of making a sharp corner with a spaceship in such a
situation, but it required a minuscule space shift each time.
It was not that there was any difficulty involved in calculating or making
such a tiny shift. But each time, the ship making it took a one in a million
chance of being lost in mid-shift. Phase-shift technology was based on the
Uncertainty Principle of Werner Karl Heisenberg, which said essentially that
either the position or velocity of a particle could be known at any time, but
not both.
The early twenty-first century, becoming informed on antimatter and a number
of such things that had only been speculated about earlier, discovered that a
particle's change of Position involved it passing through a phase of
positionlessness -in theory, it was spread over the whole universe for a
moment of no-time, before it came into being again at its specific new
Position.
From this understanding had developed a way around the limits of the speed of
light, which until then had seemed to make travel between stars so slow as to
be almost impractical. Humanity had once more gone around a problem, instead
of through it. Spaceships did not actually move by phase-shifting. Rather,
they simply abandoned one defined position, became undefined, and then
redefined at a new position.
The only drawback was that once in a countless number of such movements, they
failed for some reason to redefine at their destination; and stayed instead,
undefined. In effect, they had been disintegrated.
SO, said the history books, Donal Graeme had met his end. Attempting to move
in any way except by phase-shift through
36
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
37
a phase-shield made such a result certain. Otherwise the odds of reaching the
desired destination were very good-but not perfect.
Once in a million times was not bad odds; but to risk them a large number of
times a day, every day, was enough to make more than a few spaceship
commanders and crew uneasy. There was, consequently, sometimes a reluctance to
move closely into the comer of a patrolled rectangle and have to make that
extra shift.
The patrols could of course have covered those corners or normal drive. But,
at the velocities with which they must move to patrol their area, an abrupt,
large change of direction would make jelly of anything as insubstantial as
human bodies inside the turning ship. It was better to curve a little inside
the comer,
Accordingly, the corners of the rectangles Amanda studied were weak areas. She
sat at her calculations for a while, then put her craft into the series of
shifts she had precalculated*
Her first shift was to a space just a thousand kilometers outside the shield
above the south polar regions of Earth. This was far enough so uncertainty of
the besieging ships as to exactly where she would be after her next shift
would lessen her vulnerability. She quickly followed this shift, accordingly,
with another precalculated shift to above the north polar regions.
She paused there for the seconds required to choose which, of several
destinations she had picked as possible for her next move. She chose,
reappearing suddenly above the Equator in an unprotected corner area, keyed in
her precalculated shift through the phase-shield and appeared just inside the
open corner.
As soon as she was inside, she brought her ship to a halt, and dropped its
defenses. It was well she was as swift as she was in doing it; for eight
great, slim shapes of the battle cruisers which made up a Dorsai fighting Wing
were suddenly completely surrounding her.
Her ship-to-ship talk light was already blinking on the panel before her. She
thumbed the stud that opened it from her end. and the tank of her vision
screen came alight with the face ofa Dorsai she did not know, a woman verging
on middle age with an oriental face and high-arched eyebrows. "Amanda Morgan,"
said the other. "We were told to expect you. Hold still for a retina check . .
. Good. You can proceed,
I'm Li Danzhun. You've never met me, but I know you from pictures and your
reputation." "I'm honored you'd recognize me from that little after these
years here," said Amanda.
Li Danzhun smiled at her. "It may be none of us will ever see our homes
again," she said, "but we're still Dorsai. And you're still one of the Grey
Captains. " "Nonetheless," said Amanda, "thank you." "Now I'm honored-- The
other glanced off-screen for a second. "We just got the release signal from
Escort Leader. Go with all luck, Amanda Morgan." "And you," said Amanda.
As suddenly as they had surrounded her, the cruisers were gone. She turned and
drove northeasterly across the skies of the Home World until a mist-enshrouded
sphere, looking like a miniature of the phase-shielded Earth, as seen from
space, appeared on her screen, seeming to grow as she approached it. She was
close now, and the mist was evaporating over a metallic port which itself was
dilating to let her ship inside.
Her vessel was tiny by the standards of interstellar craft, but not so by the
standards of the opening before her. Even for her small ship there was little
room to spare at the entrance. Her ship could be brought in, but even with all
her ship-handling experience it was going to be a tight fit.
But she made it. The vessel settled with a clang into its landing cradle.
Amanda sat back in her control chair, relaxing for the first time in some
days. A voice spoke on the interior atmosphere of the vessel. "This is Ajela,"
it said. "Come as soon as you can. Just follow the corridor beyond the door to
the interior of the Encyclopedia. It's being aligned with my office right now
and You'll find the entrance at its end will let you directly in here. Just
walk in. Rukh's with me. We're alone."
Amanda nodded to herself. She had already changed clothes before shifting
close to the star that lighted Old Earth, wearing the bush jacket and skirt
she thought of as her "shore-going" wardrobe. She got to her feet, opened the
ship's lock and stepped out into the clangor and bright lights of the port
chamber. The ramp that led to the
38                   Gordon R. Dickson interior of the Final Encyclopedia was
almost beside her ship, She had never been here before, but as an educated
person she knew about the Encyclopedia's design and peculiarities.
The ramp led into a suddenly quiet, narrow, blue-carpeted corridor that looked
exceedingly short-but, she had learned, distances would be not only variable
but sometimes illusory within the Final Encyclopedia. There was a door at the
far end, some twenty meters from her. She went to it, opened it without
bothering to give her name to the annunciator above it, and stepped inside.
"Hello," she said, smiling at the two women sitting at the desk at the far end
of the room. "It's about time we met. I'm Amanda Morgan."
CHAPTER
"Take a float at the desk, here," Ajela answered, looking at the tall,
remarkably young-looking woman, whose hair was so light blond it was almost
white. "There's one waiting for you."
As Amanda came from the door, which had provided some measure of her size, her
height became less apparent. The length of her arms, legs and body, and her
breadth of shoulder, so well matched her size that only by some kind of
contrast was it noticeable. She was, thought Ajela, like Hal in that. You did
not realize how large he was, either, until someone you knew to be of ordinary
size stood close to him. She was wearing serviceable, neutral-colored clothing
that somehow did nothing to detract from her presence,
What Ajela found herself noticing in particular was the lightness with which
Amanda moved. She had the body balance of a dancer; and that trait was
curiously in harmony with the otherwise difficult to believe youthfulness she
seemed to project. She could pass, thought Ajela, for a girl in her teens-and
yet Ajela knew her to be certainly older than Hal; and possibly older as well
than either Rukh or herself-not that either she or Rukh were out of their
twenties.
The appearance of youth in the newcomer was so unbelievable it could be
appreciated only when you were actually looking at her. After she had gone,
memory would be doubted. That, taken together with the classical quality of
her
40
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
41
from beauty-even her shoulder-length fair hair and theaptaurrtquoise eyes
somehow fitted-seemed to set her a little veryone else. And yet, even the sum
of all the e i erent elements failed to explain the strongest effect she ma
      on a viewer. There was a power in her.
It was a quality which words failed as memory would. But it was like something
Ajela had never felt before in anyone, It was curiously comparable to, though
not the same as she fel t there to be in Hal when close to him. In his actual
presence she had always been able to feel a concern in him for those around
him that was like the warmth radiated by a lighted fireplace.
With Amanda it was something different. The closest Ajela could come to
expressing it, was that in the other woman there was something which strongly
reminded Ajela of the strength and clean white lines of an Ionic pillar, in a
temple of classical Greece.
To Amanda, on the other hand, as she approached the desk, Rukh and Ajela were
both much as she had pictured them from Hal's descriptions. She had wanted to
see them for herself, for a long time. Not only because of what they were, but
obviously because of what they each in their separate ways meant to Hal; and
because it was also obvious that Hal's affection for each was deep and
strong-running.
It was not that she feared competition for his love of her. She was the Third
Amanda in eight generations of Morgans ;and she had been hand-picked by the
Second Amanda as a baby, in the other's old age, Hand-picked, and with her
natural abilities trained until she was set apart from the mass of people
around her, like a queen.
In this there was more to it than the fact there had been only three Amandas
in eight generations of the Morgans of Foralie, on the Dorsai. In a very real
sense, there had only been three Amandas since the human race began; and it
had fallen to her to be the last and strongest'With or without Hal, she would
be that. But she loved him.
However, now that she saw them in person, she knew that she would like them;
and they would end up liking her-though Ajela would be the slower of the two
to come to it. They were both strong women; and life had also made each of
them the equivalent of royalty, in her own right. Moreover, Ajela had now had
experience in the possession and exercise of great authoritv.
She was dressed in what seemed more like leisure than working clothes. She
wore a sleeveless tunic of medium brown, ornamented with gold brocade over a
blouse of filmier material with balloon-shaped sleeves, above darker brown
pantaloons. Amber bracelets were on her wrists and amber earrings in her ear.
Still, the way she sat and the level gaze of her hazel eyes made these
garments and even her jewelry seem to fit her like a uniform of authority. @
Rukh, on the other hand, had been born, as Amanda knew, with unusual strength
of spirit in her, but plainly counted it as
nothing in her own scale of values. Far outranking any personal power of her
own, the quality that was in her of what she called Faith shone through the
dark lantern of her body, even through the long, high-collared, wine-red dress
she was now wearing, like the light of a candle through the horn windows of
some ancient lantern, illuminating everyone around her. Also, Rukh was older
than Ajela in her experience of life and death; and, like Amanda, had been a
warrior. In fact she was still a warrior, for all that she lived and preached
peace. She always would be. In that one element, if in no other, it was
immediately recognizable to both of them as their eyes met, that they were
alike. "I came right away, as soon as the message reached me," said Amanda,
taking the empty float. She looked at the others sympathetically. It would not
have been easy for either of these to admit to themselves that they were
helpless; and that she might do what they could not. "Faster than we
expected," said Rukh. "We didn't dare say so in the message, but it's Hal, of
course. We knew you'd read that between the lines and come quickly."
Amanda smiled. "It was clear enough, what you wanted to tell me," she said.
"You'd know it would take something like that to bring me back like this. What
is it with Hal?" "He's a case of burn-out," said Ajela bluntly.
She checked herself, rubbing her fingers for a second over her eyes. "Would
you explain to her, Rukh? With Tam and all . . . I think you'll do a better
job of it than I can, right now." "He wants to go looking for death," said
Rukh, "or tells himself that's what he wants, because, you know as well as 1,
42                   Gordon R. Dickson it's not in him to do that. He's just
told us he wants to give up his search for the answer we all need, the search
he's been on all his life." "What brought him to this?" said Amanda.
"Frustration-" Ajela broke off. "Sorry, Rukh. I asked you to tell it. Go
ahead." "But you Ire right," said Rukh. She turned her gaze back to Amanda.
"Ever since he got the necessary people back here on Old Earth and the
phase-shield up, he's been expecting at   any moment to find the last step to
the Creative Universe he's dreamed of reaching for so long. He's been working
at it without a break, all that time. In the process, he's found a way to make
all the knowledge of the Final Encyclopedia available to his mind. But even
with that and all else that's in him, he's made no progress at all. Now he
believes he's got to find a breakthrough, give up, 0, go insane; and, as all
of us know, hC won't accept insanity as a way out. So he plans to quit. Leave.
Enlist with the Earthborns under another name for Dorsai training. " "The
first Dorsai that sees him will recognize who trained him-pick him out in two
seconds from the rest,'     I said Amanda. "Would that Officer force him to
reveal himself as Hal Mayne?" Rukh's voice was level.
There was a moment's silence. "No . . . Of Course not," said Amanda then. "Not
if Hal didn't want it. That's not our way-if he had Personal reasons for not
being recognized or promoted, no explanation from him would be necessary. But
even at that, it's only a short matter of time until Bleys would find out who
and where he was and then all the worlds would know." "Hal wants the Worlds to
know," said Ajela. "He says it's a matter of the fabric of historic forces. He
believes his going would leave a vacuum that'd work against Bleys." "He could
be right in that," said Amanda slowly, after a moment. "But he's wrong in
giving up. Besides, he can't quit. For him, that's impossible. He must have
just worked himself' blind enough to make himself believe he can go hunting
the dragon.
JIM! CHANTRY GUILD
43
"Hunting the dragon?" echoed Rukh. "It's a Dorsai saying," said Amanda
absently. "It means
roughly . . . taking on something you know you can't handle, deliberately to
arrange for your own end."
She looked at them, "Because, you realize, if he did that," she went on,
"there'd be no more cause for Bleys to hold off trying to kill him." "He'd be
safe here," muttered Ajela. "You'd think common sense- "No place is safe, if
Bleys really wanted to get him. Up until now he's shared Hal's point of view;
that if either one took the simple way to a solution by killing the other, it
wouldn't alter the confrontation of historic forces between the two halves of
the race. " "And that's the only reason Bleys has held off, until now?" Rukh
asked. "I thought there was something personal there." "There is, in a sense."
Amanda looked at her, at the slim cross cut into the circle of granite at
Rukh's neck. "We, all of us, each have something. But Bleys has nothing, and
never has had-except in Hal." "How--in Hal?" Ajela leaned forward, intrigued.
"They're worst enemies," said Amanda, "which is close, in a strange way, to
being best friends. Because what makes them enemies is so much larger than
anything personal between them, that Bleys is free to admire Hal-and he
admires no one else in the human race, alive or dead."
She became more brisk. "However . . . tell me when this started," she went on.
"When did he start giving up?" "He didn't mention it until today-in fact, just
before you got here," answered Rukh. "But in himself he must have givcn up
some months ago, Earth time. It showed that far back-to Ajela and myself. We
did what we could; and when nothing helped, finally we sent for you. You got
here just in time." "How many months?"
Ajela and Rukh exchanged glances. Ajela remained silent, so
Rukh turned again to Amanda. "My best guess would be he started giving up
about half a
year ago. Ajela?"
Aiela made a small, almost helpless gesture with one hand.
44                     Gordon R. Dickson " I only really noticed it after you
brought my attention to it, three or four months ago. I've been tied up with
trying to get the Earth-born to pull all together, for the first time in their
history. The trouble's been for the first couple of years, most of them
couldn't actually believe THEY could really        be under attack. But what
with that problem . . . and Tam
She subsided. "I'd say he started thinking he wouldn't ever be able to find
what he was looking for, roughly a half year ago," Rukh went on in a level
voice. "At what point he actually gave up, if he really did-internally, I
mean-I don't know. I agree with you. He hasn't, really, even now. It's just
that he's reached the point where he feels he has to do something, and it
looks to him as if every way's blocked but back; so he's made a conscious
decision to go back, by giving up. What do you think?"
Amanda looked past them. "I think you're right," she answered. "He chose as a
child to go after it-this thing he has to find. It's far too late now for him
to turn away from it. He can make his body and conscious mind leave it alone;
but that won't help. His instinct's to attack a problem and keep on attacking
it as long as he's alive and it's still there. But my guess is his trouble may
not be quite what you've believed. I don't think he could really have gotten
stuck in a dead-end corridor. I think he created it." "How?" said Rukh. "I'm
not sure I follow you, Amanda Morgan. " "I'm sure," said Amanda slowly, "he
thinks he's been trying all sorts of ways to reach through to what he wants to
find and that he could go on trying forever and still not find it. But that
can' t be the real case. " "What is the real case then?" Ajela leaned forward.
"Perhaps, just that he's trying to prod himself to break out and find a new
angle of attack," answered Amanda. "Unconsciously, I think he knows he's
chased this problem until he's lost his perspective on it. He's become
frustrated; and his instinct to attack's betraying him. He's gotten himself
trapped into a circular path, making the same attack at the same no-answer
over and over again; and telling himself it's a different route each time."
She stopped. The other two sat looking at her,
THE CHANTRY GUILD
45
"If that's it," said Rukh at last, in that same level voice, "what's to be
done with him?" "Help him to stand back and take a look at the problem from a
wider angle." "How?" asked Ajela.
Amanda looked hard at her. "I just walked through that door a few minutes
ago," she said. "Up until then I hadn't heard what was wrong with him, let
alone what the symptoms are. I'll think. The two of you might be thinking
also."
There was another silence, this one with a certain sharpness to it. "You're
right," said Ajela. "I'm sorry, Amanda. I've gotten a little too much in the
habit of snapping out questions and orders, these last few years. I'll be
frank. I don't see any answer at the moment; and I get the feeling if there is
one it won't be quick or easy to find." "Yes," said Rukh, "and I think
something else. I think it's not something that's going to come calling in
answer to puzzling over it. Whoever finds it is going to have to feet her way
to it. And the most likely candidate to do that is you, Amanda." "Yes," said
Ajela, "you've got the advantage. He loves you, Amanda. " "You mean, I love
him," said Amanda evenly. "Yes," said Ajela, meeting her gaze squarely, "of
course
that's what I meant."
Rukh's voice interposed itself between them. "Aside from any aspect of
feelings," she said calmly, we've seen him every day-well, almost. Ajela and I
may be too close to this part of the problem, ourselves. You're going to
be looking at him for the first time in some time." "Over three years," said
Amanda.
Rukh looked at her shrewdly. "You're not saying you're out of touch-" "No, he
and I have never been out of touch," answered Amanda. "Don't you both know
people you haven't seen for a long time; and still, when you do get back
together again, you pick up just where you left ofP That . . . only stronger.
He can
have changed. I can have changed. But there won't be any new
d; fr- ---- tt- - -'t -Lp iin in fine @tpn an(] one moment.
46
Gordon R. Dickson
No, the fact we've been separated's not going to be a problem. The problem
will be getting him to accept a solution to hi@ situation besides the one he's
come to himself. The Graemes aic a hardheaded lot; and Donal has never been
turned aside froin his decisions by any other human being." "You think there's
that much of Donal Graeme left in Hal?" said Ajela. "Of course there is,
Ajela," said Rukh gently to hei. "Nobody can ever escape what they've been.
Have you forgotten how much of you is still Exotic? And you left Mara for the
Encyclopedia when you were twelve years old, didn't you?"
Ajela smiled a little wanly. "Perhaps too often, I forget," she said. "No,
you're right. Rukh. It's just that I've always just known him as Hal; and
being an Exotic, I probably don't understand what all the rest of you know
about violence-sorry, Amanda. I know that's the wrong word. " "No, it's not,"
said Amanda. "Is it, Rukh Tamani?" "No," said Rukh. "Whoso thinketh violence,
knoweth violence. It was in God's name, but I knew violence." "But to get back
to what we're talking about," said Amanda, "Rukh's right. I'll have to feel my
way to the answer. That doesn't say I'll find it. Either one of you may be the
one to find it. 11
She smiled at them. "So you'll both keep after it, too?" "You know we will,
Amanda," Rukh said. It was the first time she had used Amanda's given name
only. Amanda smiled in acknowledgement and appreciation and got a
3mile back that took account of the bond of experience between them. "Of
course," Amanda said. "I shouldn't have even asked. Well, then, if you've told
me all you want to say for the moment, can I go to Hal now?" "I'll call to say
you're coming-"
Ajela's hand, which had been reaching out to the control studs on her desk,
checked as Amanda interrupted. "if you don't mind, I'd rather simply appear,"
she said. "Can you just direct me to wherever he is at the moment?" "Of
course," said Ajela. "That's a good idea, in fact. You may well learn more
from him, suddenly appearing without
THE CHANTRY GUILD
47
warning. He's in his rooms. I'll align this corridor outside with them. First
door to your right, then, as you go out." "Thanks," said Amanda, getting up
from her float. "We'll talk again shortly?" "As soon as you want. It may be a
quarter or a half an hour, usually, before I can get loose, if I'm tied up
talking to someone, or in some kind of conference with the people down on the
surface; but just as soon as I can, I'll be available. Tell Rukh whenever you
want us three to meet again." "You can reach me anytime using the internal
communication system of the Encyclopedia," put in Rukh.
Amanda was already on her way to the door. She stopped and turned back for a
moment. "Good, I'll do that," she said, and smiled once more at them. "It's
been very good meeting you both, at last. Don't worry. I trust in Hal-the
inner Hal. You should, too."
Ajela, unlike Rukh, did not return the smile. "We always have," said Ajela
emptily, "but if after all this time he gives up and leaves us, what hope is
there for Earth, for the race? For everyone?"
Rukh turned and looked across the desk at her. "There is hope in God," she
said strongly, "who never leaves us."
Neither Amanda nor Ajela spoke. There was silence in the room. Then Amanda
turned once more, and went, decisively, toward the door. "I'll talk to you
both shortly," she said, and went out
As the door clicked softly shut behind her, Amanda thought that it might not
be all as simple as she had made it sound when she was inside talking about
Hal. One of the other two-it might have been either or both-might have been
putting pressure on him, all these months, without realizing it. Well, she
would deal with that if she came across it. Ajela in particular might have
been guilty of pressuring without knowing it. She turned right, as Ajela had
directed. Ten meters down a somewhat longer corridor than the one she
remembered walking in on the way to Ajela's office, she found the door the
other woman had mentioned. Without announcing herself, she touched its latch
button and stepped inside as it slid open before her. Hal was sitting at his
desk and he looked up to stare at her sudden appearance.
48
Gordon R. Dickson
She stopped just inside the door, which slid closed again; and stood smiling
at his startled face some five meters away from er. "So you've forgotten what
I look like already," she said. The humor and her lightness of tone were a
cover for the moment; for in that second she had seen him for the first time
in three years. What she saw was a big man-for when he had chosen to regrow
from babyhood as Hal Mayne, he had come back not in the bone and flesh of the
man he had been as Donal
6raerne, but like one of his towering twin uncles Kensie and Ian. The Dorsai
were not by any means all big-though statistically they averaged more in
height and weight than those of the other Younger Worlds and Old Earth. But
there were some families, like the Graemes and the ap Morgans, who tended to
run large compared to that average; and some among these were arger yet. Even
grown, Donal had felt like a dwarf among his own family. Therefore the
imitation of Ian.
It was a small vanity. Amanda, who had known Ian in his old age, had teased
Hal gently about it. But she did not feel like teasing him now. The man before
her no more showed obvious physical signs of stress than Ajela or Rukh had;
but Amanda, who knew him so and could look into his soul better than anyone
else alive, saw him there, as gaunt and sharpened by his inner struggles as a
hermit.
But nearly all of that was hidden within him. Outwardly, he showed only the
familiar strong-boned face, with clear green eyes under thick black eyebrows
and straight, coarse black hair; his large and sinewy hands dwarfing the
control keys beside the screen inset in the top of the desk, on which he was
composing some piece of writing.
But the look of startlement lasted only a second. An almost imperceptible tap
of his finger erased whatever he had been working on and he was up and around
the desk, coming toward her. They met in the middle of the room. "I had a
report to make-," she began; but his arms were already around her and his
mouth on hers was cutting off the rest of the words, with a fierce hunger she
had never felt in him before. She responded for a long moment; then pulled her
head back forcibly and laughed up at him. "You won't even give me a chance to
tell you how I happen to be here"" she said.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
49
"It doesn't matter," he answered. He kissed her hungrily again, drowning
himself in her. He had wanted her here for three years, as someone lost in a
desert would want a drink of water; but there was now also something else.
Something new in him this last year, that had feared her coming. For he knew
now that he had been refusing to face the consequences as far as they two were
concerned, of the decision he had just announced to Ajela and Rukh, his
decision to give up.
There was no other way it could be. His leaving the battle while she was still
in it, must part them for good; whether either of them might want it that way
or not.
C P_
PTER
7
Hal woke without opening his eyes, without moving. He felt the weight of
Amanda's upper body and head come down again on the bed beside him. He would
see her if he opened his eyes. This was no pressure field they slept upon,
but, at his own choice, an antique form of spring and mattress such as was
still used on most of the poorer Younger Worlds-which included the Dorsai. In
a pressure bed he would not have been able to feel her movements a millimeter
distant.
So-she had just now again lifted up to look at him as he slept, in the
starlight and the light of the new moon shining t
r hrough the illusion of a skylight in the room's ceiling. She had done that
often, these last three nights. She was skillful enough to raise herself
without waking him, but the return to a prone position was impossible without
doing so. He wondered what she had seen in those dark moments, how much
discovered?
For three days and nights he had avoided talking to her about what he knew he
must talk to her about, eventually. It had been cowardice to have held off
from it this long, the first deliberately cowardly act in all his lives. But
the thought of making it final, by putting it into words that they must go
away from each other-seemed to close off his throat and make him speechless
every time he tried to make himself speak of it.
Or had she read it all in his face as he Jay sleeping? He did not
THE CHANTRY GUILD
51
underestimate her. She was capable of reading deeper into other humans,
including him, than anyone else he had ever known. "Yes. " He rolled over on
his back and stared up at the stars in their true positions as seen from here,
artificial illusion though the skylight was. "We should talk."
She rose on her elbow again and the darkness of her head and shoulder occulted
part of the skylight. In the dimmer illumination of her own shadow, her
features were just barely visible. Her hair, unloosed, fell over her shoulder
and brushed with faint fingers at the left side of his face. For a moment she
looked down at him. Then she lowered her head and kissed him gently on the
lips. Then raised again and stayed looking down at him. "I should have told
you the moment you got here," he said. "But . . ." "It's al I right, dear,"
she said. "I know. Rukh and Ajela told me. You think you have to stop
searching for an answer."
Of course. They would have told her as soon as she got here, when he had just
before that announced it to them. "Yes," he answered. "I've been here for
three years, Amanda; and in all that time-not one step forward."
Her dark head nodded slowly against the stars. "I see." Her voice was
thoughtful. "Up until a year ago," he said, "I still didn't doubt. I was still
sure I'd find a way into the Creative Universe. I know it's there. I know if I
could have found a way in, the advantages would have been overwhelming and
obvious to anyone-to everyone on Old Earth, to begin with. If nothing else,
it'd be a place to which the people could escape, if the force of the Younger
Worlds does finally break through the phase-shield." "And at best?" "Why, at
best-but haven't I told you all this before?" "You've told me very little. A
bit about what you hoped to reach," said Amanda's voice softly. "A good deal
about what made you start reaching, a lot about the past, but little about the
future." "I guess-yes," said Hal. "You're right. I never did tell you much of
what I hoped for. But that was because I didn't want to promise anything I
couldn't . . ."
He ran out of words. He was fumbling for the words he wanted. An unusual thing
for him, and an unusual feeling.
52
Gordon R. Dickson
"You didn't want even me to get my expectations up, in case you weren't able
to do it," Amanda said. "I suppose so. Yes," he answered, 11      you're
right. That was why- Even you." "Didn't it ever cross your mind you didn't
have to prove yourself to me by success?" "I don't know." He hesitated. "Maybe
I was afraid of just what's happened. I mean-not afraid that I wouldn't be
successful; but that I'd have to decide to stop trying while there was still
life in me to try with."
He waited for some response. But she said nothing to help him. He turned again
to face her dark shape. "You know this is different," he said. "No matter what
you feel, and I feel, you know we have to go different ways; if I turn away,
take myself out of the equation while you're still in it. And you know you'll
stay in it. You're what you are. The Third Amanda could never turn her back on
worlds full of people needing her, simply to follow me into nothingness, for
my own sake. What you were born to be and all you were trained to be won't let
you. Isn't that so?" "It would be so," she said slowly, "if you did turn away
yourself. Yes."
It was almost a relief to hear her say it, and know that it was at last
stated, out in the open, final. "That's why I've delayed like this, telling
you," he went on. "Oh, Amanda . . . Amanda . . . "
His throat closed up on him. He could not say any more. Her hand reached out
and stroked his forehead, gently, soothingly, as if he was a child with a
fever. "You're not gone yet," she murmured. "But that's just it," he said,
able to talk again, although talking was painful. "I've already delayed too
long. There's more to it. It's not just me stepping away from an insoluble
situation before it drives me insane. If it were that alone, I'd keep trying
until they had to carry me off. But every day I wait, I hold back the time
when Bleys finds out I'm gone. One day longer to the change that has to come
when the historic forces move into the vacuum where I was." "Are you sure when
they do move, that'll be for the good of' what we've all worked for'? What if
it's for the worse?" "I don't know what'll happen, of course," he said.
"There's
THE CHANTRY GUILD
53
only one thing I know. My quitting's going to leave an imbalance. One that the
forces-which are the result of the reactions of all the people on all the
worlds-won't be able to tolerate. By going I leave Bleys unopposed, too
strong. I explained that to Rukh and Ajela. The imbalance has got to react
against Bleys, where up until now the forces of history were working for him
and the Others." "You're sure of that?" she said. "How can it be or have been
any other way?" He stared through the darkness at her, wanting to see the
expression of her face more clearly. "In all our history, no one person, one
side, ever held the race to its own will for any length of time. Sometimes
inside a generation-or less-all that a great conqueror took, or builder
erected, was gone. Something else had come to replace it. You can say the
civilizations of Egypt, the Dynasties of China, the Roman Empire, lasted for
hundreds of years. But steadily, even while the names lasted, what they stood
for changed. Always. Even the great religions grew, splintered, altered-until
from one generation to another, even a hundred years later, they'd all have
seemed very, very different to someone used to their earlier forms."
Amanda said nothing. She continued to stroke his forehead. "You know this is
true!" he said. "When the balance leans too far one way, it automatically
swings back. If I go, Bleys can never have what he's fought for-a single,
unchanging Old Earth, where all the humans alive are permanently under the
control of him and his kind. The historic forces will make an adjustment
-hopefully for the better. It must happen, just as a
child grows into an adult and an adult grows into old age and death
-inexorably. Without the constant change that brings adaptation, the race
can't survive."
Still she said nothing. Her hand continued to stroke him, that was all. It
seemed she was ready to listen eternally. "I never hoped to stop that
ceaseless back-and-forth, that oscillation," he said. "My only hope was to
take advantage of its momentum to break through to some kind of permanent
improvement in people; a growth, not in anything put together by men and women
as a society, but already waiting in the very hearts and souls and natures of
each one of them, individually. So that on the next swing each living human
would have more be more, and choose more wisely. And this improvemen;
54
Gordon R. Dickson
would have to have come inevitably, as the value of the learning and
self-discipline acquired by each individual, as the price of being able to use
the Creative Universe. If only I could have found the way into it for them,
that pass through the mountains! "
He stopped talking, out of words. They stayed as they were a little while,
Amanda's hand still gently soothing his forehead. At last, however, she
ceased; and took her hand away. "You've thought of what your leaving is going
to mean to Tam, of course?" she said. "Of course," he answered, his voice
thick with self-anger and disgust. "He had faith in me, in my finding a
solution. I've been holding off telling him just as I held off telling you.
But perhaps it's better to, now. But it'll be hard on him, after struggling to
live all these years until an answer could be found. I know it. But I can't
delay leaving any longer. Bleys is driving the Younger Worlds to produce ships
and man them, to the point where it'll kill them. Of course, he wants them to
die. And that makes it only a matter of time before he has what he needs for a
massive breakthrough. As the time before that event shortens, the time in
which my quitting can begin to cause a change in the balance of forces gets
smaller and smaller. I have to tell Tam now, and go-now.
He hesitated. "I'd rather do anything than face him with that news. Anything,
but not face him with it." "You think it means only disappointment to him?"
"What else?" he said. "He counted on me to find it. He counted on me to take
over the Encyclopedia. I can't do either. If I stayed here, there'd be no true
vacuum of power created, and affairs would haul me back into position again."
"But only disappointment, that's all you think it'll mean to Tam?"
He stared through the darkness at her, at the face he could not read. "What
else would there be? What do you mean?" he demanded.
She said nothing for a second. Then, when she spoke, her voice was a little
different, almost detached. "Do you know the children's story of the Great
Dark Place?" she asked.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
55
His mind drew a blank, made an automatic half-effort to call up the knowledge
center of the Encyclopedia to find it; but he was too sick a9d weary inside
for the effort. Besides, he knew Amanda must have some reason for wanting to
retell it herself, or she would not have mentioned it so. "No," he said.
I 'The sun, the rain and the wind happened to meet one day," she said softly.
"And the rain was upset-so upset that he was almost turning into sleet.
11 'It's just terrible,' he told the sun and the wind, 'I've come from seeing
something I wouldn't have believed if anyone had told me about it. A Great
Dark Place. I've never seen a place so dark and terrible. I got away just as
fast as I could. It scared me to death.' "The wind laughed. " 'Come on, now,'
the wind said, 'no place can be that frightening. In fact, I don't believe it
even exists. You're making it up. Isn't he, sunT " 'I certainly can't imagine
any such place,' said the sun.
" 'You go see for yourself then,' said the rain. 'Anyway, I know it's there
and I'm not going anywhere near it, ever again. The very thought of it chills
me clear through-look how my drops are freezing at the thought of it!' "
'Poo!' said the wind. 'Where's it supposed to be-back the way you just came?
I'll go see for myself, right now!' and off he went. "The sun went on his
regular way, because it was important that a day always have the right number
of minutes in it for the day it was; and he'd almost forgotten about the
rain's fright and story, when the wind came up to him. And the wind was so
shaken he was blowing in irregular gusts. " 'Calm down, now,' said the sun.
'What's wrong?' " 'What's wrong?' said the wind. 'I'll tell you what's wrong!
I went to look for that Great Dark Place the rain talked about-and it was
there! Just as rain said! The greatest, darkest place you ever-well, there's
just no describing how terribly great and dark it was. I'll never get over the
fright it gave me-never!' " 'Come, come,' said the sun, for he was a very
large and comforting person, by nature, 'it just isn't possible for any place
to be that frightening. How about this? I'll go have a look for
56
Gordon R. Dickson
myself, right now. There may have to be a few extra minutes in this day, but
we can't go having the rain and wind all upset like that. The weather will
turn crazy, if it's sleeting in the middle of summer and you're blowing a
gusty gale when you ought to be cooling everybody's brow with gentle breezes.
I'll be right back.' "Off he went. But he didn't come right back. In fact, he
didn't come back for quite a while indeed; and when he did, he was exhausted.
While the wind had been waiting the rain had come up to join him and they both
watched the sun approaching. " 'WellT called the rain, as the sun got close
enough to hear. 'Now, you see? Isn't it the most terrible and greatest Dark
Place you ever sawT " 'It certainly is not!' replied the sun as he reached
them. He was hot and more than a little cross, for now the day would have at
least an extra hour in it it never should have had-unless moon could be talked
into shortening the night by that much. 'In fact I don't believe there ever
was any such place. The two of you made it up to send me on a wild goose
chase. I looked high and low. I looked into everything and under
everything-and there's no dark place at all, anywhere! If there was, I
couldn't have missed finding it. I don't think it ever existed in the first
place, and that's the last time I go looking for something like thad' "
Hal had been lulled almost into drowsiness by the soft, regular voice of
Amanda as she told the story. Besides being natural singers, the Morgans of
Fal Morgan were gifted storytellers, and Amanda had all the family skills in
that area. Now, the sudden stopping of her voice woke him suddenly, to the
night and what he had himself been talking of before. "And this dark place,"
he said to her, "it has some particular application to me?" "You know why the
sun couldn't find it, of course," said Amanda. "The dark place was there, but
the sun saw only his own light when he looked. Tam has a dark place, even
after all these years; but when you look at it, you see it so fully lighted by
your own vision, you don't or won't see it as a dark place, because it echoes
a dark place very like it, in you. The memory of your responsibility for how
your brother Mor died."
Hal closed his eyes reflexively -because Amanda's last words had slapped him
like a physical blow. Yet again his mind broulzht him the sieht of William.
the finallv defeated and now
THE CHANTRY GUILD
57
fully insane Prince of the great planet Ceta, as he pressed the button that
opened double doors to reveal the tortured body of what had once been Mor-the
image was as fresh as if it had been yesterday, instead of a century past.
He made himself open his eyes again. "Tell me what you mean," he said. "No one
you ever knew dies-for you," said Amanda; and the eerie near-echoing of what
he had told himself, standing surrounded by the image of the library on the
estate back down on Earth in the mountain rains, just a few days before, was
part of what she always seemed able to do. "Similarly, for Tam, your uncle
Kensie and Jamethon Black, and even David Hall his brother-in-law-will never
have died. Tam's lived with his part in those deaths longer than you've lived
with Mor's death. He's carried his guilt about them more than a century; and
the only hope he's had was that your finding what you've been after would
prove that there were other causes-that it was one of the necessary happenings
that made possible your discovery of a way into the Creative Universe for all
people."
She paused. "So, that's what you're going to be taking from him, when you tell
him you're giving up: his last hope of some forgiveness from the darkness,
before he dies. For Ajela, for the Encyclopedia, even for you in your own
right, he's fought to live that long. But mostly for hope of pardon for what
happened to David and Kensie and Jamethon. Nearly a hundred years of service
here hasn't won that pardon for him. But you might have. This one thing of all
things you couldn't see-because his darkness echoes yours too closely. When
you got close to seeing it, it woke your own guilt over Mor; and so you didn't
want to look deeply into him where his trouble lay."
Hal lay stiffly still in the bed. "You make leaving harder, only," he said.
"No, I didn't realize that about Tam; but knowing it now makes no difference.
What can I do that I haven't done already?" "Did it ever strike you," said
Amanda softly, "that you've been going at the problem of entry to the Creative
Universe in what amounts to a head-on attack-like an attempt by pure force on
a fabric or situation, to break through it. Maybe you could back off for a
moment; and try to find a way of
58
Gordon R. Dickson
approaching the problem obliquely, in a way that wouldn't provoke so much
resistance."
He propped himself up on one elbow to stare at her. "By God!" he said. "Even
in this you see more than anyone else can-" He broke off and slumped back.
"But there is no other way. I've tried them all." "You've been too close to
the problem even to see them all," she said. "You think so?" He was silent for
a long moment. "No," he said, "I can't believe that. It's too easy an answer."
She let him think in silence for a while. "If you don't mind a suggestion . .
." she said at last. "I might have known!" He smiled grimly at her, aware that
the moonlight showed his face to her clearly. "No-of course I want a
suggestion!" "Then suppose I tell you that on Kultis, where I've been working
underground, the people have found their own way of resisting the armed forces
Bleys sent to occupy the Exotic worlds? A way that doesn't mean giving up
their commitment to nonviolence? Would it make a difference if I could show
you a
small corner on that world where a new kind of Exotic is coming into being?"
He stared through the darkness at her, letting her words resound and re-echo
in his mind, the implications of what she had just said flying out like sound
waves from each stroke of a clapper against the metal side of some heavy bell.
"New?" he said. "You mean a development-upward?" "Yes. Possibly upward. But
new-I'm sure. Totally new, unmistakably different." "And better?" "I think
so," said Amanda, "there's a group who've revived the old name of Chantry
Guild for themselves; the name of the organization back in the twenty-first
century, that you were once concerned with as Paul Formain. The organization
from which the whole Exotic culture sprang; changed as it was from its
beginnings." "It would mean          He rolled over once more on to his back,
talking to the ceiling as much as to her, again. "It would mean one more sure
indication the race as a whole is on the brink of a step forward. But the
Exotics were a Splinter Culture,
THE CHANTRY GUILD
59
like the Friendfies and the Dorsai. More than the Friendlies and Dorsai, they
were deliberately trying to improve all people. But to make that improvement
now, under these conditions, when everything they have has been given away, or
taken from them . . . it's incredible."
He shook his head. "And even if you're right, would it work here? These are
Old Earth people, the laggards of the laggards . . ."
He fell silent, his own mind answering him with the memory of how for this
last year or so Ajela had been pointing out evidence that on the world below
its peoples, too, had been changing, giving up-more and more of their
millennia-old sectionalism. Ajela had talked of how for the first time they
were
beginning to think and act as a unit. Rukh had insisted, not once but many
times repeating what was said by those who had come
from Harmony and Association to help her speak out against the nihilism of
those who preached support of Bleys' and the Others' attitudes. These
Friendlies had said that, even among those who did not flock by the hundreds
of thousands to see
Rukh herself in person, some still showed an openness, a
willingness to see that it was not really the Younger Worlds, like some horde
of enemies, that threatened them; but a destructive attitude on the part of
Bleys and the Others that was the core and heart of their opposition,
He had thought that by saying these things Rukh and Ajela were merely trying
to lift his own dulled spirits. But perhaps they had been honestly reporting.
Perhaps, even here on Old Earth, there was a new wind of thought, bringing
together the established, self-centered, divided and often
opposed-to-eachother peoples of a world which for some hundreds of years had
trailed behind the rest of the race in its thinking.
If that was true . . . then it could suddenly be important what was happening
on Kultis. If the Exotics were indeed, even in one small spot, anywhere near
breaking through to a new and better form of their particular Splinter-culture
type of social human. If that was the case, he badly wanted to see such a
thing for himself. The problem was, however, he reminded himself, that even if
this was true and meaningful, he could see no way now that it could help him,
personally, with the problem that had stopped him dead in his tracks these
last three vears.
60
Gordon R. Dickson
His spark of momentary excitement had gone out. And into that void Amanda once
more spoke as if she had been thinking his thoughts with him. "Suppose," she
said, "you put off telling Tam-say, for the two months it would take you to go
to Kultis, see for yourself what I'm talking about-and return?" "Yes," he said
slowly, as he thought about her suggestion. Even though his excitement had
cooled, he found he could cling to the thought that, in any case it was two
more months for Tam, Ajela and the rest to hope in. Even Amanda might hope.
She had not asked for herself, but then she would not; although she and he
were so close that he could not avoid knowing how it would cost her to lose
him, just as it would cost him to be parted from her. "I'd like you to go with
me," he said to her. "I'd planned on it," she said. "I'd have to guide you to
the people I've been talking about, anyway. They're hidden as well as they can
be from the Others' occupying military. Once there, though, I'd have to leave
you with them and just drop back at intervals. It's my district and I've got
responsibilities there. Also, in this case, I better not carry you to Kultis
by myself. We'll need a driver." "So long as you get someone who can keep a
secret." "About the fact you're gone from the Encyclopedia?" she said. "Did
you think I wouldn't'? Leave all that to me; and we'll get under way as soon
as possible."
- All right then," he said, "but two months only, including travel time."
"Including travel time. Yes," she said.
He nodded and smiled-for her sake. But it was no use, said the inner part of
him. It was a false hope, only delaying the inevitable, while shortening
vitally necessary time. Desperately, he wished he could find some way of
estimating when the Younger Worlds would have enough properly crewed ships
outside the phase-shield to try a breakthrough to Earth.
But it was no use hoping for that. Even Bleys could not know. It would depend
on how much flesh and blood could stand on the Younger Worlds; how fast the
people there could be driven to produce what the Others needed.
CHAPTER
"You're leaving immediately?" said Ajela the next morning. "Hal---it's bad
enough you're going. Don't tell me you're planning to leave in the next
minute!" "We'd better, I'm afraid," said Hal. "I said two months, which may
make time short enough as it is, at the Kultis end. I don't want to waste any
more going and coming than I have to.
He turned to Amanda. "You've got gear on board    'for me, Amanda?" he asked.
"All you'll need," said Amanda. "Simon's been taking care of that, haven't
you, Simon?"
She was speaking to Simon Graeme, the great-grandson of Ian, who had been
Donal Graerne's uncle. It was a small double miracle that Amanda had been able
to find him to be their driver. There had been none in her being able to find
him on such short notice, even after three years of her being away from her
own people. The Dorsai forces' location system, if greatly less sophisticated,
was almost as swift as the system in the Final Encyclopedia.
But the first of the small miracles came from the fact that he had not gone
out like Amanda to an undercover job on one of the Other-controlled worlds.
Like her, he had had considerable contact with off-Dorsai people, which
ideally suited him for such work.
The second had been the fact that the patrol duty slot he
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Gordon R. Dickson
was in, here at Old Earth, was one he was willing and able to leave. "They've
got a robe Exotics are required to wear," Simon told Hal, "something like a
civilian uniform, all but required by the forces occupying them-you'll see. I
duplicated the one
Amanda's been wearing in a somew at arger sty e, t an s to the Final
Encyclopedia here. Footwear's the real problem; but a lot of the Exotics moved
back and forth to other worlds, including Old Earth, and some of the earlier
stuff's still worn, since everything's hard to get for the native population
these days. "
His voice was a slightly deeper bass than Hal's. Otherwise, considering the
distance in time and relationship between them, they were remarkably alike.
Simon, of course, could have no way of knowing that Hal had once been Donal.
As far as ordinary information went, the Dorsai could only know what all the
worlds knew: that Hal had been rescued as a baby from an antique courier-size
spacecraft that had drifted into the near-vicinity of Old Earth; and that
after being rescued, Hal had been raised on that world by tutors from the
three Splinter Cultures. But Ian had lived long enough that Simon had been ten
years old when Ian died. Simon could not fail to see Ian's likeness in Hal.
If nothing else, Simon must almost necessarily guess they had some kind of
relationship. It was possible he took Hal for a
descendant of a child on another world whom Ian had never acknowledged
fathering. But Hal suspected that his somewhat distant and generations-younger
cousin had actually guessed at something more than that.
But in any case, he had never said anything of what he might have concluded.
In person, there were obvious differences between them. Simon was shorter than
Hal, stockier, with a more wedge-shaped face and dark brown rather than black
hair.
But for all that, the feeling of family was strong between them, as always
among the Graernes of Foralie; and from their first moment of meeting three
years earlier, Simon had shown that he felt it, as did Hal. As far as
appearances went they might have been-not brothers perhaps, but cousins-though
their similarity was most visible, oddly enough, when either or both were in
motion. Simon's body movements were more fluid and
THE CHANTRY GUILD
63
bitlanced, as suited someone who had been born on the Dorsai and never out of
training. Hal's were in some sense innate; and had-strange as the word might
sound-something almost spiritual about them. But when the two men moved side
by side, the attention of anyone watching was somehow drawn to the same
heavy-boned leanness, and cragginess of feature, in them both.
Amanda had located Simon in two hours, Encyclopedia time; and he had been
delivered to them within three hours after that. In the single hour since, he
had got Amanda's ship ready to take them to Kultis. "Thanks, Simon," Hal said
now. A thought struck him. "Would you answer a question for me, come to think
of it. You've had three years here. What do you think of the Old Earth people?
I mean, the ones you've had to deal with since you've been here?"
Simon frowned. "They're different from any of the people on the Younger Worlds
I've met," he said, "and than I'd imagined them. It's hard to put my finger
exactly on how."
He still frowned. "It's as if they're all very aware of the ornamental things
of life; I mean, the things you've got time for after you've won the daily
struggle for existence. C&riainly, they've rebuilt Earth itself in the past
hundred years into a green and pleasant world. But, particularly this last
year or so, I get a feeling from them of a hunger, of sorts. As if they were
lacking something but didn't know exactly what. Rich but unsatisfied, says it
maybe. Perhaps that's why, in spite of belonging to a million different sects,
groups and so forth, they all flock so to listen when Rukh, or one of her
people, lectures them on faith and purpose. I don't know. " "I'd have said
myself that they were in an evangelically ready state," said Ajela. "There's
no doubt about the hunger behind their coming to listen to us. But Simon
Graeme is right. They don't really know what it is they're hungry for." "Yes,"
said Hal. "You've noticed changes, too, then. All right. Another reason to
take a look at Kultis. Also, come to think of it, another reason why we need
to get moving as soon as nn,oJh1(- "
64
Gordon R. Dickson
He reached out to hug Ajela, who was closest; but the golden-haired woman
pulled back from him. "You will not-I tell you flatly," said Ajela, "you will
not leave without seeing Tam before you go."
Her tone was angry, but there was something more than anger in what she said.
"I hadn't intended to, of course," said Hal softly. "I wouldn't leave the
Encyclopedia without seeing him. Can I talk to him now, or is he resting?"
"I'll see," said Ajela, still with an edge in her voice. She got up and went
out of the room by another door than that by which the rest had all entered-a
door behind her desk.
She was back within the minute. "It's all right," she said. "You can see him
now, Hal. Amanda, do you mind if I just take Hal in by himself9 Tam tries to
respond to everyone who comes to see him; and he hasn't got the strength for
more than one person at a time, really." "Of course not," said Amanda-and
smiled. "Not that I imagine you'd let me in, even if I did." "Of course not.
But, I'm sorry-you may have another chance later to meet him and he's not
strong . . . these days. -
"Take Hal in and don't worry about my being upset over missing a chance to
meet him," said Amanda. "Common sense first. " "Thank you for understanding,"
said Ajela. She turned and went to the door she had just come through, and Hal
followed her. The door opened, and shut behind them.
Within, suddenly, Hal found himself in a dimness. No, not actually a dimness,
he realized, but a dulling of the light after the level of illumination of
Ajela's office and the corridors. For a moment it baffled him-as if a thin
mist had sprung up to obscure all that was around him.
Then he remembered that these quarters of Tam's were kept always on a lighting
cycle matched to the day and night of the Earth directly below the
Encyclopedia@ as Hal's illusion of his estate had been under the same rain and
wind as the actual place itself would have been at that time.
On the Earth's surface, directly under them now, it would now therefore be the
ending of the day; a time of long shadows, or of no shadows at all if the
anoroachinp evenim, was closim, in
THE CHANTRY GUILD
65
behind a sky obscured by clouds, as it must be. The light was going from the
surface underneath them, and from this room alike.
Aside from that, the room itself was as he had always remembered Tam keeping
it-half office, half forest glade, with a small stream of water flowing
through it. Beside that stream were the old-fashioned overstuffed armchairs,
and Tam in one of them; though that particular chair had become elongated and
more slantwise of back, so that it was almost as much bed as chair. In this
Tam sat, or lay, dressed as he had been every time Hal had seen him, in shirt,
slacks and jacket. Only this time a
cloth of red and white, its colors garish in the lesser light, lay across his
knees.
As his eyes rested on it, he saw Tam's index finger make a sideways movement;
and Ajela came hastily around Hal and went swiftly forward to take up the
cloth and carry it away out of sight beyond the trees. It was only then that
Hal recognized it as the Interplanetary Newsman's cloak Tam had been qualified
to wear before he came back to the Encyclopedia for good. The cloak was still
set on the colors of red and white Tam had programmed it for over a century
ago, before the death of David Hall, his young brother-in-law; for whom Tam
had considered himself responsible, and for whose death at the hands of a
Friendly fanatic Tam had never forgiven himself.
Hal looked into the old man's eyes, and for the first time saw the stillness
there. A stillness that echoed like a sound, like some massive blow in a tall,
dark, many-chambered structureso that the echoes came back, and came back
again; bringing Hal strangely, in sudden, powerful emotion, a vision of the
weary King Arthur Pendragon, at the end of Alfred Tennyson's poetic Idylls of
the King. Without warning the room was overlaid in Hal's mind with even darker
shadows from the vision built by the poet's lines about that last battle by
the seashore.
. . .but when the dolorous day
Grew drearier toward twilight falling, came
A bitter wind, clearfirom the north, and blew The mist aside, and with that
wind the tide Rose, and the pale King glanced across the field
66                    Gordon R. Dickson
Nor any cry of Christian heard thereon, Nor yet of heathen; only the wan wave
Brake in among deadfaces, to andfro Swaying the helpless hands, and up and
down Tumbling the hollow helmets of the fallen, And shiver'd brands that once
hadfought with Rome, And rolling far along the gloomy shores The voice of days
of old and days to be....
For a long second Hal could not think what had brought these lines and Tam
together in his mind. Then he realized that, like Arthur then, Tam now looked
out and saw no one but the dead. They were all dead, all those he had known as
a child, as a young man, as a man of middle age. He had left them all behind.
in the closed pages of history, long since.
Hal chilled. For in the same way those he had known as Donal were now gone,
all dead. Including Kensie, his uncle, who was one of the deaths Tam carried
on his conscience. And as he looked at Tam now, a whisper came and went in
Hal's mind, a question-will 1, too, come to this?
He shook himself out of the vision, went forward and took one of Tam's hands,
where it lay in Tam's lap. It had been an old hand when Hal had first touched
it, years ago; and it was hardly older looking now. Except that perhaps the
skin had sunk a little more between the tendons, and made the veins stand out
more on the back of it. Tam looked up at Hal. "Here you are," he said. His
voice had been hoarsened by years, long since. Now it was faint in volume as
well. "Is she with you?" "I'm here," said Ajela. "Not you," said Tam, faintly
still, but with a hint of his old asperity. "The other one-damn my memory-the
Dorsai!" "You mean Amanda?" said Hal. "She just got here, but she's leaving
right away, again. I'm going with her for two months to Kultis-if you can wait
for me that long. She thinks she's found Exotics there who are evolving-that's
what I came
to tell you. " "Bring her in here," said Tam. "Tam, too many people-," Ajela
began. "It's my life still," whispered Tam. "I have to see her. I want
11
THE CHANTRY GUILD
67
Ajela went off. Tam's eyes sought Hal's. "You should go with her, yes," he
said, his voice strengthening; so that almost, as Hal stood holding the
ancient hand still in his, there now seemed almost no change at all between
this moment and that when Hal had first taken it, those long years past when
he had come here in flight. He had been running then away from Bleys and the
murder of his tutors; and toward a maturity that would begin with more than
three years working in the mines of metal-rich Coby. Only now, the full weight
of the hand he held hung strengthlessly against the palm of his own larger
one. "I knew she was here. I knew you'd be going off for a while. Got to talk
to her," said Tam; and for the moment-for just the moment now-his eyes were
looking no longer on the dead but on the living. "She'll be right here," said
Hal; and in fact at that moment Ajela brought Amanda through the door behind
him up to the chair. "Tam," said Ajela, "here she is. Amanda Morgan."
Tam's hand pulled away and slid out of Hal's grasp. It reached for Amanda and
she took it in her own. "Lean close," Tam said to her. "Bastard doctors!
They're so proud of giving me eyes like a twenty-year-old in perfect health;
and I still can't see what I want unless I have people close. There, I see you
now."
Their two faces, the dark, aged mask of Tam and the taut-skinned, perfect
features of Amanda, were now only inches apart as she leaned down to him.
"Yes," said Tam, looking into her eyes, "you'll do. I knew you were here. You
see things, don't you?" "Yes," said Amanda softly. "So do I,- said Tam, with a
hoarse, tiny bark of a laugh, "but that's because I'm halfway through the door
to death. Do you believe me, Amanda Morgan?" "I believe you," she said. "Then
believe in your seeing, always. Yes, I know you do that now; but I want to
tell you to believe always, too; except for one time. You love him, of
course." "Yes," said Amanda. "The time's going to come . . . one time, when
what you'll see will be what is to be; but that one time you'll have to
68
Gordon R. Dickson
remember not to believe it. You'll know the time I'm talking about when you
come to it. But, do you hear me? One time, only. You'll see him then, and your
seeing will be right; but if you believe what you see, you'll, be wrong. So,
don't believe, that one time. Have faith. Believe in what you believe,
instead."
Amanda's face was very still. "What are you telling me?" she whispered. "When
the time comes, and you see him in something that must not be, don't believe
it. Promise me. At the hardest moment, the worst time, even though what you
see is true, don't believe. Because he'll need to know you won't believe,
then." "Not believe . . . " she echoed. "Promise me." "Yes," she said, and her
hand tightened on his. "I don't understand, but I'll be ready. If it comes to
that, I'll have faith beyond any seeing." "Good," said Tam on the exhale of
one weary sigh. His hand slipped out of her grasp as it had slipped from
Hal's, to lie again in his lap. He spoke without looking away from her. "Did
you hear her, Hal?" "Yes," said Hal. "But I don't understand you, either."
"For you, it doesn't matter. ,' Tam turned his head away. "You've got to go,"
said Ajela, moving forward. "He's worn out. He's got to rest now."
They turned away from the old man, who was no longer looking at them, as if he
had already forgotten their presence; and Ajela herded them out of the room.
CHAPTER
Amanda's ship, with Simon at the controls, hung in orbit above the night side
of Kultis.
Only one of the planet's moons was in the sky with them. Once, when the
Exotics had been the richest of the Younger Worlds, this, like its sister
world of Mara, had owned a
space-approach warning system that would have signaled the appearance of any
craft within a hundred thousand kilometers of its surface. Now the men and
women who had manned that system were dead or gone, and the very system itself
had been cannibalized of its parts or left to grow dusty in uselessness.
Below, the planetary night side was a round shape of darkness occulting the
stars and the smaller of the two moons beyond; but the instruments aboard the
ship cut through the darkness and the cloud cover separating them from the
surface and showed it as bright as if daylit. The screen showing that surface
was already on close magnification that gave them a view of northern tropical
uplands mounting to the foothills of successive ranges of sharply rising
mountains, tall enough to have their peaks snow-capped even in this climate
and season. As they continued their descent the viewer showed a road running
upcountry past what had been homes and estates, scattered Exotic-fashion with
plenty of land around them; through a small city and on into the mountains.
Amanda was instructing Hal and Simon; particularly, at the moment, Simon.
70
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
71
"We'll be following the route of that road, approximately," she was saying to
him. "The Chantry Guild is in the Zipaca Mountains, that range to our left
there. The more lofty range to the right are the Grandfathers of Dawn, and the
flat valley-floor in between them that widens as it comes toward us is the
Mayahuel Valley. There's a more direct route to where we're going; but I want
Hal to get the context for it all, first-I want him to see some of the rest of
Kultis as it is now. So we'll make a couple days' walk out of it. You set us
down, here . . . "
Her words were precise and clean-edged on Hal's ear, so that they stood out as
if in italics. She had changed, he thought, listening, since that moment with
Tam just before they left. She was more authoritative, more intense.
Without any specific alteration in her tone or her manner, her voice now
seemed to carry the burden of a purpose that took precedence over everything
else. As if she was now driven by something she had committed herself to carry
through at any and all cost.
The difference in her had become apparent to him almost immediately they had
left Tam's quarters for the ship. His first awareness of a difference in her
had been when they were almost to the ship; when she had fallen back from
walking at his side, turning and stopping Ajela and Rukh who were following
them, so that his next few steps carried him beyond the point where he could
hear what she said to them, briefly and in a low voice, before turning to
catch up with him once more.
He had felt an unreasonable, but for a moment very real, flash of irritation.
What was it she had to say to them that he could not be trusted to hear as
well? As they had boarded the ship and all the way to where they were now
above Kultis, he had waited for her to give him some explanation of what she
had stopped to tell the others. But she had said nothing. In fact, she had
acted as if that moment had never taken place; but since then he had noticed
this driven quality in her, this difference.
It must, he thought, have something to do with Tam's vision about which he had
warned her. Had some sort of private spark leaped between the two of them in
that moment, without his seeing it? He told himself it was nothing; it was
none of his business, in any case. But the memory and the difference in her
now gnawed at him regardless.
She was reaching out now to touch the screen and a blue
.circle came to outline the place she had indicated; and then
another, smaller screen suddenly showed a magnified view of the place she had
touched. In that screen they saw things as if they hung only four or five
meters above the ground, over a small patch of bushes just off the road, whose
ruts were black, the higher surfaces between them palely contrasted in the
cloud-filtered moonlight. The road was only some ten meters away from their
point of view. "You see this?" Amanda said to Simon, holding up a white rag of
a cloth, grayed from many launderings and slightly longer than it was wide,
with ragged edges forming a roughly rectangular shape. "I've made a micrograph
of this, so your viewer can identify even an edge of it, if that's all that's
visible. You know our general route. Search along it each night, in the area
of where a day's walk should have taken us. I'll try to display this somewhere
every day or night we stop. I'll put it where the viewer can sight it-tangled
in the branches or laid on top of one of those bushes down there, for example.
One corner should always be folded under; and that corner will point in the
direction we're headed, in case we have to vary from the original route. You
should be able to find it displayed every night, except if we're overnighting
in the city. It's too likely to be suspected as a signal there; so in the city
I may not display it. If you can't find it for one night, don't worry. After
three nights in a row without seeing it or any sign of us you can
investigate-if you think it's reasonably safe for you to do so. Otherwise,
don't try. "No otherwise," said Simon. "Simon," said Amanda. "You're our
driver on this. You take orders." "Not where it comes to any chance that doing
nothing might cost us Hal," said Simon. He held up a hand before she could
speak. "It's what he means to our side, not just the personal connection
between us-or the business of never leaving one of your own behind when you
don't know what happened to them. "
Slowly, she nodded. Hal felt he should say something to refute such an opinion
but there was no easy short way of doing it. In any case, it was too late.
Amanda was already answering. "All right," she was saying, "I wouldn't be
around to stop you, anyway, if it comes to that. Now, if you're satisfied
you've got everything you want to know before we take off, you can
72
Gordon R. Dickson
start setting us down-" She tapped the screen where the closer view now
revealed in one comer the fire-blackened wall of some ruined homestead, rather
than the living villa they had scerned to view from a higher point of
inspection. "Right away, ma'am," said Simon, sitting down to the controls.
"Hat," said Amanda. "Come on back and get dressed." "Redressed, you mean,
don't you?" said Hal, following her into the stateroom. "I've already got
clothes on." "Redressed by all means, if that's the phrase you prefer," said
Amanda, handing him a brown sackcloth penitential robe, similar to the one in
which she had left Kultis. She started to slip out of her coveralls and back
into a robe of her own. "How about you?" she went on. "Are you satisfied you
know everything you need to know? You aren't rusty on your short-language and
signals after three years at a desk?"
She was referring to what was basically a secret language built up and passed
down from one generation of children under twelve years of age to the next. It
gained and lost words from generation to generation, and was different from
family to family. But the children of neighbors as close to each other as the
Graemes and Morgans of Foralie had practically a language in common. The
reference to signals was to the silent body language, varying from minute to
large physical movements, which the Dorsai as a Splinter Culture had refined
into a second tongue they could use to converse, unnoticed, even as bound
prisoners under the noses of captors. "Not in the least," said Hal. "Be sure
then to pay attention if I shout 'court,' whatever else you do. The people
manning the garrisons that the Others put in here live for reprisals."
She was specifically alluding to the effective, short, oneX
Ilable descendant of the ancient cry of "quarter"; which the o[r D sai
professional soldiers had early put to use to advise each other in the midst
of combat that they should disable only, and if possible avoid killing, those
with which they happened to be fighting at the moment.
I'll be listening," said Hal. "Don't worry." "I never worry," said Amanda; and
he was sensible enough not to argue the point with her.
Dressed in their unflattering garments, and carrving bags with
THE CHANTRY GUILD
73
drawstring tops that held all their other possessions, they stepped out of the
ship twenty minutes later into the spicily soft and warm night atmosphere of
Kultis.
Amanda had picked their landing spot well-not that Simon would have done badly
if the decision had been left up to him. A tall stand of trees shielded them
from the road and they had landed in the darkness of one roofless room of the
burned villa they had seen in the vision screen. Its walls lifted above the
spacecraft and hid it further in shadow. "Good luck," said the voice of Simon
from the darkened port. The outer lock door of the port closed and the ship
fell silently upward, out of sight.
Amanda's fingers caught hold of the sleeve of Hal's robe, held and towed him
out of the shadow into the relative illumination of the cloud-dimmed
moonlight; and from there, on through a ruined doorway into further shadow
again-
And suddenly they were under attack. The sounds of feet rushing across grimed
flooring, the rustle of clothing, were adequate warning; along with the stink
of breath and uncleaned bodies. The outburst of yells that came as their
attackers closed around Hal and Amanda was clearly intended to be one of
triumph; and in fact Hal found himself caught by at least three people at
once, two aiming at his upper body and one at his legs. At the same time,
high-pitched to carry over the other voices and noise, came the sound of
Amanda's voice. "Court!"
Hardly fair, thought Hal, more than a little irritated, as he spun away from
those trying to hold him, breaking the finger of one who would not loosen his
hold and throwing a second into a tangle with the third, leg-level attacker.
Here he was, in almost total darkness, barely hours after the three years at
the desk Amanda had talked about, set upon by an unknown but certainly large
number of attackers; and within moments of landing, she was telling him not to
hurt these people too seriously. Those who were now earnestly trying to grab
and hold them did not smell like garrison soldiers who might be eager for an
excuse to indulge in acts of reprisal-
His first feeling of annoyance was wiped out without warning in a sudden
upsurge of something like joy within him. Joy at having something real and
physical to come to grips with after
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Gordon R. Dickson
the past years of fighting imponderables and unknowns. His reflexes from his
training under Malachi Nasuno, the Dorsai who had been one of his tutors as
the boy Hal Mayne; an I his far greater training as the young Donal, growing
up and working as a professional soldier-these all but forgotten memories took
him over. He began to whirl among his foes, tangling them up with one another
and putting them down with throws wherever possible.
An excruciating and sudden bang on the right side of his skull changed things
abruptly. The lightless room seemed to spark for a moment within his own head
and then gray out around him, abruptly chan .ging his feelings to a simple,
instinctive yearning for survival. The only thought that stirred in his
suddenly dulled brain was that he should have sensed coming the blow that had
hit him, and avoided it. Reflexively, he had already dropped to the floor,
gathering himself into a ball as he did so and rolling sideways. He came up
against something and hastily spun away. The Exotics, he knew from experience,
had liked homes with large rooms in them; and the houses he had seen in the
screen of the ship from above had been empty shells. Therefore, there should
be nothing much between the walls to impede him unless it was some other human
being. Moreover, it only made sense that those who attacked him and Amanda
would have let them get into the center of a room, so as to come at them from
all sides at once.
He did not think all this out consciously as he was spinning away from whoever
or whatever he had touched. Rather, it was a conclusion reached just above the
level of instinct. He needed time for his head to clear.
It did, and with his return to clarity came the beginnings of a
burning anger at himself, as well as a return of the unhappiness that had been
growing in him this last year and more. The fact he had been given no more
than part-time instruction by a
Dorsai as a growing boy on Old Earth; and that it had been a
hundred years since, as Donal, he had been personally in action, did not
excuse him. His lacks were clear.
He was no longer a Dorsai in the sense of the fighting potential of that name.
Any adult, properly schooled Dorsai would have been moving with his ears open,
would have built and carried in his head as he fought a lightless mental
picture of what his opponents were doing@ and been ready for that blow.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
7S
He did know that it had been no thrown fist that had hit him; but something
used as a weapon-a length of wood, perhaps.
He listened for a second longer, translating the sounds around him into that
mental picture he now remembered being taught to form. Amanda had cleared away
all who had come close to her and was now nearly at the farther door out of
the room. The ones not still engaged in trying to reach her were feeling
around, trying to find him-evidently under the assumption that whoever hit him
had knocked him unconscious.
Then he was on his feet again, a portion of his attention continually updating
the picture frorn the sounds he heard and looking for a pattern in the actions
of his attackers. There was always a pattern, made up in separate parts by
those who were ready and willing to come to grips; followed by those who would
become willing once the combat began; and those who only wanted to hang around
the edges safely until the prey had been secured by the strongest of their
group and it was safe to pile on, shouting as if they had been in the action
from the beginning.
Now he was ready to move through them to join Amanda. This time, he met what
he had expected. About thirty seconds of contact were enough to satisfy him
now that the group which had jumped them was no more than a dozen adults, of
which only four or five were daring enough to offer real threats.
Almost as soon as the deduction was completed in the back of his head, the
three full-effort fighters he had encountered on his way to the door were
either all put aside or bypassed. Amanda, his ears told him, had already gone
through the farther exit. He followed her; and his ears told him those they
had left behind did not follow.
Amanda's soft whistle asked if he was all right. He whistled back, went toward
the sound she had made, and they came together. "No problem," messaged
Amanda's fingers, tapping his cheek. "We can go on with no more trouble now.
Follow me."
She led him farther through the darkness and they emerged after a bit into an
area of no shadows at all, just as the clouds thinned slightly overhead; and
he was able to see that they were now outside the walls of the ruined villa.
"Some illegal farmers, I think. A family or families who came out to work
their field at night," said Amanda in a normal voice. "They didn't have the
slightest idea who we might be,
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Gordon R. Dickson
except that in these clothes we obviously weren't garrison soldiers and there
might be something in our sacks that could be used by them." "So those were
some of the native Exotics-after only two years?" Hal demanded. A sudden
suspicion stirred in him. "Did you know they were there, when you leci me into
that place?" "No," she said, "but it was likely we'd run into some like that
along the way."
She did not elaborate; and his unspoken question was answered. There had been
a reason she had wanted him to experience that particular type of "new"
Exotic; so different from what she had promised to show him, back at the
Encyclopedia. He tucked the fact away. Her reasons would become apparent soon
enough. "Now," she said, as they emerged from the shell of the building into
the moonlight. Across a ruined level area that must once have been either a
lawn or garden, the surrounding trees made a semicircle of darkness, with a
gap and the hint of what might have been a road or path curving off to the
left to be lost in them. "We go this way."
She led into the woods to the right of the path. "A driveway, once," she said.
"It'll connect with the road a
few dozen meters over. But we'd better stay off the road proper. We'll just
travel alongside it; and we ought to be within an easy day's walk of the city
you saw on the screen -Porphyry's its name. We won't make it before sun-up.
When daylight comes
we'll have to be careful in our travel and avoid reaching the town at the
wrong time of day."
It was a not unpleasant walk by moonlight, for the cloud cover soon thinned to
nothingness, and disappeared completely shortly after that; they moved easily
under Sofia, the more brilliant of Kuitis's moons.
The moonlight revealed, but also hid things. Almost it was
possible for Hal to imagine that there had been no changes since he had been
there last; and this illusion persisted except when they would come upon the
shell of some sad-looking, wrecked and burned-out habitation. In the bright
but colorless light, these remains of what had once been homes seemed almost
magically capable of summoning up in Hal a memory of the lightness and beauty
that the Exotics had put into their
THE CHANTRY GUILD
77
habitations. As if they wrapped around themselves now the ghosts of the beauty
with which the Exotics had always seemed to try to make up for the
abstractness of the philosophy that was their obsession as one of the three
largest and most successful of the Younger Worlds' Splinter Cultures.
There were the noises of night birds, and some insects, and other stirrings,
but no sounds of large creatures. The Exotics had not imported the genetic
starter material for variform animals of any size, beyond what was necessary
for the ecology, except for some domestic animals. Their philosophy looked
askance at the keeping of pets; and most of the things they couldn't do
themselves, they were wealthy enough to buy machinery to do, or to hire
off-planet workers-animals were not needed except for the stock of the dairy
farms or sheep ranches.
The total effect of the night, the different darktime sounds and the soft,
scented air, gave Hal a feeling of dreamy unreality which was still underlaid
with his return to unhappiness, and only partially affected by the growing
headache from the blow to the side of his head. He had been lucky, at that, he
thought, even as he automatically began to exert some of the physical
self-disciplines he had been taught in both his childhoods. His efforts were
not as much to get rid of the pain, as to put it off to one side, mentally, so
that it could be ignored by the normal workings of his body and mind. A little
farther forward and it would have come against his temple, where that much of
a blow, even from a length of tree limb, could-
He woke suddenly to the potential of what he was feeling and stopped walking
suddenly. Amanda checked herself in midstride beside him. "What is it?" she
asked. "I took a hit on the head, back there," he said. "Something more than
someone's fist. Maybe a staff or a club of wood. I didn't think too much of it
until just now-" "Sit down," said Amanda. "Let me take a look."
He dropped into a sitting position, cross-legged on the earth below him; and
was rewarded by a new shock of pain in his head at his body's impact with the
ground. "Right side of my head," he said.
Amanda's fingers went among his hair, parting it as she bent over him.
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Gordon R. Dickson
"This moonlight's bright enough so I ought to be able to see . . . "
She found something by his sudden feel of her touch-a cut, at least. "No
noticeable swelling about the scalp," she said, "but it's the swelling inside
the skull we've got to worry about. Did it feel as if it might be enough to
cause a concussion? What can you tell about it from the inside? How hard were
you hit?" "I couldn't tell you-it dazed me a bit," he said, "for maybe a dozen
seconds, no more. It didn't knock me off my feet. I remember dropping
deliberately and rolling away from the action. Now . . . "
He probed his own sensations for information. It was ironic, here on this
world, that the techniques he was using were as much Exotic as Dorsai. The two
Splinter Cultures had been on a parallel track in these matters; and when they
realized it, information had been freely passed back and forth between them.
Basically, there was much the body could tell the mind that drove it, if the
mind could discipline itself to listen along ancient pathways of nerve and
instinct.
He sat motionless, inwardly listening in this fashion. Amanda sat beside him.
After a bit, he spoke. "No," he said, "I don't think fluid's going to
accumulate in the brain, at least to any point where pressure on the brain by
the skull is going to cause real trouble. But I think I'd better stop; and not
try to travel any more for the rest of the night." "Absolutely," said Amanda.
She looked around. "We're out of sight of the road. Lie back. I'll make you a
bed of twigs and large leaves; and you can shift to that when it's ready."
He lay back, suddenly very grateful to be able to do so; resting his head on a
half-buried root emerging from some large native plant, a sort of tree-sized
bush. He closed his eyes and concentrated his attention, not merely on
isolating the pain, but on holding back the natural responses of his body that
wanted to pour fluid into the bruised area beneath the unyielding bone of his
skull.
Awareness of his body, of its pressure against the naked ground, the moonlight
on his eyelids, and all his other feelings, began to dwindle into
nonexistence. He was relaxing. The pain was dwindling too. The forest around
him ceased to be and time began to lose its meaning. He was only automatically
and
THE CHANTRY GUILD
79
distantly aware of Amanda helping him to shift over a half meter or so to his
right, on to a soft and springy bed a little above the surface on which he had
been lying.
All things moved away from him into nothingness and he slept.
Out of that same nothingness he came into the place he had dreamed of twice
before. He was aware that he dreamed now, but it changed nothing; because the
dream was reality and reality was the dream.
He was once more on the rubbled plain, the small stones underfoot long since
grown to giant boulders. Far back, on his last visit here, he had passed the
vine-covered gate of metal bars through which he had seen Bleys, who was
unable to pass through and be on the same side as he was . . . of what? A made
wall of stone? Some natural barrier of rock? He could not remember, and it did
not matter now.
What mattered was that he was at last coming close to the tower. Always, it
had seemed to recede from him as he worked his way toward it; but now it was
undeniably close-although how close that closeness was, there was no telling.
A kilometer? Half or a quarter that distance? Double or more that distance?
But it was close. Undeniably, no longer distant. It loomed over him, with its
black, narrow apertures that were windows. He should be able at last, now, to
reach it with just a little more effort.
But that was the problem. He was close to weeping with frustration. He lay on
the lip of a steep but short drop to the bottom of a trench perhaps twenty
meters wide; with as steep an upward sweep on its far side. It was perhaps
four times his height in depth; but its sides were not absolutely vertical. He
could slide down this side and go up the other on his hands and knees.
Only, he could not. A terrible weakness had come on him, gradually, over the
long distance he had traveled. That was why he lay on the rocks now like a man
half dead. Now he lacked the strength even to rise to his feet. The trench was
nothing, easily passable ordinarily to anyone with even half his normal
strength; but that was just what he did not have. A lack of strength like that
of the dying Tam Olyn held him where he was.
He concentrated, trying to drive his body with everything that he had been
tau2ht as Donal, and as the bov Hal Mavne. bv all
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Gordon R. Dickson
of his tutors. Sheer fury alone should have been enough to move this dead
carcass that was his body, at least down the slope before him.
But it would not. He realized slowly that the enemy this time was within him.
He could fight what lay outside; but it was himself who kept him from crossing
the trench; though every fiber of his being and all his life was concentrated
and dedicated to the effort of getting through and beyond it to the tower.
He struggled to isolate that inner enemy, to bring it to grips; but it was
everywhere and nowhere in him. Desperate, still fighting, he slipped at last
back into the grayness of slumber and slept until daylight woke him to the
reality that was Kultis.
CHAPTER
10
When he woke, the sun was already well above the horizon. It was unlike him to
sleep so heavily and long, out in the open. On the other hand, his headache
was greatly reduced. As he came to he had not been conscious of it at all-,
but then it began to make itself felt, growing in intensity; and he had
expected it to mount to the sharpness he had felt the night before. Clearly,
though, the blow on his head had done no real harm.
However, the headache had stopped growing at a level that required hardly any
concentration to put it aside from his attention. Still, since he wanted the
whole of his mind free to concentrate on whatever they might run into, he made
the mental effort to shift it out, off to the fringes of his consciousness.
There it perched like a bird in a tree, at roost-still with him, but easily
ignored except when a deliberate attempt was made to check on it.
Amanda had evidently been out gathering some of the wild fruit and vegetable
products of the forest for their breakfast. She had them piled on a large
lime-green leaf, others of which she had used to make a covering over the
twigs which had provided the springs for Hal's forest bed. He recognized some
variform bananas, custard apples, and ugli fruit among the eatables she had
gathered; but most were probably variforms, or hybrid varieties, of the native
flora, adapted to be usable by the human digestive system.
81
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Gordon R. Dickson
Among these were a number of thick roots of various shapes and sizes, and what
seemed to be several varieties of fruit with thick skins bristling with
spines. They had all the unfriendly appearance of the Old Earth cactus pear.
And there was
something that was neither fruit nor root, but looked like the white pith
stripped from inside the stems of some plant.
Cautiously, Hal sat up, prepared for his headache to explode in protest at the
motion. But it did not. He moved forward and sat cross-legged at the edge of
the leaf. Amanda was already seated, cross-legged herself, on its other side.
"Breakfast," she said, waving at the scattering on the leaf. "I've been
waiting for you. How are you?" "Much better," said Hal. "In fact, for
practical purposes, I couldn't be much better." "Good!" she said. She pointed
to the produce on the leaf before her. "Tuck in," she said.
Hal looked at the food Amanda spread out. "With all this why do they need to
come out at night to plant fields?"
"Because they want and need a more balanced diet," she answered. "Also they
want to store supplies for those days when the Occupation authorities won't
let them get out into the woods to gather. Those allowed days have been set up
so that if the local people depended on gathering alone they'd starve to
death. Their passes simply aren't validated for enough so-called 'travel'
days-days they're allowed outside the walls of the town. " "I see," said Hal.
"Also, out here there're only a few variform rabbits and other small wild
animals they can catch and kill to supplement the protein of which they don't
get enough-they need garden
2 ve etables to make that loss up. Plus they need the root @etables that are
best raised in quantity in a plot. Those people who attacked us last night
probably thought we were either there to rob their plot, or we were hunters
who might have meat with us they could legitimately take-since legally we're
on their ground. It'd have to be one or the other, since there's nothing left
to scavenge out here." "You knew they were there," said Hal. "That's why you
called 'court.' "
THE CHANTRY GUILD
83
"I know of that family," she said, "and when they jumped us I guessed it was
one of the nights they stayed out. They leave town and simply don't go back
until the evening of the next day; and either bribe one of the curfew patrol
to report them in, or take their chances on being found out." "I forgot," said
Hal, "this is your work district, isn't it?" "Right up to the Zipaca
Mountains," she answered. "So that's why I had Simon set us down where he did.
I wanted you to see something. That while they still believe in nonviolence
and try to practice it, there's some things some of them'll fight for now; and
one of those is survival. I don't mean all of thern'll fight, even for that;
but more than you'd think. It's one of the changes you needed to see
firsthand, for yourself." "Hardly a change for the better," said Hal, "from
their point of view, I'd think." "Wait until you've had time to see some more
of them before you make up your mind about that," she said. "For now, it's
enough that you've seen that much change. You'd better get some food into
you."
Some small, sudden alteration in the tone of her voice made him look more
closely at her. He thought he detected something nearly mischievous hiding in
the corners of her eyes and mouth, at odds with the usual matter-of-factness
of her appearance.
A suspicion stirred in him. The Morgans and the Graernes, growing up as close
as cousins, had never been above playing small tricks on each other. It was
strange, but somehow mind-clearing, to leave the puzzle of changes in the
Exotics and his own frustrated search to think of himself for once in that
youthful, long-ago context. "You shouldn't have waited," Hal said, calmly
enough. He waved at the food spread between them. "Here, you go ahead."
She raised her eyebrows slightly, but reached out, picked up one of the
strings of what looked like pith just before him and began eating. Evidently,
it was more chewy than it looked. Otherwise her face told him nothing about
its spiciness, bitterness, or any other aspect of its flavor. "By the way," he
said, as he reached for some himself, and bit cautiously into the whitish
cordlike length, "what kind of taste-"
His mouth puckered instinctively, as if he had bitten into a lemon.
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Quite pleasant, actually, if a little bland," she replied cheerfully. "Of
course, you have to be careful to eat it only when it has those pale yellow
streaks like that-oh, that's too bad, you must have hit one that wasn't quite
ripe yet, by mistake. Here, spit it out. There's no point trying to eat it at
that stage. Try one of the others with the faint yellow streaks. I'm sorry! "
He got rid of what was in his mouth. "I'm sure you are!" he said-but she was
smiling; and then suddenly they were both laughing. "So much for the
sensitivity and kindness of an Amanda! Playing tricks like that on someone who
might have had a concussion." "You didn't give me a chance to warn you," she
said. "Oh? And it was pure chance nearly all the ones without yellow streaks
are on this side of the leaf?" "Well, what do you know!" she answered with a
perfectly straight face. "Those on your side are, at that!"
Hal carefully took one of the strips with pale yellow streaks -which were, in
fact, almost invisible-and bit cautiously into it 'The pith from the ripe
plant was as bland-tasting as Amanda had said, with a flavor like bread and a
decided texture. It was, indeed, more like chewing a crusty home-baked loaf
than anything else he could think of. "From now on," he told her, "I expect
you to warn me as I go, if something's going to be flame-hot or anything
else." "I will," she said. Her voice was suddenly serious. "I'm sorry, Hal.
You should have known me when I was young-but I forget, you couldn't have.
Anyway, I didn't have all that much time to play, even then. There was always
too much to learn. You're sure your head's going to be all right?" "Positive,"
he said. An unusual softness and gentleness made itself felt in him suddenly.
"I'll bet you didn't have much time to play, at that, when you were small."
"You didn't either," she said, almost fiercely.
He opened his mouth to disagree, then realized that she was right. From the
time word had come of his uncle James's death, little of his time had gone
into recreation, compared to that of the boys and girls his own age around
Foralie. "That was different," he said. "I deliberately chose my life. " "Do
you think I didn't choose mine?" she said. "The
THE CHANTRY GUILD
85
Second Amanda may have picked me to follow her when I was too young to have
any say in the matter. But she picked me because of what I was when I was
born. I was too young to know what I wanted to drive myself toward; but the
driving was already in me, and working. But she saw it, even then, and gave it
a goal, that was all. After that, I worked the way I did for her because it
was what I wanted to do; not because it was something I had to do. I'd have
been the third Amanda among the Morgans, no matter what my name or my
training!" "Well," he said, still gently, "we are what we are now, in any
case."
They finished eating and took up their traveling again. The day warmed as the
sun rose, but it did not become so much warmer as to be actively
uncomfortable. Still, with Procyon now a white point too bright to be looked
anywhere close to, in the greenish-blue sky overhead, Hal found himself
grateful for the fact they could walk in the shade of the vegetation alongside
the road.
That vegetation was thick, but not tangled. It was undeniably tropical or
perhaps it could be called subtropical, but if the latter, barely so. For one
thing they were at a considerable altitude above sea level; for another, the
angle of the planet to its orbit was something just over ten degrees less than
that Old Earth made to its orbit, so that the tropical zone here was wider.
Down in the steamy lowlands near sea level, the wild vegetation could honestly
be called impenetrable jungle. Here, in spite of the fact it supported
tropical fruits and warm-country plants, it had more of the openness of a
forest. It would be possible to move through it at good speed without cutting
one's way, as they would have had to do in the coastal jungle. There were even
small, open, natural glades, as well as those areas that had been cleared for
homes and their surrounding grounds.
But the roadside trees were tall enough-both the natives and those variforms
which had been imported and found a home here-that the shade was pleasantly
thick. The brilliant sky above was cloudless; and both before and behind them
were the two ranges of mountains-what had Amanda called them? Oh, yes, the
Zipaca and the Grandfathers of Dawn. It was the Zipaca that held the new
Chantry Guild, and lay before them. The Grandfathers were behind.
Both were sharp-peaked. Geologically young ranges, clearly,
86
Gordon R. Dickson
by their appearance. They seemed to diverge to the far left; though this could
not be established certainly, for in that direction the land became lost in
distance and a blue haze. By the same token they seemed to angle together at
the right, though this could also be an illusion of the distance. Ahead of Hal
and Amanda, the land lifted gradually upward toward the Zipacas. But only
gradually. In the main, between the ranges it was tableland; flat, with only
an occasional swell or depression. "Where's the river?" Hal asked.
Amanda turned to smile at him. "So," she said, "you've been figuring out the
terrain." "We're all but surrounded by watersheds in the shape of those
ranges," Hal said. "And the general landslope is against us. There should be a
fair number of smaller streams off the mountain slopes -particularly that of
the Zipacas, ahead, to a large river running downward and back past where we
landed. " , ,Right you are," said Amanda, "there is. It's called the Cold
River; and we landed just about half a kilometer this side of it, so we've
been angling away from it. We'll also be crossing a few small streams today,
but that's all. The place I'm taking you to is short of the next large stream
off the mountains that feeds into the main river."
Hal nodded. "From what I've seen so far," he said, "this valley land ought to
be overlaying older, sedimentary rock, younger than the ranges. I I
"Right. The ranges are young and still growing," answered Amanda, "and you're
right, the rock under us here is sedimentary. In fact, you'll see the lower
reaches of the mountains, when we come to them, are mainly limestone and
sandstone, sheathing the granites and other igneous rocks that pushed up
inside it. That's the reason the mountains seem to rise so suddenly from the
valley floor. What you'll be looking at are slabs of the valley rock broken
off and upended by the mountain rock lifting beneath it. The Exotics liked the
contrast of building the peaceful sort of homes they made, in a geologically
dramatic area like this one." "Little good it's done them," said Hal, looking
at the road alongside them. "They've ended up getting drama with a vengeance."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
87
Into the tar-black, melted-earth surface of the road, deep ruts had been
gouged. "The garrison people drove heavy machinery along these roads
deliberately to break them down," Amanda said.           " It's part of their
organized plan of destruction. Bleys isn't waiting for the normal effects of
time, and the war with Earth, to manage his 'withering away' process for
Kultis and Mara. The Exotics produce nothing he needs; and the Occupation
troops he sent have all but explicit orders to keep trying to squeeze the
local people until the last one's dead." "Squeeze them?" "Well, you see the
road," said Amanda. "In addition to that kind of destruction, they've burned
down all the country homes they didn't have a use for themselves; and made the
people who had lived in them move into the nearest town or city. There,
they've made them live in row house apartments they forced them to build for
themselves, quickly and out of flimsy materials. Also, the town or city
populace is under all sorts of rationing and restrictions. Every day the
people there have to stand in line for hours for their chance to buy the
barest necessities. I mean they're deliberately forced to stand in line for
not enough of anything to go around, available from stores that can only be
open too few hours a day to supply everyone who needs things. Then, there's a
curfew at night and strict laws even about how and where you can move about in
the towns during the day-that's why we're timing this little walk to get to
the gates of Porphyry just a little before they close for the day, at sixteen
hundred hours-not much more than midafternoon, here. " "We're catching up with
someone," Hal said, pointing ahead. "That's right," said Amanda. "You'll see
more and more traffic as we get close to town. All the former off-planet
workers here-they were mainly from Ste. Marie-- Ste. Marie was a somewhat
smaller agricultural world a little farther out from Procyon than the two
planets of the Exotics. "-were shipped home; and most of the large farming
areas they operated on both Mara and Kultis are deserted now, with no Exotics
allowed to try and run them. The locals here can only get permits to go out of
their town for about three hours a dav. on certain davs. to
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Gordon R. Dickson
farm family plots of land that're too small, or too useless otherwise, to do
them much good anyway. That's why we ran into that bunch last night, who were
undoubtedly staying out overnight, breaking curfew so they could get some real
work done on an illegal extra field, by moonlight. They just hope a surprise
housecheck doesn't turn them up missing, meantime. It's part of the game to
quarter the soldiers on the civilian populace, to the advantage of the
soldiers and a better surveillance of the populace."
They had almost caught up now with the traveler ahead of them, who was a thin,
balding man in middle age, pushing a handcart. He nodded in answer to their
greeting as they passed but said nothing, evidently saving his breath for the
job of maneuvering the wheels of the handcart amongst the ruts on the road-the
cart being too wide for the more shady edge on which Hal and Amanda were
traveling. There was nothing more than a scattering of sweet potatoes in the
bottom of the cart; but the cart itself was obviously homemade, and clumsy as
well as heavy. The man was streaming with sweat from pushing it in the sun.
"He's taking the potatoes home to eat, or to sell?" Hal asked, once they were
far enough past to be out of hearing. "Either that, or to barter with a
neighbor," said Amanda. "He'd do better to put a bunch that smal I into a
sack." "Against the law," said Amanda. "All produce, to be legal inside the
city, must he brought in by cart, theoretically to let the gate guards inspect
it for amount, which is limited, per trip; and possible plant diseases, of
which there aren't any. "
They went on their way, and traffic, as Amanda had predicted, increased. All
were people headed into the city, rather than away from it. A fair share of
those were men or women with handcarts, like the man they had seen. Others
simply carried sacks which, Hal assumed, contained something of value that was
not produce. More than a few had the word DESTRUCT! marked in large letters
with black paint on the front or back of their robes. "A lot of town-to-town
travelers," said Hal. "No, they're local, too. Anything personal has to be
brought in by the sack that's forbidden for produce-another law. The ones
carrying those are townspeople who're taking advantage of the regulation that
lets them use their free hours outside the city
THE CHANTRY GUILD
89
to scavenge the ruins of their old country property for anything useful inside
town-not that anything really valuable will get by the gate guards. If there
was, it'd be taken 'for inspection' to ensure there's nothing contraband
hidden inside it. Scavengers are what we're supposed to be, you and 1. I've
got a fake address to give the gate guards. Theoretically, you and I have been
out hunting through what's left of our old homestead." "I see," said Hal. They
went on.
A sadness that seemed always to lurk inside him lately was beginning to grow
once more to uncomfortable strength, as it had when he had stood in his
quarters at the Encyclopedia, surrounded by the image of the estate as it had
been at that moment down on Old Earth.
Now, sister birch, white-armed . . .
Essentially, the ruined buildings, the destroyed and harassed people she
pointed out to him, were his doing. Doubly his doing, for it was his going
back in spirit to animate the body of Paul Formain in the twentieth century
that had helped lead to this. If he had not done that, there would not have
been the splitting apart of the investigative animal instinct in every human,
one part to adventure and grow, one to hold back, to stay safe and unchan.-ed.
He had set humanity free, for this.
He had done it only so that the inner conflict could become an outer one. So
that the two conflicting urges could choose up adherents of individual humans
and resolve the eons-old argument in an open conflict-from which would come
what he had then been sure would be an inevitable victory for the part of
humanity that wanted to grow.
But he had underestimated, even then, the complexity and strength in the
balance of historic forces; the interweaving of every interaction between
every human. That interweaving sought stability; and to get that stability, it
had responded to his efforts by giving birth to those maverick, talented
individuals who called themselves the Others; and whom none of the three great
Splinter Cultures could conquer or control. Not the Exotics who had grown from
the original Chantry Guild of Formain's time; nor the Friendlies, who had
grown from the pureiv sectarian fanaticisms of Old Earth into the nonulations
of
90
Gordon R. Dickson
two worlds which had produced true faith-holders like Rukh: nor yet the
Dorsai, who had evolved from brutal soldiers-forhire to a people who placed
independence, honor and duty above all other things.
The Others had come; and utterly conquered, in effect, all the Younger Worlds
except those of the Dorsai, Friendlies and Exotics. So these last, they had
done their best to ruin. And he, Hal Mayne, who had been born the Dorsai Donal
Graeme, had compounded the damage he had done as Paul Formain, by leaving the
remaining populations of those Splinter Cultures helpless before the Others,
while he withdrew the best that each of the three Cultures had to the defense
of Old Earth. An Old Earth that was only now just beginning to appreciate what
had been done for it.
And to what end? All this sacrifice had been made so that he, himself, should
be free to find what no one else had ever been able to find before-a magic,
hidden universe that would at once confound the Others and open a new stage of
evolution for the human race. It had been a vain sacrifice. In the end, he had
failed everyone else, after they had given the best of what they had, only to
provide him with the chance. Worst of all . . .
The pain mounted in him. It was the deep hurt now inside him that was the
personal retribution the historic forces had brought upon him for the damage
he had done; and he had not even let himself recognize it untiIlast night,
when he had taken a blow on the head no adult combat-trained Dorsai would have
taken, through his own ineptitude. . . .
So now he must face it. He was no longer a Dorsai. He realized now that he had
not been one for a long time; but for that same long time he had refused t(
face the fact. Now, it was inescapable. There were the Dorsai, and there was
Hal Mayne, who had been Donal. But Donal was gone, and Hal Mayne had never
been one of them, for all that he had believcd himself to be so. He was
separated from them as surely as Bleys had been locked away, once in a dream
of Hal's, behind a gate of iron bars.
He half closed his eyes at the agony of realization. But it mounted still
inside him, until he suddenly found his elbow
THE CHANTRY GUILD
91
caught, and the forward motion of his walking body stopped in its tracks. He
was turned, and looked down into the face of Amanda. "What is it?" she said.
He opened his mouth to tell her; but he could not answer. His throat was so
tight that no words were able to force their way out.
Amanda flung her arms around him and pressed herself against him, pressing her
face into his shoulder. "My dearest dear," she said. "What is it? Tell me?"
Instinctively, his own arms went around her. He held to her, this one living
link with humanity that he had; as if to let go would be to lose not only that
life, itself, but all eternity before and after it. His voice came, brokenly
and hoarsely, out of him. "I've lost my people . . . "
It was all he could manage to say. But somehow she read through them to what
was in him. She led him away from the road, out of sight of it. There, she
made him sit down with his back to a tree and fitted herself to him, as if he
was dangerously chilled and she would warm him with her body. He held her, and
they lay together wordlessly.
He felt a tremendous comfort in her presence and her closeness to him. But it
brought peace only to the top level of his mind. Below that was an
ever-widening wound; as if he was a figure cut out of cardboard in which a
hole had been made with a pinprick, which was now being enlarged and torn
apart into a long rip by a pressure too great for him to resist.
But his gratitude for her comfort at this time was immeasurable. After a
little while, still unable to speak, he lifted one hand and began to slowly
stroke the shining curve of her hair. It seemed so wonderful to him that she
should be this beautiful and this near to him; and so quickly understanding of
what was breaking him apart inside.
After a long silence, she spoke. "Now, listen to me," she said. "You've lost
nothing." Her voice was low and soft, but very certain. "I have." His voice
was ragged with tears he did not know how to shed. "First I sold my people
into a death contract; then I lost them." "You did neither." she said. in the
same soft. even tones.
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"Do you remember when you came to the Dorsai to talk about our folk coming-as
many as could-to help defend Old Earth?" "And I met you," he said. "You met
the Grey Captains, and I was one of them." "You arranged for the rest to meet
me," he said, "and I sold them a contract with the Encyclopedia, to die,
defending Earth. " "You sold nothing," she said, her voice unhurried,
unchanged. "Have you already forgotten that the chance of death was always a
part of any Dorsai military contract? Of those who met with you, only two
others besides myself had never actually been in the field. Do you think, even
not counting those three, that the men and women you talked to had not
realized, long before, that one day they would have to face the Others? It was
only a question of where or how."
She paused, as if to let her words sink in. "You showed them those things, as
you had to others, when the part of you that was Donal broke through to your
surface," she went on, "and made it plain to all of us; as he had always made
things plain to people. Has your opinion of the Dorsai mind fallen so low that
you think they-the Grey Captains -thought they could forever put off an
eventual conflict with the Others? When it was the Others who wanted
everything humanly owned, including the Dorsai itself? Our people couldn't
become the assassins that the Exotics asked them to be, to kill the Others one
by one; because life isn't worth certain costs, particularly if that cost is
the abandonment of what you believe in. But you showed them a way to fight in
the way they knew how to fight; and they took that way. How could it havc been
otherwise?"
He could not answer. What she said went through and through him; and, if it
did not heal the great rent in him, it at least stopped its growing. "And
you've lost no one," she went on after a while, still quietly. "You've only
gone on ahead of everyone else a little way; so that you've passed over a hill
which blocks your view of the rest of us when you looked back. You've stared
at that hill so long now, you've come to believe it's all space and time. But
it's not. You've lost no one. Instead, you've joined in the whole human race,
of which the Dorsai were always a part-but only a
part. You've gone on from where Donal stood, alone and solitary. "
They continued to sit for some while after that, neither of them speaking.
Slowly, what she had just said soaked into him, as sea water slowly soaks into
a floating length of timber, until at last it can hold no more; and so,
water-logged, it begins to sink slowly and quietly to the far bottom.
So, in time, what she had told him brought relief. He could not believe her,
much as he would have liked to do so. Because, much as she was Amanda and
understood, he thought he recognized his own life, and his own failure, in a
way no one else could. But the very fact that she had tried to warm the chill
of despair from him like this, as she might have warmed him back from a
death-chill, helped him. So that in time he came back again to her and all
other things. The pain that had come
from the great torn place inside him was still with him; but it had at last
become bearable, as bearable as his headache from the blow had become, when he
had pushed it away from the center of his attention, out to the fringes of his
consciousness. "We'd better go on," he said at last.
They got up and went back to the edge of the road, and continued along it
under the pale brilliant star of Procyon toward the destination she had in
mind for him.
CHAPTER I I
Procyon had started to lower in the sky, but the Kultan evening was still
quite distant when they came out of a belt of trees to sce the edge of the
village of Porphyry before them. The last hall' mile or so, traffic on the
road had increased heavily in comparison to what it had been earlier; but
those they passed, or who passed them, moved at some little distance from each
other. Enough so that any of the travelers who were moving together could talk
privately merely by lowering their voices.
Hal had been roused from the oppression of his own inner feelings by his
interest in those sharing the road-and apparently their destination-with them.
They had seen no one headed away from Porphyry. And these people were all
Exotics. They showed it in many little ways-their calmness of feature and
economy of movements, for instance. But Hal noticed that none of those they
caught up with, or were passed by, seemed to be indulging in conversation
simply for conversation's sake. In fact, none they passed seemed to feel it
necessary to greet Hal. Amanda, or each other. At most they only acknowledged
the presence of others with a gentle smile or nod.
But versions of these elements had been part of the Exotic character as long
as Hal, or Donal, had known members of this Splinter Culture. What he noticed
now, and a startling difference it seemed to him, was that there was something
extraordinarily self-contained about these sharing the road with them. It
THE CHANTRY GUILD
95
was hard to say whether it was a change in the direction of growth or not. It
was as if each had drawn inside himself or herself, and now lived a private
life behind the drawn curtains of their calm faces. There was an individualism
that was new in them; an individualism noticeably different from the communal
feeling that had always appeared to be an integral part of the Exotics he had
known; from Padma the Outbond, when he had been Donal, to Walter the
InTeacher, Hal Mayne's tutor. In no way did those about him seem a beaten or
conquered people, in
spite of their circumstances.
But at the same time, he got a feeling from them now as if part of the warmth
that had always characterized the Exotics was now withdrawn. Not gone; pulled
back away inside them, coiled like a spring under tension-but, somehow, not
gone. "We'll be at the gate in a few minutes," Amanda said, interrupting his
thoughts; and he looked ahead to see a tall wooden wall, evidently recently
built, surrounding what was plainly their destination. It reached to the side
and back as far as Hal could see in either direction, and their road led to a
wide gate as tall as the wall itself. "Let me do the talking to the guards,"
Amanda said. "You're my idiot big brother; I mean, you're literally a little
slow-witted. The cliches that work best are the old cliches. Look stupid. "
Hal obediently slumped his shoulders, let his face go slack and his mouth hang
slightly open. There was a jam-up of people at the gates, of course; but those
coming in gathered close together and waited with little talk, and without
raising their voices when they did speak, any more than they had on the road.
It was reasonable, Hal thought, that they should b Those he watched would have
been brought up as child.e.. to never abandon a conversational tone and
volume; and in spite of their present condition, that training would persist
in them.
And yet, thought Hal again, watching them behind the mask of his loose jaw and
expressionless face, there was something more going on here than just
childhood training. There was something quietly in opposition to the uniformed
men who were checking them. It was not a quietness of fear in any sense, but
one of strength that the uniformed men did not have, or even understand.
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Gordon R. Dickson
It was curious. At the same time, he was aware of something that was going on
for him, personally, him alone. It had nothing to do with what he believed he
had just seen in the people around him. It was totally unrelated to it-or was
it?
It was a curious sensation of having been part of just such a scene as this,
once before. He could not say why; but he felt an element that was medieval
about the wooden walls, the wooden gates, the swarm of people in their rough
and unlovely clothing, waiting their turn to be passed inside by the guards.
It triggered off a conviction that somehow, somewhere, he had lived through
this before. Not him, but someone very like him as he now was, had stood
almost as he was now standing, seen much what he was now seeing, and waited
with such a crowd in such a place as this. . . .
The guards, thought Hal, concentrating on them to get his mind back on
ordinary channels-if these were typical of the garrison troops here, they were
poor stuff indeed. They were neatly enough uniformed, in black, with power
pistols bolstered on their hip and swagger sticks at their belt or under their
arms; but they were not really soldiers.
Hal Mayne had never seen actual soldiers on duty. Soldiers who were purely
that; instead of half-police, like the Militia that Rukh's Command had fought
against on Harmony. But Donal Graeme had been brought up to work with troops;
and to anticipate that his life might depend on his ability to read their
value at a glance.
It was Donal's eye, therefore, that now told Hal that the eight men he saw on
duty at this gate were not only useless; but for practical purposes
untrainable to be anything better than the bullies of unarmed civilians they
presently were. Ian, Donal's uncle, who had trained troops for Donal after the
assassination of Kensie, Ian's twin, would have stripped all eight of their
uniforms on sight.
If the rest of the soldiers in garrison here were like these, it was likely
that, weapons and all, they would break and run in the face of any serious
riot; even a riot of Exotics, who, had they been any other people, would have
risen against any such flimsy oppressors, long since.
But he and Amanda had now reached the gate, at the head of the crowd of
waiting people. He concentrated on looking as
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97
harmless as possible for one of his size and appearance. "Open up," said the
uniformed man confronting them. lie was obviously from one of the Friendly
worlds. Hal had learned to recognize such in any guise, after his experience
on Harmony -though this one's appearance on his surface was completely at odds
both with the people Hal had met around Rukh, and his present uniform. He was
oriental, young, round-faced and innocent-looking. Nonetheless, he went
through the contents of their two sacks with reasonable efficiency. "All
right. Go on in. Home address?" "Sixteen, thirty-six, seven, Happiness Lane,"
answered Amanda. "Downstairs apartment."
The gate guard repeated the address into his wrist recorder and turned away
from them to the two bag-carrying women behind him. Hal and Amanda were free
to go. "What about that address?" Hal asked as soon as they were far enough
down the road within the gates that they were no longer too closely surrounded
by others to speak without being overheatd. "It's the home of three brothers,
none of which look at all like you," she answered. "I mean, why did he ask for
it?" "They do an automatic check to see that people who've left for the day
are back in their homes that night by curfew." "But what'll happen when they
find they don't even know of us at that address?" "The one checking is going
to figure the guard at the gate transposed a couple of numbers, or otherwise
got the address wrong. Then he'll forget about it. They don't worry that much
about people getting in, they worry about them getting out. " "I see," said
Hal. "Where are we headed, then?" "There're a few serious resistance people in
every town," said Amanda. "We're going to one named Nier. She lives alone with
her mother and a soldier who's quartered on them. He's a sub-officer who likes
night duty@ so he's not there after sundown, ordinarily. The result is,
they've got room to put us up overnight; and, in addition, Nier's made someth
 ing 0"   a friend of the sub-officer; which gives them a few advantages
including freedom from a housecheck under normal conditions. I want you to
talk to Nier. "
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Does she live anywhere near Happiness Lane?" asked Hal dryly.
Amanda laughed. "The other side of the town," she said. "Come on." The streets
within the walls had not beer. rutted and were in good shape. They had entered
at what was evidently an older part of it, for the buildings were large and
faced with white stone. Their fellow travelers went off in different
directions among the streets of this section and there were few sackcloth
robes to be seen after several blocks. There were, however, a number of
uniformed soldiers who seemed to be off duty, either moving about the streets
or going in and out of buildings that Hal thought might be either restaurants
or drinking places. Amanda noticed Hal watching one clearly inebriated soldier
entering one of the latter. "Alcohol's the only intoxicant ailowed-even to the
troops," she said. "Probably because of the difficulty of enforcement. You can
ferment almost any vegetable into a beverage with at least some alcohol in it.
Adding a sugar of some kind helps, of course. So since they can't stop the
making of illegal liqueurs by their own people, they let their soldiers drink
the best the planet can produce. The civilians, of course, are officially
Exotics who don't drink; though that's changed for a few of them in the last
two years." "There was a joke among the troops on Ceta, a cousin who'd been on
a contract there told the rest of us in the family once," Hal said absently,
dropping back into Donal's memories. "That you could even make an alcoholic
drink by fermenting dead rats. Impossible, of course, but the idea was to talk
new recruits into drinking a home-brew, then tell them a story that'd make
them sick . . . ...
He was completely in Donal's persona for the moment, Amanda noticed with some
satisfaction. She had hoped to trigger some of those older memories by what
she would show him. That part of him that was Donal had uses he had been too
quick to forget.
They came finally to the new section of town, where the controlled locals
lived. In less than two years it had become an obvious slum, its only
redeeming feature being a cleanliness which was a result of ingrained habit in
the older Exotics, which
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99
had caused the streets and building fronts to keep a relative decency of
appearance. Here and there, a small bunch of flowers had been put in a window,
or an attempt had been made to plant something decorative in the small strip
of earth between the edge of the street and the front wall of a house.
Amanda turned in at the door of one of the innumerable look-alike row houses
and knocked. There was no response. She waited for what seemed to Hal an
unusually long time, then knocked again. They waited. At last there was the
sound of shoeleather on bare wooden flooring beyond the door, and the door
itself swung back.
It opened just enough to show a woman in her fifties with a face the sagging
flesh of which told of recently lost weight. Her gray hair was cut relatively
short, pulled back and tied more in a ponytail than a bun, though its bunching
at the back had something of the characteristics of both. She stared at them
blankly. "Mario!" said Amanda. "Don't you know me? It's me, Corrin; and
Kaspar, one of my brothers. Is Nier here? I'd like her to meet him." "No. No,
she's not."
The woman Amanda had called Mario had opened the door just enough so that the
width of her body blocked it. She raised her voice as if she wanted someone
inside to hear her answering. "She doesn't live with me anymore. She went to
work and live at the garrison-"
A man's voice shouted something unintelligible from inside. "Nothing!" she
called back over her shoulder. "Just some people asking about Nier. I told
them to go -find her at the barracks. "
She looked back out at Hal and Amanda, and her face contorted suddenly into a
grimace of desperate warning. She jerked her head minutely, as if to signal
them to move on up the street.
But already there were the sounds of steps on the floor behind her. The door
was pulled all the way open and a somewhat overweight man of medium height
appeared as he pushed the old woman aside. He was wearing black military
slacks and a white shirt, unbuttoned at the neck. His face was made up of
small features-small eyes, small nose and small mouth. It
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
101
showed a full twenty-six hours of stubble. He was in his late thirties or
early forties and his red hair was graying. Through the stubble, freckles
could still be seen on the weathered skin of his face and the backs of his
small, soft-looking hands. "well, well," he said, in a voice that had a
bullfrog-like croak to it. He was not drunk, but there was a slight thickening
to his words that showed he was on his way to being so. "Look at this. An
oversize bull, and an oversize cala lily. And you used to be friends of our
dear, departed Nier, were you?" "She barely knew Nier. This is her brother,
who's never met Nier," said Mario quickly. "Well, well, what of it?" said the
soldier. "I'm Corporal I an. Where's your manners, Mario? Invite these good
friends of Nier's inside!"
He stood back from the door. "I'm Corrin," said Amanda as they came into a
small room that was at once kitchen, dining and living room. "My brother's
name is Kaspar."
The kitchen sink, cooking surface and cupboards occupied the corner to the
right of the door as they entered. Before them was a kitchen table with one
straight chair drawn up to it, and on it a bottle of clear glass
three-quarters full of colorless liquid, standing beside a half-empty tumbler.
Beyond were three more chairs like the one at the table and a porch bench with
back, which had been furnished with cushions, obviously homemade. "Well, now,
you're really a cala lily, Corrin," said lban. He ran his eyes over Amanda,
grinning a little. "You don't know what a cala lily is, do you'? But I do.
It's an Earth flower. I've
seen a picture of one; and you're a cala lily, all right. Yes, you are.
He gestured widely to the table. "Sit down," he said, taking his own seat in
the one chair that was already at the table. "Pull up chairs. Let's get to
know each other. "
Mario hastened to help with the chairs. "I didn't say you could sit down!"
lban's voice was abruptly ugly and his eyes were on Mario.
Suddenly a small coal of anger glowed in the ashes of Hal's inner unhappiness
with himself, so that for a moment the unhappiness was forgotten. Perhaps he
could no longer think of
himself as Dorsai; but nonetheless there was still the strength and knowledge
in him to lay his hands on this soft-muscled bully; and by the very power and
capability of the grip make the other aware that he could be broken like a dry
stick. This much he could do-
Hal forced the unexpected reaction from him. That was not the way. He had
learned it long since. "I was just going to help . . ." "Ah, that's all right,
then. Yes, help. Help yourself to a
drink, Lily; and you-whatever your name is. Get some glasses, woman!"
Mario hurried to get two more tumblers. "His name's Kaspar," said Amanda.
"Kaspar. You told me that. Kaspar-" Abruptly Than laughed and drank, and
laughed again. Seeing the other two tumblers were now on the table, he poured
a small amount from the bottle into each one. "Drink up."
Amanda took a delicate sip from hers and put the tumbler back down again in
front of her. "It's strong," she said. "Oh yes, it's strong," said lban. Hal
was trying to place the man's origins. He was neither Exotic, Friendly,
Dorsai, nor a mix of any of those sub-cultures. Not educated enough for
someone from Cassida or Newton. He might be from New Earth, where there was
still a polyglot of subcultures, or Ceta, where there was even more. Than
suddenly turned on him. "You, Kaspar!" said Than sharply. "You drink!"
Hal picked up his tumbler and swallowed the inch or so of liquid inside it. It
was a high-proof distilled liquor, a little too smooth in taste to have been
made in some backyard still; unless on the Exotics nowadays they had some very
good backyard stills. He thought that if the other had any idea of amusing
himself by watching as the stranger got drunk on an unaccustomed (as alcohol
would be to most Exotics) intoxicant, he would find himself very mistaken. Hal
had not had a drink in over three years, but he had discovered in the Coby
mines that it took more to get him drunk than it did most people. "Kaspar,"
said lban. He poured a somewhat larger amount into Hal's tumbler. "That's a
dog's name. Good Kaspar. Lap that up, Kaspar."
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Gordon R. Dickson
Hal picked up the glass.
1. 1 said lap it!" snapped lban. "Not drink it, Kaspar. Lap it! " "My tongue's
too short," said Hal mildly, sticking his tongue down into the glass to show
it could not reach the liquid within. "You!" said Than to Mario, without
turning his head. "Get a saucer! "
Mario obeyed, putting the saucer without orders on the table in front of Hal.
"Pour it into the saucer, Kaspar," said lban. "That's right. Now lap it up
like a good dog-"
He shoved his chair back suddenly, its legs screeching on the bare floor, and
got up.
--And just in case you don't know how to lap, I'm going to teach you," he said
over his shoulder, going through an inner doorway into the unlighted room
beyond and around a corner out of their sight. His voice came back to them
from the empty doorway. "It's a useful trick for a dog like you to have, you
know?"
He came out again, carrying a power pistol, which he brought with him back to
the table. He sat down, resting the thick, dark barrel of the pistol on the
edge of the unvarnished tabletop, so that the large thumb-sized hole in its
muzzle pointed directly at Hal. "Now, this is how we do it," he said. "I say
lap, and you bend your head down and start lapping with your tongue from the
saucer until it's all gone. Ready? Now, lap!"
Hal bent down and began to lap. It was a clumsy way of getting the liquid into
his mouth, but finally he got most of it swallowed. "Now I ick the plate
clean. That's right. Lift your head up. Than poured more of the liquor into
the saucer. "You didn't do so good, last time, so we'll try it again. That's
the way we do things in the Occupational Troops. Now-- "Oh, don't make him
drink another one!" said Amanda.
Than turned his attention on her. So did Hal, in case the words were supposed
to convey some hidden message to him. "Our brother Court drank some of that
once," said Amanda, "and it made him awfully sick!"
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She might, thought Hal, have had a little more faith in his common sense. He
was hardly about to take the man's gun away and break his neck, here in the
very house where the other had been quartered; in spite of his unexpected
earlier flare of fury. Then he realized that the message was not what he had
assumed. What she wanted was for either one of them to put this man
harmlessly out of action; and she was giving him a chance to do it whatever
way he had in mind, first. "Well, he should have gone right back and tried it
again, Lily," said lban. "That's the point. You've got to practice, practice,
to learn things like that. Now, we don't want to make that mistake with
Kaspar, here, do we?"
He stared hard at her for a long moment, then let his stubbled face relax into
another grin. "But of course, for you, Lily, if you don't want Brother here to
lap any more, of course I don't want to make you feel bad. So I won't do it.
How do you like that?" "Thank you. Thank you very much," said Amanda. "Of
course. Anything to make you happy. Because I want to make you happy, you know
that?" Than leaned forward toward her and, finding the table in the way,
beckoned her. "Bring your chair around here, beside me."
Amanda obeyed. Hal permitted himself a slight scowl. "You leave my sister
alone," he said to lban. "If you don't I'll put the bad eye on you. You'll be
sorry." "The bad eye?" echoed Than absently, not even looking at Hal, but into
the eyes of Amanda, which were now less than a quarter of a meter from his
own. Then the words seemed to penetrate. He turned his gaze on Hal. "The bad
eye! What kind of stupid superstition's that?" "If I look in your eyes you'll
be sorry. My eyes'll eat you up. " "Oh, they will, will they?" Than turned and
stared directly into Hal's eyes, The eyes of the soldier were a muddy brown in
color, the whites bloodshot. "All right, I'm looking in your eyes. Now, you
better be able to eat me up or you're going to be sorry you said anything like
that. Well, what're you waiting for? Go ahead. Eat me up!" "The aualitv of
merev is not strained, " said Hal in a soft
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Gordon R. Dickson
voice, but one which carried clearly across the table to the other man, "it
droppeth as the gentle rain from hea.ven- "What?"
11 _upon the place beneath. That quality of mercy is strong within you, lban.
You are greater than any normal man in that which you have inside you. You are
large, generous, compassionate; and you have a duty to yourself to make sure
that all other people know this and bow down before it         . . . ...
Hal went on talking, in the same soft, persuasive voice, until at last he
stopped. When he did, Than sat still, his eyes still fixed on Hal's. His gaze
remained fixed on the place where Hal's eyes had been even when Hal leaned
back in his chair and looked over toward Amanda. "Oh, oh," said Hal. "I got
Mario, too."
Slightly off to one side, standing a couple of steps behind Iban's chair,
Mario was also motionless, with the same, unmoving gaze. "Mario," said Hal
sharply. "No! Not you! Come out of it!"
The older woman blinked and stirred. She stared at the three of them. "What .
. . ?" she said. "An Exotic and susceptible to a hypnotic trick like that?"
said Hal. "For shame. It was an Exotic that taught it to me, and a half-Exotic
tried it on me once."
-I . . . I never learned," said Mario. "Was that what it
11
"Of course," said Hal. "You sit down now and relax." He turned back to lban.
-Listen to me, lban," he said. "Are you listening? Look at me.
"Yes, Kaspar," said Than quietly, quitting the fixed focus of his eyes to turn
their gaze on Hal. "Listen to me now and remember this for a long time. Today,
when you were having a day off-"
Hal broke off, turning to look at Mario. "That's what it was, today, wasn't
it?" he asked her. "A day off duty for him?" "Yes," Mario said. "He goes back
on at eight tomorrow morning. He's on day-duty, not nights, like the other . .
." "I thought so." He turned back to Than "IhAn vnii werp
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105
having this day off; and late in the day, who should come to the front door
but a couple of lost children? It seems their parents were visiting here, by
special permission, from another place -they were too young to tell you what
their parents' names
were, who the relatives were they were staying with, or anything but their
names-which you've since forgotten. You were feeling generous, so after
amusing yourself with making the little boy take a few drinks, you gave them
permission to stay here overnight and their parents could be found tomorrow.
Have you got that?" "Oh yes, every word, Kaspar," said Iban, nodding. "Good.
Now, the children fell asleep in a corner and you forgot about them and went
to sleep yourself. You slept clear through until the next day, except for a
moment or two about midnight when there was a knock at the door and the
parents showed up looking for the children. You gave them the children-you
were too sleepy to ask them for any names or papers-and went back to bed. You
went right back to sleep, and slept through until time to get up the next
morning, after which everything went as usual-except for one thing."
He got up, took the bottle of liquor and poured it out in the kitchen sink. He
came back to stand at the table and put the empty bottle in front of lban.
"When you got up," he said to the other man, "you found you'd drunk the whole
bottle by yourself the evening before -and you didn't even have a hangover.
That'll be something to tell when you get over to the garrison. A whole bottle
and not even a trace of a hangover. It really will be something to tell them,
won't it?" "It sure will," said lban. "Now," said Hal, "since you finished off
the bottle, maybe you better get some sleep to be ready for duty tomorrow."
"Y'right," said Than thickly. He got to his feet, got himself turned around
and wavered unsteadily back toward and finally into the room from which he had
brought out the power pistol, They heard him fall on the bed. Hal picked up
the pistol and took it to the doorway and tossed it in to fall beside the
man's bed. "Iban!" he said. "Iban, answer me! You can still hear me, can't
you?"
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Yesss," sighed the voice thickly from within. "Remember how this shows that
Mario's good luck for you. No hangover's just a sample of the kind of good
luck you've had since getting quartered here. It's all due to Mario. You're
good luck for each other. She knows that, that's why she takes such good care
of you. You've got to remember to take good care of her if you want that good
luck to keep going. You'll remember that, won't you, lban? You like Mario; and
even if you didn't, she's such good luck for you, you want to keep her well
and happy, isn't that right?" "Yesss . . ." "All right, you can go to sleep
now."
This time the answer was the first of a steady succession of snores.
Hal turned back into the room. Mario burst into tears where she stood and
Amanda moved to put her arms around the older woman.
Mario was weeping hoarsely and deeply. Amanda led her ott" into the back of
the house, through another door that evidently opened, from what Hal glimpsed,
on another small bedroom. The door closed behind both women.
Hal went up to it. "I think I'll take a bit of a walk," he said through the
door panel. "Fine. Get back here before twenty-two hundred hours. That's
curfew," Amanda's voice answered him. "I will."
He went out. The streets outside were full of hurrying people in sackcloth
robes, none of whom paid any attention to him or each other. They gave the
impression of racing against a deadline. Hal estimated that perhaps one in ten
had the word DESTRUCT painted on his or her robe. He wandered the streets,
trying to get the feel of the community about him.
It was a strange feel. The locals had all the appearance and attitudes of a
populace so downtrodden that it lived in fear and without hope or dignity. And
still, there was something innately independent and stubbornly survivalistic
about the controlled voices, the courtesy with which interactions went on@
from the apparently welcome, if brief conversations between encounter-
THE CHANTRY GUILD
107
ing individuals who seemed to be friends, to the chance collisions of those
hurrying so that they bumped into each other before they could stop.
Much was gone, but something yet remained. The words from Alfred, Lord
Tennyson's poem Ulysses came back to him. The question in his mind now was
whether what remained was something upon which an Exotic structure could still
build-or was this once-powerful Splinter Culture finished forever?
He could not tell. It was tempting to hope, but . . . he saw it was getting
close to eighteen hundred hours and he was still some distance from Mario's
residence. He had automatically mapped his wanderings in the back of his head
so that he knew he had about eight blocks to go to get back to it.
He turned toward it. Amanda was sitting on the cushioned picnic bench in the
front room when he got there. There was the snell of cooking in
the air. She got up as he came in, shutting the front door behind him.
"Where's Mario?" he asked. "Asleep," said Amanda. "I waded into the supplies
here and cooked food for the three of us. But I think she needs sleep more
than she needs something to eat-though she needs that badly enough. I'll leave
her food in dishes in her room; and she can eat it cold, or warm it if she
likes, whenever she wakes during the night. She's bound to wake sometime.
Meanwhile, you sit down and we'll have ours."
Hal sat. The meal Amanda dished up for them was nothing like the fare an
Exotic house might have given a visitor once upon a time; but it was a solid
dinner, with beans and local vegetables in a sort of curry, highly spiced,
with local corn
bread to go with it and water to drink. "The water's safe enough, I suppose?"
said Hal, lifting his glass. "The water systems put in by the Exotics still
take care of that," said Amanda. "Hal, they evidently caught Nier and the
Groupman that was quartered here in some resistance action against the
Occupation. Or at least, in something more than a breach of one of the smaller
laws. They're undoubtedly both dead. All Mario knows is that a squad of
soldiers came to the house one day when the Groupman was here and took them
both
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Gordon R. Dickson
away. Mario says Nier told her that the Groupman was being transferred to a
job for which he'd have to live in the garrison from then on; and he'd found a
good job for Nier there, too, so she wouldn't be at home anymore. Mario knew
she wasn't telling the truth-just trying to make Mario feel better. The squad
went off with them; and no one's seen either of them since. "
Hal shook his head. "So that's how it is," he said. "Yes, that's how it is,"
answered Amanda. Their eyes met. "Do you think the suggestions you gave Than
about being kinder to Mario are going to last?" "Anything like that wears off
in time," said Hal. "You know as well as I do how strong the powers of
recovery are of both mind and body; and that's true even for characters like
lban. But maybe by the time it wears off, he'll have convinced himself 'it
pays to be decent to Mario. Or it may even have become a habit. He's going to
have to excuse his better treatment of her to his fellow soldiers; and people
like him tend to end up believing their own excuses, to avoid admitting they
could be wrong about anything. But nothing lasts forever. He'll be moved out
of this house, sooner or later; and someone else'll be quartered here. " "Yes.
Well, we can hope for the best. Who was the half-Exotic you said tried to
hypnotize you?" "Bleys Ahrens," said Hal, "and he almost did, I was very young
then, and he's very persuasive. But he was hypnotizing a good-sized group at
the time and didn't know I was one of the people he was working on." "I see,"
she said. "Well, give me a hand cleaning up-- "I can do that by myself," said
Hal. "Why don't you see if you can't find some clean sheets and blankets for
that bed of lban's" We'll need sleep ourselves if we want to be gone before he
wakes up tomorrow, and there's no good reason for letting him have the bed. He
can sleep on the floor, the way he is now, and never know the difference."
"Where're you going to put him?" asked Amanda. "Out here, I think," said Hal,
getting up and going back into lban's bedroom. He lifted the slack body of the
sleeping man, carried it out into the main room and dumped it on the cushioned
picnic bench. lban's body was a little large for the
THE CHANTRY GUILD
109
piece of furniture, but he did not seem in any immediate danger of rolling
off. "You've got him programmed to believe he got up and answered the door in
the night," said Amanda. "Won't he wonder in the morning when he wakes up in
this room instead? And if you try to carry him back to his bed before we go,
by that time he may be sober enough to wake up." "You're right, he probably
would wake up. Not that I couldn't just put him back to sleep again if he did.
But we don't need to bother with putting him back in his own bed. He'll just
think he didn't make it any further back than the bench before folding up."
Hal corrected himself. "No, you're right. Of course, he may wonder a bit. But
I'm counting on his puffed-up ego over drinking a whole bottle and not having
a hangover to knock everything else but that out of his mind. If he regularly
drinks his way through his day off, he'll be expecting to wake feeling like a
three-day corpse. The fact he doesn't ought to be enough by itself to keep him
from any dangerous selfquestioning. Now, for those dishes and pots."
He had already turned away, when a question occurred to him. He turned back in
time to catch her before she left the room for the bedroom. "Amanda," he said,
"what's happened to them, inside, as a
result of all this-the Exotics here, I mean?"
She smiled at him. "You tell me what you think," she answered. "And then I'll
let you know if that agrees with my own ideas. Remember? I brought you here to
see for yourself. If it'd simply been a matter of telling it, I could have
told you back at the Encyclopedia. You tell me; and then I'll let you know how
that agrees with what I think I've noticed." "The Exotics I've always known,"
said Hal, "were calm, intelligent, reasonable people, all of them. But nearly
all of them also had a sort of philosophical arrogance underneath their gentle
exteriors. It seems to me these people've had that arrogance planed off them;
and they're almost a little surprised to find that the philosophy's still
there. Like someone who's had a stand of large and valuable trees burned off
land they own. Their first feeling is that they've lost everything. Then they
reafi-ii- thAt the oArth thov owned kz @fill there And therf-',@ nti
110
Gordon R. Dickson
reason the trees can't be regrown. Maybe even taller and stronger, because of
the ashes enriching the soil."
Amanda smiled. "I'd agree with that," she said. "Did anything about the
occupying soldiers strike you, by the way?" "I haven't seen enough of them to
tell," said Hal. "They're sweepings-no good military commander would figure
thent worth having." "Sorry," said Amanda. "I put that badly. I should have
said-does anything about the way the soldiers react to the Kultans strike
you?" "I haven't really seen enough of that, either. But Mario seems-they all
seem to have made some sort ofimpression on the soldiers. I can't make out yet
just what. Nothing specifically useful to the Exotics. Just a sort of moral
ascendancy; which the troopers seem to be acknowledging whether they're
consciously aware of it or not."
Amanda smiled again, and nodded. He smiled back at her and turned again to the
kitchen as she went off to see about something clean and unused with which to
make up lban's bed.
When Hal came in there, after cleaning up in the kitchen, he found that she
had covered the existing layers of bedding with extra blankets; and put down
some more for cover, if needed. She was already asleep on the side of the bed
against the wall when he got there. Now that he let himself feel it, a strong
weariness was in him as well.
He laid himself down softly beside her and closed his eyes. He was ready to
sleep; but once his body became inactive, a tribe of unanswered questions that
had erupted into his mind at various times of the day came back at him like a
mob, clamoring for attention. Ruthlessly, he pushed them from his mind; but
they crowded in again.
The difference in the Exotics he had seen here must be onN part of what was
obviously in process of change about this whole world. Perhaps he should have
gone down to Earth from the Final Encyclopedia, this last year, to see for
himself how the people there were really changing; as Ajela and Rukh had
seemed convinced they were. The coming of the Others appeared to have had a
much wider effect on humanity than even he had given it credit for. . . .
THE CHANTRY GUILD
111
He smiled to himself, harshly. Almost he had forgotten that he had given up
trying to reach an understanding that would give him the key to the Creative
Universe. With an effort he blanked his mind to all these questions and
possibilities and, in the dark void that remained, the sleep that his body
reached for came easily.
CHAPTER
12
A touch woke Hal. He looked up at Amanda. "Time to leave?" he asked. ."Yes,"
she said. "The gates'll be open in about twenty minutes. There'll be a crowd
waiting to make the most of the day outside the city by getting out as soon as
possible. We're safest leaving with them."
The day before had been cloudless. This one had scattered tufts of white
moisture afloat, it seemed, just beyond arm's reach, with the mountains toward
which they headed looming over all. The day warmed with the sun, but the road
climbed steeply almost from the time they lost sight of the city gates in the
vegetation behind them; and the air was thinner and drier than it had been on
the previous day's walk. "Not many people are headed this way," commented Hal,
after they had been on their route for about an hour. "Soil's not much worth
farming as we get higher," said Amanda. "Look, you can notice the change in
forestation."
Indeed, Hal had. And over that day and into the next, he watched the changes
in their surroundings. From the scattered stands of taller timber and the
plenteous bush and scrub trees of the uplands, they moved into more open woods
of variform evergreens whose ancestral seeds had been imported from Earth;
mixed, still, with some native varieties. "By the way, I left Mario some
inonev so she could reolace
THE CHANTRY GUILD
113
the food we ate without Than being any the wiser; and also so she'd have a
little extra for her own use." "Money?" said Hal. He had had so little use for
money, beyond the letters of interstellar credit he had carried in his younger
years, when he was trying to stay one jump ahead of Bleys Ahrens and the
Others, that he simply had not thought of money in connection with this trip
to Kultis. "What sort of money do they have here?" "Scrip issued by the
occupying authorities, now," said Amanda. "Arranged to further put the squeeze
on the native Exotics. Theoretically, anything else-even interstellar credits
in any form-isn't legal tender anymore on this planet and on Mara. " "Where'd
you get scrip? I didn't see any when the guard at the gate dumped your bag to
see what was in it." "I'd picked some up on my earlier trips, and brought it
out with me," she said. "At the Encyclopedia your friend, Jeamus Walters,
copied me a large stock of it. Most of it's still in the ship; but I'm
carrying a young fortune sewn into the hem of my robe. "
She paused. "Your friend Jeamus seems to be able to do anything." "With the
help of the Encyclopedia," Hal said. "Also, before I went to steep," Amanda
went on, "I stole a
small, but useful, amount from lban. Not so much that he'll notice the loss,
but enough to help out what I gave Mario. A man who stuffs scrip into any
pocket that's handy doesn't usually keep an account book in his head." "That's
true enough," said Hal. "I could have given Mario a lot more, of course," she
continued, "but the Authority strictly limits the amount of scrip in
circulation, to tighten up the shortages being forced on the people. If Mario
had a lot to spend, she'd stick out like a sore thumb. I can do a lot more
good by giving small amounts to a large number of people, spread across a wide
area."
Hal nodded. "How far is it to this Chantry Guild?" "An easy day's walk from
here to the Zipacas. Though this isn't a route I've taken lately," said
Amanda. "From there, a
short climb to the Guild itself-"
She broke off in midsentence. They had both halted reflexively at a faint
sound that it was impossible to identify.
114
Gordon R. Dickson
Amanda gestured with a hand toward her ear, in a signal to continue listening.
Hal nodded. He had lost the noise and at first heard only the sound of the
insects and the breeze in the trees around them. Then he became aware of an
undertone that was a human voice talking steadily in a low, unvarying pitch.
The voice was too far off for them to distinguish words; but it was undeniably
the sound of someone speaking, steadily and without pause or change in
emphasis. "It's up ahead," said Amanda. "Yes," said Hal.
They went on up the road, which here curved to its left through a stand of the
local evergreens. Mounting a small rise, they looked down a short, relatively
open, slope into a clearing that held the ruins of one of the former Exotic
villas.
Vegetation had not yet encroached upon those ruins, but there was little
enough left of the home that had been. Back some short distance from the road
were the low remains of firedestroyed walls, partly shrouded with vines and
weeds. Most such places, and this one was no exception, had owned white walls;
and the fire-blackening had oddly and arbitrarily seemed to paint what was
left standing of these, so that the impression was of an end to the home that
had come about by age rather than by flame.
Hal remembered that he had felt something medieval about the moment in which
they had waited at the gates of Porphyry. Today, the ruins of the houses they
had passed had struck him with a feeling from an even earlier period in
history. They had made him think, for some strange reason, of how the ruins of
Roman villas must have looked in ancient Britain, after the military power of
that mighty but decaying Empire was withdrawn; and the barbarians flooded in
to loot, slay and destroy what had been.
There was no obvious reason for such a thought to arise now. Nonetheless, it
was strong in him as the two of them started down toward what was left of the
home in the clearing, and the man they saw there.
He wore the ordinary penitential robe and had let his graying hair and beard
grow. These were clotted into locks from lack of washing; and his robe, even
from a distance, showed that it had not been cleaned for a very long time. He
was a thin man, whose hollowed cheeks looked sucked in above the beard that
mounted
THE CHANTRY GUILD
115
his face toward the cheekbones; and his arms and legs, protruding from the
robe, were skin and bone.
He stood before what had once perhaps been a decorative fishpond in the
forecourt of the villa. It was a round body of water with a red-tiled edging,
some four meters across in size and undoubtedly quite shallow, since mounds of
something peeked here and there above the surface. The breeze blowing across
it up the slope toward Hal and Amanda brought a smell sick with the stink of
organic decay.
The area around the pool itself, a circular terrace of gray stone with white
stone benches and a stone pedestal about chest high to the man-before which he
stood-had been meticulously restored, cleaned and cared for. Everything
sparkled in the clear upland light, with two exceptions, besides the
appearance of the man himself.
One, was the dark opaque waters of the pool, which seemed to swallow all light
falling on it; and the other was a row of decorative flowerpots all around its
edge. Those in the flowerpots to the man's right held many-branched plants of
some sort, that had been stripped down to bare branches and twigs, as if in
the depths of winter.
The contrast of these with the potted plants on the man's left was startling.
The latter were of the same size and shape, but bore small, heart-shaped green
leaves, and a profusion of flowers in a variety of reds and pinks, the tiny
petals of the cup-shaped blossoms curving upward together to make a bouquet
that in the case of each plant made it look like a Horn of Plenty made of
fine, tinted lace. These gleamed in the sunlight, the soil at their base black
from recent watering.
On the pedestal in front of the man was one of the pots with the
flower-bearing plants in it. As they approached he stood there, continuing to
talk-apparently to it, since there was no one else in sight-in a steady stream
of words so run together as to be individually indistinguishable and
incomprehensible.
As he did this he slowly, delicately and methodically, one by one, took hold
of petals from the blossoms of the plant on the pedestal before him and tore
them off, dropping them into the decay-smelling waters of the pond before him.
Hal and Amanda came into the forecourt itself and walked up to him. But he
took no notice of them; only went on methodically destroying the plant before
him. As the final petal of the last
116
Gordon R. Dickson
blossom fell to the dark water below, he began stripping and shredding the
leaves of the plant, one by one. "Fugga, mugga, shugga . . . , " he seemed to
be muttering.
Understanding woke suddenly in Hal's mind and, turning to Amanda, he saw that
the same comprehension had come to her. What the man was intoning was a litany
of obscenities, so many times repeated that the syllables of the words had run
together to the point where the words themselves had lost all meaning.
"Hello," said Amanda clearly, almost in the man's ear.
He took no notice of her. Whether he did not hear, or whether he heard but
paid no attention, was impossible to say. His robe was so grimed and worn that
Hal had paid little attention to it originally; but now he made out the fact
that at some time in the past, the word DESTRUCT! had been painted on it, both
front and back.
As they watched, the man finished stripping the last leaves from the flower
bush he had been denuding. He fell silent, turned from it, still ignoring Hal
and Amanda, and went down to the end of the last of the pots with the stripped
branches. He picked this pot up and carefully carried it back into the ruins
of the house.
They followed him. He went completely through what had been once the closed
rooms of the dwelling, and came out into an open area which was filled with
scores of plants in pots like his current burden.
They were in all stages from utterly bare of leaves and flowers through the
buds of new leaves and flowers to full-blooming individuals. Still ignoring
them, he found a place to set down the pot holding the stripped plant, then
went to another part of the area and chose a plant overflowing with blossoms.
Carrying this as carefully as he had carried the stripped plant, he went back
toward the front of the house, out into the forecourt, and put the blooming
plant at the end of the line of those on the left of his pedestal.
He dusted the palms of his hands together as he went back to the pedestal. He
lifted on to it the nearest of the row of blooming plants, putting it side by
side with the one he had just stripped. Leaving them there, he began moving
over, one by one, the other pots of unharmed plants, then the row of
bare-limbed ones. Finally, he took the plant he had just stripped
THE CHANTRY GUILD
117
and lifted it down into the vacant place now available just to the right of
his pedestal.
He straightened up and began stripping the petals from the nearest bloom of
the fresh pot before him, dropping the petals into the thick water of the
pond. The stream of nonsense syllables came again from his lips. All through
the time they had been beside him he had never once shown any awareness of
Amanda or Hal. "There's nothing we can do for him," said Amanda. "We might as
well go."
They turned away and went on toward the mountains. But gazing at those toward
which they traveled it occurred to Hal for the first time that if, as Amanda
had said, the edges of the rock forming the valley floor had been uptifted by
the molten, interior rock rising from below, then it was very old rock that
now essentially plated the new at the base of the mountains. As his mind
reached out to conceive of the possible millions of years of difference
between the two ages of rocks combined into one single entity that was the
range, a strange and unexplainable shiver ran on spider-light feet up his
spine. And then was gone.
But the memory of its passing stayed in the back of his mind, even as the
image of the man they had just left displaced it in his present thoughts and
continued with him as they went. Hal saw the image in his mind, only. There
was nothing interfering with his physical eyes, which took automatic note of
his surroundings; including the road that now had dwindled to a foot trail of
packed earth, and had begun to follow the contours of small, but fairly steep,
hills as it continued to work its way upward.
Their surroundings now varied from open patches to heavily forested slopes,
both above and below their way. The open spaces were covered with knee-high
versions of ferns; and for the first time Hal was conscious of these being
stirred by the passage of occasional small animals. He pointed the movement
out to Amanda. "Rabbits," said Amanda. "You remember I mentioned them'? The
Kultans imported a variform to be fartned for meat protein, for those of the
Exotics who weren't on purely vegetarian diets. Some got loose . . ."
She waved her hand at the forest about them. "Yon we the readt - @hv @Aid -N(i
witimfl nrethti)nz to keen
118
Gordon R. Dickson
them in check. They spread over this whole land mass. At any rate, they've
turned out to be a boon to the locals as the major source of meat available;
and since protein isn't easily got by any but the military, the native
population's become meat-eaters out of necessity, to balance their diet."
Hat nodded, and turned his mind to other observations of their surroundings.
Procyon was high in the sky above them and the last of the puffs of clouds
seemed to have burned away in the heat of the air at this upper altitude. He
saw all this, but his thoughts were not on it. He had returned to trying to
imagine himself in the mind of the man they had just seen.
This business of imagining himself as being someone else he had met had begun
as a game when he had been a child, and grown from there to a practice, and
from a practice almost to a compulsion. He had come to count it as a failure
when he could not imagine himself seeing all things as any other person might
see them.
It was more difficult to put himself in the other's shoes than it would be
with almost anyone else. The man was obviously insane. But he should be able
to do it with sufficient effort.
He had probably been driven into that state by whatever the Occupation
soldiery had done when they destroyed his house; and it was because he was so
plainly mad that they had not bothered to move him away from the ruins into
the town, since then, as they had with the other Exotics.
Hal focused his inner vision DOW on the thought that it was he himself
standing there, plucking the blossoms, destroying the flowers. It was slow . .
. but the image of the scene took shape in his mind's eye at last.
It was always necessary to understand; and to really understand it was
necessary to actually feel himself being somebody else. A complete empathy.
Empathy was a good word for the process of other-being. Good . . . and
necessary. Complete empathy produced in the end complete responsibility.
Complete responsibility became in the end universal and instinctive-an
automatic consideration before any action involving other human beings.
With full and instinctive responsibility in all humans, James would not have
died, Tam would not now be at the brink of death with three men's deaths still
crushingly upon his conscience.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
19
Now, to himself, he was the madman; and to him, the destruction of the plants
was the destruction of what had destroyed his sanity. Bit by bit, he was
trying to balance the books, to climb back to where he had once been. But the
path he had chosen was circular. He would never get there.
Unless, perhaps unless, Hal could unlock the Creative Universe for him, along
with all other people.
Somehow the mad man, lban, the Exotics, the Encyclopedia, the war, Old Earth,
the Younger Worlds-they all came together like lines converging to a point. He
could all but feel the convergence right now as a living thing, held in his
hands, like the willow twig of a divining rod. Oddly, he felt it in his mind
as if it converged toward this place he had never seen, the place toward which
he now moved. The new Chantry Guild.
Strange how the one person it was at once easiest and hardest for him to be
was Bleys.
His inner eye watched the thing of greater importance, the thin fingers
dropping the torn petals into the dark water. His mind went far, far back into
his childhood as Donal Graeme, a century before. "You're thinking," said
Amanda, after some time.
He started, broken out of his thoughts into the world about him again. "Yes,"
he said. "That man back there . . . I was like that, once. "
They continued walking. His eyes were on the trail ahead of him, but at the
edge of his vision he saw her head turn and her eyes look at him gravely.
"You?" she said. "When?" "When we got the news of James's death-my youngest
uncle. I told you, once, didn't l?" "Yes," she said. "You were eleven years
old; and Kensie came and found you in the stable, afterward-in a cold rage.
What would you have done, even if you'd had the man responsible there, in that
stable? Try to kill him-at eleven years old, as you were then?" "Probably,"
said Hal, watching the mountains ahead. "Pure destruction is a circular
action. It trapped me then, as Donal, and I've spent all my time since growing
out of it." "I know," she said softly. "You see," he said, looking at her,
"it's got no place to go
120
Gordon R. Dickson
but back upon itself. It can only replace, the way that man replaces his
plants, over and over, never adding to what's there. Creativity's the
opposite, a straight line projecting endlessly forward. The trouble is, the
urge to destruction is a racial instinct, useful for testing the individual's
ability to control his environment. Children vandalizing a school are doing
exactly the same thing as that man we passed. It's instinctive in each new
generation, as it becomes conscious of time, to want to sweep away everything
old and make everything new. It's instinct in them to feel that all the past
went wrong; and now
they're going to start the race on the right path from then on. "But the
circularity of destruction traps everyone who does that; and they end up
blamed, along with the rest of all history, by the generations that follow.
That's why, even with the historic forces endlessly seeking a balance, Bleys
and the Others have to lose eventually; because they'll be left behind while
the creative people move forward. And evolution happens when that takes place.
" "You're saying," said Amanda, "that Bleys is out to destroy Old Earth and
the best products of the human Splinter and other cultures, as nothing more
than some sort of surrogate for what he really wants to destroy'? Like the man
with his flower petals?" "Not exactly," said Hal. "His philosophy's sensible
enough if you accept his premises; primarily, that humanity in the past let
technology run away with it and went too far, too fast, too soon. No, it's not
a ritual, instinctive reaction that moves him, but faulty reasoning- because
he lacks empathy, and therefore a sense of responsibility. It's just that he
could have gotten started toward it from the same sort of targetless fury as I
did, like the man back there maybe did. Bleys could have begun turning into
what he is, out of rage at a universe that gave him everything-brilliance,
will, mental, moral and physical strength-and then, like the uninvited witch
at the christening in the children's story, capped it all with the fact he
could never find any other human being to share what he made with him." "You
think so?" said Amanda. "I don't know," answered Hal. "But it could be. And it
might be important."
Almost, he had become lost in his thoughts again. What brought him out of them
this time was a glimpse he thought he
THE CHANTRY GUILD
121
had, momentarily, of an expression on Amanda's face. He came back to his
surroundings and looked narrowly at her. "Were you smiling?" he asked. "Why?"
"Was IT' said Amanda, her features now perfectly composed. She tucked an arm
through his and squeezed it. "If I was, it was because I love you. You know,
it's time we stopped somewhere along here to eat. Help me look for a good
place. "
CHAPTER
13
They found such a spot, shortly. A small, fern-carpeted open area where a tiny
stream of cold, drinkable water crossed the trail, from among the bushes and
trees on the route's upper side. Seated there, they looked down a clear space
of hillside to a heavily treed valley a hundred or so meters below. Amanda
unpacked dried fruit and pieces of cornbread. The other food consisted mainly
of sandwiches, the taste of which carried the flavor of the pith Hal had eaten
before. They went well with the icy water of the stream, which must have its
source in the mountains above.
They spent no more than twenty minutes at the most, eating. Procyon was
already only an hour or less from the tops of the mountains that could be seen
towering above the treetops ahead of them. The mountains looked only a few
hundred meters ahead in the clear air, when they must be much more distant
than that, Hal thought. He and Amanda went on their way. "We haven't seen
anyone else, except the man by the pond. for hours," said Hal. "Aren't there
any people at all up this way?" "Not as far as I know. That's why the Chantry
Guild is back in here. There's nothing much to support a population," answered
Amanda. "Oh, there're mountain meadows that could be used for grazing animals,
but the Exotics were never herdsmen, even in their early years here; and of
course the
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living's so easy, particularly here at the edge of the tropics, that they've
never had any need to. Even before the Occupation, you'd have found it empty
up here, except for an occasional traveler. But now the Occupation doesn't let
natives make trips without special reason-and special permits. So from here on
until we hit the Chantry Guild we shouldn't run into anyone."
Hal was ready to believe her. The road had long since become a foot-track,
which had in turn become a trail, and now was nothing at all. It was as if
Amanda was setting her course across open country, by memory or some other
unseen means. Hal watched the ground carefully as they covered it. Tracking
had been one of the many skills drilled into him by his tutors, so his eye was
skilled enough to pick up even small signs of others having passed this way.
In fact, he did so, from time to time-things as small as a scuff mark in the
dirt or a broken twig-though those were few and inconspicuous.
He ceased to look, therefore, for sign and let himself simply enjoy the walk
through the open country.
Enjoyment was there, to anyone raised in the mountains -and Hal was doubly so.
As Donal he had grown up in the mountains holding his home, Foralie, on
Dorsai; and as Hal he had been raised until he was sixteen among the Rocky
Mountains of North America, on Earth. Being among them now brought an
exhilaration to him that no other kind of country could evoke. Unthinkingly,
his head lifted, his eyes read the lands and heights around him, his nostrils
sniffed the clean, clear air . . . and his stride lengthened. "You can slow
down now," Amanda said. "We'll be following along a stream course for a little
distance, and it's almost level." "Oh. Was I pushing the pace?" said Hal. He
was embarrassed. "Not for me. But we've got a way to go yet and the last
part's a literal climb. Better take it easy."
Even as she said this, they were already among the unbroken strip of trees and
bush, interspersed with leafy stalks of bright green fern, a meter or more in
height, that filled the nearly even floor of earth between two steeply
upward-sloping and wooded hillsides.
Here, for the first time in some while, the trail they were following became
once more visible as it wound between the
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trees. Obviously it was in regular use, to have had enough traffic to keep it
from being overgrown. What was it doing here, in a
region that did not usually host ordinary travelers-
A faint touch on his left arm brought him back to his surroundings. He looked
at Amanda, and she briefly brushed the outside corner of her left eyebrow with
a forefinger, as if some small insect had landed there.
This was one of the "signals" from the " short- language and signals" she had
asked him if he remembered, back when they were about to leave the courier
ship. She had just signed that something was watching them and paralleling
their course on the side indicated. Whatever it was, was doing so
deliberately, for it was at once keeping up with them, and keeping out of
sight among the trees and brush off to their left.
Without looking directly to his left, Hal set himself to seeing what he could
pick up out of the corner of his eyes. It took a little time, but eventually
he became aware of whatever it was, more by the faint noises and small
movements of the ferns and branches it pushed aside in its passage-though it
was apparently trying to move as quietly as it could-than by actual sight of
it.
He glanced at Amanda and questioned her with a raised eyebrow.
Amanda shook her head in puzzlement, and her hands moved in small movements,
quick but unobtrusive signals. "It's human-a child, or child-sized, I think,"
she said in this silent fashion. "It's interested in us for some reason.
There's an open spot of nothing much more than bush and fern just ahead. Let's
sit down there as if we're taking a break and try to tempt it out into the
open."
Hal blinked a signal of agreement at her, and a few moments later when they
had emerged into the open area she had referred to and reached close to the
center of it, she yawned, stretched and stopped. Hal stopped with her. "Let's
sit down a bit,        she said clearly. Whoever was shadowing them could not
have failed to overhear. "There's no hurry. "
She had stopped by a small bank overgrown with fern-a tiny variety rather than
the larger growth that had been interspersed with the trees earlier. This was,
in fact, a natural stopping place. It occurred to Hal that these would make an
excellent bed for
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Amanda and himself to stretch out on, together. They sat down on the bank now,
cross-legged and facing each other. "Chit!" said Amanda. "Reelin."
She had switched now to the audible " short- language." On the Dorsai a number
of code words were generally known by everyone, since these could come in
useful if two Dorsai on a foreign planet wanted to exchange information within
the hearing of others when they did not wish to be understood. In addition,
each family tended to have its own private code of made up words; and the
members of the Morgan and the Graeme families, growing up and playing together
as children, knew most of each others' private codes. As youngsters, there had
also been a particular pleasure in being able to exchange secret information
under the noses of nonunderstanding adults. So the codes were always improved
upon by each new generation.
In effect, what Amanda had just said was, "Let's talk in a
way our shadower can't understand. Maybe we can trick whoever it is into
coming closer to try and hear better, andfigure out what we're up to."
"Right," said Hal. There was no particular reason not to use a plainly
understandable word in answer, and a few understandable words might increase
the temptation of the listener to come in close and hear enough of them to
make out what the tenor of conversation was. "Muckle minny cat," he added.
He was pointing out that there were two of them, and since whatever or whoever
it was that had been shadowing them was not large, one of them ought to be
able to catch it while the other blocked its escape in this direction. Implied
was the question of who should chase and who should block.
Amanda smiled, slightly but firmly. "One! (I'll be the one to chase), '' she
said. "Home snapback (you stay here and get ready in case whoever we're
chasing doubles back this way.)" "R," he said, agreeing. She would be faster
and more agile at broken-country running than he. "Mark!"
The last word was to remind her that their listener had crept close enough so
that now an effort might be made to catch him or it. "R," said Amanda.
"One-C."
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
The last code word reasserted the fact that she was in Command; and, as the
chaser, she would pick her own moment to begin pursuit. Meanwhile, with their
gazes apparently only upon each other, they were both using their peripheral
vision to try and observe something about their watcher, who had indeed
slipped closer to them to try to understand their strange conversation.
"Whisper stonewall (I've heard some talk about this person, but I could never
get an 'v definite information),'' said Amanda. They both had their shadower
plainly in view out of the corners of their eyes now. " Y'un. "
That she was a "young-one, " a half-grown girl, was inarguable, since-except
for a length of what looked like dark green, dried vine, with half of a split
open pod in the middle of it, knotted around her waist-she was completely
unclothednaked was not a word that suited, since she wore her lack of clothes
as unselfconsciously and naturally as an animal wears its pelt of fur. The
vine seemed more an ornament than any attempt at a piece of clothing; although
at the moment she was apparently using the split-open half of the pod as a
sort of pocket for carrying what looked like small rocks, about half the size
of her own fist. She was certainly under the age of twelve or thirteen, unless
she was a case of arrested physical development. "Carry!" said Amanda-which
broadly translated into 'we've got to get her out of here and to some place
where she can be caredfor!" "R," said Hal.
His agreement was automatic, while waiting for her to start the pursuit-and in
fact he had hardly got the last codeword out before she had sprung to her feet
and dashed off in pursuit of the little girl.
Amanda was fast-very fast. But the child was almost literally like the wind.
Also, plainly, she knew every foot of the ground. She zig-zagged like a hare
in flight, leading the way through openings in the forest growth large enough
for someone her size to slip through, but too small for one of adult size. In
seconds they were both out of Hal's sight among the farther trees.
The sound of their passage, however, turned once more in his direction, and he
suddenly caught sight of the little girl backtracking at full speed. She
looked likely to cross the trail
127
some twenty meters ahead of Hal. He jumped to his feet and ran to intercept
her.
She zigged and gained on him, zagged and made it back and across the trail
after all. He followed her out of sheer stubbornness for perhaps fifty meters,
and then accepted the fact that she had been gaining on him with almost every
step and was plainly now lost beyond question. He walked slowly back to the
trail and Amanda, catching his breath as he went.
Amanda was standing waiting for him on the bank where they had been sitting.
"It'd take a hunting party of a dozen, with nets, to surround that one and get
her," Amanda said as Hal came close. She had already gotten her wind back,
which was more than he had. "The climate's mild year 'round at this altitude.
But still, how she's survived by herself, God knows. She couldn't have gotten
this wild and skillful in Just one summer. She's like an animal-maybe more
animal than human, by this time. One way or another, it's the Occupation
that's responsible for this, too. In Exotic times, she'd have been found and
brought in long before this." "R," said Hal, trying not to pant. He was once
more annoyingly conscious of how unfit he was, in spite of his daily exercise
sessions at the Final Encyclopedia; and being lashed in the face by branches
that were just at the right height to be run under by the child, but not by
him, had not made him any happier. "I suppose we might as well be getting
along." "Might as well," agreed Amanda.
They took up their way in somber silence. The streambed they had beera
following had been inclining more and more steeply with every step they took
these last few minutes. Suddenly, they came through a small, thick cluster of
trees and there was the face of the mountain itself; a near-vertical brown
limestone wall of rock looking as if it had grown up suddenly through the
ground before them, to tower on up and back, until it was out of sight.
The forest came almost to that wall. Amanda led Hal forward and he saw that
the lower part of the near-vertical rock was pitted and indented with
concavities. "This way," said Amanda, leading him to one dark opening, which
they had to bend double to enter. Hal followed her in, thinking that they were
moving into a cave, which made no
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Gordon R. Dickson
sense-but suddenly their way turned under the rock and he saw
light before him. They came out, into sunlight once more, somewhat higher up,
into a sort of gouge in the steep rock face itself.
Hal noticed as they emerged that a large, semi-round boulder was perched to
one side of their exit. It looked as if it-were balanced so that it could be
rolled to fall with its bulging side into the place where they had just come
out, like a stopper into a
bottle. Amanda led him into the gouge, and they continued upward, now climbing
as much as walking, working their way around bosses of the naked brown
limestone. They stopped to rest for a while on a small level area. "How much
farther?" asked Hal, shading his eyes to look up the rock face they were
climbing. "I can't see any sign of anything built up there; and-- He switched
his gaze to Procyon in the west. --the sun is going to be behind those peaks
in a hurry-I'd guess no more than another fifteen minutes. " "You don't see
anything because nothing's supposed to be seen," said Amanda. "But you're
right about the fifteen minutes. We'll make it."
Hal looked up and for the first time saw, only a dozen meters
or so higher up, that what he had assumed to be an unbroken, steep slope above
them, actually ended in the lip of a ledge. The ledge ran off out of sight on
either hand around the bulge of the mountainside. Its rock had blended in
appearance very well with a slope behind it that he now realized must be at
some distance from the edge he saw.
He had not noticed it before because the light of the descending sun had added
to the illusion of a single, unbroken, upward face of rock. Now the sun was
down enough that shadow lay on the rock face under an overhang of the upper
slope beyond, as it lay on the two of them, here. The ledge itself must still
be in sunlight, for what had caught his eye at last had been that its lip was
now rimmed with light.
Seeing it, and aware of the waiting level just above them, the reality of the
place that was their destination became suddenly solid and undeniable in his
mind. His thoughts moved together into an undeniable conclusion, and he knew
that finally he must have the answers he had wanted from Amanda earlier.
"Wait!" he said.
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. He had stopped; and now, ahead of him, Amanda stopped and turned to face
him. "What is it?" she asked. "This may be my last chance to talk to you alone
for a while." The words seemed to sound stiff and awkward even as he said
them-but they had to be said. "When Tam Olyn told you to have faith back at
the Final Encyclopedia, what was he talking about? And what was it you turned
back to say to Rukh and Ajela, just before we left?"
She gazed down at him for a long moment with an unusual intentness, as if she
was trying to search for something deep within him. "Tell me," she said at
last, "are you going on up? Or are you turning back, even at this point?" "Why
should I turn back?" "Would you-now?"
He thought about it for a moment. "No," he said then, "I wanted to come here.
I still do." "Good," she said, "because you had to come here of your own
decision, your own free will. Because you wanted to come. " "I did. You know
that." "I had to make sure," she said. She hesitated for a second. "You see,"
she said, "when I stopped to talk to Rukh and Ajela, it was to tell them it
would be all right now, that there was hope you'd find the Creative Universe
after all."
He stared at her. "How could you promise them something like that?" he said.
"I've no guarantee there's hope-you knew that. And even if I did, no one can
know certainly, one way or another!" "Oh, Hal!" She threw her arms around him
suddenly, pressing her head against his chest. "Don't you understand? ,You've
worn yourself thin trying to get through a wall at a point where there was no
way in. Back at the Final Encyclopedia, you could see how everybody else had
been worn thin; but you wouldn't face it in yourself! You've got to step back
from the problem and wait for another way to come to you. That's why you had
to come here! And as for the other question: I only know what Tam saw. He was
seeing more than I ever had, because, just as he said, he was halfway through
the door to death. But when he told me what he'd seen, I could see it,
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too-a time in which I'd need to believe in you, and why. Because you'd have
won after all-but at a greater price than any of us had ever imagined. And the
way to that's here; I can feel it! " "What price?" He was almost glaring at
her, he knew, but he could not help himself. "I don't know!" she said, still
holding him. "I said it was beyond imagination; for me-and I think even for
Tam. He only knew the fact of it. But when he told me, I could feel it the way
he did; and I understood something else-that I couldn't tell you, until you'd
committed yourself by actually coming here."
She stopped, as if she had suddenly run out of breath. "What else?" he
demanded. "Your next step on the road to what Tam made me see. You've
committed yourself now by coming to the Chantry Guild here, of your own free
will and choice. If I'd told you before this, it might have affected what you
keep calling the Forces of History. "
She let go of him then, but kept a hand on his arm as if a living connection
was necessary for the message she still had to reach him with. "Hal," she
said, "listen to me! Tam has to die completed if you're ever to do what you
first set out to do. You have to find the Creative Universe before he dies.
Only that'll justify his life in his own eyes; and he must die justified. If
he doesn't, you'll never find it!"
He stared at her. "Don't ask me why!" she said. "I don't know why! I only know
what Tam believes; and-I know he's right."
Hal's mind clicked and slid, from premise, to odds, to conclusion. Now that
his intuitive logic was given what it needed to work with, it was offering up
answers where it could offer none before. What Amanda said made sense.
Until the Final Encyclopedia should be put to its final, practical use, the
shape of that use would be undefined. It had been passed on, undefined, as no
more than a dream, from Mark Torre to Tam and from Tam to him. The chain of
cause and effect of this unreal and as-yet- unshaped, but powerful, cause
could break at Tam's death, if he believed he had died without it reaching at
last to its goal. It would mean to him that all his life, and everything
effected by it, had been a wrong
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131
working of the developing historical fabric; a working to a dead end, that now
would be abandoned.
Hal felt suddenly weak, with the weakness of shock. It had just been shown to
him that he alone, of the three of them, had been in a position of choice.
Neither Torre nor Tam could have turned from their work once they had taken it
up. He could have-had to have been able to, before being given the chance to
find the answer they all had sought-or else there was no free will. Otherwise,
the fabric of future history was pre-determined.
And it was not. Not fixed. Only the past was that. So he alone had had the
power of choice-and he had almost chosen wrongly.
No, never that.' Succeed or fail; but to give up as he had thought himself
ready to do was unthinkable after the torch had been carried this far. Fail,
if he must, but the only decision he could live with was to stick with it to
the end. Otherwise, all he had ever believed was false and useless.
He turned his face again to the ledge above them and felt Amanda's hand slip
down his arm to take his hand. Together, they went up into sunlight.
CHAPTER
14
The sunset exploded in their eyes as they came up over the rim onto the ledge,
for a moment all but blinding Hal as his eyes struggled after the dirnness of
the shadowed slope below. His legs felt strange and weak to be once more on
level ground. Gradually, visual adjustment came and he began to make out what
was around them.
They had stepped up onto a level space that ran back a hundred meters or so
before the mountain face resumed its upward thrust. The ledge was at least
five times as wide as it was deep and it was a crowded, busy place.
For a moment, still dazzled by the rays of the setting sun, Hal could not make
out the details. Then his vision made a sharper adjustment, and all that was
there seemed to stand out with a particular depth and clarity, as if he was
seeing it in more than three dimensions.
There were several openings in the mountain face at the back of the level
space; whether to caves, or interior continuations of the ledge, it was
impossible to tell from where he stood. He and Amanda stood only a little way
to the right of a small pond, fed by a stream which angled across the flat
rock of the ledge floor from a near waterfall spilling down the farther face
of the mountain. The pond must drain from its bottom, he thought, since there
was no other obvious exit, and the water probably
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133
emerged elsewhere on the mountainside or as a spring in the forest below.
Directly ahead, on the right of the tiny stream as Hal looked toward the back
of the ledge, were three large buildings. The one farthest in was slightly
larger than the one next to it; and the one closest was a structure so small
that it seemed hardly more
than a cabin by comparison with the other two.
All three buildings had been built of logs. The face of the mountain behind
was in the process of being quarried for blocks of brown limestone, and some
of these blocks had already been set up on the other side of the stream,
marking the outline of what promised to be a greater structure that would
eventually fill and use all the space at the back of the ledge. Away from the
stream on both sides, and otherwise in lines about the ledge as well as
against the upslanting rock walls of the mountain--so steep their upper
branches touched the stone-were numerous variform pine, with a scattering of
native evergreens. Pine needles were scattered everywhere, and made a carpet
over all the ledge itself.
People in robes were moving purposefully everywhere, along paths under the
lines of trees. The only exception to this, in the sharp sunset light, was a
ring of individuals walking in a circle, a little beyond and behind the pond.
They walked, one behind the other, chanting; a chant that Hal now realized
some acoustical trick of the rock below the level of the ledge had kept him
from hearing until this moment. But now it came clearly to his ears.
They intoned it as they walked, but it carried no clear message to him in this
first moment. But for a reason he could not identify, something about it rang
a deep note of certainty in him. It was right.
The last of the sunset was disappearing with the swiftness that was to be
expected on a world under such a tiny seeming circle of light. The star was,
in fact, far from Kultis and MaraProcyon was a much larger, as well as
brighter, star than Earth's Sun. At the distance from it that Earth was from
its Sun, a world like this would have been uninhabitable.
The evening shadow seemed to fall across all the world at once; and as it did
so, Hal's mind finally registered the sense of what the walkers were
repeating. That what they repeated had taken this long to become intelligible
to him had not been
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Gordon R. Dickson
because the words had not been spoken in Basic-Basic was what everyone on all
the human worlds normally used nowadays. Nor was it because they had run the
words together, or in any way sounded them differently.
it had only been because of their method of chanting. They intoned the phrase
they used, not in chorus, but as if each one was repeating it solely to
himself or herself. Sometimes the voices blended on the same sound at the same
moment; and sometimes they did not. But at any rate, now he clearly heard and
understood them. There were only eight words to what they repeated.
The transient and the eternal are the same . . . The transient and the
eternal are the same . . .
So suddenly did they become understandable to him, that it was as if they had
abruptly been translated from some language he did not know into one he had
spoken from his earliest years.
It was not so much the words in themselves that registered so strongly on him,
but the burden of their meaning; which he could not identify clearly, but
which stirred him strangely. As unfamiliar music might move him unexpectedly
and strongly even at the first hearing.
It was like a sound heard around a corner and out of sight, striking some
powerful meaning in him; but exactly what and why was not immediately clear.
Still, for the present it did not matter. The knowing would come, at its own
pace, but in time to,be useful. All that mattered now was realizing that it
rang a deep chime of truth in him.
It continued . . .
The transient and the eternal are the same . . . The transient and the eternal
...
. . .and so it went, on and on, echoing in him as if his mind was one great
unlighted cavern and it was speaking to him with the voice of all the universe
at once. Echoing and speaking, echoing and speaking. . . .
His body tensed to make an instinctive step toward the circle; then checked.
He held back, his eyes focusing for some reason
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135
on one walker with a long, white beard, silky on a thin, bony face beneath
oriental eyes. The man he watched had just completed the turn of the circle,
after having been facing away from Hal, but now came back toward him. For a
moment his features were clear in spite of the steadily deepening shadow that
seemed to wash the colors from the walker's patterned robe of thin, smooth
cloth, unlike the rough garments the other walkers wore. Hal turned to Amanda.
He saw her face looking up at him, concerned. He looked back down and smiled
to reassure her. "You were right," he said. "I needed to come here." "Good,"
she said, the concern relaxing from her eyes. "Come along then." "Where?" he
asked.
The face of the ]edge was busy with people moving to and fro between its
buildings. Some of these smiled at Amanda; but none seemed surprised to see
her. They extended their smile in a welcome to Hal himself in a manner so like
that of the Exotics as Hal remembered, that he felt a sudden, small pang of
sadness. Amanda was leading the two of them toward the smallest of the
buildings. "First you've got to meet the one in charge here," she said, "an
old friend of yours." "Old friend?" He tried to think of Exotics who might fit
that description. "Nonne?"
Nonne had been the Exotic representative -theoretically to the Final
Encyclopedia, but actually, as both the Exotics and Hal had clearly
understood, to Hal himself, since he had been the one who had won their
allegiance to the cause of Old Earth in a debate against Bleys, broadcast to
both Exotic worlds.
That had been at the time of the movement of the Dorsal people to Earth's
defense, and it had resulted in the donation of Exotic wealth and knowledge to
the same end. The time of the activation of the phase-shield. It was also the
fact that Nonne had been sent with him to voice any objections the Exotics
might have to Hal's later arrangements, as a kind of single last voice of the
Exotic Splinter Culture.
Norme had stayed the first year with him at the Final Encyclopedia. But it had
become more and more obvious that Hal was concerned, not with the management
of Earth's defense, but only with the work he pursued alone in the carrel of
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Gordon R. Dickson
his suite. So she had gone home, leaving the actual uses of Exotic funds and
skill to Ajela; and the actual execution of that defense to the Dorsai.
She had ridden out through the phase-shield with one of the Dorsai advisors,
like Amanda, who had been returning to the Exotics after a brief, necessary
visit to Earth. Hal, at least, had heard nothing of her since.
She had been a waspish, angry woman by nature, very nearly the exact opposite
of what other cultures thought of as Exotic. But Hal had appreciated the
sincerity and single-mindedness of her point of view; and her sharp-faced,
middle-aged image rose again in his mind now as he said her name. It had not
struck him until this moment that she might be the one he should come to meet
here in this place. "I'll let you find out for yourself," was all Amanda
answered. She led him on toward the entrance of the first, and smallest, log
building.
However, before they reached it a figure that was not Nonne's but even more
familiar to Hal appeared around the edge of the building. Walking beside him
was a man as large as Hal. Both wore the penitential robes. But Hal's eyes
fastened on the small body and wrinkled face of the smaller of the two, who
had been his closest companion during the time when he had been struggling to
bring the Exotics to give all they had to the cause now fought for by Earth. "
Amid!" he said. "But you're not at the Final Encyclopedia anymore,?"
He corrected himself. "No, of course not," he said. "Forgive me. I've been so
out of touch with people this last year, even at the Encyclopedia, that I
forget. That's right, about eight months ago one of the advisors from Kultis,
here, brought word your brother was sick. You left to go to him, didn't you?
But I didn't realize you'd stayed. "
A smile energized all the lines in the face of the little man so that he
seemed to shine with good humor. "Hal!" he said, hurrying forward to take
Hal's hand with both of his own. "I'd hoped-but I didn't really think there
was a chance Amanda could bring you here!"
Hal smiled back. It would have been next to impossible not to.
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137
"As you see," he answered. "But you found a job to keep you here?" "I'm sorry.
Seeing you-" He broke off. "I suppose I ought to explain that Kanin wasn't
actually a brother of mine, by blood-the way the word's used on other worlds.
In my generation, we still ran to large communal families. But he was as close
to me as if he had been, physically, my sibling. Perhaps closer. And I called
him brother'. So of course I came back here as soon as I heard. " "And stayed,
obviously," said Hal. "Yes." Amid let go of Hal's hand, but continued to beam
up at him. "For one thing, he'd died by the time I got here, and I was needed.
For another, for a long time I'd been bothered. I was sitting there, safe and
useless behind the phase-shield, in the comfort of the Encyclopedia while my
people were suffering." "So your brother was one of the people here?" "He was
Guildmaster," said Amid. "Now, I am. By default, more or less." "That's not
true," said the tall man. "No one could have filled Kanin's shoes, his
brother's shoes, but Amid." "I'm sorry," said Amid. "I should have introduced
Artur, here. He's Assistant Guildmaster. Artur, you know Amanda. This is Hal
Mayne. "
Artur extended a hand and Hal clasped it, feeling from the sudden heartiness
of the grasp confirmation of what his instinctive perceptions of emotion in
others had already suspected. Artur was an i mpressive- looking individual;
nearly bald, with a
narrow waist and massive, smooth-skinned arms and legs showing beyond the
short sleeves and the hem of the robe he wore. But he would far rather have
been a smaller man.
Hal had been aware that, in the first moment of their seeing each other, Artur
had automatically measured himself physically against Hal's size and apparent
strength. However, it had been a reflexive, unwilling measurement. Artur was
undoubtedly strong, even in proportion to his height and weight, but he
apparently was one of those who found the gifts of both size and strength as
only crosses to be borne.
Like certain other large men Hal had met, Artur clearly had an unhappiness
over the attitudes of those smaller, who assumed that because of his size he
did not suffer from their fears, their sensitivities to the pains and dangers
of life. He felt that
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everyone expected him, because of his size, to do more, to endure more, to
enjoy what they thought of as an unfair advantage. An advantage he, himself,
would happily have foregone if he could only be treated as no different than
everyone else.
It was an unhappiness which Hal had been lucky to avoid, largely because of
his upbringings, both as Donal and Hal. Also because with the Dorsai, just as
physical training and skill could more than compensate for differences in
power, they also rendered unimportant any advantages of extra size. Strength,
there, was irrelevant, in comparison with the will and soul inside the
person-large or small, old or young, man, woman, or child-on whom others might
have to depend; and the Dorsai culture took for granted an understanding of
this. "Come in. Come in and let's talk!" Amid was saying.
He stood aside to let Amanda go before him and then followed her through the
doorway of the small building. Hal was about to follow, when Artur spoke
behind him. "Hal Mayne?" "Yes?" Hal turned. " I'm sorry . . . you're the Hal
Mayne, of course. I should have recognized you at once. Amid's talked about
you often."
There was embarrassment, but also relief in Artur's voice; and Hal understood.
Artur could not be expected by anyone to compete against someone with Hal's
reputation. "Recognizing anyone right away from nothing more than verbal
descriptions is pretty good," said Hal.
He turned and went in, hearing Artur behind him. Inside, the building seemed
almost entirely given over to what appeared to be a single meeting, eating,
and working room. The last of the sunset was almost gone behind the rocky
peaks almost directly over them, in just these few minutes. But the lingering
brightness of the sky still glowed into one side of the large room they had
just entered, touching it through a number of the small, square windows spaced
evenly around the walls. Interior lighting was just beginning to supplement
this.
The artificial light came from a combination of candles, and three of the
common, portable, hundred-year lamps, affixed to the rafters which openly
crossed the space overhead under the steeply pitched roof.
Solar-charged lamps like these would be left over from before
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139
the coming of the Occupation Forces to Kultis, which brought an end to what
relatively little manufacturing the two Exotic worlds had done for themselves.
In addition, there was an open fireplace, contained within a square of four
knee-high walls of reddish brick. There was a hood over it of some metal which
looked like, and well might be, copper; undoubtedly likewise salvaged from
earlier days on this world. The hood reached up to a chimney pipe of the same
metal.
The fire already burning in the fireplace gave little light of its own; but
what there was of it softened the rather harsh illumination from the
hundred-year lamps, which were originally designed primarily for outdoor and
commercial uses.
In the partition wall opposite the door they had just come in were two other
doors, both partially open at the moment. One gave a glimpse into a small bed
area, and the other, a bathroom. Around the large room were wooden chairs,
homemade obviously, but padded and comfortable; and one large table end-on to
them, that had its farther end piled with papers.
The four of them moved instinctively toward the chairs closest to the
fireplace, for though the sun had been hidden for only a few minutes, it
seemed that a chill was already penetrating into the building from the open
air beyond the front door. "These are my quarters," said Amid as they sat
down, "but I've also got another office in one of the two dormitory buildings,
which can double as a bedroom. I'll let you two have that for the night, if
you like, since we aren't set up for guests in the ordinary way of things. But
sit down, sit down! You've come just at dinner time. Will you eat with me?"
"We'd be glad to," Amanda said. Artur got up again, hastily. "I'll take care
of it," he said, and went out. "He's a good Assistant Guildmaster," said Amid,
as the door closed behind the big man. "If I hadn't had him to help me take
charge here, I don't think I could have managed." "Do you mind if I ask why
you did take over?" Hal asked. "I can see you staying, for the reasons you
gave a moment ago. But why take on the job of Guildmaster?" "I was drafted
into it, in a manner of speaking," said Amid. "Those who'd known Kanin wanted
me simply because I'd been his brother. They seemed to think there was
something in common between us that fitted the job. And, to tell you the
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Gordon R. Dickson
truth, I did know something of how Kanin thought in many ways. Even though we
hadn't seen each other for fifteen years. I flattered myself my decisions
would be his decisions. Because he made this place work. He didn't found it,
you understand-or has Amanda told you all about the Chantry Guild already?"
"I've told him nothing," said Amanda. "I see." Amid looked at Hal. His lined
old face was shrewd. "Why did you come, Hal?" "Because Amanda said it was
something I should do. She was right," said Hal.
I I You just wanted to see it?" "Originally, it was probably more of an excuse
than a want," said Hal. "But now, if you'll have me, I'd like to stay awhile."
"I take it," said Amid, "you might want to walk in the circle then?" "If
that's allowable," Hal answered.
Amid grinned. He did not smile, he grinned. "For anyone else there'd be a
period of observation first, a
sort of apprenticeship; and a vote to be taken at the end of it, on him or her
by all the members here," he said. "But I think we
could do without that, since you're who you are."
He sobered. "In fact, no one but Artur and I knew you might be coming. It's
probably best to keep your real identity secret as long as we
can-which won't be too long. I think the other members will let you walk on my
recommendation alone, if that's necessary." "No," said Hal. "Yes," said
Amanda. "Amid, Hal doesn't know Kultis as it is now. Hal, you'd be doing the
people here a favor to at least give them the excuse that they were never told
who you really were.
Amid nodded, looking over at Hal. "She's right," he said. "Besides, it's not
as if your coming in on the Guildmaster's recommendation alone was something
otherwise unheard of. We've had people before this who were deserving, who've
been let into the circle incognito. But--
He turned back to Amanda. "It won't be more than a matter of weeks before
they'll have guessed who he is, anyway. Secrets aren't easily hidden in a
place as small as this ledge." "in a matter of weeks, the situation could be
entirely
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141
different," said Amanda. "For now, let's do what we can to protect everybody
concerned. Will Artur have spoken to anyone about who Hal is, when he went out
just now to get the dinner?" "No, no. Not Artur," said Amid. "He volunteers no
information. Besides, he's a highly intelligent individual; and even one who
wasn't would have the sense to know the danger to Hal-and to us all, as you
say-if it were known he was here on Kultis. " "In any case," said Hal, "I
won't be here too long. But-Amanda, you were right. There's something here for
me to find, in that circle. You were going to tell me about the one who
started it?" "Yes," said Amid. "It was a Maran Exotic you'll never have heard
of, named Jathed. He was a student of historic philosophy to begin with. He
was ahead of his time in speculating that we
Exotics might have gone astray from our original path. He spent twenty years,
after he finished studying at various of our
universities, examining our beginning-the Chantry Guild of Walter Blunt in the
twenty-first century. How much do you know about that?" "A fair amount, as it
happens," said Hal. "Good, then I won't have to go into too many details for
you," Amid went on. "You know a chantry was a place, or an endowment for a
place, where prayers could be said for a dead person, or persons; and that
Walter Blunt chose this name for his organization back in the twenty-first
century because by its very nature a chantry implies a relation of past,
present, and future?" "Yes," answered Hal. "Well, it was that relationship as
Blunt applied it that attracted Jathed. As I say, he spent his life studying
the original Chantry Guild, You can see how the idea of a connection of past,
present and future, now and forever, could lead to the concept of the
transient and the eternal being the same. Jathed even went to Old Earth for a
while. When he came back, he set himself up more or less as a hermit on the
outskirts of a little town near here called Ichang-"
Hal looked at Amanda. "It's about forty kilometers from Porphyry," Amanda
said. "We could have come through it on our way here, instead of through
Porphyry; but Ichang's not a garrison town. I mean, it doesn't have a garrison
of Occupation troops. The Porphyry
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Gordon R. Dickson
troops have a contingent quartered there, but that's all. I wanted you to see
what a garrison town on the Exotics, under the Occupation, was like." "This
with Jathed was some years before the Occupation," said Amid mildly. "As I
say, he became something of a hermit. You're probably already aware it's quite
possible to live off the country in areas like the one just below us. There's
enough insect, animal, bird, and vegetable life to keep anyone alive with just
a couple of hours of food hunting a day. That's how Jathed lived. He
deliberately wanted solitude to 'think through,' as he said, the proper
direction of what should have grown from that original Chantry Guild."
Artur came in, followed by two men and a woman, all carrying loaded trays.
Artur directed the setting of these at the far end of the table as Amid went
on. "Now, of course, since the Others, and particularly since the Occupation,"
he said, "every one on our two worlds has necessarily begun to rethink the
direction we Exotics took in our attitudes and our thinking after we emigrated
to these planets. But Jathed was considerably in advance of them all. At any
rate, he moved farther and farther back into the woods, to get away from even
casual contact with people; and eventually-we don't quite know when-he found
his way up to this ledge here.
--By that time, he'd acquired a few-disciples, let's call them. Yes, Artur?"
"Everything's ready on the table. And hot." "We'll be right there. Wait-- For
Artur had turned to follow those who had come in with him out the door.
"You're to eat with us. That's an order. I want you to be a part of everything
we decide with Hal, here. By the way, just to reassure us all, you didn't
mention who Hal is to anyone9" "Of course not, Guildmaster!" "That's his way
of reproving me," said Amid to Hal and Amanda, "when he calls me by my title.
The reproof is for even
needing to ask. We'll be at the table in a moment, Artur. Meanwhile, come and
sit with us; and if I forget to tell Hal part of the story of Jathed, break in
and fill the gap, will you?" "If you'd like me to," said Artur. "Thank you."
"No thanks needed," said Amanda. "You should have taken the invitation for
granted," "I'm sorry," said Artur, seating himself with them.
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143
"And no apologies are needed, either," said Amanda. "Go on, Amid. " "Where was
IT' said Amid. "Oh, yes, Jathed had started the walking down in the forest. He
continued it up here, specifying the rules under which it was to be done;
particularly the rule about how they were to chant. They were not to chant in
unison, or try to walk in step, unless these things happened by accident. The
idea was that they should be studying by themselves, even though they were in
company. Above all, they were to utter nothing but the Law-about that last he
was most emphatic. You'll have to remember that at all times, Hal. It's not a
,mantra' you're hearing from those people outside. Not a prayer, hymn, or
incantation of any kind. Jathed hated the word 'mantra' and wouldn't allow it
used by anyone around him; and he was a violent man about getting his own
way." "He used to drive people off with a staff," put in Artur, "though he did
that more when they were down in the forest-or have you told them about the
earliest Chantry Guild in the woods below us, Amid?" "No. I mentioned it, then
went right to the ledge," said Amid. "Now you see why I wanted you here?
Jathed's first incarnation of his Chantry Guild was, as Artur says, down in
the wild country below us; close to these cliffs, but not overly close. He
already had a number of disciples by that time, and he set them to walking the
circle he, himself, had earlier worn ankle deep. Of course, there were new
people coming every day wanting to join. But as I say he wasn't easy to get
along with. One mistake and the would-be member was out-chased out, in fact.
Jathed walked around with the staff Artur mentioned, and anyone who showed
what he considered 'incomprehension'but particularly the fault of calling the
Law a 'mantra'-got chased out, with Jathed running behind them hitting them
with his staff to keep them going at a good pace." "He called it a Law?" asked
Hal. "Yes." Amid looked penetratingly at him for a moment. "He called it a Law
and he meant it to be a Law, as clearly acknowledged as the Law of Gravity.
And he was furious with anyone who wanted him to teach them. He claimed all
that was needed was for each of them, individually, to study the Law." " 'The
transient and the eternal are the same,' '' said Hal. "Yes," said Amid. "I
don't fully understand it myself,
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Gordon R. Dickson
either, Hal; but like many people who've come into contact with the Law, I can
feel there's a power there; and I think Jathed was
right, too, about the fact it can't be taught. Whatever's in it has to be
found by individual effort to understand its meaning. You know, he said a
strange thing. He said that in two generations everyone-and he meant everyone
in the human race, not just those here on Kultis-would know the Law, and many
would already have started to put it to use."
He shrugged. "One generation of those two has already gone by; and there's few
enough even among us Exotics who ever heard of it or Jathed; and it hardly
looks like that'll change in the next twenty years or less. But that's what he
said." "Now is a time of change," said Hal thoughtfully. "True. But for
something like the Law to be accepted, let alone put to use, under present
conditions where the human race is at civil war with itself . . . the Others
certainly aren't going to take to the Law in any case; and wouldn't, even if
it came from some other source than an Exotic. You realize the Others are
literally out to kill us off-all of us on these two worlds? The only reason
they don't simply bring in armed soldiery and shoot us down is because a
massacre like that couldn't be kept secret from the other Younger Worlds and
it might give rise to anti-Other attitudes out there." "I know," said Hal. "in
fact, I had Bleys Ahrens tell me
about his goals, once." "The only thing that's forced Bleys to try to
accomplish his ends here by genteel starvation and casual individual murder by
his Occupation troops," said Amid, "is the fact that there're only a handful
of Others, a mere few thousands, to control all the Younger Worlds. We here at
the Chantry Guild have been overlooked, rather than specifically allowed to
survive. But, back to Jathed and the history of this present incarnation of
the Guild-- "Amid," said Artur, "might I mention the dinner again" The food's
getting cold, as I said. We could talk as we eat," "Of course. Of course,
you're right!" said Amid. "I'm getting more single-minded every day. Let's
move to the table, everybody. "
They moved.
CHAPTER
15
"At any rate," said Amid a few minutes later, when they had started to eat
from a number of dishes of vegetables, the contents of which, cooked and
uncooked, were in large bowls on the table before them, with chopsticks laid
out neatly at each seating place, "as Artur reminds me, it wasn't until
perhaps three years before the Occupation began that Jathed moved the walking
circle up here to the ledge and shortly after that, he died. Kanin was one of
his disciples-" 'The Master's leading disciple," said Artur. 'Well, well,
perhaps," said Amid. "Jathed didn't assign ranks to his followers. At any
rate, Kanin, foreseeing something like the Occupation, moved everyone
connected with the Guild-not just the walkers-up here and started building for
permanent occupation of this place. Then, last year, he died . . .and I've
already told you how I came to be with him-too late; and was asked to take
over as Guildmaster. " "The only possible choice-," began Artur, but Amid
interrupted.
-Perhaps, as I say. But what you need to know, Hal, if you're going to stay
here awhile, is that we're an open democracy in this place, everybody having a
vote on everything and the majority ruling. In practice the Guildmaster has a
veto over anything voted, but-" "In practice," put in Artur firmly, "no one
would think of
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Gordon R. Dickson
questioning the Guildmaster's veto, or an order by the Guildmaster. " "Well,
well. The point is, Hal, you'll be moving in as one of the members of the
Guild. That means you'll have a vote, of course, but I'd suggest you wait
until you understand this place better before you begin using it. You'll stay
in one of the dormitory buildings, in the singles' quarters. There are rooms
for couples here as well, but they're all full right now and we haven't had
time to build more; that's why I suggested you use
my office as your room for tonight." "Thank you," said Amanda. "We appreciate
it." "Yes, indeed," said Hal. "The office would only be empty otherwise. I
sleep here, nights." Amid made a dismissing gesture with his chopsticks. "Now,
about the circle itself. Every Chantry Guild member, which means everyone on
the ledge, has a chance to walk in it, in regular rotation. He or she can pass
up the turn when it comes, if they want. Both Artur and myself have to, most
of the time, because of the administrative work to be done. For the rest, it's
a matter of each one waiting for his or her turn, then joining the small group
of waiters beside the circle-did you see
the group of those waiting their turn as you came in?"
Hal thought back. There had, indeed, been a handful of men and women on the
far side of the circle of walkers, but he had thought they were simply people
who had stopped for a moment to watch. "The rule as laid down by Jathed, you
see," went on Amid, "is that once you begin to walk the circle you can keep
walking as long as you wish. The circle goes twenty-four hours a day, every
day of the year, so if it was physically possible, a single person could hold
his or her place in it indefinitely. But in reality, exhaustion would
eventually put an end to anything like that; and the truth is, even those
walking normally seem to reach a point far short of exhaustion, at which they
decide to step out and let someone replace them. I don't mean they stop as a
matter of fair play or good manners; but simply because something in them
feels it has accomplished, or absorbed, or whatever you want to call it-what
it set out to do. As if a good day's work had been done and they were
satisfied with what had been achieved after the time and effort expended."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
147
: "Can they tell you afterward what it was that made them decide to stop? What
it was they'd accomplished?" Hal asked.
Amid glanced at him suddenly. "That's an interesting question," he answered.
"No. They can't. But they'll tell you that they feel . . . completed. In fact,
that's the way I've felt after walking." "I see," said Hal thoughtfully. "What
this means," said Amid, "is that while I can recommend your immediate access
to the Guild members                 i you'll still have to go out there and
join those standing by, and wait your turn when it comes. Unless someone ahead
of you offers you his or her turn; and of course, this assumes that those
in-between you and the one offering don't mind you going before them, too."
"No one, I think, would object to Hal being given priority," said Artur.    "In
fact, even not knowing him, they wouldn't object if a fellow Guild member
wanted to trade places backward. " "Well, in theory they've got a perfect
right to object, and I Want Hal to   understand that." "I do," said Hal. "In
fact," said Amid, almost fiercely, "what you may actually find when you join
the waiters is that they'll each offer you the chance to step ahead of them,
so that you may be the
rst one to take the next opening in the circle. But that's up to them. They'd
have to do that. I can't, in conscience, even recommend it." "I understand,"
said Hal. "Guildmaster, " said Artur, "I think you may be leaning over
backward a little in all this. Hal should also be reminded that it would only
be showing a proper appreciation to accept if anyone offers him a chance to
move up." "Well, yes," answered Amid. "You're right of course. I'm sorry if I
seemed to imply that you shouldn't accept if anyone offers, Hal." "You
didn't," said Hal. "Good, then," said Amid. He turned to Amanda. "Amanda,
you've hardly said a word. Now what, now that You've brought Hal here? Will
you be staying, too? If so, there'll be a question of quarters. I'd gladly let
you have my
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Gordon R. Dickson
office for an indefinite number of nights, but sometimes we do need to work
over there, when I've got a lot of our people doing some large project or
other here; and in any case-" "In any case," said Amanda, "I'll he staying
only a few days to see how it works out for Hal. Then I'll be getting back to
my own work in the district below." "Whatever you want. Although," said Amid,
"I'm oldfashioned enough not to like the idea of your teaching Exotics to
physically fight for their rights." "Only if they ask for it," said Amanda.
"You should have understood by this time that what I teach them mainly is
survival-how to survive if hunted, how to survive under the noses of the
garrison troops. Your Exotics are never going to rise and drive off these
invaders. On the other hand their own culture, given a little help in some
instances, arms them with ways to deflect trouble, avoid trouble or defend
themselves, if trouble unfairly comes looking for them." "I'm relieved to hear
that," said Amid. "As far as your staying temporarily, we won't be needing the
office evenings and nights for several weeks, anyway; and in the case of your
coming back for a few days unexpectedly, we can always work out something. But
you haven't anything to say about what we're talking about? About Jathed and
the history of our Chantry Guild here?" " I'm interested-but this is Hal's
area, " said Amanda. " I'l I just go on listening, if you don't object."
"Object? Certainly not. This isn't a place where people object to things. Also
we're not discussing anything at all secret. "
Amid turned to Hal. "And since the subject of your area's come up," he said,
"I ought to admit to you, Hal, that we've got a selfish motive for having you
with us; particularly since Amanda can't stay. The Occupation Forces would
wipe us out in a moment if they suspected we were here. We avoid their finding
out as much as possible by having contact with only three people from
Porphyry, who come up this way every so often on the excuse of gathering
fruits or berries from the wild plants. But there's always a danger that
something might cause the local garrison to investigate this area. It'll be a
relief to us to have someone with some military training on hand, even though
the chance of their
THE CHANTRY GUILD
149
hearing about us up here is remote. We'll sleep a little easier until you
leave." "I'm afraid," said Hal, in a colder tone than he had intended, "you're
under a misapprehension. Maybe Amanda could be some real help to you, but I'm
no Dorsai. "
He avoided Amanda's eyes directly as he said these last words but he was aware
her gaze was on him. She said nothing. "Oh, you aren't, we all know that,"
said Amid swiftly, "but I understand you had a Dorsai as one of your tutors
and you're a good deal closer to one than anyone else on the ledge here
-except Amanda, of course. But if the soldiers find us and it comes to an
actual conflict-" "Oh, that-" Hal shrugged. "Certainly, anything an individual
can do, since I'm your guest. Of course."
He smiled a little, not happily. "It's a good thing you didn't ask me that a
couple of years ago," he said. "At that time my answer would have been that
I'd become a little like the rest of you, in that philosophically I'd moved
away from the area of violence. But now I'm free to be useful to you up here
in any way I can." "Ah," said Amid gently, "of course, you're entitled to live
by your beliefs, just as much as the rest of us. If it'd be imposing on
those-" "No!" said Hal, and was surprised by the sharpness of his own voice.
More gently, he added, "it's perfectly all right. I'm at your disposal, body
and mind." "We appreciate it," Amid answered.
Amanda still said nothing, and Hal thought he was aware of an aura of
disapproval emanating from her silence. "Tell me more about Jathed," he said,
to change the subject "Give Amid a chance to eat, Hal," Amanda spoke finally,
"then you can ask all the questions you want." "No, no. That's quite all
right. I eat very little," said Amid. "About Jathed-what specifically do you
want to know about him?" "If you don't mind, Guildmaster," said Artur, "I've
been sitting here just eating and listening; and I've pretty well finished.
Why don't I answer while you eat? If there's anything important, you can
always speak up. But you should eat." "I'll eat, I'll eat!" said Amid. "You'd
think I was a prize goat the way they're always trying to stuff more food down
me!"
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Gordon R. Dickson
"I'm sorry, Guildmaster. We do overdo it, of course-" "Never mind. I'll eat.
You talk," said Amid. "But if there's anything I want to say, I'm not going to
let a piece of fried root keep me from it. All right. I'm sorry. You're right.
Talk. I'll eat. "
He began taking pieces of food from the various serving bowls and putting them
on his plate. "If Jathed didn't believe in teaching, what did he do?" asked
Hal. "Did he walk in the circle, himself?" "Not in the memory of anyone who
became a disciple of his," said Artur. "Apparently he had for years, all those
years he was alone in the jungle living like a hermit, because, as I may have
mentioned, there was a rut-in fact, you might even want to call it a
ditch-worn outside the hut he'd built for himself by the time he began to
admit disciples. In fact, it was already so
deep that they'd shortly have worn it down until they were walking around out
of sight below ground level, if some of them hadn't started to fill it in
surreptitiously when he wasn't around. He came and caught them at it once, but
didn't object. So they filled it back up to ground level, and kept it that
way. You could never tell, apparently, what he was going to approve of or
object to.' , "But he, himself, had stopped walking by the time anyone began
to live with him?" Hal asked. "He said he didn't need to, any longer. That the
Law was in his mind all the time now-it had worn a rut there as well as in the
ground. That was one of the questions he answered from someone, once, instead
of simply shouting 'Stupid!' and chasing whoever it was off with his staff."
"But what did he do, if he didn't teach and he didn't walk?" "In his later
days," said Artur, "after he had acquired disciples, there were lots of times
when he talked to them. I don't want to give the impression he was
unreasonable all the time. In fact, most of the time he was pleasant, even
witty, and perfectly willing to discuss things. The only problem was that if
you made a mistake you got chased away for good." "Someone he ran off couldn't
come back later?" Amanda asked.
Artur shook his head. "There weren't any warning shots, any second chances,"
he
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151
said. "Evidently it' you asked the wrong question you were showing you didn't
belong there, and out you went. Some of the people he chased away tried to
form their own groups, but none of them got anywhere." "Jathed could be, and
was," interrupted Amid suddenly, "not only informative but charming. It didn't
take a question to get him talking. A bird, a falling leaf, anything or
nothing at all, might bring a comment from him and he'd go from that into a
sort of informal lecture. Theoretically, as Artur just told you        ' asking
the wrong question got you thrown out; but his disciples noticed that during
one of these informal lectures of his, questions were a lot safer to ask.
Then, he seemed more willing to explain than at other times. Some of these
'lectures' were recorded by those there at the time-Jathed didn't seem to
object to that, either, under those conditions . . .             Artur, where's
that control pad? I thought I had it on the table, right here, unless I
knocked it off. . . . "
He was searching around the end of the table. I 'I'll find it, Amid, " said
Artur. "I think I saw it over by that chair you usually sit in."
He went back to where they had all been sitting around the fireplace, lifted a
transparent glass paperweight, showing a small, green pine cone, about the
size of a hen's egg, and took a control pad from underneath it to set it down
by Amid. "Thank you," said Amid. "My memory's as good as it ever was, except
for little things like this." "You work too hard, Guildmaster." "I do what has
to be done-never mind that, now. Ah, I've got it! "
He had been fingering the pad. Suddenly a surprisingly resonant, pleasant,
deep bass voice sounded in the room. ". . . different universe. My universe is
not your universe. For example, in my universe I will now get up-watch me-walk
across the room, up the wall and stand head   down, talking to you as I am now.
That's because in my universe it's possible   for me or anyone else to do that."
There was a long moment of silence, finally   broken by a somewhat
timid-sounding, young male voice. "Jathed?"   "Yes, Imher?
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Pardon me ... but it seems to me ... that is, you're still sitting in your
chair. You talked about moving but you didn't move. "Of course not-in your
universe. But in my universe, I did exactly what I said. You didn't see it
because you're not in my universe, you're in your own. Make an effort and step
into my um .verse, and you'll see me standing on the ceiling talking down to
you."
There was another pause. "You can't do it?" said Jathed's voice. "Of course
not. You don't believe in yourself enough to believe that you can enter
someone else's universe. But there're people even on the inhabited worlds
today, Imher, who have enough faith in themselves to step into someone else's
universe. Faith and-yes, courage-which you also lack, all ofyou here. Am I
correct that none of you see me standing on the ceiling at this moment?"
There was yet another pause. "Well, speak up, speak up!" A chorus that was
very close to a shamefaced mutter of "no's" answered Jathed. "But I can! I
can, just now. ltjust happened. Jathed, I can see
YOU UP there.'' "Do you indeed, Imher? Very well, as reward for your faith and
courage, you may come up and join me. Come on up." "Come up?'' "Wasn't that
what I said?'' "Yes, Jathed."
There was a moment of absolutely soundless silence. "I ... I made it." "LIAR!
Out! Out! Out of my sight! Out of this place and never
let any of us see you again! Go! Go!"
There was a thump, a scrabbling noise and the sound of shod feet running away.
A door slammed.
There was a further lengthy moment of silence, then the voice of Jathed again,
now a little breathless. "Intolerable! Outrageous! Now, where was I? Oh, yes,
on the ceiling. I'll just go back up there ... try to watch me this time and
see me. Now, here I am again, hanging head down; though of course it's not
head-down to me, all the rest of you are
wrong-side up-ah, but what have we here? Someone who actually has courage
andfaith. Well, don't sit there on the edge
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153
of your chair, trembling! If you think you can do it, Reho, come up and join
me." "Should l?'' said a different voice, doubtfully -female this time. "Of
course I think -you can, numbskull! Would I invite you up if I didn't see-you
were i .n my universe? Come at once!"
-A// right . . . '' Silence again. "I'm here!" said the voice, full of wonder.
" Where did you expect to be? Now, for the benefit of all those below us who
still lackfaith and courage, to prove to them you're actually with me, reach
back into your own universe and break the ceiling light just to your right,
there. "
A hesitation. Then the smashing and tinkling impact of light fragments on a
hard surface. "Very good. We'll go back down now. That's right.'' "I ... I,In
afraid of heights. I didn't stop to think before I came . . . being upside
down with nothing to hold me-'' "NOT IN MY UNIVERSE! You are not afraid of
heights in my universe, Reho! Do you hear me?" "Yes, Jathed. '' "Good. Go
down.''
Silence again. "Well?" said the voice of Jathed. "Now that Reho and I are back
in our seats, none of you saw anything at all out of the ordinary-except the
inexplicable breaking of the light unit,       two meters above vour heads
'9"
"No, Jathid, " said the chorus. "Well, you all have something to hope for,
then. Each one of you pick up a ftagment of that broken ceiling light and take
it away with you to help you study. Ponder. Think. Do that success
                                          f your ./u/A and vou, too, mav one
day become aware o own universe as distinctfirom others.- "Jathed?'' It    was
yet another female voice. " Yes, Katchen '9"
"We didn't-I mean I didn't-see you go up the wall to the ceiling in your
universe. But when Reho broke the light in her uni.verse, we all saw it break.
Why could we see something that happened in her universe but not in yours?"
"Think.' Answer    'your own question. Why? Think! Can't you think of the
answer yourself?''
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Gordon R. Dickson
"No, Jathed.- "You didn't see Reho break the light in her universe-that's the
answer!" "But . . . " "But what?" "But the light's broken. We can all see its
parts on the floor there. We all saw it break.'' "Where?" "Where?'' "Don't
parrot me. I said 'where?' Now you tell me-where did you see the light break?"
There was an extended silence. "You each saw it happen in your own universe,
you idiots!'' snapped Jathed. "You didn't have the faith and courage to
believe that I could walk up a wall and stand on the ceiling, in your
universes. That's impossible. But you could believe that a
light could be broken. Because lights break. That's poss-ee-ble! " He drew the
last word out sarcastically. "When 1, Jathed, told you that the light would be
broken, so that you'd all have evidence Reho had been with me on the ceiling,
THEN you believed! Numbskulls! Reho broke the light in her own universe, only.
You-each of you-because for a moment you believed it was possible-broke it
yourselves in your own unt    .verses, to make what I promised you actual."
He stopped talking. No one else said anything. "All right. Understand then,
that You have a universe, that you can do with it what you will-look at the
piece of broken light in your hand, those of you who've already picked a piece
up-the rest of you pick one up and look at it. Think. You did that, without
getting upfrom your chair, without even walking up a wall and standing on the
ceiling! Do you understand now? Do you comprehend how your universe is a place
where you can do anything you want, ifyou've got what's needed to do it,
thefaith, the courage-and the knowledge, which in this case is the knowledge
that a light will break easily? If I'd said Reho would punch a hole in the
ceiling, you might not have been as quick to believe and make it happen in
your own universe."
--Would you turn it off?. " said Hal. "Well, do as I sa 'v, pick up-The voice
of Jathed broke off abruptly.
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155
"That's curious," said Amid. "Why did you want the recording stopped, and
stopped just there, Hal?" "Because he said something very interesting. As you
just remarked." Hal smiled at the older man. "I'd like some time to think
about it." "And what was it that was so interesting in particular, if I might
ask?" Amid said. "What he said about everyone being in their own universe,"
said Hal. "Don't ask me why just now, if you don't mind. The only answer I
could give you would be too long and complex and right now I'm not even sure
it'd be satisfactory." "If you wish," said Amid. "This tape, and others of
Jathed, are here any time you want to listen to them." "Thank you," said Hal.
"Now, since dinner's over-for which, thank you-perhaps Amanda and I had better
make our move over to that office of yours, for the use of which, also thanks.
It's been a long day, all of it uphill." "I can imagine," said Amid. "Good
night, then. It's very, very good to see you both. You particularly, Hal,
since I hadn't been sure, until Amanda talked to me about bringing you, that
I'd ever see you again after I'd left the Encyclopedia." "No meeting is ever
impossible," said Hal. "True. Good night, then, as I say. Artur will show you
where the office is, and make sure you're properly settled there. Won't you,
Artur?" "Of course," said the big man.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
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CHAPTER
16
Amid's office-the Guildmaster's office, as Artur somewhat apologetically
explained it should be referred to, when they spoke about it to anyone but
Amid-was large enough for two work positions, and that was about all. It did,
however, have enough floor space to allow the folding down of an oldfashioned
mattress, which during work hours folded up against one of the walls. It was a
generously sized double mattress, for which both Hal and Amanda were thankful,
having had to do with a few ordinary-sized beds in their time. "Well," said
Amanda, sometime later and just before they fell asleep. "Do you want to tell
me why that recording of Jathed made you feel so good'? I could feel you
radiating cheerfulness right across the dining table. I probably could have
felt it clear outside that roorn.- "It was what I told Amid, what had struck
me in what Jathed had said," Hal answered, "about there being a universe for
every individual person. I haven't lacked for evidence. I was on the right
track in my search for the Creative Universe. But I haven't had any new
evidence for several years now; and, suddenly, along comes a man who agrees
with me." "How agrees with you?" said Amanda. They were lying on their backs
in the darkness, side by side, with all of the cloth covers with which the bed
was furnished laid aside, since they were both rather sweaty. They were also
holding hands. "He
talked about a lot of universes. You've always talked about just one. " "It
doesn't matter," said Hal. "One big universe with room in it for everybody to
create what he or she wants, or one universe each in which to create what each
one wants. It amounts to the same thing-"
He broke off suddenly. "What is it?" asked Amanda. "Just hearing myself say
that both conceptions amounted to the same thing. The transient and the
eternal are the same. The likeness reminded me of Jathed's Law, that's all.
Anyway, Jathed evidently had hold of a corner of the same blanket I've got a
corner of. It does cheer you up to have your findings corroborated. " "I'm
happy for you then." Amanda gave his hand a squeeze "But to be truthful, I
still don't follow that business of the broken light. Would it be 'not-broken'
to someone who hadn't been there, who just walked into the room, afterward . .
. or what?" "I don't know," said Hal. "Maybe that's why I'm right about it
being one large universe with room for unlimited creations to be built in it,
rather than an unlimited number of private universes, like Jaffied said; and
that's what's wrong with his theory, the fact that the question you just asked
can't be answered. Or it may be that he was right in that some things done in
the Creative Universe acquire existence in this one-for example, a painting's
made in the mind of the artist, but it appears in what people will probably
always call the real universe. " "But you know why it appears in the real
universe. You can watch it being painted," "No," said Hal, "what you watch are
materials of various colors being applied to an even, vertical surface. When
do you see the painter put into the painting whatever it is that makes those
colors have a profound emotional effect on you? Or take music for example-"
"Never mind," said Amanda, "I see what you're driving at. I'm still glad you
find him corroborating you; but the fact is I wasn't too impressed with him.
He seemed more interested in showing off than anything else." "Still," said
Hal, "he was using the Creative Universe
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Gordon R. Dickson
consciously and deliberately, which is something I can't do. He was entering
it. All down the centuries, these artistic examples I'm always giving have
been cases of creativity being used onk on the unconscious level. It's as if
the artist can reach through into the Creative Universe with his arms and
hands only in it, and has to work there by touch alone. I want to go into it
completely-step into it as if it were another place to be stepped into. I have
to do that, to make a battleground where the Enemy and I can finally have it
out; and to make an opening so that other people can enter after me, wholly
and consciously, to work with it in the future. But you're right about
miracles being a bad way to teach anything, let alone this. I rejected that
method of teaching its existence the first time I discovered the Creative
Universe-but I've told you about that." "I wish," said Amanda, "you'd stop
telling me you've told me things that you haven't told me. You've never said
anything to me about when you discovered the Creative Universe." "I'm sorry,"
said Hal. "I do a certain amount of going over
things in my mind, with you there in imagination-effectively bouncing problems
off you; and unless I deliberately stop to remember when I did that on a
specific topic, I get the imaginary talks with you mixed up with the real
ones."
Amanda turned her head on the pillow and kissed his cheek. "What was that
for?" he asked. "Nothing. Go on," she said. "You're going to tell me, actually
this time, when you first discovered the Creative Universe. " "It was back
when I was Donal," said Hal. "You remember I showed you Sayona the Bond back
at the Encyclopedia? It was some time before then. I'd just quit being War
Chief for the two Friendly worlds after a rather unfriendly scene with Eldest
Bright, who was head of the United Council of Churches for the Friendlies-in
fact, he threatened me with summary trial and execution. I had to shoot three
of his guards he ordered to arrest me; and remind him that his capitol city
was full of enough of my mercenaries, who could appreciate the bloodless
victory I'd just given them, to make it unwise for him to try doing such a
thing. He'd accused me of being bought by the Exotics, over whose forces I'd
just given him the victory; and it turned out he hadn't wanted it bloodless.
He'd wanted blood and lots of it, specifically Exotic blood.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
159
So he had to let me go; but his last words were that I should go and look for
work with the Exotics. I'd already decided to do just that, anyway; and so I
contacted them. That led to an inter-view with Sayona, who hired me, but also
made the suggestion I become an Exotic. One of the things he said was that he,
at least, believed I was the kind of person who could walk on air if I really
wanted to. I turned him down on being an Exotic, but . . . "
In the quiet office-turned-bedroom Hal could hear his voice echoing
differently from the walls, now, as he remembered how it had been, being
Donal. It was Donal's voice in his present ears; and it brought a strangeness
over him. Telling Amanda about it, he found himself reliving that time, now
more than eighty years in the past. . . .
. . .deep in thought, he had returned to his own quarters in the city of
Portsmouth, on Mara, which then held the Military Command Base for the two
Exotic worlds. Portsmouth was in what on Old Earth would have been the
temperate latitudes; but the nature of Procyon, the same sun that shone on
Kultis, was such that the night which hadjust en/bIded that city as he came
back was tropical.
The soji illumination of his room had come on automatically as he entered; but
it was so adjusted that itfailed to white out the overhead view of the stars.
These shone down through the open wall of the loggia that was his bedroom.
Standing in the center of this loggia, his mind still full of the conversation
with Sayona, Donal frowned. He gazed up at the gently domed roof of the
loggia, which reached its highest point at two meters above his head. He
frowned again and turned to search through the writing desk in the room until
he found a seff-sealing signal-tape capsule. Then, with this in one hand, he
turned to look toward the ceiling again, and took one rather awkward step up
off the floor.
His foot found purchase in the air. He stepped upward, putting his weight on
it. Slowl   -v, step by step he walked up through nothingness to the high
point of the ceiling. Opening the capsule, he pressed its self-sealing edges
against the white surface oJ'the ceiling, where they (,lung. He stood there a
second in the air, staring at them. "Ridiculous!'' he said suddenlv-and just
as suddenly, he
160
Gordon R. Dickson
wasfalling. He gathered himself with the instinct of long training in the
second of drop and, landing on hands andfeet, rolled over and came erect like
a gymnast against a far wall. He got up, brushing himself off, unhurt-and
turned to look up at the ceiling. The capsule still clung there.
Suddenly he had laughed, cheerfully and out loud. "No, no," he said to the
empty room. "I'm a Dorsai!"
"You rejected it," said Amanda in the darkness. "Why?" "I handled all things
by intuitional logic, then," said Hal. "I ran the probabilities forward and
found they went nowhere-at least as far as going where I wanted to go, which
was to lead the human race to a time when none of them would ever do the sort
of thing that had caused the death of my uncle James. But you do see-"
He turned to look in her direction. Although there was some light leaking
around the door that led to the interior of the building and the bathroom
facilities, there was not enough to read the expression on Amanda's face.
--how I'd entered the Creative Universe, and used it, I'd had to, to be able
to put that message capsule on the ceiling. From that, I realized there must
be an aspect of things I'd never taken into account before; and the concept of
the Creative Universe grew from that." "But you turned away from it then?" she
said. "My first thought was that it was only good for parlor magic tricks. It
never crossed my mind it could be useful. Remember, at that time, as I say, I
still believed in the way of getting physical control of all the worlds and
making the people on them live by laws that would end the sort of situation
that'd killed James. At that time I didn't see any reason it wouldn't work."
He hesitated. "But that was the first time I'd entered the Creative Universe,"
he said more slowly, "and, like everyone else since time began, I did it
unconsciously. I said to myself, 'let's see if I can't walk on air,' and tried
it; and found I could. The potential of that came back to me once I got
control of all the Younger Worlds and found laws alone wouldn't change human
nature."
He laughed. "Breathtaking discovery, wasn't it?" he said. "At any rate, then
it occurred to me for the first time to go back to the
THE CHANTRY GUILD
161
twenty-first century and change the direction of history. My full appreciation
of what the Creative Universe could mean for the race was born in my search
for a way to do that. To begin with, it offered me a way to put my mind back
into the past-and bring it back eighty years later than when it had left, in a
two-year-old body. "
He lay for a moment without saying anything. Amanda waited patiently. "But
even then I was making use of the creative forces largely unconsciously,
without really understanding them. It was only when I had to recognize the
Others as a result of the changes in intent I made in the estab I ished
-frozen by time-historic forces of the twenty-first century, that I began to
see the real shape of the job I had to do. It was then I really looked at the
Creative Universe; and saw its ultimate possibilities, and the absolute
necessity for them." "Tell me," said Amanda thoughtfully, "you don't use
intuitional logic anymore?" "No," said Hal. "It doesn't help what I'm doing
now and hasn't helped much with anything I've done for a long time. It's a
Donal-style tool, about as useful as the ability to do calculus instantly in
your head. Idiot savants have done things comparable to it for centuries
without giving the race a chance for improvement; let alone helping it grow,
the way I hoped--
He stopped, on a note in his voice that left what he had been saying
uncompleted. "But while my mind was back in the twenty-first century," he
said, "under the influence of Walter Blunt and what the Chantry Guild was
then, as well as by my own will, I entered the Creative Universe deliberately.
Earlier, I'd just passed through it to get back in time. It was because I was
there that I could be, and was, struck at by the Enemy. Otherwise, I'd never
have begun to see what the conscious, willing entry into that universe
promises everybody." "But there's no way you can use intuitional logic to see
your way to the Creative Universe?" Amanda asked. "It doesn't work for that
sort of problem. It's essentially a tool of' the real universe, bounded by
logic. It can't jump gaps-only go through the logical steps faster. I know
I've been saying I have to find the way to the Creative Universe; but perhaps
what I ought to be saying is that I have to make a way to
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Gordon R. Dickson
it. If there was already a way, the kind of way I need, to the Creative
Universe, intuitional logic could find it. But there isn't one yet, and
intuitional logic not only can't find what isn't there, It can't make anything
on its own." "I understand then," Amanda said thoughtfully. "You're saying you
can't see ultimate consequences to anything?" "That's right. I can't. All
that's visible to it is what ordinary logic would predict if ordinary logic
had all the elements of the problem and unlimited time to work them to a
conclusion. Intuitional logic not only doesn't work in the creative area, it
doesn't work in the personal one-for instance, I can't see my own death;
because like all reasonably healthy persons, I can't, on the unconscious
level, conceive of myself as dead and the universe going on without me-"
Amanda did not move physically. The years of her upbringing, both as a Dorsai
and as the prot6g6 of the Second Amanda, held her still'. But her profound
emotional reaction reached out to Hal with shocking impact, through that same
channel by which they could touch each other across light-years of space.
Swiftly he gathered her into his arms, holding her tight against him. She lay
still there, too, but now he could feel the trembling inside her. "Amanda!" he
said, "what is it?"
-I don't know. I can't tell you . . ." she said between teeth clenched tight.
"It's as if the edge, just the edge, of some terrible sadness brushed me. Oh,
my love-hold me"'
-I've got you," said Hal. "Tell me you won't go away, ever!" "I'll never leave
you," said Hal. "Oh, thank all heavens, all gods            Amanda clung to
him. He held her tight; and, in time, they slept-still close together.
CHAPTER
17
Dawn through the uncurtained windows of the office woke them both. They
dressed and found their way to the dining hall of the dormitory building they
were in. They were seated across from each other at an end of one of the long
picnic-style plank tables, having breakfast, when Amid joined them. "Someone
told you we were here," said Amanda, as the old man sat down next to her. He
looked more diminutive than ever side by side with Amanda, Hal noticed. It was
as if the last year or so had shrunk him even further, only without harming
him. He was a little kernel of a man, but hard and alive. "Quite right." He
beamed at her. "I'd left word with those on kitchen duty in both buildings to
let me know when you were up for breakfast. "
He looked over at Hal. "I thought I'd take you out and see you started in the
circle myself," he said. "Isn't that possibly going to mean a long wait for
you?" asked Hal. "Ordinarily, yes," said Amid. "But it seems things are out of
my hands. Word about a visitor here is already around; and those currently
waiting have all volunteered to let you go first. We'll only have to wait
until the first person to step out of the circle after we get there does so.
Then you step in; Amanda and I go about our business."
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Gordon R. Dickson
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165
"Your business?" Hal looked from Amid to Amanda. 'Well, I about my business,"
said Amid. "I was merely using the expression. What Amanda's immediate plans
are, I've no idea. I assumed you'd know." "I'm staying for a day or so," said
Amanda, "so I can watch Hal at the start. I'll just wait around-unless you've
got something I can do to help pay our way with you here? I know everyone on
this ledge works at something or other." "You're our guest," said Amid. "That
rule doesn't apply to you or Hal unless you want it to."
I As I told you," said Hal, "I'll do my share of whatever's to be done."
"There you are," said Amanda. "That takes care of him. Now, what have you got
that I can be useful at?" "Thank you, then," said Amid. "All right, you can
drop by our infirmary, if you want to. We don't have much sickness here, but
small accidents will happen. Old Man is walking right now, so we could use
someone who knows something about acupressure for pain relief and such-the
sort of thing you Dorsai all know." "A place like this, on an Exotic world,"
said Hal, "and you need the skills of a Dorsai for battlefield-style medical
handling?" "Amanda radiates the will to recover more than most, as I imagine
you know," said Amid. "We have one person here, as I just mentioned, who calls
himself simply 'Old Man,' he does the same thing; but even he's not as good at
it as Amanda."
"Oh?" said Hal. "I'd like to meet him." "You'll see him when you get out to
the circle," said Amid. "He's got a sort of aura about him that seems to make
people heal themselves faster and more comfortably. Actually, his name is
Laoren, which, I gather, is Chinese in origin. But when he came here he asked
us to simply call him by its translation in Basic, which is 'Old Man.' He's
somewhat unusual; an Exotic from a family that had preserved their ethnic
purity for more
than a century and a half. You know how, on these two worlds of ours, we've
always approved rather of mixing ethnic strains than keeping them separate."
"I believe I saw him, as we came in," said Hal. He frowned with the memory of
the sunlight flooding his eyes.
"It wouldn't be surprising if you had," said Amid. "He does
rather stand out. Also, you probably noticed he wasn't repeating the Law aloud
as he walked. That's another thing about him. He only speaks when he has to
and we've gathered he appreciates people not trying to draw him into
conversation. I don't mean to suggest he's withdrawn, socially. He's probably
one of the most genuinely merry people I've met. But he just.doesn't talk
much. "
Hal and Amanda finished their breakfast and they all went outside. In the
fresh mountain air of the new day, Procyon beamed down at them out of a
cloudless sky and the temperature was rising with that swiftness that promised
a warm, if not hot, afternoon. "Come to think of it," said Amanda, with a
glance at the sky, "have you had a solar radiation shot in the past three
years, Hal? Because Procyon's not like Sol-- "I'm up to date," said Hal. He
glanced at her exposed arms
and legs, normally so pale, that were now a smooth, light tan. "How about
yourself? You look as if you might be letting the local star get to you." "Oh,
I'm up to date, too," said Amanda. "I wouldn't slip up on that. It's just that
I'd stand out like a bright light among all these Exotics if I'd stayed my
usual skin color. So I amended it, to help me fit in."
Ahead of them, the circle was moving as it had been the evening before, and
Hal now particularly took note of the small cluster of men and women off to
one side, who were obviously the waiters. There were no more than half a dozen
or so of them. "Do those in the circle deliberately cut their time short, if
they see a lot of people waiting?" Hal asked. "They could, of course," said
Amid. "But I don't think it happens very often. Once in the circle and once in
the proper frame of mind, you see what's going on around you but it doesn't
seem to have much, if any, importance-I can tell you that from personal
experience. I think we've got one or two in the waiting group there, though,
that are just out here to see you. I I
They had been walking toward the circle as they talked. "You're sure word of
who I am hasn't been mentioned?" "I'd be the tirst one any of the people here
would come and tell, if they thought you were who you are," said Amid. "Some
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Gordon R. Dickson
may have seen a picture of you; but if so, since you haven't been announced,
they're doing the polite thing and keeping it to themselves. " "A picture of
me?" "Yes," said Amid.     " It's been spread all over the Younger Worlds as
part of the Others' propaganda against Earth. I don't mean they've published
it separately. But there've been references, of course, to you, Ajela, Rukh
and some other people, as charges against them were publicly made. Not you so
far, Amanda, by the way." "Good," murmured Amanda. "I'd just as soon my
picture wasn't too wel I known." "Yes. But I'm afraid, in your case, Hal,"
said Amid, "there's a whole generation of children on the Younger Worlds
growing up who're being taught to spit after saying your name. You're supposed
to be the evil sorcerer crouched spiderlike in your lair in the Final
Encyclopedia, cooking up evil things for good people on all the Younger
Worlds."
They had joined the waiting group by the time Amid had finished saying this;
all of the people in the group, with typical Exotic politeness, avoided
looking directly at Hal and Amanda, or in any way appearing to attract the
attention of the newcomers. As those walking passed, Hal had time to notice
individuals. There was a drinking water fountain just beyond the far end of
the circle, and three small buildings that were obviously personal
waste-disposal units for the walkers. "Three?" Hal asked Amid, pointing at
them. "Yes. Oh, I see what you mean," Amid laughed. "No, it's not that we've
got three sexes around here, but you'll find when you get in the circle that
you don't think of stopping for anything until something reminds you. Then you
may be in a hurry. What we've found that tends to happen here is that someone
will make a comfort stop and inadvertently set off what you might call a chain
reaction. Jathed would have sneered at such niceties as drinking fountains and
chemical waste-disposal units here; but my brother thought otherwise-by the
way, there's Old Man turning the far corner, now."
Hal looked and saw the oriental-appearing walker who had attracted his
attention when they had first arrived, the day before. As Amid had said, Old
Man was just now coming
THE CHANTRY GUILD
167
around the far end ofthe circle, on its side that was closest to the waiters,
so that he was now walking toward Hal and the rest of the waiting group.
True to what Hal had been told, the eyes of those in the circle-and Old Man
was no exception -seemed to take in all that was visible before them, but show
no particular interest in it. Old Man's eyes looked at and through Hal as he
strode toward him. "Has he been walking all night?" Hal asked. "I believe so,"
said Amid. "You saw him in the circle when you came in?" "Yes," said Hal.
It was hard to believe Old Man had been at this for hours. He moved with a
particularly light and springy step, as if he was about to leap into the air
with the next stride; and Hal guessed that for all his long white beard and
white mustaches, the other could run like a deer if he had to. In fact, in
spite of his skinniness and the evidence of his age, there was an impression
of power and youth about him. It was startling, for in appearance alone, he
was almost frail. He was hardly taller or heavier than a twelve-year-old boy,
except for the largeness of his hands and a surprising width of shoulders
under the robe he wore, which Hal now saw figured with white blossoms upon a
background of a red color so dark as to almost seem black. Old Man's hair was
as white as his beard and so sparse that the skin of his round skull under it
was visible in the sunlight. "He's in remarkable physical condition," Amid was
saying, beside Hal. "He has a sword of sorts he brought here with him; and he
exercises with it when he isn't otherwise occupied. It's very graceful. It
looks as if he's dancing, when he does it."
They fell silent. There was something about the words, repeated and repeated
in their ears, that not only made conversation unnecessary but drew their
minds, if not their bodies, into the circle of those who moved before them.
Hal found his thoughts running over the oriental schools of martial exercises
with the sword that he could remember, He made a Mental note to watch Old Man
at his exercises the first chance that made itself available.
Hal was still at this when one of the walkers left the circle. He was a
vonnPer man with (lose-cia reddish hair anti a fi]77 Of
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Gordon R. Dickson
reddish beard. He had been walking with all the appearance of normality, but
after taking several steps away from the circle, he stumbled and his feet
dragged, like those of someone exhausted, but still driving himself to move.
One of those waiting was almost immediately at his side and helping him toward
one of the nearer of the two dormitory buildings. "In you go, Hal," said Amid.
"I'm waiting for Old Man to come around," said Hal. "I'd like to walk behind
him." "If you like," said Amid.
Old Man came around and Hal stepped in behind him. The next walker in the
circle fell back a little distance to give room. Hal followed Old Man and,
opening his mouth, began to repeat the Law:
"The transient and the eternal are the same .
Almost immediately the rhythm of the walking and the intoned phrase took him
over.
It was as if he had stepped on to the back of some powerful bird, which now
took off with him. The words were like a living thing that lifted him and
carried him away. The beating of his heart was in synchrony with the heartbeat
of the bird; and a pressure he had not been conscious of feeling, but which
had pressed down on him before, was suddenly released, so that he felt light
and free.
He ascended within himself on the wings of the feeling that bore him, that had
been outside him to begin with but which was now working itself inward on him,
staining into him. He felt the words resonating in his throat and all through
his body. He could not say what they meant, any more than he had understood
more than their ordinary, everyday meaning before. But he felt something
additional in them now, even though he could not reach through to something of
deeper import yet-like a vast mountain in the distance, somewhere beyond him.
It was as Amid had said. He did not lose sight of, or touch with, his
surroundings. He saw Amid and Amanda still standing, watching him for a little
while before they turned and went off together, leaving only the small group
of those who waited their turn in the circle. He saw and felt all that he
ordinarilv
THE CHANTRY GUILD
169
would have seen and felt, but it was irrelevant to what he was experiencing
with his own movement and the repetition of the words.
The bird carrying him was his image and he let himself go with it. He felt the
softness and warmth of the back feathers under him, felt the vibrations
through them of the powerfully pumping wings, saw far distant on the horizon
the triangular, mist-white shape of the Grandfathers of Dawn mountains that
was his destination. The clean, thin air of the heights drew deep down into
his lungs, searching out their very bottom crannies and corridors. And,
without warning, he understood.
He understood that the weight that had dropped away temporarily from him as he
stepped into the circle had been the weight of defeat. It had accumulated,
layer by layer, day by day this last year, surrounding him, but held off from
closing in on and crushing him by his strength of will, which grew and
toughened like muscle in response to the demand placed upon it. So that his
lack of success and his strength of will had increased together-until at last
the limits even of his will were. approached; and he had begun to give under
the weight.
So despondency had finally begun to touch him. He had fought well and won,
fought and won, again and again-and again and again victory had left him with
the decisive encounter yet to be. Fear and its stepchildren, self-doubt and
self-hatred, still tore and destroyed in the innermost parts of all human
beings. He had conquered one wall only to find another, and another after
that, and after that another, with his foe still alive and protected . . .
until there seemed no end to the walls, and he felt the beginnings of an end
to his strength.
He was aware that others had taken up this challenge in times before him, and
all had failed in the end. But like each of those who had gone before, he had
said, "we have come so far. We have won this much. Now, finally, we ought to
be ready to reach the final battleground; and put an end to what plagues us."
Donal had won . . . and the final battle had turned out yet to be fought. Paul
Formain had won . . . and the final battle still awaited. Hal Mayne had saved
what must be saved of the human race, safe for a little while until the final
battle could be fought-and the final battle was still beyond the horizon,
still out of reach.
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
171
There must be an end, as there must have been a beginning. For the first time
he wondered about the moment of beginning of the historical forces that had
brought him and the human race to this moment. He had used the Creative
Universe for the first time, as Donal, to go back to where he thought he could
set up the forces that would bring about a final encounter. As Paul Formain he
had found them in the twenty-first century. But neither then nor now had he
ever thought of trying to reach back and find the absolute beginning of that
last battle in which he would be a solitary warrior.
He reached out, mentally, now, to find that moment of beginning; and it led
him to a place and a time, to a scene in which he became an Englishman in
armor at the lowest point of his own life's long battle. It was a day of
victory for the Black Prince of England, the battle of Poitiers; and its
sights, its sounds, its feel came to Hal not only through this knight who had
been his unconscious forerunner in this centuries-long contest, but also from
a dying soldier of the other side. Hal was both men-, and looked through the
eyes of each to see the face of the other.
. . .Sir John Hawkwood hadfought the long day's fight, and fought well-but
none of rank or worth on his own side had been there where he hadfought the
best qf the other side, to note what he did. He had taken a prisoner, but it
was a prisoner who was a Fre ch knight of small holding; and the ransom would
not make Sir John rich. As ransoms had made rich Sir Robert Knolles, and the
notice of the Black Prince had made famous Sir John Chandos. He was weary and
the anesthesia of the winefront the night beft)re, and of the early morning
before the battle, had long since worn off, leaving him weary and wasted
inside. Aimlessly, on a battlefield on which the main acti .on was over, he
rode up one side of a little rise; over the top of which, on the Jarther
downslope, lay the tanner's son.
The tanner's son lay dying in the bright September sunlight. About him was the
odor of crushed grass and the stink of the blood and the intestines of a horse
who had been disemboweled and la-v nearby. The tanner's son was a crossbowman
from Lombardy. He wore leather hose and a leather smock of, sorts to which
chain links had been sewn. He was tall and lean, with a
swarthyface and straight black hair. He was in his early twenties and still
had most of his teeth. His mouth was wide and mobile. He had an English arrow
completely through his right side under the ribs; and he had worn the feathers
completely off its shaft, since he had gone out of his head unsuccessfully tr
'ving to draw it out the way it had entered. He had bled a great deal; but in
spite of that he continued to lie supporting himself on one elbow with such a
wild look on his ./ace that none of the English archers or men at arms had
paused to cut his throat. Besides, he lay off to one side himself where there
were no wounded French knights or such worth taking prisoner; and the battle
had gone awayfrom him.
His eyes no longerfocused on thefield. Occasionally he would cry out weakly in
the dialect of his native Genoa, forgetting he was now in the foreign fields
of France. "Help! Help for the tanner's son!"
Beyond him, at some little distance, the bearded, blooddaubed English archers
and other foot-soldiers hurried b             -v, rooting among the d    -ying
and the deadfor a prisoner worthy Of ransom. There were      slim pickings
here, for the more adventurous of their fellows had already covered the
ground, cutting throats with quick boarlike jerks of their knives, when a
candidate proved worthless or too wounded to promise to live. The wild,
calling crossbowman, with the lank black hairfialling half over his face,
the-v had passed b   -v out of a sort of instinct-two or three had even
crossed themselves in passing. For, by a trick (if its entering angle, the
arrow appeared to anyonefrom a distance to have driven squarel     'v through
the crossbowman's heart. It seemed that he must already be dead; but still
propped up and calling; whereas lie was actually only dying, like all the
rest.
Beyond the unfocused eyes of the crossbowman was part of the field of
Poitiers, in the midwest of France. Up a slope behind him was a rubble of
hedges and new-dug mounds, considerably torn about and beaten down now, which
had been the original Position of the English. Out beyond in the other
direction was the little vallev with the wood of St. Pierre to his left. In
another part of thefield, at the edge of that same wood, the banner o Edward
of England, the Black Prince, wasflyingfrom a tall tree, to serve
as a rall 'ving signal for those English pursuing the French retreating to the
moment of their slaughter below the prudently,
172
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
173
locked gates of the city of Poitiers. Below thatflag, the tent of the Black
Prince had been pitched; and in it, the Prince, Sir John Chandos and some
others were drinking wine.
In afarthersection of thefield Geffroi de Charny hadjust been killed, and the
banner of France, which he was holding, tottered to the ground. Behind him,
King John oj'France, his dead lords about him, his fourteen-Year-old son
Philip beside him, felt his weary arms failing at the effort to lift and
strike with his battle axe once again. The English were crowding close, eager
to capture a King, shouting at him to surrender. He turned to one strong young
man, pushing toward him, who had called out to him in good and understandable
French. The moment oj'his capture was near.
Meanwhile, unknowing of all this, the crossbowman wept a littlefrom his
unseeing eyes, propping himse@f on his elbow, and called out to the great pain
in his body and the sun, like a brilliant furnace at high noon over his head
in the cloudless sky:- "Help! Help for the tanner's son
And so he cried-as he had criedfor a long time without am, response, but more
weakly as time went on. Until, from somewhere he heard the approaching
thudding oj'hooves that came to him, and stopped; and a following thud as two
mailed feet came one after the other to earth beside him. For a moment nothing
happened: and then a voice in all English the crossbowmail could not have
understood even before he got all arrow through his bod -v, spoke above him.
"Who's a tanner's son. "I
A couple of iron-sheathed knees came to earth beside the crossbowman. The
crosshowman felt the weight of his upper bod 'v lifted off the supporting
elbow. Through the delirium of his pain, a feeling oj'b(,ing rescued
penetrated to him. He stopped cr-ying out and made a great effort to focus his
eyes.
A circular shape peaked at the top steadied and unblurred before his eyes. He
looked from a distance of inches up into a lean, rectangular-jawed jace,
unshaven and surmounted by all iron skullcap with a cloth skullcap showing
dark- blue and rather ragged edges underneath the metal edge. The jace of John
Hawkwood had a deep-set nose, fine blue e        -yes under straight brown
eyebrows, and a straight, angular nose that had never been broken. The jace
had the clear, even color of naturally
blond skin tanned and dried by the sun until its surface had gone into tiny,
premature wrinkles around the corners of the eyes and indented deeply around
the mouth. The mouth itself was thinlipped but level of expression, the
nostrils thin-andfirom them came a strong exhalation of breath laden with the
odor of wine gone stale. "Who's a tanner's son?" repeated the lips, this time
in the mixed argot of the military camps. But the crossbowman now comprehended
nothing but the dialect of his childhood. He understood only that someone had
come to his aid; and because the man who held him was clean-shaven he thought,
not of a knight who might need to breathe unencumbered inside his clumsy
headpot of a helm, but that the one who held him was a priest. He thought the
priest was speaking to him in latin and exhorting him to confess. "Forgive me,
Father, for I have sinned .        he whispered.
The man who held him had been able to make out the business of the tanner's
son; but this further whisper in the Genoese dialect left him at a loss.
Vaguely, he caught the sense of the word "sinned" but that was all   ' "What
the hell,'' he said, in the camp argot, a little thickly,
we're all sinners. But we aren't all tanner's sons." He sat back on his heels
and lowered the head of the crosshowman on to his knees. He lifted the cloth
and metal skullcaps of the bassinet off his head together and wiped his
forehead with the back of his hand. "I'm a tanner's son, myself. "
He broke off and looked down, for the crossbowman had begun to speak again;
and the rhythm of the phrases oj' the confessional were familiar. "Well, " he
said in English, "I can do that much for you. One Christian to another, eh?"
He put the bassinet back on his head and listened, though what the other said
was all but incomprehensible. The crossbowman was trying to remember his sins;
but he confused the pain in his body with the pain of disease, which he
associated with the evilnesses of his relations with women. To describe these,
he had of necessity to use words more common and understandable to the man
whose knees he rested on-and who nodded, hearing the words. "That's it," said
the man. "That's it. Not much like that in
174
Gordon R. Dickson
Hedingham Sibil, in Essex where I was a tanner's son-or wherever you hail
from, I suppose. But enough ql'ii here." He listened awhile longer. He noticed
the lips of the crosshowman were darkened and dried. "Use a little wine,
here,'' he muttered. "None with ine though, damn it. Go on, go on . . . "
But the crossbowman hadfinished his conftssion; and now he had begun to weep
once more. He hail thought that, having confessed himse@f, he would find
himself ft)rgiven and the pain taken awa -v. But it was still with him. Ile
pluckedj@ebl-v tit the now smooth end qf the arrow. "Help!" he husked, once
more, in a barely audible voice. ''Help, jor the tanner's son . . . " "Damn
you."' swore the man holding him, blinking his own eyes suddenly and pulling
the plucking hand from the unmoving arrow's nocked end. ''What do you want me
to do for vou That's no good."
The crossbowman wept. His mind had wandered again; and now he imagined he was
a boY again and the pain was because he was being punishedfor something. "You
made your peace, " growled the man holding him. ''Gel on with your dying. " He
looked at the arrow. ''A hard wa   -v out is it."" He blinked again. "Poor
filth. A// right, then. ''
He reached down and drew a short, heavy-hilted daggerftom a scabbard on his
swordbelt. ,.Misericord, '' he said. ''God forgive this wretched sinner, and
give him quick relieffirom payment for his sins, amen."
He leaned over with his lips close to the crossbowman's right ear, thinking
perhaps it would give the sinner the goodjeeling (?f a little pride before his
death. "A knight kills you, man. I I
But the crossbowman did not in an       v wa v understand the words. A deeper
understanding had come to him. He hadfinall        ' understood that he was
dying. His mind had fled back to imagining he was with a priest again; and
when he saw the insubstantial, glittering shape ql'the misericord li ed up
before
ft his eyes, he thought it was the Cross being given him to kiss, and he felt
a holy joy. "I am ready to die, Lord, " he thought he prayed. ''Only let it be
fast. "
It was fast.
CHAPTER
is
Hal woke to find himself stumbling over the level ground, which seemed to
heave and billow under his feet like the ocean surface. From the position of
Procyon, overhead, it was midmorning; he was no longer in the circle. Amanda
held him by one arm, supporting and guiding him. Old Man held and supported
him on the other side with equal strength. As Hal turned his head to see the
other, Old Man looked up, smiled fleetingly but warmly and then looked ahead
again to the dormitory building containing Amid's office, to which the two
were taking Hal. "What is it?" said Hal. "What's wrong?"
To his own surprise his voice came out like a whisper. His throat was raw from
repeating the words that still thrummed in his mind. "You walked for
twenty-three hours, Hal!" said Amanda. "I think you'd have killed yourself the
way a horse can run itself to death, if we hadn't pulled you out of the
circle. Now, lean on us. We'll have you in bed in a minute."
Suddenly, he felt a longing to be where she had promised. Horizontal, on a
flat surface, in the darkness of a quiet, closed room. Consciousness of the
exhaustion of his body flooded in on him. His knees gave at every step and his
legs wobbled with weakness. He staggered on between Old Man and Amanda to the
dormitory building and the outside entrance that led directly to the office,
to the bed . . . and onto it.
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Thank you," said Amanda to Old Man. He smiled back at her, then went softly
and swiftly out. She took a blanket from the bed and hung it over the windows
on a rod above them that had not been there when Hal had last seen them. The
blanket did not completely shut out Procyon's intense light, but it dimmed the
room and Hal luxuriated in the dimness.
Amanda went around to the other side of the bed and lay down on top of the
bedcovers beside him. She put her arms around him. "Now, sleep!" she
commanded.
He closed his eyes, and sleep swooped down to carry him away.
When he woke, the room was totally dark. Amanda slumbered beside him, now
tucked in under the covers in ordinary fashion. She opened her eyes as he
stirred. He laid his hand on her shoulder, lightly. "You sleep," he whispered.
"I'll be back in a while."
He got up, found his clothes-Amanda or someone had obviously undressed him
while he was still too deep in sleep to notice-and let himself into the outer
air on the other side of the office door.
Beyond the walls and the blanket that served as a curtain over the window, he
found the first faint light of dawn. He guessed it at about four in the
morning. He must have slept for nearly as long as Amanda had said he had
walked. His body worked better now than it had on its way to bed from the
circle, but it still held a feeling of having been used and overused. He was
not so much weak as drained of strength.
A few lights were on in the two dormitory buildings, particularly in the part
of each one which held kitchen and dining facilities. The mountains to the
east were a distant darkness beyond the lip of the ledge, and a few figures
moved about the area with the intentness of those on duty of one kind or
another. But in the near distance, where two lights still could be seen
burning, paled by the approaching day's illumination, the circle still turned.
Those in it still chanted and four people stood in a small group, waiting
their turn.
He walked away from the building, toward the circle and those who waited. But
he stopped back a little from joining the waiters; and stood, merely watching
them and those in the circle for a few moments. Then he turned and went on,
parallel with
THE CHANTRY GUILD
177
the stream beyond them, toward the edge of the ledge. At the point where the
stream emptied into the pond, he found a level space of ground beside it and
sat down; looking across it toward the end of the ledge, only some five meters
beyond, and at the black ridge of the Grandfathers of Dawn, distant, their
upper edges now a jagged, glowing line from the ascending sun hidden behind
them.
Slowly, as he sat watching that glowing line, he found himself beginning to
understand how Tam's dying, with his guilt still unexpiated in him, could stop
Hal from ever finding the Creative Universe.
Amanda had been right. The way he searched for was to be found out here among
people; rather than back there in that artificial, if valuable and special,
atmosphere of the Encyclopedia.
What would happen if Tam died unfulfilled, in his own mind unforgiven, for his
responsibility for the deaths of his sister's young husband, David Hall, of
Jamethon Black, who had sacrificed himself to stop the attack that Tam had
mounted against the whole Friendly culture, and the assassination of Kensie by
a political group on Ste. Marie as a direct result? Unless Hal found the
Universe in time to prove to him that, if nothing else, these things had had a
purpose to a good end, for all the race? Lacking that, plainly, Tam was
determined to leave life as the legendary King Arthur had, in sadness and
remorse.
If Tam died that way Ajela would die with him, in spirit; and that part-death
would make her unable to continue running the Final Encyclopedia, precious as
it had always been to her, as to Tani. If that happened, who else was there
who could guide and order it? Rukh had helped out to a great degree, these
last months, but it was not herjob.
Rukh's job was the kindling of a faith in the new future to be, in the people
of all the worlds; and that was a larger, more important duty than steering
the Final Encyclopedia. He, Hal, should not, because his job was also
elsewhere, leading those who would be the pioneers into this new untouched
infinity of potential that the Creative Universe would be-if he ever achieved
it. But if Ajela could not, Hal must. It was a special trust, handed into his
keeping by Tam, who had gotten it from Mark Torre in equal trust. And that
would be an end to his search for the Creative Universe. As Amanda had now
shown
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Gordon R. Dickson
him, the way to that was to be found not in special places but out among
people.
Sitting, waiting for the dawn, he was aware of the presence of Tam, keeping
him company. It was not an unpleasant awareness.
The sky had brightened, though the sun was not yet in sight above the
Grandfathers of Dawn. Below, the valley was a deep lake of white mist hiding
everything, but thinning as he watched. Slowly, as he sat with the daylight
growing stronger all about him, he felt himself gradually enclosed by peace.
Behind that peace came the order and reason he realized now he had needed for
some time.
Just as his frustration at the Final Encyclopedia had made him blind to Tam's
completion being necessary to the completion of his own search, so he had been
blind to the obvious fact that what had blocked him in his search at the Final
Encyclopedia must have been implied in the historic beginnings of that search.
He knew of the man he had envisioned while walking the circle, from his
military studies as Donal and his readings as the young Hal. And he doubted
that any histories held the moment he had relived while walking the circle.
That had been a creative reconstruction of his own imaginative unconscious. He
had not been able to enter the Creative Universe, except in his dreams; but he
had been able to reach into it from the circle to build something that must
fit closely with the known facts.
Historically, therefore, his fight against the Enemy had had its roots in the
chronicled life of a man known to history as Sir John Hawkwood, citizen of
fourteenth century Europe, and English knight in the early years of the
Hundred Years War between England and France. A man destined to become one of
the earliest of the great condottieri- professional military captains of the
fourteenth to seventeenth centuries in Italy-and the individual some later
military historians were to call "the first of the modern generals. " The
circle and the Creative Universe had at last led him to this man. Not to
Hawkwood's whole life; but that special moment of it, on a field of victory,
which paradoxically had been the lowest point of the dreams and hopes in Sir
John's life-as the past year had been Hal's lowest.
At Poitiers, Sir John had been entering into middle age, a knight with only a
modest name as a military captain and no fortune to show for the scars of
twenty years in arms and armor.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
179
And with the final defeat now of the French, let alone the caeture of King
John of France which Hawkwood at that moment had not yet known about, the war
that had promised him a way to better himself was apparently over. He had
stood empty-handed in the middle of his life and looked, it seemed, nowhere
but downward into old age, penury and oblivion.
IBut from the chroniclers, Hal knew, as Sir John then had not, that from here
the knight would go over the mountains into Italy, entering not only into more
wealth than he had ever had before, but into the pages of history.
Unknowingly, at this moment on this battlefield where his future looked most
bleak, ahead of him lay his marriage to Donina Visconti and the most important
period of his life. His name would come to mean more at the English court,
once he was in Italy, than it ever had during the long years he had been in
France.
The only question now might be whether Hal's case was really comparable to
Hawkwood's, as his vision had implied.
It must be. The parallels were too close. As the predawn light grew, Hal's
belief strengthened with it. Even though he could no more see his own future
than Hawkwood at Poitiers could have seen his, what he had just envisioned
assured him, once More, that his coming here had been the way he needed to go.
Just as going over the mountains into Italy, with the White Company of
mercenaries, after Poitiers, had been the right way in which Sir John had
needed to go.
Moreover, all this fitted together with, and was reinforced by, his own strong
reaction to the circle and the Law, from the moment he had first seen and
heard them.
As for Tam, the instinct in Hal that had caused him to associate the older
man's state of mind with the lines from Tennyson's poem on the death of Arthur
Pendragon, must be trusted as well. It fitted too well with the story and
character of Jathed, and the Hawkwood episode. Part of Hal's error, he told
himself now, had been to ignore Tam as still an important factor in the search
for the Creative Universe, beyond the point of his retirement as Director of
the Encyclopedia.
Even as Hal thought these things, the sun broke its top edge clear of the
Grandfathers of Dawn, on the far horizon. Procyon looked blindingly over them
at him for the merest fraction of a second before he could lower his eyes from
that blazing tiny circle of light; and in that same fraction of a moment he
realized
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Gordon R. Dickson
what he must do. What was necessary to him here was Jathed and Jathed's
philosophy, even though Hal instinctively felt it was not entirely correct.
What was here, that was nowhere else to be found, was the Law.
Hal could walk the circle and say the Law, as the others did. But it was not
enough to use it as a tool to put himself into flights of exploration of his
inner mind. What he must do was
understand it-completely understand it.
"The transient and the eternal are the same
He knew what the words said. But what, in their completeness, did they really
mean?
He did not know-yet. There was an understanding needed here that must be made
by the deeper parts of his mind, by his creative unconscious. Sudden
excitement lifted him to his feet. It might be that in this greater
understanding was exactly what he had sought for so long, a way into the
Creative Universe. Certainly, it had let Jathed through; and Jathed had not
the reason to go there that Hal had, nor the vision of what going there could
make.
Filled with wonder, the first direct rays of the sun already warming his back
through his robe, he went lightly and swiftly as Old Man might have gone, back
to the office where he and Amanda had spent the night,
CHAPTER
19
He reached the office and found it empty, the blanket down from the window,
the bed made and tilted up into its storage position against the wall. There
was something finished and over with about the room that brought a sadness
like the pain from the thrust of a dull knife, deep into him. He turned and
went through the office's inner door and along a corridor to the dining area
of the building the office was in.
Amanda was not there. The room was all but empty of breakfasters. "Friend?"
The server on duty behind the counter with its trays of breakfast foods called
to him. Hal turned. "You're to go to Amid's Reception Building," said the
server. "Amanda's waiting for you there, with another new visitor. " "Thanks,"
said Hal.
He left and went to the small building which had been the first he had entered
here on the evening of his arrival. Amid was there, seated with Amanda, and
not only Artur, but Simon Graeme as well, around a fireplace that now in the
growing warmth of day held no fire in it, only a few blackened ends of Wood
and the ashes, cold and gray, from the previous night's blaze. The pine cone
paperweight gleamed on the desk in the daylight.
182
Gordon R. Dickson
"There you are," Amanda said as he came in. "Come sit by me, here."
He went to the empty chair beside her and sat down. She put out a hand to him
and for a second he held it and then their grasp fell apart. "How do you
feel?" asked Amid. "A little washed out," said Hal. "Nothing another night of
ordinary sleep won't cure."
He looked back at Amanda, and Simon just beyond her. "Hello, Simon," he said.
"You look a little washed out yourself. " "Hello, Hal." Simon smiled, a little
ruefully. "Mountain climbing, even down - mountai n's, not something I'm in
training for. "
Hal's gaze turned on Amanda. "You're leaving?" "If I can trust you to take
care of yourself in that circle from now on," said Amanda. "Simon can go back
to the near vicinity of Old Earth, and fire off a millisecond message to the
Final Encyclopedia telling them how we're settled, then immediately jump clear
of the Solar System and come back to stand sentinel over us from orbit. I've
got a full district I ought to be covering locally, since no one's seen me
since I left to go back and get you. It'll take a month to cover it all, but
I'll never be more than a couple of days' march from here. So if you need me,
signal Simon with our cloth display system; and he'll either' go get me, or
pass the word to me to make it back here. What about it? Do you think you
might need to stay as long as a month?" "I could, very possibly," said Hal. He
looked at Simon. "Where's the ship?" "In a crack up back in the mountains, out
of sight from here or anyone below," Simon answered, his heavy-boned Graeme
face under its dark brown, thick hair lit up with a wry smile. "Amanda put out
the signal late yesterday and I landed last night; but I had to wait for near
day to climb down to you if I didn't want to break my neck in the dark." "How
much of a climb is it back up to it?" "A couple of hours, at most," Simon
arswered. "Slower up than down."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
183
Hal nodded. He reached out for Amanda's hand again, and felt her fingers close
with his. "I hate to see you go," he said. "I know," she answered softly. "But
I'm not needed here, and I am out there."
He nodded. "I guess that's it then," he said. "If anything changes or develops
for me, here, I'll call you back." "And I'll not waste any time coming-oh,
before I forget it again," said Amanda, turning to Amid, "I      Ive been
meaning to mention this. A few hours' walk from the bottom of our mountain,
here, there's a wild little girl in the woods who came out to take a look at
us but     was too quick for us to catch. Someone ought to be looking
after the child. Do you suppose some of the people from here could go down
there and catch her? It'll take a dozen at least. She's fast, and woods-wise."
"Hmm," said Amid. "Maybe I'd better let you answer that, Artur?"
The big man shifted uneasily in his chair as the rest all looked at him. "You
see, Amanda," said Artur slowly, "we-I know all about that girl. Her name's
Cee. Actually, she's my niece." "Your niece?" Amanda was staring at him. "Then
why haven't you done something about her before this?" "Artur has, and does-"
Amid was beginning, but Artur lifted a hand. "I'd probably better explain it
all," he said. "My sister, her husband, and Cee-Cee was only seven years old,
then-lived fairly close to here. In fact, where you saw Cee probably wouldn't
be too far from where their home was."
His face clouded and he clenched one hand into a heavy fist with which he beat
softly on the arm of the chair he sat in. "The trouble was, I was so bound up
in the Chantry Guild-we'd just begun to use the ledge here, but we hadn't yet
really moved up to it-that all those first seven years of her life, I hardly
saw my sister's house, and Cee . . ." "There's no point in blaming yourself
for what's past," said Amid. "We've discussed that a number of times." "I
know. But if I'd just dropped by half a dozen times a year, iust enou2h so
that the Pirl woidd realize I was one of the
I tilt
Gordon R. Dickson
family . . . only I didn't; and you're right, it does no good to keep going
over and over that fact now."
He hesitated. "The point is," he said to Amanda, "Cee never got to know me.
I've never been anything more than a stranger to her; and she doesn't trust
strangers. With good reason." " 'Good reason,' have anything to do with our
friends, the Occupation troops?" asked Amanda.
Artur looked at her brilliantly. "I thought you might guess that," he said.
"Yes, just after we'd hidden ourselves up here on the ledge, the Occupation
went around killing all the relatives of people known to belong to the Guild.
There was no warning for any of them. One day up here, we heard explosions
and, using a scope screen, we found troops in the woods less than half a
kilometer from here. Some of us went down to the place where my sister's home
had been-this was before they destroyed all the country homes and moved people
into town-but there was nothing left but a pile of rubble. We found enough of
my sister and her husband to know they had been killed by the explosions that
destroyed their house. We searched for Cee, found nothing there or anywhere
near; and when she didn't show up, we checked and made sure there was no one
alive under the rubble. The soldiers were going back and forth below us
frequently in those days. It wasn't practical to really dig into the rubble
without giving away the fact we'd been there. So we assumed she was dead under
it somewhere. So we gave up temporarily; and then. some of us, slipping into
the towns nearby for things we needed occasionally, began to hear about a wild
little girl in the woods up this way. I
He stopped. Beads of sweat were standing out on his forehead. "It wasn't until
nearly a year later that I began to believe that the stories were anything
more than that, and that the wild girl might be Cee. I went down to find out;
and I soon found you could look forever and not locate her, because she'd be
seeing you long before you saw her and keeping out of your way. So I started
going down there and just sitting. I sat; and after a number of trips, when I
was sitting, I began to catch glimpses of her, getting just close enough to
watch-and gone at once, if I turned my head to get a square look at her."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
185
He beat his fist softly on the chair arm again. He was looking past Amanda
now, at nothing unless it was his own memories of those times he had sat,
hoping that the little girl would move into his field of vision. "I kept that
up. It was incredible she'd survived, all by herself that way; but as you
know, you can live off the country, here, the year around. And we've got no
real winter. The temperature hardly varies. The only problem is rain, which
isn't a problem unless it comes in the winter months and then it comes down
pretty steadily. But all she'd need would be some place to get in out of it; a
cave, or even a hollow tree. Anyway, it was true. My little niece had become
like a wild animal." "She was old enough when her parents died to know about
other people," said Amanda. "You'd think she'd have gone looking for, if not
you, for someone she knew who'd been a friend of her parents." "They hadn't-my
sister and her husband weren't hermits by any means," said Artur. "But they
believed in being as self-sufficient as possible@ living off the land and
making what little money they needed out of their wood carvings-they were both
sculptors. Also, like me, my sister tended to tie into an idea and see nothing
but that. They didn't have any close friends, they were off in the woods by
themselves-and I really think that their deaths, the way it happened, did
something to Cee. She's not really sane, I suppose. Still
He fell silent. "Go on," said Amid gently, "tell them the rest of it." There
were beads of sweat still on Artur's forehead. Aside from that, his face
showed no particular expression. But now his hands clenched on the ends of the
chairarms beneath them. " I sat for weeks, " he said, "and gradually she began
to come closer to me, a little at a time. She'd stay at a certain distance for
days; and then, one day, she'd be just a bit nearer. I'd learned by that time
not to watch her, except out of the corners of my eyes; and I never showed in
any way that I knew she was gradually closing the distance between us."
He laughed, a little shortly, but his forehead was still damp and his hands
still gripped the ends of the chairarms. "I got to be very good at pretending
not to notice-so good I could almost convince myself I wasn't the least bit
interested in her-and all the while, day and night, I was carrying around a
186
Gordon R. Dickson
load of guilt because I hadn't searched harder for her after the explosion
that killed my sister and her husband. I got very good at listening. I could
hear her, quiet as she was, when she started to get very close behind me. And
still I never moved, I didn't give her any cause to suspect that I was just
waiting for her to get within arm's reach."
He stopped and wiped his brow with the back of one hand. "She finally came
right up to me," he said. His voice had acquired a strange deadness, as if
what he was starting to tell them now was beyond emotion. "She came up right
behind me, and I felt a touch-oh, what a light little touch it was-against the
back of my robe. Just a moment's touch, and no more. But still I didn't move.
I was still waiting; and, after a long while I began to see something out of
the corner of my left eye. She was inching around to look at my face up close.
And I let her come . . .
He stopped. This time Amid said nothing. They merely all waited. After a long
moment, he went on. "She came around. She was moving by twitching her heels a
tiny distance sideways, then twitching the front ends of her feet next, in the
same direction. I didn't move. I hardly breathed. When she came around by my
left knee, so that she was in plain view, just inches away, I still kept
staring straight ahead, as if she was unimportant, as if she wasn't there. And
so she came all the way round in front of me, so that I had to look into her
face or move my eyes. And we looked at each other .
He broke off. "Go on, man. Tel I them!" said Amid, as the silence went on and
on. "Wonderingly-" The word came out like a gasp. "She looked at me so . . .
wonderingly, as if she was searching rny face for something to find that she'd
know. I never should have tried what I did. I should have known better. From
the beginning I should have realized it'd take someone more patient. Old Man
could have done it. He'd have waited. He knows how to wait. I've seen him put
the tip of one of his fingers slowly under a moth perched on a twig and pick
it up on that finger, off the twig, so softly and easily that the moth doesn't
fly away. But she belonged to me . . . she was my niece, all that was left of
my sister's family."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
187
He stopped talking for a moment. Then brought his gaze back to focus on
Amanda, and went on. "And so," he said, "when she finally stood there in front
of' me, right in reach, searching my face with those eyes of' hers-hazel eyes
they are and large-without really thinking, supposing that somehow she'd conic
to understand later and everything would be all right once I'd brought her up
here-I reached for her. I grabbed at her."
He hesitated, but just long enough to draw a deep breath, this time. "She was
fast," he said. "I can't believe how fast she was. I could have sworn no
hurnan bein(l could come that close within my reach and not be caught. But my
hand barely touched her. And she was "one.
He stopped. fie breathed, another si-h that this time was so deep it seerned
to erripty him, and his large body slumped in its chair. "And since then, she
won't conic near you," said Amanda.
He nodded. "I sit-I've sat for two years since then," Artur said. "And she
comes. Sometimes I just catch a glimpse ot'her, but whether I see her or not,
I know it' she's there. But she*s never conic within ten meters of me, since.
And sooner or later, something'll g wrong. Something will bring soldiers by;
and 'o one of thern-she always comes to look at anyone who goes by-some
soldier*ll shoot her. Or she'll get sick and hide herself in some hole where
no one can find her, and die. She's all alone down there-"
He broke ofl'on a single, hoarse, dry sob that shook his heavy chest. "I can't
do anything," he said. "She won't come near me." "Of course not," said Amanda
gently. "What do you expect'? When you reached for her that way, you just
confirmed whatever it is that makes her what she is. She'll never come close
to anyone as long as you're around." "What can I do?" Artur looked at her. "I
can't just forg ,et about her   and leave her alone down there!" "Send a woman,"
said Amanda. -Didn't you ever   think of' that? I'd guess even your Old Man
wouldn't have a chance at her   now. Also now that I know what her story is,
it's plain my idea of a group   taking her would be the last thing to try. It'd
probably
meiem R. Dickson
destroy whatever chance there is of her becomin@- half\x,a@ normal again, if
she was taken by force. But a woman, startin.., from scratch, could get close
enough to make friends with he,. Note, I said make friends with, not grab. The
day she'll come home to you safely will be the day she comes up to this ledge
of her own free will, holdin- the hand of someone she trusts.
L Amanda stopped. Artur stared almost blindly at her. "I'd do it myself," said
Amanda, "but I've got other responsibilities@ and she's still only one life,
while there're hundreds of lives within two days' walk of here who can use nl\
help. It'll take time to do, probably. time I can't spare for that alone, in
any case. But there must be a woman member of the Guild who could help you."
She reached out to put a hand on his arm. "The hard part for you," she added,
"is going to be stavill(I away while the woman makes friends with her." "Yes .
. ." Artur's face twisted, then straightened out. woman' I'd never thought of
that.- "You should have." said Amanda. "The soldiers were probably all men,
judging by what I've seen of the Occupation forces. And she wits well enough
up in years to know the difference and what she is, herself. You can try it."
"I will. Thank you, I will." His face twisted again forjust a second. -But
it'll be hard not going down to see her, day after day, just as you say.
He stood up. "Never mind. ThaCs what I'll do. If you'll excuse me. Amid. I
think I'd like to Oo and look for someone to help me with Cee right now. "
just a second, " said Amanda. " Before you go, can you te) I
T me what the idea was of that vine around her waist, and what it is she
carries in the pod in the middle of it?" "Rocks," said Artur. "My sister,
Mila, and Petay, her husband, used to hunt rabbits as part of their food.
Petay Could throw a rock accurately enough to kill a rabbit front some little
distance. He'd wait until one sat up with its head above the ferns to look
around and then airn at its neck. It' he was a little high he'd still get the
head. it' he was a little low he'd still strike a shoulder area and slow the
creature down so that he could run it down and catch it.-
THE CHANTRY GUILD
189
"They weren't pure vegetarians, then, your sister and brother-in-law' '`
Amanda asked. "No," said Artur, "luckily for Cee. She's got no access to diet
supplements. Mila preferred to use a sling-you know like the sort of sling
they used on Old Earth in ver@ ancient times. Whether Cee learned from the two
of them, or practice made her good at hunting since she's been on her own, I
don't know@ but she kills rabbits regularly for her own eating, both ways. She
can throw very hard and accurately with a sort ot'sidearni swing: or she can
use the vine and pod, or something else as a sling, to kill from a greater
distance. When you tried to catch her, did she make any motion to use the
vine, or take one ofthe rock's out of' it?" "No,- said Hal.
Artur nodded. "She wasn't too frightened ofyou, then. She must have been sure
she could get away. But she does know what she can do with those rocks-as I
say, whether she had lessons from Mila or Petay or not-and I've always been
afraid that if' soldiers came up here and chased her she might try to use the
rocks on them. Then they undoubtedly would shoot her!"
He turned abruptly to Amid. "Forgive me. Amid," he said, unusually brusquely
for an
Exotic, "but the sooner I find someone as Amanda suggests . . . " "Go ahead,
-o ahead!" said Amid. When the door had closed behind Artur's back, fie turned
to Amanda. "I don't think you'll ever know how much of a help that suggestion
of yours was to Artur, just now. Well, never inind that, now. HOW soon had you
planned to leave"" 'Right awav," she answered. "Both Simon and I'll be going
our separate ways.
She looked at Hal and smiled a little, regretfully. "Let's step outside and
have a word by ourselves, betore you go, " Hal said to her. "Amid,
Simon-you'll foroive us'? We won't be more than a few minutes.'* "By all
means," said Simon, "we've g )t all the time there is. Take what you want."
Amid simply waved them out. Once in the open air and the sunshine beyond
doors, Hal
190
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
191
began to pace toward the ledge. Amanda walked along " it[i him. Their hands
joined automatically. They walked without speaking until they came near the
edge and turned. so that the\ walked along it, with empty air on their left
and the further, vertical clifr-face of rock behind the ledge some distance to
their right. "There's everything to say, and no good way to say just part of
it," murmured Hal finally.
-I know. It doesn't matter." said Amanda. "You'll find what you want; and then
I'll be back." "And Simon'll take us back to the Encyclopedia, then we'l! be
apart again. Or will you even be coming back with me'.' There's no real need,
if you're tied to your work here." "if I can be of use, I'll -o anywhere with
you, my Hal,'' she said. "You know that. If I'm not really needed by you,
though. I am needed in other places." "Yes." Hal had it sudden mental picture
of how they InList look to the Guild members outside the buildings who
happened to look this way. The tall man and the tall woman, holdiriL, hands,
their heads close together in conversation as they walkcj along the edge of
the emptiness beyond the cliff edge. "Somewhere, sornewhen, there's oot to be
time for just being together. Time to shut ourselves away from anything else,
without ha\,in,, to keep an eye on the need to go back to duties."
He searched her face with his eyes. "Life ought to owe us that much for
ourselves. shouldn*t it' "Are vou askino A mand a- who- loves- vou, or
Amanda-\vho-
91
"Both," said Hal. "Arrianda-who-loves-you promise,,, some day vx'll ha\c the
rest of' our live,, to(,cthcr.
-And Arnanda-who-sees' Her face -,re\,k verv still. "That's one thinL,
Arnanda-\vho-sccs isn't able to see." She ,,topped and turned to face him.
"Oh, hut I trust Amanda-\,\h(,lO\eS-VOLI. Don't VOL) trust her, too'? She
trusts you." 'Always." He smiled down at her. "I always trust her. fir,,t and
foremost. , ,
Thev went back to walking again. "Do you have any idea at all of how lorilg
you'll he here'!" asked Amanda after a moment.
He shook his head. "I'm at the point now where I'm beginning to pull strings
together in my own mind." "Which strings'?" "I think, mainly, the strings to
Western and Eastern thinking. in spite of the three hundred years the race has
been on worlds beyond Old Earth, those two schools of human thought still need
to be reconciled in lots of ways. Then, there're the strinps to the past, to
the present, and the future, to be brought togcth@r: and the strings to the
real universe and the Creative Universe. Many, many strings. Too many.
actually, to hope I could pull them all together, here and now. All I can hope
is to tic enough of them in with each other so I can move up the line and
begin tying in the rest." "But you do feel I was on the right track, bringing
you here'?" said Amanda. "Yes," he answered. "There's something necessary to
be learned in this place, at this time. Something I need, in this whole idea
of a second Chantry Guild and particularly in Jathed's I-aw. I've (,of to
understand that Law, understand it absolutely. But you know, there're probably
other things I don't recognize yet as important to everything I work for, that
are here, too, and need takino into account. hcre was a researcher once, long
ago. who said that whenever a source or a reference was really needed, it*(l
manifest itself out of the continuum. And centuries auO, back in the old days
of magazines, editors used to talk about the fact that all of I sudden a
number of writers would sirnultancousl@ submit stories about the same
idea-wr;ters who in many cases didn't even know each other. Then, of' course,
there're the historical facts about important inventions, or technological
advances, appearing at the hands Of two or more entire]\,, separate inventors
or workers, at almost the same tinic-and aFOuirients about Who Caine LIP with
Ahat first. "I don't see how simUltaneltv like that tics, into vour problem,"
said Amanda. "Oh, sorrv," said Hal. -You're the only person who hits to suffer
this fi@orn me-1 oet to thinking out loud around vou. What I'm driving at is
that I have to go on the premise that wherever I am there may be historically
important forces at work in making me see what I see. Forces        I should
recognize-m
192
Gordon R. Dickson
things like Old Man, Artur, or even the little girl, Cee."
Amanda 1rowned. "I don't see any connection, myself, between any of' thoso,
people and what you're after," she said. "But now we're in your work area. not
mine. Anywav . . ."
She stopped, turned to him anol reached up to put her arnis around his neck
and kiss him. "I've got to get moving," she said. "It's a good two days' walk
to the little town I want to go to first; and part of today has already been
used up." "Does it make all that much difference'       said Hal wistfully.
"You, of all people, to say that!" replied Amanda, starting to lead them back
to where Amid and Simon waited for them. "How would you like it it'you got to
a town Just one hour too late to save sorneone's life''"' "Yes," said Hal. "Of
course. You're right. But that can*t he something that happens often-never
mind. You're quite right. It' it only happens once, that*s reason enough for
not wastinp time. "
He smiled at her. "But there's a human firnit to the amount ot'help anyone can
give," he said.
-You say that"" She linked arms with him and they went back in a shared
silence that, though warm, was both deep and thoughtf'4 and still in it.
returned to the small building that was the Guildmaster's main office.
CHAPTER
20
Over the weeks that he had now been at the Chantry Guild, Hal's sitting by the
pond to watch the sun rise when he was not walkino in the circle at that time
had become a ritual. Seated, he unchained his rnind to its own ways of
abstracting his thoughts; ways that produced inner thoughts and visions also.
Although those evoked as he sat by the pond tended to be of a different
character than those he produced lor himself' in the circle.
One morning he had Just seated hinisell' while the world beyond the ledge was
still lost in the grayout of predawn. when a figure materialized from the
dimness at his back and also settled by the pond. not far frorn him and also
facing the mountains over which the sun would rise.
It was Old Man. He and Hal looked at each other companionably. Hal. however,
found himself vaguely disturbed. Not by the other's presence, but by something
about it that felt not quite right. He puzzled over this teeling for several
moments and then understandino came to him.
Old Man was sitting on his heels, quite conAortably but undeniably squatting,
rather than seating himself cross-leo as Hal had: and if there was anyone on
the ledge whom            al would have expected to sit naturally in a
cross-legged positio it would be the white-bearded older man now beside
        im. Moreover, Old Man had obviously Joined Hal and the natural
194
Gordon R. Dickson
thing would have been for hirn to sig ,nal the fact by taking the same
posture.
But years had gone by since Hal's early training by the Exotics among the
three tutors he had had as a boy@ and the occasions on which a lotus position
might have seemed appropriate for him to assume had become fewer and fewer. He
had become careless. His legs were almost in the half-lotus position, but his
toes were not tucked in behind the calves of the opposim-, legs the way they
should have been. With an old-fashioned sort of politeness, Old Man had
evidently taken the position he had to avoid seeming to go Hal one better by
sitting down in a proper half-lotus himself.
Hal was out of practice, but not so much that the half-lotus was impossible to
him. He tucked his toes in. Old Man dropped immediately into the same position
with one fluid motion. Hal bowed gravely from the waist to him. Old Man bowed
as gravely back. They both turned their attention to the mountains over which
would come the sunrise.
Hal's gaze went away beyond the cliff edge. For him. the Chantry Guild and the
place it occupied had now effectively ceased to exist. He knew the names of
the area that surrounded hirn as anyone would know his own, familiar
neighborhood.
He sat on the eastern face of' the range of the Zipac@j mountains. Behind him,
the thickness ofthat range ran eastward until it was out of sight. But Hal now
knew it descended at last to high, nearly perpendicular cliff,, overhanging
the coastal forest. which was too steamy and hot to be more than sparsely
inhabited. That forest was called the Tlalocan-the "land ofsea and mist'' in
the ancient Mayan language of Old Earth. It reached to the shores of' the
Zephry Ocean, which stretched some thousands of miles onward to the next large
continental mass of Kultis. At his feet lay the Mayahuel Valley, up which
Amanda had led him to this place; and beyond where he sat now, the Zipacas
continued, angling in so that they, and the Grandfathers ofDawn, opposite,
became one range to the north. after the upland forest below had given way to
high altitude desert. It was the Grandfathers over which the star Procyon
Would rise to bring daylight to the Chantry Guild and the people in the valley
below.
Watching the far dark bulk of the distant mountains, as their details began
gradually to emerge from the mist under the
THE CHANTRY GUILD
195
steadily brightening overhead, he let his mind flow in whatever direction
might attract it, as water seeks its own way down a slope. This was not his
way in the circle. where he deliberately turned his mind over to understanding
the Law he repeated as he walked. Here and now, he only set it free like a
hawk to soar with the waking day.
It had come to him some mornin-s since, seated in this place, that for the
first time since he had been a young boy and dedicated himself to ending that
which had killed his uncle James, he had a chance to step back and add up the
gains and losses of his own lives.
They were part-lives, really; for Donal Graerne had ceased to be before middle
age, so that he could become Paul Formain. And Formain had existed only a few
years as a shell for him who had once been Donal, before he had been
abandoned, along with the rest of the already-dead twenty-first century. From
there, what was essentially both Donal and now Hal had returned to the courier
ship of the twenty-second century: and to the timeless wait of eighty years
that had passed before he became the two-year-old child who had grown into
what he was now.
But all those lives had been aimed and controlled by a single mind and a
single purpose; and they had achieved some things and failed to achieve some
others-so far, at least. It was ironic
11 that at the Final Encyclopedia for three years, where he had had nothing to
do but concentrate on his goal, that he had never found time to do this sort
of self-survey. And now, immersed in walking in the circle, watching the
sunrise. serving food, fixing, cleanino-he had been set free to do just that.
He had Lrown smaller in the eyes of his race and larger in dimensions7where
the vision of other people did not penetrate. It was as it' to grow as a human
being he had needed to give up more and more of what other humans had desired
and admired. On all the worlds only a handful now knew him, in any real sense
of that word; and nearly all on the Younger Worlds had known Donal, in Donal's
later years.
He had started out to kill a dragon, and had ended up striving to climb a
mountain others could not even see, to a doorway they had yet to imagine. And
yet, to him his goal had become more concrete and infinitely more worthy and
solid as it became progressively more invisible and inconceivable to others.
Yet it
1-1
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Gordon R. Dickson
was the same goal-only now, sitting here, he seemed for the moment to see it
clearly@ while in the beginning, like all the rest, he had seen only that
false fao;ade within the real universe that was a tiny part of it.
Now, all the universe had become his classroom: and everyone and everything in
it, subjects of his study.
The first isolated sparks of sunlight were beginning to find crevices in the
top line of the mountains. He reached out to the limits of his imagination,
now, then stretched on beyond the veil at the end of known limits, reaching
through it metaphorically with both hands, into the Creative Universe he could
not yet wholly enter@ and with his hands hidden from him he molded the place
he now sat into the place of its own future.
About him, in his mind, the ledge changed. The few heavy blocks of stone that
had so far been hewn from the mountains and polished, multiplied and fitted
themselves together to make the finished structure for which they were
destined. The House of the Chantry Guild, constructed of the warm,
green-threaded marble of the mountain that contained it, was lifted up, roofed
itself, and sent walls and pathways forward to enclose that space of the ledge
not covered. The little stream ran now between narrow borders of native
grasses and flowers to the pool, which had become enclosed by a rim of stone
terrace. On that rim he sat, now in the far future. Behind him, he heard the
timeless chanting of those in the circle. He sat, young and waiting for a
sunrise, centuries ahead in time.
The surface of the pool now showed white flowers upheld on the surface of the
waters by flat green leaves. Variform lilies. stirred only occasionally when
their stems, reaching down underwater, were brushed by the passing of' one of
the fish among those living in the pool; raised there, then as DOW, to be part
of the food for the Guild members. Then, as now, the sun had just joined
together its sparks of light into one line of illumination marking the chain
of the mountaintops.
He sat, in lotus position, waiting for the sunrise as he did every morning.
Behind him the walker adults chanted and turned@ and the brightening day drew
his attention to the clouds of the sky reflected in the pool beside hirn, and
to a Hower on its surface, almost within arm's length.
There was a particular spark of light from one white petal.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
197
Procyon had climbed high enough to strike a diamond glitter off a dewdrop on
the blossom of a flower. There was somethint, powerfully memorable about that,
but he could not divine what it was. He looked away once more, back out to the
crest of' mountains itself, and watched the actual breaking through of the
sun, its upper edge reaching at last over the barrier of the mountains to look
directly onto the ledge, at the Chantry Guild and at him. Then with one
crescendoing upsurge of light it burst fully and directly into his eyes and
made him blind to all about h i m.
He blinked and looked away. His eyes met the eyes of Old Man. They exchanged a
smile, and got to their I'cet, parting as they went their separate ways into
the daytime activities of the ledge.
Hal turned his mind from the sunrise just past, and back to the present
practical requirements of life. Fie had now been here seven weeks, nearly
double the time Amanda had asked if he intended to stay. In itselfthis should
be no great time. but in his mind he could see the iniage offam, fighting ofF
death, hour by hour, waiting, and he fell the urgency like a hand pressing
always on his back.
He was to begin a walk in the circle again early this afternoon, but first,
this inorninu, he was scheduled to go with a foraging party to collect edible
wild fruits and vegetables growing in the forest below. The foragino group was
to consist of' six people and meet at Amid's reception building. He turned in
that direction, accordingly, and the sight of it, together with the thought of
the land below, brought back to his thoughts the matter ofCee. Ever since
Amanda had first suggested it, Artur had let one of the fernale Chantry Guild
members, a roundfaced, brown-haired, cheerful young woman named Onete, go down
to sit in the forest. But not seem(,, his niecc-at least not being able to
feel her presence there, and have direct personal evidence ofthe fact she was
alive and well-had been painful to Artur.
The pain had been evident; but he had borne it with a
quietness and patience that made no lessening of his usual activities in the
Guild. It wits behavior which had reminded Hal ol'something he had almost
forgotten. The Exotics, for all their ori6nal aoparent softness and tendency
to surround themselves
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Gordon R. Dickson
with what many thought of as luxuries, had proved to have the inner strength
Hal had seen in them, that was even now makinL,
at it hard for the Occupation to kill them off. It was a strength th ' had its
roots in the constancy of their individual philosophies, regardless of how
each one might and did interpret it, that was as characteristic of them, as
unflinching faith was of the best of those on the Friendly worlds, and courage
was of the Dorsai.
He remembered with a sudden pang of sadness and loss, even after all these
years, Walter the InTeacher, who had been the Exotic among his tutors. as
Malachi Nasuno had been the Dorsai and Obadiah Testator the Friendly-until
Bleys' thugs had gunned the three of thein down, that one warm, late summer
afternoon in the mountains of Earth, years ago. Walter, who had ordinarily
seemed the most persuadable of the three old men who had brought Hal up, had
been in fact the most unyielding, once his mind was made up. So it was with
the best of his fellow Exotics under the heel of the Occupation.
Remembering this, Hal found he had reached Amid's reception building and that
he was in advance of his fellow foragers. There was no one else waiting
outside. The thought of Cee returned to his mind@ and, since he was here, he
knocked at the door of the building, "Come in-corne in, anyone"' called Amid
from within. Hal pushed open the door and went in, closin(I it softly behind
him.
Amid was seated on one side of' the fireplace, in which ;I small fire,
probably built against the chill ofthe early hours, was now' burning doAn
unheeded to it few glowim, coais. His chair had been pulled around to face two
other chairs. in which Sat ArtUr and Onete.
-Ah, it*S you.'' Said Amid. "I'd almost have bet it'd he vou. Hal. Come
                         -1 _join Lis. Sit down. I Was OinO to C@Ill WLI in
on this. anyway.
Am I that prediadble'.' asked      Hal. enterino and takim-, I chair which he
also Pulled around.    so that thev sat in a rouoh circle, he and the three
others. "You sit out there to watch the sun come up every morning, said Amid.
"As soon as the sun's up. you oo to whatever dutv you've got. That duty's
foraging below, today. So you were bound to come here. weren't you'?"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
199
"But not necessarily to knock at your door," said Hal. "You're ahead of
tirne-watching the sun come up makes you that way." said Amid. "What are you
going to do, stand around alone out there'? Or am I so unapproachable'? You
know I like talkino to you."
Hal smiled. "When you've (,of time to spare," he answered. "But of course, I'd
forgotten. You sit here all day doing nothing, just hoping for someone to stop
and talk to you," he said. "As a matter of fact, I was going to ask about how
things are progressin- with Cm and you've got the sources of information right
with you. "It's Cee we're concerned about," said Artur. "What's aone wrong'.)"
"Nothing, as far as my trying to win her trust is concerned," said Onete. "But
while I was down there, yesterday, Elianone of the people from Porphyry-came
looking for me. I've got in the habit ofsitting in the same place down there
every day; and the local people have come to know I'm there. He wanted to pass
on the word that there was some interest, none of the townspeople knew why.
about the Guild aniong the soldiers in the garrison. " "You see," said Artur
to Hal, "we thought they'd given up looking for us Ion- ago. No one knows the
location ofthis ledge but the Guild members, Amanda and yourself'. Even the
local people below onl@ Know that we live out there, somewhere; and even
thev've -ot no idea how man@ of us there are or anything, else pertinent about
LIS. The _,arrison soldiery hunted for the better part ofa year for us, after
thc@ first moved in here. But we
stayed Lip Oil the ledge. except in eniergcncics, and they finally gave up
looking-for good, Ac thought. Our -Liess was they'd assumed we'd left the
district, if not this part of Kultis. completely, and scattered." "But noA ,
according to Elian," said Onetc.      ''the soldiers arc talkin(-, about some
sort of new hunt of the arc:i here for LIS."
-T@c trouble is," Said Amid. -if the soldiers begin making an org anized sweep
through here, they're almost certain to catch si(yht ofCce, because she'll
come to look at them. It'she wanted to, She could probably dance all around
and through them and none of them would @now she was there. But she -won't
realize
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Gordon R. Dickson
the danger of being seen. She won't realize that with enough people, acting in
concert, there's a dan-er that she can be surrounded and caught." "And there's
no way for us to make her understand this," said Artur.
-Any thoughts on the matter, Hal')- Amid asked. Hal shook his head. "Short of'
our capturing the girl first, ourselves-," he began.
-No," said Artur and Onete simultaneouslv. "She'd never recover from that,"
Artur added. "Amanda was right." "Then I haven't anything to suggest," Hal
said, "at the moment, at least."
-We may just have to wait and hope," said Amid. - liowever, a little knowledge
of what the present situation is wouldn't do any harm. You're the tactical
expert here, Hal. I'd like you to go down with the forapers just as you were
supposed to do. But don't stay with them. When they get down, break off by
yourself and take a look around the area as far as you think you can in the
time you've got to give it. You might consider delaying your normal turn at
the circle so that you could put in the whole day down there?-
-Of course," said Hal. .. Thank you," said Amid. "Thank you," said Artur,
almost simultancousiv. ..There*s nothing needing thanks in that," said @al.
"As far as that goes, I'm walking the circle in the back of' my mind all the
time I'm awake anyway-and for all I know most of the time when I'm sleeping."
"Are you?- said Amid. "That explains why we now have two ofyou, Old Man and
yourself, who walk the circle without saying the Law aloud as they go. It's
interesting. That's exactly what Old Man told me, when I asked him why he
didn't repeat the Law aloud as he walked. I'd been obliged to ask him because
others in the Guild had asked me if it was correct for him to do that. Old Man
said the same thing-he didn't need to say the Law aloud. It repeated itself'
in his head all the time, no matter what he was doing. Jathed would never have
stood for either one of you walking in his circle and not repeating the proper
words. "But you will," said Hal.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
201
Amid smiled. "I will, because I think ruy brother Kanin would have. Kanin had
a tremendous admiration for Jathed-as I may have said, Kanin was his chief
disciple. But Kanin, like any true Exotic, had a mind of his own."
Hal's car had been picking up the slight sounds of voices beyond the closed
outer door of the building. "I'd better be going," he said. "it sounds like
the others are ready, outside. " "I'll go too." said Onete, also rising,
"since we'll be traveling the same way for the first part of' it. Unless
there's some reason for me to stay awhile yet, Amid?" "No. Go ahead."
"Thanks."
Hal and Onete went out, joined the rest of the foragers and they all started
down the mountainside. "Where's your gathering bag, Friend?- one of the men in
the mixed group asked Hal. It occurred to Hal that he had become so used to
answering to the name "Friend" that he had almost not recognized his own when
Amid had used it during the conversation just a few mornents past. He had been
planning to pick up a bag after speaking to Amid-but there was no point in
doing that now.
"I've been given a separate job," he said. "Oh. ..
They were too polite, both its Exotics still and as Guild members, to question
him about what the task might be.
When thel, reached the forest below they split up, the foragers spreading out
to the north and Hal and Onete going together southward. down toward Porphyry.
"I never did (let to ask how you're (letting on with Cee. " Hal said once the
two of them were alone. "I'm inakina progress." Onete smiled. "What a
magnificent little thino she is! I used to wonder how she could survive down
there all by herself. But she really owns that forest. She knows everv foot of
it. I'll bet she could run throu-h it blind if she had to. @Llt what you want
to know is have I oot her to come reallv close to me'?" "That's about it."
said Hal. "I have," said Oncte. "Oh, I don't inean close enough to touch,
thouoh if she'd stand still for it. she comes near enough
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Gordon R. Dickson
to me, nowadays, so that I could probably stand up, reach out and touch her.
But that's not what I'm after. It's curiosity that brings her close, You know.
She wants to touch my clothes, and me, as much as I'd like to touch her-, but
she doesn't dare. She doesn't trust me enough yet. Artur grabbed at her,
eventually--well, you know that@ and ofcourse she's expecting me to do the
same thing. She's going to have to actually come up and touch me and walk
away again without my moving, a number of times. before she'll begin to put me
in a different category. Poor Arturl"
-Yes,- said Hal. "He couldn't help it, of course. He'd wanted to hold her so
long, that he just didn't have any patience left, when she came in reach. I
can tell how he must have felt, by the way I feel myself@ and she's not part
of my extended family, the only part that's left. But I'll wait. I think if I
wait long enough, Cee'll not only initiate the touchino, she'll start to lead
me around and sho" me
things. Then, I can perhaps see if' she'll let rne lead her places: and so
finally I can bring her up to the ledge and safety." "But not before these
soldiers come," said Hal. "You think they'll really make a search through
here?" Onete looked up at his face as they walked. "Yes," said Hal.
He did not say to Onete what he had also not said to Am,(!. only because Artur
and Onete had been there, which was that hc was afraid it was because of him
that the search would come.
CHAPTER
21
Yes, thought Hal, Bleys would indeed come. The Other had his own, personal
version of intuitional logic, as he had told Hal when the two had talked
together briefly in the cold and misty tunnel through the phase-shield, soon
after the shield had gone up. Intuitional logic, or its counterpart, would not
tell Bleys where Hal was, but he would be able to read from the general
situation that Hal was up to something and probably not on Earth. Undoubtedly,
on all the Younger Worlds, right now, the police. the military and all other
paramilitary under the control of the Others, were looking into formerly
closed files and commencing to examine groups and areas left unexamined for
some time.
Particularly on these two Exotic worlds. A little serious thought, let alone
an intuitional logic, would rule out one by one the other worlds beyond Old
Earth. Hal would not return to either of the Friendly worlds, where he was too
well known. There would be no reason that was likely to take him to the mining
world of Coby or the older worlds of Mars and Venus, which had been settled
early and never fully developed. Newton, the scientists' world, almost alone
among the Younger Worlds, held no groups actively resisting the Others, from
which Hal could get aid and protection. Also, Newton and its counterpart,
Cassida, were sterile for the purposes of Hal's aims, at this time in history.
There were no strong historical forces among the
204
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
205
populations of Ceta, Ste. Marie, New Earth and Freiland; and there was no
point in Hal's returning to the all but empty world of Dorsai. By default,
therefore, there were left only Mara and Kultis, either one.
There would have been a command, originating with Bleys, himself, and
filtering down through the hierarchy of political and military authorities the
Others controlled. It would have started the military and paramilitary forces
on the two Exotic worlds searching for any group or people who could give
shelter or assistance to someone like Hal. The important thing to Bleys would
be not so much to find Hal as to find what it was that could have brought him
out from behind the shelter of the phase-shield. Whatever Hal was after, by
definition it would be something which Bleys would prefer he did not have. So
the order would have gone out.
And the military in Porphyry, like such organizations everywhere, would have
begun by first searching what was easy to find and close at hand, going
farther and farther afield as they found nothing, until their inquisitions
brought them, finally, once more to this part of the valley, and possibly to
the very foot of these cliffs.
Hal did not think they would find the hidden entrance to the ledge. They would
pass by, and retire at last, empty-handed, to their garrison again. But
meanwhile, anyone like Cee would definitely be in danger. What he must do now
was find some evidence of how far out they had gotten in their searching and
their planning to search. . . .
As he had been thinking these thoughts, he had been carrying on a casual
conversation with Onete; and now they had come at last to the soft,
vine-covered hummock of decayed wood which served as Onete's chair during the
time she sat and waited for Cee, who was possibly watching them at this very
moment. Hal closed his eyes briefly and tried to feel if there were eyes
watching Onete and himself at the present moment. But he felt nothing and
opened his eyes again quickly enough so that Onete did not remark on his
having closed them. "Well," said Onete. "You'll be on your way, I suppose.
I'll settle down here the way I always do. If you come back this way. you
might be quiet and cautious approaching this spot, just in case Cee is being
unusually daring or extending herself in some new way. We don't want to
frighten her off."
"I'll be careful," said Hal.
So they parted and Hal took off through the forest, still in the direction of
Porphyry, but now alone. As soon as he was well out of sight of Onete, he took
off his sandals and hung them on a handy bush, leaving himself barefoot.
Earlier, he had accommodated his pace to that of the foragers and Onete while
he was with them, but now he would need to cover ground if he hoped to see as
much of the local territory as he had planned, this day. He broke into an easy
lope.
Like most of the other Guild members, he had fallen into the habit of walking
the circle barefoot, and the soles of his feet were hardened to travel without
footwear. Just as the weeks of work and walking up on the ledge had put him
back into shape, physically. The best of the gym equipment for exercise seemed
never to give the results that actual walking, running and hard hand-labor
did.
He smiled to himself as he loped along, feeling the enjoyment of stretching
his legs after . . . how long? He had done his running at the Encyclopedia on
a hidden treadmill, with the illusion of a countryside unreeling about him at
the pace he was traveling. It had been almost, but not quite the same thing.
For one instance, his feet had come to know the artificial irregularities and
bumps of the illusory path beneath them. Here, they were continuously new and
real.
Privately, he would have liked to go down to the valley below to do distance
running, but it was plain the Guild members avoided leaving traces of their
presence below as much as possible; and although he was sure Amid would have
given him permission to go, he did not want special consideration. The members
of the Guild had gotten used to seeing him at his various exercises about the
ledge; and, being Exotics, would never have dreamed of anything but accepting
whatever was his personal choice of a way of life. He smiled again, thinking
of the Guild members. With them, during these few weeks, he had come closer to
understanding Exotics than at any other time in his lives. Like so many
individuals of the other Splinter Cultures, and like nearly all of the people
on Old Earth, itself, he had taken the Exotics' nature and their philosophical
search for an evolved human pretty much for granted.
He had not realized what that search had meant to them in terms of an active
pursuit, or how much it had altered them as a
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
207
people. For the first time he saw their culture for what it was and realized
the real change it had made in them. There was no doubt in him now that it was
equivalent to the changes the Dorsai had made in becoming what they were, and
the Friendlies in becoming what they had become.
That change was not just a matter of surface manners, politeness and
consideration. These people actually saw life from the standpoint of their
philosophical search for an improved human race; and strove to find the
materials for that improvement in themselves. Thinking back now, he realized
his first actual acceptance of that fact had been in what he had seen in those
around him on the road to and in the town of Porphyry. They had been
subjected, but not changed. Even oppressed, all but a very few of them had
remained the Exotics they had been before the soldiers from off-world had
come.
It had been a great discovery. He felt now, for the first time, that there was
something to learn; something that-although it might be that in following it
up he was going away from his problem-might in the long run end by bringing
him back to it by a better route. The Exotics wanted an evolution in
humankind, per se. What he, himself, wanted was specifically a moral, an
ethical, evolution in humanity. Surely the two desires were close, if not
united in purpose?
But it was his survey of the land down here he should be thinking of now. He
began by swinging to his left in an arc that brought him back to a path. It
was not really a path, here, but a
trail which could be followed by woods-wise eyes, the trail that he had taken
with Amanda when she had first led him to the ledge. He followed this barely
perceptible trail backward toward Porphyry, accordingly, still at a lope, and
it was not long before it grew into what was a visibly used path.
In this early stage it could even be a path worn by larger animals, who, like
humans, took the easest route on their first time through unknown territory
and then tended to repeat their steps on subsequent trips. Of course, there
were no such wild animals on this world. He had been thinking too much as Hal,
who had seen such game trails on Old Earth. Younger World troops would not
think of anything but human feet having made such a trail, when they came
across it.
After a while the trail gave way, in small stages, to a regularly maintained
road, even though narrow and unsurfaced.
So far he had seen no evidence of recent passage this way by soldiers, or by
any group of people, organized or unorganized. There was no possible way
soldiers, particularly the poorly trained troops of the Occupation, could have
gone up the unsurfaced trail without leaving sign of their passage in the way
of bootprints and damaged vegetation, on either side of it. No
leaving sign of their passage, to Hal's eyes at any rate, in its soft surface.
The early part of it he traveled, accordingly, must also be territory to which
they had not penetrated for some time. It was not far down the road, however,
before he rounded a curve, descended a small slope and came upon not merely
sign, but a deliberate announcement of their recent visit this far from
Porphyry.
He had reached the home of the madman who spent his days stripping blossoms
from the rapidly growing plants he cultivated in pots around the pool before
his house and in the space behind it.
But the man was not plucking blossoms now-and plainly had not been for a
couple of weeks, at least. Local scavengers had been at his body. What was
left of it now swung in the light breeze, suspended by the noose from which he
had been hung.
Below him was a printed sign showing large block letters in red on white.
DO NOT TOUCH OR REMOVE, BY ORDER OF THE COMMANDANT OF THE GARRISON.
Hal was suddenly reminded of such executed corpses dangling from makeshift
roadside gallows in Hawkwood's time, with similar notices. The idea then, of
course, had been that the body of the individual who had been hung should
serve as a warning and a deterrent to other criminals. Here, where deterrence
was not the object, the sign was simple savagery and sadism on the part of the
Occupation troops.
Hal did not touch the body. There was no use; and to do so would merely serve
as an announcement to any soldiers returning this way that others besides the
madman existed in this area. He turned and headed back up the road at the same
pace he had used since he had parted with Onete.
Only the morning had gone by. He decided to use the rest of the day in
generally surveying the terrain, not only so he would know it in the future,
but so he could make some informed
208
Gordon R. Dickson
guesses as to how the troops would spread out and move through it, when and if
they came.
Accordingly, he now made side excursions to right and left out from the trail.
The soldiers, under the impression that the Chantry Guild would be in the
forest rather than above it, would look for evidence of signs of traffic to
and from the location of its headquarters. Not even they would expect an
obvious connection of trails linking that headquarters with the visible
footpath he now followed. They would be likely to simply follow the footpath
as far as it seemed to them to exist. Only after it had disappeared would they
then probably form a skirmish line and begin to sweep through the greenery
area beyond; which they would have divided on their map into blocks of
territory, running right to the foot of the cliffs.
It was well that Onete had chosen a place to sit for Cee that was some
distance beyond and off the line of the trail toward the cliffs. It was not so
good that she had chosen a spot relatively close to the entrance under the
huge boulder, leading up to the ledge.
There were advantages in such a close position, of course, She, like the
foragers, could literally be watched from the ledge, using a viewscope
adjusted for distance viewing; in fact, lately, Artur spent what moments he
had to spare during the day doing just that, to catch what glimpses he could
of Cee. Also all Guild members, when they were below, were trained to glance
up at regular intervals to where they knew the ledge to be.
Although the ledge was invisible from the lower ground, to someone who knew
where its outer edge should be, it was still easily locatable; and if whoever
was below saw a bush growing on that edge where normally no bush grew, the
warning to get immediately back up to safety was clear.
Even Hal himself had been checking the position of the ledge, hourly, without
being more than barely aware he was doing so. Reminded of the warning bush
now, he looked for it, even though the most recent hour was not up; but there
was no bush there.
No, Onete's location was admirably suited from the standpoint of' Onete's own
safety. But if the soldiers had anyone among thern who could read even the
most obvious of sign, the marks of Onete and Cee's visits to that location
would tell
THE CHANTRY GUILD
209
whoever it was that people had been there, recently. The soldiers,
accordingly, would search more carefully in the region about that spot,
including up to the cliffs, the boulder and the secret entrance.
Hal did not really think that even such a tracker, if they had -one, would
suspect that the apparently small shadowed hollow under the great boulder was
anything more than that. The slope of loose rock just below that entrance did
not hold the marks of the goings in and out of Guild members, who were always
careful to move some distance on the rock, along the base of the cliff, before
they left it individually at different points to enter the jungle.
The chances of the soldiers finding their way to the ledge, consequently, were
slim. But unfortunately the evidence of Onete's meetings with Cee would still
have directed attention to ,this area; and if there were some of the Others on
the Exotic worlds they might have the imagination the soldiers lacked-to
direct a search closely along the cliff-front, investigating every nook and
cranny until they crept in under the boulder and found the route to the ledge.
To Bleys Ahrens, himself, the evidence of Cee and Onete's meeting would simply
suggest immediately the likelihood of a secret dwelling place on the cliffs
above.
However, there was no quick way now to hide that evidence. There remained the
business he was engaged in now, which was putting himself empathically in the
boots of the soldiery; and from their point of view working out how they would
go about covering the terrain he was now surveying.
He had automatically -one back to his training as the young Donal, and that of
the young Hal under the tutorship of the Dorsai, Malachi Nasuno, on Old Earth.
For the moment everything else had been put aside and he thought and reasoned
only according to that early training. As a result something connected with
that way of thinking came automatically to his mind. It was a part of the
multivolume work on tactics and strategy, which had been the lifework of
Cletus Grahame, Donal's great great-grandfather. ". . . the importance of
knowing the terrain where encounters with enemyforces are likel -y is
impossible to underrate,'' Cletus had written in the volume titled FIELD USE
OF FORCES. "The commander. whether he exnecrv to have to onerale
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
211
deftnsively or offensively over that terrain, gains a tremendous advantage by
knowt     .ng t.t personally and intimately. It is not merely enough to glance
at a visible area and relate it to a map displayed in a viewer. Large
elements, such as rivers, gullies, i.mpenetrable undergrowth and such, are
obvious features to be committed to memory-but this is only the beginning of
the advantage to be derived from the Commander's going out in person to cover
the area. "If this is done, then a great many smaller, but infinitel.v useful
bits of knowledge may be acquired that may well make the difference between
success andfailure in any action. The qualit). of mud on the riverbank, the
exact depth of a gull     'v, the character Of the impenetrable undergrowth
-such as a tendency of part oJ' its vegetation to stick to the clothing of
enemy passing near it or a empti .ng to penetrate it-all these are items
oj'information that ma_ ,be turned to account; not only in helping to build a
picture of how the enemy will be channeled and directed, delayed, or
aided in moving through the area, but in deciding how the en-
em), forces may be led or forced into a situation where theY must surrender,
or ma    'v be easil-v taken prisoner, giving the bloodless victory that is
the hallmark oJ' the fully capable commander. . . . "
Hal frowned for a second as he loped along, his eyes noting and his memory
automatically cataloging what he saw as he wove back and forth through the
jungle across the route the soldiers would be led, by conditions of the
terrain, to come.
Something was nagging at the back of his mind. There should be something more
to the passage from the text than that. Something that was of importance, not
to the present moment, but to his larger, lifetime search; and yet, he had the
page of the ancient text from the Graeme library on Dorsai clearly in his mind
Is eye and those paragraphs were the extent of what was pertinent there to
what he was doing at the moment. He made a mental note to search his memory
again on that subject when he had leisure and turned his whole attention back
to the business of studying the ground he was covering.
He was almost to the cliffs by this time. The next pass would take him past
the foot ofthem. He broke off his traveling to and fro to make a turn back to
where he had left his sandals on the
bush. Since this took him close to where Onete was sitting, he swung wide in
his approach, and covered the last hundred meters or so silently and
cautiously so as not to disturb Cee if she were there.
He had seen no sign of Cee, however, by the time he had retrieved the sandals.
Instead of putting them on immediately, he gave in to the temptation to move
with unusual care closer in to where Onete would be sitting; and after a few
moments he came within sight of the spot and saw her.
Cee was indeed with her, standing directly in front of Onete; and, it looked
to Hal, well within reach of Onete if the latter had wished to reach for the
girt. As Onete had said, however, she plainly had no intention of doing so;
and Cee apparently now trusted her in this, because she stood   relaxed before
the grown woman, almost as if they were in         casual conversation-as
perhaps they were, in one fashion or another.
It occurred to Hal suddenly that, if only there were the materials up on the
ledge to fashion a quick-acting tranquilizer of the kind used to immobilize
wild game, he could easily have delivered it at the point of a dart or arrow,
into the little girl, from his present position or one like it. With the
proper sort of tranquilizer, Cee would never know what had hit her until she
woke up in the women's section of one of the dormitory buildings, with Onete
still with her.
She might react strongly to finding herself enclosed; but Onete's presence
would be reassuring@ and if the worst came to the worst, it might be better
than leaving her here for the soldiers to discover and catch.
Of course, in argument against doing such a thing there was the fact that even
a large contingent of soldiers might not be able to catch her-which they would
probably try to do before they tried shooting her. If she could get away from
Hal and Amanda, these Occupation troops were not going to find her easy to
deal with. Then, once they had shown any sign of doing such things, she would
make it a point to keep out of their sight.
Hal faded back from the clearing where Onete and Cee still confronted each
other. When he was a safe distance away, he put on his sandals and made his
last sweep of the ground at the bottom of the cliffs. Then he returned through
the entrance under the boulder, up to the ledge. Amid was at work in his
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Gordon R. Dickson
office, with a tray holding some crumbs of bread and the remnants of some sort
of vegetable stew in a bowl perched precariously on the corner of a table
otherwise piled with papers. "I'll take that back to the kitchen when I go,
shall P" asked Hai, nodding at the tray after knocking on the office door and
accepting Amid's invitation to come in. "What'? Oh, that. Yes, thank you. Sit
down," said Amid, looking up from the plans for an additional log building-one
which would be in between the dormitories and his reception building in size.
"What did you see'? And what did you think? You're back earlier than I
expected." ,,It didn't take as long as I'd have thought, either," said Hal,
sitting down.
He told Amid about the hanged madman and about his idea for possibly
tranquilizing Cee and bringing her up to the ledge that way.
Amid looked uncomfortable. "I'm sure Artur and Onete won't like the idea," he
said. "Even if we could do it. Oh, I don't doubt you could creep up close
enough on her to get a dart or something into her; but even I don't like to
imagine how Cee'd feel, waking up locked in one
of our small bedrooms, even if Onete was with her." "It's just a suggestion,"
said Hal. "Then there's the problem of the tranquilizer itself. We've got a
number of drugs in the clinic here, of course, but . . . -
"I know," said Hal. "As I say, it was just a suggestion." "Well, well, I'll
talk to our pharmacist and if anything like that's possible, maybe you'd be
willing to make the suggestion yourself to Artur and Onete. They and we could
sit down and discuss the chances of it working." "I'd be glad to," said Hal.
"All right, then," said Amid, "as soon as we all have some free time at the
same moment. I can call in Artur at any time, but Onete's still down below,
isn't she?" "Yes," said Hal. "And you're about to take your turn at the
circle?" "I could put that off." "No need to, particularly since we have to
wait for Onete to get back up here."
Amid sighed, a sigh that was more than a bit weary, pushed
THE CHANTRY GUILD                     213
away from him the plans he had just been examining, and sat back in his chair.
"Well," he said, "now, about the matter I wanted you to look into down there.
When do you think the soldiers might come out here? And what might they do
when they actually come9"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
215
CHAPTER
22
"I can't begin to give you even guesses by way of answers," said Hal, "until I
get some information. How many soldiers arc
there in the garrison'? Have you any idea how many of those would be free
enough from other duties to make up a search party large enough to comb the
district out here'? Do they have a
tracker among them?" "Tracker?" Amid frowned. "Someone who can tell whether
people have been moving through wild country like that below us by reading
sign -recognizing part of a footprint, or what a broken branch means, and so
forth." "Ah! I see," said Amid. "I don't know if they have or not.- "There
must have been other searches, in this district and others. Did they ever use
anyone like that to try to locate the people they were hunting?" "Not to my
knowledge," said Amid. "No, I'm sure they didn't. In fact I doubt they've got
someone like that. It would be common knowledge if they did." "If it isn't, it
only means they've got no one outstanding in that sort of ability," said Hal.
"it doesn't necessarily rule out the fact that some of them may be a little
more knowledgeable about the woods and quicker to notice a footprint or other
sign. that's open and obvious. For example, there'll be no hiding the
fact that Onete's been sitting in that little clearing for some weeks now, and
meeting Cee there." "No. I've been worrying about that; but I don't know
anything that could be done to erase the marks of their being there. Do you?"
"I haven't been able to think of anything so far," said Hal. "I'm particularly
concerned-not merely for Cee, but for the Guild as a whole," said Amid. "We've
been safe until now up here; but there's no getting around the fact that if
they find the entrance under the boulder and follow it up, they'd have us all
in a trap." "No weapons up here, I suppose?" Hal asked. "Here?" Amid looked at
him sternly, "Certainly not. We're Exotics! I suppose you could count Old
Man's sword as a weapon, if he'd let someone else use it that way. He won't
hurt anything or anyone, himself." "Too bad," said Hal. "The soldiers would be
very vulnerable, climbing up here after they got past the boulder. For all
practical purposes they'd have to come single file. With even a few weapons,
you might be able to ambush the whole party on the way up and take them
prisoner. Of course you'd have the problern of what to do with them, once
you'd captured them. I take it for granted you wouldn't be able to bring
yourselves to murder them in cold blood, even if some of them have done just
that, effectively, to people I i ke that insane man down the road." "No, we
wouldn't hurt them, of course,- said Amid. "And as I say, we've no weapons,
anyway. Is there any way we could take them prisoner, if we had to, without
weapons?" "I'd strongly advise against trying it," said Hal. "The Guild
members probably outnumber any search party that'd be sent by at least two to
one. But barehanded against soldiers like that-"
He grinned. "Now, if you were all Dorsai," he said. "Or even true,
faith-holding Friendlies . . ." "Please," said Amid, "let's be serious."
"Serious is that you simply can't afford the search party's discovering the
entrance under the boulder." "Yes." Amid frowned down at the drawing on his
desk for a Moment, then raised his eyes again to meet Hal's. "Only about five
of all the Guild members even know it," he said, "but besides the boulder
that's there beside the opening now, we long
216
Gordon R. Dickson
ago cut a second piece of rock of the right kind into the necessary
rectangular shape and buried it just beside the boulder. The spot where it's
buried has been grown over, since, just like the other spot near it that holds
a block and tackle and levers for moving the block. We can fit it into the
opening and it'll took, and feel, like part of the cliff behind the boulder.
In fact, the block's got weight and mass enough so that even a couple of
searchers-and there isn't room under the boulder for more than two at a
time-couldn't push it backward and out of their way by hand, even if they
suspected it of blocking a way through. But there's no reason they should."
"Very good!" said Hal. "What it means, of course," said Amid worriedly, "is
that once it's in place they can't get in, but we can't get out; except for
those who know enough about mountain climbing to go down the open rock face.
We've got a few who could do it. Not that we'd want to get out while there're
soldiers down there." "You're vulnerable to being seen from above," said Hal.
"I know the brush you've got growing on the roofs of the buildings and the
rest of the camouflage hides the fixed elements of what you've brought to this
ledge. But a satellite in orbit looking directly at this area on its scope, or
even a ship in orbit, could see people moving about if they made the
effort-the circle, for example, always has people in it; and even if it was
empty you'd have to cover the worn area of ground with something. And with all
that, even if you knew they might look, and hid everything and kept everybody
inside, a close study by an expert of a picture taken of the ledge in daytime
would find evidence of human occupation here." "You're telling me we're going
to be found, eventually," said Amid unhappily. "Only if they look. As long as
none of them ever think of the possibility of your being up here, you can last
forever. That's why making sure they don't find anything below to make them
think of it is crucial." "Yes," said Amid. The deep wrinkles of his forehead
were even deeper than usual. "I know. We'll talk some more with Onete about
what that Elian from Porphyry told her. He may have said something that would
give us more information about the character of the search party, how large it
might be, when it might come-and information about the garrison troops gener-
THE CHANTRY GUILD
217
Iv, their number and so on. Meanwhile I'll also try to locate anyone e se
among t e mem ers w o s ta e to someone rom Porphyry lately; and if they've
got anything of value to tell you, I can bring them in to talk to you.
Meanwhile, you were going to walk in the circle today, weren't you? You might
as well go ahead and do that. You won't mind if I interrupt your walking if I
feel I need to talk to you before you stop of your own accord?" "Of course
not," said Hal. "Anything I get mentally occupied with there, I can always get
back into at a later time." "Good. "
Hal went out, picking up the utensils of Amid's lunch as he went. These
reminded him that he, himself, had not yet eaten today. When he got to the
nearest of the dormitory kitchens, he found it, now in the early afternoon,
almost empty. He ate a
quick lunch and went on, out to the circle. There were only two people waiting
there, a thin, tall, elderly man named Dans, with dark brown eyes that always
seemed to give him a stare, and a small, athletic young woman with blond hair,
known as Trekka. "I think duty took you out of your normal turn, Friend," said
Dans. "Trekka's first, but would you care to go before me?" "Before me, as
well, Friend," said Trekka.
Hal grinned at them. "No, you don't," said Hal. "I can get put in your debt
like that once, but I'm too clever to be caught twice. I'll follow Dans. "
As it turned out, however, several of those currently walking were very close
to the point where they wanted to stop. Hal and the other two were all walking
the circle within five minutes of his arrival.
As always, when he began this, Hal shed his concern with daily matters as he
would drop a winter cloak after stepping into a building's warmth. There was
nothing special about the circle to facilitate this, or even anything
metaphysical about it, since he had been able to do it since childhood. It was
no more than the extent to which anyone lets go of their pattern of directed
thoughts, when he or she slips off into daydreams.
But on this occasion, the urgency of the possible coming search by the troops
and its attendant problems may have lingered a little in his consciousness and
directed the otherwise free flight of his mind; for he found it once more
occupied with the passage from Cletus Grahame's work on tactics and strategy
218
Gordon R. Dickson
that he had called up from memory in his reconnaissance below. Once more he
felt tugging at him the feeling that there was more to the passage than he had
read off the printed page in his memory.
Now, freed by the movement and voices of the circle to go seeking, he traced
down the source of that feeling. He was a boy again, the boy Donal, back on
Dorsai. There, in the big, shelf-walled library of Graemehouse, filled with
old-fashioned books of printed and bound paper, there had been a number of
large boxes on one shelf which had held the original manuscript of Cletus's
writings. As the boy Donal, once he had mastered reading, which he had done so
early that he could not remember when he had first started to read, anything
written was to be gobbled wholesale.
Those had been the days when he could so lose himself in reading that he could
be called to dinner by someone literally standing at his side, and not hear
the voice of whoever it was.
During that period of his life he had ended up reading, along with everything
else that was there to be read in Graemehouse, the manuscript version of
Cletus's work. It had been handwritten on the grayish-white. locally made
Dorsai paper; and here and there, there had been corrections and additions
made in the lines. In particular, in certain spots whole passages had been
crossed out. Notes had not been made by Cletus on the manuscript, usually,
when such a passage was deleted; and Hal had often played with trying to
figure out why his great great-grandfather had decided not to include it. In
the case of the neatly exed out section of the remarks on terrain, the note in
the margin had said--of utility only for a minority of readers. "
Of utility only to a minority? Why? Hal had puzzled over that reason, set down
in the time-faded, pale blue ink of Cletus's round handwriting. He remembered
going into the office which had been Cletus's to begin with, and that of the
head of the family ever since, and sitting down in the hard, adult-sized,
wooden swivel chair at the desk there, to try if by imitating Cletus as Cletus
had worked, he could divine the meaning of the note.
Why only a minority of readers? As a boy, the phrase had seemed to threaten to
shut Hal out. What if he would be among
THE CHANTRY GUILD
219
the majority who would not understand it'? He had read the deleted passage
carefully and found nothing in it that could conceivably be useful; but there
was, unfortunately, no way for him to test himself with its information in
practice until he was
grown up and an officer, himself, facing a specific terrain to be dealt with.
He had not even asked any of his elders about the passage, afraid that their
answer would confirm his fear that he might be among those who could not use
what Cletus had originally planned to include in his work.
Later on, when as Donal he had been grown up and an officer in fact, the
deleted passage had become so deeply buried in his memory that he had almost
forgotten it, and, in any case, by that time he had evolved intuitional logic,
which in every way that he could see did all and more that Cletus's passage
had promised.
The deleted passage itself was short and simple enough. Now, walking the
circle, Hal had left awareness of the ledge and the Chantry Guild far behind;
and he found himself, as in the earlier case with Sir John Hawkwood, being
both Cletus, seated at his desk and writing that passage, and someone watching
the slim, unremarkable man with his sleeves rolled up, writing away.
"If, having fully surveyed and understood the terrain," the deleted passage
had read, "the officer will concentrate on it, resurveying it in memor    'v,
and imagining enemy troops or his own moving across it, eventually he will
find the image in his mind changing from a concept to a vision. For the
purposes Of which I write, there is a great difference between the two-as
any great painter can attest. A concept is the object or scene
imagined in three dimensions and asfully as is humanly possible. But it
remains a creature of the mind of the one imagining it. It is, in a sense,
connected with the mind that created it. "But a completed mental picture, once
brought into existence, has an existence entirely separatefirom the one who
conceived it. A painter-and I speak as a failed painter, myself-can point
anything he has conceptualized, adapting or improving it as he wishes. But
with a completed mental picture it will have acquired a life of its own. To
make it otherwise, even in the smallest degree, would be to destroy the truth
of it. He has no choice but to point it as it exists, which may be greater
than, or different
220
Gordon R. Dickson
from, his original concept. I would guess that the same phenomenon occurs in
the case of the writers offiction, when they speak of the story as taking
control of itself, taking itself away from the author. Such situations in
which a character, for example, in effect refuses to be, say, or do what the
author originallY intended, and insists that he or she will be, say or do
something else instead. "As painters and authors come to have such completed
mental pi .ctures and learn to trust them, instead of holding to their oh
.gi.nal conceptualizations, so a fid/.v effective field officer must learn to
trust his own tactical or strategic visions, when the       'N, developfrom
his best conceptualization of a military situation. In some way, more of the
mind, spirit and capability of the human having the vision seems to be
involved with the problem; and the vision is always therefore greater than the
mere conceptualization. "For example: in the case of the management of
available terrain, the officer may find the ground he has surve
'ved apparently hanging in midair, in miniature, like a solid thing before
him; and he will be able to watch as the enemyforces, and his own, move across
it. Further, as he watches it, these envisioned characters may create before
him just the tactical movements that he needs to bring about the result he
desires. "This is an ability of almost invaluable use, but it requires
concentration, practice and belief, to develop it.               The
crossed-out section ended.
Now, suddenly, nearly a hundred years after he had read the handwritten
manuscript, as he still watched and was Cletus under the influence of walking
the circle, Hal understood what he had not, before.
In his own time, Cletus had needed to achieve some actual successes in the
field to prove to the experienced military that his theories were something
more than wild dreams. Those tactical successes were a series of bloodless
victories achieved where his superiors would have considered them impossible.
Hal had studied these, years ago, to see if Cletus had been using an earlier
form of intuitional logic, and had concluded that Cletus had not. He had seen
his way to the unexpected tactical solutions he achieved by some other method.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
221
Just what method, Hal had never been able to determine until now. Hal himself
knew that his intuitional logic was not unique to him. Chess grandmasters had
undoubtedly used versions of it to foresee sequences of moves that would
achieve victory on the playing board for them. What he called intuitional
logic was only a somewhat refined and extended activity of that same
pattern of mind use.
Cletus had clearly made a similar extension of the artistic function he used
in painting. His description of the miniature battlefield hanging in midair
and the tiny soldiers acting out a
solution to a tactical problem, apparently on their own, could be nothing else
than a direct application of the unconscious mind to
the problem. In short, Cletus, as well as Walter Blunt of the original Chantry
Guild-and Jathed, and who knew how many others whose names were lost in
history-had been making deliberate use of the Creative Universe to achieve
desired ends. Like Blunt. and possibly Jathed, Cletus had used the Creative
Universe without realizing its universality, but only the small application of
it to what at the moment he wanted to do. But it was startling and rewarding
to find further proof of what Hal, himself, sought-and on his own doorstep, so
to speak.
At the same time, he realized he still lacked a sure answer to the question of
why Cletus had deleted that passage. Hal was suddenly thoughtful. Since Cletus
himself had set down the way, why couldn't he, Hal, use his own creative
unconscious to try and ask him'?
He looked hard at his own vision of the man who was seated at the desk,
writing. Cletus was lost to time. There was no way of actually reaching the
living man, himself. But if the transient and the eternal were indeed the
same-even though he, Hal, had yet to feel that fact as an absolute, inward
truth-then it ought to be possible to talk to the spirit of his great
greatgrandfather by the same creative mechanism Cletus himself had described.
Hal concentrated . . . and although the solid-looking, threedimensional figure
he watched continued to sit and write, a ghostlike and transparent version of
it turned its head out of the solid head to glance at Hal standing by the
desk. Then the whole ghostlike body rose up out of the solid form of Cletus at
the desk and walked around the corner of it to face Hal. It was Cletus, as
222
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
223
much or more than the solid figure was; and, as Cletus, it sat down on the
edge of the desk, folded its arms on its chest and looked at Hal. "So you're
my great great-grandson," the spirit of Cletus said. "The family's put on some
size since my time." "In my original body as Donal Graeme," said Hal, "I was
only a little larger than you. This was the size of my twin uncles, who were
unusually large even for my time. But you're right. As Donal Graeme, I was the
small one among the men in my family. " "It's flattering to hear I'll have
descendants like that," said Cletus. "Though of course I'll never really know
of it, since you and I are at this moment just a pair of minds outside both my
time and yours. You understand, I'm not just a projection of your own
self-hypnosis, as your dead tutors were when you evoked them to advise you as
a boy in the Final Encyclopedia, when you first started to run from this man
called Bleys Ahrens.
11 the Cletus you're looking at now, am actually more alive than the one
seated at that desk, writing. He's a product of your imagination. 1, since you
brought me to life in what you call the Creative Universe, have a life of my
own. I'm Cletus Grahame. not Hal Mayne's concept of Cletus." "I wonder," said
Hal soberly. "Maybe I've done you a disservice. What happens to you when I go
back to awareness of my own world and time?" "I don't know," said Cletus, "any
more than you do. Perhaps I go out like a blown-out candle. Perhaps I wait for
you in the Creative Universe until you find your own way there, as you should,
eventually. I'm not worried about it. You wanted to know why I deleted those
few paragraphs of my writing on the use of terrain?" "Yes," said Hal. "I
deleted it because I wanted as many people as possible to read and benefit
from my writing," said Cletus. "No one's completely without unconscious
prejudices. If, in reading. someone runs across mention ofsomething that
offends one of these unconscious prejudices, they tend to find faults to
justify a rejection of the writing, whether the faults are actually there or
not. I didn't want my work rejected in that way if it could be helped. -
"Why should they find fault with your idea of a vision being
something more than a concept?" "Because I was speaking about something that's
supposed to be a sort of magic that takes place only in great artists-writers,
sculptors, painters, and so forth. The majority of the race, unfortunately,
tends far too often to have given up on the possibility of creativity in
themselves; either without even
having tried to make use of it, or after an early failure. Once something like
that's been rejected by an individual, he or she tends to resent anyone who
tries to tell them they still have it. Because of that resentment, they n or
make some ground to reject any suggestion it still exists in them; and that
rejection, being emotional, would probably force them to reject my writing as
a whole; in order to get rid of the unwanted part. So, I took out the
passage." "What about those who could have benefited from it?" said Hal.
"Those who wouldn't be looking for an excuse to reject the idea')" "They'll
find it eventually on their own, I'm sure," said Cletus. "But if a man puts a
patch over one eye and goes around trying to convince not only everybody else
but himself that he was born with only one peephole on the universe, I've not
only got no duty, but no moral right, to pull the patch off and force him to
face the fact he's wrong." "History could force you to do it," said Hal.
"History hasn't required that of me, in my time," said Cletus. "if it has of
you in your time, I sympathize with you. Brace yourself, my great
great-grandson. You'll be hated by many of those you give a greater vision
to."
Hal smiled a little sadly, remembering what Amid had told him about children
on the Younger Worlds being taught to spit after saying his name. "I already
am,- he said-
A hand had caught Hal by the arm; and at the touch his attention returned
suddenly to the circle, the ledge and the outside situation. It was Amid.
CHAPTER
23
"I'm sorry to interrupt you, as I told you I might have to-" Amid was
beginning, with relentless Exotic courtesy, when Hal cut him off. "It's quite
all right, as I said it would be. Don't be concerned," said Hal.
The sun was just disappearing behind their own cliffs; and the mountains he
watched at sunrise were now lost in night's shadow. Below them, the jungle was
losing itself in twilight; and the ledge itself, to its outer edge, was in the
last rosy light of the sunset. "What is it?" asked Hal. "A search party from
the garrison will start combing through the jungle below, tomorrow," said
Amid. "Elian visited Onete again this afternoon to tell her, while she was
visiting with Cee. Cee, naturally, disappeared just before Elian showed up;
and since Onete knew the news was important, she didn't wait around to see if
Cee would be back, but came directly up to the ledge and me. I've had them dig
up the barrier stone to block the way in under the boulder, and it's set ready
to be put into position at a moment's notice. Onete, Artur and Calas-you know
Calas, of course?" "Of course," said Hal. Calas was a wiry little man who had
been one of the original Guild Members with Artur, back when Jathed was still
alive.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
225
"We're gathered in my reception building, making plans. I'm afraid we need
your advice." "Anything I can do . . . " said Hal. Amid was already leading
him at what, for the small and aged man, was almost a trot toward the
reception building; which now, like the two dormitories, had blackout curtains
over its windows.
Within the building, an evening fire had just been lit in the fireplace and
the people Amid had mentioned were seated in three chairs on one side of it.
Overhead, the ordinary artificial lighting that was powered by stored sunlight
from collectors on
the mountainside above them in the day, was on a setting so low that its
radiants, shaped like upside-down cones, glowed no
brighter than candles. There was an empty chair between that of Onete and the
chair Amid always occupied. Amid led Hal to it and all but pushed him into it
before the Guildmaster seated himself.
Whatever the other three had been discussing, they had broken off. They sat
silent as Hal and Amid came in and found their chairs. "Here's Hal," said Amid
to Onete, unnecessarily. "Tell him what Elian told you." "He said . . . "
began Onete. A product of Exotic schools, she had naturally been taught what
the people of Mara and Kultis called Perfect Memory. In effect, this was a
ninemonic system that, when learned, gave virtually total recall of
information gained through any of the senses-the equivalent in ear, nose and
sense of touch of an eidetic memory for anything visual. " 'I just found out
at lunchtime that the garrison's definitely sending out a search party for the
Guild, tomorrow. My cousin heard Sanderson, the corporal who's quartered on
her and her husband, talking to the private he uses as an orderly. They were
outside the house, but just outside the front door. She heard them through the
doora little muffled. but clear enough.' That's the first thing Elian said
when he reached me. He was out of breath. He'd barely made it outside the town
before the guards would have looked suspiciously on anyone that late in the
afternoon; and he'd come as fast as he could once he got out of sight of the
walls."
She paused and looked at Hal. "Did he say how many soldiers were corning?" Hal
asked.
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Gordon R. Dickson
"No. He probably didn't know." "Did he say at what time they were leaving town
in the morning, so we can make an estimate of when they'll get into this
area?" "Well, no," said Onete. "Actually we talked about how terrible it was
they'd search for us after all this time; and I thanked him for coming to tell
us, and then I came right back up ere to tell Amid." "Did he say anything,"
asked Hal, "this time or at any time earlier, about how the soldiers might be
armed, what rank of officer would be leading them, whether they knew their way
around in the jungle up here or had maps of any kind? Did he mention that any
of the soldiers would be ones who'd searched this area before?" "No. As I
said," said Onete, "we just talked
She looked unhappy.
11 1 made a mess of it, didn't IT' she said. "I should have asked him useful
questions like that, or at least anything I could think of that would let us
know what we were up against. I'm sorry. My first thought was to thank him for
taking the risk to come and warn us. That's us Exotics, polite and considerate
before anything else! I might just as well have chatted with hill) about the
weather!"
Her voice ended on a bitter, self-accusatory note. "Don't let it bother you,"
said Hal. "Exotics aren't the only ones who wouldn't know what to ask in such
a situation. Just about anyone without the proper experience or training
wouldn't, " "I'll bet Cee would have asked him some of the right questions, if
she'd talk; and if she'd trusted him enough to stick around!" said Onete,
still bitterly. "Never mind," said Amid, "we'll all make mistakes like that
before this thing is over, probably. Our Exotic training is exactly the wrong
sort of training for handling situations like this Occupation." "Don't devalue
yourselves," said Hal. "Remember, that same Exotic training of yours centers
around making life more comfortable for those who have to deal with you. Just
having to live with you has brought these same soldiers more peace of' mind
and comfort than most of them have ever had in their lives
THE CHANTRY GUILD
227
before. Whether they admit it to themselves or not, it's hard for them to
deprive themselves of that comfort by killing you all off; in spite of the
fact they're aware that's essentially what they've been sent here to do.
Almost unconsciously, you've been countering the directives under which they
operate. Sodon't blame yourself for not asking questions only a professional
soldier might think to ask. To each his own way of fighting. " "Well, in any
case," said Amid to Hal, "as far as the number and equipment and so forth of
the soldiers in Porphyry is concerned, Caeas here can answer some of the
questions for you. That's why I have him here-"
The door to the reception building suddenly banged open and there strode
in-there was no other proper word for the way she moved-a Guild member whose
name, Hal remembered, was
R'shan. She was no taller than Onete and slim enough to look as
if she was barely more than a girl. But as Hal had seen, she was incredibly
strong for her size. He had seen her tossing fifty-kilo sacks of variform
sweet potatoes around in the Guild storehouse, apparently without effort. At
the moment she was in
work trousers and a somewhat ragged shirt. Her short-cropped blond hair had
dust and woodshavings clinging to it. Underneath the hair two bright blue eyes
sparkled out of an attractive, sharp-featured face. "Sorry to be late," she
said, coming on in and throwing herself into the empty chair just beyond
Calas. "I was up in the crawl space just beneath the roof of Dormitory Two and
over the third floor ceiling. Amid, I found that leak up there. All that
repairing they did around the kitchen chimney didn't do a bit of good. The
crack in the roof's a good half-meter off from the chimney's flashing. I could
see sunlight coming through-" "Forgive me, R'shan," said Amid, "but we can
talk about the leak in the Dormitory Two roof later. We've just gotten word
the soldiers from Porphyry are sending out a search party to try and find us
in the jungle below here. We've got to make plans." "Oh? Of course! " R'shan
sat up in her chair. "You'll want to
know how we're supplied-- "Yes," said Amid, "but in a moment. Hal's the only
one here who knows anything about the military and how they might go about
searching. He's asking the questions."
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Ah. Friend, here, you mean?" "Of course. Friend. Forgive me," said Amid,
looking apologetically at Hal under R'shan's correction. "My name doesn't
matter either," said Hal. "Let's stick to the situation under discussion. You,
first, Calas. How do you happen to know more about the Occupation Troops than
these others?" "I was one of them," said Calas. His voice was slightly hoarse,
and it struck Hal suddenly that he had never heard the man speak before. "I
was caught in a rock slide one day when half a dozen of us were out chasing an
escaped prisoner. The slide buried me and those other bastards just pawed
around a
little and then went off and left me. Wrote me off. Some Guild members were
out foraging and saw what happened. After my so-called mates were gone, the
Guild people came, dug me out and carried me back here to get well, I had a
broken arm and leg, as well as other things wrong with me. The Guild saved my
life. So I stayed here. I'll help you fight those sons of bitches any day-"
"Fighting them's the last thing we want to do," said Hal. "Whether the Guild
lives or dies depends on the soldiers never finding out it still exists. You
say the soldiers with you gave up digging for you after just a little effort
to find you?" "Yes. It was a hot day, but that's no excuse. Excuse enough for
them, though." "You're a Cetan, aren't you?" "Yes." Calas stared at him. "How
did you know?" "It's too cornplicated to explain at the moment," said Hal.
"Basically, the way you talk rules out your having grown up on any of the
other worlds. Tell me about the garrison. How many are there in it?" "When I
was there, counting officers, a little over two hundred. Only about thirty of
them women and most of those worked at inside jobs like administration." "How
large a search party do you guess'll be sent out tomorrow?"
Calas shrugged. "Who knows? There's live Action Groups of twenty bodies each.
The rest of the garrison people are officers or have regular iobs. The five
Grouns rotate on dutv so that there's alwavs one
THE CHANTRY GUILD
229
on active duty-it's like guard duty, except you don't do anything but sit
there and wait for something to come up, like chasing an escaped prisoner from
the Interrogation Section cells. Then there's another Group on backup, which
means you have to be able to report for duty within five minutes-and they come
on duty if the duty Group goes out on some job. The rest are off duty, until
their own duty turn comes up. Duty's twenty-six hours. A day and a night."
"Correct me if I'm wrong on this," said Hal. "Effectively they've got a
hundred active-duty soldiers, and the rest are support only?" "That's about
it," said Calas. "All right, give me your best estimate of how many bodies
might be in the search party we'll see tomorrow, how the party'd be officered,
whether they'll have maps and how they'll be armed and equipped."
Calas frowned. "No telling how many there'll be. If they're really serious,
they'd use two full Groups; but that's only if they weren't searching anyplace
else at the time or had anything else going on. More likely one Group." "What
would two Groups add up to in numbers, rank and so forth?" asked Hal. "Two
Groups," answered Calas. "That'd mean forty privates, four team-leaders, two
groupmen and maybe two forceleaders-but probably just one of those, in
command. They'd be Groups that were off duty to begin with, and they'd have
the usual needle guns-just a few power rifles-and field equipment-helmets
instead of caps and so on. The non-coms and officers carry power-pistols
instead of long guns. And that's about it. " "No power slings for casting
explosives? How about portable explosives? No power cannon that might be able
to blast holes in the ledge here, if they found it?"
Calas shook his head. "Hell, I don't know anyone in that whole outfit who'd
know how to load, direct, or fire a power sling or power cannon," he said. "As
for portable explosives, I don't think they've got anything like that, except
for grenades and fixed charges that they can slap on the wall of a house to
blow it down-and
230
Gordon R. Dickson
there's only one groupman I know of who'd know how to use that without blowing
himself up. Besides, they wouldn't bring explosives up this way. There's
nothing they know of here to blow up, but jungle; and no profit in blowing up
that." "Good," said Hal. "Anyone in the outfit know how to track?" "Track,
Friend?" "Read sign. Follow people through the jungle by seeing where they'd
stepped or the undergrowth they'd broken through. "
Calas shook his head. "Not that I ever knew of," he said. "Even better," said
Hal. "Any technological equipment -sniffers, for example?" "I don't know what
sniffers are," said Calas. "Neither do any of the rest of us," said Amid.
"What's a
sniffer, Ha-Friend?" "Equipment that can be set to sense particular odors at a
distance. Body odors, cooking odors." "Not that I ever heard of; and I'd have
heard about anything like that," said Calas. "They'd have scopes?" "Scopes?"
"Viewing scopes-for getting a close-up picture of what's distant. You might
have called them telescopic viewers, on Ceta. " "Oh, those," said Calas.
"Every non-coin and officer'll have one, and there might be some issued to a
party of the bodies it' they're going off someplace to look at things by
themselves." "Good. That ties right into what I was going to ask you next. Any
searching that's done is likely to be either with individuals strung out in a
skirmish line, or with small units of somethinlo like two to a dozen
individuals, setting up a center point and working out from there, until the
specific area assigned that unit for search has been gone over. In light
forest like that below us. where ferns and scrub brush fill the spaces between
trees at times, two men could lose track of each other easily within a
short distance; they'll probably figure to use a group working out of a center
point. If so, what's Your guess as to the size of the units the search
party'll be broken up into?"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
231
"Six to ten bodies," said Calas. "Giving us two or three units from each
group?" "That's right." "Good . . . and bad," said Hal. "Now-" "Why do you say
both 'good' and 'bad,' Friend?" asked Amid. "Good, because it adds to the
evidence that they're not expert trackers or searchers. It also means they're
either lazy, or don't expect to find anyone; so for their own greater comfort
and pleasure, they'll stick together in large units to have company and make
easier work of the searching. It's bad, because they'll be taking longer to
search over the same amount of ground; and that means they'll be around here
longer. I covered most of the area that concerns us in about six hours,
earlier today. They could take almost as many days to do it if they stay in
large groups and loaf on the job." "That's exactly what they'll do, too," said
Calas. "Right," said Hal, glancing out the window at the deepening gloom of
the night. He turned to Amid. "Do you have someone
who could climb high enough on the mountain behind us to see the road past the
madman's place, using a scope? Whoever it is would have to be in a position
where they could not only see the road, but also where they could be seen from
down here. I want someone ready to signal us below here when the troops come
in sight. That way we can leave the block out of place at the entrance under
the boulder until the last minute." "Of course," said Amid. "There's a number
of us who could do that. If I were twenty years younger-" "They'll have to
climb in the dark. I want whoever goes up to be in place by dawn." "Hmm," said
Amid. "Yes, I think we can even do that. There are some fairly easy routes up,
ways some of us already know about. Even in the dark they should be safe to
climb." "Fine." Hal looked at R'shan. "How about supplies? We've got water
from the stream. How long can we live up here on
stored food alone?" "Six months," said R'shan, staring levelly at him. "You
see," said Amid, "we've always considered the possibility ofbeing kept from
leaving the ledge for an extended time."
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Six months!" Hal smiled and shook his head. "You've done well in that
department. Now-- He looked at Amid steadily. "Did you talk to your
pharmacist; and to Artur and Onete here, about bringing Cee in the way I
suggested?" "We can't do it," said Artur. "Really, we can't," said Onete.
"She'd go wild once she woke up here and found herself locked in, even if I
was with her. From what little I can gather from her, my guess is that the
soldiers that destroyed her family home must have caught her parents outside
and deliberately put them inside before blowing the house apart; and Cee saw
that. She trusts me a lot now, I think, but anything that held or enclosed her
. . . she'd go wild and hurt herself trying to get out!" "You see," said Amid
to Hal, "otherwise, the pharmacist says it'd be perfectly possible to make
such a tranquilizer dart." "That's good," said Hal, "because they may turn out
to be useful in other ways. Would you have him make up about a dozen of them
and find me people who can shoot a bow or use a sling with enough accuracy to
deliver them?" "I can do that, yes," said Amid. "How were you planning on
using them? Because that may make a difference in how he makes them." "I don't
know, yet. It's just that such darts would give us a silent, nonlethal weapon.
Maybe, on second thought, you and I had better go over and talk with him or
her, now-" "You stay here!" R'shan was already on her feet. "I'll go get him.
People are supposed to come to the Guildmaster, not he to them-remember,
Guildmaster?"
She looked sternly at Amid, who in turn looked slightly embarrassed.
"Sometimes it's quicker-but you're right, you're right," said Amid. "I think
he's still in the pharmacy, R'shan." "Since you're going to get him, then,"
said Hal hastily, "would you get whoever's going to climb the mountain with
the viewscope and watch for the soldiers on the road?" "Missy and Hadnah,"
said Amid. "Bring them both, R'shan. " "Right." The door slammed behind her,
giving a brief glimpse of the new darkness outside. "We'll also want to cover
or camouflage the circle and anything else that's evidence of people here on
the ledge from
THE CHANTRY GUILD
233
an overhead view; just in case they do take a look from above at this area,"
said Hal. "I really don't think they can," said Amid, smiling a little. "I'd
forgotten when you first mentioned it; but of course, when all the wealth of
our two worlds went at your request to Old Earth, we couldn't afford to keep
on the payroll all the technicians and experts from other worlds we'd been
used to employing. Most of the staff on the satellite system, which was
primarily a weather-control system for whatever world the satellite was
orbiting, were other-world meteorologists. When they left, the few Exotics who
were there in the station left too; but before leaving they made a point of
effectively sabotaging the equipment aboard." "Good!" muttered Calas. "Those
the Occupation Forces sent in," continued Amid evenly, "were soldiers only.
They might have had a few people among them who could use the equipment on the
satellites, but they hadn't any who could repair it. The satellite system's
gone unrepaired ever since, as the weather patterns show. I really don't think
anyone can get an overhead view of us without actually flying a
space-and-atmosphere ship over; and it'd be prohibitive in cost to do that for
every little group like us they're trying to search out on both Kultis, here,
and Mara." "There's still the possibility of the searchers sending up a
float-kite, or balloon with a scope aboard, to relay images back to the
ground," said Hal. "We should cover up, anyway, and keep everyone out of sight
from above, particularly in the daytime." "Oh, we'll do that, of course. I
didn't mean to say we wouldn't," said Amid. "It's just that it's amusing that
they can't use the satellites because of a situation they helped bring about,
themselves. "
There was a moment's pause in the conversation, broken by Artur. "I don't know
what to do about Cee," he said.
Onete put a hand on his thick forearm. "She'll stay out of sight, I'm sure,"
she said. "It's true she's always curious; but that many people together, and
particularly if she remembers the uniforms of the soldiers who killed her
parents-and I'm sure she does, even if she won't talk much about it-she'll be
frightened and hide from them. If she really
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Gordon R. Dickson
wants them not to see her or know she's there, they're about as likely to get
a glimpse of her as they are to catch a sunbeam in a box and carry it away."
Artur turned his head to smile at her, but his face was still troubled in the
shadows cast by the firelight. He got to his feet. "I'll get busy right now
organizing the camouflaging of the ledge," he said. He went out, walking
heavily.
Since they had a few moments on their hands in which to do so, Hal had Onete
repeat her full conversation with Elian, word for word; but what she had said
earlier was correct. There was nothing more Hal could learn from it.
Amid began an explanation to Hal of how at least some weeks' supply of food
for those in the Guild was always stored ready in precooked form, or was of
such a nature that it could be eaten without cooking. These ready-prepared
foods were used up in rotation as part of their regular daily diet, and
regularly replaced. Other foods, such as root vegetables, were also used up in
rotation, being replaced by more recently acquired supplies of the same food.
The door opened to let in a tall, thin man with white hair and an unusual
erectness, considering his obvious age. "Hal, you've met our pharmacist,
Tannaheh?" said Amid. "Tanna, this is Friend, an honored visitor among us for
a while. " "I think I'm probably the only Guild member you haven't met,
Friend," said Tannaheh. "I'm honored, of course. I've heard all about you from
the others." "And I've heard about you," said Hal. "Honored, in turn.
"Tannaheh is really a research chemist-" began Amid. "Was a research chemist,"
said the thin old man. "At any rate, he's our pharmacist now. Tanna, we just
got word through Onete that a search party from the Porphyry Garrison is on
its way here tomorrow." "I've been told," said Tannaheh. "In fact, everyone on
the ledge knows it." "I suppose," said Amid, with a faint sigh. "Well, the
point is, Friend's original need for a tranquilizing drug to be delivered in
the form of a dart isn't going to be used for Cee, as we originally thought we
might use it. But he thinks he might have other uses for such drugged darts.
Do you want to explain, Friend?"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
235
"It might be possible to use something like that against the soldiers if some
of us have to go down to deal with them," said Hal. "What I've got in mind for
that purpose, though, isn't just something to put a person to sleep, but
something that would leave them physically helpless, but awake and-in
particular -susceptible to hypnosis. Do you have the materials to give me
something like that?"
Tannaheh put the tips of his long, thin fingers together and pursed his lips,
frowning slightly, above them. "You want them more or less incapable
physically," he said, "but awake enough to be put into a hypnotic state? I
assume
you're able to put someone in such a state yourself; and that's what you plan
to do after the medication's taken effect?" "That's right," said Hal. "Hmm,"
said Tannaheh. "It's a bit of a problem. You're really asking for two things,
A muscle relaxant that would simply leave them too limp to stand up would give
you the physical state you want them in. But you also want something that
would leave them receptive to hypnosis but-I assume-
not in a condition to be alarmed by you or give the alarm. I suppose the idea
is that if you have to knock one of them down with a dart, you want to use
hypnosis to make that person forget what happened to them?" "That's it," said
Hal. "Forgive me for interfering in the tactical area, where I'm not
experienced," said Tannaheh, "but if you're able to hypnotize, you ought to be
aware that a post-hypnotic command to forget something isn't likely to be
effective for very long after the subject comes out of the state you've put
him in." "I know it," said Hal, "that's why there's one more requirement. The
drugs used have to be compatible with alcohol. I take it for granted you've
got alcohol among your supplies?" "Yes. Actually, I pick up the local homemade
rotgut the soldiers themselves drink, and redistill it for my own purposes.
I've got a connection with one of the Porphyry people. I meet her down in the
jungle on certain days and trade mineral supplement pills for the drink."
"Mineral supplement pills?" echoed Hal. "Why, yes. I make a powder that can be
mixed right into the food for us up here; but the people down below find it
easier to
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Gordon R. Dickson
distribute and take their mineral supplements in pill form. Also, they seem to
feel there's something special about such pills made by a professional
chemist. It's needed in their diet, as it is in ours. You do know that these
worlds of Mara and Kultis are naturaliv deficient in the heavier metals, being
progeny, so to speak, of an F5 star like Procyon?" "I'm sorry," said Hal. "I
did know. I'd forgotten." "We used to make our supplements in central
manufactories, using metal imported from worlds like Coby," said Tannaheh.
"But naturally there's no importation now and the Occupation trashed the
factories. Of course, there's still plenty of the metals scattered around
these worlds. It wouldn't be hard for anyone to find a piece of iron, say, and
reduce it by practical methods to a
form that could be ingested, although they'd need to know the proper amount to
take . . . anyway, I do have alcohol." "Have you got some of the original
rotgut, as you call it, still in its original containers?" Hal asked.
"Certainly." "That may be particularly handy," said Hal. "My idea was
to dart them; then, under hypnosis, get them to drink a certain amount of
alcohol, and leave them unconscious with another drug and the post-hypnotic
idea, that they'd drunk themselves insensible. " "Very good. I can handle the
drug and syringe part of it for you-a syringe that drives the needle in and
makes its injection with the force of impact, I suppose?" "That'd be fine."
"Very good indeed. I'll take care of that as soon as I close up the pharmacy,
which I was about to do for the night, anyway. I'll take some of the bottles
of local drink up to your room.
You're in Dormitory Two, aren't you? How much rotgut?" "Do you have as much as
a dozen half-liters?" "If I haven't, I can make some up. You see, as I say, I
normally distill the stuff to get something I can use in the pharmacy. I can
dilute some of the high-proof alcohol I've already distilled out and mix it
back in with the original to get the amount you need."
Tannaheh got to his feet. "So, if either of you want me, I'll be either at the
pharmacy or in my room. If I'm asleep, don't worry about waking me. I wake
easily, but I can go right back to sleep again without trouble."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
237
He went out. "Forgive me if there's some reason it's not a good idea," Amid
said, "but shouldn't your Dorsai with the spaceship be signaled so that he can
take you off in case we do get found and taken, up here? Old Earth and all
good people can't afford to lose you." "The signal to Simon is the laying out
of a cloth," Hal answered. "We don't want to do that now, just when we're
trying to make this ledge look uninhabited from the air. There's no need to
worry. He was to shift in for a quick look once every twenty-four hours, in
daytime. He's got sense enough to know something's up if he sees the ledge
suddenly looking as if there's no one here and never has been. I'd guess he'll
land in the mountains tomorrow night like he did once before, and climb down
to us the morning after to see if he's needed." "You can be sure of that?"
"Reasonably sure," said Hal with a grin. "Just as I'm reasonably sure that
word is bound to leak to Amanda, wherever she is, and she'll know whether and
when to come back here, herself. " "I'm pleased," said Amid. "I feel a
responsibility, having you here." "You shouldn't," said Hal. "I came of my own
free will, on my own decision." "It's a great advantage to us, having you with
us when something like this happens," said Amid. "We'll be deeply indebted to
you." "Nonsense!" said Hal. "I'm indebted to you; and I'll be more so when
I've got what I want out of Jathed's Law." "Jathed's Law is available to
anyone who can use it. In no way could you be considered to be indebted to us
for that . . . however," said Amid, clearing his throat, "as far as Amanda
Morgan's concerned, you're quite right that she'll hear about the search very
shortly. There aren't enough soldiers to keep our people from going to and fro
with word of anything interesting, between our small towns."
He looked at Hal and blinked. "They never were really towns, you know, in the
ordinary sense," he said. "Most of us preferred to live out in the countryside
with space around each of our homes. But there were some who liked to be close
to their neighbors, so we had
or necessary
04r 'towns'
litt,cclunps of
I t@e llowers OMI IT%L, o u r
41 0q ly a few Pps W* tha were
PI th@' fire, Hal
that this was anid later when fortR-ss you've MeT41 briag the
flo%N Und I cry
&W t1o Amid's QIr" "@ -shoulder
Mai lone,- he
CHAPTER
Hal woke at his usual time, something less than an hour before dawn. He had
only had some five hours of sleep, but that would be sufficient for the day to
come. He rose, showered and dressed, out of the habit ingrained in his boyhood
as Donal, in completely clean clothes. Any morning with the chance of battle
meant a clean body and clean clothes if that were possible. Many other things
besides needle guns could make wounds; and soiled clothing pushed into a wound
could carry infection deep into the body. There was little to no chance of his
being hurt this day, but old habits had been triggered.
They made him sad and the sadness wrapped around his shoulders like a cloak as
he began the day. There was no respite.
m the time word of his uncle James's death had come to im in Donal's boyhood,
until the present moment, the birth of each day had brought a dragon to fight.
Long since, now, he had thought he would have found the nest in the human soul
from which such dragons came and have destroyed it, ending them all. But still
they came. Once again he was at a morning on which he dressed with the
possibility in mind of having to fight for the lives of himself and others. It
was as if nothing had been accomplished from his youngest years until now.
Perhaps there was no such thing as ending it. Perhaps the best he could settle
for was to meet each new dragon each day, do the best he could with it, and
count that as victory. At least he
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THE CHANTRY GUILD
241
would have fought the breed while he could. He would have done his duty. But
what was duty, if that was all that was done?
Back into his mind came a book he had read when he was young. He remembered a
verbal exchange in Conan Doyle's novel Sir Nigel, written at the beginning of
the twentieth century and laid in the fourteenth century. The fourteenth
century had been a time when "duty" was a common word among the upper classes,
in its French form of "devoir. " The words he had just remembered were part of
a passage in which there had been an
angry exchange involving Sir Robert Knolles, the leader of the group of
English men-at-arms and archers to which Nigel Loring, then still only a
squire, belonged. It was a dispute between the experienced Knolles and a
hot-headed but inexperienced young knight, Sir James Astley, concerning a
skirmish into which Astley had gotten himself and those with him.
" '. . . I have done my devoir as best I might,' said Astle.y. 'Alone, I had
ten of them at my sword point. I know not how have lived to tell it.' " ' What
is your devoir to me? Where are my thirty bowmen cried Knolles in bitter
wrath. 'Ten lie dead upon the ground, and twenty are worse than dead in yonder
castle . . . ' "
No, to fight another dragon every day might make a good show, but it made no
difference. Because as long as the nest remained, the number of dragons would
be endless. To fight anew each day showed responsibility, but nothing else;
and yet, responsibility was part of the whole answer he sought. Just as the
Law of Jathed was also part of it, if only he could grasp the full depth of
its meaning. The Law rang again in his mind now, as it had rung when he had
first come to the ledge here and heard it; but still it rang far off and
muffled, not with the close, clear message that would signal an understanding
of it, within him. Not yet-for that.
Dressed, he left his room and headed on his customary route toward the lip of
the ledge and the sunrise to come. Not yet-the understanding. Only a dragon.
It was still full, moonless dark outside and the air was not merely chill, but
icy, with that greatest coldness that comes just before dawn. The soldiers
would not be leaving Porphyry until
after the sun was well up. They would not even be coming into view of the
lookouts above them on the mountain for several hours yet and there was
nothing more in the way of preparations that could be made. Meanwhile, it
would be reassuring for the Guildmembers to see him following his normal
pattern of activity, as if the danger now threatening was not all-important.
The ledge had originally had its trees cut so as to provide corridors for
people to move about, shielded from overhead observation. But there was no
need to follow those corridors yet with the sun not yet risen.
Like all the other Guild members, now, Hal had come to know the layout of the
ledge in darkness the way he knew his own room with the lighting off. He went
toward his usual position near the front edge of the ledge but chose a spot a
little way from it, under a tree that would hide him when the sun had risen.
He sat down in lotus position.
In a little while the sky began to lighten; and shortly after, like a carven
figure emerging out of darkness, he saw Old Man, already there and similarly
seated, under a tree a few meters away. They bowed to each other and then
directed their attention toward the sunrise that was coming.
The day lightened the landscape around and below them; and Hal's mind once
more slipped off into the scene of himself, seated like this in the Guildhouse
of the far future, completed of polished stone. He sat beside a pool now
rimmed with polished granite, in which fish swam and waterplants floated their
white flowers.
Once more he searched out a plant close to him, with its white blossom, on one
petal of which was a drop of dew, that might catch the light as the sun rose.
He found a dewdrop; and again this morning, it did. Once more, as the light
was suddenly reflected from the speck of water, for a fraction of a second he
felt the closeness of the understanding he sought here, but had not yet
grasped. It was all but within his reach. . . .
But he could not close upon it. As the sun pushed more of itself into
visibility above the far mountains, and regretfully, he returned to the needs
of the moment. He exchanged bows again with Old Man and, like the other, rose.
They went their separate Ways under the shelters of the corridors of trees.
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Gordon R. Dickson
Hal's way led him by force of habit toward the kitchen of his
dormitory-building number two. He was a good third of the way toward it, his
mind full of how close he had come to some sort of understanding, back during
the sunrise, when older habit caught up with him again and he turned away.
It was old Dorsai training. Clean body and clean clothes the morning of a
battle-and no breakfast. To miss one meal was unimportant. But to have the
stomach empty might be helpful, in case of body wounds. Also there was the
feel ing-possi bly an illusion, but he like others had felt it nonetheless
-that the mind was keener and more awake on an empty stomach; just as he would
not have thought of eating just before watching a sunrise or walking in the
circle.
He went instead to Amid's reception building, sure that in spite of the early
hour, he would find the older man there. There, Amid was indeed, sitting at a
table surface between the fireplace and the front door, set up in the space
vacated by a
number of the chairs that had been pushed back against the wall. Spread out on
the table surface was a map of the immediate jungle area, from directly below
the cliffs holding the ledge to where the road past the former madman's place
turned into a trail.
The map had evidently been printed up from data records in sections, and fused
together into one large sheet, overnight. On it, at Amid's right elbow, sat a
table-model scope with a
permanently exposed, 30-millimeter-square screen. The sight of it made Hal
automatically reach to his waist to check that he had his own,
10-millimeter-square field scope folded up and hooked on there. It was. "Hal!"
said Amid, looking up as Hal came toward the table. "I'm glad you caee
directly here from xatching the sun conic up-but, wait, you haven't had
breakfast yet?" " I'll have something later," said Hal. "Don't forget to
eat-that's what they're always telling mc@ and at your age you need the fuel
for your energies more than I do," said Amid. "Hal, look at this map. Will you
show me the way you think the soldiers will do their searching?"
Hal came up to the table surface beside him. "As I told you yesterday," said
Hal, "they'll come up the road, here, to the end of the trail. There, they'll
drop off a
THE CHANTRY GUILD
243
couple of soldiers to set up a post; unless the officer in charge of the
search is lazy or for other reasons decides to set up his own
headquarters there. Either way, there'll be some of them there, in direct
phone contact with their headquarters back in Porphyry. "The rest .        His
right index finger traced routes on the map. ". . . will probably continue on
as two separate, equal units, to the two center points of equal halves of the
area to be searched. Once at those center points each unit will set up
secondary headquarters, under the command of sub-officers, keeping at least a
couple each of the soldiers with them. My guess is that one alternative then
is that the soldiers of each unit will be sent out to form a skirmish line at
the farthest extent of their part of the territory; and make a sweep through
it until they meet the skirmish line of the other unit coming from the
farthest extent of their territory. If by the time they meet they've found
nothing, they'll travel back together to the head of the trail and withdraw to
Porphyry. That's unless their plan is to break up into smaller units." "Yes. I
see," said Amid, nodding. "Now what about them breaking up into even smaller
units?" "It's equally possible," said Hal. "An alternative, once the secondary
posts have been set up, is that they'll divide the soldiers not kept at the
secondary headquarters into, say, five-person units. These units will then be
sent out to search a
specific piece of the territory that's to be examined by that particular
sub-group. In short, the original search party will still divide into two
equal units, but then the two units will each divide again into a number of
smaller units, each with the responsibility of examining a small part of the
total territory to be searched. Those small parts will probably be defined for
them by specific coordinates on their maps, which we can learn by watching how
they move." "And which way do you think they'll do it?" "I've no way of
knowing," Hal said. "The choice'll be made on the basis of what kind of
soldiers they are and what kind of officers they've got over them. For
example, if the officer in command is afraid his sub-officers are going to lie
down on the job once they're out from under his eye, he or she may prefer the
skirmish line. On the other hand, if the commander's in good
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Gordon R. Dickson
control and/or the sub-officers are responsible and have good control of the
soldiers under them, the commander may prefer the individual group method as
being more likely to make a close and careful examination of the area they're
assigned to search." "How long should it take them to get into position to
search?" Amid asked. "Probably, judging from what I've seen and what I've
heard about them, they'll take al I of today just to set themselves up," said
Hal. "Yes . . ." Amid rubbed his hands together worriedly. "I suppose we've
nothing to fear, really, until tomorrow. I was wondering whether to send word
to block the entrance yet." "Any time. I'm a little surprised you haven't done
it before now," Hal said. "There's none of the Guild people off the ledge, are
there?" "No, no Guild people," said Amid. He looked up at Hal. "But Artur
hates to see that block go into place. You understand. "
Hal shook his head. "Cee's not going to come through that entrance of her own
accord," said Hal. "Even if she knows-and I'd bet she does-that it's where all
the Guild members vanish to. She's undoubtedly followed Artur, Onete, or some
foragers back to the boulder and seen them go under it and not come back out,
before this. I'll even bet she's actually come in through the entrance when no
one was around, and possibly explored the way beyond, even as far as the
ledge." "Well, there you are," said Amid. "Artur feels the way you do. That
she knows. And he hates to give up on the thought that if she's really
frightened by the soldiers she might prefer us to them and come in. But once
that block's in place no single adult, let alone a child, is going to be able
to budge itparticularly from the outside. It weighs as much as three men your
size." "I'd close the entrance now, if I were you," said Hal. "Your first
responsibility's to all the people up here; and Artur's feelings are only
Artur's feelings." " Yes. "
Amid was clearly unhappy. He pointed to the desk scope. "Did they tell
you-Missy and Hadnah-they were going to try
THE CHANTRY GUILD
245
to set up a tight-beam link between their observation post and a
repeater down here on the ledge?"
Hal nodded. He had a great deal of confidence in Missy and Hadnah, although he
had not known that they made a hobby of rock climbing until the present
problem had come up. They looked enough alike to be brother and sister,
although evidently they were not related. Both were short, well-muscled,
blondhaired and young; and they even acted alike-being, as far as their Guild
duties and the circle-walking allowed, always in each other's company. "Well,
they did it." Amid touched a stud on the desk repeater and it chimed as its
screen lit up to show a bulging mass of cliff-face. A second later Missy's
face blocked out most of the view of the rock. "Yes, Amid?" her voice said.
"There's no sign of soldiers yet. I I
Amid moved aside to let Hal look into the screen and be seen above. "I just
wanted Friend to see you'd made the connection." "Right. Good morning, Friend.
I hope you slept well." "Very well," answered Hal. There was nothing to be
done with Exotic manners but live with them. A polite inquiry about his last
night's sleep was as out of place in her situation and his in the present
moment as a tea party in the midst of an earthquake. "I had five hours. How
much did you two have?" "Hadnah's taking a small nap now," said Missy. "After
that he can keep watch for a while and I'll take one. Thank you for asking.
We're not tired at all, really." "I'm glad to hear that," said Hal. They two
must have climbed the better part of a kilometer, vertically, during the
night. "Focus your scope on the end of the road for me, now, will you?"
"Right." Missy vanished from the screen, and the view of the overswelling rock
face above her was replaced by a view from what appeared to be only a dozen
meters above the point where the road gave way to a trail. "Pull back your
focus," Hal said. "I want to see that spot in relation to the ground around
it." "Right. Say when," replied the voice of the now invisible Missy. The
scene on the screen seemed to move away from Hal and Amid, taking in more and
more ground area as it went, until
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Gordon R. Dickson
it showed not only the connection of road-end and trailbeginning but an area
of a size that could have been occupied by four city blocks on a side. "Stop,"
said Hal.
The withdrawal of focus halted. "Let it sit with that view," said Hal. "I'm
going out to the edge of the ledge now and I'll be keying my belt scope into
the circuit from your repeater down here. You've got up to half a day before
any soldiers show up. Take another nap, yourself. If we
really need you, we can call you with the chime on your scope." "I'm really
quite all right," said Missy, still invisible. "You may not be five days from
now, up there," said Hal. "Rest while you can. We'll call you if we need you."
"All right, Friend. Thank you." "Don't thank me," said Hal. "I'm just
protecting myself against having two overtired observers sometime later on."
"Right."
The last word was followed by silence from the scope on the table surface. Hal
looked at Amid. "Where's Calas?" he asked. "I can have him found," said Amid.
"Do that. Have him come and join me out at the edge of the ledge," said Hal.
"Send out Old Man, too." "But Old Man never was a soldier," said Amid,
frowning. "I didn't suppose so," said Hal. "But he's a very insightful sort.
Tell him I'd like him to join me, if he would."
11011, he'll be glad to, I'm sure," said Amid. "I will. And you're right. He's
a very insightful individual." "And get some rest yourself, when you can,"
said Hal. "Remember what I just told Missy. This could last five days or
more; and we may need to be in the best possible shape at the very end of it.
"
He went out, and followed the closest corridor of trees to as close to the lip
of the ledge as he could get and still be hidden by tree branches overhead.
There, he seated himself in the tree's shade, unfolded his scope and keyed it
into the view he had asked Missy to set up from above. The end of the road-and
as
far down as he could see it before it vanished under the foliage of the
treetops that intervened because of the angle of the view -lay alien,
intrusive and empty in the jungle, beneath the
THE CHANTRY GUILD
247
rapidly warming rays of the brilliant, white pinpoint of sun
rising ever higher in the sky overhead.
He looked away from the scope and at the scene as his unaided vision saw it.
It would be some time yet, as he had reminded Missy and Amid. He decided to
follow Cletus's advice and let his conscious mind run freely over the terrain
while waiting for his unconscious mind to produce some process for using it to
the advantage of the people of the Guild.
In this case, that meant his remembering the ground as he had covered it
during the first part of the previous day. He stared at the greenery below and
the ground, together with the growth he had passed on it, began to unreel in
the eye of his memory, stride by stride. He was on his third survey of the
pattern he had covered when someone dropped down beside him, breathing a
little heavily from the hurry in which he had come.
It was Calas. "You wanted me?" said the small, wiry ex-soldier. His black hair
was disordered on his head. "How much sleep did you have?" Hal asked. "I
didn't fold up until about an hour after you did. But I've slept until now,"
said Calas. "That's where they found me with the word you wanted me."
Hal considered him. "You're from Ceta," he said. "Where, on Ceta?" "Monroe-I
don't guess you ever heard of it," Calas said. Hal shook his head. "It's a
tiny state, out in Czardisland Territory. " "Were you in any kind of military
outfit there?" "Local militia," said Calas. "Hell, all we did was shoot at
targets, parade and get drunk together. We had uniforms, though. "
I IAnd you got picked up for military under the Others and sent here, because
of that experience?" "Yes," said Calas. "I should have said I was a rancher
-variform sheep. I was that more than I was a soldier. Born and raised on a
sheep farm." "Have you any idea which officers and sub-officers might be sent
out?" "No," said Calas. "it could be any one of the five force-leaders, any of
the groupmen and team-leaders of the
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
249
active forces. Well now, wait, if the Commandant really wants results, he's
most likely to send Force-leader Liu Hu Shen. Liu's the one Force there who
really gets a job done. That means at least one of the forces would be his,
and two of the groupmen and four team- leaders -al I of them pretty strong on
getting things done right, simply because Liu won't have anyone who won't do
what he tells them. But the other force-leader and his sub-officers could be
anyone-if there is another forceleader. Commandant Essley might just add
someone else's force to Liu's. Not that it matters. Any other force-leader
sent out is going to be second- i n-command to Liu."
- Is Liu just a better soldier than the others," Hal asked, "or does he happen
to like hunting down and killing Exotics?" "Likes it, I think," said Calas.
"But he's a good officer, too. Probably the best in the garrison-though nobody
likes him. With him, it's always done by the numbers. Everything in line of
duty, that's Liu."
A faint sound on Hal's other side made them both look and see Old Man now
sitting there. He smiled at them, and Hal smiled back. It was a contrast, he
thought with approval. Here was Calas, wound up to the tightness of a piano
string; while Old Man was his usual self. In fact, a sort of relaxed, almost
grandfatherly, warmth seemed to radiate from him as he sat there; and Calas
was already perceptibly less tense. "Thank you for joining us," said Hal, and
suddenly realized he was talking like an Exotic.
Old Man smiled and bowed slightly from his sitting position. "I didn't ask you
to join us," said Hal, "for any specific reason. I'd just like the benefit of
your opinion on anything about the situation that you think might help. If you
don't mind staying here with us, we'll watch the soldiers as they move in and
perhaps you'll have some suggestions to make after you've seen them and the
way they act. -
Old Man nodded and smiled, He looked out over the jungle below in the
direction from which the soldiers would come. Hal turned back to Calas. "You
don't have to stay with us now, if you'd like to get breakfast, or some such
thing," he said. "In fact, if you canic directly here after they woke you and
haven't eaten, I'd suggest you get some food into you. It may be a long day's
watch. I won't need you back here until after the soldiers are in view on
the scope, close enough so that you can tell me who the important ones are and
how they might act-or react."
Calas nodded. It was an abrupt, rather ungraceful movement after the nod Old
Man had given. He got to his feet. "I'll go eat," he said, "then I'll come
back." "Take your time," said Hal. "It'll be three hours yet, anyway, before I
expect to see the soldiers-and that's even if they left their garrison at
dawn. They wouldn't be I ikely to leave before that, would they?"
Calas gave a grunt of laughter. "No," he said. "Under anyone but Liu, they
wouldn't leave even then. They might not get off until noon."
He turned and went. Hal and Old Man sat together in a silence that held no
need to be broken. The sun moved up into the sky. The hours passed. After a
while Calas came back. It was nearly noon by the time a
line of four combat vehicles made their way up the road to the end of the
trail and stopped there, letting the search party out. "Liu," said Calas. Hal
saw the one he meant. "Porphyry itself hasn't any at mosphere-to- space ships,
or any other above-surface vehicle they could use overhead?" Hal asked Calas.
"Not Porphyry," said Calas. "They could call some in from Omanton. " "Perhaps
that's what they'll do, then," said Hal. He turned to the scope, on which the
soldiers were now visible at close range, and pressed the chime stud. The
voice of Hadnah spoke to him. "Yes, Friencl?" "If Missy's not awake, wake
her," said Hal. "Both of you forget the scope for now and watch for the
approach of any kind of atmosphere ship. Each of you take half the visible sky
to watch. It ought to be coming here in no particular hurry, but as
soon as you see anything in the air, even if you're not sure it's headed this
way, let us know below here. Amid, are you listening?" "I'm I istening for
Amid. He's lying down for a bit," said the voice- of Artur. "Good. Make him
rest as much as you can. Have everybody make sure they're undercover, starting
now. We may have aerial observation at any moment from now on. Calas says they
may
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Gordon R. Dickson
get air assistance from Omanton. I don't know where that is, but it's got to
be close as above-surface travel goes." "I'll have someone check to see
everyone's hidden, right away, Friend. " "Good," said Hal. "I'll let you go
now."
Artur sounded as if he was in control of himself, Cee or no Cee, Hal thought
as he turned back to closely examining the soldiers shown in the scope. He
touched the controls to move his own picture to a closer view of the soldiers
who had just got out of their vehicles and were forming up in units. "All
right," he said to Calas, "Liu is obvious, with that force-leader's insignia
on his lapels. Tell me about the subofficers. " ' 'Right. See that thin
groupman in the tailored uniform, with the black, black eyebrows, right by
Liu, there?" said Calas. "That's the Urk, Sam Durkeley. He's Liu's pet. That
groupman just getting out of the cab of the second vehicle,    and the one
forming up the first unit of men, are new since I was there. I don't know
them. The other groupman just beyond the Urk is Ali Diwan. The only
team-leader I know is the one backing the first vehicle off the road to turn
it around, so it's ready to head back. That's Jakob . . . can't remember his
last name. He's pretty decent, compared to most of them, There's more I don't
know than I thought. I forget how long it's been since I joined the Guild."
"It looks as if Liu is setting up a command post just off the end of the road
there," said Hal. "They're putting up a shelter. Do you suppose Durkeley'll
stay with him?" "He wouldn't be wearing that tailored uniform if he'd expected
to go slogging through the jungle," said Calas. "No, the Urk'11 be where Liu
is, you can count on it." "And Liu is obviously staying at the end of the
road," said Hal. "That ought to mean he's got enough confidence in his
sub-officers to let them make the search out of his sight; since you said he
was the most capable of the garrison's force-leaders. he wouldn't be letting
them do it on their own simply because he was lazy or unsure of himself."
"Right," said Calas. "He's either got them scared, like old Jakob there, or
trained like the Urk. That doesn't mean he won't come on in, himself, if they
find anything, or run into any
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251
trouble. Or he might show up when they don't expect him just to keep them
wound up. That's the way he is."
The search party continued to get out of their vehicles, form up and move off
into the jungle. "Calas," Hal said abruptly, "have you any idea how many more
scopes we have that aren't in use at the moment?" "No," said Calas, "I don't."
He scrambled to his feet. "I'll go find out," he said. "If there's three more
that can be spared, will you bring them out here to me?" said Hal. "From the
way they're deploying I'd guess they're going to follow the plan ot'dividing
up the area and putting a team in each section. We may need to keep track of
several different parties simultaneously." "I'll be back as quick as I can,"
said Calas, and went off at a run down the corridor of trees. Hal's eyes met
those of Old Man and Old Man smiled gently at him. The scope before Hal
chimed. "Craft approaching by air at three o'clock," said the voice of Missy,
off screen.
CHAPTER
25
The craft was a surface-to-orbit shuttle bus, completely unsuited to
surveillance of the sort it was being put to here. The Occupation was clearly
hard up for space- and-atmosphere craft. since the Exotics had given away most
of these with their spaceships to Old Earth, before yielding to control by the
Others.
Very probably its pilot knew that this trip was simply a waste of its time and
his; for the craft made two explosive, supersonic passes over the area where
the troops were, far above the speed at which any naked eye observation would
have been possible. Pictures, of course, could have been taken; but even if
they had been, Hal doubted that they would be subjected to the timeconsuming,
careful examination that an expert would have to make to discover evidence of
human occupation anywhere on them. The time-cost of such expert attention to
all the small areas probably being searched at the same time would be
prohibitive.
The chance was still there, of course. But it was so small that he thought
they could afford not to worry about that until it proved to have some
substance.
Having made its passes, the shuttle bus disappeared. Hal, with the other two,
went back to watching the deployment of the soldiers below into their various
assigned areas of search.
It was a slow dispersal, and the soldiers were not driving
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253
themselves to accomplish it with anything more than casual speed. As the units
departing the roadhead broke up into smaller and smaller units, their pace
slowed progressively, until by the time they were down to the four individuals
that seemed to be the team number for an individual section of territory, they
were literally loafing along; and when at last they reached the area that was
to be theirs alone to search, they put themselves first to the leisurely
business of setting up temporary camps.
Meanwhile, Procyon moved across the sky overhead and the day wore on. Hal and
Old Man sat still, engrossed in the developing situation as shown on the
screens of the four scopes that now sat in front of them since Calas had
rejoined them. None of the soldiers, as yet, were close enough for naked-eye
observation. But Calas became more and more restless as the day wore on. Hal
could feel the tension in the wiry little man growing with the passing hours.
"Why don't they get it done, damn it?" exploded Calas finally. "Do you know
about the battle of Thermopylae?" asked Hal.
Calas turned to look at him. "No," Calas said. "It' happened on Old Earth,
nearly three thousand years ago," Hal said. "Persia, a huge empire of that
time, set out to conquer the city-states of the Greeks on a peninsula reaching
down from the southern part of Europe into the Mediterranean Sea. Xerxes, the
Persian ruler, attacked the Peninsula with a vast army. His forces clashed
with seven thousand Greeks on a narrow strip of coastline with the sea on one
side and steep cliffs on the other. The sea was barred to the Persians by
Greek ships. The seven thousand Greeks on land were mainly from Sparta, a city
that produced the best hoplites in the world then-men armed with large shields
and long spears, fighting in close formation. "
Hal paused. Calas was, at least, listening with every sign of interest. "For
three days of fighting Xerxes tried to get past the Spartans. But Leonidas,
King of Sparta and their commander, with his troops, who--were mostly
Spartans, held them. Then a Greek traitor showed the Persians a narrow
footpath up over the cliffs. They started to go up and around the Spartans to
take them from behind. Leonidas, learning of this, sent most ot'his
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
255
soldiers off in retreat. He, himself, and three hundred of his Spartans with
some of the allies from other cities, stayed and defended. They who stayed
died fighting; but what they did allowed those sent off to get away safely."
He paused again, this time glancing at Calas. "The place where they fought the
Persians and died," he said, "is called Thermopylae; and after, there was an
inscription put up there. It said 'go, stranger and tell the Spartans we lie
here in obedience to their command. ' "
Hal stopped; he reached out and enlarged the view on one of the scopes. "And?"
said Calas. "What has all this three- thousand-yearold history to do with what
we've got down there?"
He jerked his hand at the valley below. "Just that Leonidas knew what he was
deciding to do when he chose to stay and die-and those with him knew. " Hal
looked directly into the eyes of Calas. "We only have one life@ and at its
end, there's one important question only. Whether what we did praises or
condemns us in our own eyes. And judgment cae rest on any moment's decision or
action, from all our years.
Old Man bowed as only he could from a seated position, toward Hal. Hal looked
at him. "Now, why?" he said to Old Man. "I only put a truth into words. " "It
was the truth I bowed to," said Old Man; and smiled. "All right, all right . .
. ... muttered Calas, peering into his scanner, "you don't have to underline
it. Maybe I know what you mean better than you think. Don't forget I figured
myself for dead, under the rocks of that slide, when I heard those mates of
mine taking off without digging for me."
But from then on he watched the screen before him closely, continuously and
without fidgeting.
By the time the sun began to set, the soldiers below had all made their
individual camps. A few of the separate teams had even made a brief search of
part of their assigned area. But most had simply spent their time setting up
shelters and building a
fire. They sat around the fires as darkness grew, talking and drinking from
their canteens, and when, at last, there was nothing to be seen from the ledge
but deep shadow where forest
foliage had been visible, the numerous firelights flickered and twinkled like
echoes of the stars that grew into brightness overhead. "Friend?"
Hal had heard the footsteps coming up behind them; but, still caught in his
long day's observation of what was below, on identifying them as the footsteps
of Artur he had merely noted them, and returned to his concentration on what
was lit on the screen before him by the light of one of the fires below. Now
he roused and answered. "Yes?" he said.
He got to his feet, cramped by the long watch. Beside him, Calas and Old Man
were also rising. "I thought I could take over for you here," said Artur. "At
night, there's not much need for a skilled watcher; and you'll need rest."
"True," said Hal.
The darkness was deep enough so that the two men were standing close together.
Hal caught the faint sour odor of nervous perspiration from the other. Fresh
sweat raised by the body in response to physical effort did not have that
smell. "I'll head back in, then," he added. "Calas, Old Man, come along.
Amid's probably going to want to talk to us about what we've seen."
He stepped around Artur, making it a point to pass so closely his elbow
brushed lightly for a second against the shirt of the Assistant Guildmaster.
Sure enough, Artur's shirt was soaked through with sweat. "Make sure you get
enough sleep yourself," Hal said to Artur as he passed, "Don't worry about
me," Artur's voice came, controlled and level behind him. "I'm wide awake."
"Good,,, said Hal.
He led the two with him to Amid's reception building. Within, Amid was
talking, also by firelight, but artificial illumination as well, to Onete. ".
- . All right," said Onete, breaking off whatever she had been saying as he
came in the door. "I'll be going."
She smiled at Hal and the others as she passed them on her way out. The door
shut behind her.
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"Come and sit down," said Amid. They did so. There was a rough circle of
chairs to one side of the table where the map was laid out, in one of which
Amid sat. They took others facing him. "You put in an extended watch," Amid
said. "How are you all?" "Myself," said Hal, "I'm still a little stiff from
sitting that long. But it's something that'll work itself out." "I'm fine,"
said Calas-but there was tiredness to be heard in his voice. Old Man smiled
and nodded. "What were you able to figure out about them, and their plans for
searching?" Amid asked Hal. "Most of what I saw just confirmed what I told you
earlier," said Hal. "They've clearly divided the area into small sections
they're going to search in no great hurry, with units of four searchers to the
section. Thanks to Calas, I understand more about some of their officers than
I did. But before we get into that, you know that Artur's taken over as night
guard, replacing us?" "Yes," said Amid. His wrinkled old face squeezed up in a
frown that would have been almost comical if it had not been so concerned. "He
knows it doesn't do any good, but he feels better out there, where he can
watch where Cee must be, even if he doesn't know exactly where she is and
couldn't see her down there, even if he knew. There's no great need for him to
be doing anything else. I thought he might as well be busy at what he wanted,
so I agreed to let him take the night watch. There's no problem with that, is
there?" "Not from the standpoint of safety," Hal said. "How much sleep has he
had?" "He told me he'd had over six hours last night," said Amid I'll ve only
got his word for it. What is it? Are you afraid he might fall asleep out there
on watch?" "No," said Hal. "But you can be wide awake on very little sleep and
still not thinking straight-even though you think you are. I I
"I'm not sure I believed that about the six hours, but I believe him when he
says he couldn't sleep now if he tried," said Amid -
"Why's it important? The soldiers certainly won't do anything during the
night?"
"No," said Hal. "They can't search in the dark; and they're
not the type for night exercises, even if they were trained to it, which I
doubt." "I never got any training in night exercises, when I was with them,"
said Calas. "Garrison people, that's all they are." "But what did you learn,
then?" asked Amid. "Anything that can help?" "That surveillance craft possibly
took pictures of the whole area," Hal said, "but as we agreed last night, it's
doubtful they'll be studied by anyone able to pick up the small signs that'd
show we're here, under the cover and camouflage you've set up. Chances are
more likely some officer'll just run an eye quickly over them to see if
there're any obvious signs of people-and that, they won't find. " "Yes, but
the soldiers," said Amid. "How likely are they to notice some sign of our
presence, down there in the flatland? After all, we do have foragers down
there often; and there's the spot where Onete's been meeting Cee." "I'd hate
to promise anything," Hal said, "but even if they do recognize some signs of
people, from what I saw today I think we'll be fairly safe if we just sit
tight up here. That ought to include, by the way, not making any noises that
could be reflected down into the valley. As we sat on the edge of the ledge, I
could hear the sounds of the Guild people moving about here, reflected off
that cliff-face above us. Sound rises rather than falls; but we should still
keep things quiet until the soldiers are gone," "We can do that," said Amid.
He made a note. "I'll see to it. 1,
"As far as the soldiers themselves go," Hal said, "they all moved clumsily
through the forest, making harder work than they needed to of getting places
in it. They've got the city-bred tendency to try to push their way through
undergrowth with main strength, rather than slip through at the best place for
it. Also, very few of them set up camp in the best places available. The few
who did, I think, did it by accident. They're certainly not Woods-wise; and
they're probably not too happy to be here. That attitude'll help make them
careless when they start searching. "
He paused.
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Those are the most certain points about them I picked up today; that and the
information Calas was able to give me about certain officers. Basically, from
what Calas says, we've got to deal with a commander who's something of a
martinet, leading poorly trained and motivated troops. What that adds up to is
that he'll probably be used to clubbing them-metaphorically speaking-to get
results. Which in turn means they'll slack off the minute he's out of sight,
no matter how much they might be afraid of him finding out about their doing
that, later. I'd guess that unless something favors them, we're pretty secure
up here. Cee, even, should be fairly safe down there, unless she literally
walks into their hands."
He stopped and looked questioningly at Old Man. "Anything to add?" he asked.
"They'll sleep poorly tonight," said Old Man with one of his gentle smiles.
"They're people of bad conscience trying to rest under unfamiliar conditions.
Their sleep and their dreams will be bad; and tomorrow they'll be more tired
than usual, and so more likely to miss seeing things they might notice
otherwise."
He fell silent and, with Hal, looked at Calas. Calas cleared his throat. "Me?"
he said. "You want a report from me on thern?" "Certainly," said Hal. "Well, I
wasn't really watching them the way I should have, earlier in the day. I
didn't really look at them-then. Friend, I have you to thank for making me try
to actually see them; rather than just sit up there and swear at their being
here." "What did you see when you did look closely?" Hal said. "A lot of
thern're new since I was there. Not that there's any really knew well; but the
faces of the ones who were there when I was there, I'd recognize. You know?
So, most of them are faces I never saw before, which means they're new; but
they're going to be just like we all were. Most of therri'll have come out
with something to drink-liquor, I mean-in their canteens or hidden in the
equipment they're carrying; and so most of therri'll be drinking tonight. I'd
have been drinking, even though I wasn't that much of a drinker when I was
with them; just to help me sleep out here and make it more comfortable. More'n
a few'll have hangovers, tomorrow.
He paused a moment.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
259
"Some won't drink at all, of course," he said. "We've got some Friendlies and
others who've got individual reasons for never drinking. Anyway, that's one
thing."
Hal, Amid and Old Man waited. "Something else, though," said Calas. "I didn't
think of it until you told me about decisions; but friends tend to stick
together, and the groupmen and team-leaders usually let them. Because that
makes it easier for the sub-officers. That means in most of those units of
four, there's almost sure to be at least two who're side-by-siders. That means
those two'll stick together and the other two'll have to tag along with them.
Also it means that one of the two is the leader of the two. So you've got one
man in each four-man unit who'll probably end up making up the minds of the
other three, whenever there's something to make up minds about. I don't know
just how knowing that'll help; but maybe you, Friend, can see some use in it."
Hal nodded slowly. "It may apply," he said. "Apply to what?" Amid asked
sharply, then immediately softened his voice to its usual gentle tone. "I'm
sorry. Do I sound bad-tempered? I don't mean to. It's just that it's been a
long night and a long day-- "You don't sound bad-tempered," said Hal, "and to
answer
your question, there's something about what I saw of their dispersal down
there today that bothers me. There're patterns to everything that humans do,
and there's something about the pattern of the way they've set up for their
search that bothers me, only I can't put my finger on just what it is. I've
got my own system for figuring out cause and effect, which generally helps
with problems like this; but right now it doesn't seem to have enough
information to work with. I'll be able to tell you more tomorrow, when they
begin actively searching. "
The door to the building banged open and Onete entered, followed by two men
wearing the large white kitchen duty aprons everyone used on that job. All
three were carrying trays heavy with cloth-covered dishes. Amid popped to his
feet and whisked the map off the table as Onete led her companions to it.
They set the trays down on the table and began unloading the dishes. "You
haven't eaten, any of you, all day," said Amid. "I
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Gordon R. Dickson
asked Onete to go for food as soon as you got here. I may not be able to get
Artur to eat, but I can make sure the rest of you are fed. "
At the sight and smell of the food in the dishes, Hal became aware of how
hungry he was. "Thank you," he said, pul I ing his chair up to the table as
Old Man and Calas joined him.
After they had eaten and the others had gone, Hal stayed behind at Amid's
request. "I'm worried about Artur," said Amid. "As I said, he's not eating. I
don't really believe he's sleeping, either. He acts just the way he does
usually; but I know him well enough to know he's tearing himself to pieces
over this business of Cee being down there with those soldiers. You see, he
feels responsible." "Yes," said Hal, "that would fit his pattern." "He shares
your belief, as we were saying," Amid went on, "that Cee's probably followed
one of us back under the boulder and right up to the ledge. That she knows
where we live. He's afraid that if the soldiers catch her, they may assume
she's one of us and try to get her to tell them where we are. "Yes," said Hal,
"that would fit their pattern, too." "So, if they threaten to hurt her to make
her talk, she'll have no,choice but to tell them. Then, when they find the
stone in place, they may think she's lying and doesn't really know@ and then
they'll kill her. On the other hand we can't leave the way open; so in a way
we-and he-will be responsible for her death; and she's just a little girl."
"Never try to predict what an individual will do under torture," Hal said.
"It's not a matter of will power. The individual doesn't even know himself
until the time comes. The bravest can crack and people you wouldn't expect it
from will die without saying a word. She might simply refuse to talk at all. "
"But then they might torture her to death, to try to make her talk!" Amid
seemed to shrink. "We can't let that happen!" "You can. You must-if there's no
way to avoid it," said Hal. "It won't save her to throw away the lives of
everyone else in the Guild-and what the Guild might mean for the rest of your
Exotics, someday. But keep your mind filled about how horrible Cee's situation
could be, and sooner or later you, or Artur, or somebody else'll try some
scheme that doesn't have a
THE CHANTRY GUILD
261
chance of succeeding, one that'll dump all of you into the soldiers' hands."
"Even if we could-," said Amid. "Even if we could accept sacrificing her,
Artur never could. Never!" " Then lock him up," said Hal, "until the soldiers
aregone." "We can't do that!" "He'd hate you for it," said Hal. "But it may be
the kindest way of dealing with him." " I'll speak to him," said Amid. He did
not wring his hands. They lay still in his lap, but he might as well have been
wringing them. "If he can convince the rest he believes Cee will be safe-"
"You know yourself that's not good enough, even if he could do it," said Hal.
"Your fellow Guild members are almost all Exotics. They're too empathic to be
fooled just by his pretending not to be concerned. He's actually got to face
the chance that Cee may die; and, by his example in facing that fact, lead the
rest of the community into facing it, too. Anything less than that won't work.
More than that, it'd be wrong." "Wrong?" Amid sounded shocked. "Yes," said
Hal, "because you'd be letting a situation that's out of your control upset
your people at the very time when this community needs to keep its morale as
high as possible, and its thoughts as clear as possible. I promise you, if I
see any hope of doing anything at all for Cee, I'll let you all know and I'll
do it myself, if that's what's best. But until a real chance to help her
appears, two things need to be done; and they're very hard things, especially
for you Exotic-born Guild members. One, the members have to accept the fact
that whatever is going to happen to Cee will happen, and they can't do
anything about it, as things stand now. Second, Artur has got to face that
fact himself, and show the rest of the community that he's done so.
There was a long moment before Amid answered. , ,It'll be hard enough for us,"
he said. "For Arturimpossible. " "Then lock him up, as I say."
Amid did not answer. Hal got to his feet. "I'm sorry," he said gently, looking
down on the old man who seemed to have shrunk within the confines of his chair
until he was no bigger than child-sized himself. "Sooner or later
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Gordon R. Dickson
everyone reaches a day on which he or she has to face things like this. It
does no good to pretend such a day won't ever come."
He waited, a moment longer. "It's your decision," he said. "If you think of
some way I can help, call me. I'm going to get some rest now, while I can."
He went out. The following morning he watched the sunrise as usual with Old
Man and then took his position on the ledge's lip with the scopes. Calas
joined them shortly thereafter. But it was a good three hours after that
before the first of the searching groups down below began to go to work; and
at that time some of them had just wakened.
Hal leaned forward suddenly and turned up the magnification on one of the
scopes. "Calas," he said. "What's that they're putting on the ends of their
needle guns? Something like an explosives thrower."
Calas looked. "Oh, that," he said. "They're catch-nets. They use them a lot
when chasing escaped prisoners-or taking any prisoners they'll want to
question before they shoot them. You know how a needle gun works?"
Hal smiled. "Yes," he said. As he had learned, growing up on Dorsai, the
riflelike needle gun was a universal favorite as a weapon for field troops
mainly because its magazine could hold up to four thousand of the needles that
the weapon fired.
Each of the needles could be lethal if it hit a vital spot; but a spray of
them was almost certain to bring down a human target. one way or another. The
needles were slirn little things, hardly bigger than their average namesakes
that were used for ordinary sewing. A kick from a machine-wound spring unit or
from a cylinder of highly compressed air flicked the needles clear of the
muzzle of the gun and started them toward their target. But each needle was
like a miniature rocket. A solid propellant, ignited by the needle's escape
from the muzzle of the rifle, drove it up to three hundred meters in a
straight line toward whatever it had been aimed at. All needles fired on the
same trigger pull formed a spiral pattern that spread as it approached its
target, like shot from the muzzle of an ancient shotgun.
The advantages lay, therefore, in the amount of firepower from a relatively
light weapon; plus the fact that the needle gun
THE CHANTRY GUILD
263
was almost invulnerable to disablement through misuse. You could drag it
through the mud, or recover it from being under half a mile of water for six
months, and it would still work. Moreover, the fact that it could be used in
poorly trained hands to spray the general area of an enemy like a hose, made
it extremely popular.
It also could deliver a number of auxiliary devices, kicking them clear with
spring or compressed gas, to be self-propelled toward a particular target. But
this catch-net device was one Hal had never encountered before; probably
because, as Calas had said, its design fitted it rather for police than
military use. I "They've got seeker circuits in the noses," said Calas. "Once
fired, the catch-net capsule homes in on the first human body it comes close
to-combination of body heat, bodily electrical circuitry and so forth, I
understand-and when it gets right close to them, it blows apart and spreads a
net that drops over the body. As I say, they use them for recapturing
prisoners and things like that. In fact, I think the catch-net was designed in
the first place for prison guards and police crowd control. That sort of
thing."
Hal checked the other scopes. All the soldiers who were ready to begin
searching had the catch-net capsules perched like blunt-nosed rockets on the
barrel-ends of their needle guns.
He sat back to see how the search would develop. As the sun mounted in the
sky, this second morning, all the individual search units were finally at
work. Hal checked the command post at the roadhead and saw that Liu was still
there, with the sergeant Calas had called "the Urk" in attendance. Outside
Liu's shelter an operations table with map screen in its surface and
permanently mounted scopes stood in the daylight. One of the vehicles in which
the searching party had come out was still there and parked by the table,
undoubtedly generating power for the table, as well as the comforts of the
command shelter, on tight-beam circuit.
Old Man reached over suddenly, just before noon, and tapped with his finger on
the screen of the scope before Hal. Hal looked, but saw nothing to explain the
other man's drawing his attention to it. Still, the slim, yellow fingertip
rested on the screen, which was now showing a mass of forest undergrowth just
beyond the two soldiers they had in focus there at the moment. Hal kept his
eyes on that area of the screen, waiting;
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Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
265
and, after a moment, he too saw what had caught Old Man's eye-a flicker of
movement.
He watched. A small, slim, brown body was moving parallel to the searching
soldiers, at a distance from them of perhaps ten meters. Hal continued to
watch and for a moment she was fully in view, before the greenery hid her
again. It was Cee, with, as before, nothing but the length of vine with its
split-open pod shape a few inches to one side of her navel. 'I don't think
they've seen her," said Hal. "No," answered Old Man. "Seen who?" demanded
Calas. Once more Old Man's finger tapped and held on the screen. Calas stared
at it. After a long moment he whistled softly and sat back.
He looked at Hal. "What should we do?" he asked. "What would you suggest we
do?" Hal said, meeting his eyes. Calas stared at him for a long moment and
then looked away. Hal softened his voice. "For now," he said, "you concentrate
on that screen. Try to keep Cee in sight, but watch particularly for any sign
either of those soldiers've spotted her." "Yes. Yes, I will," said Calas,
fixing his gaze tightly on the screen.
Hal flicked the controls on another scope so that he had a v ew of the whole
area. A few more finger-taps overlaid the picture of the land below with a
ghostly map of that same area, but divided into sections, with small bright
lights in each section, each representing one of the searching soldiers.
The pattern in the process of search which he had not been able to find but
which he had sensed was in the making there still bothered him. The troops
below were equipped not only with their weapons but with all other ordinary
field equipment. including helmets that would have built-in communications
equipment, putting them in verbal contact with their fellov" searchers, their
immediate sub-officer, and even the command base. He wished for a moment he
could tune in on what was being said over that communications network. That
reminded him of another, earlier, wish, which was that the Guild, in addition
to what other equipment they had possessed, had seen fit to equip themselves
with a long range ear-gun-a listening device that allowed the one using it to
pick up even a faint noise
from a specific spot no larger than an adult human hand and a kilometer or
more distant.
As it was, he had a view of the searchers, but no idea of what they were
saying. With the ear-gun he could have overheard conversations even back at
the command post where Liu waited. But to want what was not available was a
waste of time. He put both desires from him and considered the pattern of
ghost map and lights once more.
With intuitional logic he should have been able to track down what he felt
immediately. The fact he could not meant that to intuitional logic the pattern
he sensed was not there. Either there actually was no such thing, or a
necessary link in the logic chain that would relate it to what he saw at the
moment was missing. A word overheard from one of the searchers might have
filled that gap. Particularly since he had known Amanda, he trusted his
instincts more than ever before; and now his instincts were positive that
there was a pattern to the development of the situation below him that he
could not yet see.
He leaned forward sharply to peer at the screen he had been watching. "What is
it?" asked Calas. He glanced up to see both Calas and Old Man watching him.
"Is Cee still following those two soldiers?" Hal asked. "Yes." Calas nodded
emphatically. "Has either one of them seen her, as far as you can tell?" "Not
as far as I could tell." "Or I,- said Old Man unexpectedly.
Hal looked back at the screen before him. "What is it?" said Calas again.
"They may not be as inept as I was thinking they were," said Hal. "Perhaps
some of them've had some field training after all. " "Some'll have had
training rounding up prisoners before," said Calas. "That's all." "That may be
enough," said Hal. He pointed at the screen before him with the ghost map and
the lights. "Or they may be wearing some special equipment-heat sensors or
such that would warn them Cee was following. Those two soldiers just began
searching outside their own area." "Outside . . . ?" said Calas. "They're
still moving in a straight line, and it's taken them
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Gordon R. Dickson
over into the territory of another search unit-as best I can judge where the
boundaries of the territories are-"
He broke off. "There it is," he said. "I see what they're doing now." "What
are they doing?" asked Calas. "Those soldiers Cee's following have spotted her
after all. They're leading her on. Take a look at the screen. The other search
teams are changing their pattern. The team leading her is keeping on going
forward, to lead her into position, and gain time for a good number of the
others who're close to move into a circle around her. Then, as they move in,
using their helmet communication, they'll draw the circle tighter around her.
When she finally begins to suspect and makes a break for it, it'll not only be
these two, but a lot of the others, who ought to have a good shot at her with
those catch-nets of theirs. Unless sh,@ stops following these two now, I think
she's virtually certain to be captured."
There was the sound of feet on the gravel-like soil behind them. They all
turned. Onete came up and stopped before them all. But it was to Hal she
spoke. "Artur's gone," she said breathlessly. "Evidently, he left last night.
Rolled the boulder aside and rolled it back in place after him. He left a note
by the boulder.
She paused to catch her breath. "He said he was sorry, but he had to go down
to do what he could to protect Cee. He asked them to leave the boulder in
place as long as they could before they felt they had to replace it with the
rock plug. Just in case he was able to bring her back up to safety after all."
CHAPTER
26
"And it's been left?" asked Hal. "It's been left," answered Onete. "Everyone
wants it that way. "
There was nothing they could do from the ledge but watch. Onete left them
again. In the next three-quarters of an hour as Procyon climbed brilliantly
into a clear sky, Cee shadowed the two soldiers and was drawn into a semi-open
area with short but vertical, near-unclimbable cliffs on two sides of it; and
with now more than two dozen of the following members of the Occupational
Troops closing in behind her to shut off escape back the way she had come.
She clearly heard them moving in on her, as they drew close; but the sounds
must have come from all directions, so that she turned, ready to flee one way,
then hesitated, turned to run in another, and hesitated again.
The hesitations were what doomed her. If she had raced full tilt for their
line at the first noise, she would have had some chance, at least, of dodging
between two of them, twisting, ducking, evading their grasps and so getting
away. But at her first betrayal of the fact she had heard them, they all burst
into a run toward her, so that when she began to run, herself, they were
already closing in on her.
She checked and stood, legs spread apart, one in advance of the other. She had
evidently been carrying something cupped in
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Gordon R. Dickson
each hand all this time; and she now threw these two things, whatever they
were, at the men most directly before her.
The throws were delivered with the kind of power and accuracy that could only
come from long practice. With a sidearm motion her whole body sent the
missiles on their way, and to the surprise of those on the ledge as well as
that of the soldiers, the two men she had thrown at went over backwards and
down, while she dashed forward again at the gap in their line she had now
created.
Almost, she made it. But the others were too close. Nets exploded into
existence in the air above and around her, dropped and enveloped her; and a
moment later her net-swathed body disappeared under the swarm of adult
figures.
From the ledge it was still plain, however, that she was not easy to subdue.
The huddle of soldiers' backs, which was all those on the ledge could see,
heaved and moved for some tiime@ and it was only the sudden appearance of Liu
Hu Shen and the Urk that stopped one of the soldiers who had finally reversed
his needle gun, raised it, and seemed about to use it as a club.
The huddle struggled a bit more and then went still. Hu Shen clearly was
issuing orders right and left. There were now between twenty and thirty of the
uniformed men in the clearing, and at last the group holding her stopped its
struggle, indicating she had finally been held and immobilized.
In remarkably short time the power pistol which the Urk had been carrying had
been used to cut down a number of trees, large and small, to enlarge the
clearing; the cut-down upper parts being hauled off to one side by teams of
the men. Left standing were two trees about ten meters apart. By this tinic
three dome-shaped battle tents had also been erected. The moment the first of
these were up, the huddle of men carrying Cee, invisible in their midst, moved
into it, to come out its entrance a little later by twos and threes with every
sign of relief'. Clearly Cee had been left, tied down or otherwise secured.
somewhere within. "Bastards!" said Calas.
Liu, who had been generally overseeing the work being done, now for the first
time went into the building where Cee had been taken. He was inside for only a
few minutes, however, before he came out again, crossed the clearing and
entered one of the
THE CHANTRY GUILD
269
other structures, into which his men had been bringing various furniture, such
as chairs, a desk and a cot. They had brought the furniture folded up in
carrying cases; and once the furniture was inside, they reclosed the cases and
carried them into the third dome.
Calas's gaze, however, was all on the structure into which they had taken Cee.
"They could be working on her in there right now!" he growled. "I don't think
so," said Hal. "My guess is Liu just stepped inside with her long enough to
see if she'd answer him, but not really expecting her to. When she didn't, he
left her tied up; or however she's restrained, in there, for now. " "That's
your guess," said Calas mutinously. "I know the kind of shithouse sweepings
they've got in that outfit!" "I believe you do," said Hal, "but I also believe
they won't dare do anything they aren't ordered to do by that commanding
officer, from the way you've described him. And he won't want any of them
touching Cee-just yet, anyway." "Another guess?" Calas said. "No. Look down
there for yourself," said Hal. "If he'd wanted to question Cee physically, the
obvious place for it would have been back at his base, in Porphyry. They've
undoubtedly got the equipment for it back there-" "That's true enough," said
Calas, under his breath. "But back there, he'd have superiors who might take
not only control away from him," said Hal, "but whatever glory there might be
in catching the famous little wild girl. It just might be, too, that Liu has a
pretty low opinion of the officers over him."
Calas nodded. "You mean, he's right in feeling that way?- asked Hal. "Unless
they've got some brighter ones in since I was around," said Calas. "Right up
to the Commander, the rest are all the sort that want to get to their desk at
eleven in the morning, sign half a dozen papers, then go to lunch and take the
rest of the day off. You're right, as long as he stays out here, he's the one
in charge. " "Yes," said Hal, "and he stands to gain more credit; which none
of his superiors can take away from him, if he comes in, not orily with the
girl, but with as many more strays and outlaws
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as he can pick up and bring back. As I say, take a look down there. Don't
those two tents and the cut-down trees make it look like he's planning to stay
a day or two, at least?" "Yes," said Calas, somewhat grudgingly, looking at
them. "It's a good guess, then," said Hal, "he's been lookin@_, beyond Cee's
capture all along. He'll be pretty sure she knows who else lives around here,
and he'll want her help in finding them. "
His eyes met Calas's brown ones. "You mean he knows about the Chantry Guild?"
"Guesses, at least," said Hal. "He may have picked up bits of information from
townspeople he's questioned, and gotten enough out of them to at least suspect
there's some kind of' community of free Exotics up here. That's why he'll be
in no hurry to get his men back to barracks; and that's why he won't hurt Cee,
to begin with at least. He may even try to make friends with her." , ,Lots of
luck!" Calas cleared his throat, and spat, deliberately, over the edge of the
cliff before them. "If she wouldn't answer when Artur tried to talk to her and
she'd barely answer Onete, Liu's chances of making friends with her .
Calas ran out of figures of speech, into silence. "But it's still all just
your guesses, all the same," he said, at last, to Hal. "Old Man," said Hal,
turning to the silent figure beside them, "what do you think?" "I think you're
probably right," said Old Man softly. Calas turned to stare at the
white-bearded, thin face. "He'll need the child in good physical shape to lead
them to whoever else is hem and if he's got any experience at all with
managing prisoners, he'll know she'll be more willing to help him if she
believes he doesn't plan to hurt them when he gets them. So I'd think he'll
begin, at least, by making ier as comfortable as possible; while at the same
time makinf, sure she doesn't run away. Also, he'll try to give the impression
that it's just a matter of time before he finds the other people, whether she
helps or not, and a leisurely attitude to the situation is going to help along
that illusion."
As usual, when Old Man talked at any length at all, the Guild members had a
tendency to listen attentively. Calas listened. When Old Man fell silent
again, he nodded, slowly.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
271
"Right," he said. "it makes sense. But what happens if she still doesn't
answer him? He's going to run out of patience sooner or later." "We'll have to
watch, wait, and hope some kind of opportunity comes up for us to do something
about the situation, without risking discovery of the Guild," said Hal. "I
don't know what other option we've got. Do you?"
After a long moment, Calas slowly shook his head again, and turned back to
watching the screens showing where Cee was being held. Missy and Hadnah had
followed the action of the chase closely and now held the area of the three
buildings and the clearing in a good-sized picture. Calas sat unmoving and
watching, but now he watched the way a wolf might, at a rabbit hole.
It was midafternoon when he suddenly exploded into speech. "By God, they've
got him!" It was unnecessary to ask who had been meant by "him." Artur was the
only one down there likely to be brought in as a
captive. By rights it should have been Missy or Hadnah who first caught sight
of the large man and his two captors, benefiting from the higher angle of
their post of observation. But evidently the approach had been under the cover
of treetops, which were
more an obstacle to those viewing high on the mountainside, than Hal and the
other two with him. "He doesn't look very mussed up," Calas went on. "You'd
have thought someone like him who could move that boulder at the foot of the
path out of his way and then roll it back could have put up more of a fight
before they took him." "He's unarmed," said Hal. "What would you do if you
were
faced with a needle gun-and both those soldiers bringing him in have them?"
There was a pause. "You're right," said Calas; but he said it grudgingly.
Artur had plainly given his clothing some thought before he dressed to leave
the ledge. He was wearing green shorts and shirt, and boots made of rough
leather tanned a light brown. He would not have been easy to spot among the
growth below unless he moved. On the other hand, Hal guessed that Artur knew
less than nothing about moving inconspicuously through the high-altitude
forest below.
Cee, on the other hand, could have given any one of them
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273
lessons. If it had not been for the heat sensors, or whatever other
technological aids the soldiers had been carrying, Hal would have been willing
to bet she could have moved around and between them all day long without being
spotted.
As the two guarding Artur brought him into the camp, one of' the dozen who had
stayed around after the three shelters had been set up ducked into the other
tent, the one holding Liu. A moment later the commanding officer came out and
stood while Artur was brought face to face with him.
They stood looking at each other. The screen showed their lips moving. Hal's
ability to read lips had become rusty over the last few years and the angle at
which the screen showed the two had Artur's back to him and Liu's face averted
to the point where he could see only the left corner of his lips. He could not
make out what either man was saying. However, they talked for no more than a
few minutes.
The conversation ended with Liu abruptly turning around and re-entering his
shelter. The two escorting soldiers, apparently having been given their orders
by their disappearing commander, took Artur to one of the two trees that had
not been cut down. They tied him to it, in standing position with his back to
the tree trunk, enclosing him with what seemed an excessive number of turns of
rope around his body and the tree. He stood with his back to the tree, unable
to move even in small ways. "Now what?" asked Calas. "I believe," said Old Man
in his soft voice, "that the officer has decided to leave him there to think
his situation over." "Does Artur know they've got Cee, do you think?" asked
Calas, looking from Old Man to Hal and back again.
Old Man said nothing. "I don't think so," answered Hal, "any more than I think
they've let Cee know they've got him. Liu's probably planning to spring the
news on both of them when the time's right to goet the most shock value from
doing it."
That may have been the commander's plan, but in any case he seemed in no hurry
to carry it out. Procyon descended in tile west and the stars came out. The
forest below became one dark. mysterious mass, with the exception of two small
spots. One was where a blaze of artificial light lit up the clearing in tile
distance where the trucks were still parked. The other, closer. was more
directly below the watchers, where Artur stood, still
tied to the tree, and with Liu still out of sight in his shelter. From one of
the other domes trays with covered dishes were carried into the tent that was
Liu's, and it was perhaps three-quarters of an hour afterward that he finally
made an appearance.
The Urk hurried up to him and was told something. The tall, thin underofficer
in the tailored uniform went off to the shelter that held Cee, and re-emerged
a few minutes later, followed by two soldiers with the little girl held
between them, her hands tied behind her.
She was making no effort to walk under her own power. Her knees were bent and
the two soldiers were forced to carry her to the other tree that had been left
uncut, where she was roped into the same upright position Artur had been tied
into. After a few moments, she unbent her knees and took the weight of her
body on her feet.
Her face had that blank look of a child's which could indicate anything from
an extreme of terror to complete incomprehension. Her eyes followed the Urk as
he went to speak to Liu.
Liu and the Urk came toward her.    Behind the two men, in the center of the
clearing, a large open fire was being built. It was not an unreasonable thing
to do. At night, because of the altitude, even here at the base of    the
mountains proper, the nights were cool, for all that they were almost on the
equator of the planet. But it did not get so cold that a fire so large had any
real utility. Cee, herself, was obviously used to the nighttime temperatures,
which she faced unclothed.
She was still unclothed now; more so, in fact, because her vine-pod girdle had
been taken from her. But, as Hal had noticed on first seeing her when he had
been with Amanda, her nakedness was such a natural and unconscious state that,
if anything, she made those around her in clothes look unnatural. Her
expression remained blank as the two men came up to her, and Liu spoke to her.
It was intensely frustrating to Hal not to be able to catch enough of the
officer's lip movements to guess at least a word or so from him, or from one
of the soldiers.
In any case, she did not answer. Only, now, she stared directly at Liu,
instead of the Urk, with that completely unfathomable, completely observant,
open-eyed stare of which only the young are capable.
Liu's lips moved again. The expression of his face grew stern.
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THE CHANTRY GUILD
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There was no movement of lips or change of appearance in the girl before him.
He glanced at the Urk, beside him, and the Urk said something. "I think," said
Old Man unexpectedly, "he asked for confirmation of the fact that she actually
knows how to speak, and understands Basic."
Hal looked suddenly at the brown eyes in the ageless face behind the white
beard. "You read lips?" he asked, almost sharply.
Old Man shook his head. "No," he answered, "I only guess. But I think it's a
good guess. And I think this Urk is reminding him she was six years or older
when her parents died."
Liu turned away and went back past the fire to Artur. His face was now so
averted in the picture shown on the screen before Hal that it was obviously
useless even to try to read lips. "I'd say your guess may have been pretty
close to the mark," he told Old Man. "What do you think he's saying to Artur
right now' ,"'
Old Man shook his head a little slowly. "It's guessing, only," he said. "I
could be very wrong, but obviously this officer's deliberately waited until
dark to let the two see each other. Plainly, the fire is to make the scene
look
even more threatening. He gives the impression of a man who hopes to make use
of psychological as well as physical pressures. Watching someone else tortured
to produce answers is one of the favorite ways of getting information since
mankind started to use such methods. The idea, of course, is to weaken the
will of someone who doesn't want to talk. Here he's got two prisoners. He can
question either one with all kinds of painful means, with a double chance of
getting answers-either from the one he questions or from the one watching and
expecting the sarne thing. Either might break. Obviously, though, he expects
to be able to judge the effect of his questioning better on a grown man, than
on someone like Cee." "He'll be threatening Artur with torture now, if Artur
doesn't tell him how to find the other people who're around here? That's what
you're saying, isn't it?" demanded Hal. "I would guess," said Old Man simply.
Liu continued to talk to Artur several minutes longer; but Artur's face,
unlike Cee's, showed anger and defiance. Liu
pointed at Cee several times and Artur shook his head. Most possibly, Hal
thought, the big man would be denying any knowledge of the little girl;
although it remained impossible for Hal to read the movements of his lips.
Eventually, Liu turned away from him and went back across the lighted clearing
into his i1helter; while the Urk, with two of the soldiers, got busy with the
physical questioning of Artur.
Calas began to swear in a low, monotonous tone; and his voice went on and on,
as if he were talking to himself.
Mercifully, the angle of vision both from the ledge and from higher up on the
mountain with Missy and Hadnah was such that the bodies of the three men were
in the way of any camera view of exactly what they were doing to Artur.
However, the soldiers and their noncommissioned officer were careful not to
block the view Cee could have had of what was going on.
But their efforts were wasted. After watching them for a
moment until Artur's mouth opened in what was obviously an involuntary scream
of pain, she took her attention off them. Her eyes, in that expressionless
face of hers, turned instead to focus on the round, white shape of the tent
into which Liu had vanished. They kept their gaze immovable upon the tent.
Old Man drew in an audible breath. "He's made a mistake," Old Man said. "He?
You mean Liu?" asked Hal. "Yes," said Old Man. "Artur denied knowing her and
Cee told him nothing. The officer has no way of knowing she loves him, or he,
her." "She loves Artur?" Hal asked. "Amid told me she wouldn't let him get
close to her, after that one time he tried to reach out and touch her!" "True
enough," said Old Man, "but all the time she must have remembered who he was
and either loved him from befoi-e or come to love him when he tried to make
contact again with her. She was just too frightened to come close to him. Look
at her face now."
Hal reached forward to turn the screen's controls up to give a
close-up picture of Cee's face. They saw it only slightly averted, staring at
Liu's shelter off screen; but Calas's swearing broke off abruptly. "Holy
Mother!" said Calas.
Hal also was absorbing the shock of what he was seeing. It
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was strange, since in no easily visible way had Cee's blank expression
changed. Only, the steadiness of her gaze seemed to have acquired a power of
its own. "God help that Liu if she ever gets her hands on him-, and him tied
up, or helpless!" breathed Calas.
Old Man nodded. "But why do you say Liu made a mistake?" Hal asked. "If she
had not already, she has now identified him with whatever she saw done to her
parents when they died. Liu Hu Shen thought to provoke fear in the child by
forcing her to watch Artur being tortured. Instead he's unleashed hatred. A
terrible hatred in her, against him."
After a long moment of silence, Old Man added: "Who would have thought one so
young could hate so much'? But then life has made her more than half wild
animal; and the actions of that man have now made her wholly so. . . ."
CHAPTER
27
"I can't take any more of this!" said Calas in a thick voice. He got up
abruptly and blundered off into the darkness. They heard the sounds of him
being sick farther back froni the lip of the ledge.
Hal and Old Man sat in silence for a while. Eventually, Old Man spoke, raising
his voice, but not looking back over his shoulder as he spoke. "It's over for
now," he said.
There was a pause, then the sound of footsteps coming back to them. Caeas
reappeared, a shadow in the darkness, and stepped around in front of Hal.
"We've got to do something about this," he said. "We will." Hal looked into
the screen. Artur sagged in his ropes, apparently unconscious. The Urk and the
two soldiers had abandoned him when Liu had stepped out of his shelter and
spoken to them, a few minutes earlier. As the three men on the ledge watched,
they came back now, untied Artur from the tree, eased his unconscious body to
the ground and re-tied it with the same ropes that had held it upright.
Cee, supple as a cat, had managed to slide downward not only herself but the
ropes binding around her and the tree, until now she sat cross-legged on the
ground at the foot of' the tree. She looked almost comfortable. But nothing
else about her expres-
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THE CHANTRY GUILD
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sion or the target of her eyes, which was still either Liu or his shelter when
he was inside it, had changed. "We'll do something," said Hal. "I just had to
know whether Liu was going to try to force the answers he wants tonight, or
stretch the process out a day or two. Clearly, he's going to drag it out. Time
doesn't seem to be a factm or perhaps he has at least several days to find out
what he wants to know. I was afraid he'd need to find out tonight whatever
Artur or Cee could tell him, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Look,
they're even covering Artur against the night cold."
It was true. On the screen they could see one of the soldiers throwing a
blanket over the motionless form of Artur. Another soldier took a blanket over
to Cee and tucked it around her shoulders so that it made a sort of small tent
covering her body. Like the others, he ignored the fact she was now seated on
the ground.
She paid no attention to the blanket being put around her, but when next they
looked, it had left her shoulders and was a pool of darkness around her lower
legs and on the ground. A soldier got up from among a group of them who were
seated around the fire and passing a bottle around. He tucked the blanket into
place again about her shoulders; but a few minutes later it was once more on
the ground.
He started to get up once more, but the soldier next to him pulled him back
into a sitting position. After that they ignored Cee. "Missy? Hadnah?" Hal
said to the screen. "We're watching," the voice of Missy came back to him.
"Good," said Hal. "We're going to leave our screens down here for a council of
war at Amid's. If you want me, that's where I'll be. You two can keep the
watch going?" "Count on us," chimed in the voice of Hadnah.
Hal got to his feet a little stiffly. His legs had adjusted to the morning
sittings to watch the sunrise; but whole days seated on the ground were
something else again. Old Man got to his feet lightly and easily, as if he had
been seated there for minutes rather than hours. With Calas, they went to
Amid's office.
He was busy dealing with a short, thick-set, and-for an Exotic-a remarkably
pugnacious- I ook i ng man with bristly gray hair, cut short; about some
matter having to do with the building on of extra dormitory space to provide
larger units for
couples, particularly couples with young children. The grayhaired man was
named Abke-Smythe, but that was all Hal knew about him except that he had some
sort of responsibility for the group's housing. Amid started to interrupt
this, to talk with Hal and the others as they came in; but Hal shook his head
at the older man. "We can sit and wait a few minutes," he said. "In fact one
of your chairs would feel good."
He dropped into one of the larger overstuffed chairs, and both Calas and Old
Man followed his example, except that Old Man, with a momentary, mischievous
smile at Hal, took his position in cross-legged fashion upon the seat cushion
of his chair.
Hal grinned back, momentarily, then let his mind go elsewhere. The fact was,
as much as his body needed a rest from the position it had held all day, his
mind now needed to switch gears from analyzing everything he had seen in the
jungle below him since early morning and planning what was to be done with the
night before him.
Without intending to, he fell asleep. He blinked and woke, startled to find
that time had gone by and things in the office had changed. A table had been
set up with three straight chairs, and in two of them Calas and Old Man were
already seated, eating. At another empty chair a place had been set which was
obviously waiting for him. "Take your time, " said the voice of Amid. Hal
looked over to see the head of the Chantry Guild still behind his desk,
fingers busily tapping on some keys inset in his desktop. "We can keep the
food hot," "It's all right," said Hal. "I guess I just needed a moment to sort
my mind out. I'll be right there."
He got up, went over and took the empty chair at the table. Calas passed him
covered dishes, from which Hal began transferring large amounts of food to his
plate. The fact was, he thought as he did this, that what he had just said was
exactly the truth. The night before he had had a good night's sleep, and had
not needed more now, but from long experience he recognized that his
unconscious mind had wanted his consciousness out of the way while it
addressed the problem he was facing now. It had worked. He had awakened with a
solution clear to him.
He opened his mouth to start talking to Amid and the others, then closed it
again. There was eating to be done and it would be
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281
some time into tomorrow's daylight before he would have a chance to eat again,
probably. Best to finish his meal now, and have his discussion later. He went
to work on the food, accordingly; in spite of his late start, ending up at
almost the same second as Calas, who had continued to eat for some minutes
after Old Man had finished. "Thank you," Hal said, looking over at Amid. "
Now," said Amid, "what have you got to thank me for? Simply a share of our
food, which we'd give to anyone who was here, let alone someone like yourself,
who we count on to help us solve a situation like this." " Don't count too
much on me," said Hal. "In the first place, -something might happen to me;
and, in the second place, there are a number of people, including you and Old
Man, who could do a creditable job of solving it alone. And in fact, if Amanda
was here, you'd be idiots not to use her for dealing with this, rather than
me. She's had experience with this world, the soldiers, and a complete Dorsai
upbringing." "No doubt," said Amid. "But I think that if she, or anyone else,
was here, she'd join the rest of us in choosing you to suggest what we need to
do. There's something about you that carries a banner everyone rallies to."
"Including Bleys?" Hal smiled. "I'm being serious," said Amid. "You know what
I mean. All right, if you've finished eating, what have you got to tell us?"
-Not a lot that I haven't told you already," answered Hal soberly. "The
trick's going to be to send these soldiers home thinking they've found nothing
worth worrying about; and also to get Cee and Artur back alive, if we can.
That's where those darts come in. By the way-" ''if you'll look on the table
over in the corner there, under that white cloth, I think you'll find what
you're asking about,'' interrupted Amid. "Tannaheh     ought to have been here
fiftecfl minutes ago-ah, here he is, finally!"
It was a little difficult to see why Amid should sound so sure. since he
completed his sentence before the door to his "office'' had swung wide enough
to reveal who was coming in. But he was not wrong. Tannaheh was the one who
entered, carrying a good-sized box which seemed to have been filled with long
strands of-rass, now dried to a golden brown color. Behind hini
was another man, a short man in his fifties or older with a long, straight
nose and hands that were large for the rest of his body, as if spread and
thickened by years of hard work. Under the thin, straight, gray hair the man's
face was solemn almost to the point of sourness. He wore a jacket made of some
material that looked like leather, over heavy, dark brown trousers and a
checked shirt-a contrast to Tannaheh, whose slim body was dressed, as it had
been earlier, in the gray wool sweater, white shirt, blue trousers and boots.
"Sorry to hold everybody up," said Tannaheh cheerfully. He carried the box
over and set it down gently on the table covered with the white cloth. "I
thought Luke was going to wait for me
at his workshop with the belts and bows, and when I got there and didn't find
him, I thought he'd just stepped out for a minute; and so I spent some time
waiting there for him, until his son
dropped in for some tool or other. He told me Luke'd already brought the
things over here earlier and then gone on to the dispensary to wait for me.
Anyway, we got together finally at the dispensary and here we are. " "You know
Luke, don't you?" Amid asked Hal. "Indeed, I do," said Hal, nodding at Luke,
who was the Guild's chief craftsman. "Sorry about the mix-up," said Luke, in a
surprisingly deep bass voice. "Well, well, it doesn't matter now you're here;
and Hal and everyone's here," said Amid, getting up to come around his desk,
rubbing his hands and holding them out to the central fireplace of the office,
to warm them. --Poor circulation in the extremities, Age. Well, show them what
you've got." "You go ahead, Luke," said Tannaheh. "The darts and the drugs in
thern'll need a little explaining." "All right."
Luke twitched the white cover to the back of the table, revealing a number of
items on the polished surface, including several bandoleer-like belts, with
loops for ammunition. But what took Hal's eye particularly were five short
recurved bows, no more than four feet in length, made of a milky-colored,
smoothly glasslike material. Luke noted the direction of his gaze. "Had the
boys up all night, making these," he said. "The belts took hardly any time at
all."
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Gordon R. Dickson
He picked up one of the bows and handed it to Hal, meanwhile reaching with his
other hand for a rather stubbylooking arrow, apparently made of' the same
material as & bows.
The bow was already equipped with a string, tied tightly at one end and ending
in a loop at the other. Hal had already placed the tied end on the floor and
was putting his weight on the bow to bend it, as he slid the looped end up the
shaft and into the notch prepared to hold it at the bow's far end. The bow. he
saw, seemed to be made of a form of glass. Once strung, he held the bow up in
one hand and ticked the string with the thumb of his other. It hummed
musically.
The string was a little strange. It appeared to be made ofthe same milky
material as the arrow shafts. Also there was a feel to it that was different
from that of any bow string Hal had handled before. He plucked the string,
listened to the musical note ofit, hefted the bow and turned to pass it to Old
Man. "You know swords," he said, smiling. "Am I correct in thinking you know
something about these, too?" "Something," said Old Man, nodding as he took the
weapon. "We used to shoot at a prayer target, blindfolded.- "Oh?" said Amid,
interested. "Some form of divination'! Or should we ask?" "Of course you may
ask," said Old Man. "But it wasn't divination. Hitting the target correctly
was a test of control over the body and mind."
He was going through the same motions with the bow as Hal a before, first
unstringing, then restringing it-except that where Hal had placed an end of
the bow on the floor and leaned
s weight on it in order to bend it enough to slide the looped end up into its
notch, Old Man merely tucked the bow under one arm and bent it against his
body to string it. "I don't think I'd be able to do that," said Hal, watching.
"Indeed you could," said Old Man earnestly. "It's only a matter of
practice-and habit. Forgive me. I didn't mean to seem to be showing off." "We
all know you don't show off," said Amid. "What was that about shooting at a
mark, blindfolded, though? Could you show us that?" "If you'll forgive me
    Old Man looked around the room, then turned his back on it, so that he was
facing the wall
THE CHANTRY GUILD
283
behind Amid's desk. "If one of you would fix a piece of paper against the far
wall, then blindfold me and hand me an arrow-one with a sharp point, if you
have one?" "I'm afraid," said Tannaheh, "all the points are on the darts which
fasten to the ends of the arrows-" "That's all right," said Luke, "give me an
arrow."
He took the blunt-ended, feathered shaft Tannaheh gave him, reached to Amid's
desk for a pin from a tray which held such things, along with page fasteners
and other small clips and devices. Hitching around from the back of his belt a
case that held a number of small instruments, he clipped off the blunt head of
the pin with what looked like a needle-nosed set of pliers, then held the
chopped-off point for a moment in the jaws of the pliers. Hal saw the blunt
end of the pin glow red for a second before Luke used the pliers to sink it
into the blunt end of the arrow shaft, which melted before it. "That ought to
give you point enough for wooden walls like these," Luke said. "I'll go put up
a target."
He handed the arrow to Old Man, who received it without turning back to look
at him. Luke tore off a sheet from the memo pad on Amid's desk, walked with it
to the far wall and placed it against the wall at a point about level with his
own eyes. By some means Hal could not see, he made it cling to the wall, then
stood aside.
Meanwhile, Amid had been busy blindfolding Old Man with one of the napkins
that had come with the food. When he was done, he stood back. "All ready," he
said to Old Man. "The target's up. Go ahead. "
Old Man turned almost casually, with the arrow already notched to the bow
string. He gave the string the merest tweak, for the other wall was at most
ten meters away. The arrow arced into the air and almost fell against the
target, the pin in its end sticking in the very center of the paper, and
plainly through it to the wood, for the arrow drooped, but did not fall to the
floor. "Now," said Old Man, "if you'll bring the arrow back to me and take
down the paper."
Luke did both things, stopping halfway back to use one of his tools to
straighten out the pin, which apparently had become bent. Once more Old Man
fitted the arrow to his bow and sent it on its way. It stuck again, this time
in the bare wall.
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Gordon R. Dickson
Luke walked over to retrieve it, reached for the shaft, then hesitated,
staring at the place where it was stuck in the wall. He whistled. "Just a few
millimeters off from the first hole," he said.
He pulled the arrow loose and brought it back, as Amid took off the blindfold
and Old Man laid down the still strung bow on Amid's desk. "How could you do
it?" Hal asked him.
I 'I listened to the rustle of the paper as it was carried across the room,"
said Old Man, "and aimed at where the noise stopped. " "But you hit the center
of the paper!" Amid said.
Old Man smiled. "There were only two sources of paper on your desk," he
answered. "Notepaper, and the memo pad. They would rustle differently. Besides
the memo sheets are glued together at the top. I heard Luke tear one loose;
and when he pressed it against the wall to make it stick, the board made a
small creak. I aimed at w ere t at sound had been, with the memo sheet, and
the wall, pictured in my mind." "And then you did it again, with the paper
gone," said Amid admiringly. "Even more simply, I'm afraid," said Old Man.
"The second time I simply used the bow exactly the way I'd done the first-,
and the arrow went to the same place."
He turned to Hal. "These things are unimportant in themselves," he said. "I
just wanted you to be sure I could be useful to you with the bow. " "You've
made your point," said Hal. He turned to Amid. "Amid, we've got a record of
all the scopes saw today, haven't we
"Why, yes," said Amid. "They're the usual sort of scope. They store images
unless you set them not to; and we assumed you might want to check something
or other." "I do," said Hal. "Would you have someone check the records for
everything seen in them today, to see if we've got any views of even parts of
the interiors of the three structures Liu put up down there. Particularly, I'd
like any views we might have of the building he's in, himself."
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285
"I can do that right from here," said Amid. He sat back down at his desk,
punched a few keys, and looked expectantly at the screen of the scope on the
desk that was now showing the brightly lit scene of the soldiers' camp below.
The uniformed men around the table had dwindled to two and the bottle had
disappeared. The extra men were spread around on the ground in sleeping sacks,
unmoving. "They were drinking when I last looked," said Hal. "That
underofficer, whatever his name is-" "The Urk," supplied Calas. "Urk. Odd
name," said Amid, "-looked out just before you came in here and they put the
bottle away. He was in the center one of-what do you call those buildings?"
"Hutments is the military name," said Calas. "They're a
kind of tent."
--The middle one of those hutments," went on Amid. "The officer's in the one
on the right of the screen as we look at it now. I caught a glimpse of what
looked like a cooker and various kitchen furniture in that same one the Urk's
in. Strange, but he and the officer are the only ones under shelter. Of
course, at this time of year night showers are unlikely-" "That's one of Liu's
little military points," said Calas. "He never misses a chance to point up the
fact that rank has its privileges. Making the ranks sleep on the open ground
just drives home the difference between them and him and the Urk. "A strange
personality," said Amid. "Not so strange, after all," said Old Man softly.
"Here we go!" interrupted Amid, as the scene on the screen changed to a still
picture which showed Liu's hutment, with one of the two flaps that closed its
front entrance folded back. A camp chair, an unfolded and set up desk and the
corner of a cot could be seen, the cot already with bedding on it. "Seventeen
more views, the screen says. Shall we look at all of them?" "If you don't
mind-," said Hal. "Of course not . . ." Amid tapped his desk controls and they
went, one by one, through the various views the scopes had been able to make
of the inner area of Liu's hutment. It was furnished with what they had
already seen, plus a sort oftall box that could be it filing cabinet or a food
and liquor cabinet. "All right," said Hal, when they had examined the last
view.
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Gordon R. Dickson
11 iu should be in that cot now and asleep. So should the Urk, in the center
hutment. The two guards will probably be changed at intervals. Now--
He turned his attention back to Amid. "I'm going to go down there tonight," he
said, "to try to get Cee and Artur back and leave those soldiers with the
impression that they found nothing worthwhile. If I can manage the hypnosis
properly, after disabling them with the darts, I'll hope to leave them
believing neither Artur nor Cee had anything to tell them-that they both died
under torture, and were buried up here-so that they'll go back thinking the
whole thing was a wild goose chase. The question is going to be who I take
with me.
"Me, for one," said Calas. "Perhaps," said Hal. "We'll see. Now, Amid, who in
the Guild knows the forest down there at night, and can move around in it in
the dark, quietly?" "Onete, of course," said Amid. "And there are four or five
other foragers who like to do night foraging. There're sonic p ants-some
tubers part icu larly -that betray their presence at night more than in the
day, by actions like opening blossoms or leaves, or-there's even a tuber that
causes the ground above it to glow slightly, at night. But I'm wandering."
He pressed a key and leaned over a speaker grille in his desk. "All those
whore particularly adept at night foraging," he said into the grille, -come to
my office right away, please." "Good," said Hal. "How many of them, do you
know, can use a bow and arrow effectively?"
Amid looked blank. "I haven't the slightest idea. " He appealed to Old Man.
"Do you know""
Old Man shook his head. "Calas?" "I haven't any idea," said Calas. "By the
way," Hal said to him, "you wanted to come. Call you move quietly through the
jungle at night?" "I've been out night foraging, too, if that's what you
mean," said Calas. Then, on a more subdued note, he added, "I may not be the
quietest, but I know enough to look where I'm putting my feet. No one down
there'll hear me." "And you can use a bow?"
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287
"No!" said Calas explosively. "But we've got to have an hour or two before we
go down. I'll learn in that time."
He looked at Old Man. "He can teach me." Hal turned his gaze on the quiet,
bearded face. "What do you think?" he asked Old Man. "Could you teach him to
use one to any good purpose, in just a few hours?" "At short range, perhaps,"
said Old Man softly. "At any rate I could try. Perhaps you'll have to let me
try teaching others along with Calas. Perhaps several people. " "I can use a
bow," said Luke. "Shot one for years. Made my own first real bow when I was
thirteen. I may not be as good as this magician, here-" He nodded at Old Man.
--but I'm good by any ordinary standards. I'll say that and stand on it!"
"Then perhaps the two of you can do some teaching," said Hal. "When we finally
go down, the six best shots will carry bows and darts. Old Man and I are two,
that leaves four to be picked. "
He turned to Amid. "You might put out a call for anyone in the Guild who does
know how to use one, night forager or not. And Tannaheh, while we're waiting,
you might start showing me how the darts work and telling me about them." "Of
course!" said Tannahch, on an explosive outrush of breath that betrayed his
chafing at the delay in getting to discussion of this particular subject.
He led Hal to the box and reached down among the dried grass he had used as
packing. What he came up with looked like an old-fashioned hypodermic of the
kind used back before the human race had first settled the Younger Worlds,
three hundred years before. There was a round, tubelike cylinder with a collar
at one end that was threaded on the inside. At the other end was a slim needle
of a rod, perhaps twelve millimeters in length, ending in a point that was so
sharp Hal could not see it, except as a twinkle in the overhead light from the
ceiling of the office. All of it was made of the same milky-appearing material
as the arrow shaft. "You're lucky I have a library," said Tannaheh, holding up
the dart. "You're from Earth, Friend, as I understand it; and there they've
still got zoos and refuges with wild animals in them. Consequently, they've
got wild animals that need to be
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Gordon R. Dickson
tranquilized so they can care for them when they're sick, or whatever. But
Kultis hasn't any large fauna, native or introduced. The largest wild variform
creatures we've brought in as tIrozen embryos from Earth have been some
rabbits, and bi,-, birds, like hawks and vultures. The result was we haven't
lia@ any need for tranquilizer darts, or means to propel them into the animal.
I had to go back into medical history, to the time of Earth's first ventures
into space, to find the information I needed. "
Hal nodded. Tannaheh gave every evidence of wanting to deliver a lecture, but
it was too early to put the brakes on him, yet. He let the Guild pharmacist go
on. "I managed to dig up illustrations and information on what they were using
then, and build on that; making do with substitutes, where necessary-which was
in almost every phase of making the dart."
He reached into the box and came up with a machine copy of what was obviously
a page from some old book. It showed a drawing of something very much like the
dart he had in his other hand. " You see, " he said, " I've recreated an
artifact from the past.
ut I had to use my imagination to duplicate almost everything about it. To
begin with, our ancestors used metal projectiles. The body of the dart and
even the needle itself was metal. We have some metal, but no way to machine it
into this sort of shape. " "I understand," said Hai. "But clearly you found an
answer to that." "Quite right. I didn't have metal I could work with; but I
did have glass that was as strong as metal and as flexible as I wanted to make
it, something our ancestors of that time didn't have: and ! could work with it
more easily than they could work with their earlier version of glass. So this
dart you see is made entirely of glass. " "Well done," said Hal. "I'm glad you
think so," Tannaheh went on. "But actually the problem of what to make the
dart out of was small compared to finding the drugs needed to produce the
effect you told me you wanted. Now, when the dart hits . . ."
He laid the drawing back in the box, fumbled around anion.p
THE CHANTRY GUILD
289
the packing and came up with a small square of wood about three times as thick
as his hand. "The needle is pushed back into the body of the dart, this
cylinder here-" He pushed on the dart and the needle shortened to perhaps four
millimeters. --as you see, injecting the drug. I'll be giving you a chart
showing what parts of the body you should try to shoot the needle into for
best results. Then, once the drug has been injected, the cylinder falls off,
again as you see-
He let go of the body of the dart and it fell to the floor, leaving the needle
still sticking in the wood with only a length of what looked like string
trailing from it. "The needle," he went on, "is coated with a sterilizing
agent, which means you can pull it out without worrying about having started
an infection. Not only that, but it's thin enough and sharp enough so that the
person hit by the dart isn't going to feel much; and the only evidence that'll
be left is going to be a small red mark on the skin surface. No blood,
probably. Afterwards, the site of the needle entry is going to itch, rather
than hurt, once the tranquilizing agent wears off; and this, together with the
red dot, will make it seem like the person was bitten by some insect. No one
should suspect       . "Good," said Hal. "Old Man, you and Luke had better try
out the arrows with the weight of the dart on their ends. I assume," he turned
to Tannaheh, "you've got some practice darts there without the drug in them;
which can be used without our worrying about blunting the needles on something
we're going to have to use later?" "Of course," said Tannaheh. "I'll give
them to you in just a second. But first let me tell you how I came up with
substitutes for the drugs used in the old Earth darts." "Go ahead," said Hal
patiently. The hours of night were short, but he could give this man, who had
after all done something absolutely necessary for them, the courtesy of
listening to him for a little while longer. "The original darts described in
my books," said Tannahch,
used several drugs which weren't difficult to obtain back on Earth, even in
those days, but impossible for me to get here. There were several mixtures.
One of the very good ones was ketainine hydrochloride combined with xylazine
hydrochloride
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Gordon R. Dickson
and atropine. The atropine was there essentially to keep the subjects under,
but breathing, after they'd been knocked down by the other two-which were very
quick acting."
He paused, obviously waiting. "I can see where you'd have a problem," Hal
said. "A large problem," said Tannaheh. "I had native substances that could
duplicate the knock-down effects of the two hydrochlorides, but they wouldn't
mix with the closest native equivalent to atropine derived from one of our
night-blooming plants. Mixed, they started interacting chemically,
immediately."
He paused again. "So what did you do?" Hal asked. "Obviously the only solution
was to have you inject the atropinelike drug after the earlier ones were
already in the blood streams of your targets!" said Tannaheh. "And so you made
two kinds of darts?" "That was the first thing I thought of," Tannaheh said.
"Then I had a better idea."
He picked up the shaft which had fallen from the end of the dart head driven
into the piece of wood. "You'll notice," he said, passing the detached shaft
back to Hal, "how the shaft is marked with a circle some twelve millimeters
back from the end where the needle comes out? Break that end off."
Hal broke it off. It came free very easily, revealing another. somewhat
shorter, needle projecting from what was now the new, effective end of the
shaft. "You see?" said Tannaheh. "You can shoot it from the bow again, or use
it by hand to inject the atropinelike drug directly. Be careful of giving
anyone a double dose, though. It's in very dilute form, here, but still
dangerous. In its natural state, as part of the sap of the plant you get it
from, it's a very effective poison. "You've made whatever we can do down there
possible," said Hal. "I think you know how grateful everyone is to you-"
"Nothing!" said Tannaheh. He waved his hand lightly. "I'd like to tell you,
though, what you've actually got by way of chemicals there in these darts-"
"is this something we need to know to use them?" interrupted Hal.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
291
"Well, no. But-- "Then, if you don't mind, you can tell us all about it
later," said Hal. "We've only got so many hours of darkness to work in and a
lot to do. I'm sure you understand."
-I-well, of course," said Tannaheh. "Believe me," Hal said to him, more
softly, "later, when there's time, we'll want to know. But right now there's a
lot to be done. " "Of course. Of course," said Tannaheh, taking a step back
from the desk with its open box of darts. "Forgive me." "There's nothing to
forgive." Hal turned to the rest of the room.
While they had been speaking, the door had been opening to
let people in; and now there was a small crowd of them in Amid's office. They
had lined up against the front wall of the office on either side of the door.
"Now," said Hal, "which of you are night foragers who can move quietly down
there among the vegetation and rocks? Put your hands up so I can identify
you."
Eight men and women to the right of the door as Hal faced it responded. "And
who's the best?" "Onete," said several voices at once, with several more
following-all, in fact, but Onete herself, who had been one of those standing
there and holding up her arm.
"Good," said Hal. "Which of you can use a bow and arrow?"
There was some hesitation. Those who had their hands up lowered them and
looked at each other, Finally, two of them raised their hands hesitantly
again.
Hal smiled at them, to relax them. "I take it," he said, "this means you two
can shoot an arrow from a bow, but you haven't much faith in yourselves as far
as being able to hit the mark?"
The two arms went down and the heads above them nodded. "Old Man," said Hal,
turning to him, "and you, Luke, do you suppose you could take these two and
any other two who want to volunteer-" "Me," said Calas, quickly and
stubbornly. 'Ikll right," said Hal, "and one other volunteer, then. Take
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Gordon R. Dickson
them to some inside space where there's light to see a target at about six to
ten meters, and see if you can teach them something about hitting what they
aim at." "The corridors in the dormitories'd give us the distance," said Luke
to Old Man.
Old Man nodded. "And there are ways of hitting the point desired, that call
for belief in self more than practice," he said. Both men began to move toward
the door. "Just a minute," said Hal. "In addition to the six who feel most
sure about their ability to move in the dark quietly, we're going to need
about six more who'll be needed to help carry. For the benefit of those of you
who've just come in, what we're going to do is go down to that caep where
Artur and Cee are, try to put the soldiers out of action, and bring Cee and
her uncle back up here to the ledge. We'll need a stretcher for Artur; and
that stretcher will need at least four people to carry it at any given time."
He paused to let that sink in. "Bringing him up the steep slope is going to be
the real probi m. He'll have to be roped to the stretcher, so he doesn't slide
off, and his bearers are going to have to be changed frequently. For those of
you whove never done this-and I think that's most, if not all, of you-I can
tell you that carrying even an ordinary-sized man on a stretcher up a steep
slope is a very rough task, indeed. So we'll need at least three teams, so
that the stretcher bearers can change off frequently. That's where you other
eight come in. You can wait for the rest of us back out of earshot of the camp
and help carry once we reach you with Artur and Cee." _Will the girl come?"
asked one of the men to the left of the door. "I think she'll come if you
bring Artur," said Old Man. "You should be careful how you handle him, though.
If he cries out or any reason, she may assume you're just more people like the
soldiers, as far as your reason for carrying him off goes."
I 'By the way, " put in Tannaheh, "I've made up a medical kit with
pain-killers and other first aid supplies for use on Artur, as soon as you
reach him." "Good," said Hal, "and thank you. I should have thought to ask You
for that myself."
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293
He turned to look at Onete. "I think you better take care of the first aid,"
he said to Onete. "You may be the one person who can do things to Artur
without Cee thinking we're simply harming him more." "I can try," said Onete.
"She just might trust me." "Old Man's right, too, I think," said Hal, "in
saying she'll follow if we take Artur-even all the way up here, where she's
never come before. She won't trust him out of her sight in anyone else's
hands."
He turned back to the people who had just come into the office. "We've got
until midnight to get ready," he said. "If for any reason some of you don't
want to go, speak up now. The rest of us'll start getting ready to go down. I
want to move into that camp there as soon as both moons are down; and be back
behind the boulder on our way up to the ledge before it starts to get light."
No one moved or spoke up. "Good," said Hal. "Then, you four bow-people go with
Old Man and Luke. Onete, you and the other night foragers gather around me,
here. I'll explain how your part of it'll work."
CHAPTER
28
Making the nighttime descent of the mountain from the ledge to the boulder
beneath which they would exit had been almost like descending in daytime, from
Hal's point of view. He had spent most of his life as Hal with Earth's single
moon. Here, however, both of Kultis's moons could be in the sky at once-as
they were at the moment-and both near the full. The combination of the two
made not only for adequate light, but a nearelimination of shadows.
The indescribable spicy odor of the alien semi-tropical forest had risen to
meet them as they descended, and the clean mountain breezes were left behind,
above them. At the boulder barring the entrance to the up trail, they had left
the backup team of eight men and women, seven of whom stayed behind the
boulder, which had been rolled back in place, and AnnaMist -the
eighth-followed them through, but only as far as the other side of the
boulder. It was to be her job to keep watch and, if necessary, pass the alarm
back to those on the other side not to open up, if she got warning of anything
gone wrong with the expedition.
Down in the forest, the moonlight was dimmer but still good, by the standards
of Hal's Earth-accustomed eyes. However, the small and bright moons were
fast-moving, and the smaller soon set. So the light dimmed, as they made their
way toward Liu's camp. Eventually, it shut off completely, leaving them with
only
THE CHANTRY GUILD
295
the starlight to help them see where to put their feet.
There had been some stumbles, and some who held to the person in front of them
to make sure of the way. But Hal had sent Onete and the experienced night
foragers ahead to lead. With these up front they made steady progress, until
the line halted-so suddenly that Hal almost ran into the last member of the
foragers, just before him.
A whisper came back down the line, passed from person to person for him, and
he made his way to the head of the line. There he identified Onete by her
general outline and body odor, as he had become acquainted with the body odors
of most of the Guild members in the last few months. "We've found some new-dug
soil that looks like two graves," she said in a whisper so low that no one
else could hear it. "You don't suppose . . . " "No," he whispered back. "It'd
make no sense for Liu to get up a couple of hours before dawn to kill the two
of them and bury them without the answers he was after-even if he'd had time
to do all that since we left the ledge. Wasn't someone carrying one of the
scopes? Let's take a look at the camp. " "The light from the screen
began Onete doubtfully. "How close to the camp are we?" "A hundred and fifty
meters. But you warned us against any light or sound once we left the
boulder-" "I think with a hundred and fifty meters of forest in between we can
risk it, in this instance," said Hal. "Can you get it for me? The rest of you
make a wall with your bodies between us and the camp."
There were a few minutes delay and then the closed scope was placed in his
hands. He opened it and touched the controls. A tiny view of the camp they
were headed for appeared in the center of the screen. The figures on it were
almost too small to be recognizable, but one was clearly still Cee, seated on
the ground, and one was clearly Artur, still wrapped with rope and unmoving.
Hal turned the scope off, closed it and handed it back. "Someone take this,"
he said. It was removed from his grasp. To Onete he added, "It'll be messy,
since we've only got our hands to dig with, but we're going to have to see
what's buried here, if anything is. Use the scope light, if you need to.
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Gordon R. Dickson
That camp's got two men on watch, but they're only watching as far as the
nearest darkness; and with those bright lights it must be like looking into an
endless cave all around them."
Onete stopped him as he bent down to start digging, himself. "Not you," she
said, "you may need clean hands later on for some reason. Also, most of us
know how to use the plants we pass to find materials to clean ourselves up
with."
It was a realistic argument. Even his effectiveness in shooting the bow he
carried might be hampered by badly grimed fingers. "All right," he said and
stood aside. He watched as shadowy figures labored in the soft earth of both
dug-over areas. After some minutes, Onete's outline detached itself from the
working group and came back to him. "We've found a body," she said. "We're
just finding out if the other grave holds a body, too."
There was a subdued murmur from the working party, a few more motions, and
then work ceased. "I'll come take a look," said Hal. "Have you got that scope
handy?" "I'll get it." Onete moved away from him. He went to the group, which
made way for him, and bent over the two half-excavated openings in the
reworked earth. A hand pushed the scope into his grasp. He opened it, turned
it on to show a minimum-sized picture, and directed the reflected light of the
screen down into the opened holes.
A boot toe, the upper part of a body and the head of a soldier had been
roughly cleaned of covering soil in one of them, the upper body and head of a
second in the hole alongside.
The white, pale light of the scope, washing over the halfexposed bodies and
their still dirt-streaked faces-eyes closed but features staring up at the
star-filled sky-was unpleasant enough so that a murmur arose from the group
around the two graves. "Quiet!" snapped Onete, with a tone of command Hal had
not expected from her. "But look at their faces-," said one protesting voice.
Hal reached down and brushed a little more of the loose dirt off the face and
throat of the nearest body. "They strangled to death," he said. His fingers
moved down to clear a little more dirt from the throat of the body before him:
then pressed lightly on where the man's Adam's apple had been.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
297
The dead flesh yielded before the pressure like a loose sack of small
fragments and there was the faint crackling of trapped air forced into the
surrounding tissues. "His larynx's been crushed. "
There was silence from those around him. "Does anyone here know," he asked,
"was Artur acquainted with any of the martial arts? I'm talking about those
for bare-handed fighting."
The silence continued another moment. "No," said Onete, "I don't believe he
did." "No blow from the edge of a hand did that," said Old Man's voice behind
Hal. "It could have been done by a kick, a very skillful kick; but it's
unlikely. The blow of a fist, perhaps; though even Artur would have to be
lucky as well as powerful to strike that spot with enough force."
Hal squatted back on his heels, staring down at the nearest body. "There's no
 good reason they'd kill two of their own that way," he said, half to himself.
He raised his voice slightly. "We'll need to cover them up again so that the
graves look undisturbed. "
He got to his feet and watched as the shadowy figures around him became busy,
pushing the loose dirt back into its original place. When it was done, they
started out once more through the forest with its root-cluttered, rock-strewn
ground all but invisible under their feet.
It was not long, though, before those in the lead halted, and the line of
people bumped each into the person ahead of him or her, and stopped. Onete
came back to Hal. "This is about a hundred meters from the soldiers' camp,"
she said. "Thank you," he answered. "All right, here's the place where we'll
leave all of you except the six of us who are bow-and-dart people and the
other six night foragers Onete picked out as being able to move most quietly.
I want one forager attached to each of us who've got bows, to get us to the
edge of the illuminated area of the camp as quietly as possible. According to
Missy and Hadnah's count, there're sixteen of the soldiers, counting Liu and
the Urk. Calas, I'm sorry you've got to be one of those to stay behind, but
you can't shoot and you can't move as well as the people we're taking."
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"It's all right," said Calas, his voice low and hoarse from the black wall of
bodies that now stood clumped around him. "More than anything I want to see
Cee and Artur free. Just one thing-if we hear noises from the camp that sound
like they've woken up and may be taking you, can the rest of us rush the camp,
and try to help?"
Hal hesitated. "You'd be smarter, all of you, to head back for the boulder and
the ledge." he said. "If they get their hands on six of you, anyway, they're
going to be able to make at least one show them the way up to the ledge," said
Calas. "Yes," said Hal. "All right, if you're sure they're all awake and
trying to take us prisoner or whatever, come along. You can rush the camp. But
you'll probably just be giving them that many more prisoners, or dead bodies."
"That's all I want to hear," said Calas.
The small forward group moved off. They were close enough to see some glimmers
of light through the trees ahead when Onete stopped them for the second time.
"About another twenty-five meters,- she told Hal, "and you'll be just outside
the clearing. They were foolish to put their lights up high that way. It means
that direct illumination stops, for all practical purposes, at the edge of the
area cleared. Reflection off ground and tree trunks will throw light farther
back, but the eyes of those on guard aren't likely to pick up what it
illuminates. Their sight is going to be adjusted to the brightness of the area
under the camp lights. It's so stupid to do things that way! Maybe there's a
trap to it, somewhere?" "I doubt it," said Hal. "I don't think they're really
expecting us, or anything on the order of a try to rescue the prisoners. Those
two men awake there, from what Calas tells me about the officers, are probably
just part of Liu's spit-and-polish attitude. The rule book says post guards in
situations like this, so he posts guards. " "Do you want your bow-people
spread around the camp now?" Onete asked. "I can have the foragers position
them." "Not spread around," said Hal. "Old Man stays with me and I'd like you
yourself to take the two of us down close to the hutments. Luke and the three
other bow-people, take them over
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299
to where the soldiers are sleeping on the ground. Old Man and I will take out
the two men on watch duty; and-Luke?" "Right here," said Luke's voice from the
darkness. "The minute," Hal said, "you and the other bow-armed people see the
two on guard drop, start shooting into the soldiers in the sleeping, sacks.
Old Man and I will be going after Liu and the Urk. Meanwhile, Onete, I want
you to do what I asked you to do up on the ledge. Use that knife you're
carrying to cut loose Cee and Artur. Then whistle in the other toragers with
the stretcher to put Artur on it and start carrying him out of here.
He paused and looked around at them, so that his voice would carry to each.
"Remember," he said, "what I told you when I briefed you before we left the
ledge. Once things start happening, eac o
you ignore everything going on around you and just do what you came here to
do. This is to free Cee and Artur, get Artur on the stretcher and carried out.
Onete, it'll be up to you to try to get Cee to understand we're not going to
hurt him the way the soldiers did. She probably won't trust us at first sight,
any more
than she trusted them.
Onete nodded. " I'l I do exactly that, " she said. " Don't worry about my part
of it, just concentrate on your own."
Hal smiled at her, though he knew the smile would be hidden in the darkness;
but perhaps it would color the tone of his voice enough for her to pick it up.
"I know you will. And we will." he said. "Let's go now.
Onete, go around to everyone, pass the word to anyone who didn't hear or
understand me completely, just now. Then come back and guide Old Man and me to
our proper positions."
She did, and a few moments later saw the three of them ghosting like morning
fog around the outskirts of the camp to the far end where the hutments stood
and the table at which all the enlisted men had eaten. It was now occupied
only by the two on duty. These two, deprived of their bottle, were seated at
one end of the table and had found themselves entertainment in the form of
some kind of gambling that involved dice. All their attention was on the
movement of the small, dotted cubes.
Beyond them and close by, Artur lay silent and motionless
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Gordon R. Dickson
under the blanket they had thrown over him. Farther off, Cee still sat
cross-legged at the foot of her tree. She was wide awake, but her gaze was
finally off the hutment that held Liu. Instead it was focused as plainly on
Onete, Hal and Old Man, as if it was broad daylight and she could see them
clearly, in their movement around the camp. "Can she see us, do you think?"
Hal whispered as softly as he could and still be heard by Onete. "Hears us,
more likely," whispered Onete in answer. "It's all right as long as one of
those two soldiers doesn't take a look at her and get interested in what there
could be out in the dark here to make her watch it," said Hal.
They stopped. Onete faced Cee squarely and shook her head deliberately, waving
one hand past her face and deliberately turning her own gaze away from the
little girl.
Whether Cee could not actually see them, or chose to ignore Onete's signal to
stop watching them, was impossible to tell; but in any case, her gaze remained
brightly following the three of them. Hal shrugged. They moved on. "This will
do," he whispered, finally, when they reached a
point which put them at about the same distance from hutments and the two
soldiers on watch. "Old Man?"
Hal had already taken his bow from his back and was stringing it. Out of the
corner of his eye he saw Old Man doing the same. They each took a shaft from
the quivers at their belts and a dart from a loop of one of the
bandoleer-belts that Luke and his helpers had made for them.
In silence, together, they screwed the darts on to the ends of the arrow
shafts. Old Man smiled, and-holding bow and arrow with one hand-held up the
fingers of his other with the thumb and middle finger only a couple of inches
apart to indicate the very short distance they had to shoot.
Hal smiled back and nodded. It was true. They were less than six meters from
the soldiers. Even Calas, probably, could not have missed, at this close
distance. Hal pointed at the farther soldier, the one across the table from
them and whose face was toward them.
Old Man smiled and nodded, aiming at the other man. They shot almost together.
The soft twang of the bowstrings was loud enough to be heard by the two
targets. Both men looked up from their gambling, startled, as the dart points
went
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301
home, Hal's in the shoulder muscle of the man he had aimed at, Old Man's in
the back of the neck of the soldier on his side.
Both the uniformed men reached with puzzled looks toward the points of
irritation where the dart needles had entered; but the shafts had already
dropped off the darts, clattering down and through the slats that made up the
seats of the benches with which the tables were equipped. Old Man's target
actually managed to close a couple of fingers weakly on the end of the dart
which protruded from his neck; but Hal's never managed to touch his, before
both men were failing backwards off the bench on to the ground.
Both Hal and Old Man broke off the ends of two more arrow shafts and shot
another dart into each slumped body, a dart that would inject the atropinelike
substance Tannaheh had equipped them with.
Now, for the first time, Hal took a second to look around the clearing. The
soldiers in the sleeping sacks were still receiving dart-loaded arrows fired
from the darkness beyond them. In the dazzling light from the overhead
illumination, he saw Onete, knife in hand, on her way to cut Cee loose from
the tree to which she had been tied.
The twang of a bowstring close to his right ear brought his attention abruptly
back to Old Man. He was in time to see a dart-laden arrow penetrate the wall
of the hutment in which the sleeping Liu was housed. "I believe that lodged in
a safe body area," Old Man said, lowering the bow and looking mildly at Hal.
"I thought you were going to wait until I could go and open one of the door
flaps, so you could see what you were shooting at," said Hal. "I know you made
that offer, back up on the ledge," said Old Man, still softly, "but as it
turned out it wasn't necessary. The still pictures on the scope were good
enough to show us where his cot stood and how he lay on it-you remember there
was one that showed him taking a nap with one of the flaps open, so that we
could see him there in the shadow on the cot?" "You're right," said Hal. He
looked at the middle hutment. "We saw the inside of the Urk's hutment too, but
without him on the cot. That's why you didn't put a dart through the wall of
it into him?"
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Gordon R. Dickson
"According to my memory, his cot was almost completely surrounded by equipment
of one kind or another." "I'll take care of it, then." Hal kicked off his
boots. "I'll open a flap to let you see what you're shooting at; and if
there's still no way you can get a clean shot at him, wave me on. I'll go in
and place a dart in him by hand."
He glanced about, saw Onete busy now with the medical kit and Artur, stepped
to the door of the middle hutment and pulled back the right-hand one of the
two flaps that closed its entrance. Within, by the outside light of the
clearing that was reflected inside through the open flap, it was possible to
see a body in a sleeping sack on a cot between what looked like a
temperaturecontrolled food storage box and a cooker. Hal was turning to check
with Old Man when the soft twang of a bowstring was accompanied almost
simultaneously by the passage of an arrow by him. It lodged its needle in what
looked like the upper body of the form in the sack.
The body lifted its head and shoulders as if to begin to get up; then fell
back and was still. "Here," said Old Man.
Hal turned to see the other beside him, the bow in one hand and the other
holding Hal's boots, the top rims clutched together. Hal took the boots and
put them on, as Old Man went forward, picked up the fallen shaft of the arrow,
broke off its end and made the second injection into the drugged sleeper on
the cot. "Indeed, it's the one Calas called the Urk," he said. The hand that
was not carrying his bow now held the power pistol the Urk had worn earlier.
"This was in its holster; on a belt with the rest of his clothes, on a chair
beside the cot." , ,Thanks," said Hal, "you don't want to keep it yourseIP"
"It's a machine for killing-nothing more," said Old Man. "I've never killed,
human or animal, and never will. These drugged darts are permissible."
Hal nodded and tucked the pistol into the waistband of his trousers.
He led the way back outside to the clearing. There, the other bow-people were
injecting the follow-up, atropinelike drug, mostly by hand, as they bent over
the still forms in the sleeping sacks. Hal shook his head and smiled a little.
For once, to
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303
confound practice as opposed to theory, a tactical plan had worked out as it
had been planned.
Hal turned to the darkness of the forest and whistled. The sound went out into
obscurity, and another whistle distantly responded.
A few moments later, Calas and the other Guild members they had left a hundred
meters back ran into the clearing, carrying the various parts of the stretcher
that had been part of their responsibility. As Hal watched they began to fit
it together and prepare Artur, now unconscious from a drug in the medical kit
but otherwise still alive, to be lifted on to it and secured there for
carrying.
The sight reminded Hal of Cee. He looked back toward the tree to which she had
been tied and did not see her, only Onete, hastening toward him. He went to
meet her. "Where's Cee?" he asked. "I don't know. I don't have any idea,"
answered Onete. She sounded distressed. "She can move so fast . . . I cut her
loose and had her with me, coming to join all the rest of us, here; and
something must have made me look away for a moment, because all at once she
was gone. Maybe she ran off into the forest." "Is that likely')" Hal said.
"With Artur still with us'?" "But I don't know where else she would go--
Hal did not hear the rest of what Onete said, because his ear was suddenly
caught by a faint, but undeniable noise, a wheep., wheep! sound. He started at
a dead run in the direction from which the sound had come, which was either
right beside or in Liu's hutment. The image of the two dead soldiers they had
unearthed was starkly in his mind, @uddenly connecting itself With a memory of
the two he had seen fall on the screen as the Soldiers rushed Cee to capture
her. He reached the hut and burst through the flaps; but he was too late.
Cee, holding one of Liu's socks in either hand, each sock with a heavy-looking
lump in its toe, ducked under his arm and was out the flaps before he could
turn around.
He did not wait to examine what he knew would be the corpse of Liu Hu Shen,
but ran after Cee, almost catching her as she went in between the open flaps
of the Urk's tent and actually catching her, a moment later, as she stood just
inside the entrance swinging in her right hand a weighted sock that gave
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Gordon R. Dickson
forth the same sort of noise that had attracted his attention a moment before.
He grabbed her from behind, wrapping his arms around both of her arms, pinning
them to her body and lifting her clear of the ground.
She fought back fiercely, in utter silence and with incredible strength for
one so young. She kicked back and up with her heels; but he had anticipated
this, spreading his legs and holding her closely against him, so that those
same heels, rock-hard after years of running unshod on all kinds of surfaces,
could not reach his rom.
She tried to swing the weighted end of the sock up to smash his face or hit
his head; but his grip was around her elbows and she did not have the freedom
of movement and strength to rotate the heavy end through the air and upward to
its point of aim. Meanwhile, continuously, she struggled to twist and turn in
his arms, to win enough freedom from his grasp so that she could twist loose
and escape.
But, fighting as best she could, she was a youngster pitting the strength of
her small body against the large and powerful adult one. Hal held her fast and
backed with her out of the hutment. "Onete! Old Man!" he shouted.
He heard the sound of two pairs of running feet, but it was Old Man who first
stepped around from behind him to face them. He twitched the weighted sock so
suddenly from Cee's grasp that her fingers failed to hold their grip on it,
and tossed it aside. Her gaze noted where it fell and returned instantly to
glarc at him. "Child, child," he said sorrowfully to her, "don't you kno" that
nothing is ever settled, nothing is ever gained, by killing?"
She stared back at him with savage, unrepentant eyes. "Take her," Hal told
him. "Hold her." Onete had now joined them and was talking rapidly and
soothingly to Cee, who ignored the woman completely. "Old Man can hold her,"
Hal said to Onete. "You try and make her understand that we're here to rescue
her uncle and take him to someplace where he'll be safe; but her killing Liu
just now- "She killed the officer!" Onete said. "I'm afraid so. I should have
realized she might."
Onete stooped and picked up the officer's sock Cee had
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305
dropped, held it upside down and shook it. A short, heavy energy pack for a
power pistol dropped out of the end of it. "She must have got them from Liu's
uniform belt, " Hal said, -and thrown sock and pack together, the way she'd
send a rock from her sling. Those two dead in the forest will have been her
doing. The two we saw on the screen, who fell when they rushed in to catch
her. But never mind that now." "What are we to do with her?" Onete said,
distressed. "As I say, Old Man can hold her. It'll be up to you to make her
understand that we're here to rescue her uncle; but she's already made a
problem for us by killing Liu. If she kills anyone else, we may not be able to
cover it up and send the soldiers away believing things that'll keep them from
coming back. If they don't believe and do come back, they'll find and kill us
all, including her uncle, after all."
Onete nodded. "I'll try," she said. "Don't just try. She's got to understand
and go along with us. You've got to get through to her, somehow. She's got to
understand that we have to take Artur back up to the Chantry Guild to fix what
the soldiers did to him; and she's got to help us
do that, not hinder!" "All right," said Onete. "Take her, Old Man," said Hal,
"but be careful. Loosen up for a second and she'l I get away; and we'l I never
catch her. "
With her weapon taken from her, Cee had stopped struggling in Hal's arrns; but
he was very sure she would explode into action the moment she felt any
loosening of the grip upon her. He waited for Old Man to take the child into
his own arms; but instead the other merely reached up and began to stroke the
back of Cee's neck, meanwhile crooning to her, a wordless melody that
consisted of the same series of musical phrases repeated over and over again.
"Artur told me about that," Onete murmured to Hal. "It was
one of the things Cee's mother used to hum when Cee was a baby and even after,
to put her to sleep. Artur thought he could use it to make Cee trust him; but
maybe he just didn't hum it right. Old Man must have learned it from him."
Hal nodded. The neck-stroking, he knew, was one of the Physical aids to
hypnosis.
In any case, he felt the tension gradually going from the
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Gordon R. Dickson
small, tight body he held, growing less and less until eventually Cee hung
almost limply in his arms.
Old Man stopped his crooning. "I think you can let her go now," he said to
Hal. He took one of Cee's small, hard and dirty hands in his own. "Come with
me," he said to the girl.
He led her off. Onete followed. Hal turned back with a feeling of relief,
mixed with urgency, to the matter of taking care of the soldiers, on whom the
drug would act for only a limited amount of time.
The first thing to be done was to get the Urk up, and bring him out under
hypnosis to ostensibly explain things to equally drugged and to-be-hypnotized
soldiers. Hal's original story that he had planned they would carry back to
their headquarters was to have been given them by Liu; and would have simply
told them that both Artur and Cee had died under torture-the last stage of
which would have been supposed to have taken place privately at the hands of
Liu himself in one of the hutments; that the two had thereafter been buried
and, since Liu had learned enough from them before they died to be certain
there were no other people around in this area of the forest, they would all
be returning to headquarters.
Now, his story must not only be given by the Urk, which weakened it, the Urk
being no more than a noncommissioned officer; also it must explain Liu's
death, which would raise a great many more questions than if Liu, himself, had
returned with only two soldiers lost. Particularly when the loss could be
blamed on the great strength of the adult they had captured. And it would be
Liu's word that there was nothing more to be found up here.
In time, of course, that hypnotic memory would wear thin; and some memory of
what had actually happened to each of them here tonight would have surfaced @n
the minds of all of' them, officers and men. But by that time, the subject
would have been closed and filed away some time since, and none of them. even
Liu, would have any good reason to make extra work and trouble for himself by
digging back into the records and looking for the truth of what had actually
happened.
Hal stepped into the Urk's hut, still wrapped in thought. It was not until he
actually opened the top flap of the Urk's sleeping sack and put his hand on
the man's throat to both rouse
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307
him and begin the process of hypnosis, that the coolness of the flesh he was
touching brought his attention back to what was before him.
The coolness was very slight, because of the shortness of time that had passed
since they had reached the camp. But it was noticeable enough now to alert
Hal; and now that he looked closely at the man under his hand, he saw that the
Urk was also dead. Almost as immediately as he registered the fact of death
and his eyes found what had killed the man, his memory clicked back with
something he should have remembered, but had not until this moment.
When Cee had dodged under his arm and out of Liu's hutment before he could
catch her, she had been swinging two of the officer's weighted socks. There
had been one in each hand. This, in spite of the fact that Liu had died of a
crushed throat like the two dead soldiers they had disinterred on the way
here. Since Liu presumably had been wearing only one sock on each foot, and
had taken those off for the night, she had been able to turn them into weapons
after she had stolen silently into his hutment. She would have loaded them
with energy packs from the carrying loops in the man's belt. Then she must
have thrown, and picked up again, the one she had used to kill the
force-leader.
But when Hal had burst into the Urk's hut and wrapped his arms around her as
she was just about to throw, she had been carrying only one of the socks with
which she had left Liu's sleeping place. Somehow she must have gotten off one
throw before Hal had caught her; and since it had been a hurried shot at the
target, she must have been about to follow it up with a
second cast when Hal had seized her.
There was an ordinary battlelamp on the chair holding the Urk's clothes. Hal
turned it up and in the wash of reddish light that spread over the form on the
cot the face stood out clearly. The right temple was plainly indented. The Urk
must have died instantly from the first energy-pack loaded sock; but Cee, who
had most probably been aiming at his throat as she had in all the previous
cases, must in the dimness of light reflected from the outside of the hutment,
have realized only that she had missed her target. So she had tried, but
failed, to get her second weighted sock thrown before Hal had stopped her.
He stood, head slightly bent under the low roof of the
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Gordon R. Dickson
hut ent, which had been tall enough for people like the Urk and Liu but was
not for him. Now, the situation was even more co@plicated.
Briefly, what he would now need to hypnotize the soldiers into believing, must
be an ever greater distortion of what had actually taken place here in the
forest.
He turned, went out of the hutment, and across to the group that was now
strapping Artur securely onto his stretcher. A little off to one side, the
drugged soldiers sat or lay still, watched by the other four bowmen; and a
little beyond these were Cee, Onete and Old Man. Old Man's hand still rested
on the back of Cee's neck. But it lay there with an appearance more like that
of a comforting gesture, than a calming one. Onete's lips were moving steadily
as she spoke to Cee; who in her turn was utterly unmoving and unanswering, but
listened to the grown woman as if fascinated.
Hal reached the group by the stretcher. "I'm sorry," he said, "but I'm going
to have to make use of Artur before you carry him away. If he's ready to be
moved, follow me. I want to bring him into the hutment on the far right where
the officer in command was sleeping. Calas?" "Right here," answered Calas,
emerging from the crowd. "Come along," said Hal. "I want to talk to you as we
go. After Liu and the Urk, who'd be in charge of these soldiers?" "Who?
Probably him," said Calas as they walked toward the hutment. He pointed to a
square-bodied, middle-aged man with thin, tousled hair on a round head,
sitting beside his sleeping sack and staring at nothing. "He's a supply
corporal; and theoretically he wouldn't command force-soldiery. But he's the
senior in rank; and besides, he's one of the headquarters clique, one of the
bunch that runs things and you keep in good with, if you know what's good for
you. His name's Harvey. He'd take command here if Liu or the Urk couldn't.
He'd like doing that-but it's not likely-"
He stared at Hal abruptly. "Or is it?" "Yes," said Hal bluntly. "They're both
dead." "Dead?" Calas stopped in his tracks, then had to run to catch up with
Hal, who had not paused. "Cee got to them," Hal said.
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309
"She did?" Calas broke into a smile. "How?" The stretcher bearers, also close
enough to hear this, turned their heads at Hal's blunt statement. But he did
not answer. They continued to stare, to the point where they almost missed the
entrance to the hutment at which they were aiming, before finally carrying the
stretcher through it. "So, as a result, we've got a problem on our hands," Hal
went on. They were now inside the hutment that had been Liu's. Hal stood aside
to let the bearers set down on the floor the still unconscious Artur. "Take
him off the stretcher," Hal directed them. "I want him laid, face down,
sprawled out on the floor as if he'd fallen trying to reach Liu on his cot.
When you're done with that, go to the hutment next door, dress the body of the
Urk in his uniform, sidearm and all-find the power pistol-and carry him in
here on the stretcher. " "Calas," said Hal, as soon as they had gone out, "how
well could you imitate Liu's voice? I don't mean you'd have to be good enough
to foot anyone under ordinary conditions, close up; but I need a shout or two,
supposedly from him, to back up what I'm going to hypnotize the rest of the
soldiers into believing. Did Liu have some particular way of speaking that was
his alone? Everyone does; and most soldiers can imitate their officers'
mannerisms." "He had a high voice and a snappy, snotty way of talking," said
Calas. "I think I could come up with something like it, if I'm to be yelling
from inside the hutment here, where they can't see me and the hutment'll
probably mess up the way his voice'd sound, some. " "Good," said Hal, '. what
I want you to yel I is an order from Liu to the Urk to shoot. The idea will be
that Artur's somehow gotten loose in here." "Good," said Calas. "I can do that
standing on my head. Anyway, I like the idea of Artur getting loose in here
with the two of them. Or, I would if Artur would have actually done anything
to them, even if he did get free."
CHAPTER
29
"Good," said Hal, in his turn. He moved to the cot and began propping Liu's
head up on the pillow beneath it, so that his throat was visible. The body was
beginning to cool further, but still had not stiffened. He took the officer's
pistol belt from its perch over the back of the bedside chair that held the
rest of the man's clothes, and laid it on the seat of the chair, so that the
power pistol in its holster was lyin.@, flat, with the pistol butt next to the
bed.
He stretched out the man's arm and curled the dead fingers around the butt of
the weapon, half drawing it from its holster. He chuckled, with a rueful edge
to the chuckle. "What's the joke, Friend?" Calas's voice asked behind him
"Only," said Hal-turning to face the former soldier--the fact I'd just been
thinking earlier that our plans for all this had gone off perfectly this time,
exactly as we made them, up on the ledge. That was before I found Liu and the
Urk had been killed-and everything had to be changed." "You've got a different
idea now?" asked Calas.
There was no doubt in the smaller man's voice. Clearly, he had complete
confidence that whatever might have come up, Hal could adjust their plans to
take care of it. "I had it in mind to arrange things so that the two of them
would take their troops home. Their report would be that both Artur and Cee
had died under questioning. But that it was pretty
THE CHANTRY GUILD
311
clear from what they said that there was no one else living up here. They
would have reported that they'd buried the bodies, the way they buried the
soldiers that Artur'd have been blamed for killing earlier, then simply gave
up and went back to the ga7ison. "
And now?" prompted Calas. The stretcher bearers came in with the dressed and
armed body of the Urk. "Put him down just inside the entrance flap to the
left," Hal told them. "As I was just telling Calas, we've had to change plans.
Now when I hypnotize those soldiers out there I'm going to have to convince
them that everybody killed everybody else. A taller story by quite a bit. Two
dead soldiers, even a dead underofficer's one thing. A dead commissioned
officer's some-
thing else-at least as far as paperwork is concerned. Their headquarters is
going to be grilling these soldiers for details -that's right; take the Urk
off the stretcher and pull him up so
he's not quite alongside Artur. Now turn him nearly all the way over on his
face, so that you can't see the front part of his body. "
They did as he said. "All right," said Hal, when they were finished. "Now,
roll the stretcher up around its poles and lay it along the wall of the
hutment, behind the cot, so it can't be seen. In a moment I want the rest of
you to go out and join the others guarding the soldiers. Send someone to me at
once if any of them show signs Of coming out of their drugged state."
He knelt beside the unconscious form of Artur. "Oh. Also-,- he said, raising
his head to look back over his shoulder at the stretcher bearers, "one of you
go out and get me a length of the rope they had him tied up with. About a
meter's length'I I do."
The bearers looked at each other, and the one nearest the door went out. When
he came back with the rope, Hal took it, tied Artur's hands gently together
behind his back with one end of the rope. "Anyone got a knife?" he asked,
still kneeling beside Artur.
Calas and one of the stretcher bearers were the only ones with such items, Hal
opened each of them in turn and tried the edge of the blade on his thumb. He
chose Calas's. With it, he made various cuts all around the rope in an
irregular circle, severing
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Gordon R. Dickson
only the top strands. He pulled these cuts apart and cut deeper, pulling on
the rope as he did so, so that when at last it parted, it showed a ragged end.
"There," he said, winding the rest of the rope around the central pole that
upheld the hutment and had been mechanically driven deep into the packed earth
under it. He left protruding about as much rope as would make one turn around
the pole, with the ragged-looking end projecting into the air. "There," he
said. "That should look more like someone broke the rope with sheer strength,
rather than its being cut. I think, under hypnosis, I can make them believe
someone as big as Artur could do that." "He probably could have," said Calas,
accepting his knife back.
Hal shook his head. "Have someone tie you with your hands behind you using
ordinary string, sometime; and see if you can break it to get loose," he said.
"if you've a length of it between you and what you Ire tied to, so you can
snap the cord with a sudden jerk, you might be able to break it. If there's no
play in it, I think you'll probably find you can't break even that. But it
doesn't matter. I think under hypnotic suggestion we can make the soldiers
believe Artur did it with this rope."
He stood up. "Now," he said, "everybody out, except for Calas and one of you.
Calas can use whoever stays with him as a messenger, if he needs to send me
word of something. Come on."
He led them back out into the night and the bright overhead lights of the
camp. A slow, damp breeze-a herald of dawn -had begun to blow. They had
probably less than an hour before they would be able to see each other's faces
without the artificial lights.
The prisoners were still either sitting or lying motionless, still under the
effect of the drugged arrows. "Set them up," Hal told the Guild members.
"Including the two who were on watch and sitting at the table. Add those two
to the back line of the others. I want them all sitting up with their backs to
the hutments. "
The Chantry Guild people went about setting up the resistless soldiers. Most
of those they handled stayed put in an upright
THE CHANTRY GUILD
313
position, once placed in it, with their legs crossed. A few were overweight
enough or tight-jointed enough that they needed support to hold that position.
In such cases, a Guild member sat down with his or her back against the
soldier who could not balance himself.
Meanwhile, Hal had been going down the line of men. There were two lines,
since that was the way the sleeping sacks had been laid out on the ground. He
squatted in front of each one in turn and spoke to the relaxed, apparently
unhearing, man before him for a few minutes until he evoked an answer to the
question "Do you hear me?"
At a "yes," he moved on to the next one in line. It took him nearly half an
hour to get all of them to answer him. When, however, he had gotten a response
from the last one in the front line, he turned to the closest Chantry Guild
member; a slim, almost fragile-looking girl of eighteen, with a sudden
dazzling smile that came without warning and invariably seemed to change her
completely. Her name was Kady and she was one of Onete's picked group of
expert night foragers. "I'd like you to go to Calas now, in the hutment over
there," Hal said to her. Her smile flashed in agreement. "Tell him that when
you pass the signal to him, he's to call out in his best imitation of Liu's
voice. What he's supposed to shout is "Shoot, Urk! Now! Shoot him!"
Hal repeated the words to be shouted, slowly. "Now," he said to Kady, "you
repeat them back to me." "Shoot, Urk!" said Kady, in a thin, clear voice.
"Now! Shoot him!' "Good,': said Hal. "You make Calas repeat it back to you,
that same way, to make sure he's got it correctly. Then step outside and keep
your eyes on me. When I wave, you stick your head back inside and tell him to
shout. You've got all that?" "When I see you wave at me I make Calas repeat
'Shoot, Urk! Now! Shoot him!"' said Kady. "Then, what do we do?" "I'll take
care of the rest of it," said Hal. "You two leave the hutment and back off.
Repeat that for me." "Calas and I leave the hutment after he shouts and we
leave the rest to you," she said. "Right," Hal replied, "you're perfect."
She smiled again, and went toward the hutment. Hal himself
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Gordon R. Dickson
turned back and walked around to face the two lines of seated soldiers, who
now all sat facing the still dark jungle beyond the clearing lights.
His eyes picked out the man named Harvey, who was one of those able to sit
upright, cross-legged, without any support at his back. He had a strong-boned
face, softened by fat, and the bulge of his stomach was enough to reach
between his crooked legs almost to the ground in front of him, leaning forward
as he was; and probably helped counterbalance any tendency he had to fall
backward. He would have looked pleasant and ineffective if it had not been for
the hardness of feature under his facial fat.
On Hal's first pass along the seated lines, asking the individual soldiers if
they could hear him, Harvey had been the single individual to whom Hal had
said anything more. He had suggested then that Harvey might have to take on a
position of decision for all the rest. With the others, he had merely made
sure that he had fixed their attention hypnotically upon him and upon what he
was going to tell them. "Listen to me, all of you, now," he said, raising his
voice. "You've all been asleep until just now,"
He paused to remember something. He had asked the two men who had been on
watch duty what their names were, and for a moment he had misplaced those
names among the thousands of others tucked into his memory. "All of you have
been asleep," he went on, almost immediately, "even Bill Jarvis and Stocky
Weems, who were on watch. That drink they had earlier tonight must have gotten
to them. In any case, you were all asleep until just now. Isn't that right?
Answer-yes! " "Yes," muttered the two lines of men. "You knew when you went to
sleep that your force-leader, Liu, and the Urk were still at work in Liu's
hutment questioning both the little girl and the big man you all took
prisoncr," Hal went on. "But you paid no attention to that until just now,
when something woke you all. What woke you?"
He waited for a long moment of silence. "I'll tell you what woke you," he
said. "You heard a yell from the Urk, as if he was hurt or frightened. You
don't remember what he said, but you do remember what you heard after that
yell had woken you. You all remember that, don't you? Say 'yes' if you
remember."
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315
"Yes," said the seated men, again. "That's right," said Hal. "From that moment
on, you all remember everything, just as it happened, or as it was told to
you. That's so, isn't it? Say 'yes,' if you remember." "Yes. " "You won't
remember me or any of these other unfamiliar men and women you've seen here
tonight. You'll forget that anyone was here but your own fellow soldiers and
officers. Say 'yes.' " "Yes," intoned the soldiers like a ragged, impromptu
choir.
Hal walked forward among them until he stood before Harvey, in the second
rank. He turned to the man on Harvey's right. "You can't see me, or hear what
I say to Harvey. You won't remember me at all, either from earlier or now. Say
'yes., "Yes," said the soldier.
Hal turned to the man on Harvey's left, repeated his words and got another
"yes" for answer. Hal turned his attention back to Harvey, squatting down so
that he was almost face to face with the fat man wearing the corporal's tabs
on the gray collar of his uniform. He spoke to Harvey, using a voice pitched
so low that the two soldiers on either side would have had trouble hearing him
even if they had been listening. "Harvey," Hal said, "you hear me, don't you?"
"Yes," answered Harvey. "You won't remember about this conversation, any more
than you'll remember seeing me or anyone but your own people and the two
prisoners," said Hal. "You'll do this because I tell you to, but also because
it'll be in your own best interests to forget. If you forget you'll get all
the credit for getting these soldiers back to headquarters, yourself."
Harvey smiled, but the expression of the rest of his face did not change. "In
just a minute or two," Hal said quietly, "something is going to happen. None
of the rest of the soldiers out here know it's going to happen; but you've
been expecting some trouble of this kind to crop up from the moment you saw
Liu and the Urk planned to question that very large, strong man, all by
themselves, in one of the hutments, without a couple of the armed soldiers
standing guard. You knew he was dangerous because he killed two men with his
bare hands while he was being captured.
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Gordon R. Dickson
But of course, it wasn't your place to say anything to the Urk or the
force-leader, so you didn't. But that's why you've been ready to take charge
of things if some kind of trouble does crop up. Isn't that right?"
1, Yes. I I
Hal paused. "That's why, not like the rest, you've been sleeping lightly; and
so you woke up the first moment you heard anything out of the ordinary. Now,
you're just about to hear it. I'll leave you for a moment, and then I'll be
back beside you when you hear it, to tell you what to do; and I'll stay beside
you until everything's under control. Understood?" "Understood," said Harvey.
Hal got to his feet and moved swiftly and silently to Liu's hutment. He
stepped inside to meet the inquiring gazes of Calas, Kady and the one Guild
member who had stayed with Calas as a messenger. "All set," he said to Calas.
"Now, when Kady passes you the signal you've got two things to do. One is
shout what Kady told you to shout. The other is to take the power pistol from
the Urk's holster, and use it to blow the throat out of Liu. Can you do that,
or have you got some hesitations about shooting a corpse?" " I wouldn't shoot
I ive people today-I hope, " said Calas. " I felt like killing Liu after what
he'd ordered them to do to Artur. But I don't think maybe I'd kill, anymore,
except someone like him, now I'm a Chantry member. It's not going to bother
me, though, to blow the dead bastard's throat out. I suppose you want to hide
the fact of how he was killed?" "That's right," said Hal. "If you hadn't
wanted to be the one who used the power pistol, I'd have to, and I'd do the
shout and the shot from here, before I go back to the soldiers. After you're
done put the pistol into the Urk's hand."
-@ight,- said Calas. "Good," said Hal. He turned to Kady. "Come with me and
stand just outside the door, so you can see me. I'll be waving soon after I
get back to one particular soldier. When I do, you tell Calas, and run away
from the hutments-fast. Orban, you come away now and get out of sight with the
rest of the Guild members. "
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317
. Orban was a slight man in his forties with very light-colored blond hair
flat on his skull. He nodded.
Hal left the hutment, went back to the soldiers, and squatted down once more
in front of Harvey. He looked about. All Guild members, as instructed earlier,
were out of the line of sight of the hypnotized soldiers. "Whatever happens, "
he said, looking back at Harvey, "it'll be up to you to lead all the rest of
the men out of here and back to headquarters. You've got rank on everybody
else; and the others'll follow you. All you have to do is take charge. I'll be
right beside you all the time until you leave here, even though you won't
remember that afterward, and the rest won't see or
hear me when I talk to you."
He paused. Harvey watched him, listening with an attention that was so
profound it was almost innocent. "Now, in a moment, what woke you all up is
going to go on with more noise and trouble," Hal said. "You'll need to take
charge of things at once, Order all the rest of them to stay put here while
you go and investigate. Remind them you're the one
in command, Corporal."
He watched Harvey's eyes closely on the last word, but they did not change.
The ranks of groupman, force-leader, and team-leader, which Cletus Grahame had
proposed in his mas-
sive work on tactics and strategy, had come into being as the jealously
guarded property of the actual fighting troops. The older ranks of corporal,
sergeant, warrant officer and lieutenant had been kept only for those in
support positions. Some who bore the older ranks were ashamed of them; some
secretly pleased by the special access to privileges that went along with
them. Harvey, it seemed, was one of the latter.
Nonetheless, most noncommissioned officers in his position secretly yearned
for the authority to directly order and command combat troops. What Hal was
suggesting hypnotically to Harvey now would give him not only that, but the
approval of his superiors back at headquarters, when he took control of a
situation in which his officers were dead.
Some men in his position might have found the prospect either forbidding or
unpleasant. Harvey, however, gave no sign that this was the case with him.
Hal stood up.
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Gotdon R. Dickson
"Now," he said to all the soldiers, "lie down. Sleep." They all, including
Harvey, obeyed. Hal turned to face the hutment that had been Liu's and the
slim figure of Kady standing just outside the entrance flaps. He lifted his
arm over his head and waved it back and forth, slowly, twice. He saw her arm
go up to wave back and she turned to speak in through the flaps.
Turning back, she went off at a run toward one side of the hutments, where at
the edge of the darkness, Onete stood with Cee. The girl had wrapped around
herself another vine having a split-open pod, and the pod sagged down, heavy
once more with what were probably more rocks of a size to fit the girl's
closed fist. Her eyes were steady on the hutment in which were not only the
dead Liu and Urk, but the still living Artur.
A shout, almost high-pitched enough to be called a scream, came from the
structure, with the words Hal had directed Kady to pass on to Calas. They were
followed almost immediately by the coughing roar of the power pistol, and
almost as quickly after that, the figure of Calas slipped out through the
flaps and headed off in the direction Kady and Orban had taken.
Hal clapped his hands together loudly. "Sit up!" he shouted. "All of You men!
Listen! What's happening? What's going on in there?"
They were sitting up, most of them looking around, bewildered.
Hal leaned down swiftly and spoke in the ear of Harvey, who was also now
sitting up, but looking toward Liu's hutment. "Now!" Hal said softly. "Now,
you take control of them, or it'll he too late. Tell them to stay where they
are. You'll look into it!" "Hold it! Stay put!" shouted Harvey, scrambling to
his feet. "That's an order-from me! I'll find out what's happening."
A few of the soldiers who had already fumblingly started to rise, sat back
down. Still groggy from the remainder of the drugs still in their bloodstream,
but released from the deeper stages of hypnosis by the clapping of Hal's
hands, they swore and muttered to each other, staring at the hutment-but they
stayed put.
Harvey stumbled toward the hutment. His cross-legged position had evidently
cut off the circulation of blood to his legs; and
THE CHANTRY GUILD
319
they were just now reawakening to normal flow. He was walking more normally by
the time he reached the flaps of the hutment. "Corporal Magson, sir. May I
come in?" he called, and waited. When after a moment, there was no answer, he
pushed his way inside, closely followed by Hal.
Under the silent interior lights of the hutment, the bodies of the obviously
dead Urk and Liu Hu Shen and the unconscious figure of Artur lay still.
.-They're all dead," said Hal quickly, standing behind the corporal. He spoke
in a low voice, directly into Harvey's ear, as the fat man stopped, checked by
the sight before him. "You can see what's happened. The prisoner must have
been strong enough to break loose and start for the force-leader. Liu must
have reached for his pistol, but since he'd been watching from his bed and the
sidearm was in its holster on the chair beside the bed, he must have seen he
couldn't get to it in time. So he shouted-we all heard him, just now-for the
Urk to shoot. And the Urk must have-but not fast enough to save his own life.
Look at that, his head's all crushed in. That big man must have been as strong
as a giant! But the Urk did manage to kill him with that one shot." "Yes . . .
" said Harvey, still staring, still under the influence of the hypnosis to the
point where he heard Hal's words as if they were his own thoughts. "And when
the Urk shot the big man," Hal went on in a soft, persuasive voice, "the
charge went right through him and killed the force-leader, too. They're all
dead." "Yes, that's it," said Harvey. "You'll really have to take charge now,"
said Hal. "They'll think a lot of you at headquarters for handling this
properly. You'll want to bring the officers' bodies back for burial, of
course; but you can have some of the men scrape a hole and rol I the body of
the big man in it, next to where they buried the child, after she died from
the questioning. As Liu himself said just an hour ago-remember? Liu said that
there was pretty surely no one else up here to find; or either the child or
the man would have talked by this time. But he said, remember, they might as
well make sure by working on the man until he died?" "Yes," said Harvey, "yes,
I remember just how it was."
Hal paused. "Actually, you know," he said in a lower, more confidential
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Gordon R. Dickson
tone in Harvey's ear, "those two just wanted an excuse to have their fun with
what they had left." "Right. They would," muttered Harvey. ,'Now, the first
thing," Hal went on, "is to get a couple of the soldiers you can trust to
remember what you say and do what you want. Get them in here with you to see
what's happened, and then they can take the big man out and bury him. Also,
you better record some pictures of how things were, here, while you're at it,
to show back at headquarters." "Now!" he said, clapping his hands softly
together behind Harvey's right ear. "Remember. None of you've seen anyone but
the big man and the girl. Now, get things moving!"
Harvey started, turned, and went out of the hutment. Hal followed. The fat man
walked slowly back to the seated soldiers, an went around to stand in front of
them. " All right, listen to me now . . . " he began . . . and paused. Hal
whispered in his ear and he spoke up again. "We've had a blowup. Both the
Force and the Group are dead. That leaves me in command; so all of you snap to
and do what I tell you! We've got to bury that prisoner, strike camp, and get
the officers' bodies back to headquarters, right away. Ranj, Wilson and Morui,
you three come with me. Bring a recorder. I want you for witnesses and to make
some recordings of what's happened inside the Force's hutment. The rest of you
get busy striking camp and making ready to move out. Come on, come on now!
Move!"
Time was also moving, Hal noted. Dawn was very close. Both moons were long
down; and the utter blackness just before day, at the ground level, denied the
lightening of the sky beyond the lamps of the camp, when he looked straight
up.
Back on the ledge, Hal had warned the Guild people to start getting back out
of sight the moment he first clapped his hands, to begin the process of
bringing the soldiers partially out of their hypnosis. They had faithfully
faded back beyond the lights into the jungle dark; and, as the morning
lightened further, they would move farther and farther off, until even under
daylight, the forest itself would hide them from the view of anyone in the
camp.
In the meantime Hal, continuing to remind the three soldiers Harvey had chosen
and any others he dealt with, that he was not there as far as their
perceptions were concerned, had supervised
THE CHANTRY GUILD
321
the picture-taking of the interior of Liu,s hutment. Then, at his prompting,
Harvey had picked up entrenching tools and taken the same men out into the
darkness with a single handlight, to dig a grave for the supposedly dead
Artur. While they were involved in this task, he had the Guild bearers carry
Artur, once more on the stretcher, with the straps securing him in place, to
the edge of the excavation. The soldiers, digging and swearing at the hand
labor, paid no attention to the bringers of the body they were to dispose of,
and, having set Artur down, the Guild people melted back out of sight into the
darkness.
Harvey had been supervising the grave-digging under Hal's instructions. When
the diggers had gone deep enough into the soft forest floor, half mold, half
earth, Hal had Harvey call them out for a break in their labors and take them
aside. There, by the limited light of the single source of illumination they
had brought with them, he brought them momentarily back into a more profound
state of hypnosis, and gave them a false memory of having tumbled Artur
themselves from the graveside into the grave; then begun to cover him up,
before Harvey had called them out for a rest. Then he signaled the stretcher
bearers to start back to the ledge with Artur.
As soon as they had faded into the darkness with their load, at Hal's
prompting, Harvey sent the grave-diggers back to finish shoveling into the
open excavation all that they had taken out. They did so; and Harvey took them
back to camp. By now, all of the hutments and erected lights were down and
packed, ready to move; and most of the soldiers themselves were in full kit,
with their weapons, and ready to move out as well -
At the edge of the camp, Hal left the soldiery to complete the job of
returning to their headquarters under Harvey's command -
He had little doubt that from this point on, military habit would take them
back there without further prompting. The hypnotic command he had given them
would eventually wear off; but their memories of what had actually happened
would remain confused, and there would be nothing for any of them to gain
later by changing their version of what had happened, as they would have
originally given it to their superiors.
He dropped into a lope over the now clearly visible ground, to catch up with
the party from the Guild, who by this time would be halfway back to the
entrance of the trail up the mountainside.
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Gordon R. Dickson
The day was rapidly brightening around him and his steady jog felt good. The
ledge was small enough, and he had been deeply enough immersed in his other
concerns, so that he had not deliberately walked, let alone covered ground at
a run except for that one day, since he had left his exercise room at the
Final Encyclopedia.
He was reminded again of what he had thought during that last run, a few days
ago-even his running treadmill at the Final Encyclopedia, surrounded with the
images and scents of an imaginary outdoors, had not been like this. This was
real; and it brought back old memories of his runs through the forest near the
estate in the Rocky Mountains where he had spent his second childhood; before
the coming of the Others had sent him scuttling for a hiding place on the
Younger Worlds.
For a moment, the image of the young gunmen with their long, slim-barreled
void pistols, and Bleys Ahrens, as they had suddenly appeared at the estate,
came back to him. Particularly Bleys, slimmer then than he was now-wherever on
the Younger Worlds he might be at this moment, eleven years later. Slimmer,
and seeming much taller; both because then, in that first sight, Hal had not
himself reached his full adult height, which was to be the equal of Bleys';
and because of the last ten years of slight but noticeable aging and
thickening of the other man's body.
A cold feeling like a breath of some stray breeze seemed to pass through him.
He had let Amanda bring him here to Kultis and the Chantry Guild with no real
faith that here he might be helped to find the Creative Universe. The impasse
keeping him from that goal these last two years had been like some great,
impossibly wide, impossibly thick wall of glass, holding him out. But now,
over the past few weeks, he had come out of the despondency that his failure
had built in him. Hope had stirred in him once again-but with hope, now, also
came fear.
Time was passing. Tam's days were numbered. Even if they had not been, the
force that Bleys was building to overwhelm even the phase-shielded Earth was
moving to its inevitable completion. Time was on the march; and while he had
refound hope-great hope, somehow, with this successful rescue of Artur-he had
still not found a way past that impassable, glasslike barrier to his lifetime
goal-
He glimpsed the figures of some of the Guild members
THE CHANTRY GUILD
323
through the farther trees before him and realized he had finally caught up
with them. He checked his jog to a walk. It might worry them to see him
running, might make them think that there was more urgency than there actually
was now, to getting Artur up the mountainside to the ledge and proper care.
Actually, it was only Artur's physical condition that still urged that time
not be wasted. The soldiers of the Occupation Forces should not bother them
for some little time to come.
He walked, but stretched his stride to cover ground swiftly without appearing
to race. In a moment or two he was up with them. Artur, on the stretcher, was
at the head of the traveling group, with a man on each of the four handles of
the stretcher. As Hal had foreseen, Artur was proving a heavy load for his
carriers, even across this level, if somewhat cluttered, forest floor. The
extra people beyond the rock would be very much needed to get him safety up
the steep trail of the mountainside to the ledge. "How is he?" Hal asked
Onete, who was walking beside the head of the stretcher, keeping an eye on
Artur's face. "He came to," answered Onete, without taking her eyes off
Artur's face. "Tannaheh gave me several loaded syringes to use if he did that.
I used one; and he went back to sleep. I wish Tannaheh had told me what I was
supposed to be giving him. I don't like doing things like that without
knowing." "It probably didn't occur to Tannaheh," said Hal. "It occurred to
me," Onete said, "but he shoved them into my hand just as we left the ledge,
after running after us to give them to me. I didn't have a chance to ask him,
in the dark and all. Anyway, Artur's back unconscious or sleeping again, one
of the two; and that's a blessing-"
She lowered her voice almost to a whisper, speaking out of the corner of her
mouth, still without taking her gaze off Artur's face. "Check to my right,
about four meters off," she said, barely using her lips, "but don't turn your
head to look."
He leaned over the stretcher as if to gaze more closely into the face of
Artur, using the movement to disguise a tilt of his head to the right, so that
out of the corner of his eyes, he could see into the forest on that side of
them. His view picked up Cee, prowling along level with the stretcher and
himself.
The vine with its pod no longer was around her waist. It hung
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Gordon R. Dickson
by its vine-ends from one fist, with the weight of what was probably a single
rock only pulling it down. Cee's other fist held a second rock ready. Her eyes
were on him with the same steadiness they had held back at the camp when she
had looked both at him and at Liu. "She still doesn't trust us completely,"
Onete said, still in a barely audible voice, still with her lips hardly
moving. "But particularly, she doesn't trust you. Liu gave orders to the
soldiers and they did what they did to Artur. You give orders to us, as far as
she can see; so you must be another like him. If she starts to rotate or to
raise either arm, hit the ground, or get something between you and her."
"Thanks," said Hal, "I will. But don't worry about me. I know about slings-I
can even use one myself. I'll be able to tell if she starts to use that."
What he said was true enough. His knowledge of slings as well as a number of
other primitive weapons dated back to the early training of his first
childhood on Dorsai. What he did not tell her was that it was going to be
impossible for him to keep an eye on Cee at all times and meanwhile do
whatever he might do to make sure they all got up to the ledge safely.
It was full daylight now; and they came at last to the large outcropping of
rock under which it was possible for them to make their way to the boulder
that had been set up to block the path beyond it on to the trail leading up
the side of the mountain to the ledge.
CHAPTER
30
Shawnee, a slightly stout, middle-aged woman, with her gray hair puLled back
above her ankle-length blue robe and sandals, had the round, calm face of a
typical Exotic and was on sentry duty just outside the entrance under the rock
that led to the mountain trail. "We heard you coming," she said, as the group
reached her, "and got you on the scopes by relay from the ledge. The blocking
boulder's moved back and the way's clear. You can take Artur through, and
we'll block the way again behind you. "
There was a short period of difficulty, for the bearers had to bend double to
pass through the entrance and this made Artur an impossible load for the four
of them. It ended up with seven people, including Hal, crawling through with
the stretcher essentially carried on their backs, until they reached the other
side of the rock face and the opening beyond where the path up the
mountainside began. The large granite boulder, as Shawnee had promised, was
off to one side.
They stopped to rest while the boulder was rolled back. Once in place, it cut
off not only entrance, but any light from above. Now anyone crawling under the
rock face would have no alternative but to believe they had come up against
the solid mountainside and that nothing but stone was beyond. "Amid said we
shouldn't need to bother digging up the plug
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Gordon R. Dickson
rock, if the soldiers were leaving," said Shawnee, "unless, you've got some
reason to." "No. No reason to now," answered Hal. He felt weariness, but with
the warm hearth-glow of success at its heart.
But then began the labor of getting Artur up the steep slope of the
mountainside track to the ledge. In spite of the Guild members' own experience
with the way in, and the fact Hal had warned them, the carriers found they
could only work in five-minute stretches before needing to be relieved. Hal
stayed beside them all the way, on one side of the stretcher, ready to help
catch it if one of the bearers should slip and fall. On the other side climbed
Onete, her syringes ready, and beyond her, scrambling sometimes on all fours
like a mountain goat, but with the sling loaded and its vine-ends caught up
short, ready in one grimy fist, was Cee-her eyes continually on Hal.
There was one uncomfortable moment when Artur began to come to, and moaned.
Cee was instantly upright, the vine-ends of her sling sliding down through her
fists to their full length; and in the same moment Onete stepped up to the
side of the stretcher, her body directly blocking Hal from any throw by Cee.
"He's all right! Hal's done nothing!" she snapped at Cee. "I'm going to make
your uncle comfortable and put him back to sleep, right now. "
The stretcher bearers had stopped. Any excuse for a moment in which to catch
their breath. Onete turned about, still blocking any throw at Hal with her own
body, and gave Artur another injection. He relaxed on the stretcher.
11 et's get on," said Hal, taking his own grip on the side of the stretcher
again; and they resumed their painful way upward.
When they finally stepped out onto the level surface of the ledge itself,
everybody was at the end of their strength. "We'll take him to a room in the
clinic," Onete told Hal. "You can find him there later, if you want him.
Tannahch has some people trained as nurses and assistants. There'll be
somebody with him all the time." "Tell Tannaheh someone who's been through
what Artur's been through is going to have to be brought out of it gradually,"
Hal said. "For a while at first after he comes to, he's going to think he's
still in the hands of his torturers-but Tannaheh probably already knows that."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
327
"I'll tell him anyway," said Onete. "You better get some rest yourself. You've
been up more than twenty-four hours, haven't you?" "Perhaps," said Hal.
"Anyway, I've got a few words I want w-have with Amid before I call it done.
I'll see you later." @ He turned away from her and the stretcher bearers, who
were now brand new at their job, being from among those who had stayed up on
the ledge. Some of those who had helped the stretcher up the last few meters
of slope had simply sat down, or lain down, where they had stopped, although
to Hal's eyes none .of them looked in need of more than an ordinary night's
rest to put them back on their feet. He turned away and went toward Amid's
office.
The heat of the rising sun of midmorning struck at his face and chest through
his sweat-soaked shirt, and the level ground felt strange under his feet. He
slanted across the open ground, approaching Amid's office from the front and
side. He reached it at its right corner and walked along its front toward its
entrance. As he passed, he glanced in one of the windows that were the best
compromise these forest-built structures could make with the former Exotic
homes, where it had been hard to tell from one room to the next whether you
were outdoors or indoors. It had suddenly occurred to him that the small, old
head of the Chantry Guild might be somewhere else about the establishment, and
the thought of a prolonged search for him on legs wobbly with weariness was
not attractive.
But Amid was there. Hal saw him through the window, seated in one of the
chairs around the now fireless central fireplace. In a chair facing him was
Amanda.
Hal stopped for a second. Down below, he had forgotten Amanda might show up.
He went on; but at the door, set open to the warming morning air, he paused
and looked through its aperture at those inside.
He was not quite sure why he had stopped. It was as if an instinct had put out
its hand to stop him for a second, to make him stop and think, first.
Perhaps, he thought, with sudden unnatural clarity, he did need to think
before entering. A number of times in his life before it had been when he was
most tired, after great and prolonged effort of mind and body, that his mind
had taken on a strange, almost feverish clarity. The most important of those
THE CHANTRY GUILD                           329
had been a moment there in which he had " - her with the telephoned picture of
her
then that he had thought to himself that I@ beautiful, but lacked something
which rt-,MF!RP_v1"MM,fi    wbich in that moment he had
not been and was not intensity. It was something Amanda went beyond. Part of
her extended another dimension, lived in another dimension. struck him now,
had the potential to extend into dimension, but only particular individuals
chose to
only in some of these could it be seen in them by
he saw it now, where he had never been it before. Now, remembering Rukh, he
realized he seen it in her; and perhaps a little even in Ajela and t7mmmi
faith-holders on Harmony, like James Child-of- "%M been, now he thought of it,
very clearly visible in it was in Tam Olyn; and it had been there in his three
that he now realized he had learned, partly at least,
it from what he saw in them, without identifying was, but imitating it in his
own life as he imitated the
men in other ways. was in other, more unlikely people, too. It was in Cee,
enough. And it must have been in Jathed. In fact, had co
me here to ask Amid, tired as he was, without why he needed the answer, but
knowing he could not ntil he had it-was whether Jathed had, in those early
n in the forest, had some sort of contact with Cee. he had visited her
parents? Then the sudden discovery MP- here had all but driven the questions
from his mind, he realized, suddenly, that Amanda was connected to herself a
part of them, in fact. tie Went in; and the other two turned at the sound of
his boots .,;Vnthe Wooden floor. Amid, he was now able to see, had his own
IMended element; and it came to Hal that both Amanda and 'W   , low 'd as well
as others like them, were not only part of what he
chosen to spend his life finding but part of what he had
for when he had let Amanda bring him to Kultis. She @'@@-VlOuld not have
identified this specific element as one of the @:A ings he needed to discover;
but, that strange, almost mystic
0    of her that had always set her family apart from other Dorsai
1 -'r
328
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
329
times had been some years back now, in the militia cell on Harmony, where he
had been left burning up with fever, to die; and instead, in that moment, his
mind had seen and worked clearly as never before.
Something like that was on him now, although he did not seem to be able to put
it all together. But, out of the dull hopelessness from which Amanda had
brought him, when she had led him here, he had finally climbed-to this.
But what was this? One thing was certain, it was not anything resembling his
former despondency. He was alive again, and the feeling that the cause to
which he had dedicated himself could not be lost was with him again. Also,
there were some new bits and pieces of understanding. But they did not fit
together. More than ever in his existence before, he felt he stood on the
brink of the answer he searched for, but could not quite see the final step
that would take him to it.
Part of it was Jathed, that wild Exotic philosopher, who had preached a
separate universe for each living individual. Part of it was Cee. Part of it
was the fact that he had gone with the others and succeeded in rescuing both
Cee and Artur, while sending the soldiers away harmlessly. And done it without
harming anyone. True, Cee had killed. But Cee was no more to be held
accountable as a murderer than a wolf who had killed in defense of itself and
one of its cubs.
Somehow, all these things tied together; but also, somehow his mind failed at
the moment to connect them. Particularly, it failed to connect them with
Amanda, who was part of the understanding. Amanda, from the moment she had met
him on Dorsai, had made him the gift of that insight of hers. The full value
of that gift he was yet to know, any more than he could yet appreciate the
full implication of the connection of the other bits of discovery afloat in
his mind. All he knew about the gift was that it had been a part of herself;
and that it was something no one else could have given him, because no one
else had had it to give.
It was an awareness of that gift that had stopped him now. Stopped him,
because it had made him more perceptive; and that added perception in him now
rang a nameless dread of whatever she might have to tell him.
He remembered sitting in her kitchen in the Morgan homestead, Fal Morgan, on
the Dorsai world, that first morning after
meeting her. There had been a moment there in which he had had a chance to
compare her with the telephoned picture of her sister. He remembered then that
he had thought to himself that the sister was equally beautiful, but lacked
something which Amanda possessed-something which in that moment he had called
"intensity."
But it had not been and was not intensity. It was something much more. Amanda
went beyond. Part of her extended invisibly into another dimension, lived in
another dimension. Everyone, it struck him now, had the potential to extend
into that further dimension, but only particular individuals chose to do so,
and only in some of these could it be seen in them by another individual-as he
saw it now, where he had never been able to see it before. Now, remembering
Rukh, he realized he had always seen it in her; and perhaps a little even in
Ajela and some of the true faith-holders on Harmony, like James Child-ofGod.
It had been, now he thought of it, very clearly visible in Ajela, as it was in
Tam Olyn; and it had been there in his three tutors-so that he now realized he
had learned, partly at least, to recognize it from what he saw in them,
without identifying what it was, but imitating it in his own life as he
imitated the three old men in other ways.
But it was in other, more unlikely people, too. It was in Cee, surprisingly
enough. And it must have been in Jathed. In fact, what he had come here to ask
Amid, tired as he was, without knowing why he needed the answer, but knowing
he could not sleep until he had it-was whether Jathed had, in those early
years down in the forest, had some sort of contact with Cee. Perhaps he had
visited her parents? Then the sudden discovery of Amanda here had all but
driven the questions from his mind, until he realized, suddenly, that Amanda
was connected to them, herself a part of them, in fact.
He went in; and the other two turned at the sound of his boots on the wooden
floor. Amid, he was now able to see, had his own extended element; and it came
to Hal that both Amanda and Amid, as well as others like them, were not only
part of what he had chosen to spend his life finding but part of what he had
hoped for when he had let Amanda bring him to Kultis. She would not have
identified this specific element as one of the things he needed to discover;
but, that strange, almost mystic part of her that had always set her family
apart from other Dorsai
330
Gordon R. Dickson
must have sensed both his need and the location of this, among what else he
reached for.
That sensitivity to his need and that which would answer it was part of what
made her what she was. So that wherever she happened to be, as now in Amid's
office, the perceived universe seemed to fall into order about her, to become
sensible and clear of purpose. It was as if she shone with a light that,
though invisible in itself, let those about her see more clearly.
He reached her and they held each other for a long moment without saying
anything. Then, still holding him with her hands, she stood back a little from
him and turned his face to the light of the nearest window. "Better," she
said, studying it. "Yes, you're better. But not all the way back to what you
should be." "I'm closer," he answered. "All the more close now that you're
here."
She let him go, and frowned as he put out a hand to Amid's desk for support.
He would have fallen otherwise. His legs felt as if they had no strength left
in them. "The grapevine brought me news of the soldiers coming up here to look
around," she said. "I came as soon as I could, but I waited for full night to
go up to that group you had guarding the rock blocking the trail in. I've been
here since about an hour or so after you took your party down there. It was a
temptation to follow you down, but if you'd planned what you'd planned without
me, there was no point in my barging in and upsetting things. I've been
waiting for you since-but you're ready to collapse. " "You could say that," he
told her with a weary grin. "But I had a question or two to ask Amid befQre I
folded up." "Anything, of course," said Amid, getting spryly up from his chair
and coming forward. "But do you have to have the answers right now? Amanda's
right. You're exhausted." "Two quick questions," said Hal. "Was Jathed around
down there when Cee was living with her parents? I believe he was already dead
when she began to run wild-but could they have talked to each other,
somehow-would they have talked to each other?"
Amid frowned. "I'm sure he was around, for a couple of years at least," he
said. "And as for Jathed talking to her, what I've heard of him
THE CHANTRY GUILD
331
is-that he would have talked to, lectured at, anyone-all in the same way,
regardless of their age or situation. But whether he and Cee actually
communicated-I'd have to ask some of the more longtime members of the Guild.
I'll do that and let you know tomorrow. The question isn't going to be whether
Jathed would talk to Cee, but whether they encountered each other -and whether
Cee, young as she was, would be able to understand anything. But maybe she
might. She might even
have sensed he was no sort of threat to her, or even saw him as special
-children can do that." "That's what I wanted to know," said Hal.
He turned away from the desk, reeling as he lost the support of it; and being
caught and held upright by the strong grasp of Amanda. "Sleep for you," she
said, "this way."
CHAPTER
31
Hal woke to almost complete darkness relieved only by the faint line of light
under the door to the bathroom. This alone told him that he was not in his own
bed in Dormitory Two, but back in Amid's second office, in which he and Amanda
had slept on his arrival at the Chantry Guild. There was someone beside him in
the bed; and he turned his head to make out that it was Amanda, deeply
sleeping, her hair spread out on the pillow.
It must be deep into the night. He Jay there, trying to remember.
He had no recollection of getting here. He remembered nothing beyond Amanda
catching him, holding him up, and telling him he must sleep. He had no memory
of being brought to this bed. But now that he tried to recall anything at all
after that'there came to him a few flashes from momentary wakings, as seeing a
sliver of the rich daylight illumination of Procyon, that had managed to make
its way here and there through the blanket she had once more hung over a rod
to provide a near-perfect blackout curtain.
In each case he had awakened long enough only to recognize the fact that he
was safe and comfortable, then fallen immediately and heavily back to sleep
again. He had no memory of Amanda joining him. She would have been quiet so as
not to disturb him, of course, as only she could be quiet. But how long
1:112
9:1. 41wif-MWi GUILD
333
had it been since she had come? How long since night replaced day outside his
curtained window?
Some diurnal clock deep inside him told him that it had been a long time-that
he had slept most of the night through, as well as the day; and dawn was near.
It had been no ordinary sleep. He had put in forty-eight hours of wakefulness
under active conditions before this, without falling into such a pit of
unconsciousness; and while he might be a few years older since then, and
softer, in spite of his daily exercise in the Final Encyclopedia, neither time
nor inaction could account for such a heavy, prolonged slumber.
There had to he another reason for it; and even as he formed the question the
answer came. His unconscious mind had once more wanted his consciousness out
of the way so it could work with perfect freedom, putting together all the
things he had learned, one by one-those parts that now almost, but not quite,
came together like the parts of a puzzle of many pieces, to give him a
complete picture of his goal.
He felt a yearning to stay here, where he was, and put an arm gently over
Amanda, coaxing her gently back into wakefulness and the joining that they had
always had so few chances for. But at the same time, there was a powerful
feeling within him that now and only now the answer he sought, or at least
another step toward it, was calling him outside this room. It was waiting for
him with the dawn that would be coming; as it had waited all this time he had
been here, but he had not yet learned enough to see it.
Quietly, as Amanda must have come to bed quietly, he left it, found his
clothes, dressed and let himself out of the room. The corridor was bright-lit
and silent; but outside, when he closed the main door of the building behind
him, the ledge was in complete darkness. The night was empty except for the
chanting of those who walked the circle, invisible to him. Both moons were
down and the light of the stars was not enough to let him see his hand at
arm's length before him.
But like the Guild members, he now knew the ledge well enough to find his way
about it blindfolded. In addition, in this season of summer, even at this
altitude, the wind blew toward the ledge across the land below.
Accordingly, he turned his face into the wind and, feeling the
334
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
335
familiar slopes and pitches of the ground under his bare feet, went toward the
edge.
As he went, his eyes readjusted to the darkness from the bright glare of the
hall lights. He was able to see the treetops overhead occulting the stars, the
trees that had been deliberately left uncut in patches and clumps so that part
of one of them always hid any walkway below it. Almost unthinkingly, he
oriented himself by those shapes of the treetops against the pinpoints of
light in the sky, and as he got close to the edge he cou   see it as a line of
demarcation where darkness gave way suddenly to deeper darkness.
He was out here earlier than usual and he did not expect to find Old Man here
yet; and in fact, when he got to the place by the pool where he usually sat,
the spot the Old Man usually occupied was empty. After all, Hal reminded
himself, his fellow watcher was no longer young, and also had just finished
putting in much the same hours, at the same activity as had Hal. It would
hardly be surprising if he did not show up at all.
Hal sat, therefore, waiting for the paling of the sky that would signal the
approaching day and the sunrise. There was a strange blend of expectation and
excitement in him.
In patches, where the native vegetation of the pond did not obscure its
reflecting surface, the image of the stars overhead looked back up at him-as
they also looked down on him through the clear, high-altitude air. He felt
enclosed by them as an individual feels warmly enclosed by family or close
friends at a gathering of those who were close. The sky about them was
beginning to pale, but only beyond the line of the Grandfathers of Dawn in the
far distance-that place from which the sunrise would come. Overhead, it was
still dark enough for their lights to be clear and sharp against the deep
dark.
As far as he could tell, none of those that he could see up there were stars
that were suns over the otlier Younger Worlds, or
art itself. Those solar bodies were at present in the wrong position to be
seen from Kultis-or more accurately, this part of the planet was pointed in
the wrong direction. But those he did see stood in for those he knew, in his
imagination; so that it was as if they had come here at this important moment
to watch him now from both above and below at once, waiting for him to take up
his journey once more along the path he had chosen for himself that day of his
uncle James's death.
It had been a ridiculously ambitious decision at the time on the part of a
half-grown boy, to find and destroy whatever element it was in people that
made them selfish and uncaring to the point of brutality and cruelty to each
other. The shape of the answer he sought had emerged, little by little from
the mists of things undiscovered as he worked his way toward it, trying one
route after another, finding his way blocked but learning a little more each
time, so that with each fresh start he chose his next route with more wisdom.
So, slowly, he had progressed. Slowly, his certainty had grown that there was
a path to humanity's becoming a race of tpeople who would voluntarily refrain
from all harming of their fellows, by all actions, from literal killing, to
the exercise of the little cruelties of words and sheer thoughtlessness that
were so common in human society that they went almost without remark. But now,
he was surer than he had ever been, that only a few thin veils-perhaps only
one-hid it from him.
As Donal he had found that power and law alone could not force the change he
wanted. But the discovery pointed to the r9ad he himself must travel; and,
after him, the race. As Paul Formain, back in the twenty-first century, he had
found that part of the answer lay outside the known universe and its laws; but
that this further universe-the one he had come to call the Creative
Universe-was again, only part of the answer.
His last attempt had been the gathering of the best of what the Younger Worlds
had gained-from the Exotics, the Friendlies, and his own world of the
Dorsai-into safety behind the phase-shield he had caused to be set up,
enclosing Earth and the Final Encyclopedia. He had been confident then, that
at last, having done this, the next and last step to his goal would be
obvious.
But it had not been. What he had achieved had only once more cleared the mists
a little way, but left him with no understanding of what was to be done next.
It had only shown yet a farther stretch of the road still to be covered.
He had not been wrong in anything he had done so far. Faith, courage, and the
ability to think philosophically, all faculties of the human, developed from
its animal forebears, and their extended forms, as embodied in the Friendlies,
the Dorsai and these Exotics, had been part of the answer. He had not been
wrong in that much; but now he saw what was needed was
336
Gordon R. Dickson
something still hidden by unknowns, still in shadow. He could only be sure now
that it was somehow connected with the creativity in every living human.
In his disappointment and weariness, he had become blocked; and believed
himself burnt out-a failure. So he had continued to think until Amanda had
come to tell him he might find a new
point of view here, on an Exotic world now wrecked and ground down by the
forces of an enemy point of view that was trying to kill the growth element of
the human spirit and destroy all that had been accomplished.
She had been right. He knew that now with a wholehearted, instinctive
certainty, as he sat here, waiting for Procyon's rise over the mountaintops.
Somewhere, with her and among the Chantry Guild members and with his recent
part in the rescue of Artur and little Cee, who was of an age with the boy he
had been when he had made his original vow, he had once more found a way to go
forward. And now, now here, waiting for the sunrise, he felt perhaps only one
more large step toward what he sought; perhaps even close at last to the
doorway itself, through which he now knew he must pass to find what he sought.
The paling of the night's black sky and the extinguishing of the stars had
spread forward from above the distant mountains as he had been thinking, and
the light had grown stronger. He felt the approaching dawn like a hand laid
upon him; and although the breeze was merely cool, it seemed to blow through
his clothing so that he felt as if he sat naked and waiting, his legs crossed,
his hands not in prayer position but laid, palms down, one on top of the other
in his lap; as he remembered his uncle Ian's massive hands used to lie.
He let his mind go out to his customary imaginings of this daily exercise of
body and mind; conjuring up the time of the far future of this Chantry Guild,
when the ledge had been filled by a massive structure of stone blocks quarried
from the mountain, its flat surfaces paved and gardened and this pool before
him enclosed by a rim of pink-veined, light gray rock, with the native plants
replaced by imported water-lilies spreading their flat, broad petals on the
liquid surface to uphold themselves and their night-closed and sleeping white
flowers.
Those flowers of his imagination which would be opening with the coming light
of day.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
337
As with some repeated meditation, the envisioned scene
ed the reality around him. His ears heard the chanting replac    ack of the
present and future walkers in the behind his b circle. . . .
The transient and the eternal
are the same . . .
Now, the chant seemed to pick him up and possess him. So that he resonated to
it as a tuning fork resonates to being struck, with a single pure note. In the
pool, the white blossoms were
beginning to open as the light flooded forward and the day brightened.
His eyes ignored the unvarying green sweep of the highaltitude forest below
him and focused on the distant range of -mountains, the Grandfathers of Dawn.
Always the mountains. Always the mountains and the sunrise. These belonged as
much to the future of his imagined scene as they did to the present second in
which he sat here. To the mountains and the sunrise, the years or centuries in
between were unimportant, the moment of a single drawn breath in a lifetime of
breaths.
The sun was not yet in sight from behind the range; but the brightness of the
sky showed that it was close now, very close.
His eyes were filled with light and he felt the cool air passing in and out of
the lungs above his motionless body as he sat. e looked down at the pond and
saw that the white flowers were now fully open, some of them showing the drops
of the dew that had collected in their tightly closed petal tips earlier. He
felt as
if some essential but nonphysical part of himself was lifted out of the rest
of him and rushed through the airy space between him and the distant mountain
range to meet the dawn, seeing nothing else.
At the same time his physical eyes looked down at the pond and focused once
more on a single flower, on one white petal of which a dewdrop sat like a
blessing. The flower filled his gaze and like a wave through him came a great
sweep of feeling, that anything should be so wonderful as the living leaf with
the perfect transparency of the dewdrop upon it.
Feeling this, it was as if his flying, incorporeal self reached the upthrust
giants of the land that waited, as they had always waited, for him in this
moment; and, lifting, it and he saw the
338
Gordon R. Dickson
first blazing edge of Procyon, which was too bright to look at with the eyes
of his body back on the [edge, appear in the bottom of a notch in the rock
before him and send the first ray of direct light leaping across the space
between range and ledge to touch the pond, to touch the flower.
It touched the dewdrop; and for one second too short for breath to draw or
mind to do anything but hold in memory, the drop exploded, scintillating with
light like a diamond, radiating off in all directions, including into him,
where it shone unforgettable, from that moment on.
He sat, blinded by the vision. Behind him, the voices of the walkers chanted
still. . . .
The transient and the eternal are the same . . .
And, suddenly, moving in to replace the wonder within him came the
understanding he had waited for. Now, the words of the walkers engulfed him.
Suddenly, at last, he understood the truth of what they chanted, what he had
so often chanted; that it was not a matter of faith but of actuality.
For the transient and the eternal were the same. He looked at the petal now
and the dewdrop was already beginning to shrink, to disappear as the heat of
the sun's ray drew it up. In a little it would be gone. The petal would be dry
and it would be as if the dewdrop had never been there.
But the dewdrop was always there. Even as this one blazed for a second with
incredible light and began to disappear, somewhere in this infinite universe
there was another dewdrop just beginning to scintillate, and after that
another, and another . . .
And another dawn and another, and another mountain range and another, when
this one should be worn down to level dust; and without a pause, another
world, which would make another range through which a ray of light would come
to another dewdrop on another petal-forever and forever, until time should
end.
The dewdrop was beyond destruction. The moment of its brilliance was eternal.
It was transient here, but eternal everywhere. Just so, all things were
eternal, only waiting to be found, even the doorway to something that had only
been his dream all these years.
The physical light of the present day was everywhere about
THE CHANTRY GUILD
339
and the vision of the future was gone; but the moment of the
44@11rli6i, explosion of illumination from the dewdrop still filled
He got to his feet and went back, past 11197117.2011k, visible circle of
walkers toward the buildings beyond. He felt incredibly Ilight-bodied. As if
he could, with little effort, walk up into the thin air. A figure in the
ordinary light workshirt and trousers, vmrn by the majority of the Chantry
Guild members when they were otherwise occupied than walking in the circle,
stepped out from behind some tree trunks to meet him. It was Old Man and he
smiled up at Hal as they met and Hal stopped. "You weren't there this
morning," said Hal. "I was there. I sat behind you," said Old Man. "Some
things are best touched alone. "
His smile grew and became almost impish. He reached into a
pocket of his trousers and brought out a small mirror, which he held up to
Hal's eyes.
Hal stared at the image of his own face. There was a difference in what he saw
that he could not pick out at first. Then he saw it-the pupils of his eyes
were contracted almost to pinpricks of darkness, like the eyes of someone
under drugs. For a fraction of a second the scintillation of the dewdrop
seemed to leap out from those pinpricks and the mirror at him, making him feel
light-headed, but happily so. "How could you tell ahead of time, in the dark9"
he asked, as Old Man put the mirror back into the pocket.
Old Man passed his hand from left to right through the air at chest height
before him, palm outward toward Hal. "I felt it," he said.
Hal stared at him, waiting for additional explanation; but Old Man, still
smiling, merely turned and went away from him, back through the trees from
among which he had emerged.
CHAPTER
32
He went back to their room and discovered that Amanda had already risen and
left. He found her having breakfast by herself at a small table in the
building's dining room and joined her.
Actually, he wanted nothing to eat; and she, after a single wise look at him,
said nothing, not even "good morning." Instead, she merely smiled and
continued her own meal, leaving him to sit and do what he wanted, which was
merely to enjoy the early day with her, along with the other breakfasters. He
let himself be immersed in the chatter in the dining room and the sounds from
the kitchen. The sun, shining in through the windows of the room to brighten
all around them, wrapped him in an unusual sense of happiness.
When she was done, she rose. He went with her. Taking her tray with its used
utensils and dishes to the disposal slot, she pushed it through. Then, smiling
again at him, she led him outside and parted company with him, going off
herself in the direction of Amid's office.
He was left to his own devices, and found himself happy to be so. Kultis,
around him, had never seemed more bright and fresh. Its colors stood out at
him, as if just washed by a brief summer shower, from the sky overhead to the
gravel of the paths underfoot.
He roamed about the ledge. There was a lightness to his body; and the sense of
the illumination he had just received lingered
THE CHANTRY GUILD
341
ifi , him. For once, he felt strangely free of purpose. It was as
consciousness had been cut loose, like a towed dory from I.".behind a small
Miml boat, to drift at the whim of soft winds
and gentle waves under a bright sun.
He smiled. The image of the loose dory pleased him. The implications of what
he had found were too massive and momentous for his mind to handle logically;
and so that part of him had been set free temporarily by the more capacious
mental machinery behind it, that moved in creative and other areas where the
conscious, with its rigid patterns and logics, could not go.
The day, accordingly, passed like a pleasant dream. Either Amanda, or Amid, or
someone among the others must have passed the word to leave him to his own
devices. None of the Chantry Guild members approached him or tried to draw him
into conversation; for which he was grateful.
His thoughts slid between wonderings at small things in his ,.surroundings
-from the quaint shape of a pebble among the gravel at his feet to the living
design of a variform leaf or blade of grass, or their native equivalents that
he came upon. Architecturally, they were all beautiful; and he was a little
surprised he had failed so utterly to appreciate them before.
Interspersed with these were other things observed, or remembered-bits and
flashes of scenes from his past. Images from his boyhood and manhood as Donal
Graeme, from his brief life as Paul Formain and his present life as Hal; all
these came and went in his head like bits of a serial recording.
Something within him guessed, but did not struggle to verify, at the
possibility that these things he recalled were reflections of what his deeper
mind was fitting into the matrix of his lifelong search, from what he had come
to understand this morning. But he did not investigate this, did not question
it; and it did not matter. A. 74 ZL
It was like being on a vacation. It occurred to him with a small shock of
surprise that he had never really had a vacation, since he had been a
schoolboy on the Dorsai. From the time he had left his home world he had never
let go of his life's commitment for even a day. It was a strange feeling to be
so cut loose now, even for a few hours like this; to be content with the
distance he had come so far, when the end was still not yet reached. Though he
could see it clearly, now.
342
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
343
As the morning grew into noon, he drifted toward Amid's office. When he
stepped inside it at last, he was surprised to find it, for once, empty. Then
it came to him that Amid, himself, might well have run short of sleep, these
last forty-eight hours, and be in his own quarters, resting.
In any case, he had not come here to see Amid, but because of the memory of
the recording of Jathed to which he had listened. He began to search both his
memory and the office, and finally came across a filing cabinet with the name
"Jathed" on it. There was a box of recording spindles in the second drawer
from the top.
He took the box with him to Amid's desk and seated himself in a chair near it
with the control pad Amid had searched for and found earlier. It was a
standard desk unit and in a moment he had the first of the recording spindles
in the control pad's magazine. Jathed's voice, apparently from several years
earlier than the tape Hal had listened to before, sounded immediately in the
room.
As he listened, he examined the other spindles. They were dated in order over
a period of some twelve years. He started with the most recent ones and began
playing them in reverse order to their dates of recording. Sitting in the
empty office, he list ned to the resonant, compelling voice of the founder of
this reincarnation of the Chantry Guild.
He did not need to listen to more than half a dozen, however, before
concluding that there would be little advantage to him in hearing them all.
With the exception of two which were histories of Jathed's early life,
dictated in an unfamiliar, elderly voice that might have belonged to Amid's
brother, they were essentially repetitions of what were basically two or three
customary lectures delivered by Jathed to audiences consisting of disciples,
or others with an interest in what the cantankerous, but remarkable, man had
to say.
In effect, the message of all of these was simple enough. Jathed believed that
each person who had the necessary faith and self-discipline should be able to
enter a personal, extra universe exactly like the physical one that surrounded
him; except that in this other universe, the will of the person involved could
accomplish anything wanted by merely determining it should be SO.
Furthermore, if that will was powerful enough, Jathed
apparently believed that the effect produced in the extra universe could be
duplicated in the universe of reality by convincing the minds of others that
the alteration applied to the physical universe also.
In short, he believed in a personal, extra universe; and that the so-ca
rea universe was no more            an _agreement among the human minds
existing in it.
It was in this latter view, about the real universe, that Hal found himself
disagreeing with the other man.
It was true that when he had been Paul Formain, three hundred years before, he
had experienced the night of madness brought upon a city by the original
Chantry Guild of Earth, under its founder, Walter Blunt-that original Guild
which had become the parent of Kultis and its sister world and the whole
Exotic culture. It had been a night in which he had seen a
monument melting down like wax, a stone lion decorating the balcony of a
building lift its head and roar, and a hole of nothingness appear in the
middle of a street. A nothingness of such utter blackness that his eyes
refused to focus on it.
That, and history was full of miracles witnessed by crowds, as well as
smaller, so-called "magics" seen by small groups of people gathered in
confined spaces for just that purpose.
And, finally, there was the sound of the breaking light on the first recording
of Jathed Hal had ever heard.
Nonetheless, Hal held to his own view of a single, separate, creative universe
that would be a tool, not just a box of conjuring tricks, for humankind.
The only strong point he shared with Jathed was that the other must also have
experienced a moment of revelation in which the absolute truth of the
transient and the eternal being the same became undeniable. But from that
point they had each built different ways, if with much of the same material.
In any case, his mind would not work with the problem right now. It was a
refusal, but a different sort of refusal than he had experienced at the Final
Encyclopedia before coming here.
That had been a blockage; a painful situation in which he Went over the same
answers time and again, on each occasion finding them unworkable. This day was
a pleasant moment of rest along a route that he now knew to be correct and to
run
straight to his goal.
But his mind would not wrestle with that problem-or any
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Gordon R. PJRveia
problem, just now. He put the spindles in their box back where he had found
them, the control pad back on Amid's desk, and went out.
Later he was never able to remember, without a great deal of effort, how the
rest of that day went for him. In part'he did not really want to investigate
the memory, only recall it fondly as a sort of pleasant blur. At any rate, by
the time night had fallen and he had at last taken something to eat and drink,
he was back, seated in Amid's office in one of its few armless chairs, with a
musical instrument in his hands.
The fire was alight in the fireplace and the instrument was someone's
reconstruction of a six-string classical Spanish guitar. It was enough like
the instrument he had played and sung with on his trips to Port, during the
period when he had been a
miner on Coby, to suit him.
The guitar had been offered to him, rather shyly, by one of the Guild members,
who had said Amanda had suggested he might enjoy having it for a while.
Indeed, he did. He wondered what part of the almost occult understanding in
Amanda had prompted her to make such a suggestion.
In any case, he had ended up here with it, seated beside the fire in the
evening.
The lights were turned down, so that almost the only illumination was from the
fireplace itself. He was letting his mind and his fingers wander together, in
whatever direction his memory took him, which for the last half hour had been
to the ancient ballads and songs out of the past centuries of Old Earth. Songs
he had learned there, as a boy, from books and recordings in the library of
the estate where he had been brought up.
Amid and Amanda were seated in chairs before him, listening; and so, too,
surprisingly, were a number of the members of the Guild, who had slipped in
quietly over the past hour or so. taking more distant chairs-so that they were
all but lost in the moving shadows cast on the wall by the flames of the fire.
Most surprisingly, among those there was Cee. He had not noticed her entering.
He had only become gradually aware of her sitting with Onete in a couple of
chairs against a far wall.
Since that first moment when he had discovered her, she had moved closer and
closer to him; until now she was seated on the floor, almost at his feet. He
had not caught her in movement
THE CHANTRY GUILD
345
once. She had made each tiny shift toward him at a time when his eyes were
briefly off her, inching toward him, until she was
where she was now.
He was careful not to look directly at her. But now it was not necessary. She
was near enough so that he could examine her face out of the corner of his
eyes. There was no more friendliness showing in it than there had been during
the hard trek up the mountainside with Artur on the stretcher-but a great deal
of wonder and fascination.
He had drifted off into the singing of old English and Scottish ballads,
learned long ago out of the collection made by Childe in the nineteenth
century.
How much such songs could mean to Cee, he had no way of imagining. The Basic
tongue universally spoken nowadays on all the worlds was a descendant of the
English language as it had been spoken during the latter part of the
Technological Age, of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Its archaic
word forms would be a little strange to the young girl, but most of it would
still be understandable. Only, what she would make of the medieval Scottish
and English accents with which he was
pronouncing the words, and with those words which were in dialects now dead
and forgotten, he could not guess.
He slid into Sir Walter Scott's Scottish version of The Battle of Otterburn,
which was a little less loaded with unfamiliar words . . .
Itfell about the Lammas time, When the muir-men won their hay, That the
doughty Earl Douglas went Into England to catch a prey.
He chose the Gordons and the Graemes, With them the Lindsays, light and gay:
But the Jardines wadna wi' him ride, And they rued it to this day.
And he has burnt the dales 0 Tine And part of Almonshire, And three good
towers on Roxburgh fells He has left them all on fire . . .
346
Gordon R. Dickson
This time Hal saw her move. It was a small shift, to only slightly closer to
him, but the fact that she had allowed herself to be seen moving was enough to
show that she had ceased to care about whether or not he would catch her at
it. A new light of interest had come into her eyes. Clearly, this one was to
be a song about fighting and destruction. Somehow, by chance-or was it by
chance, entirely?-he had picked a ballad that particularly woke her interest.
She was motionless now, watching and listening. He continued to study her
upturned features. It was a grim little face, in some ways. Again, he was
reminded of the similarity between her protective reaction toward Artur, and
his own reaction years before in that moment when, as Donal, he had heard of
his uncle James's death. Perhaps his development since was an indication of
the development to come in her. It was warming to think so.
He wished that there was some way that he could reach her with words, to tell
her that the road she had been forced to follow so far need no longer be the
way she must go. That he had followed one like it, himself-, and, even though
he had accomplished all he had set out to do in that direction, it had not
brought him to the end he wanted.
But he knew that, even now, though she might listen to and enjoy his singing,
she would probably not listen if he tried to talk to her-she would probably
not even stay close to him if he tried talking to her. If he could stay here
at the Guild for a long enough time for her to grow into the ways of the Guild
members, the day might come when she would listen. But he could not stay here,
just for that, just for her, no matter how strongly in this moment he might
want to reach her with the truth. There were larger tasks calling him away.
But his progress with them might in some way be a pledge for hers, into the
new human future.
From covert glances around him, he read puzzlement and some little
consternation on the faces of some of the older Guild members there, listening
to this story of iron and blood in this place where both by their heritage as
Exotics and by their own choosing, they were committed to an attitude of
nonviolence.
Just as it was with Cee, it was impossible to explain to them that the
proliferating forces of history, conflicting, joining, altering each other's
paths, had shown that the human race was
THE CHANTRY GUILD
347
not yet free of violence; that the laws, the authorities, the many ways that
had tried in the past to end it, had overlooked the stark fact that it was
something that must be dealt with inside each individual, herself or himself.
And to deal with it, the individual had to understand it.
So he sang on, letting the verses of the ballad recount its version of that
dark and bitter encounter between two armies of men; whose only excuse for
fighting each other was that they wished to fight, in a place and at a time
where neither land, nor anything else but who should win, was at stake.
He sang about how the Earl Douglas, son of the king of Scotland, having
ravaged along the border, came at last to Newcastle, the home of Percy, the
English Earl of Northumberland. It had been another Percy-called Hotspur-who
had been immortalized as a character in one of the plays by Shakespeare.
At Newcastle, the Scottish force had been stopped. For all their numbers, they
had had no way to take the fortification that the castle represented. But
there was skirmishing just outside it . . .
. . .But 0 how pale his lady lookd,
Frae off the castle wa, When down before the Scottish spear She saw brave
Percy Ja! . . .
. . .And   some symbol-a pennon, a sword, something of symbolic value-was
taken from the English to be carried back into Scotland as a trophy; something
the Percy swore should not happen. So an appointment was made for the two
forces to meet at Otterburn, some distance away in the Cheviot hills, where
the Scots would wait for the English. . . .
. . .they lighted high on Otterburn,
Upon the bent so brown They lighted high on Otterburn, And threw their
pallions down ...
And settled in for the night. But during the deepest hours of darkness, an
alarm was sounded to the young Earl Douglas.
348                   Gordon R. Dickson
... but up then spake a little page,
Before the break of the dawn. '0 waken ye, waken ye, my good lord, For Percy's
hard at hand!
'Ye lie, ye lie, ye loud liar, Sae loud I hear ye lie! The Percy hadna men
yestereen To dight my men and me ...
There was a small noise during a second's pause of the guitar's ringing and
Hal's voice. The door to the office was opened from the outside as someone
came in. But, caught up in recalling the lines of the song, Hal did not look
to see who it was. For the next verse was one that had rung, echoed and
re-echoed down the years, not only in his own ears but those of many other
writers and poets . . .
... but I have seen a dreary dream,
Beyond the isle of Skye; I saw a dead man won the fight, And I think that man
was I-
He broke off abruptly; and the vibrations of the guitar strings faded away
into the silence of the room. For the person who had entered stood cloaked and
tall inside the doorway of the room, a darker black shape against the dimness
there; and though he could not see its face, Hal knew who it was.
So also did Amanda, for she got up quickly, turning to face the door. "Forgive
me, Guildmaster," said Old Man, slipping around the figure to stand in front
of it, "but this visitor says he has come a long way to talk privately with
Friend." "Yes," said Amid, and the tone of his voice told Hal that he, too,
had recognized the newcomer. "I'm afraid we'll have to end the entertainment
for the evening. I'd suggest the rest of you leave now." "No reason for me to
interrupt things," said the deep, compelling voice of Bleys Ahrens. "I can
wait." "No," said Amid. "If everyone else will please leave?"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
349
"I'll stay," said Amanda. "You might like to stay, too, Amid. " "I'd prefer
to," said Amid. "I have a responsibility to all that happens here." He looked
at Hal. "But I don't want to intrude?"
There was a touch of humor in Bleys' voice as he threw back the hood of his
cloak and stood, a head and shoulders above everyone standing around him.
"Everyone can stay, as far as I'm concerned. "
But the Guild members were already moving out of the open door behind the tall
man. Only Cee stayed where she was, ignoring Onete's beckoning. Cee's eyes on
Bleys did not hold the implacable gaze she had turned on the Occupation
forceleader and on Hal; but they held the steady look of a wild animal ready
to attack if it was approached. "Stay, Amid," said Hal, setting the guitar
aside. "Come in, Bleys. Sit down." "Thank you."
He came over and settled himself in the chair directly opposite. He threw back
the rest of his cloak, revealing himself in dark jacket, trousers and shirt,
in every way unremarkable except for the personality with which he somehow
invested these clothes. Amid was still at his desk.
Amanda had moved back, into the fire-thrown shadows over by the exit door.
Standing there, she was nearly invisible to those nearer the flames. "You can
come and sit with us, Amanda ap Morgan," said Bleys. "I'm not here to try to
do any harm to Hal. He and I know that it'd make no difference to history if
either or both of us died. The historical forces are in motion. We're only the
aiming point of each side." "Perhaps. Perhaps not," answered Amanda's voice.
"I'll stay here, thanks. " "It's all right, Amanda," Hal said with his eyes
unmoving on Bleys, "I don't think he'd try to kill me, here-even if he could.
"Come now," Bleys smiled, "do you think that if I'd come, seriously intending
to do away with you, I'd have come at all unless I was sure I could?" "If you
were to try," said Amanda; and her voice had a curious, remote sound, almost
an echo to it as if she spoke from
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Gordon R. Dickson
a far distance, "you'd never leave this room, yourself, Bleys Ahrens. " "It's
really all right, Amanda," said Hal, still without taking his eyes off the man
opposite. "I'm safe." "Perhaps now, if you say so," said Amanda. "Five seconds
from now, who knows? I'll stay here."
Bleys shrugged and concentrated on Hal. "Surprised to see me?" he asked. "No,"
said Hal. "Clearly, the pictures taken by that flyover were studied after
all." "Yes. You didn't really expect to leave the Final Encyclopedia for one
of the Younger Worlds without my hearing about it eventually, did you?" said
Bleys. "You can't shut off all traffic between the Final Encyclopedia and the
surface of Old Earth; and no matter how reliable the people making the trip
back and forth, information is going to travel with them. Information leaks;
and the leakage reaches me, eventually; since we're always watching you there
at Old Earth."
Amid got up from his chair and added a fresh couple of split logs to the fire,
which flared up more brightly as the new fuel crashed down among the
half-burned wood below it. With the gradual addition of other bodies to the
room while Hal had been singing, the temperature had risen in the office; and
then, when the door had been opened to let nearly all of them out, cooler air
outside had swept in. There was a chill about them, now; and to Hal it felt
even as if a breath of coldness had reached out to him from the folds of the
cloak Bleys had just flung back.
Hal studied this man, leader of those who called themselves the Others, those
who now controlled all that mattered of the Younger Worlds through their
powers of persuasion -powers so effective as to seem almost supernatural, and
which had set the people of those worlds to the task of conquering Earth.
He had met Bleys in person only at rare intervals in his own life, beginning
with the time of the murder of his tutors and his own near capture by Bleys
and his gunmen. The last time had been more than three years before, when Hal
had first gathered nearly all the people of the Dorsai world, and the wealth
and
dge of the two Exotic ones, safely within the phaseshield Hal had caused the
Final Encyclopedia's engineers to set up, enclosing and protecting it, and
Earth.
But all those moments of confrontation were etched unforget-
THE CHANTRY GUILD
351
tably in his memory-and he thought likely in Bleys' as well-for the two of
them were oddly alike in many ways; and both had felt those likenesses, as
though they might have been close friends if they had not been predestined
foes.
So now, he noted the changes in the other man since their last meeting between
the two walls of the tunnel opened in the phase-shield to let them meet. For
either to have touched the milky whiteness of these walls, then, would have
meant being drawn into it and destroyed, the touching body spread out evenly
through the physical universe.
The impression of strength and burliness Hal had noticed for the first time
then had developed even further in Bleys-even while in appearance Bleys'
height and slimness were still the same. He had been almost elegant in that
slimness, when Hal had first seen him, at the killing of Hal's tutors. He
could not be called "elegant" now.
Instead, a force that was invisible, but very powerful, now radiated from him.
It was strong enough that Hal could almost feel it, like the heat from the
fire; and it challenged by its mere existence, challenged and attempted to
dominate all those about Bleys.
For a long moment Hal was baffled at how such a thing could grow in the man he
faced-and then he realized. Each time before that Hal had met Bleys, it had
been obvious that the Other possessed great personal power. But the difference
now was that he had taken a step further, the ultimate step. He no longer
possessed nor controlled power. He was power.
Now most of the people of ten Younger Worlds looked and listened to him as if
he was, in some way, superhuman. They did not merely obey his commands
willingly. They rushed to follow the voice that would send them to die, if
necessary, to destroy a Mother World they now believed had never given up an
ancient desire to conquer and enslave them-an Old Earth, backed by the black
magic of the Final Encyclopedia and ruled by the evil will of an arch-demon
named Hal Mayne.
Hal reached for some compensating power within himself, but did not find it.
He was not daunted by the strength now in Bleys, and he did not doubt that his
mind, his will and imagination, was as strong as the Other's. But he could not
feel a similar counterforce in himself. If it was there at all, it was as
something entirely different, for all that he stood as Bleys'
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Gordon R. Dickson
opposite number, the equal and countering chess piece on the board of History.
At the same time he was grateful that he had not met with Bleys, robed in
power and certainty as he was, a couple of months ago when he, Hal, had been
at his lowest ebb in the Final Encyclopedia. Or even, that they had not had
this meeting before this morning's sudden explosion of understanding in Hal;
the revelation that had come as the sun had risen above the mountains and the
dewdrop burst into its explosion of light.
As it was, now he looked at Bleys from the viewpoint of eternity and found
that which the other possessed to be infinitely small and transitory in that
context. "What brings you?" Hal asked. "You can't really be expecting any
change of attitude on my part?" "Perhaps not." Warmth now flowed from Bleys
instead of the push of personal power. He could charm, and he knew it; even
though everyone in the office at the moment knew that all but a fraction of
his abilities in that respect were composed of hypnotic and other techniques
developed by those same Exotics Bleys was now trying to destroy. "Perhaps
not," he said again, "but I've always believed you'd listen to reason; and I
have an offer, one you might want to consider. " "Offer?" "Yes. Let me
establish a little background first. One of your tutors, who I most wrongly
and mistakenly allowed to be killed-you'll never have forgiven me for that-"
Hal shook his head. "No," he said, "it's not a matter for forgiveness. I can
see now why it happened. At the time though, their murder triggered off the
way I'd felt about another, earlier death. So I wanted to destroy you, then;
as I'd wanted to destroy whoever was responsible, in that earlier time. It
wasn't until I had to live through that sort of loss a second time, with you,
that I started to understand retaliation's not the answer. No, forgiveness is
beside the point, now. Which changes nothing as far as you and I are
concerned."
al had seen Bleys' eyes narrow ever so slightly at the mention of an earlier
grief; and felt a touch of annoyance at possibly having betrayed himself to
the Other's acute mind. No one could match Bleys in catching and pursuing an
incautious
THE CHANTRY GUILD
353
slip. But then the annoyance evaporated. There was no way, even with Bleys'
own self-developed equivalent of intuitional logic, that the man opposite him
now could trace Hal back to the life of Donal Graeme. "An earlier grief?"
echoed Bleys now, softly. "As I say, it's beside the point now," answered Hal.
"What about my tutors?" "One was a Dorsai. He must have made sure you learned
something about military history, as far back as civilization tells us
anything about it?"
Hal nodded. "Did he ever mention a man who lived in the fourteenth century,
one of the first military captains, condottiere as the Italians named them,
named Sir John Hawkwood--
Hal jumped internally, though he kept his face calm. What sort of black magic
in Bleys had made him bring up that, of all names? Then his thoughts calmed.
Their minds of necessity ran on parallel tracks toward a mutual end. It was
not as unlikely as it might seem that they should both have considered the
same historical character in the same short span of time. It could mean
nothing at all that Bleys had happened to mention him now. Moreover it was
Bleys' way to go at things obliquely. He would hardly have brought up his main
purpose in coming, this quickly. Best to wait and see what was behind the
mentioning of that name. "Oh, yes," said Hal. "I'm not surprised," said Bleys.
"A sort of medieval Cletus Grahame, wasn't he?" "I suppose you could say that.
Why?" Hal said. "There's a story about him-a bit of poisonous gossip,
actually; only important really because it could be repeated and believed by
some people who didn't know better, even after hundreds of years. I just
wondered if you knew it-about two of his soldiers he was supposed to have
found quarreling over a nun they had caught-"
--and he cut her in half, then said something to the effect that now there was
part for each of them?" Hal nodded. "Nes, I know that particular bit of false
history." "I can't understand it." Bleys' tone was close to musing. "You'd
think the sheer physical impossibilities involved would be enough to make
anyone see through such a story. I suppose
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Gordon R. Dickson
the reader is supposed to imagine that this man Hawkwood neatly divided the
victim at the waist with one swipe of his sword, then delivered his single
line of dialogue to the two soldiers and walked off, leaving them both stunned
and deprived. None of those who repeated the story can have had the least
experience with butchering animals for food. I had, as a half-grown boy on
Harmony; and I boggle at the idea of hacking through that much flesh and
backbone with one swipe of a fourteenth century broadsword. Even if the victim
cooperated as much as possible by somehow miraculously keeping in place and on
her feet until the operation was complete and the soldiers stood by with open
mouths, it's humanly impossible. In real life it could have taken him
minutes." "More than a few minutes," said Hal, "given the mild steel of the
weapons of that time; and the probable lack of edge left on his sword after
whatever fighting they'd all been in. Since it was only with the soldiers
drunk and blood mad after taking a city or castle, that even the worst of them
would have indulged themselves in such license. But that's the least of such
an event happening in real life."
Bleys looked at him amusedly. "The least?" he asked. "Yes," said Hal. The
knowledge stored in the Final Encyclopedia was coming back to his mind.
"Hawkwood isn't called the first of the modern generals for no reason. He was
the most businesslike of the early condottiere. He knew the people he fought
against today might be the people he'd be fighting for tomorrow. So he made
sure his men never ruffled the sensitivities of local civilians, except under
the conditions of outright war. That was one of the reasons for his success;
apart from the sensitivities other elements of his life show. He kept a strict
discipline over his hired soldiers; and hanged any one of them caught
infringing even minor local laws." "But of course," said Bleys, "as you say
this must have happened during the sacking and looting of a just conquered
city. " "in which case he wouldn't have been present at such an incident at
all," said Hal. The memory of being Hawkwood as he walked in the circle had
come to life again in his head. "He was a man of the fourteenth century and a
combat professional. His actions and letters don't show him as the type of man
who'd
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do anything as ridiculous as what that story has him doing; any more than a
present day Dorsai would slaughter or torture prisoners. I I
The dry note in Hal's voice had not been enough to hide the emotion
underneath. To his annoyance once more with himself, he saw Bleys had been
quick to hear it. "Torture and slaughter were involved in that earlier grief
of yours, you mentioned?" "No," said Hal.
Torture had had no part in the death of James. But evoked now by Bleys' acute
question, the memory of Donal's older brother Mor, dead after torture at the
hands of the deranged William of Ceta, had come inevitably back to mind. It
was a memory he, Donal, should have foreseen arising out of any discussion
with Bleys such as he was having now. He had been too deep in the wood to
watch out for all the trees. He would never be able to escape the knowledge
that he had been at least partly responsible for Mor's hideous death. "In any
case," he interrupted his own thoughts now, "Hawkwood wouldn't have been there
in the city at that time under any circumstances." "Perhaps you'll tell me why
not." Bleys smiled. "As you know, my own military education is limited." "I
wouldn't have thought so," said Hal. "But, if you want me to spell out what
might have happened-after months of besieging a city, after inaction and
boredom, living for weeks on end in the mud and stinks of their lines, with a
shortage of food and drink from a surrounding countryside, scoured clean of
supplies so that they were almost as starved as the people in the city, the
attitudes of the besiegers became as savage as the attitudes of wild animals
toward the besieged. One hour after the city was taken, the rank and file of
soldiers conquering it would have been roaring drunk and blood mad, on
whatever wine or other drink they had managed to loot." "Yes." Bleys nodded.
"That sounds like the human animal I know. What was there to say that their
commanders weren't equally drunk and mad among them?" "The fact that when it
was all over, in a day or two, those commanders would need to lead these
drunken madmen again, as sober and obedient soldiers," said Hal. "But they
waited until the drink was gone, the raping and looting was over, and
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Gordon R. Dickson
the hangovers had taken charge, before they tried it. Raging wild in the
conquered city, any of the troops, even the most loyal and trustworthy, were
as likely to turn on their commander as sharks in a feeding frenzy. One of the
earliest things a military leader learns, even today, is never give his
subordinates an order they might not obey. So the medieval leaders stayed well
outside wherever the looting and such was going on after a taking. They
couldn't change what was going on in any case-"
He broke off suddenly. "So," he said. His eyes looked directly into Bleys'.
"It was a possible sacking of Earth you came to talk to me about." "That's
right," answered Bleys. "Don't tell me you haven't thought of that
possibility; once-as it's bound to, eventually -the number of ships we can put
into an attack is such they can make a simultaneous jump through the shield
and smother any resistance, even that of your Dorsai. This, too, is a siege;
and the same sort of attitude we've been talking about is developing on my
side of the phase wall."
He paused. "I'm willing to do whatever's necessary to put the human race back
where it belongs, on Old Earth, for a few thousand years until it's had time
to mature properly," he said. "But I don't like blood baths either; so I
thought we should talk."
And he smiled at Hal.
CHAPTER
33
Hal sat looking at Bleys for a moment. "The crew and officers on your
spaceships on patrol outside the shield," he said, "don't live in trenches or
dugouts. They aren't sick, or starving. In fact, I'll venture to bet they eat
better than their friends back on the home worlds they came from. If they're
developing a siege mentality, perhaps it's because you've fed them full on the
idea that the people living on Old Earth nowadays are something subhuman, that
the Final Encyclopedia is an invention of the Devil, manned by devils, and I'm
the chief devil of them all. It seems to me that an effort on your part put to
taking those ideas out of their minds would also Prevent any chance of a blood
bath." "Probably," said Bleys quietly, "but I'm not going to do that. And
since I'm not-you'll admit you've considered the danger of such a blood bath?"
Before Hal could answer, he went on. "Forgive me. That was an insulting
question. Of course, You've considered all the possibilities, just as I have."
"Speculations waste time," said Hal. "You came here to make me some kind of
offer. Make it." "I'd like to call off the war," said Bleys. "I'll be damned!"
Hal said. "Will you indeed?" answered Bleys. "In that case, try to get word
back to me what it's like. No one's ever been able to
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Gordon R. Dickson
send any messages back so far; but you might just be able to do it."
Hal hardly heard him. He told himself no one but the Other man could have
startled him to this extent. For a moment he even found himself wondering if
he had been wrong all along and that Bleys was far superior even to him after
all; that the Other could read minds and see around comers. How else could he
explain this sudden offer that would concede defeat just as Hal was about to
move closer than he ever had been to winning the contest between them? Unless
Bleys had somehow sensed Hal's breakthrough of just that morning?
Amid moved a little, involuntarily, in his chair; but no sound came from
Amanda, all but invisible in the shadows by the door; and Hal did not move. In
the fireplace a burned through log broke and fell into two halves with a soft
crash; and the flames shot up above it suddenly, sending shadows dancing on
the wall beyond Hal and Bleys.
Hal pulled himself together. There was a price, of course -some impossible
price. "In return for what?" demanded Hal bluntly. "Well, you'll take down the
phase-shield, of course," said Bleys. "And we'd want to settle some of the
Younger Worlds' people on presently unused areas of Old Earth." He sat back
comfortably in his chair. "There're tundra areas at both poles and sections of
desert that Old Earth's ignored ever since its population stabilized,
following the wave of immigration to the Younger Worlds nearly three hundred
years ago. You see, I'm willing to leave the dispute between us, you and 1, to
the verdict of future history, without any use of weapons." "Are you?" said
Hal. "You know better than to think I don't know what kind of Younger Worlds
people you'd settle there. Their colonies would he enclaves, from which your
colonists could work to convert as many as could be, of Earth's own people, to
your way of thinking. The end result would be an Earth torn by a division of
opinion-and ultimately a worldwide civil war-as much of a blood bath as the
invasion you talk about. Why do you suppose I was instrumental in having the
shield wall put up in the first place?" "Instrumental's hardly the word," said
Bleys. "The shield wall was all your doing. But think about it." "There's no
need," said Hal. "Old Earth's awakened to its
danger now. It's building ships and training crews for them, with Dorsai help,
in greater numbers all the time; and potential ly it's still got more
resources in materials, manufacturing and people than all the Younger Worlds
combined. Let alone the fact it hasn't light-years of lines of communication
to maintain support for its fighting ships." "Yes," said Bleys, "what you
say's all true. Earth's building faster all the time-but I think not fast
enough. I think the Younger Worlds have too much of a head start. We'll be
ready to come through the wall before you're ready to hold us off, let alone
drive us away."
He stopped talking. Hal had made no effort to interrupt him and continued to
say nothing, now. "You disagree, of course," said Bleys, "or perhaps you
don't. In any case, I've made the offer. You've no choice but to -consider it.
"And I've told you," answered Hal, "what you know as well as I do. What would
happen if Earth let you colonize like that.
Bleys nodded. "But you know," he said, "that while you and I may ride the
winds of history, we're not just completely helpless passengers. Of course
what you say is right. But the result of those colonies moving in doesn't have
to be what you suggest. Perhaps you can let them in and still bend the winds
to your advantage. It's possible. " "Possible, not probable. What you suggest
is a road downhill to what you want. But for we who want something else, all
roads would be uphill if I agreed." "The alternative's invasion and the blood
bath-very soon now. I I
It was true, thought Hal, even if the invasion Bleys talked of was not likely
to come quite as soon as he implied. It was also true, unfortunately, that
there was an element of truth in what Bleys offered. It was possible Old Earth
could absorb the enclaves Bleys suggested, without war, and the future be
settled that way.
But-Hal felt an echo of the same uneasiness he had told Bleys he had felt
three years before when they had been face to face in the phase-shield. The
feeling nagged at Hal that if Bleys got what he asked for, somehow the road to
the Creative Universe that he now thought he saw so plainly before him
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Gordon R. Dickson
would be blocked as surely as it would be by Tam's death, unless he found the
entrance to it before then. Should Hal reject this now-that might be the
answer for everyone now alive-in a gamble on what he might be able to do for
them and all generations to come?
He knew which choice he wanted. "Maybe you're right and it would work," he
said to Bleys slowly, "but I was never one for shaking hands with the Devil. "
"I thought," Bleys said, "you were the Devil, the Chief Devil?" "Only
according to your doxology," said Hal. "But in any case," Bleys smiled,
"what'll you tell Old Earth, when the people there learn they had a chance to
be free of the phase-shield and the warships of the Younger Worlds, but you
turned it down?" "That'll depend on whether you actually make such an offer
officially and publicly," said Hal. He smiled back. "There's nothing official
about me, outside the Final Encyclopedia. You'd need to make your proposal
formally from the United Younger Worlds to the Consortium of Old Earth
governmentsand give them time to consider it. In the end, you may decide not
to make the proposal, after all." "Oh?" said Bleys. He sounded genuinely
intrigued. "You think so? Why?"
Hal kept his own smile. "Wait and see," he said. "The pattern of the historic
forces changes constantly. You know that as well as I do." "I do, indeed,"
said Bleys softly. He hesitated for a moment. "I think you're bluffing." "Try
me and see," said Hal. "Yes," Bleys nodded, "I'll do that."
He had looked away from Hal and at the fire, musingly for a second. Now he
looked back. "Tell me," he said to Hal, "the last time we met, why didn't you
carry through? Why didn't you move to resolve what's between us two, at our
last meeting? I'd expected that to be the moment of our confrontation. You'd
undeniably stolen a march on me. You'd gotten all the people you valued and
needed safely hidden behind that phase-shield you'd had built around Old
Earth; before I could sweep them up, one by one, or group by group, from their
native worlds. When I met you in the wall of
9:1: 00.511W%1, GUILD
361
the phase-shield, itself, we were at a moment in time when you had a definite
advantage. Why didn't you push for a conclusion dien?"
Hal remembered again how at that particular last meeting he had noticed how
Bleys had become more physically powerful in appearance, how he had put on
weight in the form of compact muscle. He and the Other had been about the same
height since Hal had come into his growth-that had been the original height of
Hal's uncles, Ian and Kensie. Bleys had always been an unusually tall man. But
when Hal had first seen him, there had been none of the evidence of physical
strength that was part of him now.
Now, Bleys had apparently deliberately built himself up to match Hal. It
dawned on Hal that the Other man must have put in an incredible number of
hours physically developing and training himself for every possible kind of
hand-to-hand conflict, with or without weapons. This, because the extra
strength by itself would be only a part of making himself a physical match.
for Hal. Therefore he had, for his own reasons, been looking forward even at
that meeting in the phase-shield wall, to possible conflict on that level with
Hal.
But, even as he realized this, Hal also realized that what Bleys had tried was
impossible. No adult could possibly train himself to the point of physically
matching a Dorsai of comparable size, age, reflexes and ability, who had been
trained from the cradle upward.
Only then did Hal remember, once more, that he now was no match for such a
Dorsai either. All his physical training as Hal Mayne had been some of the
tutoring from only one of his tutors, as a child of Old Earth; and even that
had been a long time ago. He had tried to keep himself in shape since, helped
by an active life at times, such as when he had been a miner on Coby, or a
member of Rukh's Resistance band on Harmony; but that didn't make him a
Dorsai. Recognition and realization took place in his mind in barely the time
it took him to start answering. "You come at an interesting time to ask me
that," he answered. "Maybe it isn't so surprising though. Many of the historic
forces that move you parallel those that move me; and it's natural that we'd
come together under coincidental conditions. "
362
Gordon R. Dickson
"But you didn't answer my question," said Bleys, his eyes steady on Hal.
"That's why I say you come at an interesting time," said Hal. "If I'd had to
answer you then, there in the phase-shield, I wouldn't have been able to. All
I knew then was that I noticed that you were ready for a showdown; and
instinct told me to back off from it. I felt-you'd have to cal I it an
uneasiness about accepting any try to settle things there and then. Now I
understand why. What I'd realized unconsciously was,'as I told you then, that
you couldn't win. But, as I later realized, if I agreed to the confrontation,
then and there, neither could 1. "I don't follow you," said Bleys. "I mean I
believe I would've won that contest," answered Hal. "But either of us could
have; and, I'll give you this, you might have won after all. We were at a
point where, with one of us gone, the other would have had an advantage.
Pressed home, that advantage might have given a seeming victory." "Seeming,
only?" Bleys' voice was pleasantly curious. "Yes," answered Hal. "Seeming
only; because we'd merely be once more repeating a cycle of time-worn history.
I learned a long time ago that even having all possible power over all the
worlds doesn't make you able to change human nature; and it's that that's been
the point of argument between us from the beginning, whether the individual
human's nature is going to be changed or not. If I'd won I'd have gained a
victory; but it'd have been only a partial victory. As, if you'd won, you'd
have had only a partial victory. And the problem with any partial victory for
either of us was that final victory, the ultimate victory, would've been
closed off from the survivor, forever; or at least until some later generation
should create the confrontation once again; and in that future time be wiser
in its decision. So I chose to leave things at stalemate so that I could try
for the greater victory, in my own time."
As I do again now, he thought to himself. It's the same uneasiness, the same
decision. "Did you?" said Bleys. "And, do you see your way to it now?"
Hal smiled. "If I've found the answer, " he said, "it's there for everyone. Go
find it for yourself."
Bleys looked at him for a long second. It was strange to see
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363
Bleys Ahrens pause like this. He must have done so only at very rare moments
in his life. "So," he said at last, "not this time, either. But I think I'll
do what you say and find whatever you say you've found, for myself. And I'll
meet you at the end of the road, wherever that is. Look for me there when you
reach it."
His voice softened suddenly. "Stop the little girl," he said. But Amanda had
already been in movement. Her hand closed now over Cee's just as Cee's fingers
closed on the glass paperweight containing the miniature pine cone, on Amid's
desk. Amanda pried it loose from Cee's grasp. Cee struggled, silently if
fiercely, to hold on to it; but her strength was no match for an adult's.
Amanda came away with the paperweight. "We don't kill people," Amanda told
her. "Ever."
Cee's eyes held Amanda's and the small face was unreadable. "She's decided
you're dangerous," Amanda told Bleys. "Don't ask me exactly why. Smelled it in
you, possibly; and I can't really blame her. She's right."
She turned her attention on Cee again. "But we don't kill people," she
repeated to the girl. "You don't kill people. Leave this man to those who know
how to deal with him; like Friend, here."
Bleys was frowning at Cee. "You don't actually mean," he said to Amanda,
"she's that dangerous?" "Yes." Amanda still held Cee unwaveringly with her
gaze. "Men sent here by you made her that way. Ask your four dead Occupation
soldiers-if you can talk to ghosts." "Well . . . " said Bleys thoughtfully.
He stayed for a moment where he was, facing Hal. He rose, and Hal rose across
from him. They stood close as brothers, two tall men under the close, dark
ceiling of Amid's office. "Well, I've made my offer." Bleys pulled his cloak
closed again around him, and its dark folds swirled and flashed for a second
in the firelight. "I'll leave you with it. You might be kind enough to send
someone with me to light me down the mountainside path, so I don't go in the
wrong direction and fall off a cliff. From the upper side of that stone at the
bottom that closes the path, he can easily roll it back into place alone. It's
only opening it from below that's a hard job for one man."
364
Gordon R. Dickson
He looked over at Amid. "Don't worry," he said, "I'll keep the secret of this
place of yours, here, and any of the Occupation Army that's tempted to explore
in this direction will find orders disapproving such a move after the
pronounced nonsuccess of the late force-leader and his equally late groupman.
You can go on living up here in peace. I I
He turned back to Hal. "But they're lucky they had you with them." "I didn't
kill those soldiers," Hal said. "So you're giving me to understand." Bleys'
eyebrows raised. "This child did it for you. I find that a little hard to
believe. " "It's true," said Hal.
Bleys laughed. "if you say so." "You see," Hal said, "you're making a mistake.
Here, where you're standing, is the cradle of the new breed of Exotics.
Exotics who'll be nowhere near as vulnerable to you as they've been in the
past. " "If they can kill soldiers, perhaps you're right," said Bleys. "But
I'm not particularly worried. I don't think this place and its people have
very long to survive, even without a hand being raised against them. Now, what
about that guide to light me on my way?"
    I
"You must have rolled the entrance stone aside from below," said Amid
suddenly. "How could you do it, alone?"
Bleys glanced at Hal. "How about you?" he asked. "Are you surprised, too? No,
you wouldn't be, would you? You could do it yourself. You know that there're
ways of concentrating your strength. Have been ever since the first caveman
lifted a fallen tree he shouldn't have been able to move, off a hunting
companion in a moment of frenzy he didn't think he had in him. But you might
not have thought of me before now as being equal to you, physically. I am,
though. I think, in fact, we're just about equal in nearly all respects;
though that's something neither of us will be able to check. " "If there is,
it'll show at the end," said Hal. "Yes," said Bleys, more quietly than he had
spoken until this moment, "at the end. Where's that guide?"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
365
"I have called for Onete to get someone," said Amid. "Here she comes now."
In fact, the door was opening, and Onete came in through it, followed by Old
Man, carrying a powerful fueled lamp, already lit. ,,Then too," said Bleys
thoughtfully, looking at the slim, white-bearded man waiting by the open door,
"there might be those about whom there could be a legitimate doubt if they
could roll the stone back alone, even from the top side.
Old Man's eyes twinkled back at him. "Then, perhaps not," said Bleys, striding
toward the door. "Lead on, my guide." Old Man stood aside to let the Other
pass through the door first; then went out himself, closing it behind him.
Amanda came forward to the fireplace so that she was together with the seated
Amid and the still standing Hal. "You frightened me," said Amid to Hal, "when
you told him that this ledge was the cradle of the new breed of Exotics; and
right after he'd promised to keep our being here a secret! Do you think he was
telling the truth about leaving us in peace?" "Bleys feels himself above ever
having to lie," answered Hal. "But I'm sorry you were frightened. I wasn't
just being thoughtless enough to raise a doubt in his mind; I was actually
confirming his original notion you were harmless. "
Amid's already wrinkled brow wrinkled more deeply in a frown. "I don't
understand," he said. "He's a fanatic," said Amanda. "You know his background,
surely? You Exotics must have looked into his background. His mother was one
of your people."
Amid nodded. "It's true she was an Exotic," said Amid. "But she turned away
from us. If we were a religious people, you might have said she was an
apostate." "She was brilliant, and knew it," said Amanda. "But not brilliant
enough to gain control of all the Younger Worlds, the way Donal Graeme
effectively did, back in his time; and fate had caused her to be born into the
one Splinter Culture whose people were best equipped to resist manipulation by
her." "Yes," said Amid, with a sigh, "at any rate she left us and went to
Ceta."
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Gordon R. Dickson
"Yes," said Amanda, "and it was on Ceta, later on, Bleys was born. He's never
known who his father was. Actually he was from Harmony. An unhappy older man
she seduced merely to see how easily she could do it. But I think she really
wanted to believe she was the only one responsible for Bleys; because almost
from the day he was born it was plain he had everything in the way of
abilities that his mother had liked to think she had herself, but hadn't. So
she started cramming him full of knowledge from the time he was old enough to
talk; and he was well on his way to being what he is now at only nine years of
age, when she suddenly died. Possibly he was responsible for that. He could
have been. She'd left directions that if anything happened to her he was to go
to his uncle on Harmony. Do you know that part of his history?" "Not all of
it," said Amid. "When we looked into Bleys' background, years later, we found
out about his mother. She had no Friendly genes in either the maternal or
paternal lines of her ancestry. But the man-the Friendly on Harmony he was
sent to grow up with-couldn't have been Bleys' uncle! A cousin, a number of
times removed, at most." "Well, she called him an uncle and the boy was taught
to call him 'uncle.' In any case he was a farmer with a large family; and a
fanatic, rather than a true faith-holder. He raised all his children to be
fanatics like himself. Some of what Bleys is he caught from that man. Though I
don't suppose it was more than a week or two after he got there that the
nine-year-old Bleys was controlling that whole family, whether they knew it or
not. He
t lled them; but his 'uncle,' or all of them, infected him with their
fanaticism all the same."
I 'It's not easy to tell the difference between a fanatic and what you call a
true faith-holder-particularly when you call them so, Hal," said Amid, looking
from Amanda to him. "I'd hate to think we simply use the word fanatic for
anyone whose views we disagree with. " "There's almost no difference in any
case," answered Hal, "between a fanatic and someone of pure faith, though what
difference there is makes all the difference, once you get to know them.
Basically, they differ in the fact a faith-holder puts himself below his faith
and lets it guide his actions. The fanatic puts himself above it and uses it
as an excuse for his actions. But
THE CHANTRY GUILD
367
ical purposes, the two are almost identical. The fanatic pract 'I die for what
he believes in as readily as a man or woman of
Ili= came back to him a memory of a man who had been a
1@natic and tortured Rukh Tamani close to death; but who now wrved her among
the most loyal of her followers and was a Jaith-holder. Amyth Barbage had been
ari officer of the Militia ftt harried and tried to destroy such Resistance
Groups as Rukh's on both Harmony and its sister Friendly world of Association.
He and James Child-of-God, Rukh's second-in-command of the Resistance Group,
would have seemed, to anyone who did not know them intimately, to have been
cut from the same bolt of cloth. Both men were harsh and uncompromising both
in attitude and appearance-except that Child-of-God was old enough to be
Barbage's father. Both spoke an archaic, 'canting' version of Basic, full of
"thee's" and "thou's." Both put what they thought of as their faith before all
other things. But Barbage had been a fanatic.
James Child-of-God had been a true faith-holder. He had spent his life
fighting against the Militia that the Others had found so useful and put to
their own purposes; and he died, alone, behind a small barricade in the rain,
deliberately giving his life to slow up the Militia companies that were close
on the @,heels of what had by then become a sick and exhausted Resistance
Group, driven by the relentless pursuit of a Barbage who had unlimited troops
and supplies at his disposal.
To this day, Hal could not remember lightly his final moments alone with
Child-of-God, before he had left the old inan to his final battle in the rain
with the foe he had opposed so long. Always the memory tightened Hal's throat
painfully. On the other hand, the memory of Barbage that had just come to mind
was of an entirely different nature, but showed the same
kind of utter dedication to a purpose.
This other memory was of a somewhat earlier time when the Group was being
closely pursued through a territory of dense Woods by Barbage and the Militia
Companies stationed in one of the local Districts through which the Group had
been fleeing; and Hal, because of his training as a boy under a Dorsai, had
been the best choice to try and slip back quietly to spy on their
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Gordon R. Dickson
pursuers. He had silently backtracked and come upon the pursuing companies,
temporarily halted for a meeting of their officers. He had worked his way
close enough to hear them, co ing within earshot at a point where the superior
officer of the Companies had gotten himself into a confrontation with the
knife-lean, relentless-eyed Barbage, who had apparently been sent out from
Militia Headquarters and made into what he was by Bleys' direct personal
influence. The scene was suddenly there, now, as he thought of it, in his
mind's eye. . @ .
I.. . . yes, I say it to thee, " Amyth Barbage had been sayt .ng in his hard
tenor voice to the Commandant of the Militia, who
was a Captain, as Barbage was himsetf. Hal moved closer behind a small screen
of slim variform willows. Barbage was on his feet. The other, junior, officers
of the Militia had all been sitting with the Captain himself in a row on a
fallen log, between the two men, with the other Captain seated at thefar end
of their line. "I have been given a commission by authority far above thee,
and beyond that by the Great Teacher, Bleys Ahrens himself; and if I say to
thee, go-thou wilt go!"
The other Captain had looked upward and across at Barbage with a tightly
closed jaw. He was a man perhaps five years younger than Barbage, no more than
midway into his thirties; but his face was square and heavy with oncoming
middle age, and his neck was thick. "I've seen your orders," he said. His
voice was not hoarse, but thick in his throat-a parade-ground voice. "They
don't say anything about pursuing over district borders. " "Thou toy man!"
said Barbage; and his voice was harsh with contempt. "What is it to me how
such as thou read orders? I know the will of those who sent me; and I order
thee, that thou pursuest how and where I tell thee to pursue!"
The other captain had risen from the log, his face gone pale with anger. The
sun glinted on theforward-facing oval end of the butt of the power pistol
sheltered under the snapped down weather flap of the holster at his belt.
Barbage wore no pistol. "You may have orders!" he said, even more thickly.
"But you don't outrank me and there's nothing that says I have to take that
sort of language from you. So watch what you say or pick yoursetf a weapon-I
don't care either way."
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369
Barbage's thin upper lip curled slightly. @W
eapon? What Baal's pride is this to think that in the Lord's "*wrk thou
mightest be worthy of affront? Unlike thee, I have no JVch playthings as
weapons. Only tools which the Lord has made amilable to my hand as I have
needed them. So, thou hast
called a weapon, then? No doubt that which I see on ,,,*mething
ou didst not like y side, there. Make use of it, therefore, since th dw name I
gave thee!"
The Captain flushed. "You're unarmed," he said shortly. "Oh, let that not stop
thee," said Barbage ironically. "For the servants of the Lord, tools are ever
ready to hand."
He made one long step while the other man stared at him, to end standing
beside the most junior of the officers sitting on the log. He laid his hand on
the snapped-down weatherflap of the young officer's power pistol and flicked
the flap up with his thumbnail. His hand curled around the suddenly exposed
butt of the power pistol beneath. A twist of the wrist would be all that would
be needed to bring the gun out of its breakaway holster andflre it; while the
other Captain would have needed to reach for and uncover his own pistol first
before he could fire.
From the far end of the log the Captain stared, his heavy face suddenly even
more pale and mouth open foolishly. "I meant . . . I IThe words stumbled on
his tongue. "Not like this. A proper meeting, with seconds-'' "Alas, " said
Barbage, "such games are unfamiliar to me. So I will kill thee now to decide
whether we continue or turn back from our pursuit, since thou hast not chosen
to obey my orders-unless thou shouldst kill me first to prove thy right to do
4s thou wishest. That is how thou wouldst do things, with thy weapons, and thy
meetings and thy seconds, is it not9"
He paused, but the other did not answer. "Very well then," said Barbage. He
drew the power pistol from the holster of the junior officer and leveled it at
his equal in rank. "In the Lord's name-," broke out the other man hoarsely.
"Have it any way you want. We'll go on then, over the border!" "I am happy to
hear thee decide so, " said Barbage. He replaced the pistol in the holsterfrom
which he had withdrawn it and stepped awayfrom the young officer who owned it.
"We will
370
Gordon R. Dickson
continue until we make contact with the pursuit unit sent outfroon the neq
District, at which time I willjoin them and thou, with thy
0 officers and men, mayest go back to thy small games in town. i That should
be soon. When are the troopsfrom the next District to meet us? . . . "
"The fact that the goal he works for is wrong won't slow Bleys down," Hal said
now to Amid. "He'll do what's necessary to accomplish what he wants; just as I
will. It's not the goal, but his belief that's important; and that's as strong
as if his faith was as right as anyone's ever was."
Amid nodded slowly. "I see," he said. "But the fact that he's found me here
changes things for me, personally," went on Hal. "I'm afraid I'd better be
getting back to Earth and the Final Encyclopedia pretty soon, now." "Not just
pretty soon," said Amanda. "Immediately. Now. "
Hal turned to her. "You've been here all this time and you're only saying it
now?" he demanded. " She's only saying it to you," Amid said. "She told me the
minute she arrived, but you were down in the forest busy rescuing Artur and
Cee at the time. Since you've come back, you were first, dead for sleep, then
sometime early this morning you seem to have had a revelation or discovery of
some kind-and none of us wanted to disturb you until you were ready to be
disturbed. What had touched you may have been too important for the future of
all of us to be damaged by intrusion. "
Hal sighed, and nodded. "Yes," he said. "Actually, the fault's mine. I should
have asked Amanda for news, the minute I saw her, last night." "You were in no
shape-last night," said Amanda, "to ask, or hear."
He smiled a little. "Perhaps," he said. "What happened to me at sunrise this
morning might have been blocked off by whatever news you've brought that makes
it necessary I go back immediately. But I don't think so. I was deaf and dumb
with tiredness, though; I'll
THE CHANTRY GUILD                          371
gmnt you that. At any rate, now that sunrise and Bleys are both p4st-what is
it?" "It's for your ears only," said Amanda, "all I've told Amid was that
you'd have to leave right away. Actually, that's all you ought to need to know
yourself, to get moving. I'll tell you as we
90-"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
373
CHAPTER
34
They were well down into the forest and headed away from the direction that
would have taken them back to the town of Porphyry and still Amanda had not
brought up what she had promised to tell him as they went, whatever it was
that was "for his ears only." "No doubt," said Hal, at length, "you had a good
reason for not letting me know up there why I had to leave in a hurry; but
we're well away, now, and I'd still like to hear."
I'll m sorry." She was walking along, staring at the ground ahead of them a
little ways off, and he realized she was frowning. "The fact is, I could have
let you know long before this. But I've had my head full of the problems
involved." "Bad news of some kind?" asked Hal. "Yes, but . . . " Amanda
hesitated, then her voice picked up briskly. "In a word, Tam's sent you a
message."
Hal stopped. She stopped also and they turned to face each other. "A message?"
Hal repeated. "He's hardly got the strength-"
s one word, only," said Amanda. "The word is 'tired.' Hal nodded slowly. "I
see," he said softly. He turned and began walking on again automatically in
the direction they had already been headed. Amanda went with him.
'477
"Yes," she answered. "He said it to Rukh at a moment when
she was alone with him. Ajela had been called out of his quarters for a
second. He knew Rukh would understand and --pass on the word to me; and I'd
get it to you."
Hal nodded. "It was bound to be," he said, on a long exhalation of breath.
-14e held on as long as he could-for my sake. There's still nothing wrong with
him physically?" "You needn't ask that," said Amanda. "Medical science using
the Final Encyclopedia could keep his body from ever
breaking down. It's his mind that's had too many years. That's-- "I know    ,,
said Hal, "there's more to living than a body that'll go on forever. He's
weary of life itself. But he's been holding on . . ." "Rukh thinks, and I'm
sure she's right," said Amanda, "that he sent the message because he can't
last much longer; though no doubt he's going to try until you get back to see
him one more time. If he'd had the life energy for just a few more words she's
sure that's what he would have said."
Hal nodded. "Yes, he would have," he said. "How'd the word reach you?" "Rukh
sent a courier ship to orbit at a distance around this world until it could
contact us. Its driver knew approximately how far off-surface Simon's ship
would be orbiting, waiting for us. He found Simon, told him, and Simon
signaled me. I've got a system of signals that involves things like you saw
our first day here after Simon dropped us off-the white cloth I spread out on
the tops of bushes where his viewer could spot it from orbit. In this case,
Simon sent down a small capsule under power with the message to a spot which
he knew I check regularly for word from him. I signaled back. We'll be at a
point where he can pick us up in just a few minutes-he'll be tracking us right
now from orbit. " "Good." Hal nodded. "And he should have us back to Earth in
a couple of days, ship time." "Or less," said Amanda. "We'll make it in as few
shifts as possible-shave right down the probability line of enough error
to lose us among the stars on the way there-unless you've got Some reason not
to."
374
Gordon R. Dickson
.'No. I I
Hal lifted his head and squared his shoulders. "Well, at any rate, I've got
something to tell Tam, when I see him." He paused, then went on, "I might
still be able to give him what he wants, in time; enough for him to let go
with an easy conscience." "You see why I didn't dare break the news to you,
even in front of Amid? To too many people, on too many worlds, Tam Olyn's a
symbol of hope even bigger than the conflict between you and Bleys. " "It's
not a personal conflict," said Hal gently. "I know. Forgive me," she said. "I
put it badly. But there're too many people who may start to lose the one hope
they've hung on to, ever since the Others took over completely on the Younger
Worlds. Even there-Bleys' propaganda about you and everything else hasn't been
able to shake their hope in Tam. If they think he's close to being gone, now,
with nothing found, the heart could go out of a lot of them. That could have
been a reason behind Bleys' offer, just now. As long as Tam was still alive,
they could hope for a miracle that'd set everything right. "They can still
hope for one," said Hal. "But who's to convince them of that?" said Amanda.
"Bleys has done too good a job of blackening your reputation for them to
believe in your word alone; and there's no one else of comparable stature."
"There's Ajela. " "Who really thinks much, or even knows much of her, outside
of Earth?" asked Amanda. "Besides, she's the second problem, not the
solution-here we are."
They had reached a natural opening in the forest, something that on another
world, with a different sort of groundcover from the creeping ground vines of
Mara at this altitude, would have been called a meadow. "Simon should be here
inside an hour-maybe even in minutes, now," she said.
She stopped at the edge of the open area and Hal stopped with her. He studied
her face in profile. "Why did you say 'the second problern'T' he asked.
She turned to face him. "Tam's going to die," Amanda said. "Don't you realize
what that means in the case of Ajela?"
THE CHANTRY GUILD
375
"Oh," said Hal, "of course." "More 'of course' than I think you realize," said
Amanda. ..,.O'With Tam's death Ajela's going to collapse; and as things
@,stand she's the working executive head of Earth. Who's to fill in for her
until she can take control again, and how can we handle things while keeping
Tam's death a secret?" "You're right," Hal answered. "I thought about that a
little while I was up on the ledge." "You've had your own search to occupy
you. But now, I think maybe you should set that aside for a moment. Hal, you
know everybody's done all each one of them could, to leave you free to search
for the answer you were the only one able to find-- "Including you taking
yourself off to risk your life daily on worlds the Others held in the palms of
their hands, just to keep yourself out of my reach?" "Not just to keep myself
out of your reach," she said swiftly. "This work I do is too badly needed to
be taken on as just an excuse. But at the same time, your search is something
you have to do on your own. We all know that. If I was around, I'd be a
distraction to you, whether you wanted me to be or not."
Their eyes met. "I'm one of Time's soldiers, too, Hal," she said, "and it was
my duty to be elsewhere." "And what if it's to be we never have time for
ourselves?" Hal asked softly. "You asked me that before. We will," she
answered. Her eyes still held his steadily. "We will. I promise you."
An unreasonable happiness leaped up in him; but just at that moment the air
quivered about them like soundless thunder, felt not heard, and they both
looked up. A dot was flashing down out of the sky toward them in jumps,
growing with each jump more into a visible shape, and nearer. It was Simon
Graeme doing what the Dorsai did as a matter of course, but few pilots from
Other worlds would risk-phase-shifting down to almost the very surface of a
world, so as to avoid any but the briefest sound of a ship coming through the
atmosphere to a landing. "We'll talk more-later," said Hal hastily. "Yes, we
will," she answered; as with a sudden brief explosion of displaced air and
atmospheric motors, the courier ship landed in the open area less than fifty
meters from where they stood.
376
Gordon R. Dickson
They went forward, but the entry port swung open before they had reached it
and Simon looked out. He gripped Hal's hand briefly as they came aboard, and
punched the key that closed the port behind them. "We'll have to move fast,"
he said. "There're more Younger World ships in orbit than I've seen here
before; and that courier from Earth coming out to contact me was noticed. Find
your seats, strap in, and we'll lose ourselves outside Procyon's orbit as soon
as possible . . . ...
It was almost two days, after all, before they reached safely through the
phase-shield and landed inside the Final Encyclopedia. Simon and Amanda had
taken turns driving the ship, so that the next shift to be calculated was
always being worked on even as they were making the current jump. So abrupt
had been their departure that they had left with nothing but the clothes they
had on-in Hal's case, some gray trousers and a light blue shirt that had been
made for him at the Chantry Guild. In Amanda's case, they were her standard
bush clothes for travel out of sight of the local military: boots, trousers
and jacket, both of khaki twill, the shirt with a number of pockets.
Rukh, who was waiting for them in the docking area at the entrance to an
access corridor as they stepped out of the parked ship, showed no interest in
how they were dressed. She herself was looking unusually, almost ominously
formal, in a long black skirt and high-collared white blouse, with her usual
lone adornment the steel neckchain with its pendant granite disk incised with
a cross, showing in the collar's short opening, in front. "Hal!" she said.
She hugged him. There was still a remarkable strength in her thin arms. She
had seemed made of monocellular cord and steel when he had first known her as
a commander of her Resistance Group on Harmony. Now, she felt so light as to
be almost weightless in his arms; but he thought now that there was part of
that original strength, which had survived the attrition of the days and
nights of torture in the Militia cell; and the glow of her faith, which never
failed to seem to set her aglow from within. For a second, holding her, he
thought he touched the reason she had been so easily able to accept Barbage,
her former torturer, as now one of her most dedicated followers. It was not as
if she had merely forgiven him. It was something greater than that. It
THE CHANTRY GUILD
377
o understand how he could have ks if her faith allowed her t what he was then,
and yet suddenly become what he was
rgiveness on her side, or So that there was no need for fo '_ iimd to ask for
it, on his. But she was stri
ding ahead of them now, drawing away from
Amanda's were so Am in spite of the fact that his legs and
longer than hers. urry!" she said. "We've got his quarters right next to the
area, expecting you." rideed, it was only some thirty meters down the silent,
.'gwen-carpeted hallway between the dark-paneled walls to the tingle door at
the corridor's end; and she led them through into ',_,the rooms of Tam Olyn.
The mechanical magic, which could shift areas around within its shell, at
will, had brought Tam as
dm to their arrival point as possible.
They stepped into the familiar main room, which had been designed long since
at Tam's order to look like a woodland glade on Old Earth, the trees barring
sight of the walls surrounding giving the illusion of the outdoors on the
world below-an illusion reinforced by the small stream wandering down the
Center of it, among the massively overstuffed easy chairs that --mere
scattered around what seemed to be the grass of a tiny ineadow. Two people
were already there. One was Ajela. She was seated, holding one of Tam's veined
hands in both of hers, as he occupied the chair opposite.
Tam sat with the utter motionlessness of extreme old age. He was dressed as if
for the day's work, in a business suit of the sort he had worn all his life.
If the heavy cloak, red and white on one
side and with a dark inner lining, of an interplanetary journalist had been
added, there would have been no difference in his dress 'now from the time
when he had been just such a newsman, with no plan to ever set foot in the
Final Encyclopedia again, after his single early visit to it. Like Hal, he had
needed to leave the Encyclopedia in order to find it again. But it had been
over a
century now since he had been the young man who had made that single visit, at
his sister's insistence, and heard the voices as
Hal and Mark Torre had done.
Only they three had heard, as they passed through the centerpoint of the globe
that was the Encyclopedia; but in the case of each of them, that hearing had
changed their lives.
Now Tam sat waiting, holding on to life that had become a
378
Gordon R. Dickson
burden rather than a pleasure, trying to endure just enough longer for Hal to
reach him-and now Hal was here. For the Encyclopedia's sake, he waited for
Hal. For Ajela's sake, he would wait as long as he could.
It was Ajela that caught Hal's eyes now. Physically, she had not changed since
he had seen her last, but what Tam's steady and obvious weakening was doing to
her was made clear in her dress. Whatever the Final Encyclopedia had
automatically laid out for her to wear this day, in the program she had set up
in it long since to save her time in dressing, as she had come to save time
whenever possible, could not have been what she was now wearing. Her choice
had clearly been dictated by an unconscious desire to rouse the dying man
through his male instincts, if nothing else.
She had chosen to put on a sari-like garment that wound tightly around her
waist and hips. It was a hot pink, with yellow flowers imprinted over the base
color. Above the sari there was a space of bare midriff, and above that a
small, short-sleeved, tight blouse of the same material; while on her arms
were multiple slim bracelets and in her ears earrings made of multiple small
chained pieces-all these ornaments of bronze-which chimed and jingled at her
slightest movement.
But the sari was carelessly draped; and the sound of the bracelets and
earrings were lonely in the room as she turned to look, with a shadow of
desperate appeal on her face, at Hal and Amanda as they entered.
Clearly, on his part, Tam did not see them enter. Plainly he saw Ajela beside
him, but equally plainly he no longer noticed what she wore. His eyes were
fixed on something among the trees, or upon his own dreams, or perhaps upon
nothing at all. It was not until Hal had walked up to stand almost before his
chair, and knelt on both knees, so their faces should be on a level, that
recognition came.
Even then, it came slowly; as if it was a great labor for Tam to rouse himself
to what he saw before him. But it dawned in his eyes at last and the hint of a
smile liftcd the corners of his mouth. His lips parted and moved, but whatever
he meant to say was not voiced loudly enough for Hal, or any of the others, to
hear it.
Hal reached out and took Tam's free hand between his own two, so that he held
it as Ajela was holding the other one.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
379
"I'm here, Tam," he said softly. "I'm back; and I've found now. Can you hold
on just ::,@@4omethiinig I needed. The way's clear _@a matter of hours more)
It won't be     long. Not long at all." Is small smile saddened. Barely
perceptible, but with Tam
enough to    see, his head moved twice, a few centimeters from side to side.
"I know, Tam," said Hal "I'm not trying to hold you here. I'll only try to
work very fast, just in case you're still with us
when I reach what we've been after all this time. But it's a solid promise
now. The way's clear. The end is in sight. The Final Encyclopedia's at last
going to be what Mark dreamed of; what you dreamed of, and 1, too. Maybe it'll
happen fast enough-"
He broke off as the old head before him made the same minuscule side to side
movement. Tam's hand stirred slightly between his two palms; and he was
puzzled for a second before he realized the other was trying to return a
pressure to his touch.
Once more Tam's lips moved. But this time the ghost of a
voice came from them. "Hal . . .
But the faint exhalation of breath died, the heavy eyelids wavered and closed.
Tam was utterly motionless and the moment of his stillness stretched out and
out. . . . "Tam!" cried Ajela suddenly; and both Rukh and Amanda moved in on
the chair where Tam sat. But Tam's heavy eyelids fluttered briefly and rose.
For a second he focused on Ajela; and that small attempt at a smile once more
turned up the corners of his lips for her.
Hal rose and moved back out of the way, as Ajela slipped forward onto her
knees where he had been, threw her arms around Tam and buried her face against
the ancient body.
Rukh bent over the gold-haired, kneeling figure. Hal felt a
touch on his elbow and looked to see Amanda's eyes meaningfully upon his. He
turned and followed her out of the door by which they had just come in. As the
door closed behind them, he turned back to face her and they stood, looking at
each other. "What can I do?" said Hal. "is there anything I can do at all
for her?" "Not directly," said Amanda. "Leave her to Rukh and me. Both of us
have been through this sort of experience in our own
lives. For me, it was Ian, when I was still young. For Rukh it was
380
Gordon R. Dickson
James Child-of-God. We can help her. You can't, except by getting on with your
own work." "Which is what I intend starting immediately," he said. "With luck,
I can still achieve something before-"
He broke off. Rukh had just come through the door and joined them,
11 How is she?" Hal asked. "She's best left alone with him for now," said
Rukh. "Later it'll be a matter of getting her away from him to rest for a
while. Let's go to her office to talk."
With another brief use made of the Final Encyclopedia's magic, and another
short walk down the corridor, they entered the office. It was, like the office
of any of the others from Tam on down who worked with the Encyclopedia, merely
one room of the personal living space of each within the massive structure
that was the TFE. But illusion made the space chosen appear as large as was
wished and hid all doors to more rooms beyond, to all but those who knew the
quarters intimately.
Sol as with Tam's forest glade, Ajela's working space was a reflection of her
own individual identity. As his did, hers had water; but not a stream. Where
Ajela worked was a round, shallow pool in which brightly colored fish lazily
swam. There was indeed a desk beside the pool but the floor space about it was
furnished in lounge fashion; except that the chairs, like the desk, were
floats, instead of solidly floor-standing, oldfashioned furniture.
However, the largest difference between the two personalized rooms lay in
their general concept. Tam's was a slice of Old Earth. Ajela's was a nostalgic
reconstruction of part of a typical Exotic countryside residence; one of those
artfully constructed dwellings in which it was possible to move from indoors
to outside without having realized it, so well were the two environments
integrated in the design and furnishings.
The inside surface of the wall through which Hal, Amanda and Rukh now entered
was simple wood paneling. But where the wall connecting to it at an angle on
their right would normally be was the seeming of a vertical face of roughly
cut, warm brown granite. The wall to their left seemed a trellis overgrown
with vine from which hundreds of varicolored sweetpea blossoms looked inward
at them. While the wall that should have
THE CHANTRY GUILD
381
iven opposite the one through which they had entered appeared not to exist.
Instead, they looked out on a vista of green treetops in a bowl-shaped valley
lifting in the distance to bluish mountains wreathed in soft tendrils of
moving white mist. "Let's take the desk," said Rukh. She stepped ahead,
leading the way, and went forward and around to seat herself behind the desk.
It was a piece of office furniture that could be expanded both lengthwise and
in width to make a conference table seating up to fifteen people; but at the
moment it was down to its minimal size of a meter in width and two in length.
Rukh sat down behind it, in a float near one end, and Amanda and Hal moved,
respectively, to the end itself and the front of the desk directly opposite
Rukh. Two nearby floats, their sensory mechanisms triggered by the heat of the
bodies close to them, moved forward to be used; and Hal and Amanda sat down.
Hal looked at the desk. Its present state was the one thing in the room that
did not resonate of Ajela. In all the time Hal had been in tfie Final
Encyclopedia, he had seen its surface in either one of only two states. Either
it was completely bare and clean, except for a stylus next to the screen inset
in the desktop where Ajela usually sat; or it was high-piled and adrift with
the flotsam of hard copies of official papers, correspondence, contracts and
the like.
Now, it was in neither state. It held a number of hard copies, but they were
neatly stacked in orderly piles. Hal looked at these as the desk top opened
before both Amanda and himself to make available to each of them a screen and
stylus like that now in front of Rukh.
The neatly stacked papers were not the product of Ajela's hands. The desk
showed the touch of Rukh. Hal raised his eyes to her. "Have you taken over
here for her completely, then?" he asked. "I'm afraid so," said Rukh. "It's
not official, of course. @jela's authority comes from Tam-I should say, from
you, since Tam named you Director, only you've never used the authority. She
has. But aside from the fact she's got no right to pass it to someone else
while you're alive, we daren't let word get out to Earth or anywhere else that
she's not, effectively, at the helm. There're a handful of inner circle
secretaries that
382
Gordon R. Dickson
know, but they keep it to themselves. Not even most of the Encyclopedia
personnel realize how much she's out of the picture most of the time." "You'd
think they'd guess something like that was going on, with Tam as close to the
end as he is," said Amanda. "They do," said Rukh. "They're just loyal enough
not to ask embarrassing questions. But Hal-- Her brown eyes leveled on his.
"They'll feel better now you're back." "I never did run things here," said
Hal. "No, but they know Tam looked on you to finally succeed him, and in fact
you were already made Director years ago, when the shield went up. They'll
feet better with you actually in the Encyclopedia." "How are you managing on
your own?" Amanda asked Rukh.
The brown eyes moved to meet the turquoise ones. "It's all decision-making,"
said Rukh. "The internal problems I turn over to the heads of departments. In
special cases, I go to Ajela if I have to. The rest of it, particularly the
problems coming up to her from Earth, are usually just a matter of common
sense or mediating between two unreasonable points of view In fact, nearly
everything that comes up here for decision from the surface is something that
could and should have been handled by the people down there. They did, in
fact, until they woke up to the fact that we were in a war and the
Encyclopedia was the one their defenders were contracted to. Not that I make
any military decisions. I leave that up to the Dorsai. "But Hal," she turned
back to him, "these things aren't imp rtant. Tam is. Is there anything,
anything at all, you can do for him and Ajela before he has to let go
completely? In spite of what you may think by what you saw in there, he'll
fight it out to the last minute. It's the way he's made. If there's the
slightest chance of you discovering anything, or doing something that would
make him feel he was free to go . . ." "I have found something," said Hal,
"and I'm going to try to do something. Is Jeamus Walters still with us?"
Rukh smiled. "Does it seem that you've been gone that long, Hal?" Rukh smiled.
"Right now you ought to find him in his office. Shall I call and find out?"
She picked up the stylus.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
383
"No. Never mind. I'm going there anyway, said Hal. "I'll you both later." He
was getting up as he spoke and was already turned toward door. "Call on me if
you need me," said Amanda. -On all of us, for anything," said Rukh. "I will,"
said Hal, already at the door. He went out. kamus Walters was in his office,
as Rukh had guessed. It was
_,typical of the man that his work place sported no illusions wh Iatsoever.
Its bare metal walls were completely covered with L shelves holding hard
copies of designs and schematic drawings.
His desk threatened to outdo Ajela's at its worst with an
overload of hard copies. Jeamus lived for work and work was all ,he lived for.
He had been that way, as far as Hal knew, from long before he had become
Research Director of the Encyclopedia; and apparently that was the way he
always would be.
Now, Hal, who had hardly seen the man in the preceding three years, during
which he had been caught up entirely in his own search and work, looked at him
clearly for the first time in a
long while, and saw changes in him, small but unmistakable.
There was a little less hair with more gray in it, in the circlet that
surrounded all but the front part of his skull like an uncompleted wreath. His
square mechanic's body and blunt mechanic's hands were the same as ever; his
face showed no real
signs of aging, but there was a faintly dusty air about him, as if he was a
mechanism that had been left unused for some time. He, got to his feet with a
sudden start as Hal entered after giving his name to the door annunciator.
"Hal!" he said. His hard, square palm and fingers enclosed Hal's. They made up
a smaller hand than the one Hal enclosed them with, but they were hardly less
strong. "How are you? Is there something we can do for you?" "Yes," said Hal,
"there is. I'm up against a time limit, Jeamus-you can guess why. I need
something you can build without too much trouble-I think. But I don't want you
to boggle at my plans for using it, so I won't tell you those, if you don't
mind."
CHAPTER
35
Jeamus frowned at him and hesitated for just a moment. "If you say so," he
said; then, his frown clearing, "everyone knows Tam expected you to take over
as Director whenever you felt you were ready. It's just that I've gotten used
to taking orders from Ajela-" "And Rukh."
Jeamus glanced at the door, which was slightly open. It was close enough in
the little office, so that he could reach out without getting up. He pushed it
closed; and it swung back against the jamb but did not latch. "And Rukh, of
course," he said, lowering his voice, "though most, even here, don't know
that. What I was going to say was that I've gotten used to taking orders from
both of them; and if you say you think I might boggle at your plans, it makes
me think that it's very likely either one of them would boggle, too. " "They
would," said Hal. "That's why you have to do this for me without telling them
anything about it."
Mentally, he added Amanda to the list of those who might not like what he
wanted to do, then backed off a bit from that thought. Amanda's perception was
remarkable enough that she would be the most likely of the three women to take
him on faith.
Jeamus was distractedly ruffling what hair remained of him.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
385
"This is a little uncomfortable for me," he said. "Technicalyou're in control
here and should be able to order anything . but Ajela has been in charge so
long, and in control-it's
to think of not telling her-particularly about something might not think was a
good idea. At the same time I hate to -bother her right now . . . ...
He sat for a moment, frowning and ruffling his hair. Hal sat in silence,
patiently waiting. "All right," Jeamus said at last. "You've got my word. Now,
,:.what is it?"
To begin with," said Hal, "is there a blind corridor xvailable in the
Encyclopedia? I mean a short corridor with an entrance at one end but no doors
at all leading off of it?" "Yes. There're several," said Jeamus. "They were
set up originally to allow for overflow or changes in the personnel aboard.
Right now they're all being used as storage areas, but %e could clear one out
and store whatever's in it, in some other area-we've got the available space."
"Good," said Hal. "I'll want this corridor to come to my call; no one
else's-even by mistake. Can we be certain of that?"
Jeamus smiled. "All right," said Hal, "I hadn't any real doubt, but I wanted
to make sure. Would you have such a corridor cleared and call me when it's
ready? Then I'll tell you what I want done." "Why not tell me now?" "You'll
understand that, when I tell you what I want," said Hal. "All right? I'll be
in my quarters. Call me when it's ready; as soon as possible, for other
people's sakes beside my own." "Tam?" asked Jeamus, a little grimly. "Other
people besides me," said Hal. "All right," said Jeamus. "It'll be a matter of
a few hours, ]DO more." "Good. As fast as you can. As I say, I'll be in my
quarters. You can call me there."
When Hal let himself back into his own apartments, Amanda had not yet
returned. This was as Hal had hoped. He seated himself on the carpeting of the
carrel that was the workspace of his quarters, and summoned up with his
imaging link to the Encyclopedia an image of the range of glowing red lines
that was the internal map of the knowledge in that mighty body.
386
Gordon R. Dickson
As he had known there would be, changes showed themselves in the lines-small
changes, but undeniable ones that were the result of information constantly
added, from the state of affairs on Earth, news brought by couriers from
outside, and the readings of the many instruments that scanned and kept track
of the wings of enemy space vessels prowling the outside of the phase-shield.
His eyes were drawn immediately to each small change, as any change is noticed
in a known landscape; or the face of a loved one; and he took a few moments to
incorporate all of these in his earlier mental picture of the Encyclopedia's
core memory. Then he dismissed the mechanical image, and replaced it with one
evolved from his own memory and imagination, comparable now with the latest
and most up-to-date image the Encyclopedia itself had formed for him.
Sitting, holding it in the field of his mental vision, he could feel the
complete knowledge of the Encyclopedia open to his mind, like some vast
storehouse of priceless art objects, too multitudinous in number to be seen in
one moment from any one single viewpoint. Then he let the rest of his mind go
back, back to the chanting circle, to the first edge of the morning sun
at was Procyon's bright pinpoint orb beginning to show above the far-off
mountain peaks, and the single ray lancing into the dewdrop to make the
explosion of light that signaled his sudden understanding of the full truth in
what he and the rest had chanted . . . the transient and the eternal are the
same.
That great and ringing verity echoed in and through him as if e was a tuned
piece of metal struck by an invisible padded hammer-and it was not just as if
comprehension of all the individual bits of knowledge stored in the memory of
the Encyclopedia shrank until they could be contained by his one human mind;
but as if the back of his thoughts, his own unlimited unconscious
understanding, widened and spread to take in and possess, all at once, all
that that warehouse contained.
He was not suddenly filled, as a vessel is brought to the brim with liquid-but
it was as if there was nothing known here that he had not known and handled,
understood and loved, in its own body and measure.
He sat as if bound, as if part of the workings of the Encyclopedia itself,
possessed of all it contained and caught up
THE CHANTRY GUILD
387
in the fact like someone mesmerized. For there had been more there than any
person could hope to learn in many lifetimes; but-the transient and the
eternal were the same. He had one lifetime only, but less than a moment of
that could contain eternity, and in that eternity he had had time to possess
himself of all that the Final Encyclopedia contained.
At last, the Encyclopedia was ready to be put to its proper purpose, the one
Mark Torre had envisioned for it, without even
being able to see or name that vision. He could go to Tam now, and tell him
that the search was over.
But, there was still the problem of using what he had touched and come to own.
All that the Encyclopedia held was no more use locked in his mind than it had
been in the technological container that was the Encyclopedia itself. He would
use
it-then go to Tam. Surely, there was time for that. . . .
He woke to the surroundings of his carrel to find Amanda standing and watching
him. Plainly, she had caused the Encyclopedia to make fresh clothing for her.
She was no longer in the bush clothes in which they had left Kultis together,
but wearing a plain, fitted, knee-length dress of blue-reminiscent of the
color of the wintry seas around the northern islands of the Dorsai that he
remembered from his childhood as Donal. There was no way for him to tell,
after that timelessness from which he had just returned, how long she had been
there, waiting for him
to respond to her presence.
He got swiftly to his feet; and she looked up into his eyes with a steady,
almost demanding, gaze. "Whatever it was you were doing," she said, "it
worries me.
Do you want to tell me?" "To tell you it all would take-I don't know how long.
" Hal smiled at her to reassure her. "But I've won through-I've found what
Mark Torre and Tam-and I too-have been after all these years. But there's not
enough time to tell you now. I have to put it to use, before I go to Tam with
the news. Will you trust me and wait a little while longer? It's your doing,
you know. The key was that the transient and the eternal are the same. " "And
with this," she said, "you're going to do something to
make Tam happy before he dies?" "I think so," said Hal. "Though it's only the
beginnings of the full answer. But it means the rest of what we need is only
388
Gordon R. Dickson
waiting to be found. Let's say it'll set him free to let go, content that the
end is in sight."
His voice softened, unthinkingly. "Ajela's torn apart, isn't she?" he asked.
"She can't bear to lose him, but she can't bear to let him go, either." "Yes,"
said Amanda, "and she can't help that. She'll be better off once he's gone;
but even if she could face that now, it wouldn't make anything easier for her.
I wish you'd give me more of an answer." "I've got to keep it a secret for
myself, awhile longer," Hal said. He put his hands on her shoulders. "Can't
you trust me for a little while? You and Rukh can come and see what I'm going
to do as soon as anyone can. But if, with all this, it shouldn't work after al
I . . . I've felt so close to the full answer so many times before, I want to
make sure this time. I'd rather you didn't say anything, even to Rukh, let
alone Ajela, before I'm ready to have you tell them."
She stood still, under the grasp of his hands, her eyes now thoughtful.
"You're going to try something that means gambling your own life, aren't you?"
"Yes," he said. "It ,S not for me to stop you   . . . ... She moved away from
him, and his hands loosened to let her go. They fell to his sides. She turned
back and put her arms around him. "Hold me," she said.
He enclosed her strongly in his own arms, and she held him tightly. He felt
the living warmth of her body against him, and for a moment an unbearable
poignancy swept through him. "You realize," she said as they pressed together,
"you can never leave me behind." "I know that," he said. He rested his cheek
against the top of her bright head, "but I can't take you with me now."
11Y "
es, she said, "but I'll always follow. You should know that I too. Wherever
you go."
It was true. Of course, he knew. There was nothing to be said in answer. He
simply held her.
A little over two hours later, when Amanda had finally left to see if she
could be of any use to Rukh in Ajela's office, there was the soft chime on the
air of Hal's quarters that announced someone wanted to speak to him.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
389
"Yes?" he said, back to the surrounding atmosphere- "The corridor's clear." it
was Jeamus's voice. "The door at the far left end of the present corridor
outside your rooms will
let you into it." ,'I'll be right there," said Hal.
He followed the directions and a moment later stepped into a
short corridor with green metal walls, rather like Jeamus's own
office without the shelves but stretched out in one dimension. It also smelled
faintly of an odor something like mildewed paper, which Jeamus's office did
not. "We haven'tdone areal cleaningjob on it yet," Jeamus said. "I guessed
you'd be more interested in getting on with whatever
you had in mind." "You're right," said Hal, "and now I'll tell you why I
wanted this space to come and open only to me; and of course, you and whoever
needs to be with you to help while you're building it. What I want you to
build me is something that I think might be dangerous to someone who could
just stumble across it. " "Dangerous?" "Yes. I want you to build me a
doorway-a phase-shift doorway-that's the best I can do by way of describing
it. Essentially, it's to be just a single phase-wall, not the complex affair
you made for the phase-shield around Earth. I just want it to disperse
whatever touches 'it, spread it out to universal position; and it should fill
the corridor from ceiling to floor, wall to wall, about a third of its length
from its blind end." "Just an out-shift wall?" said Jeamus. "Where's what
you're sending through going to be reconstituted?" "It isn't, until it chooses
to come back through the same wall." "Chooses?" echoed Jeamus. "There's no
choice about that. Once dispersed, unless there's a destination at which it
can be reconstituted, anything you send simply stays spread out until
time ends." "That's not the point", said Hal. "Can you build it?" "Oh, it can
be built, yes," said Jeamus. "Though I think what you're talking about
actually would require a double
screen, one to disperse, the other to reintegrate. That means the
reintegrating screen would have to be in front of the dispersing one, so that
you'd need a space here around one side of it, say,
390
Gordon R. Dickson
to get at the outgoing screen. But what you're aescribing doesn't make any
sense. You mean it's departure point would be effectively just a meter or so
from the arrival point?" "if there have to be two screens, yes. The closer the
better," said Hal, "and, I'm sorry, but don't ask me to try to explain,
no@@cll, it can't be any other way." "All right. Can you build it?" "Of course
we can build it. " Jeamus stared up at Hal. "But I can't imagine what sort of
idea you've got in mind; and the more I hear of it, the less I like doing it
blind. Let me see if I've got it straight. You want to be able to put
something through the screen, reducing it to universal position. Then,
somehow, it's going to come back by itself, and it has to come through the
screen just a step away from it-I suppose you're thinking of what you send as
somehow entering the return screen from the other side-and translating back
into its original form. Actually, there is no 'other side' in the ordinary
sense. What makes you think something like this could happen?" "I'm going to
find out," said Hal. "The only question I have for you is, whether you'll make
it for me." "As I say, we can build what you're asking for," Jeamus said. "But
there's no way that'll guarantee you'll be able to reconstitute something
already spread out through the total universe. That is, it can be built so
that if whatever it is gathers itself for re-entry-and how that's going to
happen baffles me-then if it does the return screen will bring it back to its
original location, which is here. The same way a spacecraft, shifting, returns
to its original form at the point where it wants to be. But the ship has been
pre-programmed to come out at that specific spot; and the action is
essentially timeless-it happens in no-time. So, in effect, if I set up a
device to do what you say, the going and returning is going to be
instantaneous. The second screen,11 simply cancel out the action of the first,
so that in effect whatever you send will only have moved a meter or so,
immediately-that is, if it ever comes out at all, which it won't. The point
is, what you're planning to have happen is impossible. " "Not if I'm right,"
said Hal. "What I put through is going to stay awhile and come back when it's
ready."
Jeamus shook his head.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
391
"It can't happen," he said. "The laws of phase-shift physics I"'A    t don't
permit it. I don't know how much you know about
In
tt
s
........... don't quite understand-"
- "Never mind," said Hal. "You've said you could build it. That's all I need
to hear. Now, the next question. How fast can
you get it done?"
Jeamus stared at him again. "You're talking about a crash prograrril" he said.
"Like the building of the shield-wall around Earth?" "Or faster," said Hal.
Jeamus breathed out sharply and almost angrily through his teeth. "I don't
understand any of this," he said. "Can you at least tell me-has it got
something to do with Tam?" "Yes," said Hal, "but it goes far beyond that."
"All right," said Jeamus. "We'll build it for you. There's nothing tricky
about the technics of it. Will a matter of hours suit you? A chunk more hours
than it took to clear this corridor for you, of course. " "As soon as you
can,' I said Hal. "For Tam's sake."
Jeamus looked at him. I'Tam?" "Tam," said Hal. Jeamus took a deep breath. "As
soon as it can be done, it'll be done," he said. "I'll call you. I I
Hal got up. "I'll be in my quarters", he said. He headed back to his quarters,
but was hardly back into the corridor containing his door when the transmitted
voice of Rukh spoke in his ear. "Hal, could you come to the office? Amanda's
already here, and the Dorsai Commander-in-Chief."
Hal went. He found them as Rukh had said. Rukh herself was
in a float behind the desk and Amanda in one of the padded
392             Gordon R, DiCkSon
armchair floats facing it. In another such overstuffed float, placed so that
his face could see and be seen by both women was
Rourke di Facino, wearing a blue uniform with a single gold       i
strip slantwise across each lapel of the jacket, and a gray scarf
ti underneath, over the collar of the white shirt underneath.
Hal had not seen the little man since he had spoken to most of
the Grey Captains of the Dorsai, those who by local agreement spoke for their
immediate area of that world; and that had been
before the Dorsai had agreed to come and take Over the defense
of Earth. Hal, in fact had not kept track of who the commandIng officer of all
the'Dorsai in the ships patrolling inside the
phase-shield had been. Now, Perversely, he was glad that it was
Rourke the other Dorsai had elected to this Post.- The sharptongued,
sharp-eyed di Facino was oddly reassuring, with his
invariable certainty that there was a right way to do everything.
-Good, you came right away," said Rukh, as Hal took one of
the floats. "We've just had a disturbing incident. Fifty of the
Younger Worlds' warships just made a simultaneous jumP through the
phase-shield in formation. We lost two of our own
ships and had eight crippled, knocking them out of our own space or forcing
them down to surface, where they were captured -I I
"The damaged ships,11 be back on patrol in a week," said.di Facino. His light
tenor voice was incisive to the point Of abrasiveness. "But the two that were
killed were lost with
-yone aboard them. We can't afford losses - "
e 111 assume," said Rukh, "there weren't any Of the newly
trained people up from Earth among them?"
Di Facino shook his head. "All Dorsai." "I thought," Rukh went on, "the
program to train new crc\lv had been going faster than that. 1. keep getting
word from below
that the recruitment centers are Jarnmed." "They are," said di Facino, "but
without training, the men
and wo@ien jamming them are useless. To operate a space war vessel's one
thing; to fight it, something else entirely. Even our own people are rusty -
It's not the way it was a hundred years ago
when there was still war in space between the worlds and actual
ship fighting was part of many of the contracts our people were
drilled and have the then signing. Still, our people, at least, are
393 THE CHANTRY GUILD              hen needed - The attitude . They'll do the
right thing N         stion marks
Earth are each one of them que                  all e we get from
d in action-and in spite Of .1 they've actually been te5te only a handful axe
on ships so in the recruitment centers,                                   sets
tone ready to crew the new ves for nal training, let a
there.
bly lines down re rolling off the asscm
laven,t got any trained crew yet from Earth whO're you t
           any of Your Ships?"
rot work on to take over regular Pat 'Rukh stared at him -
       ,From a world with
answered di Facino. it won't Say that,"                             iger ones,
there
jual to that of the thirteen You'                had population ec'who have the
right instincts and have hm to be a few                   we want them to
learn. it's a _@@;!training that Is very close to what                     its
regional,
way, that Earth's hung On to @`@-_blessing, in a )nal and so-forth differences
all these centuries; sectional, natto              d-mass groups have
maintained because a few of the larger tan                 d some of the
of a personal space force; an ---the rudiments
almost duplicate a sea-nations have underwater warships which       dful have
come
id atmosphere-going ship of war; so a ban          I say, are space an
          Some Of those, as to us already semi-trained.
        er the undergoing final training irt our ships on duty just und
s not the matter of recruitment that shield now.At any rate, it luestion of
what this last fifty-sh'p brings me here. It's the 'of what the other side has
in mind, incursion means, in term'-      .ncredibly wasteful. Their ships The
jump into our territory*was 1       ing. Even if they'd been didn't have a
chance of gaining anythi            have hoped to eur equal, vessel to vessel,
what could they                         ide,
for others of their own s achieve in the way of opening a path         ?11 or
in the way of doing something to Earth,           ia?" Amanda '-Could fifty
ships destroy the Final EncyclOPed asked Rukh. [ they couldn't," answered Rukh
-In fact, Jeamus "I'm told Walters' answer to me when I asked him that was
that it'd almost be easier for them to destroy Earth. He tells me that they
couldn't even pull the suicidal trick of jumping a ship through
the Final Encyclopedia's own protective shield; to cause a
matter explosion when it reconstituted itself inside the Encyclopedia, on the
obvious basis that two solid objects can't occupy
the same space at the same moment. It seems there's a shunt
mechanism in the Encyclopedia's own phase-defenses that
394
Gordon R. Dickson
would cause a ship trying any such thing to keep shuttling forever back and
forth between the Encyclopedia's inner and outer shield, and never
reconstituting." "Why didn't they build that same mechanism into the Earth
shield when they were at it?" di Facino asked. "The Earth shield is too big,
apparently," said Rukh. "According to what Jeamus told me when I asked him
that same question. There's a factor that keeps doubling, apparently, as the
size of a phase-shield grows, so that only a little less than twice the size
of the Encyclopedia is the practical limit for adding the shuttle effect."
"Obviously, they'd have done it if they could have," said Amanda. "But suppose
we concentrate on the important point, what this recent and apparently
senseless attack means. Hal, you've been sitting there ever since you came in
without saying a word, and you know Bleys Ahrens better than any of us. What's
your opinion?" "I can't be much more sure than the rest of you," said Hal,
"but my instinctive guess is, it's a message, that's all." "A message? To
Earth?" said Rukh. "What would it be supposed to mean?" "I think .       Hal
hesitated.        a message to me, from Bleys. " "What message?" asked the
little Dorsai-in-Chief. "That he meant what he said," Hal answered, "when he
talked about the siege mentality and a blood bath on Earth when his forces
were finally so overwhelming they'd be able to jump through simultaneously and
overwhelm any defense we had. Amanda, did you tell them about what Bleys said
when he came to the Chantry Guild?" "I was just about to when you got here,"
Amanda put in swiftly. "Bleys came and found us where we were on Kultis--
"Found you?" broke in Rukh. "And you got away safely?"
She was leaning forward tensely over the desk. "It wasn't like that," said
Hal. "He came alone to a place where we were surrounded by friends. Also, I've
told you before that Bleys is as aware as I am that either his killing me, or
1, him, wouldn't change things, except possibly to work against the killer.
The real opponents are two forces in the human race that have developed
through history to this moment. He and I
happen to be in point gg@
With." "That's a somewhat simplistic
THE CHANTRY GUILD              395
s on the forces we're
,vay of putting it," said op. dryly, "You'll remember he did bring up the
possibiliof his killing you." "I was in no danger," said Hal. "About the
message-,         11 t=Cted di Facino. "You're
he promised you a
blood          if and when he finally broke through. I can see     it
 if it finally came to that. But why come to tell you, if this assault was
supposed to send the same message?" "Because he also told me he didn't like
blood baths; and I ,:-,;.know him well enough to know he's telling the truth."
"Telling the truth!" said di Facino. "He was trying to frighten you into
something. A man can't be responsible for something like that and say he
doesn't like doing it." "Have you ever cut off the leg of someone, without
anesthetic, and knowing-as I suppose you don't-anything about such surgery.
"No, I haven't!" snapped di Facino. "And you're right about my not knowing
anything about how to go about it." "But you'd do your best in spite of that,
if it was a case of a member of your immediate family and the only way to save
that person's life was to cut, immediately, wouldn't you?"
Di Facino stared at him. "You know I'd do it," he said, "and I see what you
mean. I wouldn't like it but that wouldn't stop me, if it was a matter of life
and death for someone I loved. But you aren't trying to tell me Bleys is in
that position in planning a blood bath for Earth?" "Not exactly," said Hal,
"but in a position very much like it. . . . "
He hesitated. "I think I may be the only other human alive who understands
some aspects of Bleys," said Hal. "You have to realize how differently he
thinks from other people. Try to appreciate, for example, what his own
existence has been like. He must be the loneliest human being alive. No,
lonely's the wrong word. Say instead he's the most isolated of all humans;
because he's never experienced anything but complete separation from everyone
else and can't conceive of any state that'd be otherwise. So
396
Gordon R. Dickson
he suffers; but he isn't aware of suffering from this the way you and I would
be, because he's never known any other state." "He could look around and see
other humans who aren't suffering that way, and learn from them that other
states of being exist," said di Facino. "Learning from them is just what he's
shut himself off from," said Hal. "From the time he was old enough to notice
such things, he had to see that the people around him had limited intelligence
compared to his, and couldn't match him in other capabilities. Almost as soon
as he knew himself, he must have felt alone in the universe, surrounded by
creatures who looked and acted like him but lacked perceptions, and were
easily controllable by him without their realizing it. All he had to do was
put his mind to manipulating them, and they did whatever he wished. He was
walled off by what he was from the rest of the race."
Hal hesitated, unsure whether he was not perhaps talking too much; then he
decided to go ahead. "There's a couple of lines in a poem by Lord Byron. He
was a nineteenth century English poet; and one of his poems was called The
Prisoner of Chillon-Chillon being a fortress prison in Switzerland; and the
prisoner was in solitary confinement there. The lines come when, after at last
managing to get a glimpse of the outside through the high, small window of his
cell, the prisoner finds confinement has changed him. The lines go . . .
. . .and the whole Earth would henceforth be
A wider prison unto me . . . "
Hal looked at them. Rourke di Facino was looking back with a int of
puzzlement. Amanda and Rukh, by contrast, had expressions that were strangely
sympathetic. , ,So you see," wound up Hal, "while his situation was slightly
different, in essence it was pretty much the same, in that Bleys learned
almost from birth that all the worlds were only a 'widerprison' for him. He
could search in every face he met and not see an understanding of what he felt
in himself. Fame and fortune could mean nothing to him because he knew he
could have them by merely reaching out his hand for them. He had no
THE CHANTRY GUILD
397
friends. Those who thought they loved him, did so without understanding. He
had been given a lifetime to spend and nothing to spend it on. So he decided
to do what he didn't think anyone MWIMFIV MoMIMMITMITMIUM MoMMMI of future
history it would never have taken if he hadn't come along. Even if the turning
might mean doing some things he might not like, he'd do it. So, he went to
work." "And ran into you," said Amanda. "I was there." Hal looked back at her.
Amanda merely watched him, steadily. "But why the blood bath?" said di Facino.
"If he finally ends up with enough ships and trained men to wipe out our
defensive forces, there are certainly ways of taking Earth without that kind
of action." "There are, of course," said Hal. "What's he trying to do, then,
frighten you into promoting a
surrender for him?" "No," said Hal. "The obvious reason for the talk of a
blood bath and this incident to support it is to try to push me into acting
hastily. How long, would you say, Rourke, at the rate his forces outside the
shield are building, until he gets to the point of having enough in ships to
try that sort of mass jump through the shield and assault this world-with some
hope of success?" "I'm not Donal Graeme," said di Facino. He spoke as if the
time in which Donal had been known to exist was no more than yesterday,
instead of close on a hundred years. "It depends on how fast he can drive the
Younger Worlds to give him ships and crews for them. Anywhere from six months
to five years, absolute time." "Let's say six months," said Hal. "If we're
really only six months from such an assault and blood bath, there'd be some
reason to panic. But I don't think we are. I think, as I say, he's trying to
prod me to moving too quickly and making a mistake. "
They all watched him. This time even di Facino said nothing. "You see," said
Hal, choosing the words of his explanation carefully, "he's not worried about
being able to take over Earth. At the last minute, he can always pull a rabbit
out of his hat and make the conquest in some unexpected way. He said as much
three years ago when he and I met in the thickness of the
398
Gordon R. Dickson
phase-shield, just after the Dorsai and the Exotics had given all they had to
give and the shield had gone into place to keep his ships out. He's worried
about me-the fact that I also might pull a rabbit he doesn't suspect out of my
hat, before he can out of his. I'm the one person he knows who might do
something he can't expect. If he can panic me into moving even a little too
hastily, I may fumble and not have time to produce that rabbit. " "God!" said
di Facino. "What a way to try to pressure someone-with the threat to massacre
perhaps billions of people. " "That threat at its closest is still six months
off," said Hal. I 1Y
ou know, the motto of Walter Blunt, who founded the original Chantry Guild
here on Old Earth, was destruct. What he wanted was to clear away everything
and everybody but a few special people on a specialized Earth, that could then
build to a special end. Note how Bleys' aim all along has echoed that. He
wants to depopulate the Younger Worlds entirely and reduce the population of
Old Earth to a particular group who'll mature over generations to something
like himself." "What of it?" asked di Facino bluntly. "Just that the
destruction Blunt preached never got off the ground. Instead the Chantry Guild
shifted its aims toward nonviolence and an idea of philosophical evolution."
"That was then." "Now's then, too; as the present is always made by and
contains the elements of the past," said Hal. "Hold on a little longer; don't
let your concern over this run away with you for six months yet." "Meanwhile,
you'll be doing what?" "I want to have something to show you before I answer
that," said Hal. "Right now, what I'm chasing has no more substance than a
dream-any more than any discovery has before it's made. But I'm sure it's
there; and if I'm right, it'll give us an escape hatch from this situation
without any massacre and without a shooting war, long before six months are
up. I'll let you know when I've some progress to report. Meanwhile, it's
important that everyone on our side keep pushing ahead full speed and without
any doubts." "On faith," said di Facino. "Exactly, on faith. There's nothing
stronger." Hal glanced for a second at Rukh, then back at the small
Commander-in-
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399
.Chief. "Remember, the difference between our camp and his. Finally, that part
of the race that believes in going forward and adventuring outward are here,
around us; and those who'd turn back and hide their heads from the risk of
progress are with Bleys. Everything either side does, from building ships to
fighting them,is part of the thrust of that side's purpose; and it's 'going to
be needed when the final confrontation comes."
Di Facino stared grimly at him, but sat silent for a long moment. "We'll do
our part," he said at last, "as you know we will. For the rest-you're right.
It's going to take faith for us to believe that you and- everyone else is
doing theirs-lots of faith!"
They talked for a little while longer, but nothing more of importance was
said, and the conference broke up.
CHAPTER
36
Sixteen hours had passed.
Ajela, Rukh and Amanda had taken shifts staying with Tam, as he fought to live
a little while longer. Hal had returned to his quarters to study the knowledge
stored in the core of the Final Encyclopedia and now open to him. He had
studied it awhile, then slept, then rose to seat himself again with the mental
image of the core before him. His eyes saw it, but his mind was far distant,
wandering the reaches of what had been stored in it over the centuries.
It was like wandering through the corridors of an endless museum. Here were
the artifacts of creativity. But they were strangely lacking in some invisible
element he could not put a mental finger on. Then, it came to him, Where were
the souls that had created each of these things? It was strange. You could
follow the creation of a piece of art or discovery down through the levels of
the craft that made it actual and real. But only up to a certain point. Then
you came suddenly to a gap, a quantum jump, beyond which the work became
wholly the product of the individual who did it-no one else could have done it
just that way-and there was no more craft bridge there to explain the
uniqueness of what you saw, heard, or felt. Beyond was simply incomparable,
irreplaceable individual talent made manifest, the essence of creativity
itself at work, as if it were magic.
There was this gap, this vital element missing, yet. For his
THE CHANTRY GUILD
401
rposes in the Creative Universe, it must be touched, even if it Id not be
grasped. As one mind could never wholly grasp the tent of another mind, but
could touch and understand enough the other's intent to work with that. For
some hours now, Hal had turned his unconscious loose to @search for a way to
so touch what was needed; while his .conscious still wandered the corridors of
the Encyclopedia's storehouse, just as his conscious mind had been left to
wander about, that day on the ledge-and at last the answer came to him as
something he had almost forgotten.
Three years before, when he had asked Tam about how he, Hal, could learn to do
what Tam did, in reading the knowledge core, he found that Tam could not
describe how he did it in logical, verbal terms. He referred Hal to an old
twentieth century novel, which had ended up by becoming a classic after being
nearly forgotten, then rediscovered in the twenty-first century. The Sand
Pebbles, written by an author named Richard McKenna, had for its lead
character a non-commissioned officer assigned as engineer on a United States
of America Navy river patrol boat in China, during a time of great upheaval.
All the other enlisted crewmen aboard had yielded to the custom of hiring
unofficial Chinese understudies for their jobs. As a result, the actual work
in the engine room was done by Chinese. The lead character, who loved engines
and was adamant about handling his duties himself, could not bring himself to
do this. He was determined to do his job with his own hands. This earned him
the enmity of the Chinese workers, since his decision kept one of their own
people out of a job they had come to regard as theirs.
There was a scene in thenovel, Tam told Hal-and Hal later looked it up with
the help of the Encyclopedia's memory-in which the lead character, pacing
around the engine room while the ship was under way, suddenly found himself
stopped and standing over a small trap door that gave access to the steam
piping underneath the engine room floor. He had lifted the trap and found that
a valve that should have been open was turned down tightly, shutting off the
steam through that pipe. An act of deliberate sabotage by one of the workers.
He had opened the valve; and only much later discovered that by doing so he
had earned a reputation as a magician among the Chinese workers, since
apparently he had gone directly to the
402
Gordon R. Dickson
THE CHANTRY GUILD
403
deliberately closed valve and opened it, although there was no way he could
have known about it.
In a reminiscence by another author of the same period, the other author had
told of asking McKenna directly whether, in all the noise of a steamship's
engine room, someone could actually hear the difference made by shutting off
one small valve. McKenna, who had worked with the engines of navy ships in
just that same sort ofjob, had said someone could. He had noticed such changes
and corrected them, himself, while on duty, in almost unthinking reaction, so
used he had become to the proper sound of the engine.
As the engine sound had been to the man in the engine room, so the stored
knowledge of the Encyclopedia had come to be to Hal. What he needed to do was
to be able to think with the full knowledge stored in the Encyclopedia
available to his mind from his mental image of the lines; and, now, he had
found the only missing note in their silent symphony.
The individual notes of creativity, which he would need to reach out to build
with, in the Creative Universe, were all around him here, then, and his ear
was not yet tuned to them. So far, he had built what his own mind had already
created, or a few sounds of creativity from the verse or making of others
which had touched his own soul in the past. But that universe would not be
truly open until it could hold and he could hear the sounds of others.
But that had been enough to let him create the potentiality of a split in the
human race-animal, so that it might-and had-grown into two separately
developing entities; one of which embodied the desire to grow and evolve, and
one which tried to hold back and stay as it was.
A chime sounded suddenly on the air of his room and a voice spoke aloud in it,
summoning him back to the real universe. It did not speak privately, as Rukh's
voice had spoken in his ear to summon him to the conference just past. It was
the voice of Jeamus. "We're ready, Hal Mayne," Jeamus said. "You'll find the
entrance to the special. corr idor through the door at the left end of the one
presently outside your quarters." "Coming," answered Hal to the empty air
above him. He rose and went out.
e stepped into the blind corridor, what he saw brought udden stop. The two
phase-shift constructions Jeamus ised him were there. The nearer one extending
i(6it. of the way across the corridor, leaving just room
t to the second one, which, as far as the first .-st It to e lowed him to see,
blocked the farther corridor corn-
ut waiting for him there were not only Jeamus and a men in Research dust
smocks, but also Rukh and Rukh wore her usual long, high-collared dress, black
@,i this time. But Amanda was also wearing a floor-length dress she ust have
ordered the Encyclopedia to fashion for her-one he
7,, had never seen her in before-of a dark, sea blue. The general
effect was vaguely formal, as if they had dressed themselves in authority to
come here. "I thought," said Hal to Jeamus, "I asked you not to say '-anything
to anyone else about this?" "I'm sorry," said Jeamus. "It turned out there was
a danger we hadn't expected. In the moment of powering up these two -screens,
there's a danger of one or both of them trying to
interface with the protective screen around the Encyclopedia itself. Once up,
there'd be no danger. But in turning them on, there was; and none of us could
estimate what might happen. No one had ever set up a phase-window completely
within another window before-" "What about the Encyclopedia's screen inside
the one enclosing Earth?" interrupted Hal. "But they're both double screens;
loops, closed circuits within themselves. What you've got here isn't and can't
be a closed circuit. Not if you want it to do what you asked for. So I had to
turn the Encyclopedia's shield off for just a few seconds while we turned on
these; and I didn't feel I could do that without warning Ajela or Rukh. Rukh
wanted to know more about what was going on that made me ask for something
like that. "I suggested she ask," said Amanda. "Don't jump on ariyone else,
Hal. Something unusual like that had your fingerprints all over it; and when
we found out what it was, Rukh and I both wanted to be here. And we've got a
right to be." "I couldn't lie to Rukh Tamani when it was a direct question,"
said Jeamus.
404
Gordon R. Dickson
"Of course not. I don't blame you, Jeamus. " Hal took a deep breath. "And
you're right, Amanda. You and Rukh should be here if that's what you want."
"How could we not want to, Hal?" said Rukh.
Hal shook his head. "Of course. All right. I was wrong not to tell you from
the start what I wanted to do. It was just I didn't-I still don't know-if it's
going to work. It could be an utter failure."
Jeamus had been looking slightly bewildered. "I don't understand," he said.
"Just what is it you're planning to put through this first screen?"
-myself," said Hal. Jeamus stared. "My God!" he said. "Do you know what you're
talking about doing? Committing suicide! You'll end up spread out through the
universe, with no way back." "There's that chance, of course," said Hal, "but
I've got reason to think, in this case, it's not going to happen that way."
"All the same," said Jeamus, "if that's what you've had in mind all along, I'm
going to pray that nothing more goes on when you step through the back screen
there-that you immediately step back out, facing us, through this near one!"
"Thanks, but I hope not, myself," said Hal.
He turned to Rukh and Amanda. "But I might be able to do what I hope to do in
what amounts to no-time, like any phase-shift, so that I still come back here
right away," he said. "On the other hand, it could be that time spent between
the screens is the same as time spent here and it'll be awhile before I'll
come back. But there's no real doubt in me I'l I be back sooner or later."
Rukh came to him, put her arms around him and kissed hin, on the lips. "I
should have done that long ago," she said. "We'l I wait for you I Hal."
He held her for a moment, feeling his heart moved once again, as it had been
when he carried her out of the prison cell on Harmony four years before, by
the frailness of her body, even now. Then he let her go and turned to Amanda,
who also held him and kissed him. "I love you," she said.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
405
A "And I love you," he answered. "This could be the answer,
last, what I'm going to do." "I know," said Amanda, and let him go.
7-1WWWoravie from them, around the nearer screen the second, and stepped
through it.
CHAPTER
37
THE CHANTRY GUILD
407
He was everywhere and nowhere.
His senses were no longer working. He could not feel, smell, hear or see.
Instead he had an awareness of his surroundings that recognized certain
patterns, some of which were in the form of objects and some of which were
not; but which in any case were unimportant.
It was a place where time existed, but did not matter. A place where his now
changed self had no desire to understand or act. In fact, his ability to do so
was limited. He had memory, but no purpose, for he found he could not conceive
of the future, and the present was forever. But he could remember; and,
remembering, he recalled how he had been through something like this, once
before. It had happened when he had been Donal going back in spirit to the
twenty-first century, when he had worked by inhabiting the body that had
belonged to the dead Paul Formain. Then, he now remembered, something had
carried him through what he was presently experiencing. . . . I The memory
part of him that was still working gave it back to him. Then he had expected
to go beyond this to something else, to a twenty-first century Earth; and the
momentum of that expectation had carried him through without realizing the
concept of purpose he now lacked.
It was a remembrance of an impossibility that had yet happened. For the
Creative Universe he now realized he had
406
visioned both then and now could not, by definition, exist
1@11Until he had created it. It did not exist now; and yet he had been
ary part of going aware of experiencing it before, as a necess
k to alter the implications of the past.
-this Chaos-that was Under the limitations of this place
logic-limited conscious mind was not capable of t to be, his n erstanding the
contradictions. Here he could only go on
of which were blocked by ith, philosophy and courage, none the limits of his
logical mind. With them he could accept the fact that he had been able to
experience the Creative Universe "once before and use it as a window to the
past; because his unconscious had assumed a path back through time for his
identity; and by that assumption, like the assumption that creates a poem
never expressed before, had caused it to be.
His logical mind had afterwards rejected what, to it, could not be, and tucked
the memory out of sight in his unconscious. '2-    There it had stayed until
now, because the framework of understanding he needed to develop had not yet
been there to understand how it could happen. Only now, spread out between
time and space, did it all, at last, make sense.
As with the making of a poem, the explanation was that here ,,t    all
mechanisms must be developed in the unconscious; for the conscious mind could
not operate without the arbitrary concepts it had gradually imposed over
centuries on the physical universe; to give that universe a shape the
conscious mind could work with.
He must now, therefore, not so much make what he wanted in the Creative
Universe, as find it within himself; in this place where conscious logic and
physics did not naturally apply. He must find it, as he had found poems and
other discoveries of meaning and intent, in the past. . . .
He let go, therefore, of his now useless and almost nonexistent upper mind. In
effect he passed over into the realm of dreams and daydreams; and a jumble of
memories and fancies tumbled through his imaginings, like the unchained
thoughts that come in moments just before sleep sets the unconscious
completely free.
So, letting go, he passed into what would have been a dream; if it had not
been directed by some previous, deep-held sense of purpose that had directed
him back to the twenty-first century. He could feel, in this universe-that-
was- not, not only that earlier
408
Gordon R. Dickson
passage, but all the vast information of the Final Encyclopedia. The latter
worked on the former. . . .
-And, suddenly, he was where he wanted to be. It was a dream, made real after
all. Real, it was, because not
b only all his senses now reported on the reality of it; but his logical upper
mind, that must think in the language of symbols and identities, was once more
awake and capable. But it was also a dream, because he remembered how he had
first dreamed it, when he had been with the Resistance Group on Harmony, under
a younger and strong-bodied Rukh. He had dreamed it then, and at other times
since; and now, with the knowledge r f om the Encyclopedia, he had made it
actual. It was at the r dream's opening point now, that he, with the faith,
belief and courage in him, had resolved the chaos around him into actuality.
Again, he was on horseback, with others also mounted. They were traveling in a
group through a lightly forested area of some landscape in the temperate zone
of an Earth-like world. They rode without talking, as he had earlier dreamed
they had; but now, for the first time, he had a chance to look closely about
him and identify those he rode with; and there were none of them he had not
known, and all of them were now dead.
Obadiah the Friendly, Malachi the Dorsai and Walter the Exotic-the three who
had been his tutors and raised him as Hal Mayne, rode not far behind him.
Immediately beside and about him were those of his own-of Donal's-family.
Eachan Khan Graeme, his father, now dead for nearly a hundred years, rode at
his right side. Beside him on his left was Mary Kenwick Graeme, his mother;
and beyond her was his brother Mor, who because of him had been tortured to
death by the hands of the demented William of Ceta.
Mor leaned forward in his saddle to look around their mother at him; and Hal
braced himself for the look that would be in the other's eyes. But when those
eyes met him the look he had expected was not there. "Welcome back, Donny,"
said Mor-and he was smiling, a
r , happy smile. With that, Hal realized that he had indeed become Donal
again, in body as well as in memory.
All the other tall menfolk of the Graemes once more
THE CHANTRY GUILD
409
:-Overto ped him, as they sat their saddles around him; and he p was as he had
been in his early life. ,.., "What's the matter, Brother?" Mor said. "Did you
think I wouldn't understand?"
He reached out a hand across the neck of the horse Mary Graeme rode; and, with
a moment's hesitation, Hal took it and found his brother's grasp comforting
and as warm as his smile. "I didn't think it through far enough," he said.
"I'd never
have let him do that to you I if I had, for anything." "I know," said Mor, as
their grips parted and they straightened up in their saddles, "but it brought
us to this, and this is best. Isn't it?" "Yes," said Donal-Hal, "it's a new
road, at last."
He looked around. In his dream he had not had time to
identify faces. Now he saw how Ian and Kensie rode on the far side of Eachan;
and how beyond Mor was his other uncle, James, whose death had set him on his
life's path to this Moment.
He looked farther back and saw, also riding near him, the . Second Amanda
Morgan, eerily like the Amanda he had left behind him beyond the phase-screen.
A horde of other members of the family, long since gone, rode with them,
including even
Cletus Grahame, his great-great-grandfather.
But, farther back, there was also James Child-of-God, Rukh's second-in-command
of the Resistance Group, who had died in the rain on Harmony; and the farther
he looked, the more faces
he recognized. Only now they were come to the edge of the forest, to the brink
of a rubbled plain that stretched away toward the horizon, with nothing
visible growing upon it and only one
shape breaking the horizon line where rocky surface met the gray, unbroken
ceiling of the clouds overhead.
That one shape stood darkly upright, so distant that it might have been on the
horizon itself; and it was a single tower, black, featureless and solid, with
the shape of one of the ancient keeps of the medieval centuries of Old Earth.
About it, there was a
terrible sense of waiting that held them all silent; as, following his
example, they all checked their horses and sat looking at the tower. "I go on
alone from here," he said to the others.
They answered nothing; but he felt their acceptance of what
410
Gordon R. Dickson
he had just said. He could also feel that they would wait for him, here, no
matter how long it took.
He got down from his horse-as he had remembered dismounting before in his
dream-and started out on foot across the endless distance of the plain, toward
the tower.
In his dream it had been vitally necessary that he go alone to it; and he felt
the same unexplained urgency now. At some time later, he looked back and saw
those who had been with him, still sitting their horses, small under the
trees, which were themselves shrunken with the distance he had put between
himself and them. Then he had turned once more and continued on toward the
tower, to which he seemed hardly to have progressed a step since he had left
the edge of the wood.
Without warning, something he could not see touched him on the left shoulder.
He whirled about, ready to defend himself, but there was nothing there. Only
the waiting forms on horseback, now farther off than ever; though when he
turned back toward the tower, still it seemed that he had moved hardly a step
closer to it, in spite of all the distance covered.
The pebbles and rocks that made up the surface of the plane were now larger
than those onto which he had first stepped. Looking down at them, the wealth
of the Encyclopedia's knowledge flowed into him and he identified them as the
detritus of an old lava flow, dark igneous rock that had over centuries been
exposed to extremes of temperatures; unti           I, cracking under the
succeeding expansions and contradictions of their composite materials, the
solid rock had decomposed and broken into many pieces-pieces which were later
covered by a sea, and tumbled one against the other until their sharp edges
and corners had become rounded.
His mind encompassed all this-or did it only create it as an explanation, out
of the storehouse of the Encyclopedia? In any case he found himself
understanding the geological ages that had made the surface he walked on; and
without knowing how it could be possible, he realized that the tower toward
which he was headed had been built on what had been an island during the
period of the shallow sea that had rounded off the rocks. Inconceivably, it
had been built before the waters rose to cover the lava plain of cracked and
broken stones. Ancient it therefore
THE CHANTRY GUILD
411
was, as ancient as the human race itself; and what was within it, drawing him
to it, was as ancient.
But it was still a long way off; and he was more concerned with the discovery
of its creation. For in fact, it was his dream made real. He had created it
only now, but as surely as he had . .     .. .1
       chaos in which he had found himself. He had created his body and those
of his companions and their horses. He had created the thick cloud layer
overhead that hid a sun that he had chosen to be a duplicate of the star of
Old Earth; illuminating this world that was itself a duplicate of Old Earth;
more so than any of the terraformed planets of the Younger Worlds.
He had built it, here in the Creative Universe, that was only a Creative
Universe because with the Encyclopedia's help, he had brought it finally into
being. For without the ability of the Encyclopedia's knowledge available to
his own creative unconsciousness, he could not have made any of this. A poem
could not be written without a knowledge of what made poetry-the images, the
shapes and the language. Without a knowledge of what was required to produce
such works, no original painting could be painted, no cathedral built.
In the creation of the very tower toward which he now made his way, a
knowledge of the forces of gravity upon its structure, and of the materials
that made its walls, was needed.
Glancing back over his shoulder, he saw the tiny figures waiting behind him
now seemed to stand somewhat above him, and in fact the plain between them now
had dipped downward, as if he had descended onto the old sea bottom that
stretched level until it rose again in the far distance to the higher land of
what had been an island when the tower was young. Looking ahead once more at
it now, he saw that the sea floor approaching it, which had earlier seemed
level to his eyes, actually rose and fell, gradually, in swells and hollows,
before it reached the former island of the tower, and that he was now
gradually ascending the slope of one of the nearer rises.
Sure enough, a little farther on, when he looked back again, the plain seemed
to have descended toward the horizon behind him, and the group he had left
there was indistinguishable now from the edge of forest behind them.
He turned his face forward and went on-and an unexpected
412
Gordon R. Dickson
shadow swept briefly over him, so that he looked up, startled; even as he
heard what the Encyclopedia's knowledge now within him identified as the harsh
cry of a raven.
Mixed with that cry was something he could not quite be sure he heard. It was
as if a sound that was soundless had still somehow managed to signal itself
upon his ear. It was like the resonance of a heavy bell, struck twice.
Something that somehow echoed back to the time when he had been Paul Formain.
Yet it did not belong to the memory of that time, but to the future still
before him.
Like a warning note, it reminded him of the possible passage of real time. He
did not know whether his time spent here was
merely part of a moment of no-time back in the universe beyond the
phase-screens, or whether a minute here might not be a day, or month, there.
He stopped suddenly. The rise in the ground he had been ascending had
steepened gradually but steadily over the last fifty meters or so, and he was
suddenly much closer to the tower. He had adjusted unthinkingly from what was
a walking pace to a
climbing one; so that he had come to the top of the rise without warning and
now he checked, looking down its short, farther, descending side.
It dipped sharply for no more than ten paces before him. At that point it
broke off abruptly in an edge as sharp as any cliff's. Beyond it was
nothingness, with no sight of farther surface below. He saw only a relatively
short distance horizontally to what looked like another cliff edge level with
this one, that was
visibly the edge of the one-time island with the tower upon it.
He went forward, cautiously. For the downslope was steep and he had to lean
back to brace his weight and not slide forward over the edge before him. But
even when he stood on the very lip of it, he could see nothing below him; only
what appeared to be an endless fall to eternity. He looked at the distance of
nothingness between him and the edge of the island; it was just far enough off
that he could not quite make out the nature of the rocks that made up the
distant land.
He stood, baffled. There was no reason for this space to be here, barring his
way. He made an effort to visualize the gap filled in with the same sort of
former sea bottom he stood upon. But nothing
THE CHANTRY GUILD
413
happened. It was as if here, alone, his creativity could not bring into being
a land bridge where there was nothing. It was as if he had nothing to build
with, as if what was needed to bridge the space was not in him.
For a long moment he stood, unbelieving. Then his mind began to work, and up
out of the back of it came the answer that what he looked at was his own
doing. He had created this gap, without ever realizing it, by his own act in
going back to be Paul Formain and changing the implications of past history.
He had set out to split up the Enemy that had struck at him during the old
Chantry Guild's initiation ceremony, so that it became not a semi-living
racial force, but a part of every human living.
It had been the only way he had known, then, of making humanity take sides,
for either creativity or stasis; and so bring that hidden, inner conflict to
an outer resolution.
And he had succeeded-with the Othem as an unexpected and unwelcome by-product.
But he had succeeded. And here was another by-product.
The road to evolution of humankind led through the Creative Universe. But to
enter it himself was not enough. It must be entered by at least one other
human. The tower and what it stood on must be given relevance, as he had been
required to find a relevance to feel the souls behind those creations of
humankind and time stored in the Final Encyclopedia.
He could not cross the gal) before him, because up to this point was no more
than a plac@ he had made himself. Beyond it, on the island and in the tower,
he must share this universe with whoever or whatever in the race would oppose
him there; for it was there the argument would come to a head and be settled.
This place he had created was only an arena for decision, by his own choice he
had willed it to be so.
There was only one other person so far alive, besides himself, with the
background and experience to move through the phase-screen as he had and
create a destination. After that one came here it would become progressively
easier for those who would come after. But for now, and for that one person,
the time was short. Perhaps, even now, too short.
He turned about quickly and stepped backward-with intent. So it was he stepped
not back up the stony slope away from the edge of nothingness, but out through
the farther phase-
414
Gordon R. Dickson
screen into the MUT11 corridor of the Final Encyclopedia, where Jeamus and
hisieuAv, with Rukh and Amanda, still waited for him. . . .
Thank the I M11V" said Jeamus. "How long wm. I gone?" asked Hal. "No time ai-
all," said Jeamus. "Perhaps a couple of minutes, then yeii came out of the
other screen-" "Good," he interrupted. "Now I want this whole device moved and
set Us in Tam's main room, right wma, "How fast?" "I-uh-" Jeamus floundered.
"An hour-" "Five minutes," said Hal. "Five?" "Or as close to that as you can
come," said Hal. "I want to get it there while Tam's still alive. Just the
minimum of what you have here to make the doorway work." "But a minimum's all
we ever had--
Jeamus's hands fluttered, half-lifted for a moment, helplessly. Then the
meaning of Hal's words seemed to penetrate. He threw up his hands; and his
voice hardened. "Maybe fifteen minutes . . . or ten? Maybe even . . . five?
But Tam's quarters ? " "Yes." As Jeamus stood uncertain, he added harshly,
"I'm speaking as the Director. Move it. As fast as you humanly can.
Amanda? Rukh?"
He went out of the door. The two caught up with him just beyond it. "What is
it?" said Amanda. He glanced at her as they went, for she had a right to ask.
She saw deeper into him than Rukh. "Why the special hurry?" "I was in the
Creative Universe," he answered briefly. "But someone else besides me has to
go there; and only Tam's qualified, because he can read the Encyclopedia's
knowledge core-not as well as 1, but well enough." "There's a problem?" she
asked. "Yes. What I mentioned-and there's something else. A gap where there
shouldn't be one, a gap I can't reach across. I need a bridge. " "A bridge .
Still striding swiftly down the corridor he turned to look at her. There was a
look on her face he knew.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
415
-What is it?" he said. "The cloak ... I think," she said. Looking past him. "I
177"t know why, but the cloak will make a bridge."
But they were already at the entrance to Tam's quarters. "Yes," said Rukh, as
they turned to go in, after him-he realize d he was back in all the size of
his Hal-body, --all thanks to God you came when you did. I have a feeling he's
very close to the end . . . very close."
THE CHANTRY GUILD
417
CHF,J,@"Ikk
They went as swiftly as the Final Encyclopedia could align their blind
corridor with the one leading to Tam Olyn's quarters; and Rukh led them in
through the door there without waiting to ask for entrance.
Inside, things had hardly changed. Ajela was dressed now in a Japanese kimono,
which Hal noted was perfectly arranged, in contrast to the disheveled sari she
had worn earlier. She was sitting upright now, but still held one of Tam's
hands, and Tam still gazed off at something beyond their sight; he was now
holding his interstellar newsman's cloak, that he had not worn since he had
returned to the Final Encyclopedia, over ninety years before. It was still set
as it had been since the death of his sister's young husband, on the white and
red he had worn the day of David's end.
Hal reached the side of Tam's armchair opposite Ajela in six long strides and
knelt beside it, putting his hand on Tam's arm which lay strengthlessly along
the top of the padded armrest. "Tam!" he said in a low voice, but urgently.
"We've done it! I've been in the Creative Universe. Now, to make the
Encyclopedia the tool for everyone, the way we always dreamed, and Mark Torre
dreamed, we only need one more thing-one final effort from you. Can you make
it?" "What're you saying?" Ajelas voice rang through the forest
glade that was actually a room. "You aren't going to ask anything of him now?"
Hal ignored her. Amanda and Rukh moved in to draw her aside from the chair and
speak to her, in low, imperative voices. "But he can't do anything now! He
can't-"
The low-pitched but steady voices of the other two women interrupted her. Hal
ignored her. All his attention was focused on Tam, his eyes staring into the
faded old eyes only centimeters from his own. "Can you do it, Tam?" Hal asked
again. "I've got Jeamus and his people on the way here with the equipment to
make it possible. You can go into the Creative Universe and I'll go with you.
Now, in the beginning, it has to be done by someone besides me, it has to be
used by more than one mind; otherwise, it's just something I've created for
myself. But if I can share it with you, we can go on to share it with everyone
else, on all the worlds. Do you understand, Tam?"
The ancient eyes stared into his. The head moved minimally forward and back
again in what could have been a nod. "But he can't-he can't do anything!" From
the sound of her voice, Ajela was crying now as she talked. "He hasn't any
strength left! You can't ask anything more of him now. It's too late. He ought
to be left to die in peace." "That's what I'm offering him," Hal answered her
without taking his eyes off Tam. "That's what it is, Tam. A chance for you to
see the end at last; a chance to see it completed." "I tell you he can't do
anything-he couldn't if he wanted to!" Ajela protested behind Hal. "I think he
can," said Hal. "This one last thing. This final effort, Tam. Can't you?"
There was a change in Tam's face, so small as to be unreadable by anyone who
did not know him like the four now with him. Again, his head moved-in a motion
more clearly of agreement now. "Good. You remember," Hal said, "how the
knowledge here in the Final Encyclopedia had to be a requirement. Nothing less
would do. Whoever intended to be a creator in the Creative Universe would need
a memory bank at least that large. "
He paused. "Can you hear me, Tam?" he asked. "Do you understand?"
418
Gordon R. Dickson
Tam gave another minuscule nod. His eyes seemed to see nothing but Hal's face.
"I thought there had to be the way in. I thought I'd find it here," Hal went
on. "But for three years, these last three years, I couldn't find it here.
"Then Amanda came to suggest I take a fresh look at the problem from outside
the Final Encyclopedia; and she was
right. I went to a place called the Chantry Guild, on Kultis-a new
                         .1in the Creative Universe without giving up the
rules and laws of the real universe we already know. And those rules, by
definition, were the last to apply in the Creative Universe, where the first
principle of creativity had to apply-that anything and everything conceivable
could be made."
He paused; and this time Tam nodded without being asked. "There were no
rules," said Hal, "but there were necessities. First, it was necessary for
those who entered the Creative Universe to believe in it. Next, whoever tried
to enter it had to believe humans could do so. Last, it could only be entered
by a
mind willing to put aside the laws and rules of the real universe. "
Hal paused, but only to take breath. "That was the hardest of all, that last,"
he said. "From the first moment of life, instinct tells us the only laws are
the laws of the place where we're born. I don't think I'd have been able to
keep going if I hadn't already had my own private proof of a place somewhere
with different laws. I had it with my poetry. I had it when I went back, in
mind only, to the twenty-first century to alter a future not yet made; the
future of the time I'd known as Donal."
He held Tam's eyes with his own and his voice held them both. "I was ready to
give up when Amanda came. And you know she feels what's right. She was right
this time. At the new @@ila", 0anu she was
ul d   n Kultis_,A
Chantry Guild, I found it-the belief of another man who'd been as close to the
Creative Universe as I'd been. He'd come up with one insight. Only one, but it
was enough to point me to where I could finally understand how, just as the
physical laws of our universe can be, they can also not-be . . . and that
they'r subject to us, not us to them!"
He paused once more. Where were Jeamus and the doorways? "Tam, his name was
Jathed; and his particular battlecry was:
THE CHANTRY GUILD
419
*the transient and the Eternal are the same.' At first it meant nothing to me,
logically-only a contradiction in terms. And then I saw the truth of it. I
broke through, finally, to that truth-and the whole Creative Universe opened
out before me like a flower to the morning sun. For if the Transient and the
Eternal could be the same, then all things could. All things were possible. It
was only our point of view that had learned to encompass the possibility it
wanted, using the knowledge the race already had, to make it real; and that
knowledge was there, waiting for us, in the Final Encyclopedia! "Jeamus and
his people are going to be here in just minutes, with the equipment we need to
make the trip," Hal said. He dared not take his eyes from Tam's eyes, and the
strength he could see in them that the old man was trying to gather, the
ancient fighting spirit of a lifetime trying to rouse for one more effort. But
he could feel time slipping away from them, like the running water of the
stream beside Tam's armchair. "Amanda, Rukh-" he called, his gaze still locked
with Tam's. "Isn't there some way you can call that corridor where we were?
Find out how they're coming. Tell them we have to have it-now!"
He concentrated on Tam once more. "We had the means of going there, all the
time," he went on to the still face, behind which the great struggle was going
on to rouse a dying spirit. "It was in phase-technology. The same
ing that gave us the phase-shift and the phase-shield. But maybe even that's
not necessary. Maybe it's just an excuse for the mind to go into the Creative
Universe. I don't know. But we don't have time to experiment now; and I used
it when I went this first time. So--
He was talking without a pause, desperately, as if his words were the lifeline
up which Tam was pulling himself to safety. There was a fear within him that
if he stopped speaking, even for a moment, Tam would lose his hold,-would fall
back, and be lost. "You see," he said, "you go through a phase-doorway to no
set destination; which should end you spread out to infinity-"
But at last now, behind him, there was a sound of the door from the corridor
banging open with unusual noise and violence; and a moment later Jeamus
struggled, sweating, into his field of vision, helping one other man move the
framework of
420               Gordon R. Dickson one of the phase-doorways. The framework
had obviously been made weightless, but they still had to contend with its
mass and the awkwardness of its size and rectangular shape. "There's a
chance-" Jeamus panted, as the two of them stopped behind Tam's chair. --there
may be a chance you can go-and come through the same doorway-so to save time
we
came-with just that. You want to try it'.) if so, where-where . 9do we put it.
"Yes!" snapped Hat. "Put it right here, in front of Tam's chair! "
He turned back to Tam, seeing them obey out of the comer of
his eye. "Now we go," he said gently to Tam. "We go together. I know you can't
get up and walk through the doorway-that's what I did. But when I went back to
the time of the first Chantry Guild, I only sent my mind back. Trust me. You
can send your mind through that doorway the way I went then."
He looked and saw that Jeamus and the man helping him had just set up the
doorway, less than a meter from Tam's feet; and other men he recognized as
being from Jeamus's crew were
connecting it to some kind of heavy cable that snaked out of sight to
disappear among the illusion of trees to their right. "All right," he said to
Tam, and closed his hand around the wide but bony, cold hand of Tam, "come
with me, now. Look through that doorway as if it was an opening on wherever
you want to go to. In your mind, stand up and step through the frame to that
place; and I'll go with you, by your side, holding to you
as I am now."
He broke off, and stared then; for the doorway before him had
suddenly become not merely a plate of silver blankness, as it had been in the
blind corridor for him. Instead it now seemed to open on a green hillside,
lifting beyond the doorway for only a
few meters, before it reached a crest, beyond which was only the cloudless I
light blue of a spring sky. It was the sky of one of the
Younger Worlds Hat had never been on; but he had seen images
of it. it was a spring sky over the northern hemisphere of the small, lush
world of Sainte Marie, the world on which both Jamethon and Kensie had died.
Hal rose to his feet, letting the dead weight of Tam's hand slip from his own.
But-unless it was his imagination-it seemed
THE CHANTRY GUILD
421
he still felt it there; though Tam had not stirred and no one stood
visibly beside Hal.
Still, he felt that Tam was beside him, that their hands were linked. "Here we
go," he said, without looking to his left, where the spirit of Tam should now
be; and he stepped forward, through the phase-doorway.
At once he stood on the sloping surface of the hillside under the warmth of
the different sunlight. He felt the hand withdrawn from his grasp and,
turning, now saw Tam standing with him.
But it was a younger Tam; a Tam in no more than his thirties, wearing green
field clothing, except for the newsman's cloak. Tam took a step forward by
himself and stood, looking at the hilltop.
His face showed an expression that was a strange mixture of grimness and a
hope so painfully deep it barely escaped being a fear. He had let go of Hal.
Now he moved away from him. Hat stood where he was and watched.
After a moment, some little distance to their right, a head appeared above the
brow of the hill, and lifted as the man
bearing it approached. It was Kensie, as Hal had last seen him, riding in the
place Hat had created in his different universe.
Only here Kensie was wearing a Field Commander's uniform in the dark blue of
the Exotic Mercenary Forces. But aside from that he was no different than
ever; and the warmth of his smile, directed at Tam, went like a wave before
him down the slope.
Tam breathed out, a soft, deep breath; and at that same moment another man
mounted over the crest of the hill to the left, wearing the black uniform of a
Friendly Commandant out of the last century. He was thin and tall, but nowhere
near the height of Kensie, and he also smiled. It was a grave, small smile in
his narrow face; but it was there, and it, too, was directed at Tam.
Tam stared at Jamethon as he, too, came onward down the slope. But at that
moment two more figures came over the hilltop, this time from directly ahead.
One was a young woman, looking hardly out of her teens, with black hair and
the same
sharp features as Tam himself, holding hands with a man who
looked no older than she did, but wore the historic battle gray of the
Cassidan Field forces. His uniform was without insignia or
422
Gordon R. Dickson
mark of rank. These two, also, broke into smiles, coming down toward Tam, so
that he suddenly ran forward toward them, the woman who had been his sister
and the man who had been her husband, David Hall.
So they all came together, all five of them, halfway up the slope from Hal, in
the sun; and clustered together there like a
family reunited. Tam was all but hidden by the others surrounding him; but
Hal, remembering Mor reaching out his hand across the crupper of his mother's
horse as they had ridden together in another place of this Creative Universe,
could feel what was in the man who had been Director of the Encyclopedia so
long.
He turned back and stepped through where his instinct told him the
phase-doorway must be, and was suddenly again in the room with the old man,
beside the running stream and with the three women, all surrounded by the
illusion of the trees.
Below on the Earth's surface, a cloud must have slipped before the face of the
sun, for shadow fell about them as Hal stepped forth. Amanda in her long
formal dress of that wintry blue that was the color of the Dorsai northern
seas; Rukh, all in black, one hand at her throat holding the circle of grarite
on its chain, with the simple cross in its gray-white rock; and Ajela in the
green, formal Japanese kimono of fleshy silk, embroidered with a design of
pine branches with snow on them-these three in their colors seemed to glow
somberly in the little dimming of the light like three queens at a state
burial.
Hal turned just in time to see those he had left on the hillside, Tam among
them, moving close together over the crest of ground and disappearing beyond.-
The hill vanished then; and the face of the phase-door was once more silver
and blank.
Hal turned to Ajela and the others. "Did you see?" he said. "Did you see how
they met him, smiling, and took him away with them?" "No," whispered Ajela.
Slowly the other two shook their heads. "I did .       The faint words were
barely breathed by Tam, but they all heard. Slowly, Tam's eyelids dropped. But
a new, faint smile on his lips remained. Ajela ran to him and hugged him; but
it was not the desperate embrace Hal had seen her give the dying man in recent
times before. It was an enfolding of warmth and joy.
THE CHANTRY GUILD
423
Tam's eyes closed finally; and, as they watched, the tiny lift 'and fall of
his chest stopped its movement altogether. The faint smile still remained on
'ram's lips, but he had at last stopped b eathing. "Lord," said Rukh, "now
lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.
And in that same moment the cloak, like a creature released, changed back from
the white and red it had held for so long, and shone on its basic setting,
with all the colors of the rainbow on Old Earth.
Hal stared at it. Amanda had been right. It was the bridge.
THE CHILDE
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